Anniversary Waltz

A fleet of generation ships wanders in space looking for a new world to colonize. Every twenty-five years, they choose a percentage of their population to exchange among the ships to keep the gene pool from degenerating and preserve the species.

The Captain of the Niagara stood at a podium on a small stage in front of one hundred individuals chosen for the Exchange. After clearing his throat, he began his speech. “A thousand years ago, twenty-five ships left our home world in search of a new home for our species. Every twenty-five years, we have selected a group of citizens to journey to one of our sister ships...” Sparrow Sutliffe stopped listening to the Captain’s speech and started to look around the room. She slowly inched her way to the back of the crowd and sat on the deck with her back against a bulkhead. She pulled her electronic slate out of her jumpsuit pocket. Unfolding it, she searched the ship’s library for information on the Yosemite, the ship that she would be moving to in a matter of whenever the Captain chose to end his long boring goodbye speech.

The Yosemite was identical in design to the Niagara with housing for well over one thousand residents and crew. She would be passing one hundred of her citizens on to the Wallaman while the Niagara received one hundred from the Hannoki. All of this in the name of genetic diversity – at least, that is what they taught. As Sparrow studied the list of the selected citizens, she noted several abnormal aspects in each of them. But her interest soon turned back to the comparison of the Niagara and the Yosemite.

“There you are, Freak.” Wanda Bellringer loomed over Sparrow. Sparrow ignored the well-dressed young woman addressing her. This would ordinarily bother Sparrow if it had been anyone else. She didn’t like to be close to normal people, but Wanda was not a normal person. Wanda was overly gregarious. She had little respect for personal boundaries. And she lacked a filter, saying whatever came to mind.

Sparrow noted that the outermost module did not connect to the ship’s central spire. The module was docked to the module just below it. The module was identical to every other module with two common areas near the spire airlocks and the landing lifts.

“I see they are finally getting rid of you.” Wanda knelt next to Sparrow to get a look at what she was working on.

“They are getting rid of you, too,” Sparrow looked up and smiled. “Or you wouldn’t be here.”

“Fair enough,” Wanda sat on the floor, “but actually we are staying here. It’s everyone else who will be moving.”

“That’s logistically not possible. They moved us into the section of the ship that gets swapped. It’ll happen later tonight. This is the Captain’s goodbye speech. We have until curfew to say goodbye to our families and the friends who are staying here. Then while we sleep, the swap occurs.”

“Is that our new home?” Wanda’s finger touched the screen causing it to zoom in on the drive section of the Yosemite.

“The Yosemite is almost identical to the Niagara. I’m still going over all the specs and the operational history.” Sparrow touched the screen again to access information on the engines. With a few rapid gestures, she instructed her eSlate to create a spreadsheet listing all the specs of both the Niagara and the Yosemite.

Sparrow finished her spreadsheet comparison of the two ships a few minutes before the Captain dismissed the group. She folded her eSlate and slipped it back into her pocket before joining the crowd on their way to spend time with their families for a last supper on board the Niagara. Sparrow’s parents gave her a family photo before her father walked her back to the airlock between modules. She smiled at him and gave him a tight hug. “I’ll miss you, but there’s always the ship-to-ship. Promise me you’ll send me updates on Squirt. I’m going to miss the little imp.”

Hal Sutliffe promised that he would send her weekly updates on the family. As he walked away, a knot formed in his stomach. He passed Wanda Bellringer and her parents and nodded politely to them. He was too afraid to speak lest he break down and alert Wanda to the truth. He wondered if the Bellringers were aware of the sacrifice that they were about to make.

Sparrow spent the hours before “lights out” working on her spreadsheet comparison of the two ships. Out of curiosity, she added the rest of the fleet and came across an anomaly. Each of the ships carried six modules, but they had been designed to carry only five. She wondered where the extra modules had originated. After digging into some classified files, she found the source of the module that she was currently inhabiting. There had been another ship, the Silver Thread, which had launched with the twenty-five. She added the specifications of that ship to her chart.

Wanda spent the time socializing with the rest of the chosen transferees. As she went about the common room, she noticed something odd about everyone chosen for the transfer. Every person she met lay somewhere on the Autism spectrum. She didn’t have time to meet everyone since some like Sparrow had stayed in their quarters. She would have to ask Sparrow to check it out for her when she got back to their shared quarters.

Wanda waited patiently while Sparrow told her about the mystery ship. The Silver Thread had suffered engine trouble and abandoned its twenty-five modules to the other ships. Sparrow had found a log entry of a recent signal from the Silver Thread. The ship was underway and in pursuit of the fleet. After Sparrow finished her recap of her research, Wanda brought up her discovery that not a single neurotypical was among the chosen. She suspected that to be the case on all of the other ships. Sparrow had made a similar observation earlier. She queried the various ships for their module six rosters.

Just as Sparrow finished copying the rosters from all twenty-five vessels, they felt the jolt of their module separating from the Niagara. “If this were a video, this is when they would be playing a waltz in the soundtrack,” Wanda declared with her usual aplomb. Had they been asleep in their beds, they would not have noticed the moment. They ran to an observation port and watched as the modules moved away from the ships. To their horror, the ships, once the modules were clear of them, accelerated away leaving the twenty-five modules behind in the Lagrange point.

Sparrow and Wanda watched as the modules slowly clustered together into groups of five. She could feel the mild jolts as four other sections connected to hers. The twenty-five modules slowly accelerated out of the Lagrange point in formation, heading in the direction of the fleet. As they drifted out of the planetary orbital plane, a five-spired ship approached on an intercept course. The new arrival slowly maneuvered into position to capture the five cylinders.

A loud clunk resonated throughout the lower modules and rose slowly up through the cylinders as they locked onto their pylon. An acceleration alarm sounded and passengers scrambled to the special seats within their quarters. Sparrow and Wanda released themselves as soon as the all clear bell signaled that it was safe to walk about the ship. They went down to the drive module to confirm that the rescuing vessel was the Silver Thread.

A small group of curious teens met outside the gangway to the command spire. After a series of quick introductions, they opened the door to the bridge of the Silver Thread. They stood both defiant and awestruck by the composition of the crew manning the bridge. There were aliens sitting at varying consoles and one sitting in the Captain’s chair. The aliens were catlike in appearance, though lacking tails, who spoke in tones approximating English.

“Come in, please,” the creature in the Captain’s chair yowled. “We have examined the data downloaded from the various pods. One of you discovered an instability in a ship’s engine. If we can overtake them, we can save the ship.”

Wanda slapped Sparrow on her shoulder. “Way to go. I told you that your OCD would come in handy someday, didn’t I?”

Sparrow rubbed her shoulder and nodded in reply. She stepped forward toward the viewing port. She could barely see the tops of the residence spires, but she had a clear view of the stars ahead. A young human Ensign turned to her and smiled. He turned and addressed the group of teens. “You might want to go below and strap in on the observation deck. We’ll be decelerating soon.”

Wanda led the group down the ladder to the observation deck. Sparrow took an empty seat next to the young Ensign. “Still no response, Captain. Should I send the message again?” The Ensign held his hand over the resend button.

“Yes, they must wait for us.” The Captain spoke as the fleet appeared ahead of them. Before the Ensign could hit send, a series of radio transmissions bombarded the Silver Thread.

“We need to abandon the Niagara. We can’t shut down the drive unit and are just barely holding her engines below critical. Releasing her modules now.”

“Niagara Five reporting clear of docking pylon. On course for the Yosemite.”

“Niagara Four reporting clear of docking pylon. Heading for the Wallaman.”

“Niagara Three reporting clear of docking pylon. Heading for the Iguazu.”

“Niagara Two reporting clear. Heading for the Pissing Mare.”

“Niagara One clear. On course for Victoria.”

A short moment later, the Niagara Drive module pushed ahead of the fleet leaving behind jetsam. As the Silver Thread slowed to where the fleet lay, a bright flash appeared in the darkness ahead as the Niagara’s Drive module exploded.

Isolation

“How’s the patient doing?”

“Not well, I’m afraid.”

“What is he doing?” The medical specialist leaned against the glass wall separating him from the patient down below.

“We aren’t sure. He’s been making that tapping sound for several hours. It might be some kind of code or an attempt to communicate.”

“What about the periods of unconsciousness?”

“They appear to be normal.”

“Has he eaten lately?”

“We have provided food and fluids to replenish his output. He seems to be a carrier of considerable microscopic organisms. One of our technicians accidentally exposed herself to his bodily fluid and is currently being treated for some type of infection.”

The patient in the chamber below was busy tapping his hands against his knees while he sat on the edge of the cot. The chamber was practically bare, with just the cot, a table, and a chair. There was a chamber pot that appeared in a corner of the chamber just after the food appeared on the table. He wasn’t sure how long he had been there. He had gone to bed feeling a little feverish and woken up in this strange chamber. His fever had subsided days ago, but his cough remained.

He was certain someone was watching, but no one responded to his attempts to ask where he was. So, he sat on the cot strumming his fingers against his kneecaps and humming. And while he hummed, the cause of his mild fever was spreading. It had infected a technician who nicked her glove during a fluid draw. And from there, it spread to the two attending medical personnel who were caring for her. Within hours it had spread throughout the research facility and by the end of the day, it had spread to other areas outside the facility.

The patient reached into the air with his fists and yawned as he did before he went to bed to sleep. The lights in the chamber had already dimmed while he waited. The medical specialist watched as the patient stretched out on the cot before curling up into that same curious position that he maintained while unconscious. The medical team waited for the man’s staccato nasal emanation before entering the chamber.

The patient listened carefully for the footsteps of the beings who came in to examine him while he slept. This time, he wasn’t sleeping. He noted that they were being extra careful handling him while twittering away around him taking samples of his blood, urine, and stool. There was no one watching from above as she slowly rose from the bed and quietly followed them out of the chamber.

The lights in the hallway were brighter than the dim red glow of the chamber. His eyes slowly adjusted. He watched the group trudge down the hall toward the labs with their samples before heading in the opposite direction. It would be several hours before they noticed that he was missing. Even then, they would be too busy to search for him.

At the time of the patient’s escape, the virus had spread throughout the facility and the nearby environs. The sudden death of the infected technician raised concerns about the virus responsible. When several other technicians became ill, medical experts made an effort to determine how it was spreading. While those in charge were busy trying to stop the spread of the infection, the patient slowly made his way outside the medical facility.

As the patient passed through the exit doors, they locked behind him and a sign lit up indicating that the facility was under quarantine. He continued down a long hallway, past a series of door bearing strange markings. At that point, he wondered if perhaps he had actually fallen asleep and was only dreaming that he had escaped his cell. Until he reached the end of the corridor, he held on to that possibility. Peering out through the large window, the full gravity of his predicament hit him when the moon rose from behind the Earth.