“I think we're good?” Hwang said, looking around at everyone.

  Doctor Smith looked up at the camera.

  “Hook? Anything to add? You see any medical emergencies I've missed?” Doctor Smith asked.

  “Only that from the observable biological markers I can determine through the camera's your blood pressure is extremely elevated Doctor Smith.” Hook responded.

  Doctor Smith looked up at the nearest camera and gave it the most withering glare I had seen him give anyone so far.

  “Okay...” I said, taking a breath.

  “Now, please, tell us what is going on?” Doctor Smith asked, interrupting me as I was about to do just that.

  I didn't blame him, we had woken him up to treat a bunch of really alarming shit that had come out of nowhere.

  “We... somehow managed to jump, without jumping.” I said, leaning against the bulkhead in Carolina's room.

  Everyone stared at me. Megan and Hwang were a bit less incredulous, having heard this part already, and looked more thoughtful, but Doctor Smith... I could see him going back into his 'emergency doctor' mode, putting his exasperation away as his nervous system prepared for another emergency. I'd seen that look on plenty of nurses and doctor's before.

  Doctor smith made a winding, 'come on' motion with his hand.

  I sighed.

  “Okay, so you guys know I have a sense for the void, I can tell where we are when we are in it.” I said.

  They all nodded in response and motioned for me to keep going.

  “Well when we got near the jump point I wanted to test something, so instead of triggering the drive when we immediately got in range, I... drifted. I got as close as I could to the 'center' of the jump point and just kindof... let my mind go. I thought I could feel something, and I used the maneuvering thrusters to adjust closer to that 'feeling'...”

  I paused.

  “And then we were here. And I was apparently bleeding internally and Ricky... what happened to Ricky?” I asked.

  “It was very odd. His lungs and heart suffered a sudden rapid increase in pressure. He also had a large blood pressure spike, accompanied with extreme nausea. Not to mention all the blood pooling in his abdomen. You mostly had blood pooling in your legs, but...” Doctor Smith said.

  “Did he have compartment syndrome like me?” I asked.

  “No, his organs were stressed but there's no blood in his tissues or anything, everything is where it should be, but...” Doctor Smith shrugged.

  “He suddenly had twice as much as there should be for a moment?” I finished.

  Doctor Smith nodded. “That being said, by the time I got him to medical I could find no trace of the excess blood aside from his stressed organs and swollen tissues. It's why he's on his feet so fast.

  “You think your other half merged with you or something Ricky?” I asked him.

  He shook his head.

  “No, or at least only part of him did... I don't know if he actually died... I feel stretched, for lack of a better term.” Ricky began lamely.

  “So we appeared here, and then I was all messed up. We started figuring things out. We're in transit space, the void, whatever, but... it's thicker somehow.” I started.

  “Thicker?” Megan asked.

  “Like treacle. We aren't drifting towards the exit like normal, though... I haven't tried any thrust yet. Also we are surrounded by hundreds, If not thousands of wrecked ships.” I continued.

  Hwang whistled.

  “And that revelation freaked Carolina out?” Megan prodded.

  I nodded.

  “I picked Carolina up in the void after her ship had been attacked by Lindwurms. After she watched most of her crew get butchered by some invisible creature, she locked herself in one of the maintenance spaces and hid for... god I don't know how long. I know she was sucking fumes by the time I found her. I think the idea of being stuck in the void again triggered some PTSD from that. Honestly I wish I had some way to help her, but I'll be honest if we had a psychiatrist on board she'd have to get in line behind me.” I explained.

  “That is unfortunately outside of my wheelhouse. The best I could to is prescribe anti-depressants, but otherwise this is more in the realm of counseling unless there is something physically wrong with her brain.” Doctor Smith looked grave as he spoke.

  I nodded.

  “Okay.... so we've dealt with the medical emergencies and all the issues following that. Next item. How are we getting out of here?” Hwang forged ahead, highlighting the important issues at hand.

  “I have some thoughts on that. Ricky, remember the remote operated fighter craft you were designing?” I asked.

  Ricky cringed.

  “Yeah... I don't really like how it turned out. I had a vision in my head but the more I tried to work with the components I had the more it, well... It didn't really work.” Ricky started.

  “That's fine, I took your design and ran with it conceptually, I put together something I think could work, but most importantly, I think we can use it for a testbed for what I want to do next.” I said.

  “And what's that cap?” Ricky said, face looking somewhat less depressed than before.

  “I want to design a propulsion method for moving in this void space that won't attract every nasty thing from forever away. Gonna use the fighter to try it out.” I replied.

  Everyone looked at me.

  “So... you want to stay here, and experiment? Aren't you on a time crunch?”Megan asked.

  “Yep, sure am. But I don't know how to cross the distance from here to the exit point without using main drives. We could try maneuvering thrusters, and we'll experiment with them, but this is a really rich opportunity. We are surrounded by dead ships we can strip for parts, and most importantly, we can search them for data, what did they do to get here. That will help us answer so many questions.” I stated.

  Megan turned and looked at everyone in the group, then Hwang, then Doctor Smith and Ricky.

  “I mean... if you are okay with that, you are the captain.” Megan said, like she was testing the waters.

  “I'm not going to lie, this almost seems like a vacation after the last few days, first the robot attack, then the escape, then having to fight those mercs... just sitting here and stripping ships feels like a good way to get our heads on straight.” Hwang said.

  “Yeah... a vacation.” I said, smiling.

  Everyone was silent and awkward for a few beats.

  “I'm going to head back to the bridge.” I said. Everyone else dispersed to their own rooms.

  I made it back to the bridge and settled into the helm seat with a sigh.

  “A vacation on the clock...” I muttered to myself as I reconnected.

  ***********************************************************************************

  “Hey Brayden?” Came a voice from Hwang's room.

  I had managed to pipe the microphones from all of the crew rooms in to me so they just had to speak and I would know what they were doing, so I heard and was able to respond fairly quickly, despite following doctors orders and not dropping into a higher reference frame... no matter how much I was tempted to.

  “Hold on, let me just save... trying a modification of the fighter and I'm having to fight the controls to make it do what I want.” I said over the PA in her room.

  In truth it wasn't so much fighting the controls as... teaching it.

  It was used to very mechanical shapes, even the tentacles on the drones were still too mechanical for what I wanted.

  I saved my place and made a note for myself before I swapped over to the camera in Hwang's room. She was sitting in just an undershirt and... panties? At the foldout desk in her room.

  “Are you ever dressed?” I asked immediately.

  “Not if I can help it. The reactions from people not expecting it are way too fun. More than one delivery guy has had to pay for the food because they dropped it at the door.” Hwang said teasingly, sticking her tongue out at the camera.

  “Little exhibitionist aren't you.” I said.

  She shrugged, and turned back to the display in front of her.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Everyone has a hobby. Speaking of hobbies, I kinda wanted to talk about a C.O.G. Hobby with you.” She said.

  “Which one? C.O.G.'s primary goals seem to be generating and consumingmedia to stave off boredom and prevent brain damage from prolonged sensory deprivation.” I said flippantly.

  “Wait, is that a thing that can happen? Is it happening to you?” Hwang looked up alarmed.

  “Not that I can tell, but due to the way our brains our wired in and from what I know of the human brain it increases the likelihood of it. If it takes a month of solitary confinement to cause significant brain damage in a regular human it would likely need less than a week to mess with our grey matter while connected. Maybe less for me, cause my brain is weird.” I said.

  Hwang continued to look concerned. “But.. that's not happening right?” She asked.

  “Nah, I have lots to occupy myself, also I am constantly interacting with you guys, so I should be fine. What did you need?” I asked, wanting to get to the root of the issue so I could get back to designing stuff. I really did want to get out of here as quick as possible, despite framing it as a little vacation to the others.

  No need for them to be as stressed as I was if they didn't have to be.

  Instead of immediately answering Hwang chewed her lip, showing a more vulnerable side of herself than I had seen so far. She had always come off to me as a hard bitten veteran, but now she just looked like a nervous girl.

  It didn't help that she was so small. I wasn't stupid enough to voice that though.

  Not when I couldn't run and she knew exactly where I was.

  “So.. I've been thinking...” She started and stopped.

  “Yeeees.” I said, trying to drag it out of her.

  “We're in space, and it's a way more hostile environment than just about any on planet.” She began.

  This was going to take awhile. “That is how space works yes.” I said flippantly

  “And... well okay, everyone else has something they can do aboard ship, but I've been infantry my entire adult life. Fighting is all I know. It's also what I am good at. But... as I am now, even with the new suits, one hit and I am sucking vacuum and I'll be no help to anyone.” She said.

  Okay, I was starting to see where this was going. I wasn't expecting this but.

  “And I was looking at some of the C.O.G. Files on augmentations... Can you augment me?” She asked nervously.

  I brought up the augmentations she had been looking at to reference them as we spoke.

  “I think I can... It will depend on what you want, I might need to expand the medical bay, but... yeah I don't have any issues with doing it. What are you looking at? Gun arm? Cause that is literally the first augmentation I looked up when I got access.” I said enthusiastically as I paged through her recent search history. She was obviously super nervous and I wanted to be encouraging.

  Partly for her, and partly because she was right. She was extremely vulnerable in space. Hell we all were, but seeing them fight that Lindwurm hammered home how easily any of them could die out here.

  She let out a breath of air through her nose in a little snort, but it came out like a squeak.

  “That was adorable.” I couldn't help myself.

  “Quiet you. And yeah, I looked at the gun arms... but honestly, guns are tools, you need the right tool for the right job, and building one into your arms kindof locks you into one tool. It would suck to replace your arm with a hammer and find out you need a screwdriver, right?” She said.

  I mean, it made sense I guess.

  “Still, having a backup weapon built in would be good wouldn't it?” I said, feeling defensive of arm guns.

  Arm guns are cool.

  She waffled her hand back and forth.

  “It's good till you have to disarm for some kind of scanner, or function, and they want you to take off your arm.” She said.

  “Fair point. I'd say just try to sneak it in but I get that's not always an option.” I conceded.

  “I'd rather augment myself to the point that I could turn anything I could get my hands on in said party into a weapon.” She said, grinning.

  “NOW you are speaking my language. So what are you thinking then? Enhanced musculature?” I asked.

  “Among other things. The first thing that caught my eye was the 'spacer special' which is basically a top to bottom set of external augmentations to let you survive sudden decompression with minimal effects.” She began.

  “Ah, I see. I get it.” I said, a sudden realization hitting me.

  “What? What do you get?” She replied, raising an eyebrow.

  “Makes perfect sense that an exhibitionist would want to go on a space walk naked.” I said teasingly.

  She looked me dead in the camera.

  “You know I could walk up to the bridge right now and break your dick in half with one hand right?” She said, deadpan.

  “Sorry, couldn't help it.” I said, trying to sound contrite.

  “You're mouth is gonna get you in trouble one day.” She said.

  “Has already happened, and will continue to happen. My response to stress is to either mouth off or disassociate, so if I'm quiet I am having problems.” I said, admitting a little too much truth.

  She sat there awkwardly.

  “So the spacer special.” She said.

  “Right! What's that involve? A part of me really wants there to be like bio jets to move in EVA but... That would probably be too much.” I said.

  “I did see those, but the ratings on them were ass. You basically have to jump into the void ACTUALLY naked to use them. And despite what you may think, I'm not THAT much of an exhibitionist. And I do want them to be useful. My main goal in mind is to be ships security, and be durable enough that you can put me into dangerous situations without having to worry about an errant tear in my suit flatlining me.” She explained.

  I nodded, moving the camera up and down with a little whir.

  “Wait, when did you learn to do that?” She asked, narrowing her eyes at the camera.

  “Do what?” I asked, making the camera whir and turn.

  In truth I had added articulation to ALL of the camera's on the ship, letting them move slightly both to get different angles; which combined with an algorithm I found let me approximate depth perception very well from a single camera lens, and also allowed me to add some movements while engaging in conversation.

  People rarely understood how important body language is to being understood until you are deprived of the ability to use it.

  “Anyways...” Hwang continued, giving my camera the side-eye. “the most important parts are 'sealing' my eyes, nose, ears, mouth and... other mucus membranes against vacuum.” She continued.

  “'Other' Mucus membranes?” I teased.

  “Quiet you. The next big thing is dermal reinforcement, both against the extreme temperatures of space, vacuum, and general wear and tear, so that the same puncture that breaches my suit doesn't cause all of my blood to gush out in a vacuum. Then there is a really cool one, magnetic grappling in the hands and feet!” She continued.

  “Wait, can you shoot your hands and feet out like grapnels?” I said, excited all over again.

  She shook her head.

  “No no, nothing that extreme, it will just let me make attractive magnetic fields on my hands and feet to latch onto things, or to slowly drift toward something if I don't have any thrust.” She continued.

  “I think grapnels would be cooler.” I said, feeling robbed.

  “What like with a rocket fist with a line attached to my arm or something?” Hwang asked jokingly.

  “It would be SO COOL! Rocket Punch!” I said enthusiastically. A tad too enthusiastically maybe.

  She eyed me.

  “Fuckin nerd. Anyway. That, plus some dermal reinforcement, skeletal reinforcement...” She trailed off, looking back at her terminal and the list she had put together.

  “Blood vessel sheathing, organ bracing and shock absorbing gel, high—oxygen auxiliary pseudo-blood?” I rattled off a few more items.

  “Have you been perusing the catalogue?” She asked.

  “No, but before we left earth we had a lot of fiction and a lot of people spent a lot of time trying to figure out the most efficient upgrades for the human body if and when we got there. I am just listing some of the ones that made the most sense for combat.” I replied.

  She nodded her head while moving it to the side, like she couldn't decide whether she wanted to say yes or disagree.

  “I was thinking about some of the more extensive combat upgrades, but... it's a lot.

  Hook pinged me.

  “Hold on, Hook has an opinion.” I pulled Hook into the loop on Hwang's speakers.