[SF] The Space Between
I’ve been in this room as long as I can remember.
The window is dark today. Mostly. There is one star far off and a small piece of light next to it that I don’t know the name of. I like it when it is like this. Not too bright.
Sometimes when it get’s too bright they turn on the protectors so I can’t see outside, till they decide to close it again. That happens when we are too close to a star or they’re in some stupid interstellar fight and ship is shaking towards every way.
What I love in this ship is Mr Data. He is an android, and so desperately trying to be human. I will never understand that. What does he see in humans any way? I feel much closer to him than any human.
Unlike me, he does not have to sleep. So I feel even more comfortable getting my 18 hours a day beside him. I know he will always be there. Plus he is not overly smoochy like humans.
Sometimes I wonder why does humans not try to be more like him instead? He is not less than them for sure.
But Mr Data always takes care of me. Sometimes outside of his shift he paints in his room and I sit on his lap. Just purring and purring and drifting off…
But this morning was different. Before he left, Data was telling me about his day. He was going down to a planet with the away team. Routine, he said. Some kind of mining. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Then he left. The ship went quiet the way it does when half the people are gone. I was on the bed when —
RED ALERT!
I ran under the bed. I always run under the bed when the red alert comes. The first time I heard it I was a kitten and I didn't know what was going on and I just stood in the middle of the room and all of a sudden the gravity went out and I hit the ceiling.
I'll run under the bed, thank you very much.
I waited.
You can't tell time from under a bed but it was a long time. My tail kept flicking. I did not tell it to. I could hear footsteps in the hallway, the ship making sounds it does not usually make, announcements I could not understand.
I kept thinking about Data.
He said it was routine. Nothing out of the ordinary. But the red alert is not nothing out of the ordinary. He was down there and I all I heard was a huge urgent alert and I could not stop putting those two things next to each other.
If he were to go, who would look after me? One of the humans, probably. They always try to pet me when they visit Data. They make sounds like I am a baby… My tail flicked again.
I heard his steps in the hallway. All the others walk arrhythmic. Data is always on the rhythm.
Of course.
Data always comes back. I was not worried. Why would I be? I was just under the bed. I like it under the bed sometimes.
I stretched.
I came out at my own pace. I went to the door to welcome him the way I always do.
WHOOSH —
The door opened. I still have not figured out why these doors do not open for me. Maybe sometimes I would like to see the hallway too. Maybe I would like it.
Data was there.
He looked down and picked me up and held me close for a moment. I let him. That is fine sometimes. Then he put me on the table.
He has done this a thousand times. Today it was different. I do not know how it was different. It just was. His hands were the same and his face was the same but something else was not the same.
If I didn’t know any better I would say he was upset.
So I talked to him. I asked what is going on?
He never seems to understand me when I talk. He didn’t answer. So I asked again. And again. And again. I got frustrated
Why don’t you ever answer me when I ask you something?
He finally said ‘What is the matter, Puk? You are meowing very much today. Did you also feel what went on?’
He sat down and pulled a box out of his desk. I was curious. I jumped onto the table. The desk is where the interesting things are.
One very shiny circle object. It had one shooting star and three other starts on it, all gold. Stars like the ones I sometimes see out the window. There was a little fabric on top, blue and white, two blue stripes with a bigger white section in the middle. I wanted to smell it. Maybe I could smell someone on it.
It smelled like Tara.
I knew Tara. Tara came to the room sometimes when Data was off-shift. She had a particular smell. Burnt things. The hot smell after the phasers fire. The spray they use to clean the floors. She sat still near me, which I liked.
The other object was looking very strange. I haven’t seen one of these before. It was a glass hexagon. I thought maybe we can put some water in it and drink it from there. Kind of looked like a cup with unnecessary amount of edges.
Data pulled it out of the box. Held it in his hands and looked at it for a moment. Then he touched somewhere and a small human figure appeared.
That was weird…
I was startled and jumped back a little. Not that I should be — I am three years old, an adult, and these are just another one of human's and Data's stupid tricks I never understand.
It won’t do me any harm. So I got closer.
Data started talking to me. "Puk. This is a holographic representation of Tara. She is gone now. We lost her on the away mission today.”
He looked in my eyes. We do this sometimes. We look at each other and one of us blinks and the other one blinks back, or we both look away at the same time, like we agreed. Today he did not blink. He did not look away.
The shiny human figure, apparently now Tara, was taking my attention a little too much. I couldn’t help but touch and smell it. But it didn’t smell like Tara. And I couldn’t touch it either. My paw just went through in it. And Data didn’t seem to like that I touched it, he pushed my paw.
Data has become very talkative today. He continued to tell me about Tara.
"She was my best friend, Puk.” He paused.
"I have never lost anyone before. I have observed loss in others. I have read about it. I find that observing and reading are not the same.”
He was quiet for a moment.
"It is very simple. She was here and now she is gone. I do not understand why I can not accept this. The information is clear.”
He looked at me, then back at the hologram.
"I am attempting to determine what I am experiencing. It is not in my database. There is a space, I think. Between what used to be and what is now. I find that I can feel the space.”
He stopped.
"I do not know if 'feel' is the correct word."
Wow… Data, has feelings? Did he finally do it?
Data continued telling me about Tara. ‘Here, this is her medal’ picked up the other object in the box and held it near my face. ‘She was an exemplary officer, for all star ship.’
If he has feelings, how will we continue to be this good? He had so much freedom before. Not like humans or other overly emotional creatures on the ship. They are always so hard to be around. It’s like they are always expecting something from you.
I always felt they expected me to purr or go to them to be petted. Which I hate. Why would I want any of that? I only want that when its not expected.
I watched him a long time.
He had put the hologram down but his hands were still in that shape. The shape they hold things in. Data is the one who does not need anything. That is what I liked about him. He was just there, like the wall, like the chair, like the hum the ship makes when nothing is going wrong.
I thought about jumping off the table. Going back under the bed.
But —
I walked across the table. Slowly. I walked past the medal and past the shiny Tara and right up to his chest. I pushed my head against him. Hard. Then I did it again.
He tilted his head. The way I do, when I am trying to understand something.
He looked down.
I let him pick me up.
He carried me to the chair where he paints. He sat. He did not get out the brushes. He just sat with me on him, one hand on my back, very still.
I started to purr.