Blood Impulse

Part 18.3 - K.I.A.

Halogen Sector, Battleship Singularity

The room was a clammy, gnarled convergence of pipes that knotted together chaotically to the untrained eye. Shut off and control valves speckled the entangled mass, their colored paint so chipped, the metal below seemed splotched with festering wounds.

Leaked oil and coolant had gathered on the pipes in an ugly brackish sludge. Drips of condensation slid down the walls, pulled from the humid air. The laboring air scrubbers only pushed the odor of hot oil and metal around the room, unable to fully remove it.

It was dark down here. The main engine control room was long overdue for deep clean, leaving the old overhead lights unable to penetrate the pervading layers of grime. Still, the Admiral didn't hesitate to pull off his black glove and run his bare hands along the piping.

A wrong move, and the heat of the metal could easily burn him, but he knew these engines better than that. They were the heart of his old ship. He knew their limits and their faults, able to identify their smallest strains. Dancing his hands across the valves, he began to tune the engines, working to correct a slight shake in the noise that filled the room.

Another might have hesitated. Down here in the darkness and dinginess, the convoluted piping could play games with an unfamiliar mind. This space could feel entrapping and hostile, the pipes likened to the writhing mass of a monster as raw power hummed in the humidity of the air.

To those who didn't know it, didn't recognize it, that untamed intensity was a reminder that this machine was thousands of times more powerful than any human. Against her, they were little more than insects: fragile and weak.

But those who knew that power, those that understood it, were never so threatened. After all, these engines, as they rumbled on, steadier than a heartbeat, generated the heat that kept the crew warm and provided the power that gave them lights to see and air to breathe in the void. These engines, the heart of the ship, kept her crew alive.

And maybe that was the problem.

The Singularity, like all battleships, was, at a basic level, an immensely powerful weapon. She had been designed to bring death, but also to protect the lives of her crew at any cost. The contradiction at best was illogical, and at worst was nothing more than a short path to insanity for the ghost.

As wrong and cruel as it felt, pushing the ghost and her affections away would make it easier for her. Every time, it killed another bit of the little human decency he had left, but it had never been about him. It was about the sanity of an immortal whose full power could irreversibly scar the galaxy.

It was an extremely complicated situation, but he understood, "I have a responsibility to do the right thing here." It was exhausting. Morality was such a stupid game.

He sighed absently to the old ship, "I don't know why you put up with me. You know how much I hate doing the right thing." It itched like a bad rash. The last thing anyone would call him was moral. No wonder his relationship with the crew was so strained. The trust he'd once unconditionally commanded wasn't there anymore. The crew genuinely feared that he might give another ruthless order like the one he'd given in the Aragonian Sector.

Were they wrong? Of course not. He would do absolutely anything to ensure his ship's survival. In that regard, there was no line he would not cross.

Turning one last valve, the engines fell into perfect alignment. The low rumble that filled the room shifted into a purr. Much better. He loved that sound. "We're going to get ourselves in trouble someday, you and I." Not that they weren't already in trouble. They were playing a very dangerous game.