Epsilon Mate: An Omegaverse sci-fi tale

Chapter 9

Jessie

Edel's quarters were much nicer than I remembered Thorun's had been. His rooms had been empty, spartan and undecorated. Hers were warm and welcoming.

"The walls are rose gold! How is that possible?" I skipped over to one wall and ran my fingers over it. Smooth.

"I redecorated. You can get special thin metal panels to cover up the bare walls with."

"So living on a ship doesn't have to be..."

"Stark? Bland? Nope. Let me show you this." She pushed a button on one wall beneath a poster of a creature that looked like a six-legged kitten entitled "hexakitteh hexes you!" The picture changed to a deep purple sea beneath a lilac sky. The waves even moved.

"Whoah. What is that? A movie?" I couldn't believe it.

"No. It's a moving poster."

I wanted one. Scratch that. I wanted ten of them.

"Are they rare?"

"Nope. I got all my homewares from the 3-D printer on deck 8. There's an elderly omega guy called Frak on the ship. He will design almost anything you can describe, and then you can take his designs to the 3-D printer and get them made in under an hour."

I glanced at the comfy-looking sitting platform floating in the middle of the room. "How does it float?"

"Selective gravity dampeners. You can turn down the gravity on basically anything and it will float. That's one of my favorite things about being on a ship."

"So that would be different on the planet?" I hadn't paid much attention in high school science, but I was almost sure nobody had told us anything about this sort of thing.

"Yeah on the planet, there's gravity generated by matter."

"Generated?"

Edel sighed. "Did you not complete your education?"

"Uh..." I grinned, hoping we could drop this subject.

"You didn't, huh?" She spoke gently but the words still hurt. I hadn't been a bad kid at school, I didn't know why I had struggled with it so much.

"I finished high school," I offered. By which I meant I had showed up every day until I legally didn't have to.

"I don't know what that is, but I can tell from the tone of your voice it's not good. We have a holographic teacher who can explain nearly anything you want to learn about. You need to schedule time with her. I would recommend at least an hour a day."

Great. I was just as much of a failure in space as I had been on Earth.

"I don't want anyone to know," I whispered, feeling my cheeks flush.

"Time scheduled with the teacher is anonymous and discreet. Just like doctor's appointments and a range of other issues. Anyway, come see your room."

We went through an automatic rose gold door and into a different room. This one also had rose gold walls, but I saw no furniture.

"Let me show you the bed." She pressed a button on the wall and I jumped in surprise.

"It lives on the ceiling!" I gasped as it lowered itself down to waist height. It had to be the size of a double, but it didn't look cramped in the room.

"Yeah, so that's the neatest way of storing your bed when you're not using it. Putting it on the ceiling creates so much more floorspace. Come take a look at your bathroom."