Chapter No.40. Interlude

The next day, the women seemed to have settled down, but I knew that I was not going to escape being teased.

I sat down next to Janet and Sharon at the command station. "Find any new habitable planets?"

"Yes," Janet replied. "We found what appears to be a habitable moon orbiting a gas giant in the habitable zone of a G-class star. It's only two hundred light years from here."

"Good! We'll give it a go."

She grinned. "We're impressed by your performance in the auto-doctor."

"Yeah," Sharon said with a grin. "We love how big you got."

"Did you enjoy the auto doctor caressing your organ?" Janet asked, still grinning.

"We could do it much better," Sharon said. She turned to Janet. "Couldn't we!"

"Most assuredly!" Janet replied, her entire face projecting extreme excitement.

"You two gals are being ornery," I said with a subtle grin.

They giggled.

What was strange about them teasing me is that they could get all the release they want by coming to my bunk at night. Their reluctance proves they are only playing a game with me as the subject of their barbs.

Later that day, we strapped into our G-chairs to go into hyperspace, a process that had become a routine. The burn lasted fifteen minutes, and when it ended and the wheels were up to speed, we got out of our seats relieved that nothing bad had happened.

"We'll drop out of hyperspace in three days, five hours, and seven minutes," Janet said after we sat down at the command station.

"Good," I said before getting up and going to the food station to get a beer.

Kali joined me. After obtaining a beer, she sat down and gave me a subtle grin. "I think you should expect to be the primary object of humor now that the gals saw your auto-doctor performance."

I sighed. "Yeah, I expected that."

"You have to realize that you're the only male on this vessel, so you're going to be harassed."

"I'm okay with that."

She smiled.

The first day went without any nonsense, but it wasn't about to stay that way. The women waited until I went on a run and then stripped to take a shower. While I was in there, they set up chairs on the opposite wall so that they could watch me emerge. I was greeted by whistles and applause. I acknowledged their attention by standing facing them while holding my shorts behind me for several minutes before I went to my bunk to fully dress. I decided to let them have their fun at my expense without showing anger or disgust.

When we did drop out of hyperspace, their playfulness ceased. They realized that danger was always a possibility when dealing with the unknown.

"The moon is definitely habitable," Sharon said. "I'm measuring the proper amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide in its atmosphere."

"It's amazing how many atmospheres end up like that," I said.

"It's probably because once life emerges, oxygen follows, and plant life removes carbon dioxide."

"How old is this system?"

"It's about five billion years, give or take," Janet said. "Long enough for intelligent life to emerge, depending upon how stable this orbital configuration is."

"I'm detecting a signal that's confusing," Sharon said. "It's definitely not the compressed digital types that we use."

"What sort of signal is it?"

"I think it's like the old analog signals that were used at the beginning of the radio and TV era."

"Any way to convert them?"

"I suppose I could work up a conversion algorithm, but I'll have to experiment to get it right."

"Go for it," I said.

The other women joined us.

"What's cooking," Kali asked.

"Sharon is picking up an ancient analog radio signal from the moon. She's working on a computer routine to convert it to digital."

"I can help you with that," Kali said.

"We can take over your planetary observations," Natale said.

Sharon nodded.

I was essentially a fifth wheel, so I decided to go down to the agricultural and engineering decks to check on things, but I knew that I wouldn't be alone for long.

"Are you hiding down here?" Bridget asked as she walked up to me in the agricultural deck.

"Not really. I'm just checking on things." I smiled. "That's what I get paid to do."

She snickered. "Yeah, right!"

She became serious, lowering her eyes before looking back up at me. "We were hired to be prostitutes."

My right eyebrow shot up momentarily. "Why would you agree to something like that?"

"We needed the jobs. Things were rough then in the middle of an economic crash."

"Did you have sex?"

"No. We were in hibernation the entire time."

I ran a hand through my hair and chuckled. "Yeah, I forgot that."

She looked me in the eye. "Did you ever have sex?"

My expression grew more somber for a moment. "Yes. I was dating a girl when I was at the academy. Unfortunately, she was killed."

She frowned. "What happened to her?"

"It was a shuttle accident. There cadets were killed because of an engine malfunction." I sighed. "Unfortunately, she was carrying our child."

Her eyes moistened. "Oh, my God!"

"It was a long time ago, but I still remember it as if it just happened."

Her expression exuded remorse. "I'm sorry. I didn't know."

I smiled at her. "It doesn't matter now."

Actually, it did. When Bridget told the other women my story, the teasing and harassment died, at least for the time being.

I could tell that the story got to the women when we collected for the communal supper. They almost acted as if they were apologetic for their recent behavior.

"I think I've got the computer routine to decode those radio signals," Sharon said. "It turns out that they're using frequency modulation with video and sound information much like the old TV broadcasts. Hopefully, I can get the color signal correct."

"Why would they be using some ancient signal like that?" Natale asked.

"Why did humans use it?" I said. "Because it works."

The next day, we were able to watch a video from the planet, and it was beyond belief.

"What the hell are they doing?" Natale asked. "It looks like they're playing a game."

"Interesting," I said. "'They look almost like humans, but a lot of that is because they're dressing like people did back in the twentieth century." I tapped a finger to my lips. "I think I recognize that game. It's based on an old TV series called 'Wheel of Fortune'."

"How could they know about some old TV show?" Bridget asked.

"Humans have been sending high frequency signals out into space ever since the beginning of radio and TV." I turned to Janet. "How far away is Earth?"

"Ah, about a hundred light years," she replied.

"That would suggest that they could have been monitoring our signals for at least two, maybe there, hundred years, which would put them back into the era that is representative of that show."

"How could they monitor a signal from that far away?" Natale asked. "It would be almost background by the time it got here."

"They would have to have several large radio telescopes positioned all over the planet, linked together."

"We can search for that," Sharon said.

"I pity them," Kali said.

I turned to her. "Why?"

"They have to be totally corrupted from watching all of humanities' old TV shows."

I laughed. "Yeah, you're right about that."

"Are we going to go down there?" Natale asked.

"I don't think so. We would risk being infected by some disease we're not immune to. Even worse, we don't know how they would react to us. They could consider us invaders."

"Then, what are we going to do?"

"Keep searching for habitable planets in this part of the galaxy. We still haven't determined what happened to the majority of humans."

I don't know if they were happy with my opinion, but they chose not to argue. What we discovered next determined what we would do for the rest of our lives.