Chương 5: A day of disarray

In the empty room, the immobile figure left her lethargic state when something caught its attention. - Stop F3 - With that command one of the screens stopped actualizing the data and shown rows of letters and words. After a few minutes of unmoving observation, there was a soft short sound of 'exhaled air in rapid action but with an abrupt stop' and the silhouette extended it's hand to the screen.

---------------------------------------

Rie was rejected and intimidated by the crewman, so she went back to her corner to daydream and wait for the food.

She didn't know what to do in the meantime so she ended up lifting her hand to her hairpin pc by reflex and opening her holographic text editor again.

She intended to review what was already written and see if maybe some idea pop up in her mind but, again, there was an extra line in her text.

"['Perfect Twelve' is a valid codename as long as it works for identifying an individual. The meaning of names is pointless superstition, just like numerology is. But, as you want, Ascil is a human name that means perfection. ]"

It seems that it was answering to her rant.

"Oh, that seems like a good name! You're good at it. Thanks." Her hands wrote an answer before she could remember that she was angry at the mysterious one meddling with her text.

['Thanks'...Isn't that a pointless word? It's a given.]

Okay. that's a strange fella. Rie thought.

"No? You helped me, so 'Thanks' is a must to express my gratitude." She explained typing awkwardly.

[Gratitude? I didn't help nor do something rewarding gratitude. Just what I must.]

"..." A really strange fella.

"Didn't I said that you DID HELP me? That's why I'm thankful." Why was she explaining that? Doing that made her a little irritated.

[The act of help is when someone needlessly collaborates with someone in need. It's an imaginary concept, and by correlation so is gratitude.]

... What's wrong with him...she... whatever. Rie didn't know how to reply anymore. But luckily, at least for the conversation flow, a new string of letters appeared.

[Pirates will arrive in 1d17h.]

The abrupt change of topic made Rie confused for a moment before she reacted.

"They were attacked by The Empire, I will not change the plot!" She defended her story, but while she was writing the reply more words from the other party appeared stating: [Not fiction.]

Rie was stunned a good while. What did it mean with 'Not fiction'? What's not fiction?.... Wait... She remembered the first thing that appeared in her text: '[The Empire didn't attack the ship. Space pirates attacked them.]' Plus the time it says now seems too specific?

"Wait, wait, wait. Yo don't scare me. There's no way that you're talking about the broken engine thing? It was only a malfunction." She wrote in a hurry, a little anxious. Repeating herself the 'truth' and to not be fooled by that stranger. But then, with the next row, blood drained from her face.

[It was sabotage.]

Then, the first thing the other party wrote wasn't a critique but a warning?? There's no way! It must be fooling her for not taking its recommendations. A hater! that's what it is!

She closed the text editor in a hurry to escape reality, if that's it. Although she didn't believe it, she was still anxious and a little scared. What if it's true?

She couldn't help herself from stealing glances at the leisurely pair of crewmen near the entry of the tent. Were they hiding the truth?

Fuck that mysterious troll! If the first sentence was a warning, would it kill it to warn more clearly!?

She didn't know what to do. It's not like she could go and say to the crewmen "Hey, are we being assaulted? Will pirate come and murder we all in this desolate land in the darkness of space? Or you are the pirates? Jaja, just kidding" And see if they answer, and all the people here panic and then burn her in a stake like a witch for cursing them all with the jinx in her writing. Yeah. No.

Anyways, if she believes it or not didn't make much difference. She was powerless of doing anything. Even if she wanted to do something, she didn't know what.

And she knows better than believing some strange anonymous entity of the internet. Yeah... Well... But there wasn't any internet... Her resolution began to waver and she shakes her head trying to stop her pointless chain of thought.

She will know if the hater was lying or not in two days.

Before she knew it. A day passed and it was the morning of the second day. Or the clock says so. More specifically, the clocks laugh as it tells "Yo'! Just 9 hours'till the pirates arrive! Or they will?"

The 'day' was grim. There was no sunlight. The only light shining over the dwarf planet was that of the stars. And even that was dimmed by the membrane shields of the atmospheric tent.

Rie was tired, she didn't sleep last night and this time wasn't because of writing, although she tried to. But worry about the stranger's words got her.

She tried to pry something from the crewman, but with the scarce communication skills she had, she didn't know if she was too low key in her motives and they didn't catch it, if they played the fool, or if they answered in a low key manner and she was the one that didn't catch it. In summary, it was an awfully awkward chat. They ended up talking about bath bombs for goodness sake!

Then she said 'forget it' and tried to resume her writing but couldn't, so she tried to plan some countermeasures in case of the worst, but ended up thinking only in that 'worst' that could happen.

On the bright side, she now had a lot of material if someday she wrote about a pirate assault.

Coming back to the morning of the second day. There comes the food. Or so she thought when she heard the airlock mechanism of the entrance of the tent. But what she saw when she looked up was not Silas carrying the ration's box but a young child no more than 5 years old.