37: An Odd Form of Trade
PyrrhicSteel
Look natural.
- Location
- Idaho
The library was as quiet as it had ever been. Two or three other humans were immediately in view, all of them too quietly interested in their own research to pay each other that much attention. The sound of shifting paper, shuffling feet, and buttons being pressed filled the silence, an agreeable background of white noise that somewhat countered The Abyssal's frustration.
It had been a simple question: Can humans have white skin? Trinitite thought that getting a straight answer would be easy, considering she just needed yes or no, but Deep had she been wrong. First, she'd been directed to a page about something called 'Vitiligo,' a condition where patches of a human's skin become white. The vast majority of jargon on the page was beyond her, so she had no idea how humans found themselves in that condition, but she did learn three important facts: Human skin color was decided by melanin, which she guessed was analogous to paint, and they'd be white as she was without it. Secondly, this condition only affected humans in weird splotches, meaning she couldn't use it as an excuse.
Third, she'd learned that 'white skin' to humans meant 'light tan skin' to anyone sane. This was an… unwelcome development, because Trinitite soon realized that most of the information she found would relate to the skin tone provided by her makeup, rather than actual white, her real coloring and that found in humans with Viti… something. She'd already forgotten the term.
Rephrasing the question with terms like 'pure white' only brought up even more questions, such as the fact that some humans considered the color of their skin, and not something important like tonnage, horsepower, or number of guns, a defining factor that elevated them above anyone else. Trinitite suppressed a chuckle after realizing that. She had white skin, actually white skin, and it certainly wasn't an advantage now.
Even then, it was easy for Trinitite to think of a better skin tone for a human. Let's see, they constantly lived among all these trees and bushes, right? Green, then. It would make them less of a target, and that was a tangible advantage. Still, plenty of abyssals were absolutely certain of stupid things, and from Mother's stories and her own experiences, she knew humans could be just as bad. This wasn't much of a surprise, then. No use arguing with someone who had their mind made up, no matter how nonsensical it was.
The issue was a pleasant distraction, but still a waste of her time. This didn't help her get any closer to an answer. Humans could have patches of white skin. Could there be a different name for when that failure to source melanin applied everywhere? Frowning, Trinitite adjusted her question. Melanin had been added to the end of her research list, but since it wasn't looking like she was going to get a good answer any other way...
Could humans have no melanin?
There, in extra-dark letters. Albinism. That wasn't so hard, was it? Trinitite searched for the term, trying her best to commit the weird terminology to her memory. She needed an excuse if her disguise failed, after all. Apparently, it was something that happened in all animals, but in humans? Some images didn't look like her at all, but others matched her appearance well enough, she guessed. Apparently, the condition also meant an aversion or weakness to sunlight, which was nice because Trinitite had never enjoyed the bare sun. If that was strange for humans, then it was pretty convenient that the exact same condition that gave a human white skin also gave them the same preference.
Now that that problem was solved, Trinitite marked it off on her list. She'd made much better time with this term, and hopefully she wouldn't have to reword her next question as much. This time, she needed some clarification on something brought up in that odd encounter three, maybe four days ago? So much had happened since she made landfall, it was hard to remember in what order everything happened without combing through her crew's logs. Anyways, that odd human who'd just been asking for money mentioned something about parents. Specifically "Parents" as a plural, as if it was possible for a human to have more then one.
The idea sounded like a disaster in the making. Trinitite loved her mother more than anything, but she wasn't sure The Jellyfish Princess could have shared command with another princess. There were the Night Straight Princesses, but they were an exception, and frankly too interested in each other to manage their fleet well. If they hadn't been, Trinitite could only imagine the power struggles that must be involved. Their subordinates would have to constantly choose one over the other, furthering divides in the fleet and making the whole thing far too brittle under pressure.
Parents (More than one?)
The first couple of answers weren't all that useful, involving a parent having more than one 'child.' Trinitite assumed that was human for 'subordinate,' especially considering the situation here where fleets and families were separate arrangements. In that case, of course a parent would have more than one child! They couldn't rely on only one child to do all the family's duties, could they? What if they sank, or just needed some time in the drydock?
Thankfully, a link a few answers down sent her to the Wikipedia fleet's information on the topic, and Trinitite sighed in relief. She wouldn't have to be rephrasing the question, unlike last time. Trinitite clicked on the link, her rangefinders darting over the first sentence…
And freezing on "offspring." Deep, why did the humans protect so many of their secrets inside an impenetrable belt of jargon! That word went on the list, and so did 'gamete,' 'raise (child),' and far too many other terms. Trinitite soon realized she'd read two paragraphs without learning anything!
Finally, Trinitite found a sentence with useful information. "...Mothers, Fathers, step-parents, and grandparents." So, there were different classes of parents, and her own Mother was just one of four possible types. It implied that it would expand how they differed later in the article, but it did mention something about 'birth,' another term that needed to be added to the list. Thankfully, the explanation for each one was short, and had enough plain language that she thought she got the gist of the text. Because males and females were different, the terms Mother and Father were based on that split, with grandparents merely being the parents of a parent.
Huh. Now that she thought about it, Mother never really talked about her own parent, or if she had more than one. Trinitite had always thought that her Princesses simply hadn't had one, but that wasn't a very good assumption, was it? Thus, 'Saratoga's Parent' found itself on the research list, right under 'Sperm.'
DNA was brought up again in another section, showing it was used somehow to prove who the parents were. There were a lot more terms she didn't understand, but given the context Trinitite didn't feel the need to investigate further. What did interest her, however, was the next term: Guardianship. She didn't need to look it up; the article phrased it fairly well, but the Abyssal still found she had to read through it again, anyways. Unless 'guard' had a different meaning in human language, it weirdly implied that parents were supposed to protect their children.
Who could think that was a good idea? There were several children and only one parent, after all, and no matter what the parent could do, there was no way they could do everything. If Mother had ventured out with the rest of the fleet, and was supposed to protect everyone else, then what would she do if a submarine came along? She'd have to rely on the hydrophones of the Fleet's destroyers, meaning that the destroyers would be protecting her, and even if Trinitite and her sisters had been a design with a smaller air wing then Mother's, their combined air wing would make a much better CAP then just Jellyfish's fighters. It was simply impossible for the parent, no matter what class they were, to protect their family alone in a combat situation, let alone themselves.
No. The Fleet Protected the Princess. Maybe that was why there was more than one human parent? To make up for each other's weaknesses in a tactical situation? If male and female were different classes of humans, and most (but not all, as the next section confusingly pointed out) groups of parents had one of each, then maybe their strengths and weaknesses as classes of humans complemented each other, making the family safer overall?
But how, though? Male and female humans looked somewhat different, obviously, and the article had put a lot of work into differentiating the two, but Trinitite didn't think they had any obvious advantages or disadvantages. Neither of them had sensors such as radar or hydrophones that the other lacked, as far as she knew, and the armament of either was… she'd wanted to say nothing, but that couldn't be right. Considering how aggressive animals were on this landmass and the danger of other human fleets, they had to have something to defend themselves, like her Pilots' sidearms.
Trinitite leaned back in her chair, closing her eyes to blot out the view of the article she'd failed to comprehend. It was somewhat rare that an issue she put her mind to wouldn't make any sense even after committing herself to learning it, but then again, she hadn't really needed to grasp concepts so complicated since her initial training as a fleet carrier. Hopefully, some of the terms she'd added to her list would explain all of this.
Looking back down at the keyboard, the abyssal moved onto her next topic. This one was a little more relevant, considering it had been a part of the training she'd received from yesterday, and then she'd known she lacked crucial context. Heasantly, the Wo-class turned her attention back to the array of labeled buttons, fingers carefully picking at the console until her next phrase of interest had been inputted.
Sexual harassment.
This time, wikipedia was only the second one, the first belonging to one of the fleets associated with the tight coalition known as the US Government. They might have useful information, but Trinitite wasn't going to trust anything that came from someone allied with the Firebringers and the Navy, so she was going to rely on Wikipedia once again.
Was it wise to get so much information from just one fleet?
Probably not. Still, between them and the government, she knew what she'd prefer. Setting that problem aside for now, Trinitite began reading.
Sexual Harassment, sexual overtones, sexual favors, sexual abuse… again, she knew she was missing something, but all of these had one word in common. This wasn't going on the list. She'd have to look into it right after she finished reading this.
…Actually, Trinitite could already tell she wasn't going to understand most of this, like in the previous article. Perhaps she needed to straighten her keel and 'act like a capital ship,' as Firestorm would put it. The sooner she managed to address the questions at the center of the problem, the sooner she'd be able to get over the confusion she'd been feeling since that training video yesterday.
Feeling the pressure in her active boiler slowly rising, Trinitite opened a new tab. The term 'sexual' was being used to describe an action, so would the actual term be different?
What does sexual mean?
Okay, it looked like it was a different term. Opening the question… thing at the bottom of the screen again, Trinitite asked the computer one word.
Sex.
Apprehensive, The Fleet Carrier started looking through the wikipedia article about the subject (Just how much did they have an article on?), and that pressure dissipated. That was just the human's word for the two major classes of human? It didn't explain things like their differences in size and color, but it helped make sense of some things. Did that mean that sexual harassment was the term used if the attacker and defender were of different sexes? It would make sense, if the training material yesterday hadn't gone out of its way to deny that.
Again, the first couple of paragraphs were frontloaded with jargon and terms that flew high over her deck, but she was getting used to this pattern, now. Better to skip to the next section, where things would be spelled out a little clearer.
One of the basic properties of life is reproduction, the capacity to generate new individuals, and sex is an aspect of this process.
The first line in this new section was much easier to understand, although that only raised more questions. Trinitite knew she was alive, the dull throb from her damaged flight deck being a constant reminder of that. However, she didn't have this ability, and neither did any other abyssal, as far as she knew. Her aircraft and their pilots didn't count, as they were as much a part of her as her guns or deck apes.
Another thought shifted in the back of her mind, reminding her that those two pilots she'd lost at the coast still hadn't returned. She was starting to worry about them, especially since that meant they were quite alive, somewhere. Still, that wasn't something she could do anything about. Hopefully they were handling themselves.
Returning to the article in front of her, Trinitite scanned through the rest of the section, her rangefinders carefully examining each unfamiliar word. Once she got to the end, the abyssal checked her list to confirm that she'd already added 'offspring,' before darting again over the paragraph she'd just read.
Sex organs… she didn't know what an organ was, but the information the section was trying to convey seemed to be this: Humans were split into two basic classes, because one of each type was required to work together for… 'reproduction.' The process involved some kind of trade of genetic material, which for reasons the Wo-Class didn't understand was an essential part of this process.
Again, reproduction was phrased again, and while the sentence from a while ago gave Trinitite a fairly good clue as to what it meant, The Abyssal was going to wait until she'd read a bit more. Still, if some of her guesses were partially accurate, negotiating for this genetic material would be a high-stakes and risky prospect. You could be tricked into giving it to someone who planned on using it to bolster their own power instead of mutual gain, it could be exchanged for a promise that wasn't kept, or obtained through less honorable tactics, like threats of force or outright theft.
Because of that, she could see why an employer fleet would want to keep such negotiations low-key or suppress them entirely. A web of alliances and betrayals within a fleet would waste time and torpedo its cohesion, so if they wanted to get anything done effectively, they'd have to do their best to keep this 'Sexual harassment' in check.
However, the tactics shown in the training material hadn't seemed like good diplomatic maneuvering to her. Some seemed reasonable, of course, like withholding an opportunity if this oh-so-vital genetic material wasn't given, but what the man who'd tried to stop her back on the worksite had been doing was a terrible way to secure a trade of strategic resources. Wouldn't anyone get suspicious if they were suddenly complemented by someone they didn't know?
Had he really been asking for her… genetic material? Well, it would have been a waste of time, as Trinitite was an aircraft carrier, and didn't have any!
A moment passed, the Wo-class pondering that thought, before she leaned back, pressing her wrist against her shirt to get a better look at her hull.
She didn't have any genetic material… right?
Well, if she did have such a resource, her supply officers would have let her know about it, right? Not everything was stored in her hold, however, and everyone in the Abyssal Fleets was female, so perhaps it had gone unnoticed since it wouldn't have any use? She needed to find if she did have any, and set up a guard to make sure it was secure. If it could be traded, after all, it could be stolen, and who knew if it could inadvertently clue an aggressor into the fact that she was an abyssal?
Was that why there weren't any male abyssals? Assuming she had hadn't misinterpreted the handful of words explaining reproduction, if males existed, then abyssal fleets could produce more ships without having to rely on the steady but small stream of ships that The Abyss produced and assigned to its Princesses, Demons, and Installations. Was that a power tactic, to ensure The Fleets always had to rely on the Abyss?
If it was, It sure wasn't making use of it. No one knew if The Abyss actually wanted anything in exchange for warships, beyond the fact that it would give any new warship that one order: Report. If it exuded any control over the fragile and volatile coalitions of Princesses, they would have gotten a lot more done by now, maybe even pushing the humans into using the fire. As it stood, though, it was very clear that no one was in command.
No, it probably wasn't for any nefarious reason. As Mother had talked about her previous life, she'd made it fairly clear that ships were female. There weren't any male abyssals because that was just how things were, and The Abyss hadn't had any more of a say in it then Trinitite did.
As she thought, her eyes had wondered to a sign informing her about some '3d printing' event, rangefinders flitting over the fancy text without committing anything to memory. That had been enough pondering. Back to the intel on sex, more specifically, the section termed 'evolution.'
Right, several other animals had been mentioned during this article, hadn't they? How did fish or birds engage in the advanced negotiations required to trade genetic material? How did plants do anything like that?
Terms were flying straight over her deck, again. Before she knew it, she'd gotten to the end of the section without actually learning anything. She guessed 'evolution' was going on her list, then.
Sexual reproduction.
Alright, this was where she would be able to confirm if her inference about 'reproduction' was accurate. It was also where the first real photograph had been placed, an image of two flies… pressing into each other. Were they hugging? Trinitite didn't know they did that. Still, the idea that something as pure and intimate as a hug would be used for something as dry and cynical as an exchange of resources… it felt deeply wrong, somehow.
Just because it felt wrong, however, didn't mean that it wasn't true. Trinitite kept reading, stumbling into a simple explanation of what 'gametes' were. That was convenient. Guess she could cross something extra off on her list. Apparently, the female form of gametes were eggs! She knew what those were, from what plenty of animals would leave lying around ashore! Trinitite paused, ordering her details of marines and supply staff to get looking. The small teams of fairies dispersed, shuffling through her compartments while the Abyssal kept reading…
Then immediately recalled her search parties.
She knew where they were, now. This 'female reproductive tract...' Trinitite was fairly sure what the article was referring to. The abyssal shifted in her seat, uncomfortably adjusting her jeans.
Ah… That was what it was for. She didn't need marines crawling around down there. This also might explain why humans were so opposed to nakedness. She still wasn't sure exactly how important this… trade was to them, but covering it made a lot more sense, to keep everyone else focused on their jobs. Otherwise, it could be distracting.
Her thoughts returned to that accursed tape measure Elizabeth of the Fred Meyers Fleet had used on her. She hadn't been through in the slightest, not as much as her paint-and-chip detail had to be, but the fact it had been someone else, and those weird feelings she'd had to deal with...
I'm not an animal, though! I'm a ship!
An alert came from her boiler room, her engineers frantically working to get the pressure in her active boiler under control. She was a ship, sure, but she had the parts, the… organs, as the article named them. Before now, she'd had no idea what that was for, besides creating the occasional leak of oily blood that her paint-and-chip detail would take care of, and she had no idea if there actually was genetic material there, but the idea of something entering-
Her arms and legs tensed as she twitched away from the computer. The chair had rolled back, somewhat, giving her legs time to bounce and rub together as she tried to shake the mental image from her head. Emergency pressure valves in her boiler room suddenly opened, injuring a handful of unlucky engineers as the compartment filled with rapidly-cooling steam.
That- that was enough for today. Standing perhaps a little too suddenly, Trinitite closed the article and gently pushed the chair back into place. After that, she turned, marching out of the library and trying desperately to ignore the human rangefinders that were boring into her hull.
There was no way this blush wasn't ruining her disguise. Almost desperately, she lightly slapped her cheeks, but she'd already know that was never going to help. She needed something else to think about, and fast.
Like food! Yeah, a carrier always needs to eat, and she'd only done so early this morning! Her supply situation was still good, but Trinitite wanted nothing else but to be alone right now. On the way to and from the Walmart Fleet's installation, she'd passed a fairly open space with a nice, small lake, and plenty of vegetation to serve as cover. What had the sign called it, again?
A park! Yeah, she needed to eat at the park! The lake probably looked amazing in the current light!
It had been a simple question: Can humans have white skin? Trinitite thought that getting a straight answer would be easy, considering she just needed yes or no, but Deep had she been wrong. First, she'd been directed to a page about something called 'Vitiligo,' a condition where patches of a human's skin become white. The vast majority of jargon on the page was beyond her, so she had no idea how humans found themselves in that condition, but she did learn three important facts: Human skin color was decided by melanin, which she guessed was analogous to paint, and they'd be white as she was without it. Secondly, this condition only affected humans in weird splotches, meaning she couldn't use it as an excuse.
Third, she'd learned that 'white skin' to humans meant 'light tan skin' to anyone sane. This was an… unwelcome development, because Trinitite soon realized that most of the information she found would relate to the skin tone provided by her makeup, rather than actual white, her real coloring and that found in humans with Viti… something. She'd already forgotten the term.
Rephrasing the question with terms like 'pure white' only brought up even more questions, such as the fact that some humans considered the color of their skin, and not something important like tonnage, horsepower, or number of guns, a defining factor that elevated them above anyone else. Trinitite suppressed a chuckle after realizing that. She had white skin, actually white skin, and it certainly wasn't an advantage now.
Even then, it was easy for Trinitite to think of a better skin tone for a human. Let's see, they constantly lived among all these trees and bushes, right? Green, then. It would make them less of a target, and that was a tangible advantage. Still, plenty of abyssals were absolutely certain of stupid things, and from Mother's stories and her own experiences, she knew humans could be just as bad. This wasn't much of a surprise, then. No use arguing with someone who had their mind made up, no matter how nonsensical it was.
The issue was a pleasant distraction, but still a waste of her time. This didn't help her get any closer to an answer. Humans could have patches of white skin. Could there be a different name for when that failure to source melanin applied everywhere? Frowning, Trinitite adjusted her question. Melanin had been added to the end of her research list, but since it wasn't looking like she was going to get a good answer any other way...
Could humans have no melanin?
There, in extra-dark letters. Albinism. That wasn't so hard, was it? Trinitite searched for the term, trying her best to commit the weird terminology to her memory. She needed an excuse if her disguise failed, after all. Apparently, it was something that happened in all animals, but in humans? Some images didn't look like her at all, but others matched her appearance well enough, she guessed. Apparently, the condition also meant an aversion or weakness to sunlight, which was nice because Trinitite had never enjoyed the bare sun. If that was strange for humans, then it was pretty convenient that the exact same condition that gave a human white skin also gave them the same preference.
Now that that problem was solved, Trinitite marked it off on her list. She'd made much better time with this term, and hopefully she wouldn't have to reword her next question as much. This time, she needed some clarification on something brought up in that odd encounter three, maybe four days ago? So much had happened since she made landfall, it was hard to remember in what order everything happened without combing through her crew's logs. Anyways, that odd human who'd just been asking for money mentioned something about parents. Specifically "Parents" as a plural, as if it was possible for a human to have more then one.
The idea sounded like a disaster in the making. Trinitite loved her mother more than anything, but she wasn't sure The Jellyfish Princess could have shared command with another princess. There were the Night Straight Princesses, but they were an exception, and frankly too interested in each other to manage their fleet well. If they hadn't been, Trinitite could only imagine the power struggles that must be involved. Their subordinates would have to constantly choose one over the other, furthering divides in the fleet and making the whole thing far too brittle under pressure.
Parents (More than one?)
The first couple of answers weren't all that useful, involving a parent having more than one 'child.' Trinitite assumed that was human for 'subordinate,' especially considering the situation here where fleets and families were separate arrangements. In that case, of course a parent would have more than one child! They couldn't rely on only one child to do all the family's duties, could they? What if they sank, or just needed some time in the drydock?
Thankfully, a link a few answers down sent her to the Wikipedia fleet's information on the topic, and Trinitite sighed in relief. She wouldn't have to be rephrasing the question, unlike last time. Trinitite clicked on the link, her rangefinders darting over the first sentence…
And freezing on "offspring." Deep, why did the humans protect so many of their secrets inside an impenetrable belt of jargon! That word went on the list, and so did 'gamete,' 'raise (child),' and far too many other terms. Trinitite soon realized she'd read two paragraphs without learning anything!
Finally, Trinitite found a sentence with useful information. "...Mothers, Fathers, step-parents, and grandparents." So, there were different classes of parents, and her own Mother was just one of four possible types. It implied that it would expand how they differed later in the article, but it did mention something about 'birth,' another term that needed to be added to the list. Thankfully, the explanation for each one was short, and had enough plain language that she thought she got the gist of the text. Because males and females were different, the terms Mother and Father were based on that split, with grandparents merely being the parents of a parent.
Huh. Now that she thought about it, Mother never really talked about her own parent, or if she had more than one. Trinitite had always thought that her Princesses simply hadn't had one, but that wasn't a very good assumption, was it? Thus, 'Saratoga's Parent' found itself on the research list, right under 'Sperm.'
DNA was brought up again in another section, showing it was used somehow to prove who the parents were. There were a lot more terms she didn't understand, but given the context Trinitite didn't feel the need to investigate further. What did interest her, however, was the next term: Guardianship. She didn't need to look it up; the article phrased it fairly well, but the Abyssal still found she had to read through it again, anyways. Unless 'guard' had a different meaning in human language, it weirdly implied that parents were supposed to protect their children.
Who could think that was a good idea? There were several children and only one parent, after all, and no matter what the parent could do, there was no way they could do everything. If Mother had ventured out with the rest of the fleet, and was supposed to protect everyone else, then what would she do if a submarine came along? She'd have to rely on the hydrophones of the Fleet's destroyers, meaning that the destroyers would be protecting her, and even if Trinitite and her sisters had been a design with a smaller air wing then Mother's, their combined air wing would make a much better CAP then just Jellyfish's fighters. It was simply impossible for the parent, no matter what class they were, to protect their family alone in a combat situation, let alone themselves.
No. The Fleet Protected the Princess. Maybe that was why there was more than one human parent? To make up for each other's weaknesses in a tactical situation? If male and female were different classes of humans, and most (but not all, as the next section confusingly pointed out) groups of parents had one of each, then maybe their strengths and weaknesses as classes of humans complemented each other, making the family safer overall?
But how, though? Male and female humans looked somewhat different, obviously, and the article had put a lot of work into differentiating the two, but Trinitite didn't think they had any obvious advantages or disadvantages. Neither of them had sensors such as radar or hydrophones that the other lacked, as far as she knew, and the armament of either was… she'd wanted to say nothing, but that couldn't be right. Considering how aggressive animals were on this landmass and the danger of other human fleets, they had to have something to defend themselves, like her Pilots' sidearms.
Trinitite leaned back in her chair, closing her eyes to blot out the view of the article she'd failed to comprehend. It was somewhat rare that an issue she put her mind to wouldn't make any sense even after committing herself to learning it, but then again, she hadn't really needed to grasp concepts so complicated since her initial training as a fleet carrier. Hopefully, some of the terms she'd added to her list would explain all of this.
Looking back down at the keyboard, the abyssal moved onto her next topic. This one was a little more relevant, considering it had been a part of the training she'd received from yesterday, and then she'd known she lacked crucial context. Heasantly, the Wo-class turned her attention back to the array of labeled buttons, fingers carefully picking at the console until her next phrase of interest had been inputted.
Sexual harassment.
This time, wikipedia was only the second one, the first belonging to one of the fleets associated with the tight coalition known as the US Government. They might have useful information, but Trinitite wasn't going to trust anything that came from someone allied with the Firebringers and the Navy, so she was going to rely on Wikipedia once again.
Was it wise to get so much information from just one fleet?
Probably not. Still, between them and the government, she knew what she'd prefer. Setting that problem aside for now, Trinitite began reading.
Sexual Harassment, sexual overtones, sexual favors, sexual abuse… again, she knew she was missing something, but all of these had one word in common. This wasn't going on the list. She'd have to look into it right after she finished reading this.
…Actually, Trinitite could already tell she wasn't going to understand most of this, like in the previous article. Perhaps she needed to straighten her keel and 'act like a capital ship,' as Firestorm would put it. The sooner she managed to address the questions at the center of the problem, the sooner she'd be able to get over the confusion she'd been feeling since that training video yesterday.
Feeling the pressure in her active boiler slowly rising, Trinitite opened a new tab. The term 'sexual' was being used to describe an action, so would the actual term be different?
What does sexual mean?
Okay, it looked like it was a different term. Opening the question… thing at the bottom of the screen again, Trinitite asked the computer one word.
Sex.
Apprehensive, The Fleet Carrier started looking through the wikipedia article about the subject (Just how much did they have an article on?), and that pressure dissipated. That was just the human's word for the two major classes of human? It didn't explain things like their differences in size and color, but it helped make sense of some things. Did that mean that sexual harassment was the term used if the attacker and defender were of different sexes? It would make sense, if the training material yesterday hadn't gone out of its way to deny that.
Again, the first couple of paragraphs were frontloaded with jargon and terms that flew high over her deck, but she was getting used to this pattern, now. Better to skip to the next section, where things would be spelled out a little clearer.
One of the basic properties of life is reproduction, the capacity to generate new individuals, and sex is an aspect of this process.
The first line in this new section was much easier to understand, although that only raised more questions. Trinitite knew she was alive, the dull throb from her damaged flight deck being a constant reminder of that. However, she didn't have this ability, and neither did any other abyssal, as far as she knew. Her aircraft and their pilots didn't count, as they were as much a part of her as her guns or deck apes.
Another thought shifted in the back of her mind, reminding her that those two pilots she'd lost at the coast still hadn't returned. She was starting to worry about them, especially since that meant they were quite alive, somewhere. Still, that wasn't something she could do anything about. Hopefully they were handling themselves.
Returning to the article in front of her, Trinitite scanned through the rest of the section, her rangefinders carefully examining each unfamiliar word. Once she got to the end, the abyssal checked her list to confirm that she'd already added 'offspring,' before darting again over the paragraph she'd just read.
Sex organs… she didn't know what an organ was, but the information the section was trying to convey seemed to be this: Humans were split into two basic classes, because one of each type was required to work together for… 'reproduction.' The process involved some kind of trade of genetic material, which for reasons the Wo-Class didn't understand was an essential part of this process.
Again, reproduction was phrased again, and while the sentence from a while ago gave Trinitite a fairly good clue as to what it meant, The Abyssal was going to wait until she'd read a bit more. Still, if some of her guesses were partially accurate, negotiating for this genetic material would be a high-stakes and risky prospect. You could be tricked into giving it to someone who planned on using it to bolster their own power instead of mutual gain, it could be exchanged for a promise that wasn't kept, or obtained through less honorable tactics, like threats of force or outright theft.
Because of that, she could see why an employer fleet would want to keep such negotiations low-key or suppress them entirely. A web of alliances and betrayals within a fleet would waste time and torpedo its cohesion, so if they wanted to get anything done effectively, they'd have to do their best to keep this 'Sexual harassment' in check.
However, the tactics shown in the training material hadn't seemed like good diplomatic maneuvering to her. Some seemed reasonable, of course, like withholding an opportunity if this oh-so-vital genetic material wasn't given, but what the man who'd tried to stop her back on the worksite had been doing was a terrible way to secure a trade of strategic resources. Wouldn't anyone get suspicious if they were suddenly complemented by someone they didn't know?
Had he really been asking for her… genetic material? Well, it would have been a waste of time, as Trinitite was an aircraft carrier, and didn't have any!
A moment passed, the Wo-class pondering that thought, before she leaned back, pressing her wrist against her shirt to get a better look at her hull.
She didn't have any genetic material… right?
Well, if she did have such a resource, her supply officers would have let her know about it, right? Not everything was stored in her hold, however, and everyone in the Abyssal Fleets was female, so perhaps it had gone unnoticed since it wouldn't have any use? She needed to find if she did have any, and set up a guard to make sure it was secure. If it could be traded, after all, it could be stolen, and who knew if it could inadvertently clue an aggressor into the fact that she was an abyssal?
Was that why there weren't any male abyssals? Assuming she had hadn't misinterpreted the handful of words explaining reproduction, if males existed, then abyssal fleets could produce more ships without having to rely on the steady but small stream of ships that The Abyss produced and assigned to its Princesses, Demons, and Installations. Was that a power tactic, to ensure The Fleets always had to rely on the Abyss?
If it was, It sure wasn't making use of it. No one knew if The Abyss actually wanted anything in exchange for warships, beyond the fact that it would give any new warship that one order: Report. If it exuded any control over the fragile and volatile coalitions of Princesses, they would have gotten a lot more done by now, maybe even pushing the humans into using the fire. As it stood, though, it was very clear that no one was in command.
No, it probably wasn't for any nefarious reason. As Mother had talked about her previous life, she'd made it fairly clear that ships were female. There weren't any male abyssals because that was just how things were, and The Abyss hadn't had any more of a say in it then Trinitite did.
As she thought, her eyes had wondered to a sign informing her about some '3d printing' event, rangefinders flitting over the fancy text without committing anything to memory. That had been enough pondering. Back to the intel on sex, more specifically, the section termed 'evolution.'
Right, several other animals had been mentioned during this article, hadn't they? How did fish or birds engage in the advanced negotiations required to trade genetic material? How did plants do anything like that?
Terms were flying straight over her deck, again. Before she knew it, she'd gotten to the end of the section without actually learning anything. She guessed 'evolution' was going on her list, then.
Sexual reproduction.
Alright, this was where she would be able to confirm if her inference about 'reproduction' was accurate. It was also where the first real photograph had been placed, an image of two flies… pressing into each other. Were they hugging? Trinitite didn't know they did that. Still, the idea that something as pure and intimate as a hug would be used for something as dry and cynical as an exchange of resources… it felt deeply wrong, somehow.
Just because it felt wrong, however, didn't mean that it wasn't true. Trinitite kept reading, stumbling into a simple explanation of what 'gametes' were. That was convenient. Guess she could cross something extra off on her list. Apparently, the female form of gametes were eggs! She knew what those were, from what plenty of animals would leave lying around ashore! Trinitite paused, ordering her details of marines and supply staff to get looking. The small teams of fairies dispersed, shuffling through her compartments while the Abyssal kept reading…
Then immediately recalled her search parties.
She knew where they were, now. This 'female reproductive tract...' Trinitite was fairly sure what the article was referring to. The abyssal shifted in her seat, uncomfortably adjusting her jeans.
Ah… That was what it was for. She didn't need marines crawling around down there. This also might explain why humans were so opposed to nakedness. She still wasn't sure exactly how important this… trade was to them, but covering it made a lot more sense, to keep everyone else focused on their jobs. Otherwise, it could be distracting.
Her thoughts returned to that accursed tape measure Elizabeth of the Fred Meyers Fleet had used on her. She hadn't been through in the slightest, not as much as her paint-and-chip detail had to be, but the fact it had been someone else, and those weird feelings she'd had to deal with...
I'm not an animal, though! I'm a ship!
An alert came from her boiler room, her engineers frantically working to get the pressure in her active boiler under control. She was a ship, sure, but she had the parts, the… organs, as the article named them. Before now, she'd had no idea what that was for, besides creating the occasional leak of oily blood that her paint-and-chip detail would take care of, and she had no idea if there actually was genetic material there, but the idea of something entering-
Her arms and legs tensed as she twitched away from the computer. The chair had rolled back, somewhat, giving her legs time to bounce and rub together as she tried to shake the mental image from her head. Emergency pressure valves in her boiler room suddenly opened, injuring a handful of unlucky engineers as the compartment filled with rapidly-cooling steam.
That- that was enough for today. Standing perhaps a little too suddenly, Trinitite closed the article and gently pushed the chair back into place. After that, she turned, marching out of the library and trying desperately to ignore the human rangefinders that were boring into her hull.
There was no way this blush wasn't ruining her disguise. Almost desperately, she lightly slapped her cheeks, but she'd already know that was never going to help. She needed something else to think about, and fast.
Like food! Yeah, a carrier always needs to eat, and she'd only done so early this morning! Her supply situation was still good, but Trinitite wanted nothing else but to be alone right now. On the way to and from the Walmart Fleet's installation, she'd passed a fairly open space with a nice, small lake, and plenty of vegetation to serve as cover. What had the sign called it, again?
A park! Yeah, she needed to eat at the park! The lake probably looked amazing in the current light!
Direct hit! Wo-class has suffered critical damage to innocence!
Anyways, this isn't a topic I've really written about before, but I still feel like I got just the right amount of awkward for what was happening. Let me know if you disagree, because I'm sure I will hate it after reading it a year or two from now. It was also one of those scenes where you just don't know where it's going to go until you've finished it.
Anyways, the plot is going to skip to Monday in the next chapter. Obviously, that'll mean a return of Alton, now that he's had a day to think and rethink his revelation, along with an interlude I'm pretty exited to write.
Anyways, this isn't a topic I've really written about before, but I still feel like I got just the right amount of awkward for what was happening. Let me know if you disagree, because I'm sure I will hate it after reading it a year or two from now. It was also one of those scenes where you just don't know where it's going to go until you've finished it.
Anyways, the plot is going to skip to Monday in the next chapter. Obviously, that'll mean a return of Alton, now that he's had a day to think and rethink his revelation, along with an interlude I'm pretty exited to write.
