Cosmic Dash: Pause & Effect

Day One: Part One

Bunk Room: Hour 2

The diagrams flew across the touch screen as Dash Kameku flicked through them absent-mindedly. He skimmed each one looking for a place to start, some nugget of insight or flashing text that more or less spelled "start here." So far, his arrangement with Mr. Kimney had been entirely one-sided, though not from a lack of effort on Dash's part. Bucketbot had become a big help in Dash's duties aboard the ship, but recent events and the general workload had kept him from providing any real suggestions to the multitude of project files Kimney had transferred to him... and continued to transfer, almost daily. Dash's eyelids drooped. The days had begun to run together. He resigned himself to giving the project files a serious once-over since lately he didn't feel comfortable sleeping.

He continued browsing on auto-pilot. Throughout the documents, one recurring term offered some small glimmer of interest to him. Nanotech. Even though he studied applied energies, ion and particle accelerators, propulsion, and energy shielding in college, he was always intrigued by robotics. He had been working on his own robotic project for months and, despite needing to teach himself the basics, progress was steady. He was in no way knowledgeable enough to figure out just what was the deal with Blu, but then he doubted anyone could explain that little stowaway robot. He set a flag for all documents marked "nanotech" and reclined in his chair at the terminal. He felt his eyelids grow heavier, but he knew he didn't want to sleep. It had been this way since the Vark-incident; his eyes would ache and he'd fight against them. He rubbed at his eyes with his fingertips and let out a groan. He adjusted his vision, watching splotchy colors drift away from his field of view, and then fixed his stare at the monitor, looking at nothing in particular.

He knew everyone would wake up soon, so he shut off the terminal and crawled into his bunk. He wrapped himself in a blanket as he stared at the plastisteel-tile ceiling. He continued staring for what seemed like an eternity until finally, he heard Guugel, the diminutive, one-eyed security guard, get up out of his own bunk to begin his day. A few minutes later he found himself drifting off. Sleep overtook him.

Bunk Room: Hour 3

Dorian woke up two hours before his alarm. Again. His eyes were wide open as he stared at the time displayed on the front of his data-wallet, which rested on the nightstand next to his bunk.

He turned over and tried to go back to sleep. He enveloped himself in his covers, folding and tucking them under his body. He went into a fetal position. He closed his eyes as tight as he could and breathed at a steady rhythm. In and out. In... and out.

He threw the covers off of his body and grabbed for his data-wallet, picking it up and waking it with a tap on the screen. The lock screen was blank for now. If the ship was within galactic network range, there would be all sorts of notifications on it. With such limited network reception out in space, it seemed as if it was more of a glorified watch and music player than anything useful to him. He unlocked his data-wallet, went to the network settings and turned on the wireless radio. He waited, staring at his static home screen in the dim room.

His data-wallet began to vibrate in short bursts, buzzing over and over. Icons upon icons appeared. Windows popped up and tabs popped out on every direction of the screen. He made deft swipes and quick taps, clearing the notifications and pop-up windows. After a minute, the home screen was clear. He opened the social media folder and held his finger over the Spacebook icon. He hesitated for a second... before tapping it.

He waited a moment as his news feed refreshed itself. His feed was now full of posts where his friends and university colleagues did their best to show off to one another. There was a picture of his sophomore friend Songo taking a selfie with an award for excellence in research from the Salderi Project. If Songo could help them find the cure for spacer-rot, he could cure himself of narcissism, too. Niloa, from Dorian's xenoimmunology class, posed with her Parrack friends in front of a climate-controlled display of tropical trees at the Skyhaven Parrack National Embassy on Oonoo. Dorian wondered how such a cold woman found so many friends in warm places. The rest of the feed consisted of ads for products he did not need and for concerts he wished he could attend. As he suspected, he had no messages.