“Ah,” Igid says as understanding flashes across her face. “The Replicator takes care of that.”
Nudging me out of the way, Igid takes the tray to the Replicator and stacks the dishes inside of it. When she closes the door, I hear awhirringsound.
“How does the Replicator work?” I ask, coming up behind her.
“You don’t have Replicators where you come from?” Igid straightens from stowing the tray in a cabinet. Her brows knit tightly, and she’s looking at me as if I told her we didn’t have something as basic as indoor plumbing.
“Not exactly.” How do I explain to her that just because we don’t have the equivalent of a replicator doesn’t mean we’re stuck in the Stone Age?
“It’s easy,” Igid says, turning away from me. With a tap of her finger, the replicator lights up with alien characters. Realizing I won’t be able to read them, she points to a purple squiggle. “Tap this.”
The menu screen changes from writing to a visual menu. “All you have to do is choose the dish you want. You can scroll up or down using the buttons on the side.” Stepping aside, she motions for me to try.
None of the dishes pictured are recognizable, and I’m about to choose something at random when I see an image for Kahva. I tap the icon, and the screen goes blank. A moment later it beeps at me.
“Did… did I do something wrong?” Crap. Leave it to me to break the Replicator the first time I try to use it.
“Not at all.” Igid laughs and opens the front, like she did for the dirty dishes. Inside, my steaming mug of Kahva is waiting.
“That was fast,” I muse, taking the mug from Igid. She closes the Replicator door and shakes her head as she taps out what she wants.
“Your people are very strange,” she tells me, opening the door and taking out a bowl of steaming… something. It’s green, and I think I see a tentacle floating on the surface, but I can’t be sure. It smells all right, somewhat like curry.
We sit at the table, Igid with her tentacle curry and me with my mug of kahva.
“We must be very strange to you too.” She stabs a—yup, it’s a tentacle—with her spork and pops it into her mouth.
“Different for sure,” I take a sip, “but I don’t know if I’d say strange.”
“Yes, I think you’re right.” Igid grins at me over my bowl. “Have you left many behind?”
I pause, the mug halfway to my mouth, and my mind goes to everyone I’ve left behind. “Yes,” I quietly say.
“I am sorry.” She nods reverently. “In a way that makes you lucky.”
I open my mouth to contradict her, to ask how having people miss me would make me lucky?
Before I have a chance, she continues, “If something happened to me, there would be no one to mourn me. Well, no one besides Rovos, Treto and Sone. They are the closest I’ve come to having a family.” She’s been looking into her soup but then lifts her eyes to me. “Did you have a mate?”
“A mate?” Like a husband? I shake my head. “No. Nothing like that. No serious potential… mates, either.”
“Who do you leave behind, then?” she asks me.
“My mom and dad. My sister. Friends. A job I worked hard to get.” I take another sip of kahva, but it’s gone cold so I push it away.
For the next hour, I get caught up in telling Igid about my family and friends. And she listens raptly to everything I have to say.
I tell her about my parents, who had only planned on having one child. They were already in their thirties when they had my sister. So it was a surprise when I arrived, quite by accident, ten years later. Some people might feel bitter having an unexpected child so late in life, but my parents took it in stride. I tell her how, despite our age differences, I’ve remained close with my sister and her family. How, ever since I was a little girl, I wanted to be a nurse. Focusing all my energy and working my ass off, I made it into one of the top schools and graduated with my pick of hospitals.
“All that hard work, and for what?” I gripe, slouching against the table. “What good is my nursing degree in space, where they have med-bots and food replicators?”
“Your hard work proves you are dedicated,” Igid tells me, leaning over the table. “It may not mean the same here as it does on your planet, but it proves you aren’t afraid to work hard or to carry out what you set your mind to.”
“I—” My mouth opens and closes like a fish out of water, then I laugh because… “You’re right. Thank you, that’s what I needed to hear.”
Igid grins at me and then slides out from the table, taking our dishes to the replicator. After closing them inside, she turns to face me. “You’re welcome. I have work still to do. Would you like to help me?”
I consider it but then shake my head. “I want to wander around the ship, if that’s all right. I still haven’t figured out my way around without getting lost.”
