Bridgebuilder

Lukewarm Welcome

"Good morning, Mr. Sorenson." Shawn, the technician who monitored Alex during the mornings, stretched out the 'good' for a solid three seconds like he was a radio DJ, which did sort of fit the twangy northern martian drawl he had. After five days of waking up to that, it was starting to grate on him.

Alex squinted into the overhead lights as they warmed up and rolled onto his side, looking at the clock through the thick observation wall. Six AM, just like yesterday and the day before that. Just like every day since they had taken the portal back to the Solar System. "You got half of that right."

"Sunny as always, I see. Please proceed to the scanner." Shawn's voice was coming from somewhere in the ceiling, likely working from a different part of the station. Alex hadn't been able to locate the speaker. Aside from the lights, all he could see was the single air vent, a scanner array and a half-dozen burner nozzles. Not being there in person probably made it easier to fry the room if need be.

"Bathroom first." He swung his legs out from what passed for a bed, standing with a stretch. The quarantine room was a strange place. With the exception of the ceiling and observation wall - 250 millimeter thick impact resistant glass with an airlock - it was nothing but white, curved surfaces with varying levels of resistance. The bed itself was little more than a soft plateau rising up from the hard floor with a pillow-like lump at one end.

Shawn didn't reply, but the lights on the camera nodes went off. He didn't know if they actually shut the cameras off, but there were laws that allowed basic levels of privacy, even in quarantine. There were a host of other ways they could monitor him without violating those laws. Heat scanners, sonar, lidar... that big observation window. While the hallway it was open to was currently empty, it was the most difficult thing to get used to when he was taking care of his business.

Coming home had not been triumphant. Not that it wasn't great at first, when he gently accelerated the Kshlav'o out through the ring. That first minute had been tremendously exciting. He had been on top of the world.

As it turned out, having an object of unknown origin appear out of nowhere in your home system set off all of the alarms. Having it spit out a ship that had been listed as an emergency recovery, supposedly dead in the water several thousand light years away, exacerbated the response.

There had been a lot of very authoritative yelling on the comm.

A boarding craft had come for them, soldiers in full boosted armor escorting them off the Kshlav'o at gunpoint. It was hard to tell if someone was sympathetic or not with the faceplate they put on those suits. The flight to the medical station had been very, very quiet.

That had turned right around just as soon as Alex had been sequestered into his quarantine suite. Several branches of the military had come around to take statements on what happened in the dyson shell. Most of it, anyway. He may have omitted the part about taking a nap with his girlfriend.

They had been particularly unhappy that he had shut off his recording equipment. None of them seemed to like the answer that he had just wanted some privacy while he went to relieve himself and had forgotten to turn it back on.

Once they had gotten enough information, they disappeared. Alex hadn't spoken to anyone but Shawn in the morning and then Lorin in the evenings since then. They both seemed like good people. He hoped they were, anyway. They had access to the button that would burn the room, after all.

He washed his hands and dried them on the mint green scrubs they had furnished him with. "Done."

The camera lights came back on. "Good. Now proceed to the scanner."

It was only three steps away. Another platform rising up from the floor, narrow and directly under the medical scanning array. He climbed onto it, head resting on a squishy lump at one end. There were three scans per day in quarantine. Alex closed his eyes, expecting to pick up some more sleep. Not like they needed him to do anything other than lie there.

The scanner hummed to life above him. "You want your five day evaluation?"

Alex shrugged, eyes still closed. "Sure, why not?"

"Everything looks good so far. Even taking into account the repairs made by the mediboard, you returned in slightly worse shape than you left. That is consistent with how the body reacts to long periods of elevated stress."

"I don't recommend getting shot up by the Eohm."

That got a chuckle out of Shawn. "In addition, your scans have been clear of any sign of infections, viruses or foreign bodies - with the exception of that thing fused to your sternum. That's giving the boys in the lab a fit."

"Oh yeah?"

Shawn hummed an affirmative noise. "It doesn't scan well, or appear to do anything. It just seems to get them all riled up. They think your account of how you got it is impossible, but there it is."

He found that was particularly annoying. It had been incredibly painful, something he didn't expect he would ever forget. "Shame they weren't there, could have experienced it firsthand for themselves."

Shawn sounded particularly entertained by that idea. "I don't reckon they'd like that very much."

"They have any thoughts on what it is?" Alex knew they probably wouldn't talk about that, but he asked anyway.

"I've heard a few things being floated around." He hesitated, the speaker going dead for a moment as Shawn took a moment to consider his next statement. "They all seem to come back to your first assertion."

He had assumed it was there as a sort of ID chip, possibly for tracking or just a pass of sorts to use the portals or other systems on the shell, if they ever found any other systems. "Good to hear, but it feels like cold comfort right now."

"I can understand that." A keyboard clattered furiously in the background of the audio stream, for a moment. "Your morning scan is done, by the way. As long as nothing changes, you'll be out of there in another two days."

Exposure to unknown alien environments had a one week quarantine. The scans were to make sure they weren't missing anything that could have adverse effects on him, or be otherwise transmitted to the general populace. That's how you get alien zombies, after all. Better cautious than getting your brain eaten. "So soon? How's Shipmaster Tshalen doing? Is that something you guys can tell me?"

"Hang on." There was a significant pause this time, long enough for a nurse to drop off clean scrubs and his morning nutragel in the smaller airlock embedded in the airlock, and leave the observation hall before he came back. The speaker popped back on and Shawn's chair was the first thing through it, squeaking loudly as he sat back down. "Yeah, hey, are you still there?"

"No, I checked out. The other quarantine station has a jacuzzi." Alex replied through a mouthful of faintly flavored though highly nutritious gelatin based food substance. "Five stars for service but the amenities here are lacking."

"Supposed I walked into that one." He cleared his throat before continuing. "They say she seems annoyed about everything but professional, and was pleased to hear you wanted to check up on her and inquired about your well being. We have to get approval from you before releasing anything, of course."

"Yeah, that sounds like her." Alex smiled and laughed, "by all means, you have my permission."