After finishing a ret repair job, Alexander decided to take a break and head down to the terminal to order some supplies as a few of his printer materials were running low. And maybe check his mert at to see how much money his patent had earned him.

  When he checked his at, he was surprised to see a message waiting for him.

  Hello Mr. Kane,

  You don’t know me but a mutual Captain friend told me of your improvements. I was skeptical until I checked out your work myself and I must say, impressive.

  Before I gush too much, let me introduce myself. My name is Dr. Nova Lund. I run a researstitute out past the rim. We study all sorts of theoretical sce, but our focus is primarily on improving the speed of travel between stars.

  I know there are the hypergates, and humanity has the Alcubierre drive, although you may just know it as the or bubble drive. The first is hardly uood and the sed is turies old. Each has its limitations.

  We want to break those limitations! This is ould like to offer you a position within roup. I know this may seem sudden, and it is, but your talents would fit anization perfectly. We have a lot of theories, but we need someone capable of turning those theories into reality. I think you’re just the person to make that happen.

  Even if this offer doesn’t i you, here is my personal number. If you ever wish to chat about sce or other matters, please reach out to me. Those of us who still wish to push the boundaries of sce grow fewer every year. We must stick together!

  Thank you for your time, Dr. Nova Lund.

  Alexander would have done a slow blink if he had eyes. Luainly was right, this offer was kind of out of nowhere. And while iing, he didn’t know who this person was, let alone if he could trust them. From the letter, he had a pretty good guess as to who this mutual friend was. The only people that knew of his work were Captain Daniel and his crew. And the few people who had purchased his design improvements. Also… what the hell ergate?

  As he perused the for information about these gates, he thought more about the Doctor’s letter. Of course, Alexander knew of faster-than-light capabilities. You didn’t build an ielr empire without the ability to travel faster than light. And he had worked on or near enough ships to see they weren’t doing that with their thrusters. He just hadn’t known the specifics of how they aplished this feat. Like the grav-pting, teical manuals for advaech like that were way out of his price range.

  Although now that he knew, maybe he shouldn’t be surprised. He had memories of this Alcubierre drive, and that it was theoretically possible from back when he was human, just not any specifi the research about it. Usually, the only thing keeping something from going from theoretical to practical was a teological breakthrough of some sort. It was good to know humanity had figured that out. His fragmented memories of Earth didn’t paint a very bright picture of humanity's ces of survival from back then.

  The hypergate information was likely locked behind a simirly expensive paywall. Except he hadn’t even known to look for information oeology. Most of the information he had purchased focused on human history, ret history specifically. Which is why he had missed this important footnote.

  Hypergates were not avaible in human history archives because humanity hadn’t built them. Aliens being real was another revetion. But he didn’t have the credits to go diving into that subject at the moment.

  As he perused the avaible dots on hypergates, he realized humanity had stumbled across the structures only forty years after first leaving the Sol system. There were multitudes of research papers written about the objects. But there were no teical dots for purchase. At first, he thought they might be top secret or something, but then why leave the research papers for ao purchase?

  He purchased a few of these papers and studied them. Funnily enough, one paper was from Dr. Lund. Unfortunately, even the doctor could only specute on who made them and how they worked. Some seemed to think the shi, a race of feline-like aliens, had built them. However, the other papers rejected this notion because the teology didn’t matything the shis possessed.

  So not only were aliens real, but humanity had entered at least one species. Alexander really wished he had unlimited credits and time so he could scratch that itch to know more. But he didn’t so he quickly moved on.

  The leading theory on the hypergates seemed to be they somehow either folded space or created a wormhole between two points. Nobody was quite sure, and the govers that had taken residen those systems with hypergates, which acted like major hubs for humanity, had strictly forbidden anyone from doing anything that might damage or disable the unknown teology.

  It made seo Alexander. If he trolled a major trade hub, he would want to protect that at all costs. And the fact that nobody knew how to make or fix these hypergates, meant they would lose everything if they stopped w.

  Thankfully, he didn’t trol aire system, so his opinion was quite different. Alexander certainly wouldn’t trust some unknown teology, at least until he knew how to repair it if it broke. Probably not even then until he could recreate it from scratch. Another fact that seemed to get glossed over by most of these papers, but not Lund’s, was the fact that the three gates just so happeo be pced in human habitable systems. And they were all within fifteen light years from Earth, yet Sol didn’t have a gate.

  Acc to Lund, that clearly shoreference from whoever built them to avoid humanity even though they were likely very simir to us. The aliens that built the gates probably wouldn’t be too thrilled if they found out humanity had coopted them for their own use. Assuming they were still around. There was no evideo suggest they were.

  But that was something way above Alexander’s pay grade. He was more ied ieology behind these hypergates, but nobody had ever risked taking a gate apart for study so there wasn’t anything to learn. He sighed. sidering the ents in the research paper, this robably why Lund was so hell-bent on finding alternatives.

  Although even if humanity lost access to these gates, they wouldn’t lose much. Travel would certainly be slower to key systems, but it was on the order of months instead of days. It wasn’t like it would cause the STO to e crumbling apart. Some systems may struggle if they aren’t self-suffit, but any system with a habitable phat couldn’t sustain itself robably doomed eventually anyway.

  A shift like that may even see humanity ehe eological revolution. y is the mother of iion and all that.

  While it was iing to postute the possibilities, Alexander o get back to work. He quickly pced his order and headed back to his shop, but not before sending a quick respoo Dr. Nova Lund.

  Thank you for the kind offer, Dr. Lund, but my current situation ates that I remain where I am. However, I would like to take you up on your offer to discuss further stific theory if you are amenable.

  Alexander.

  When Alexander returo his shop, he found a rather bashful Yulia talking with an older dy holding what looked like a toaster. Well, he didn’t specify what he would fix.

  “Greetings, I hope I didn’t make you wait too long.”

  The woman turo him and gave him a motherly smile. “Nonsense, Dear. I was just having a nice chat with this lovely young dy here.”

  Alexander held out his hand, and the woman took it without hesitation. “I’m Alexander. And if she fot to introduce herself, that is Yulia.”

  “Yulia? What a lovely name,” she wi the girl, making Yulia smile and blush while turning away. “You call me Eva. I was told you fix things?”

  “That I do,” he said opening his door auring for them to e inside.

  “OH!” Eva said in surprise as Yulia raced past her to get to her stool.

  Alexander chuckled, making his avatar do the same. “Don’t mind her. She likes to watch me work as well as study.”

  “And her parents don’t mind?” the older woman whispered. Not that Yulia would have heard her. She was already fixated on the meical puzzle Alexander had built for her today.

  “She’s a ward of the station,” Alexander replied sadly.

  “Aw, poor child. If I was a decade younger, I might sider adopting, but I’m lucky if I have a few years left in these old bones,” she stated simply.

  Alexander wasn’t going to challenge her assessment, but she hadn’t felt weak when they shook. Her grip was firm and calloused. It reminded him more of the workers whht him items to fix rather than an old granny.

  “So, what have yht me today?”

  The woman turo him and held out the item with a smile that seemed to drive away any mencholy. He had to check his memories for a moment to make sure magic wasn’t a thing. Nope, sure wasn’t.

  “Toaster elements up and died on me.”

  His first guess was accurate, it was a toaster. He wouldn’t make any money on it, but he would fix it all the same.

  As he worked to disassemble the device, the woman chatted with him. He didn’t mind. He had grown fond of chatting with Yulia so more people to talk to was infinitely better. That being said, the woman sounded a bit lonely.

  She kept trying to get him to e over to dinner. He politely refused, not wanting t up his cover story.

  She switched to talking about her time as a first mate aboard a ship. Then she asked him about himself.

  Although Alexander didn’t mind, it got a bit unfortable since he didn’t have much to talk about. So he gave her vague answers until finally tellihat he was essentially trapped in a box that kept him alive. Teically true.

  The woman didn’t even bat a that, although she did give him a pat on the arm in sympathy.

  Alexaold her how he met Yulia. The woman ughed lightly at that. “Children get up to all sorts of things. Why, I practically raised the Captain’s son. I swear if there were something that boy could break, he would find it.”

  “That’s cause boys are doo-doo heads,” Yulia chimed in happily. She had just finished her puzzle and the little meical frog was hopping about the desk.

  Eva ughed. “I won’t argue with you on that, child.”

  A few mier, Alexander finished reassembling the toaster. “All done,” he said, pushing the device across the ter.

  “Thank you, Dear. How much do I owe ya?”

  “It’s on the house, Eva. Call it thanks for the wonderful stories.”

  She shook her head. “That wouldn’t be right. Work deserves pay.” She pulled out a credit chip a oable.

  Alexander went to hand it back to her, but she gave him a disapproving frown that made him feel like some misbehaving child. “I won’t take no for an answer.”

  “…Um… Thank you, Eva.”

  Her frown turned bato a smile. “You are wele, Alexander. And it was wonderful meeting you. You as well Yulia.”

  The girl turned bashful again.

  The woman gave o wave before walking out with her repaired toaster.

  After Eva left, he turo Yulia. “How e you were ag so withdrawn?”

  She shrugged. “Dunno.”

  He sighed internally but left it at that.