The Alien Ship Ch. 03

Kyle quickly discovered that his chair could swivel to allow him to face any direction within the room and this would allow him to easily directly observe the activity at any of the workstations. Tracy took some time to show Kyle the controls he had available on the arms of his chair, mainly interfaces to the AI and communication systems. Kyle spent a few minutes practicing with them and getting a start with learning how the controls on his chair worked.

The central control room was one of the three points where it was possible to bypass the AI and control the engines and other parts of the ship directly. This was provided by the original builders of the ship to allow the living people on board to retain control of the ship if the Artificial Intelligence ever failed for some reason. In addition to central control there was also the secondary control room, which was identical in size and layout to the central control room but in a different location, and the engineering control center. Any of the three points could be used to control the ship directly if that were needed.

After spending a few more minutes in central control Kyle decided he's had enough touring the ship for the day and so he decided to return to his cabin. Arriving back there he discovered he could watch most of the movies available from Earth on his view screen, since the ship's AI was continuously monitoring satellite communications, which included the video feeds for most of the major cable channels. Kyle selected a recent release and settled down to watch on the big screen in his cabin. The screen was so large it was almost like a movie theatre and it was even better after the two female androids sat on the couch and snuggled up to him.

About half way through the movie Kyle received a call from Cindy. It seemed she was going to be delayed several hours before returning to the ship with Shelley but she would still be coming back. Cindy also told Kyle she was bringing a surprise for him, he would see it when she got back to the ship. Kyle spent a few more minutes talking to Cindy before ending the call and putting away his phone and resuming the movie.

After the movie finished Kyle had dinner from the meal dispenser in his cabin, the two android girls providing conversation even though they did not need to eat anything. Kyle found that asking the androids questions about the ship seemed to be easier and more personal than talking directly to the ships AI. Though, of course with the networking and intercommunication between them it was really just the same thing anyway. And as he talked with the robot girls more their conversation became more fluid and human-like and less like talking with a computer.

After eating Kyle watched another movie and then went to bed. He was curious about the two androids so he asked them to join him in his bed. He wasn't quite ready to experiment too much with them yet but it did feel nice to have them cuddled up to him and he was almost able to forget they were machines.