Keller takes the disc and places it neatly back into the box. With a closing of the lid and the press of a button the song continues on with its jubilant melody.
The voices ringing from the box were muffled and distant. Perhaps it was just the rudimentary nature of Keller’s design, but this song certainly didn’t sound like anything I’d heard before. It sounded… old. Like singing from the distant past.
“We were taking bets on when this could have been made, sir,” one crewman draped in a brown cloth pipes up, “I think it’s from the Glass Wars.”
“Fuck off, it’s far too old for that, I’d say twenty-ninth century… at least,” another butts in with a deep baritone voice.
“What about you Keller?” I ask, the Engineer sitting himself down. Keller puts a gloved hand to his face, rubbing more grease onto it.
“I’d say… Reclamation,” he guesses, putting his hand to his chin in a comedic fashion. The group howls in laughter at the idea.
“Reclamation! Fuck you! Something like that doesn’t survive that long out there!” the man to my right yells.
“I like that idea,” I say, and the laughter dies down, eyebrows raise. “I’d say it’s Reclamation too.”
“Well looks like you win, Keller,” another jokes. “Captain has final say. Reclamation it is. We’re listening to the original Aryans.”
“There’s no way to know for sure,” I state, not wanting the festivities to end just yet, “So what are we betting?” I ask. “Just so I know what we get if we win.” I point to Keller and me.
“The finest German whiskey, aged twelve years, winner gets the bottle.” Keller states, holding up a fine brown bottle with the engraving of an eagle. An idea pops into my head. There is a way that we could figure out this little mystery… or at least, the best-educated way to.
“I have a way to settle this,” I say. “My brother Ulric. Knights have all that knowledge of Reich history over any of us buffoons. He might help.” Drunken agreement arises from the crowd.
“I’ll go wake him up!” the man to my right eagerly says, but before he stands I place a hand on his shoulder.
“If some random sailor he doesn’t know knocks on his door at this time of night, I guarantee he won’t come out, and we’ll never learn the secret,” I joke. “I’ll do it.”
With that, I lift myself up, excuse myself from the group who raise their drinks to me, and turn back toward the portway into the officer quarters.
The joyous song still plays behind me. It must have been some crazy bastard, to go out into the desert to get that. Yes, it was “illegal” to take objects from the sand, but nobody really bothered to scavenge anyway. Going out without a ship oftentimes was just suicide.
A decent suit of armor was really the best and only defense against the scalding heat outside, and at best it lasted a few hours. After that, the last bit of power runs out, the cooling systems fail, and the suit’s occupant succumbs to the heat in a matter of minutes.
Who would want to risk their own life to try to find something out there? Everything interesting, like old ships and lost civilizations once under the sea, had supposedly been picked clean long ago. Who would expect that after two thousand years, there would still be objects out there left undiscovered? Something potentially from the Reclamation—from the time of the Eternal Führer and the founding of the Reich? The time when Europeans reclaimed their land from the influence of foreign outsiders…
It was a difficult time. Everything changed so rapidly. Technology, culture, society as a whole. Records from that time were simply lost over the thousands of years. Now only the legends, the book My Struggle, and the dams remained as a testament to that time we can only imagine now.
The origins of the Aryans have always been wrapped in a bit of mystery because of that. So to have something from that time, to hear those voices speaking back to us… if it was actually true… that’d be a remarkable find.
I stroll down to the special chambers where the officers sleep and find myself in a dimly lit, empty hallway. Most of the occupants are out on the deck or stuck in the Bridge. I really should get back to Volker and Witzel, yet my curiosity is getting the best of me.
I reach a metal door and knock softly on it with three rhythmic hits. There is no response. After a minute of waiting, the door slowly opens, revealing a puzzled Ulric. He has disbanded his armor for the night. His eyes, half shut, look back at me as he scratches at his disheveled hair. Looking past him, I see inside his quarters a book placed upon his mattress. It looks like a copy of My Struggle.
“What is it?” he asks, resting an exhausted hand on his forehead. “I was about to sleep.”
“Not socializing with the crew, huh?” I say with a smile to a sleepy Ulric. He looks back at me, unresponsive. Mouth agape.
“Not particularly,” he yawns after a few seconds. “I was just reading, it’s pretty late.”
“It’s only 22:00,” I chuckle. “Nobody sleeps this early.”
“Two hours to read before bed. I was on the section where the Führer discusses how peace in Europe came to be.”
“Want to use that reading for some good?” I say. Ulric’s eyebrows perk up, and he straightens himself up just a little bit.
“What do you mean?” he asks, an inflection of curiosity coming through his tired voice.
“First Engineer Keller somehow got in the possession of this old black disc.” I explain, putting my hands in the shape of the circular object, “It plays a song, and nobody can place when it was made.”
“And this can’t wait ’til tomorrow because…”
“A twelve-year-old whiskey is on the line,” I flat out admit.
Ulric stares at me blankly, blinks a few times slowly, and begins to close the door. My hand goes to catch it.
“The song might be from the Reclamation,” I quickly explain, just before the metal hatch shuts. A gap still persists, before Ulric swings open the door again, snapping himself out of his stupor. He looks at me with wide eyes at the sound of the word.
“You’re joking?” he asks, his tone shifting to excitement.
“Not at all, that’s why we need you. You’re the scholar here,” I say.
Ulric stands frozen. I can tell the cogs must be turning. He looks to his bed, and then back to me.
“Damn it,” he curses under his breath. “Wait here.” And with that he shuts the door.
Back on the deck, I lead Ulric past the other fires and toward the group with the booming song. They notice we’ve arrived and raise their drinks yet again, welcoming Ulric in. He nods to the men. I can tell his main focus is on whatever the artifact must be, as he sits down on a stool. I join him.
“My brother caught the best of my curiosity. Damn him,” Ulric says. “So what am I looking at?”
“That is an audio device,” Keller answers in a satisfactory tone, pointing with pride at the unremarkable combination of wood, wire, and a horn fitted on top. “I made it myself, took a couple months.” The song continues on with its melody: