“Dang it!” Leo crossed his arms and looked at the floor, defeated. Think! There had to be some other way to… He blinked at the shredded Dreda webbing still littering the deck. “Wait! I just remembered something!”
Waverlee kneeled on the lid of Burlock’s gurney, bouncing up and down on his chest like she was trying to close an overstuffed suitcase.
“You’re about to go into heat!” she glubbed. “Gah! Mammals are so gross!”
“What? No! Just so much no!” Leo snapped. “Dilly, when we got to the Murderblossom concert you tried to unplug a speaker and electrocuted yourself, remember?”
“Yes.” Dilly’s gray face wrinkled. “Is not good memory.”
“Yes it is! Because it means Dreda webbing is electrically conductive.”
Kellybean’s head cocked. “Wait, are you suggesting Hax use Dilly’s silk as cable?”
Leo turned to Dilly. “Would that work?”
Dilly flicked its wrist, firing a web at Burlock’s gurney. As soon as the strands bridged the gap between the edge of the lid and the contacts on the bed, a white spark blasted Waverlee off the top with a bubbly yelp. The diagnostic panels lit up as the connected electronics whirred to life. Dilly nodded.
“It would work.” It scuttled to Hax. “Come along, robot. We have repairs to make.”
It grabbed Hax and stuffed him under its arm. Hax cheered as Dilly raced off the bridge. “Wheee! New lab partner!”
Waves of power sizzled across the window as rocks and ice peppered the hull. Leo turned to his crew. “Any chance we can get that magnetosphere shield back online before the storm obliterates us?”
“I’m sure Praz is all over it,” Swooch said.
“Praz abandoned ship!” Kellybean cried.
“Oh.” Swooch shrugged. “Then no.”
Kellybean hopped down from the MonCom console. “I can go take a look. But I’m gonna need someone who’s a genius with hardware. Someone I can trust.” She threw a coy glance at the EngTech station. “Do you want to get out of here?”
Jassi grinned and cracked her knuckles. “Yes, I definitely do.”
***
Alerts buzzed and warnings flashed across the glitching consoles of the primary machine room. Beyond the windows, the dynamo chamber was quiet and dark. The enormous orb of its iron core sat dead still in a ring on the floor with its plasma shell pooled in a moat around it. Kellybean pawed at a flickering console screen as Jassi lay underneath, yanking out its wiring.
“There’s one thing I still don’t understand,” Kellybean said distractedly. “If you knew Stobber put something in my drink, why didn’t you tell me?”
“Apparently I did. But we were too blotto to remember.” Jassi stripped a wire with her teeth and spat out the insulation. “I hauled you out of there to sleep it off ’cause I didn’t want you to get in trouble. I know you have a reputation to uphold and all.”
A blush ran through Kellybean’s ears. “That was very gallant. I’m sorry I accused you of disrespecting me.”
Jassi shrugged. “I’m sorry I formed a band with the biggest arzehole in the galaxy.” She twisted two wires together and Kellybean’s glitching console resolved to clarity. “Boom.”
“Nice!” Kellybean leaned in and studied the screen.
Jassi climbed to her feet and waved at the darkened dynamo. “So do you actually know how to start that thing?”
“Maybe?” Kellybean tapped the interface. “I’ve got a level-one engineering certification, but the dynamo is really high-end stuff. Hopefully the help files are—”
She hissed as a hologram burst from the top of her console. It depicted an orb of black iron the size of a basketball with two big googly eyes.
“It looks like you’re booting the dynamo!” the sphere shouted.
“Ack!” Jassi snapped. “What the shix is that?”
“I’m Core-y! I’m the magnetosphere dynamo interactive assistant! Would you like help?”
“Yes!” Kellybean said. “How do we power up the dynamo?”
“I’d be happy to guide you through the process,” Core-y said brightly. “But first, would you like to install updates?”
“No.”
“Are you sure? Regular updates keep your system running at optimal—”
“It’s not running at all!” Kellybean snapped. “Just tell me how to turn it on!”
“Technically, it is on,” Core-y beamed. “A system failure has put your dynamo into emergency core lockdown.”
“Fine! How do we fix it?”
“First you’ll have to initiate the suspensor beams through the stabilization interface.”
Kellybean’s screen changed to a diagram showing the iron core resting on the deck with six beam emitters surrounding it. Three on the floor and three on the ceiling.
“Thank you!” She tapped each one in sequence and the room went dim as a deep mechanical rumble thrummed through the deck plating. In the dynamo chamber, the three lower emitters kicked on, blasting the enormous sphere with blue light. It trembled in its base, but didn’t move. Errors flashed over Kellybean’s console. “What’s wrong? I did what you said!”
Core-y tried to answer, but his hologram blinked and glitched unintelligibly.
“I don’t get it,” Jassi said. “We should have enough juice for this, unless…” She unlatched a wall panel and peered inside at a row of twitching gauges. “Shix! The whole ship has been running on backup batteries since the primary power links were severed.” She waved at the core. “It’s enough to keep the air on and the beer cold, but no way it’s gonna be able to get that thing’s heavy arze off the ground.”
“Arg! Okay. Plan B.” Kellybean’s tail thrashed as she pulled up a list of all ship systems. “Maybe I can steal enough power to lift it, but it’s going to mean turning off almost everything.”
“What if we only turned off one thing?”
Kellybean shook her head. “Nothing pulls enough power by itself to—” Jassi pointed to one checkbox. Kellybean’s eyes widened. “Oh my gosh, Jassi. You’re a genius.”
***
On the bridge, Doctor Waverlee fussed over Burlock’s bed, poking at the control panels and adjusting levels of medication and healing currents.
“Is he going to be all right?” Leo asked.
Waverlee shrugged as lightning sizzled across the window. “Well, he’s not gonna die of old age, that’s for sure.”
Leo turned to the only bridge station still occupied. “Swooch, any word from Hax and Dilly?”
“Nope. Lemme see if I can get ’em on the horn.” She leaned over her console and flicked through a crew directory with an agonizing lack of urgency. “Haddonfield… Haggis… Hasselhoff… Ah, Hax.”
She poked the screen and an outgoing call popped up on the front window. A second later it resolved into a video feed of Hax in an engineering conduit.
“Thank you for calling Hax!” the robot said. “I’m sorry, but I am not available to take your call right now.”
Swooch turned to Leo. “Sorry, bro. He’s not there.”
“Clearly he is. I can tell by the way he answered the call.”
“I didn’t say I’m not here, I said I’m not available,” Hax clarified. He shouted off screen. “Good work, Lieutenant Commander Marshmallow Hug Dilly Dilly! Now do breaker L-770 to conduit 118-9.”
“Acknowledged,” Dilly’s collar said.
Leo peered at the robot. “What’s happening? How are your repairs coming along?”
“Oh, just dandy! Check it out.”
Hax turned his camera around to reveal a corridor tall and wide enough to drive a hovercoach down, extending into darkness in both directions. Its walls were lined with sparking wreckage and leaking pipes, torn apart in swaths the size of enormous Nomit hands. But the technological carnage was mostly hidden behind an elaborate and systematic spider web that stretched from wall to wall, ceiling to floor, knitting the ruined components toget
her.
Dilly slapped a spinneret on breaker L-770 then flicked its wrist toward conduit 118-9, throwing out web like a fisherman casting a line. The instant the strand made contact, both ends sparked and the bridge lights brightened with a pleasant whirrr of power.
“Yes!” Leo said. “Whatever you’re doing, do more of it!”
The wall behind Hax slowly drifted downward, as if he were in an invisible elevator. “We’re almost finished. Just a few more connections and the engines should—”
He squeaked and his eyes frizzed as his head banged against the ceiling. All around the corridor, loops of connective webbing floated like seaweed in calm shallows. Leo jumped out of his chair.
“Hax! What did you do—”
Before he could complete his thought, a fist of nausea punched his stomach, as if he’d just gone over the peak of a roller coaster. He yelped and swung his arms as his feet lifted off the deck. In front of him, Swooch gently floated out of her seat like a balloon.
“What’s happening?” Leo shouted.
Waverlee tumbled through the air and caught hold of the MonCom console. “The artificial gravity is off!”
“Gah!” Leo cried. “Another system failure?”
The doctor peered at the screens. “No! Somebody turned it off. On purpose!”
Leo thrashed wildly as he drifted toward the ceiling. “Why would somebody do that?!”
***
The weightless iron core of the magnetosphere dynamo floated in its chamber, slowly drifting from side to side as its suspensor beams erratically pulsed and trembled.
“To the left!” Kellybean shouted. “The left!”
Jassi had six wall panels hanging open, exposing their sparking innards. She twisted a power modulator inside one and a single beam grew brighter, shoving the ball to one side.
“No!” Kellybean shook her head, thrashing her bob in a floating wave. “Sorry! My left!”
“Gah!” Jassi kicked off the wall and flew like a dart to a panel on the other side of the room. She cranked another modulator, tipping the sphere the other way. It drifted against the anemic force of the flickering beams and settled in the center of the space.
“There! Stop!” Kellybean crouched in her bolted-down seat, toe claws dug into the upholstery. “That’s it! The core is aligned!”
“Huck yeah!” Jassi cheered. “Let ’er rip!”
Kellybean mashed her panel, but nothing happened.
“It looks like you’re igniting the plasma sphere!” Core-y the interactive assistant said.
“Yes! Why isn’t it working?”
“The sphere can’t be ignited without a boost from the engines,” Core-y explained. “The system has insufficient power.”
“Still? Come on!” Kellybean hammered her thumb on the pad. “Just ignite, you stupid ball!”
“Ah ah ah! You don’t have enough power.” Core-y wagged side to side condescendingly. “Ah ah ah! Ah ah ah!”
“Please!” Kellybean cried. “Gah damn it! I hate this hacker crap!”
Jassi whipped her rumpled tabloyd from her back pocket and dialed a call. “Hax! Get your shix together! We need those engines powered up!”
***
Dilly sailed through the engineering conduit, patching pipes and connecting junctions. But Leo wasn’t watching the video feed of the Dreda. He was looking past it, through the bridge window, eyes wide in unbridled terror.
The gaping pit of the gravity well loomed in front of them like a planet-sized, polished black marble of nothing. Just a complete and total absence of something, leaving only pure, unadulterated nothing. Enormous boulders caught in the raging storm funnel tumbled into its ravenous maw. As they crossed its event horizon they seemed to pause for a moment before stretching out like an infinitely long noodle and then vanishing in a crackling red fizz of obliteration.
Leo tugged at his collar and whimpered. “Hax? Please hurry.”
“Don’t worry, Mister Captain!” Hax said from the feed. “Just one more… Oh! I have another call.”
He tapped his screen and Jassi appeared in a second window next to him. “Hax! Get your shix together! We need those engines powered up!”
“Well, aren’t I the belle of the ball?” Hax turned to Dilly. “Ready, spider friend?”
Dilly slung a web between a sizzling crystal and a knot of torn wires. “Final connection complete as directed.”
“Then we are good to go!” Hax cheered. “You may fire the engines when ready, Captain!”
“Swooch!” Leo shouted. “Do it! Do the thing!”
“Right on.” Swooch’s stubby legs kicked off the ceiling and she did a slow end-over-end rotation in the air, making a soft, butt-first landing in her chair. She fastened her seat belt and grabbed a set of keys stuck in the helm console. “Let’s rock and roll, brah.”
She cranked the key in the ignition and the video feed from the engineering conduit strobed like a thunderstorm. Hax screamed as Dilly swept him away from the wriggling blue energy blazing through the spider-web wiring. With a deep groan and a gut-churning rumble, all four engine pods thunderously ignited at once.
All around the ship, lights brightened and music echoed through concourses as systems that had been in standby mode woke up. On the bridge, half the console alerts blinked out. The other half still screeched warnings about the gravity well dead ahead.
“Swooch, get us out of here!” Leo shouted.
“You got it, dude!”
The helm officer planted a palm on the steering yoke and languidly cranked the wheel as she stood on the accelerator pedal. Blazing arcs of white-hot exhaust belched from the thrusters, incinerating a mile-wide swath through the storm as the ship did an abrupt 180-degree turn.
***
The machine room lurched to one side, sending the core drifting perilously out of alignment. Kellybean clawed at her console. “It’s shifting! We’re losing it!”
Jassi floated near the ceiling, gripping fistfuls of tied-together cable and hose in both arms. Her makeshift belts were looped around the beam-strength modulator wheels in six different panels circling the room. She grunted and tugged the belts, remotely manipulating the wheels like clothesline pulleys.
“I can’t balance them all! The gain is too unstable to—”
A thunderous bass note rattled the windows as the six flickering suspensor beams suddenly blasted to full power.
“Engine online!” Core-y’s hologram intensified as a smile spread across his face. “Dynamo systems energized! Ready to ignite plasma shell!”
“Do it!” Kellybean cried.
A green “start” button appeared on her console and she smashed it. Core-y’s cartoony sphere began to revolve as a gooey dribble of red plasma crept across his surface like an apple being dipped in toffee.
At the same time, a blinding magenta light seared through the windows. Kellybean threw a paw over her eyes, squinting against the brightness. Fixed firmly between the enormous, blazing columns of the suspensor beams, the iron core accelerated to a blur of speed. As it did, raging streams of superheated, hyperconductive plasma surged upward from the moat and clung to the ball, creating a liquid shell slowly rotating in the opposite direction.
Jassi shuffled off the belts and drifted across the room. “It’s working! Holy shix, it’s working!”
“We did it!” Kellybean cheered.
Core-y’s face disappeared in a blur as he spun himself to oblivion with a joyous, “Wheeeeeeeee!”
***
On the bridge, the pounding hailstorm of rocks against the window went silent as a wave of energy surged off the hull, pushing back the storm in a perfect sphere of protection. Leo’s ears rang in the newfound silence as he gaped at the ball of green aurora blazing a quarter-mile off the bow.
“Yes! The magnetosphere is up!” he cheered.
Waverlee grunted as she wrestled with Burlock’s weightless gurney. “But the gahdamn gravity still off!”
Jassi called out from her comm window. “Oh, that’s us. Hold on.”
She grabbed a slider and Kellybean sucked a breath. “Wait!”
Jassi shoved the control all the way up and a thunderous clatter rang through the ship, as everything from flatware to grand pianos to crew members became reacquainted with the ground. Leo dropped into the captain’s chair with a pained squeak. Burlock’s gurney crashed to the deck, and Waverlee slapped down on top with a dull thwump.
Kellybean winced at Jassi. “FYI, standard procedure for reinstating gravity is to turn it up slowly over a period of five hours.”
Jassi snuffed. “It’s sweet you think we’re gonna live that long.”
Leo gazed out the window at the bow of the ship. It was pointed toward the edge of the storm, but the safety of open space wasn’t getting any closer. In fact, it was creeping farther away. He leaped from his chair and over to Swooch. “What’s wrong? Why aren’t we leaving the accretion disc?”
“I’m tryin’, dude. Every thruster is maxed out full-forward but we’re still getting pulled in.” She shrugged. “Gravity wells are the worst.”
“Show me,” Leo said.
“Right on. Activating rear-view.”
Swooch’s long fingers tapped her console and a holoscreen sizzled up behind Leo. He turned to look at it and a screech caught in his throat. Beyond the blinding ion streams of the engines, the crushing black void of the event horizon inched ever closer behind them, sucking them toward oblivion.
Leo whipped back around, eyes wide and cheeks pale. “I regret looking at that.”
On the comm screen, Hax waved a hand. “Oh, hey captain! I just thought you should know, these repairs are only effective for a limited time.”
“How limited?” Leo asked.
Hax cocked his head. “Surprisingly limited.”
He turned the camera to reveal an inferno blazing through the engineering conduit. White lightning and yellow flame surged through the webbing, turning the strands to cinders. Connections snapped and shorted against their neighbors as Dilly raced up and down the corridor, firing off webs from all of its upper limbs, trying to control the damage. A trembling hiccup rumbled through the engine pods.
“Dilly! Don’t let those engines burn out!” Leo shouted. “That’s an order!”
Galaxy Cruise: The Maiden Voyage Page 22