Kurt straightened up when Jack abruptly stood, turned to him and said, “I want you to work closely with Don on an analysis of this thing. But, you’ll also need to keep a close eye on the ship’s systems. I don’t want to get caught in whatever happened to them, so if you see even the slightest sign of anything unusual…”
Kurt simply answered, “Got it,” and followed as Jack led the way to the bridge. Jack took his seat and started giving directions to Devon, while Kurt followed Don over to his station.
In a low voice, Don said, “From what you described, I don’t expect there to be much for us to analyze. At least not much more than what you’ve already done.”
“You’re probably right,” Kurt answered. “Though, in this case, I wouldn’t mind it at all if you found something I missed. You know, solve this mystery right away and get those guys back safely.”
Don answered only with a half-smile, and directed his console to bring up shuttle-two’s transmitted data logs.
Kurt continued, “I went through their scans a bit. They weren’t even able to show what that thing’s made of. The problem is, I don’t think we’ve got any equipment on board the IPV that’ll do any better.” As Don paged through the data, Kurt looked up at the main view screen. The broad silver arc of the near ring dominated the fore-ground. Behind it was the thicker central ring, with its opaque, black center. When he looked back to Don, the scientist had switched to actively scanning the alien device with the IPV’s instruments.
“I’m not getting any readings on it at all. Nothing. And we’re talking about radar and full-spectral analysis,” Don announced.
Jack turned and asked, “Nothing at all?”
“Nothing. I’m repeating the full range right now: Visible, UV, IR, X and Gamma ray. It’s perfectly reflective across the board. There’s not the slightest bit of absorption or anything.”
“What about the central one?” Jack asked.
Kurt watched Don’s fingers fly across the keypad as he re-aligned the sensors. When the first readings were displayed, Don quickly cleared them and tried again.
Jack’s impatience showed as he said, “Don?”
“Give me a second. We’re closer than before so I want to be sure…”
“What do you mean?”
“The outer surface is just like this ring. Everything I throw at it gets bounced back. But the middle is different. It’s like there’s nothing there.”
“It can’t be empty,” Kurt protested. “Then we’d see the stars on the other side.”
“No, you don’t understand. I’m getting nothing back. On the screen, in visible light, it’s pitch black. That means, it’s absorbing everything. What I’m telling you is that its doing that at all wavelengths. Long radio all the way out to Gamma. I’m not getting the slightest bit of reflection back at all. Nothing solid in this universe absorbs everything and emits nothing. Hell, that’d violate the laws of thermodynamics! The only way that I’d get readings like this is if it were hollow – but that’s obviously not the case since we can’t see through it. It doesn’t make a God damned bit of sense!” Don was practically shouting by the end.
Jack answered in the same calm tone he always used, “Do you see anything unusual at all from the reflected spectra from the outer surface?”
“Nothing...well, there’s a strange bit of skewing of the wavelength distribution. But that could easily be explained away due to the gravitational effects. Remember, we’ve got a planetary mass here compacted down to only a couple dozen kilometers. Or, it could be rotating – like what we were thinking before.”
Jack politely rephrased his question, “Don, is there anything that will help us find out where that shuttle is?”
“No, nothing. I am picking up some of the metal nodules from the alien debris cloud, but not even a hint of anything that I would classify as shuttle debris.”
Kurt watched silently as Jack just stared at the main view screen. He wanted to add something to the discussion, but there really wasn’t anything he had to say. The bottom line was, Kurt still felt fully responsible for the shuttle’s loss. Jack finally broke the silence, saying, “Devon, bring us closer and take us across to the other side of the near ring. We’ll start our search from there. Plot a standard-grid search pattern.”
A wave of apprehension twisted in Kurt’s gut. He didn’t know why, and futilely looked to the view screen, searching for an answer.
“Don,” Jack continued, “scan every inch of that thing while we do this.”
Kurt knew they had to stop, but hesitated. As they approached the half-way point, it felt like he was looking down the barrel of a gun. A wave of nausea shot through him as the image became awash in the same blue-green glow he’d seen in the VR playback. “Jack! Get us...” He wanted to get the rest of the words out, but couldn’t. The room appeared to flex and bend around him, like he was looking through water. Everything, even the people around him started pulsating. The ripples of distortion coalesced into a wave that swept toward him. Before he could react, he was thrown from his seat against the rear of the bridge. Pinned against the wall, he struggled to breathe and grew dizzy. The sounds of glass and metal crashing around him were deafening. He tried to push the fear aside and understand what was happening, but slowly the din, and everything around him, faded away.
Part 3: G3-Alpha
Chapter 15 – July 17, 2124; 22:00:00
Jack was surrounded by darkness and silence, and only slowly became cognizant that he was on the bridge and power was down. He turned his head to regain his bearings but a sharp pain cut through his shoulder, forcing him to stop. It took a deliberate effort to gather the strength to ignore the injury and look around. Nothing was moving, save for a few drifting shards of glass and metal that sparkled slightly in the dim, red, emergency lighting. They mixed with the long shadows of the darkened bridge, making it difficult to discern what had happened. Fixing his gaze toward the front, he was finally able to make out the silhouette of Devon’s unconscious form still strapped in the pilot’s station. Kate was drifting not far to his right, near her terminal.
“Devon,” he called not too loudly. There was no answer and he repeated himself with more urgency, “Devon! Kate! Can you hear me?”
Again the bridge remained silent. He withstood another sharp stab of pain as he turned quickly toward the rear. Kurt and Don were floating near the access door. “Kurt!” he shouted. Frustrated, he hit the ship-wide intercom button and called out, “This is the captain. If anyone can hear me, please respond immediately.” The echo of his voice from the ship’s speakers quickly faded, and the room was silent again. He consoled himself with the thought, ‘At least we’ve got some power.’
The stillness broke as a response came in over the comm., “Helena here, captain.”
Jack didn’t bother hiding his relief as he answered, “Thank God. What’s your status?”
“We got banged up pretty good. Right now it’s just myself and Maurice here – not counting Janet. What the hell happened?”
“I’m not sure yet. I’m going to need some help up here though. It looks like everyone here’s unconscious.”
“Give me a couple of minutes.”
“Thanks. Bridge out.” Jack unstrapped himself and carefully pushed his way through the debris toward Kurt and Don. They were breathing, and to his relief both men started stirring when he touched their shoulders. He spun back to the front as Devon grunted, and muttered, “What the hell?”
“You OK?” he called.
“I don’t know, I guess.”
Jack momentarily left them to their recovery, and said, “Computer, I need a report of hull integrity and all other critical components now.”
He was caught off guard when there was no response. The computer system was powered by its own separate, shielded grid, and should have stayed active. He repeated his request, but again there was no answer. “Maurice, are you still there?” he called.
“Yeah?”
“I need you to get the computer
back on line.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I asked for an update, but got no response.”
“Hmmm, might be the receivers, though the surge protectors might have been triggered as well.”
“OK, whatever it is, I need it fully functional asap.” Without pausing, Jack typed in the engineering channel, and said, “This is the bridge, respond please.”
“Nadya here,” was the quick reply.
“What’s your status?”
“I’ve got one nasty headache, and Claire’s unconscious. Don’t know if I was too. Anyway, the reactor’s in safe mode, so it’ll take me a few minutes before I can get main power back on line. For now, all we’ve got is battery power for life-support, comm. systems and the like. What’s going on?”
“We’re not sure yet. I’ll let you know once we know something. Just let me know as soon as you’re ready to get main power back on line.”
“OK.”
Jack took another quick look around the bridge and met Devon’s questioning gaze. Gliding over to his dazed pilot, he asked, “How’re you holding up?”
“I’m fine,” Devon answered, though his tense expression hinted that his pilot wasn’t being completely truthful. “How long was I out?”
Jack reflexively looked to the clock over the main view screen, but like everything else, it was blank. He then glanced at the antique watch he wore on his wrist – a gift from his grandfather before the Magellan’s launch – its hand wound springs would have been immune from any power surges or E-M pulses. It took a deliberate effort though to angle his arm and get enough light on it to read its dial. Then in disbelief he read it again, and softly muttered, “Damn.”
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s eleven – we were out for over six hours.” He quickly turned to Kurt, who was now hovering next to him, and said, “I need you to get me a full damage report. Check every bulkhead.”
“I’m on it.”
“Don, go help Helena. Do a room by room search for injured. Make sure everyone is accounted for.”
“OK.”
Jack watched the two exit the bridge before returning to his seat. As he leaned back, the lights flickered to life. A moment later there was the welcome hum of circulation fans and other equipment coming to life as main power flowed back through the ship.
Nadya’s voice came in over the comm., “Jack, we’re back up and running, but it’ll take a little time for many of the systems to fully re-initialize.”
“Very good. How about the engines?”
“I don’t know yet. I’ll call you back in a few and give you an estimate. Engineering out.”
“Devon,” Jack said, “try and get an accurate fix on our position. If we were out that long, I want to know how far we’ve drifted. Also...”
A warning buzzer cut him off. Jack waited for the automated announcement that normally followed, but there was none. A wave of frustration hit him for a split second before he realized the buzzer meant at least some of the computer’s functions were on-line. He’d just have to find out what was going on the old-fashioned way. His terminal displayed two words in bold, amber letters, “Communications Error.” Touching it yielded the message, “Error Code 165A.”
“Kate, what’s a 165A?”
“You sure about that?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s the data link with Magellan – it’s down.”
Though the crew had fully moved over to the IPV, the Magellan still served as a communications hub and storage facility for supplies. There was even a contingency plan to move back to the Magellan if a proper base camp couldn’t be established on Epsilon Eri-D. As a result, the IPV maintained a perpetual data link with the Magellan. “Devon, after you get our position, check our antenna orientation.”
“I’m having a problem with that sir.”
“What, the communi...”
“No, our position. I’m getting terminal errors on the nav-system. It won’t re-initialize.”
“Can you by-pass them manually?”
“No, these are hard stops. It won’t continue with the startup program.”
“What’re we talking about here, hardware or software?”
“I know where you’re going with this sir, but I’ve done those checks already. The problem is that I can’t tell. It just says that it’s unable to validate reference stars. It could mean one or more of the external cameras is down, or that it’s having problems with the on-line charts.”
“It could be the latter since the main computer’s still off-line,” Jack offered. “But first see if you can get an image directly from each of the nav-cameras, and verify things manually.”
“OK, I’ll let you...”
“Jack!”
He spun around to see Kate staring at him from her communications terminal. “What’ve you got?”
“The locator beacon from Shuttle-two. I’ve got a signal”
“What? Where?”
“I can’t tell without linking to the nav-system.”
“Damn! Are they transmitting anything?”
“No, I’m just getting their beacon.”
He resisted the urge to shout the obvious and tell her to get him a signal. Instead he took a deep breath and stared ahead at the main view screen. Though it was blank, he didn’t break his gaze. There had to be a way to get something more. “How strong is it?” he finally asked.
“It’s tough to tell. It sounds like it’s fading. Wait...”
Jack allowed only a couple seconds to pass before he asked, “What?”
“It’s gone.” Her statement was so sheepish, that he almost wanted say that it was OK; but it wasn’t. The bridge stayed silent waiting for his response. Instead he continued staring at the screen. His mind raced through likely causes and recoveries, until it finally latched onto a possibility – a failure in their antenna or amplifiers – and asked, “Do you think it’s a receiver problem, or did it stop broadcasting?”
“I don’t think it stopped transmitting, but I can’t say for certain.”
“What makes you think so?”
“If it’d stopped, I would’ve expected it to just cut out. This thing just faded away.”
It was better than nothing, but there was no sense pursuing this for now. Kate would let him know when she knew more. He immediately jumped back to their nav problem, and asked loudly, “Devon, do we have an external video feed yet?”
“No sir.”
“God damn it! I don’t like flying blind.” He pounded his intercom button and shouted, “Maurice, respond please.”
There was no immediate answer. He looked around the bridge, but no one met his gaze – they all had their heads buried in their terminals. Though he knew that only a few seconds had passed, the wait since his call was too long. He raised his hand to hit the intercom button again, but stopped as an answer finally came through.
“Maurice here. The computer’s still not on-line. It’ll take...”
“Forget about it for now. I need the nav-system up immediately.”
“That’ll take some time too.”
“We don’t have any time. Whatever it takes, get it up asap!”
There was no immediate answer, prompting him to ask, “Maurice did you hear me?”
“Yeah. I’ll let you know when I’ve got something.”
Jack disconnected the comm. channel as calmly as he could, and asked aloud, “Can anyone tell me what the hell is functional around here?” He didn’t expect an answer; it was as stupid question. He just leaned back in the silence that followed. Sitting still even for a few seconds, though, was too much and he called down to propulsion. “Nadya, what’s your status?”
“Not bad. We’ve already got full use of the maneuvering thrusters. But it’ll be another ten minutes before I can begin charging the main drive.”
“Good, was there any damage?”
“None that I’ve found so far. It looks almost like we had a massive power surge that tripped all the bre
akers. All we’re doing down here is resetting relays and cut-off switches.”
“Excellent. Let me know as soon as we can move. Jack out.” Without pausing, he activated the main intercom again and said, “Don, respond please.”
A second later his science officer’s voice came through, “Don here.”
“What’s your status?”
“So far so good. I just met up with Helena, and we’ve got everyone accounted for. Most people just kept dialing into sick bay, reporting their loss of consciousness – it made tracking them all down much easier. Hold on, I’m gonna put Helena on.”
“Jack?” she said.
“How’re we doing Doc?”
“So far nothing worse than a few bumps and bruises. Claire was banged up the worst, but I don’t think she has a concussion. I’m at a loss as to why we were all out so long. I am going to do some tests on a few people – just some spot checks.”
Before he could answer, Kate interrupted again, “I’ve got them again, Jack.”
“Helena, carry on. I’ll get back to you. Kate, what’ve we got?”
“Just its locator beacon again. It’s weak but getting stronger.”
“No regular communications transmissions?”
“None. But, the beacon can give us a rough status.”
“How so?”
“It’s triggered in one of three modes. Each tells us something about the amount of damage the shuttle sustained. For example, there’s a mode that would tell us if the cabin depressurized and there was no life-support.” She paused for a split second, realizing the conclusion that could be drawn from her comment, and continued quickly, “But, that’s not the case here. This one says the crew compartment is intact; just that there’s no power. Maybe similar to our own situation.”
“Good. How’s the signal now?”
“It’s holding steady. I just...wait...”
Kate had a habit of completely immersing herself in a problem, and forgetting about everything else around her. He knew she didn’t realize she’d left the rest of them hanging on her unfinished thought, and gave her a few more seconds before finally asking, “What is it?”
“I don’t get it. It’s getting fainter again. If it’s like before it’ll be gone in a few more seconds.”
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