by John Ringo
"So, does he like... guys?" Dana asked.
"I have no idea," Mutant said, chuckling. "But don't get your hopes up. He's not going to notice a lowly EA."
"I wasn't..." Dana said.
"I'm funning you, FUN," Glass said. "I'm not the sort of guy who pays a lot of attention to the lifestyles of the rich and famous. So I have no idea of Mr. Vernon's tastes in such things. But you see him around. He rarely goes back to Earth. He sort of lives on the Troy or in Wolf."
"That sounds... lonely," Dana said.
"Permission to enter a personal conversation?" Paris commed.
"Granted, Paris," Glass said. Practically every conversation in the station was monitored by Paris but he rarely interjected.
"Mr. Tyler's sexual tastes are heterosexual," the AI commed. "He does not have a significant other. He occasionally complains about that, but his schedule is such that he rarely meets with appropriate females. He spends much of his time alone. And, yes, it is lonely. He says that he is adjusted to that existence, having maintained it for over fifteen years."
"Oh," Dana said.
"Paris, don't go matchmaking with my EA," Glass said, grinning.
"That was not the intent," Paris replied. "My intent is more complex." The AI cut the connection.
"I think you stepped on it, CM," Dana said.
"I'm trying to figure out Paris' point," Glass said, thoughtfully. "I suppose it might be situational awareness."
"CM?"
"Vernon's..." Glass said then paused. "Vernon was the guy who created the Troy. He had little or nothing to do with developing the Constitutions, but he created SAPL, which is the real defense of the solar system, and Troy. I think that Paris was making the point that knowing something about a guy who has that much power and influence is slightly different than knowing which movie star is cheating on which."
"Ah," Dana said.
"What I'm still trying to process is why Paris made the point to us," Glass said. "But I'm not a big brain AI so I'm going to ignore it for now."
Dana swiveled her screen around to examine the Starfire again.
"Maybe because we asked?"
Mutant had carefully traveled around to the West side to get to the door, avoiding all the other traffic in the bay. Entering the opening was to be plunged into blackness. Vacuum didn't transmit light except in a straight line so the light from the Dragon's Orb was cut off abruptly.
"No traffic," CM1 Glass said, leaning back. "That's nice. I always hate it when the tunnel's full."
"It's a kilometer across, CM," Dana said, frowning. "The Constitutions are a hundred and fifty meters in width. Even with two or three across... There's plenty of room."
"There are six SAPL beams coming through," Glass pointed out. "Fifty-meter radius safety zones around those. So that's two hundred meters cut off. And the internal diameter is only seven hundred, not a klick. Crowded is relative, but when you're a very small boat negotiating around giants..."
"I take your point, CM," Dana said.
"Can't wait for the internal SAPL system to get done," Glass said with a sigh. "Those things are killers."
"Internal?" Dana asked, confused.
"They intend to eventually drill SAPL conduits through the walls," Glass said. "Run them in through big collimators on the surface and bounce them around the interior. That way they're not crossing the main bay."
"That will be nice," Dana said as they emerged from the tunnel. "Oh... my."
"Nice, huh?" Glass said.
In the shuttle up to Troy she'd been in a center seat and the Columbias didn't really have much in the way of portholes. Sarin had gone over to look out the one free one but she hadn't bothered. She wasn't really big on space, she just wanted to give the Horvath some payback.
This wasn't a porthole and it wasn't even a big screen. But it was full of stars.
Every square centimeter seemed to have some point of light in it. From Earth, most of the light from distant stars was filtered out by the atmosphere. In space, they were everywhere.
"This is what makes all the other crap worthwhile," the coxswain's mate said.
"I don't understand why they call it the Black," Dana said softly.
"Depends on which way you're looking," Mutant said, enigmatically. "And now we get to work."
He engaged standard cruise power, ninety gravities, and headed out into deep space.
"Once we are clear of the busy parts we will go through some evolutions," CM Glass said. "We will run through some standard shipboard emergencies and you will respond to them, following all procedures and standards. If you pass this qual, you will be well on your way to being an engineer first class."
"Yes, CM," Dana said.
"And so we start," Glass said as the lights and grav cut out. "Uh, Engineer, we seem to have a failure...?"
—|—
For four hours, Glass had put Dana through hell. Most of the time there was neither light nor gravity. And whoever had built the failure tests was devilishly clever. Some of them would have been damned hard to find in a repair bay!
"The inertial system is up, CM," Dana said, finally finding the "faulty" relay.
"Good," Glass said. "We won't be turned into glue when... ugh! Urk! Agh!"
He slumped over to the side theatrically.
"You noted that there is a large hole that is leaking volatiles from your coxswain's head," Glass said, pulling out a drink bulb filled with a red liquid and puncturing it. "He appears to have been hit by a micrometeor which had other issues..."
The air in the compartment started to pump down, the lights and power went out again, and Dana was left in microgravity. Then she noticed it wasn't microgravity. The ship was starting to spin, causing a rather unpleasant centripetal effect. And the rate was increasing.
"That's going to get everywhere, you know!" Dana said.
"I know," Glass replied. "And you're going to have to clean it up. I suggest a toothbrush."
"Dammit," she muttered. "Stupid coxswains always getting themselves killed."
She first determined that she, in fact, had control power. But one of the maneuvering thrusters was set to full power and she couldn't kill it from her engineer's position.
Getting to the relay, with the ship spinning harder and harder, was a matter of clambering hand-over-hand across the flight compartment to the appropriate panel. She got the relay to shut down by the simple expedient of pulling it. Then she had to start working the other problems...
"CM Glass, all engineering issues rectified," she said.
Glass was still slumped over to the side. He appeared to have fallen asleep.
"Uh... Coxswain?" Dana said.
"Your coxswain has bled out while you were fixing the ship," Glass said. "It's okay. With that head wound he was going to be a vegetable anyway. You are on your own. You noted in your repairs that the same micrometeorite that killed your coxswain also took out the navigation system and the hypernode. Paris, CM1 Glass Four-Three-Eight-Two."
"CM1 Glass Four-Three-Eight-Two, Paris."
"Notional emergency in shuttle Two-Niner," Glass said. "Repeat, notional. Hypernode and navigation inoperable. Coxswain terminated. Control transferred to EA Parker."
"Confirm notional emergency," Paris responded. "Good luck, Parker."
Parker was confused. With the hypercom out she couldn't even call to ask Hartwell what she was supposed to do. She had done the engineering side, except for the "destroyed" hypercom. But she didn't have any orders and couldn't recall a procedure that fit.
"Am I supposed to fly back?" she asked.
"You're talking to a dead man," Glass said, sitting up. "What you do, now, is up to you entirely. You have a dead person and the bird."
"Well, I could always discharge the dead weight," Dana said. "Save some fuel."
"Try it, Danno."
Dana finally realized that Glass just wasn't going to give her any orders. She'd been following orders for so long she wasn't used to making her own decisio
ns.
"Okay," she said, aloud. "Boat's damaged. Coxswain dead. The only smart choice is to head to the nearest help. Which is..."
The navigational system wasn't operating. She could probably tinker around the lock-out but that wasn't what the test was looking for.
"Troy, Troy," she muttered. "Where is Troy?"
She had visual systems. But they had spent so much time under power that even the massive nine-kilometer space station had disappeared. Not only was it probably a dot, she wasn't sure which direction it was from their current position. She'd been paying attention to engineering, not nav. All there was was deep space all around her.
"Oh... crap," she muttered. Without nav she had no real idea where she was. "Okay, okay, I can figure this out..."
She oriented the ship towards the sun and started hunting. The gate stayed in a location between Earth and Mars, in line with Earth. It wasn't actually in a stable orbit but it had gravitic controls to keep it in place. The gate was ten kilometers across but the ring was only a hundred meters wide. It might be hard to spot.
Troy was near the gate. Near, not at. It moved around due to the L point gravitational issues. If she could orient to the gate, she might be able to spot the space globe. If worse came to worst, she had enough fuel to make it to Earth. But she figured she'd probably get reamed out if she took the Myrm back to McKinley Base.
She found the sun. After a while she managed to find Earth. Line those two up and she'd be between Earth and the gate. Spin around.
But at their distance, the width of the sun left enough wiggle room that even by turning the ship around and orienting it carefully she still couldn't spot Troy or the gate.
"Crap," she muttered.
"Now you know why they call it the Big Black," Glass said. "Hartwell finally gave up on this one."
"I know he doesn't like the Black," Dana said, glad the CM was at least willing to talk.
"I will give you exactly one hint," Glass said. "You are looking the wrong way."
"There are three hundred and sixty other degrees to look," Dana said. "In plane and in vertical. That's one hundred twenty-nine thousand six hundred degrees to search."
"Didn't say it was easy," Glass replied.
Looking the wrong way. She had assumed when Glass headed out from the Troy he had headed towards Earth. But they had kept a more or less straight initial vector from the door. And the door was oriented away from the gate, "up" in the plane of ecliptic.
She oriented to the sun again then rotated the boat so that the sun was "up" from her position. Then she started scanning around.
It was the gate that she spotted first. The thin, high albedo, ring just leapt out. Then by searching around some more she finally spotted the Troy. It was so small it looked like a minor star. Without figuring out their initial vector she'd have been lost in space until their power ran out. Or she just gave up and headed to Earth.
She engaged power and started to head back at full cruise.
"Paris, Shuttle Two-Niner," she said. "Declaring notional emergency."
"Your hypernode is out," Glass pointed out.
"At some point, my internals are going to get through," Dana said. "If I recall the manual, at about six kilometers, but I'm willing to bet Paris has some ears out from Troy. And I'd really like to know where the SAPL beams are. They head in to Troy along this line, somewhere."
"Discontinue test," Glass said, grinning.
"Thank God," Dana said, lifting her hands from her flight controls. "Your bird, Coxswain."
"Your bird, Engineer Apprentice," Glass said. "Paris, Two-Niner."
"Two-Niner, Paris. Get your notional emergency under control?"
"All done," Glass said. "Shuttle Two-Niner continues under control of EA Parker."
"Coxswain EA Parker, aye," Paris said. "EA Parker will observe all traffic notices and lanes. Be aware of SAPL zone six thousand meters to your right. No major traffic in entry zone for one hour. Please decelerate to a maximum of one thousand kilometers per hour before entering close approach zone. Maximum velocity in entry, ninety kilometers per hour. Have a nice day."
"Am I taking it all the way back to the dock?" Parker asked.
"That depends on if you ding it on the way."
—|—
"Docking maneuver complete." Dana sighed. Even with the automatic systems and the tractors, docking was always ticklish.
"Verify hard dock, Procedure Three-Six-Five-Four-Niner-Dash-Alpha," Glass said.
"The engineer does that," Dana said, looking over her shoulder.
"And you're the EA," Glass said.
Dana checked all her telltales and noted one red light.
"We've got an environmental light," Dana said, frowning. "It's... cabin pressure?"
"I'm going to give you a pass on this qual," Glass said. "You did a great job on correcting all the crap I threw at you and at responding to the emergency. And you found your way back to the barn. But next time you might want to repressurize the cabin."
—|—
"Watch quals complete," EM1 Hartwell said. "Suit, eng and cox cross quals complete. Drill quals complete. I'm recommending EA Parker to EN, Chief."
"Mutant?" the chief said, looking at Glass. "She's completed them sort of fast. I hate to suggest... favoritism..."
"If you mean she has a cute ass, Chief, just say it," Glass said. "And she does. But that's not why she made quals so fast. Oh, maybe a bit but just because people were willing to spend more time with her, not let her slide. She's pretty damned sharp. I held her back on cox quals 'cause she was doing well enough I wanted to see how far I could push her. I'd take her as a cox OJT any day. She's just... good."
—|—
"Parker," Hartwell said, sticking his head into Twenty-Nine.
"EM?" Dana said. She was removing a balky grav plate that was part of the ISS. The things were not only heavy, they were just bulky. She was about to kill the internal grav to get the damned thing out.
"Go down to the BX and get your EN tabs," Hartwell said. "Once they're slapped on, I'm going to move you over to Thirty-Six."
"Boomer," Dana said. She got along well enough with the CM3. He was better than most at having his ass kicked by a guuurl at nullball. "Does that mean...?"
"You're full qualed," Thermal said. "Don't let it go to your head. You know some of the idiots we've got who are full qualed. But take some time getting your tabs. Maybe pick up some lunch at the food court. You've earned it."
"What about the grav plate?" Dana asked.
"Leave it for AJ," Hartwell said. "This isn't your bird anymore."
"Booyah!" Dana said when the EM was gone. "Hey! AJ!"
CHAPTER SIX
"SET CONDITION ONE! CONDITION ONE!"
Dana rolled out of her bunk and was halfway into her suit before she even realized the 1MC was blaring.
Another damned...
"Suity" had mentioned that there were regular air-loss drills. What he had not mentioned, probably because the civilian side didn't have to deal with it, was the Condition One, "battlestations," drills, the launch drills, the damage control drills...
She had been working twelve hours a day on her bird, maintaining her flight qual, mandatory "fun" time, training evolutions...
She did not need a damned drill every thirty minutes! "THIS IS NOT A DRILL. HORVATH SHIPS IN E ERIDANI. SET CONDITION ONE..."
"Holy hell!" Dana said, dogging her helmet while cycling the hatch to her quarters.
The benefit of all the drills became evident as she made her way to her bird. She was still not quite awake but when she'd first followed EM Hartwell to Thirty-Six she thought she'd never be able to find her way back.
After a week she could do it in her sleep. As she was proving.
—|—
"Mutant, Longwood," LCM Martin commed.
"Mutant, sir," Glass responded.
"We've got a real world evolution," the commander of Charlie Flight commed. "We're doormen, helping the Apollo tugs
close the plug. And I've been given the word that they want every boat out there. Moving this thing is going to be a nightmare."
"We're down two coxswains, sir," Glass pointed out.
"Which is why I'm comming," Longwood replied. "Pick two ENs that are cox qualed."
"Move Gopher to Thirty-One and Danno to Thirty-Three, sir," Glass commed without hesitation.
"Danno?" the CO said. "That seems like a bit of risk when we're still in the middle of a review from the last incident."
"Her scores on famil were so high I'm wondering why she's an EA, sir," Mutant replied. "In Thirty-Three it puts her with Thermal to keep an eye on her. And it gets us two more birds, sir."
"Do it," the lieutenant commander said. "Tell Paris..."
"I will, sir," Mutant said. "Any word on Spade and Boomer?"
"They were on the seventeen forty from Minot," Longwood replied. "If the Horvath come through any time soon... I don't think we'll be getting them back."
—|—
"Go, Go, Go," CM1 Glass said, standing by the hatch to the shuttle bay and tapping people through. It was his job to count through the personnel and make sure everyone was in place. EM Carlemon Trotman was in charge of warming the boat while AJ was Earthside with Spade and Boomer, so all he had to do was hit the seat and drive. "Move it, Danno!"
"Roger, CM," Dana said, leaping through the air lock and catching the grab bar.
She spun in the air and hooked another bar with her foot to get oriented then pushed off, floating down the corridor to her bird.
"Sweet, Danno," Sean called. He was hauling himself along hand-over-hand to his bird.
"Float like a butterfly," Dana said.
She pulled herself into Thirty-Six, hit grav in a two-point stance, dogged the hatches and pounded across the cargo bay to her position. Thirty seconds after hitting the bay doors she was in position and warming the bird.
She wasn't sure why she was warming the bird. Her coxswain, Boomer, was Stateside as a witness in an "incident review." Before she arrived, an Alpha Flight Myrmidon plowed into a clearly marked SAPL beam. It had missed a marked turn. The two men in the crew were killed. The Myrm had been completely destroyed to the point of scattering bits all over the bay. Two of the Charlie Flight's coxswains and two from Alpha had been in formation, so they were called to testify.