“Let’s assume they hear us Fuse and Defuse,” I said slowly. “That would explain why they attacked our ships at nav checkpoints.”
“How could you hear an N-wave?” the Chief wondered. His glance traveled up to the simulscreen, where the jagged line pulsed. “And what about that wave we’re producing. That—caterwauling.”
I wasn’t listening; I’d already swung to the console and slapped the power lever to “Off.” The jagged line vanished from the screen. “Kerren, reset emergency override on the engine room! Disconnect power to the drive!”
“Aye aye, sir. Override reestablished.”
I stared at the simulscreen, terrified of what might appear. Nothing came. After long moments I forced my muscles to unknot and swung my chair back to the waiting officers. “There’s no proof you’re right,” I said to Gregor. “But we’ll proceed on the assumption you are, until we learn otherwise.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Anything else?”
“No, sir.” He looked as if he wanted to make himself invisible.
“Then take your seat.”
He did, quickly. We had little left to discuss and the conference ground to a gloomy halt, I told the Chief to explain to Ms. Bartel and the others why we’d stopped testing. “If there’s any grumbling, send them to me. And keep standby power to the lasers at all times.”
I took up the caller. “Mr. Tzee, summon the first laser firing detail. They and Group B will rotate watches for the next week.” Hard on them, but I couldn’t risk less.
“I’ll take the next watch,” I said, blinking back exhaustion. We’d been up through the night, time unnoticed, and it was already near end of morning watch. “I’ll go change my shirt first. Chief, you have the conn ‘til I’m back. Philip, get some rest. You too, Cadet.”
Wearily I trudged to my cabin, wondering what had become of Mrs. Reeves. I had my finger on my hatch panel when the alarms sounded again.
I scrambled back to the bridge. I only needed one glance at the simulscreen. “Chief, go below!”
“Right!” He moved fast for a big man.
This time, there were eight.
In a moment the departments began reporting. Philip Tyre, his duty station on the bridge, dashed in, coat awry.
“Lasers have power!”
“Seek targets!”
I gripped the thruster controls. There was little to do but watch.
“Target bearing one five four, range five hundred meters!” Elena Battel.
“Kill it!”
“He’s getting ready to throw!”
Deke shouted, “Big’un behin’ us, Cap’n!”
I saw. A copious squirt of the port thruster, and Challenger responded with an unbearably slow turn.
“Amidships! Jesus, he’s close!”
“Got a lock!”
Kerren’s monotone was continuous. “Encroachment oh five oh, declination three five, range five hundred meters. Encroachment two six one, declination oh eight four, range one hundred meters. Encroachment—”
“Watch the one above us! He’s settling!”
“Power line overheat! Switching to alternate!”
There were too many, too close. Save us, Lord God. “Philip, all passengers stand by to don suits. See to it.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
A whirling tentacle broke free, sailed toward us in the deadly silence of vacuum. “Damn! Get it!” Walter Dakko.
“I’m tryin’! It’s movin’ too fast!” Deke.
“Inside our circle!”
“It’s comin’ at the launch berth!”
I was already at the thrusters. Challenger turned her broadside from the swirling mass, not enough to avoid it, but enough so it struck the hull forward of the launch berth.
“Propellant reserves at minimum,” Kerren said calmly. “Two minutes maneuvering left, Captain.”
“God damn them!” My blasphemy went unremarked.
“At the stern,” shouted Dakko. “The shaft!”
A big fish drifted aft, colors pulsating against the black night. As I watched horrified, a blowhole opened, squirted. The fish floated toward the drive shaft wall, below the engine room.
Reluctantly I squirted another precious blast of propellant. We swung away from the danger. The fish followed. A patch in its skin began to swirl and change colors. One of its outriders began to emerge.
“Stand by to repel boarders!”
Not one, but three of the figures launched themselves from the fish alongside the engine room. They sailed to the hull surrounding the drive shaft.
“Got the sumbitch!” Ahead a fish wilted, its innards spurting into the night.
“Engine room reporting. Alien boarding party on hull outside the drive shield.” Somehow, Dray made it sound like a routine status report.
“Master-at-arms, repel boarders at engine room! Dray, get your people suited!”
A fish forward of the disk pulsed rhythmically, disappeared.
“Look! The bastard Fused when he got hot!” Elena Bartel.
“We’re already suited, sir,” said Dray. “Uh, the fish is closing fast.”
On the simulscreen, I watched catastrophe approach. My eyes flicked to the readouts. We had propellant for barely one more maneuver.
“Jesus, Lord Christ!” Philip rose from his chair. Aghast, I started at the screen.
About three hundred meters off our starboard side a fish had appeared, the largest I’d ever seen.
Kerren intoned, “Encroachment oh nine three, declination zero, range three hundred meters and closing.”
Propellant puffed from a blowhole. Already a tentacle was forming on the exterior. The fish drifted closer.
“The fish at the stern is just off our shield, Captain!” Dray’s voice was ragged. Nothing but a plastalloy drive shield separated the engine room from the vacuum. When the fish dissolved the shield, the engine room would decompress. And my suited men would be in the compartment with those—beasts.
“Is Dakko there?”
“Here, sir! Engine room.”
“Can you fight them off?”
“There’s three of the outriders Outside. If they eat through, we’ll burn them. But the fish tself—” He left the rest unsaid. Dakko’s puny weapons could do naught against the might of the looming fish.
We were under attack from all sides, but the most immediate danger came from two fish: the one releasing invaders to the engine room, and the immense creature looming amidships.
I glanced at the screen. The aft fish was within meters of the drive shaft. If it hurled its acid projectiles at the hull ... I recalled the deaths of Hibernia’s crewmen. Walter Dakko and his party were helpless against the acid.
All was lost. “We have to abandon the engine room,” I said, the taste of defeat so bitter I paused before issuing the command.
“No!” Philip leaped to his feet.
“There’s no choice—”
“We’ll lose power to the lasers!”
“Unless we get our men out they’ll be killed!” I gestured helplessly. “We can’t save the engine room!”
The huge fish amidships let go a projectile. It spun lazily toward the hull.
“We can!” Philip insisted.
“No lasers fire far enough inward to cover the drive shaft.”
Dray’s voice, edged with panic. “The fish will make contact any second!”
“The launch.” Philip was pale. “Let me take it.”
“It’s unarmed.”
“It’s got hot propellant and it can ram.”
Dumbfounded, I stared.
He waved at the simulscreen. “What difference does it make? Look at them!” Still I said nothing. “Sir, let me go. Maybe I can scare that thing off.”
I found my voice. “No.”
“What else am I good for?” His young features contorted.
“No!”
“Then we’ll die for nothing!” He hesitated, then ran to the hatch. “Maybe I can sear the fish with our
exhaust.” The hatch slid open. He paused a microsecond. “Permission to leave the bridge, sir!”
I had to try twice before I made the word audible. “Granted.”
The midshipman flipped a perfunctory salute and ran down the corridor out of sight.
I swung to the screen. Our fire had neutralized the projectile from the midships fish, but the alien had formed another glob, already swirling toward us.
In less than a minute the console lights blinked, warning me the launch berth was occupied and depressurizing.
The midships projectile sailed untouched through our fire.
“Sombitch!” screamed Eddie Boss in the comm room, blasting my eardrums. “My gun! He got my gun!”
“Midships laser malfunction!” Kerren.
The launch shot from its berth.
“Shut down power to midships laser!”
“Power is down.”
“Captain, it’s gonna throw at the engine room right now!” The Chief, his voice taut.
I swallowed. “Abandon eng—”
“Hang on, Dray, I’m almost there,” Philip Tyre’s voice was steady. “Get in the shop compartment, you’ll have another bulkhead between you and the acid.”
“Do that, Chief.” My hand gripped the console.
“Aye aye, sir.”
Mr. Tzee’s voice cut across the babble. “Look at the screen, sir.”
The huge fish amidships was growing three more projectiles.
“Fire on him!”
“They’ve knocked out all our guns that bear at this angle, sir. I need a bow-on shot.”
“I’ll come round!” I squirted propellant. Our nose drifted ever so slowly toward the fish.
Kerren’s camera picked up the launch. Philip maneuvered the stern of his tiny vessel toward the fish at our shaft. He kicked a jet of propellant at it, causing the launch to shoot away from the fish. The fish quivered, random dots of color swirling in its skin, but it remained still.
“Go, you bastard!” Philip’s voice was savage. He swung his craft close for another try.
A cry of dismay from Mr. Tzee. “Captain, they’ve got our bow laser.”
“Can you bring anything to bear?”
“We’ve nothing big enough to hurt them, sir.”
If the Admiral had left us more of our lasers ... “Very well.”
Philip squirted a blast of propellant at the aft fish, without effect.
It wasn’t working. I rested my head in my hands.
“Engine room decompression! Captain, they’re through the hull!”
“Keep away from the acid! Burn the outriders as they poke through!”
“I’m going to ram,” said Midshipman Philip Tyre.
“No, Philip!”
“It’s our only chance. The impact may drive him away. I’ll try to eject before contact.” I knew that was impossible, as did he.
“Mr. Tyre—”
He swung his little ship about, spending propellant with reckless abandon. About a hundred meters distant he matched velocities and aimed his prow at the bow of the fish.
“Mr. Tyre!”
“I’m glad I served with you, sir. If you see Alexi, tell him I’m sorry.” He jammed his throttle to full. The launch spurted forward.
If his aim was true he would lance the fish head on. “Sir, Godspeed—”
I snatched up the caller. “Kerren, record! Mr. Tyre! I, Captain Nicholas Seafort, do commission and appoint Midshipman Philip Tyre a Lieutenant in the Naval Service of the Government of the United Nations, by the Grace—”
The radio crackled and went dead—
“Of God!”
Challenger’s launch tore into the bow of the fish, accelerating still as it clawed through the alien tissue. The fish bucked. It appeared to ripple. Viscous material spewed from the gaping hole. The momentum of the launch tore the fish from our hull. Inert, it drifted out of sight behind Challenger, our launch imbedded within.
“Penetration in the hold!”
Lord God, I repent my sins.
“DECOMPRESSION LEVEL 2, SECTION SIX!”
“Captain, east hydros are decompressed!”
Pray forgive my trespasses.
“Engine room!” I expected no answer.
“Here, sir! Only two of the outriders got through, and we fried ‘em both. Clinger, get that patch in place!”
“Full power to the thrusters, Chief. Give me all remaining propellant.”
“You’ve got it! We’ve less than a minute’s burn, sir.”
Lord, I beg Thee, take me unto Yourself.
“I know.”
Challenger had swung almost nose-on to the midships beast that still threw its projectiles. I glanced at the screens; other fish maneuvered alongside. There was no way to avoid them all.
“Kerren, ramming course!”
“Course true! Relative oh oh oh!”
I’m coming, Amanda.
My hand jabbed at the red ball of the thruster control. Challenger drifted forward almost imperceptibly.
I cried, “Christ, is that all we’ve got?”
“Acceleration is cumulative,” said Kerren, as if that explained everything. Perhaps it did.
Our motion was more evident now. As we neared, the huge fish squirted propellant and began to float aside. I slammed the port thruster to full to correct course, and five seconds later ran out of burn.
“All passengers and crew suit up, flank!” My eyes were locked to the simulscreen. Foolishly I braced myself as we approached. The bridge was in the disk, halfway down the length of the pencil that was our ship. The view on my simulscreen was from Kerren’s camera forward. It, not I, would make first contact.
“Wait for us, you bastard!” My teeth clenched, I slurred the words.
In seconds we would skewer the fish with our pointed prow.
The fish began to pulse rhythmically.
“Wait for us ...”
The fish pulsed. If it disappeared now ...
“WAIT, YOU THING OF SATAN!”
Contact.
Kerren shrilled warnings. “Prow disintegrating! Forward sensors inoperative! Hull collapsing forward of the disk! The hold is—”
The screen went black.
I was on my feet, braced for an impact I couldn’t feel. “Kerren?”
No answer.
“Kerren?” I waited for the power to dim. If Kerren was destroyed—
The lights remained steady.
“Kerren!”
“Fusion is successful, sir,” the puter said calmly. “Please provide course for my data calculations.”
“What?”
“Fusion drive is on, sir.” The puter’s tone was patient. “As you Fused manually, I do not have the calculations to—”
“DRAY!”
“Engine room, sir.”
“Is the drive on?”
He snorted. “Of course not.”
“Oh, Lord God!” I stared at the screen, willing the stars to reappear.
“What is it?” Dray asked.
“The fish. It tried to Fuse just as we hit.”
“Yes, sir?” He waited.
“It ...” I stumbled for words. “It took us with it.”
20
WE CAME TOGETHER IN the Level 2 corridor, Dray, Walter Dakko, Gregor and myself. Seconds had dripped into hours, while the screens remained blank.
Kerren insisted we were in Fusion, and I didn’t dare examine the rents in our hull to find out. When we were Fused, any object thrust Outside would cease to exist. A body too near a hull opening would be caught up in the stresses of the field, and would suffer molecular collapse and oblivion.
“Now what?” I’d dropped all pretense of military formality. It was all I could do to keep from trembling.
“We’re alive,” Dray said gruffly.
“For the moment.”
“Where are we?” Walter Dakko’s voice was a husk.
I shrugged. “In purgatory, perhaps.” Dakko raised an eyebrow, said nothing.<
br />
“What’s going to happen?” Gregor.
I stated the obvious. “We’ll die.”
Gregor winced, gathered himself. “When, sir?”
“Soon. When the fish Defuses or digests the ship. Or when the food runs—”
“Digests?” blurted Dakko.
I said, “Just before the alien, uh, Fused, Kerren reported the prow was disintegrating and the hull collapsing where it pierced the fish. Now he says all his hold sensors are inoperative. We don’t dare open the hatch from the launch berth to the hold because of radiation and the danger of viral contamination. When whatever’s dissolving the hull eats as far as the hatchway, we’re through.”
“How long will that take?” Gregor, again.
“How the hell should I know!” My rage drove him back a step. “Don’t ask stupid questions!”
“Sorry, sir! Aye aye, sir.” He held himself at near attention.
The mood changed subtly. Walter Dakko asked, “What do we do now, sir?” They waited for my response.
I had an urge to say, “Whatever you damn well please,” and stalk to my cabin, leaving them standing in the corridor. What more did they want of me? I had no miracles to bestow.
I sighed. “Engine room status, Chief?”
“We got the hull patched before Fusion, sir, so the engine room’s inhabitable. One of the power output lines was hit but the other one’s all right.”
“You mean after all this we still have power?” I couldn’t believe it.
“Enough for lights and heat, yes, sir. I might be able to patch the second power line too. Anyway, we don’t need power to the thruster pumps; we’re out of propellant. And the lasers were wiped out, so ...”
My mind spun slowly. We were imbedded in the body of a fish in Fusion. The engine room, aft, was in good shape, the disks where we all lived were airtight, while our hold forward of the disks was being eaten away.
“What else do we know?” I labored through a fog. The Chief’s report seemed an annoying distraction.
Dakko said, “The recycler chamber is undamaged, but some of the feeder lines are out of commission and the fluids in them are lost. East hydros—”
“They’re gone,” said the Chief. “Decompressed. I don’t think we should try to open the hatch. We’d have to pump out section eight to get in there, and anyway the plants are dead.”
“West?”
“West hydros weren’t damaged, but we never got them fully operational again.”
Challenger's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 2) Page 39