Law's End

by Glenn Douglass

  Software analysis of the programmed course quickly classified it as a pursuit evasion tactic, and Sabha's systems were familiar with the use of solar corona in this manner. In a typical combat operation the maneuver would be used to break hostile sensor track just long enough to escape or to allow reengagement from an unexpected direction. Depending on which was applicable in this situation the Sabha was able to calculate a range of optimal responses to maximize operational capability.

  Further analysis of what little cargo and mission details were available to it indicated that the cargo was organic and from flight clearances that the mission was an official rescue operation. What was mainly of concern to Sabha was the lack of information about the nature of these individuals and their importance to the overall mission. They could have been soldiers, prisoners, refugees, or held a variety of other classifications which would dictate optimal tactics. If the individuals Sabha carried had to be kept out of hostile hands at all costs then a dive into the star to prevent their capture was the clearly preferred option.

  Another area in which Sabha had insufficient information was Law's End itself. No one had ever fought a war in what data indicated was a barren, uninhabited, and uncharted region. Even Sabha's own historical records revealed little of a tactical nature about this area of space. Records of systems being taken offline, combined with indications that the region was avoided, led Sabha to classify Law's End itself as hazardous to mission success.

  More recent records in Sabha's database indicated only one other ship detected in the vicinity; designation Armhamon. These records included the passive scan Kassad had initiated which revealed a formidable and modern warship. With this information Sabha was able to conclude that this ship was the hostile which they were evading.

  Each of these electronic conclusions narrowed the potential escape corridors to avoid destruction in the solar flare. Eventually three thin tube shaped courses were chosen as the most likely avenues to pursue. The first was dismissed because it left them too long in the mysterious hazard region. The second was dismissed because it would leave too obvious a trail in the highly energized plasma within the star's corona.

  The entire emergency maneuvers process had taken less than one thousandth of a second. Implementation of the actions took much longer. Yet all of this happened faster than the occupants could process and with little concern for the wellbeing of the occupants.

  When the throttle slammed back and forward to apply proper thrust Kassad's arm was violently dislocated before he could even register the event. When the Sabha flung herself through a high gee arc it slammed Greene against her poorly secured restraints leaving deep bruises. As thrust was cut for covert egress from the coronal mass unsecured objects bounced around the ship interior with a vigorous energy that imperiled soft tissue and eyes. Sabha was safe and clear on a freefall flight out of the system long before Kassad or Greene recovered from their shock at the revelation of the solar flare.

  Canis was the first to recover, and least battered by the maneuvering. In the microgravity Canis bounded to the center console, gripping it with his legs, and began barking vigorously. Reverberating in the enclosed space the barking drowned out any rebuke.

  Kassad slapped awkwardly at the flight track history with the hand on his good arm. He was only slightly astounded to see that Sabha had executed the intended maneuver flawlessly. In fact Sabha had managed it better than Kassad could have hoped, and as they drifted at unimaginable velocity towards the Law's End barrier Kassad felt the pain in his arm to be a small price.

  Gasping relief Greene pushed free of the restraints their unbearable pressure on the bruises they had left. Blood pouring back into her extremities caused them to throb with an intensity that would take more than mild pain killers to quell. Drifting out of her seat she caught herself with her legs so that she drifted half in and out of the acceleration couch.

  When Canis' outburst finally subsided Greene looked over to see Kassad cradling an arm that jutted at an unnatural angle from his body. "Are you alright?"

  With the initial shock from the injury wearing off the pain it revealed from the dislocated limb began crashing over Kassad in waves of ever increasing intensity which made him recant his earlier gratitude. "I guess Sabha thought I was too slow. I think she broke my arm."

  Canis bowed his head to sniff at the limb.

  "It looks dislocated," Greene countered, "at the shoulder." Certainly the limb looked wrong in a way her mind found disturbing.

  Canis instinctively licked at Kassad's face to ease the suffering he saw there.

  With a strained grin that pulled his flesh so tightly to his face that it looked like it might push his skull free Kassad said, "Great. Can you pop it back in?"

  Kassad's idea horrified Greene. "What? I don't have any medical training. I've never done anything like that."

  Through pain so intense it seemed to Kassad to posses color and texture he gasped, "Me either. Just… just pull it back to where it should be."

  A double bark from a worried looking Canis was clearly directed at Greene and encouraged action.

  As far as Greene was concerned medical attention was not something provided by people in any but the most desperate and dire of circumstances. "No, we need to get you into one of the automedics."

  "If you put me in one of those it's going to see the neural decay and insist on knocking me out for the rest of the trip." What was left of Kassad's vision disappeared behind a stabbing light in his eyes, and gasping in between the pain's wave crests he pleaded his case. "You've got to do this. If the Armhamon picks up our track and starts firing on us someone is going to have to fly. Sabha's emergency maneuvering protocols won't be able to pull that off without help. You have to do this."

  There were many things that Greene had prepared herself for in case of the worst that this trip might entail. Handling the corpses of her husband and co-workers was one, but manually reattaching a limb wasn't. As inescapable as the logic of what she had to do was there was an unaccountable dread that thought of actually performing the deed raised within her.

  Bracing herself in position with her legs against her seat so she didn't drift off in the zero gravity Greene leaned over the center console, with Canis crowding in underneath her, and then hesitated. "How? How do I get it back in?"

  Greene's question distracted Kassad from the peculiarity of the pain he felt. "I don't know how. I've never done this either," he snapped, and then fearful that Greene might abandon the attempt forced encouragement through the pain, "look, it's supposed to be in the socket. It wants to be in the socket. You just have to get it around so it pulls itself back into place."

  Canis let loose a single loud bark that was deafening in such close proximity to their faces.

  Neither Canis' canine commentary nor Kassad's encouragements were helping and Greene shouted to shut them both up. "Okay!"

  When action to reset his arm didn't immediately follow the shout Kassad shouted back, "Now, would be good!"

  This time it was two loud plaintive barks that split their ears as Canis looked back and forth between the two.

  Suppressing an urge to slap the man she was looming over Greene shouted, "I'm doing it!"

  In exasperation Kassad growled, "If you were doing it then I wouldn't be…" Kassad was cut off as Greene grabbed his arm and pain jolted him into silence.

  Everything about the arm felt wrong in Greene's hands. In part this was due to her Law's End addled senses which rendered the limb more as a thick tentacle than anything arm like. In larger part the revulsion she felt was a result of the way the arm lolled loosely, as if a solid tug would tear it free completely.

  With his body secured in place by his seat restraints Greene leveraged her body's weight against the limb. Gripping under the armpit and at the elbow she wrested the arm out and around the shoulder. The amount of force entire procedure required had to be gauged by sight, and that had been reduced to something like looking down a length of conduit at dista
nt objects.

  Eyes bulging and spittle hissing out from between gritted teeth Kassad stared wide eyed straight ahead. The waves of pain had risen as a tide to swallow him whole. It was a strange pain that echoed throughout his body into regions that had no reason for complaint.

  Greene's own eyes bulged and teeth gritted as she struggled to see what she was doing and guessed at how much force she was applying. Moving the arm wasn't difficult as it slid gratingly in whichever direction she demanded of it with equal ease. More important than how it felt was that it looked wrong as she pulled it closer to the rounding the shoulder bone on which it was the wrong side of. This went on interminably for both of them until, with a sickeningly loud pop, the limb wrenched from Greene's grasp and Kassad began coughing spasmodically.

  Staring in horrified fascination at the limb which appeared to be back in place Green collapsed exhausted back into her seat. Kassad's coughing eased into rasping gasps as Greene's momentum tried to carry her in a summersault across the cabin restrained only by her powerful legs. Both of them panted as if overcome by physical exertion.

  In between the two recovering forms Canis alternated yipping encouragingly at one then the other while wagging his tail.

  Recovering first Greene said, "Let's not do that again."

  Kassad's response was to use his good arm to gingerly cradle his restored but still woefully sore arm close to his body. Then with his vision still not returned he again used that good arm to reach out and fumble with the cockpit's first aid kit until it produced pain killers. Getting the patch into place under his suit was unpleasant but after it was complete resulted in a sigh of contentment at the immediate relief provided.

  Embarrassed by the obviousness of the treatment Greene observed, "We probably should have done that first."

  Shaking his head weakly Kassad opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. It took a moment with the distorted sensory feedback to guess that his mouth and throat were too dry to work properly. Fortunately his suit's built in water supply was more easily at hand to bring relief to his throat.

  Eventually Kassad managed to ask, "Can you still see?"

  "Yes," Greene responded realizing the implications of the question, "you can't?"

  Kassad shook his head in the negative. "It's not even blackness. I just can't see. My brain keeps trying to fill it in with patterns and shapes, but trying to focus on anything just hurts. Feels like a needle through my eyes."

  Scanning the numbers and symbols on the cockpit wireframe display Greene asked, "How long until we're out of here?"

  Shaking his head again Kassad admitted, "I don't know. It depends what last minute tweaks Sabha's emergency routines made to the course." After a moment he added, "It will be at least seven hours, could be days or weeks." With a sigh of resignation Kassad concluded, "It's possible our course has us heading deeper into Lawless space."

  Forcing down the rising panic Greene "You… you'll have to teach me how to read the navigation data. Then if we're off course you can tell me how to correct it."

  "If we can correct it." Kassad corrected direly. "We don't have a lot of fuel left. I kept just enough for a little jinking if the Armhamon starts firing on us. There's no telling how much Sabha used to throw us clear of that flare."

  Unwilling to surrender easily Greene said defiantly, "Well I assume there's a fuel gauge on this thing somewhere?"

  For the next few hours Kassad coached Greene verbally on the intricacies of the heads-up-display. Sometimes this was accomplished by guessing at what the numbers should read and sometimes by sketching out the symbols on the console with his good hand. Determining their exact status was a process involving much trial and error and bickering.

  As user friendly as the controls of the Sabha were the process of deciphering it shouldn't have taken nearly as long and it frustrated both of them. Both mental and physical fatigue combined with the degenerative effects of Lawless space to aggravate their attempts. Three times they gave up on the task and a half dozen more times they restarted the learning process from the beginning before they agreed on the display readings.

  Pushing back into her acceleration couch Greene rubbed at her eyes in a vain attempt to force her rapidly fading vision to return. "So it's six hours and three hundred kilos of fuel."

  Kassad had stopped caring one way or the other an hour ago and replied simply, "It would appear so."

  "Is it going to be enough?"

  Spreading his hands in defeat at the overwhelming number of unknown variables Kassad guessed, "Maybe enough to evade a few shots."

  It wasn't the sort of clear definitive answer Greene was looking for. "But is that enough?"

  With a sigh Kassad explained, "It may be enough to get us clear of Lawless space but it won't be enough to match velocity with our destination. Everything in the universe is in motion at a particular speed in a particular direction. If we can't produce delta-vee to match the speed and heading of the destinations' own then we'll zip through the Horsehead nebula at such speed the cloud's gasses will tear us apart."

  "Great, so what do we do about that?"

  "Without fuel we'll have to get the reactionless drive back online."

  "We can do that right?"

  Kassad knew well that there was only so much that planning could accomplish and after that you just had to do the best you could with whatever you had. "Maybe. Nobody has ever been beyond Law's End as long as we have, at least not and returned to tell the tale. We know what the effects have been on us, but there's no telling what it has done to the equipment, even powered down."

  Now rubbing her temples Greene complained, "We should have taken our chances with the Armhamon."

  "We have no chance with the Armhamon, and I'll take a slim chance over no chance." Kassad scoffed. "So don't wish too hard because if both of the FTL drives are out then you'll get to see what kind of greeting they want to give us."

  Begrudgingly Greene admitted to herself that it was well past the point of turning back there anyway. "Okay, fine. So what's our contingency plan for the reactionless drive being out?"

  He'd already had this entire conversation in his head with himself, but if it made Greene feel better and killed some time Kassad couldn't see any reason to object. "We can try to find a place with similar enough speed and velocity and the capability and desire to send a rescue ship to retrieve us. That's assuming our senses return enough to find and plot such a course."

  Groaning in frustration Greene snapped, "And do you have a plan for our senses not coming back?"

  It wasn't a possibility Kassad wanted to dwell on. "That does tend to make things more desperate, which is why I made sure to get the safest course plotted into the automated navigation systems." Kassad did the broad calculations for their course in his head for the umpteenth time. "Assuming the jump drive works then in two days we'll be in a good drift position between galaxies. Even at this velocity we could drift for hundreds of years without coming close to anything. If it comes to that we can load ourselves into the ships auto-medics and let them try to fix us."

  With a venting bitterness in her voice Greene complained, "This is what I hate about space travel. It's all 'if' and 'then' and 'with luck'. It's like the whole universe is constantly flying apart."

  Kassad observed dryly, "Well, technically the whole universe is constantly flying apart."

  Her upper limit of exasperation having been surpassed Greene responded evenly, "You know what I mean. It's the constant uncertainty."

  Kassad smiled in remembrance of his first days in the life. "Eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we fly."

  Laughing bitterly at the sentiment Greene apologized, "I don't mean to be so…"

  Helpfully Kassad supplied, "Argumentative?"

  "Well, I was going to say difficult." Greene admitted, "It's just the stress getting to me."

  "Yes, you live on a civilized world and everything is engineered and managed to be low stress. I know. I grew up in that life; comfortable, stra
ightforward, understandable, and simple," Kassad grinned, "and it's not like Sabha wasn't designed to carry as much of that around with her as possible, but it's not real." Shaking his head Kassad ran his left hand reassuringly down the near bulkhead. "One thing I've learned living out here is that back down the gravity well is just as complex and dangerous, and maybe more so. It's just that there are systems developed over millennia to hide the dangers from you and manage them without your having to be aware. So long as those systems work you can delude yourselves into thinking you're safe and everything is straightforward, understandable, and simple." Kassad took a deep breath, held it only briefly, and sighed heavily before continuing. "Out here you have the ship's captain. Oh, a captain can lie to the passengers and color everything with pretty words to make you feel as safe as at home. Some see it as part of their job, but it's not part of mine. I'm not going to lie to you. I'll tell you straight how things are, what I'm going to do about them, what I need you to do, and what I hope to accomplish, but there are no guarantees." Kassad leaned back as far as his acceleration couch would permit. "So I tell you that I will do everything possible to get us all back safely. If need be I will lie and cheat, sneak and steal, and even fight if I have to. That's my commitment as ship's captain, and that's what we are depending on to keep us alive."