The Colony Ship Conestoga : The Complete Series: All Eight Books

by John Thornton

  The screen responded with a list of fifteen nearby locations. All but two were flashing a pale red which Eris knew meant they were not functional. She opened the first of the functional surveillance apertures, and all it showed was a hallway much like where Eris stood. Dripping water on the walls, fungal growth on the deck, and dim lighting. As she watched, two white and brown spotted goats frolicked past the camera’s view.

  “Wild animal unrestrained? Not in the habitats? Just wandering around? Again?” Eris shifted to the next surveillance aperture.

  The view was canted sideways, but showed a different scene than she had observed before. This time it was a large dining area, she checked the display and it showed ‘Eatery 98’ as the location. Long burn marks were scorched across the far wall. Tables were melted, and the whole place was a wreck. There were no wild animals, nor much growth medium on the decks or other surfaces. She adjusted the view and increased the magnification. The camera would not swivel, and she understood it must be bent from its housing. The ducts of the room were still covered by shut grilles. The door to Eatery 98 was welded shut in a crude and harsh way. Nothing else was visible.

  “I still need to get to the Command Bridge,” Eris declared. She palmed the next display and it opened. This was a general transport coupling, and while it was energized, there was already an error message regarding the ship-wide transport vehicle tube system.

  “The main tube transports are down, but they are heavy energy users anyway,” she muttered. So she tapped in a code for the funicular car and received a positive response. She let out a long sigh. She had not realized she was holding her breath in anxiety over all the failures and negative functions she had encountered. She really had wondered if the funicular car system would be working. She knew it was a long walk to the Command Bridge, especially with the elevators being out of service. So the funicular was important. Keying in a final code, she got another positive response, and the display registered that the funicular car would arrive in three minutes.

  Eris closed up the ESRC, stuffed as many of the food cartons into her duty belt and pockets as would fit, and left the rest on the floor. She started to walk away, and then reconsidered. Turning back around, she opened the ESRC and picked up the remaining food cartons, their tiny suspended animation systems still working well, and stacked them back into the ESRC.

  The access door for the funicular car was only a short distance away. By the time Eris had reached that location, the car had arrived. The door was surrounded by green light which flashed as she approached.

  A recorded safety alert sounded as Eris touched the nine section color control pad’s center box. The colors cycled in tune with the audio message. “Warning. Gravity manipulation changes beyond this point. Warning. Gravity manipulation changes beyond this point.”

  The door slid open, and Eris proceeded into the small cubicle. It was about two meters long and a meter wide. Its width was due to the double set of doors which comprised its composition. At the end, she could see the lights which illuminating the interior of the funicular car she had summoned. She stepped into it, but the car was not in a position to travel yet, and so she waited for a moment. The size of this funicular car was three meters by two meters by two meters. It was a smaller one than some, but she had not designated a specific car to come, but had just summoned the nearest one that responded. The interior was better lit than the dim hallways.

  Eris was not at all surprised by the vista which opened around her as the permalloy shell of the car blanched into transparency. It felt like she was standing on a ledge of a huge building, looking out into the blackness of space. For the ceiling and three of the walls around had become transparent. As her eyes adjusted, she could make out the scattering of stars against that black blanket of sky, and none of those star patterns looked familiar. So she studied their placement in the sky as she waited for the car to continue its operation.

  Its functioning was more sluggish than she had expected, and she feared it too was failing. Then the door behind her slid shut and she felt a slight tremor as the whole cubicle shifted. The floor beneath her moved outward toward the stars, yet she knew there was only about two meters until the clear permalloy would be felt. The wall behind her, which was the last side of the car, was moving away from the hull of the Conestoga and tipping into place. It then dawned on her that here inside the small funicular car, there was no growth medium, no fungi, and not any dripping water. It felt more natural and normal to her, an oddity since she had awakened.

  As the car tipped into place, the exterior view changed from feeling like standing on the ledge of a building, to feeling like she was standing on a vast plain, surrounded by a clear rectangular box. Only the floor of the car was still opaque permalloy. The hull of the needle ship no longer looked like a vertical wall, but instead her perspective now saw it as a horizontal landscape of sorts. The irregular and rugged mechanical apparatus on the exterior hull were very familiar to Eris and her engineer’s mind did a reconnaissance of what was visible. Gravity’s draw on her body remained constant as the car tipped onto the track where its mechanisms locked into place.

  Darting her eyes in what was now upward, Eris said, “Where is the Seven of Six?” She looked from star to star seeking the pattern she had memorized from the projections which were in her training sessions. “Perhaps the constellation is blocked by the needle ship,” she murmured as her mind raced with trepidation. She recalled the small image of the green planet and red sun she had seen on a monitor, but could not accept that without confirmation. “Yet none of these star patterns look like the views I should be seeing from Tlalocan. Oh, mother, if you were here, you could confirm my observations. All I see is unknown chaos, not the ordered constellations you and the others of the astronomy team taught us about.”

  Thinking of her parent’s death, she offered up a prayer for their eternal fate, and added an entreaty for her to get worldly assistance here, no matter what world the needle ship was orbiting. “Astrophysics could tell me my exact location, but it does not look right. I clearly recall what we were supposed to see from Tlalocan, and this sky is not it.”

  Eris remembered those classes and especially the constellation called Seven of Six. That was comprised of the brightest six stars in the night’s sky from Tlalocan. They made the number 7 in the sky. Swallowing hard, Eris thought again about the view she had seen on the display in the repository. That strangely green planet was not at all what Tlalocan was conjectured to look like. Added to that, these star patterns did not align with any of the views she had been taught to look for on Tlalocan.

  The engineer in her shoved aside the astronomy concerns, but could not completely suppress them. She then looked over and saw that the control board had raised up from the deck as the car locked into place. She had not noticed it, and chided herself for wasting time gazing at the stars, when she should have ordered the car to proceed to the Command Bridge. She pressed her palm onto the control board, and blue light lit it up. A bank of buttons rose, and she keyed in the sequence for the Command Bridge.

  A negative function sound came.

  “Any artificial intelligence system or synthetic brain, respond immediately!” Eris called out. She looked out at the vast hull of the needle ship, and noted how there were no habitats anywhere in sight. Just the long empty wilderness of the needle ship’s permalloy structures. She could just make out a constituent joint where a habitat had once been connected. The end of that enormous joint was empty and as blank as the response she was getting from the Conestoga’s lattice of compeers. “Please respond!”

  Eris tried the sequence for the Command Bridge twice more, but each time the negative function sound came on. She then entered an alternative destination code, that of the Central Memory Core Gallery. This time she heard a different tone. It was the now only slightly reassuring tone of an accepted command.

  The tracked mechanism of the funicular car engaged and began moving the vehicle along the hull following t
he track it was locked onto. Eris rode inside that clear permalloy car as it proceeded among the maze of house-size protrusions, storage tanks, antenna arrays, as well as the myriad of oversized pipes, tubes, boxes, and miscellaneous objects. All she saw she fully recognized and understood but it all seemed so lonely. Her engineer training was battling against the growing fear she felt. She prayed again for help and a clear mind. The tracks led around and between the mechanical landscape, and the visibility ahead was limited only by the denseness of the structures of the hull. She could see the track ahead of her, and saw that it looked free from any damage, although the patterns of lights and signals on the exterior were evidence of multiple problems. There were vast damaged areas. Several structural failures where atmosphere had explosively vented, and other places with power failures from unknown origins.

  “With the Captain Level Disaster Alert in place, the Command Bridge is just locked down,” Eris said and grasped her arms with her hands in a self-hug. “The Central Memory Core is right next to the bridge, and from there I can directly access the ship’s AIs and SBs and finally find out what is happening here. Then I will just connect with the crew from there and they will explain all this insanity.”

  The funicular car continued its crawl along the track, and made its way past another set of constituent joints. Here was where Habitat Eta had been connected, but some of the pipework that had once neatly spliced into that biological habitat was shattered and broken, floating in space, only connected by fragmented sections of tubes and remnants of shattered pipes.

  Looking up, Eris saw that the car had moved to another side of the needle ship, and much closer to where the Command Bridge and the associated features near to that were located. The stars above her still looked foreign, alien, and strange. Nowhere to be see was Seven of Six, or any other constellation she expected.

  “Oh dear, what has happened?” Her jaw fell open as the car passed through between some structures, and the Captain’s Hanger Bay doors were visible for a bit. There was a long arroyo where some shuttle had crashed and left a line of damages marring the exterior doors of the hanger bay. The remains of the Class 9 Shuttle were wedged into the permalloy in various places. “That was a severe impact.”

  She did not comment much more, because the car carried her beyond where she could see those large hanger bay doors. A while later, the funicular car stopped. Eris recognized the destination, and was pleased to see operative lights and other indications of power in the hull. The clear permalloy of the one side of the vehicle darkened and became opaque. The car unlocked from the track, and slowly tipped itself to the side. Eris saw the landscape outside slowly shift from horizontal to vertical as the car settled down next to the hull. Yet to her, the pull of gravity manipulation felt unchanged. She now again felt like she was standing on the side of a very large building. The walls around her then all became opaque and lights came on surrounding the door in the side of the vehicle.

  “Well, there has been some major disaster, but now I will just connect to the primary artificial intelligences, and then link to the crew,” Eris pulled at her lip again, and offered another silent prayer. Nothing felt right, and the damages she had totaled up in her mind were extensive.

  The light shined around the perimeter of the door, and it slid back into its pocket. A stairway was revealed, and Eris stepped out of the funicular car and through the hull of the Conestoga. Taking two steps down she stopped before the next door, a bulkhead door, which was labeled with an inscription: ‘Central Memory Core Gallery: Machines are our greatest allies, and thinking machines our most loyal friends.’

  “Indeed, on this trek through the heavens, machines are some of our greatest allies, and thinking machines our most loyal friends.” Eris smiled as she added a final phrase in her mind, ‘Aside from God and my parents.’ She always added that since she was a small child. A few tears ran down her face as she was struck again by her parent’s death. The image of those failed suspended animation cocoons flashed across her mind. “I must warn the crew about that to save the other repositories.”

  She stepped ahead, and the bulkhead door remained closed. She nearly bumped into it as she fully expected it to discern her engineer implant and automatically open. It did not.

  “It is just locked down for the disaster,” Eris said in a shaky voice. She looked at the nine-section color control pad. She entered a security combination sequence, and was thrilled that the door opened.

  Stepping into the Central Memory Core Gallery, she gazed about in dismay. She dropped to her knees. “My parents are dead, and now this?”

  4 dispatch of the automacubes

  Jerome awoke as Sandie the AI called to him. “The automacube S-1DT has now arrived from Habitat Alpha. TA-242 has been sent back to Alpha to be ready for transport of the next items when completed.”

  “Cammarry?” Jerome asked as he rolled over and reached for her. She was not in the bed they shared.

  “Cammarry is in the Goat Room,” Sandie informed him. “I apologize that it took seven hours, after the automacube was assembled, for a window of opportunity to open up for the teleportation. Two of the patrolmen in Alpha Habitat became amorous and they chose the Reproduction and Fabrication center for their tryst.”

  “They did not find the teleporter did they?” Jerome asked. “Ironic they would be drawn to a place like that. That facility does not meet my ideals for a romantic setting, but what is love? A rose by any other name would still smell sweet.”

  “No they did not discover the teleporter. That man and woman were rather more motivated by sexual lust and unbridled erotic passion than by romantic endeavors,” Sandie replied. “Additionally they did engage in a long period of use of that intoxicant lek, after their sensual needs were spent. Carnal cravings followed by drug induced apathy were much more the cause of the delay than romantic ruminations.”

  “Interesting that an artificial intelligence system has such profound feelings about fleshly activities,” Jerome teased. “Art thou a jealous lass, Sandie?”

  The AI replied, “Is whispering nothing? Is leaning cheek to cheek? Is meeting noses? Kissing with inside lip? Is stopping the career? Of laughing with a sigh? Of…”

  Jerome chortled, “Oh yes, skulking in corners and wishing clocks to more swift, passing the hours, minutes, noon, and midnight? I suppose Reproduction and Fabrication in Alpha may be a sulking corner.”

  “Or they may have been taking the designation, ‘reproduction’ in a far too literal and physical sense,” Sandie answered. “Finally they did depart and I was able to have S-1DT come through the teleporter.”

  Jerome dressed and joined Cammarry where she stood by the teleporter system.

  The large room, which they still called the Goat Room, had the three teleporter systems set up. The large receiving pad, which they had built for the people from Dome 17 to use was central, with the teleporter for Beta on one side, and the teleporter for Alpha, which was now active, on the other. The smaller receiving pad was glowing with the open orifice. Jerome could see the shadowy outlines of the cramped apartment just outside of Reproduction and Fabrication as he looked though that teleporter’s tunnel through space.

  “Hello Jerome,” Cammarry said as she squatted next to the bright and gleaming red automacube. She was inspecting the machine. She had a small panel on the back of the six wheeled boxy machine open. Its manipulation arm was folded down flat to its top, the weapon’s muzzles on its front were dull black, while its six drive wheels were a very deep gray color. Cammarry held a tool, a multiuse distal probe, in her hand as she swept its beam of light across the interior circuits. On the deck next to her was a small display showing a three dimensional and magnified representation of the automacube’s interior mechanisms, circuits, and controls. The multiuse distal probe was sending the magnifications to the image display.

  “Is there some problem?” Jerome asked.

  “None at all,” Cammarry replied. “I see nothing at all out of the specificati
ons, and my check was just for my own satisfaction anyway. Sandie assured me the quality of the production was without a doubt, but…”

  “You wondered if a Shadow implant device was in there, right?” Jerome placed his hand on Cammarry’s shoulder. “With real and legitimate concern. You are absolutely correct and justified in checking. Right Sandie?”

  “That is correct,” Sandie answered. “I have instructed the synthetic brain on the construction, but have no qualms at all about further inspections, especially in light of how difficult that Shadow device was to detect. I have found no evidence of what it was in any of the Conestoga’s databases or catalogues, but we know it was real, and it was a threat.”

  “Well, I did this for my own peace of mind anyway. Sandie, I see the enhanced communication gear is several generations better that the original designs. So this automacube,” she shut the rear panel and stood up, “will remain in constant linkage to you?”