The World Game

by Allen Charles

  “Technically you are correct Councillor Hannaford, however we intend to calculate the exact force required to nullify at least two of the tumbling effect vectors. This will leave us with a major spin around one axis with probably some wobble left, but not enough to matter and something we can deal with in the long term.

  The two major explosions will be augmented by placing reaction mass in the plane of the explosion. This mass will be rock debris that we will mine from the fragment in a place that is most beneficial towards our stabilizing efforts. We will collect this mass in cargo nets and place it over the charges. The effect will be like the difference between shooting an ancient projectile weapon with a bullet or with a blank cartridge. Our recoil is the force we are looking for to push back the spin. Councillor Shaw will do the calculations and Councillor Carver will verify them before we proceed.” Fuller stopped talking and looked expectantly at the faces around him. “Any more questions? None? Let’s get to it.”

  CHAPTER 47

  Inside the fragment.

  Zardooz awoke strapped into a control room chair. He felt stiff and disoriented by the erratic movement of the fragment. His balance was completely thrown and he felt as if he were drunk, a feeling that he knew well from the numerous times he had defied the prophet Mohammed’s teachings. He slowly extracted himself from the webbing and worked his way over to the tiny galley area that serviced control room personnel. He pulled open the mini fridge and found a Turkish coffee self heat cup. Thirty seconds later he was inhaling the delicious aroma of the coffee and allowing the thick, sweet brew to spread its warmth through his whole body. The caffeine hit was rapid and began to counter the constant dizziness from the tumble dryer effect of the motion.

  His head clearing, he started to think how he was going to get a view outside to see where he was and how much of Iran had come with him. His secondary issue was to stop the sickening motion somehow. He could not last long under such conditions. At the back of his mind was the violent action that had started the tumble and injured Arjmand. What had caused it?

  He slowly savored the coffee and looked around the control room. His mind empty by choice, he looked for inspiration in the dials, screens and devices. Nothing struck him as exceptional or possibly harboring some obscure duality of use. He looked again and then a third time. Nothing.

  Rolling up to a computer console, he commanded the computer to open an inventory list.

  “Supply room log.” he said.

  A list appeared in front of him, text description and a small dimage next to the list. He scanned the column quickly, paying more attention to the dimages than the words. A dimage of a crate gained his attention and he rotated the dimage to see all four sides, then flipped it to reveal any hidden markings on the base. There were just three letters in English script stencilled on one side. He activated a check box next to the dimage.

  “Show location.” he commanded the computer. A grid appeared locating the object in three dimensions. The dimage showed ghost shapes of other containers indicating that this box was two rows in and three high in the storage. He wondered if the impact shock had moved the stacked supplies.

  “Retrieve selected dimage object.”

  The computer confirmed its task. “Retrieving dimage object selected.”

  While the computer did its work, he looked through the list once again, occasionally flipping or rotating the 3D images that had become to be know as dimages when holographic displays became the norm. The most recent development in dimage technology was a shape matching electric charge projection that gave the hologram image an illusion of tactile solidity and allowed the rotation to work. Zardooz smiled to himself as he recalled the prank he had played on his lab assistant before fragmentation.

  He had upped the charge voltage on their lab computer so that every time she manipulated a dimage her hair would spread out and stand on end while she received the tingle of an electric shock. Seeing her not withdrawing from the electric discharge and the silent scream on her face, he thought he had gone too far and did an emergency shut down of the system.

  His assistant, and also his not infrequent sexual interlude, screamed at him to turn it back on. He had just shut down the best orgasm she had ever had without a man around.

  Zardooz reminisced with regret that he would never get the opportunity to exploit this phenomenon. He had already planned the erotic dimages that would be sold along with the high voltage systems, with half the population of the world potential consumers and the other half gift purchasers for the first half. How sad.

  He looked back at the computer. The retrieval was still in progress.

  “Computer, show me surveillance schematic and live feeds.”

  A wire diagram came up showing the complex. There were the expected nodes showing for the inner section of the complex and the two active corridor segments. There was one odd node that appeared to be totally disconnected from the rest of the complex. It was blinking on and off, more off than on. This was very interesting. He touched the screen where the node was blinking and commanded the computer, “Isolate and expand.”

  The screen zoomed and filled with the blinking dot. “Details.”

  Two columns appeared, one with the node designation and position, the other showing technical details of the feed from that node. The designation was correct, but the position was a series of null dashes, because it depended upon non existent GPS satellites. This was an external node all right and the blinking was caused by ongoing attempts to locate the GPS signals.

  Zardooz scrutinized the data before him. How could he circumvent the GPS feed? Was there some way of substituting? More importantly, could he make the node active and get a reading of the surface?

  His thoughts were interrupted by the computer beeping that the retrieval was done. The box he wanted had been delivered to the receiving room which was two doors down the corridor. He slowly got out of his harness, refocused on the schematic. “Save page. Personal Zardooz.”

  Making his way to the receiving room with extreme care, he was confronted by a wooden case, about a meter long and half a meter on the sides. The stencil on the side that had been unclear on the dimage was fuel cell powered device warning. There was a lot of raw hydrogen compressed inside the package. He commenced unclamping the steel band lock ties until he could fold back the lid. Inside lay a gleaming, polished Robotic Automated Boring Instrument. Known as a RABI, all he had to do was activate the fuel cell and the device would become active and fully self operational, even from getting out of the box on its own. After that, it was commanded through the computer system.

  Zardooz reached into the box and lifted back the activation switch cover. He keyed in his personal ID code on the pad and immediately the RABI came alive. It said, “System check.” A few whistles and beeps sounded. “All systems working.”

  “Stand by for instructions RABI.” Zardooz commanded the Borer. He left it and headed back for the control room, already planning the first task for the RABI. The device had rudimentary facilities for performing low level repairs once it reached its target. He planned to send it to the operational surface node and attempt to disable the GPS search. Once disabled, the node would go into local mode and become operational within its immediate area. Whether this worked or not, he would have the RABI deposit a hand carried communicator on the surface with a direct line down the bore hole. Not perfect, but some type of solution with two, better than zero, possibilities of success.

  Back in the control room Zardooz examined the schematic of the nodes imposed over the layout of the complex. He was looking for a point that the RABI could start its journey through the rock. He needed a place that could be sealed off to prevent atmospheric loss when the RABI penetrated into space. He wasn’t overly concerned about proximity of the node to the starting point for the bore. The RABI had capacity for long distance tunneling which was not going to be tested.

  He ran his finger over the schematic to focus on every detail, but after a few minutes
he had exhausted all options and he sat back in his seat with a frown on his face. After a few more minutes of staring and thinking he began to nod and talk to himself. He tapped the screen on the access corridor where Arjmand had come to grief, the seed of a plan germinating in his mind. He had to try to jury rig some circuits in the dead part of the corridor for his plan to work, so he called up the electrical circuit schematics for that section.

  A scream from the living quarters reminded him that Arjmand needed attention. He got up from the station and drifted in a wall bouncing path towards the cries of agony.

  CHAPTER 48

  Aboard Martin’s X6 Transport.

  “We can store all this stuff as reaction mass but we can’t get it into the system without an EVA,” said Corcoran, “and first we need to do the math to see if jettisoning it now will give us the edge with the remaining reaction mass. Every item we jettison will change our directional vector slightly. We have redundancy totalling about ten percent of the transport mass. That is a significant effect on our vector if we do it right.”

  “The transport has to be revolved so that the air lock is opposed to and in the same plane as Space City. For greatest benefit we have to push the stuff of at the center of mass and perpendicular our present vector. If we miss the center of mass we will impart a spin to the transport and have to use reaction mass to correct, so we lose the benefit.”

  Martin brought up a calculation table and ordered a dimage of the transport showing center of gravity and the neutral points on the skin that would not cause rotation. The points formed a ring about two thirds of the way to the rear of the transport where the reaction mass and engines were located. “We have to take the stuff out of the air lock, down the side of the ship and pitch from that point on the ring.” He pointed at a spot in line with the air lock. “We don’t have to rotate for air lock alignment. We can trek at an angle to the pitchers mound.”

  Corcoran laughed at the thought. “It’s going to be much easier if the lock is in line with less distance to drag everything. Don’t forget that as we jettison stuff the center of mass position will change so the pitchers mound has to move. That’s not a bad idea to set up something as a place holder.”

  “We will have to stuff the lock full to reduce the number of cycles. We will lose too much air other wise.” said Martin.

  “The air in the lock is conserved to ninety percent. We don’t lose a lot each time and we don’t really have an option. Let’s do it.”

  The pair started by removing empty seats, which easily unclipped from their bases. They decided to discharge the gory mess that was breaking into globules and floating about. The on board vacuum system took care of that, with the collection bag looking like a huge Scottish haggis by the time the job was done. Each load was tied into a bundle using fabric stripped from the jettison seats. They then started at one end of the transport and worked their way up checking the cartons and bales that had been haphazardly thrown aboard at the tumultuous take off. They separated out drinking water and food supplies, enough for about three days, which is what they had calculated as their maximum survival period, after which there was no point. A very fine balance indeed.

  The pile of material was strewn down the aisle to the air lock. Martin entered the lock and Corcoran passed the first bundle in and closed the lock. He went to the control cabin and initiated the rotation of the ship to the optimum position, then headed back to the lock.

  “You’re good to go.” Corcoran said to Martin over the lock intercom. He watched through the view port as Martin cycled the air out of the lock and opened the outer door. He struggled with the ungainly load which had snagged on the door sill and gave Corcoran a heart palpitation when the mass suddenly free and headed for the stars with Martin attached. He watched in helpless terror as he saw his friend being carried off, the primeval emotion drowning the cool logic and training of a professional astronaut.

  Then he saw Martin’s arm appear around the edge of the bundle and the rest of his body appeared as he swung himself around to the back of the pile of seats like a child on a monkey bar. Martin saw Corcoran and gave him a big grin and a quick thumbs up as he launched himself towards the air lock and grabbed the recessed handle. He had the bundle on a leash of seat fabric and waited until it had drifted to its full extent, then using the gradual extension of his arm and body, gently brought it to rest without shock. He then drew it back very slowly until he was able to grasp it and slow it down to a stop.

  “OK!” He exclaimed. “Take two.”

  A relieved Corcoran peered through the port. “You scared the living crap out of me man! I thought I was going to have to go fishing for you!”

  Martin turned his head and gave another cheezy grin that Corcoran could just discern behind the youniform visor. He turned back to the task at hand and gave the mass a small push in the correct direction, following it holding the tether with a little slack. There was no room for error now as there were no grab handles to prevent being dragged off into space. Only the engine nacelles remained between him and eternity.

  The stately procession of junk on a leash leading the astronaut like a huge dog being taken for a walk made its way to the first “pitcher’s mound” point. This was the tricky part, as Martin had no way of stopping the mass drift. He had rehearsed his moves in his mind over and over, but now it was do or die.

  He released the leash and jetted himself around and in front of the oncoming bundle. He didn’t have a bat and there were no balls or strikes coming up. He had to hit a home run every time. He had time to plant an adhesive base to the pitching point. The technology was ancient and had been called “Velcro” in its heyday. Every transport carried these patches to allow skin surface repair of the non-ferrous outer wall due to meteorite or other holing damage. Now the hook and loop material proved itself again.

  Martin planted his feet to which he had attached the hook part of the system onto the loop base. He was secured to the ship sufficiently to be able to tilt himself about forty five degrees forward, as far as his human ankle joints would allow, ready to receive and bring the mass to a halt once again. In a way, his previous mishap has given him confidence as he now had a feel for the forces involved and the energy he needed to apply to stop the mass.

  It came at him and he grasped available projections, using his legs and arms as shock absorbers through to the hook and loop anchor. He felt the immense strain on his legs and felt the ripping of some of the loops as the hooks were dragged free in a shearing action. His left foot was lifting and almost loose. He was in trouble!

  The mass stopped in equilibrium and he heaved a sigh of relief as he carefully planted his left foot back on the loop base.

  “Is everything OK?” Came a tentative inquiry from Corcoran.

  “Just peachy old son. Just peachy. Watch for the pitch now.”

  Martin crouched down and tickled the mass overhead until he felt it was reasonably centered above him. He carefully placed his palms on solid points of the bundle and then pushed up with his whole body to impart a velocity to the mass perpendicular to the axis of the ship. It took off like a dog after a bone, the leash trailing out to the side in weightlessness. Martin also flew upwards, only arrested by the hook and loop tether looking like a dancer in an ecstatic fling. He followed the course of the mass, thinking of the dog and stick. Good thing there were no fire hydrants in space. He giggled to himself at the absurd thought.

  He took a moment to rest, then squatted down. He had to do a back squat, one hand on the skin, while the other helped his leg pull away from the attachment. Once one leg was freed, he had to almost peel the other foot away to avoid bouncing away into space. He could use this pitcher’s point five more times before he had to move it back towards the nacelles. The good part was that he would gradually have security points in case of further emergency. He called for timing from his buddy. Less than five minutes had elapsed since his near disaster. He probably had around fifteen loads to jettison. Fourteen more times doin
g this, he thought to himself.

  “Eleven down, four to go Martin.” Corcoran was elated as each cycle went without a hitch. He was monitoring the effect of the jettisoning on the relative velocity of the transport. The cumulative effect was now significant with a directional component towards space city. The final four loads would bring the shift to about half the required move. The final adjustment would have to be delivered by precious reaction mass thrust.

  Martin had got each cycle down to around three minutes, gaining confidence and experience as he went along. As the pitcher’s mound was moved farther back the extra time was offset by his ability to shove the masses at greater speeds as his confidence increased. Finally, a quarter hour later he cycled back into the lock for the last time.

  As he came through the inner lock he imagined all the missing passengers clapping and cheering. “Not going there.” he thought to himself. Corcoran grabbed his hand and actually gave him a hug, a very unprofessional and human showing of care. Martin just relaxed with a sigh in Corcoran’s embrace and whispered, “Got to stop meeting like this man.”

  Corcoran pushed back and held Martin’s shoulders at arms length. They both burst out laughing while the invisible crowd aboard escalated their silent cheering.

  “Come on, its not over yet. We’ve gotta check the new vectors and plan the best burn. Then we can pray.” said Martin as he disengaged and made his way forward. “That was five tons we just dumped.”

  “And all our passengers.” added Corcoran.

  CHAPTER 49

  On the Fragment Surface.

  “It’s so difficult to stay in place on this thing!” exclaimed Felicity. “I used to do rock climbing, but this is extreme rock climbing, being flung off in any direction with an endless drop ahead. Creepy!”