by Dean, Warren
Finally the ramp began to lift, agonisingly slowly. More soldiers came through other hatches around the hangar bay and she fired bursts in all directions to keep them back. After what seemed like forever, the ramp clicked shut, sealing itself automatically.
She didn't waste a second. She ran towards the elevator chutes, signalling Carson and Vitaly to follow. "Stay together," she ordered. "There are probably other people on the ship, and some of them may be loyal to Chang."
"What happened to Heller?" gasped Carson as they ran into one of the chutes.
"He was hit," she said, pressing its touchscreen.
"Stunned or..."
"I think so. I couldn't do anything for him."
The chute doors sprang open and they moved cautiously out onto the landing on the bridge level. They ran quickly down the walkway leading to the bridge, checking the living and dining cabins along its length. In one of them they found three technicians crouched nervously against a bulkhead. From the badges on their overalls she could see that two were British and the third American.
"Are there any Chinese soldiers on board?" she barked at them.
The American spoke up nervously. 'We haven't seen any, Ma'am, and we have been on board all morning. Can you tell us what is happening?"
"The ship is about to launch. We cannot open the loading bay to let you out so you have no choice but to come with us." She turned to Carson. "Take these technicians with you and search each level. Round up anyone on board and take them to one of the passenger cabins. Make sure they are all secured within life-support cocoons. If you see any Chinese soldiers, I need to know how many and where they are. Use the ship's com system to contact me on the bridge."
Carson led the technicians away, quickly explaining the situation to them. The other two headed for the bridge. They approached the massive suspended cylinder which encased it. Located centrally within the ship, it was designed on the same principle as the life-support cocoons. Attached to the hull by malleable tethers, it would sway and twist so as to minimise the effect of the G-forces generated by wormhole travel. There was a wide clearance around the cylinder to give it enough space to do so. It was reached by a retractable conduit, which would be withdrawn before the star drive was engaged.
She checked the repeater; it was almost out of charge, but there was nothing she could do about that now. They ran across the conduit to the main bridge hatch, which was closed. They flattened themselves against the outside of the cylinder, one on each side of the hatch. Keeping his body to the side, Vitaly carefully opened it and pushed. They both stood still, waiting to see what reaction they would get from whoever might be inside. Nothing happened, but that didn't mean much. If there were Chinese soldiers in there, they would be waiting to see who came in. If Hans and Harry were inside, as she fervently hoped, they would surely be hiding. Of course, there might be no-one in there at all.
She realised that she was going to have to offer herself as a target again. There was no time for anything else. She thrust the repeater at her companion. "Come in right after me. If anyone starts shooting, take them out. There is only a single burst left, Vitaly, so don't waste it."
"But Colonel, surely I should go in first and you should take the repeater?"
"Don't argue with me. This whole thing is my idea and my responsibility. I have already had to leave Heller behind and I don't intend to lose anyone else. If I don't make it, the ship will still have you as a pilot."
He nodded, accepting the order and the repeater. She took another deep breath and then exploded onto the bridge, rolling forwards and then throwing herself sideways. She crashed into one of the consoles, driving the wind out of her lungs. Vitaly came in a second later, his repeater swinging left and right, ready to fire.
"You're late," said Hans. "Try not to break anything, will you."
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Katya waited for her breath to come back and then stood up smoothly. She motioned for Vitaly to keep the entrance covered. "How did you know it was us?" she demanded from Hans. "Wouldn't it have been safer for you to hide?"
He was seated within the pilot's console. Apart from looking more tired and dishevelled than usual, he seemed to have survived his spacewalk intact. "Then how would we have been able to prepare for launch? And anyway, we saw you come aboard on the video feeds. You have stirred up a hornet's nest out there."
He swiped at the console's main touchscreen, calling up a visual from the hangar bay. It was still swarming with soldiers. They had sealed off all of the exits and surrounded the ship. But there was not much else they could do; they would need more than laser-repeaters to break open a hull designed to withstand the forces of wormhole travel.
The pilot's console, shaped like large bubble, was situated in the centre of the circular floor of the bridge. In that position it would be least affected by those forces, optimising the chances of the pilot maintaining consciousness during the voyage. In normal space the console was fixed in position, but when the ship was travelling through a wormhole it would revolve freely. This would enable its occupant to maintain some semblance of horizontal balance.
Arranged in a semi-circle around the pilot's console were nine more revolving consoles of varying sizes. Each contained a manoeuvrable seat, which was surrounded by arrays of electronics, touchscreens, switches and pedals.
There was no central screen or window on the bridge, like those found on shuttles and other conventional space ships. Earthworm was an enclosed ball; the design most suited to hurtling headlong through a rift in space.
Harry was seated within the star drive console, entering equations onto a touchscreen. He took the time to give her a nervous wave, and then went back to work. Five or six technicians from various delegations were scurrying around, busy with various tasks.
Hans flipped a set of switches above his head and she heard the faint hum of the air-vortex thrusters starting up.
"What is the status of the star drive?" she asked. "Is it operational?"
He slid out of the console and offered it to her with a flourish. "We are about to find out, my dear. We haven't exactly been able to test it, you know. We will be ready to launch in a few minutes."
She climbed into the pilot's console. It was time for her to assume command of the ship. "We must wait for Carson to report back. I sent him to find everyone on board and take them to one of the passenger cabins."
Hans scurried over to one of the other consoles, replying over his shoulder. "He shouldn't have much trouble. Very few people have come aboard since we arrived. We had to hide once when some Chinese technicians came to examine the star drive. Luckily, they didn't try to dismantle it. We haven't seen any soldiers at all, so we have been able to work pretty much continuously. Harry and I recruited these technicians to help us. He has been training them to operate some of the ship's systems."
It was good to sit surrounded by the controls she had been familiarising herself with for so long. She flicked away at the main touchscreen, calling up the charts and calculations she had been working on before her incarceration. She began plotting a wormhole vector. It was exhilarating to be doing it for real after the hundreds of simulations she had worked on. If circumstances were different, she would have appreciated the historical significance of the moment, but all she cared about was getting the ship away from the Moon.
She decided not to be too ambitious with her choice of destination and selected Gamma 1680, a star within nearby Centaurus A. The jump would be relatively short, minimising the risk of anomalies. According to the Faerie Folk's charts, the star was stable and had a number of solid, Earth-like planets orbiting it. The system was uninhabited, but it had been identified as a possible candidate for human colonisation.
Although the main purpose of Earthworm's maiden voyage was to prove to the world that space travel was viable, the beleaguered population of the planet would be given an additional lift if the ship were to return with the co-ordinates of a planet suitable for human habitation.
Carson reported in from one of the passenger cabins. He had swept the ship as best he could and found no Chinese soldiers, nor any other Chinese personnel. He had rounded up the personnel he had found, and they were now safely ensconced within life-support cocoons. She ordered him to join them and to stay put until she gave the all-clear. Then she sealed the bridge hatch and retracted the conduit.
Vitaly relinquished his guard duty, stowed the repeater, and climbed into one of the co-pilot consoles.
The important thing now was to get off the Moon before Chang found a way to stop them. "How long," she barked at Hans. She couldn't see his face from where she was sitting, but she had the feeling that he had rolled his eyes at her imperious tone.
"Two more minutes," he said, working feverishly on two touchscreens at once. She turned her head to where Harry could be seen checking and re-checking the star drive he had been programming for the last three days.
The hastily trained bridge technicians scurried around, booting up the systems they would need to lift off from the Moon. One of them, a young man from the British delegation by the sound of his accent, had been given the responsibility of monitoring communications. He reported that the ops room was calling over the external com, demanding that they open the loading bay ramp and surrender control of the ship.
Suddenly angry, she flicked open the com. "This is Colonel Kasparova. I am now in command of the star ship. It will be launching shortly. Please clear all personnel from the hangar bay. We have no wish to cause harm to any of your soldiers, but we will not hesitate to do so if necessary."
After a moment of silence, the flat voice of General Chang replied. "Colonel, your actions are unauthorised and your unprovoked attack on Chinese personnel constitutes an act of war. My superiors have been notified of these events. However, I wish to avoid any further unpleasantness. If you relinquish control of the ship and submit to my custody immediately, you will be returned to the brig unharmed and I will recommend to my superiors that no retaliatory measures are taken."
Katya ignored him and used the time to complete her calculations. "Prepare for launch," she ordered the rest of the ship, and then switched back to the external com. "You seem to have forgotten, general, that it was your soldiers who invaded the moonbase and imprisoned me and members of the other delegations. It is you who has committed an act of war and you cannot complain about the measures we have had to take in order to defend ourselves. We intend to launch in sixty seconds. Please clear the hangar bay."
"Haven't you overlooked something, Colonel? How do you intend to open the dome? Have you forgotten that the ops room can override the ship's dome control system?"
"That applies only if the override system in the ops room is undamaged, general. Forty seconds to launch."
The external com was silent for a few moments. She could almost hear the general asking the ops room staff what she was talking about. She allowed herself a moment of satisfaction imagining the reply; that the stun-grenade explosion had also knocked out the ops room's override system. They couldn't prevent the dome from being opened from the ship.
The com came back to life. "You have been very clever, Colonel. But if you open the dome, Lieutenant Lahm will be killed. He is still lying in the hangar bay where you left him."
The words were like a dagger through her heart. She hadn't spared a thought for Heller since she had charged the loading ramp guards. She swiped at an auxiliary screen, calling up a visual of the area where he had been hit. His prone body remained where it had fallen. She had assumed that the Chinese would take him back to the brig. Perhaps they hadn't had a chance to do so yet, or perhaps they had been ordered not to.
She flicked open the external com again. "Twenty seconds to launch. There is no need for any loss of life, General. I will delay the launch to give your men time to remove Lieutenant Lahm and get well clear of the hangar bay." She wondered whether the soldier Carson had shot was still alive. If he wasn't, her appeal was going to fall on deaf ears.
She waited for a response. None came. She called up visuals from around the hangar bay to see what was happening. The Chinese soldiers were evacuating, sealing the hatches behind them. Heller remained where he had fallen. The external com remained silent. Her countdown reached zero.
"Stand by," she ordered over the ship's internal com.
She switched back to the external com. "I will give you one more opportunity, general. There is no need for a man to die. Once we have gone, you will have to answer to the United Nations for your actions on the moonbase. If you retrieve Lieutenant Heller, you may be shown leniency."
Carson broke in over the internal com. "Have the soldiers left the hangar bay yet, Colonel? If they have, perhaps I can go out and get him."
"Negative, Captain. As soon as we open the ramp, those soldiers will be back in the blink of an eye. You will never be able to reach Heller and get him back to the ramp in time. Maintain your position."
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Hans shake his head and sit back. "It's over, Katya. We cannot sacrifice poor Heller."
"It is not that simple, Hans. If we surrender now, Chang will gain control of an operational star drive. He has already told us that he intends to use it solely for the benefit of his country. He promises that it will be made available to the rest of the world later, but how can we trust him after what he has done here on the Moon? And anyway, once it is taken to China, that decision will be out of his hands.
"But if we leave now, we can deliver it to the rest of the world. Hundreds of thousands of people, who might otherwise be killed in conflicts or by disease or famine, will have the opportunity to leave the planet and start a new life. We may save one man today, but cause death and hardship for many."
"Katya, we cannot think like that. There must be another way. Perhaps we can negotiate with Chang. Let us postpone the launch. They cannot force their way onto the ship. We still have some time."
"That is where you are wrong. Chang's technicians will be working on restoring the dome override system. It shouldn't take them more than a few minutes. Once they repair it, we will be trapped. If we are going to go, we have to go now."
"Then we should vote on it. I say no. What about you, Harry?"
Katya didn't give the British astrophysicist time to respond. "This is not a democracy, Hans. I command this ship and it is my decision." She flicked on the internal com. "Prepare for launch in sixty seconds."
There was a shocked silence on the bridge.
"There is something else you haven't considered, Hans." She deliberately left open the internal com so that everyone on the ship could hear her. "Do you think that Chang is simply going to let us go? He knows that we have the knowledge to re-engineer the star drive. If he allows us to go home, we will replicate it and the advantage he has worked so hard to gain will be lost. You may think that he has the option of keeping us prisoner, but I don't think that he can. Our governments won't stand by and leave us up here. The knowledge we have is too valuable.
"They will demand our release and, if Chang refuses, they will have no option but to attack the moonbase in an attempt to free us. That will probably precipitate a full-scale war, which will be catastrophic for the whole planet. Chang's simplest solution will be to kill us. He will claim that we attacked his men in an attempt to commandeer the ship and they killed us in self-defence. Our nations will protest, but there will be nothing they will be able to do about it."
No-one on the bridge said anything.
"Thirty seconds. Begin launch sequence," she ordered Vitaly. The hum of the thrusters changed pitch, and the ship rocked gently as it began to lift off the ground. She carefully avoided looking at the sector where Heller still lay. The technicians on the bridge scrambled to strap themselves into consoles.
"Harry, I am sendin
g you my wormhole vector equations. As soon as we are clear of the Moon, activate the star drive. We will acquire the wormhole on your signal."
"Ten seconds to launch. "De-pressurize the hangar bay. Commence the dome exit sequence."
Vitaly hesitated, realising that what he was about to do would mean the end of Heller. He punched at his touchscreen, his face a blank mask.
Katya swiped at her main screen to bring up a visual of the apex of the dome. For a moment nothing happened and she thought that the Chinese must have succeeded in repairing the override. But then she saw a glimmer of starlight appear and grow between the receding edges of the two halves of the dome.
"Launch when you are ready, Vitaly." He engaged more of the thrusters and the ship seemed to gather itself together. In the hangar bay, unsecured equipment was sent tumbling across the floor by the increase in thrust. Then, like a rubber ball rising from a bounce, Earthworm accelerated through the opening and away from the moonbase.
Harry fed Katya's vector equations into the star drive and activated the system. She wasn't an expert on the mechanics of the device, although she had a basic understanding of the theory. A particle accelerator built into the ship's hull began smashing photons together. The collisions generated a mass of sub-atomic twin particles. Each particle was the polar opposite of its twin. By virtue of quantum entanglement, any spin applied to a particle would cause its twin to spin in the opposite direction.
The force of the collisions which created the particles drove each particle away from its twin. Half of the particles were retained in the accelerator; their twins were launched into space at high velocity.
The twins out in space became suffused with dark energy; the intrinsic energy of space which makes up over seventy per cent of the universe. When the ship reached the target acquisition quadrant, the particles in the accelerator were spun into a high speed vortex. Their twins, infused with the power and mass of dark energy, replicated the vortex, but on a far larger scale.