by Ginger Booth
Yes, these weekend events were intended to keep life fresh during the interminable months of the journey. Sass found morning jumping jacks especially irritating in a floaty dress. Then the ends kept tangling between her thighs while they jogged the hold. Today’s route was to run to the catwalk stairs, thunder around to the forward bulkhead, run up that and across the ceiling, down to the catwalk, around and down the slide, and repeat for ten.
Cortez, damn her, decided she was a Roman slave girl. She draped her toga cloth over skin-tight khaki skivvies. Her sheet, knotted around her ribs and behind her neck, flowed down her back like a cape. The guys, though dressed much the same as Sass, had the height to keep the sheet at mid-thigh instead of fouling between their legs. Kassidy kept pace with Sass on the battle of the toga wedgie. Jules waited for the afternoon workout circuit with her husband, currently on watch.
“Zero-g game of EVA after jogging!” Ben the sunset leader called from the rear of the line.
“In togas,” Wilder scoffed.
“I’ve been picturing this all week!” Ben assured him. Their ensuing good-natured scuffle at the top of the rear bulkhead caused them to fall behind the group.
Sass jogged in place on the catwalk and let showboat Kassidy launch first down the slide. Painful experience on the first lap taught the women that sitting to this meant they’d take the friction on bare thighs. Kassidy slid backwards. “Last lap! Wilder, Acosta! Hurry it up!”
Kassidy cleared the bottom with a nice thump into the wall. Sass took it at a run and dove on her front at the ship’s full 1-g for a meatier thunk at the bottom.
And suddenly, a thunk hit her sideways, and she barrel-rolled off the slide, toga tails aflutter. She continued rolling mid-air toward the ventilation bulkhead forward.
“Mr. Copeland, report pressure status!” Abel barked over the public address.
Sass instinctively commenced zero-g maneuvers, as though they played their usual game of EVA. But forward of the slide was out of bounds for the games and offered no guylines. Other limbs and togas, caught off-guard, likewise spun in the hold like leggy chrysanthemums.
Except for Copeland, who immediately cut in his personal grav to land nimbly on the deck and run for the downstairs engineering control podium by the cargo lock.
Sheepishly, Sass followed his lead. She was jogging to his position before the situation finally dawned on her. We lost gravity. Oy… She didn’t know how that was possible. Even when the star drives shut down for the fire, they hadn’t lost gravity. “Talk to me, Cope.”
“Good news, no pressure leaks,” Copeland replied. “Dammit, could you…? I left my tablet in my other toga.”
Sass snickered. She shared the same problem. This bed sheet offered no handy pockets. She punched the comms button on the podium and vowed to slip her pocket tablet into her bra next time she got a chance. “Abel, Copeland reports no pressure leaks. Still investigating. Be advised we have no comm tablets in our togas.”
Abel’s voice responded on the public address system. “All hands, carry your comms no matter what you’re wearing. Wilder, Cortez – fetch comms to officers in the hold. Priority to Copeland and the captain.”
Ben caught up to Sass and Copeland, purple-edged skirts swishing prettily at mid-thigh over his usual sneakers. “Cap, where do you want me?”
“Don’t know yet,” Sass replied. “Cope? Talk to me.”
“We were hit,” Copeland returned distractedly. “Question is where. All compartments secure. Pressure secure.”
She could see he was systematically reviewing external camera footage, probably in order of paranoia. Although… “I flew forward. If something hit us it was on the front.”
Copeland nodded without losing focus. “Worked that out myself, cap,” he muttered. “While we’re going several thousand klicks per second in the opposition direction –” For the deceleration phase of their long cruise, Thrive flew rump-first. His intent gaze grew riveted, and his finger-slide panning on the controls abruptly switched to button jabs.
Sass pulled around the console to peer over his shoulder, trying to see without crowding the man or breathing down his neck. He rapidly cycled through their external cameras, a black screen flashing past along the way.
“Engineer going EVA,” he reported, already throwing off his toga and yanking open the pressure suit cabinet. “Sass, you want to go with? Or Abel?”
“Me,” she agreed, punching the comms button again. “Abel, be advised engineer and captain stepping outside for damage assessment. Camera…8 is not reporting.” She let up the button. “Cope, you didn’t see anything on the other cameras?”
“I quit looking,” he growled in return, already pulling on his suit. “Ben, take over comms here. Then study all camera feeds at time of impact.”
Sass should have thought of that. She yielded her spot to Ben and hastened to catch up to Copeland on suiting up. She took a moment to snag Copeland’s drifting sheet out of the air and pass it to Ben along with her own. Then she yanked off her sneakers and pulled on her pressure suit, wishing she wore a little less bare skin to touch the chilly interior. She zipped up, checked her air levels, and sealed her helmet in nothing flat.
At least she had comms again. “Captain on damage control channel 2. Ready.”
Copeland just stood there, inches away. Apparently he was thinking something through. He stepped further down the bulkhead and rummaged through another cabinet. He stuffed several items into a satchel. He tossed several coiled guylines her way without comment.
Sass caught the lines and reached for an armored body vest from the suit locker. Couldn’t hurt, and the webbing had extra pockets. Copeland’s come-hither gesture suggested he wanted one, too.
“Mr. Copeland, are you on channel 2?” she inquired.
“No, dammit, I wasn’t,” he agreed after a moment. “OK, I’m set. We take the trapdoor out.”
Sass gathered he was talking to himself, since no one had used any other airlock since they accelerated toward Denali. Or – well, it would be a bad day indeed if they needed to use any other door. But today was looking rather bleak. The trapdoor led to an interior cross-shape of access corridors between the double layer array of 8 containers, granting them access to retrieve fuel and supplies, sheltered between the big boxes. Industrial strength netting prevented anyone or anything from accidentally escaping the relative safety of the access aisles.
She accepted a knapsack of tools to carry and handed him his webbing armor vest. He didn’t stop until he’d opened the voluminous trap door and climbed in. She hopped in beside him and immediately hit the door close button. She tapped her grav controller on the outside of her vest.
He’d forgotten and sealed his grav generator inside his suit.
He swore a blue streak and stabbed the door button to dilate open again above them. He hauled off his helmet and hollered, “Someone give me their grav generator. Now!”
Wilder, arriving with their comms tablets, tossed him one. Immediately, Copeland withdrew back inside to pull his vest on, with the grav generator. Sass left him be, and silently reoriented upside-down. He took the hint and selected foot-holds, then attached Sass’s offered safety line.
“Ready,” the engineer attempted. The word came out too soft, so he cleared his throat and repeated it.
“Talk to me, John,” Sass urged. “Something’s got you spooked.”
He nodded microscopically, and grabbed the safety bar with his free hand. “Let’s see.”
The controls were on her side. With trepidation, Sass punched the button for the pressure to cycle, then opened the outer door.
Unlike Copeland, she’d barely been out on EVA this trip. He and Abel led the resupply excursions while she minded the ship. Now what she noticed first was that the safety net was missing beyond the corridor, the stars unblinking in the distance. The stars were also unmoving, a feature of space travel that unnerved her if she thought about it. Though they hurtled along at terrifying speed, that was nothi
ng to stellar distances. They might as well have been sitting still compared to their achingly distant landmarks.
Another moment, and she noticed what her companion probably saw straight off. They used to have two layers of containers. Now they had one. Four out of eight containers appeared to be missing. And her engineer was frozen to the spot in horror.
Sass transferred their anchoring D-rings to the outside of the craft in cautious slow motion, then hazarded a look around, only her helmet out the door. The two aft containers appeared well-seated, snug against the belly of the Thrive. The gaps between the forward containers and hull didn’t match, neither as snug as the aft boxes, and one maybe 10 cm looser than the other.
Copeland peered beside her now, and absently nudged her out of his view. Again struggling for voice, he announced over the intercom, “Damage control request. Following personnel suit up for EVA. Wait on standby in the hold. Rocha, Cortez, Yang.”
Ben offered, “Cope, you want me?”
“I do not,” Copeland returned. He unhooked their D-rings and withdrew them inside, punching the button. “Need a different door.”
“John, please talk to me,” Sass begged.
“The grav,” Copeland struggled to get the words out again. “We lost the starboard forward anchor point. No sensor, no camera, grav system power lost at that corner. We lost 4 containers, obviously.” She’d seen that for herself.
Sass hesitated a moment, then said, “Abel – no, Ben. Scout for 4 loose containers.”
“And figure out how much fuel we have left,” Copeland murmured. “And water.”
The trapdoor opened, but now it was Sass’s turn to remain frozen. She hadn’t added up the danger until he said those words. If they’d lost too much fuel, too much water, they were dead. But even if they could still make it to Denali, the chance of them having enough fuel left to return to Mahina was vanishingly small.
The engineer vaulted out into the hold, then turned back to extend a hand to her. His face looked haunted through his helmet. “Cap?” he whispered, and gulped.
16
Sass’s heart pounded a few more times, thundering in her ears. Familiar panic sweat coated her hands inside her gauntlets. And her key man was petrified by a disaster beyond his training and abilities, and the possibility of never seeing his baby boy again.
That thought, compassion for her poor engineer’s plight, broke through her paralysis. She nodded to him firmly and grasped his proffered hand to vault out of the trapdoor airlock into the hold.
Their backup team was only just arriving, not yet suited. And clearly Copeland didn’t know yet what to ask them to do. She nodded to them as well, and briskly proceeded with Copeland to exit the side airlock, above the container array.
While the air cycled out, she switched to a private circuit. “What are you thinking?”
“I have no fucking clue,” he replied, belatedly realizing he hadn’t switched off the damage control channel. Ruefully, he changed channels now. “First, secure the remaining containers. Somehow.”
“Then we hope to retrieve the others?” The airlock was depressurized, so she punched the button to open the outer door.
Copeland secured their D-rings and peeked out. They were traveling at over 4,000 kilometers per second. He gulped and switched to the command channel. “Abel, no maneuvers, no engine burns. None. Zero. Until further notice.”
“Roger that,” Abel agreed. “Ben?”
Ben replied, “Disabling AI piloting control. Guns only. Cope, I found one of the containers.”
“Great, Ben. Not now,” Copeland replied. Back on his private channel with Sass, he added, “Need to secure what we have first.”
“Absolutely,” Sass agreed. “I’m tethering you to me, and both of us to the ship. I’ll mind the tools.”
He nodded sharply and headed out, crawling along the side of the ship using the magnetic pads on his knees and forearms, transferring his D-ring off to each hand-hold.
Sass deemed his progress too slow. “Stay clamped, Cope. Passing you,” she announced. Zero-g propulsion took extensive practice to build reflexes, just as a baby learned to walk. She was simply better at it than he was – one of the best on the ship. She clamped off her ring in front of her, gathered to jump as hard as she could, and launched at a 20-degree angle off the side of the ship forward, straight into the stars.
This maneuver took real guts the first time. But the physics were reliable. When she reached the end of her tether, her momentum had to go somewhere. In this case, her line pivoted on her anchor point back by the airlock, and slapped her to the side of the ship at the front of the containers, because that’s how much slack she’d allowed. She grabbed a hand-hold and locked on.
She tugged on her line to Copeland, who was also clamped to a hand-hold. “Let go, I’ll reel you to me.”
He trusted her – confident movement engendered that trust. Within a few more seconds, he was securely anchored within a meter of the problem of the moment. The engineer didn’t even bother to acknowledge the ride. He immediately resumed crawling on magnetics to reach what he needed to see, and clicked on his helmet light. “Need another light.”
Sass crawled beside him, adding her light. She secured tools and lines before satisfying her curiosity. But the broken metal before her didn’t make any sense to her. Clearly a camera was missing from its mount, its legs sheared off, feet bolts still in place. She’d expected a torn hole from something colliding with them. Instead, the forward starboard container corner simply jutted too far out from the ship, a gap of 25 cm here.
Copeland scrabbled crablike around the front of the container. Earth-born instincts screamed to Sass that this was unsafe. Something could hit him. But of course, if anything hit the front of container or ship, they would all die at this speed. She firmly reminded her instincts to shut up. The ESD field and guns kept debris far away from this spot. Or rather, they had so far, except for whatever impact just cost them half their containers. If there was an impact.
“Sass,” he requested, “move one meter from the corner on your side, and shine your light into the gap.”
She did so, expecting to see through to the next container. But she didn’t. The top of the box seemed to bulge enough to touch the Thrive.
“One more meter down,” Copeland asked. “I’m going to the far corner.”
The railway car-sized containers weren’t all that large. Basically they both moved 2 meters in from the suspected problem corner where they started, the engineer traversing its 2.4 meter width while Sass backtracked part of its 12 meter length.
“It’s round in the middle?” Sass asked, after she shifted. “Still aft from here.”
“I’ll be damned,” Copeland agreed. “Huh. I could check down the other side.”
“Veto,” the captain said. “Until this one is secured, do not turn that corner.”
“Right,” he agreed. “Cap, continue walking it back, just one meter at a time, until you think you’ve found the touch point. You know, where it’s bellied out the most.”
“I think I was there before,” Sass returned. “Maybe 2.5 meters from your end. Not sure how far in.”
After a slight pause for him to shift position, he decided, “Just right of middle. Um, towards you. And you don’t see anything else? Just a bellied-out top of the container?”
“Correct. So the mounts are alright?”
“Hell, no. All the mounts are broken. But if the container’s top is round, it won’t anchor back, anyway.” He switched channels. “Ben? Or Abel. Can you figure out what we have stored, sort of to the back of the forward starboard container?”
“Ben,” Sass translated, “Cope means back from the door of that box. Relative to the ship, that position is maybe 9 meters from forward, 4 to starboard.”
“Understood,” Ben agreed. “Manifest says machinery from Hell’s Bells. Satellites, electric motors, some tall stuff. I think the taller boxes are star drive cores.”
“Fragile,
this end up,” Copeland murmured.
“Care to expand on that, John?” Sass prompted after a moment’s silence.
“I think something in this container blew up? Expanded? Shot upward into the hull? Something. Damn.”
“Can we re-anchor this without flattening the box?”
Copeland clambered around the corner. “Returning to the access aisle,” he noted. Rather than wait, he unclamped at that corner and started hauling himself back toward the airlock. He was almost there before he addressed her question.
“We probably could re-anchor it belly-topped,” he allowed. “But it won’t be as strong. More to the point, I want to know it isn’t going to do this again. And whatever it was also stabbed into the gravity power conduit.”
“Meaning?” Sass inquired, following along behind and retrieving their lines.
“We weren’t hit by anything, cap,” he clarified. “Something inside this box bellied out the top and stabbed into the bottom of the ship. I want that out of there. And anything else that’s going to do the same thing. Ben, confirm for me – there were four of those crates?”
“Yes. All in this container,” Ben replied.
“So we need to jettison them?” Sass asked.
Abel cut in, “Sass, those four crates are worth more than the ship.”
“Not if they kill us,” she retorted.
“Not really the problem, cap,” Copeland interrupted. He’d reached the access corridor between the forward and aft containers, a space about 3 meters wide aligned with the main cargo ramp – closed – and cargo trapdoor in the middle, slightly aft of the airlock. He paused to consider his tether options. His carefully considered network of steel guylines was gone.
Sass joined him and fastened them both to the nearest handholds, and each other. “What’s really the problem?” Sass reminded him.
“We have no gravity. Items inside this container are free-floating. And something in there just kicked with enough force to break our luggage frame and knock off four containers. Oh, and this box is currently attached to the ship only by whatever spear it shot into our grav plate conduit. That’s not much of an anchor.”