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Page 33


  “Parts are still on backorder?” Capt. Aribella wiped sweat from his forehead. He left a streak of grease in its place. Andy threw him a towel.

  “Yeah, I checked this morning before chow. Everything is still five days out.”

  “Stellar. Melody, you okay?”

  Melody rolled her feet at the ankles, trying to make her boots fit better.

  “Yeah . . . Still pregnant though. Bit of a mixed bag.”

  “Whose fault is that?”

  “I blame Dustin. First Expeditionary guys are always to blame,” Andy said.

  “Her own fault.”

  The three crewmates turned and looked at the unwelcome intruder. Standing out like an itchy sore on their backs was the red nosed Ensign Moribelli. He stood behind a large wheeled cart covered in various parts. Many of which were thermal plates, a rear loading door gasket, and some piping and tubes that belonged to a TOV induction system. The parts weren’t factory new . . . but they were present.

  “Can we help you, Ensign?” Captain Aribella said as he got to his feet.

  “No sir, I came to help you. I made some calls, pulled some strings, and was able to gather the parts that you need for Beagle.”

  The ensign held up a sheet of paper, and looked it over. A look of smug pride came over his face.

  “Yep, all of what you need is right here. Plates, induction parts, and the gasket for your loading door. I checked parts numbers and these are all the exact same things you asked for, just used.”

  Andy went to the cart and looked the parts over. He fiddled with each widget, trying to find flaws in them, but couldn’t find anything.

  “All there Andy?” Dan asked his sergeant.

  “Yes, this is . . . great. Thank you Ensign Moribelli. Very helpful.”

  “I was surprised the parts became available. When I put a wide request out, I got nothing back, but when I added that the request was to get Beagle up and running, that changed the tune. People had stuff shipped from their own hidey holes to get your ship up and running. You folks are quite well known it seems. So I’ll leave these with you. The hangar commander wanted me to let you know that you’ve been released from ship maintenance, and that he wants you to get to work on Beagle effective immediately.”

  “We’ll finish up this afternoon, and get to work on Beagle in the morning. First thing,” Aribella said. “Should be up and out of here within a few days.”

  “About that . . . ” the ensign replied, another smug expression rising. “The hangar commander told me to tell you that you have until tomorrow at eighteen hundred hours. He expects you to start work now, work through the night, register a flight plan no later than zero six hundred, and depart by eighteen hundred. Anything beyond that he’ll consider dereliction of duty.”

  “That’s pretty unreasonable. I’ll talk to the commander,” Dan said with a surprising lack of hostility.

  “Whatever cycles your air. Just be ready for his wrath. He wants you, your crew, and your boat out.”

  The junior officer left without a salute.

  “Shit,” Melody said. “Now what the hell do we do?”

  “I might be able to buy us a day. Titan can’t shove off for Selva yet. It’s too early, and we’d be racing to get ready. This is bad,” Dan said after the two gathered closer to her sitting place.

  Melody looked at her sore feet and sighed. “If we push up Titan’s departure, we need to entirely recalculate the voyage. An earlier departure means more time in space, too. We might not have enough fuel, or food for that to be a possibility. I’ll talk to Leah, see if she thinks it’s an option.”

  “I’ll hit the hangar commander up with Leah as backing too. He’ll back off for at least a day or two to let us sort it out,” Dan said. “At least a day.”

  “I’ll . . . keep working on the ship?” Andy offered.

  Melody extended a hand to him.

  “You can help me up.”

  For the first time in weeks, Melody allowed her emotions to show. Fresh hot tears streamed down her face and her lips quivered.

  “Leah, we can back out. You’ll just go without us,” Melody said, resigned to failure.

  Leah sat down on the narrow bed in her cramped quarters and put an arm around Melody’s shoulders. Melody blew her nose in an oily shop rag from her trouser pocket.

  “As much as I’d like to say that’s an option, it isn’t. My primary helmsman had her appendix burst a couple hours ago. Shipped back to Pacifica on the last shuttle for medical leave. My co-pilot isn’t a part of this. He listens to rules.”

  “So who will your pilots be?”

  “I had three with her, you and Dan. That was enough. Now I have you and Dan. If you get sent to Sota for maternity leave, and Dan gets sent to purgatory, we need to start from scratch and it’s too late to do that. We have to ship out early, short on flight crew. It’s that or scrap the mission.”

  “Okay. Okay. I’ll get my stuff. I’m ready. What do we need to do?”

  “I’ll get more food and water for the transit. Titan is already loaded with gear for when we land. Fuel might be an issue, but it can’t be. We cannot run dry. I’ll handle getting another fuel cell. What you can do, is talk to Dr. Maine.”

  “Why?”

  “Our navigators are good, but they aren’t as good as him, and we’ll be charting this by the naked eye as we go. A small error in the trajectory, or velocity, and we hurl ourselves into the sun. If he’s willing to come, it’ll make it a whole lot easier.”

  Melody cleaned up her face with a tissue Leah handed her. “I’ll talk to him. I’m sorry I had a meltdown.”

  “Shut up and get your job done. You’ve got a month to cry about it on the way to Selva. And clean up. You look ridiculous with snot and oil smeared on your cheeks.”

  The women laughed, stood, and got to work.

  Hours later, Melody, Leah, Dan and the rest of the crew who would be leaving Pioneer 3 for Selva decided that an early departure was a necessity.

  They would leave that night, and a frightened Herbert Maine would go with them.

  Chapter Sixty

  Pioneer 3 transorbital vessel hangar, Titan’s bridge in Gharian orbit

  26 November 163 GA

  “It’s a routine parts delivery,” Dan Aribella said, pushing the tablet with the flight request into the hands of the traffic controller. She looked at the commanding officer of Beagle and shook her head.

  “Highly unorthodox, Captain. A stunt like this on such short notice isn’t routine at all. Can’t this wait until morning shift?”

  “It really can’t. The third shift crew on Titan weren’t shipped their proper parts on the exo-loaders last night, and now they’re two shifts behind on work orders. One TOV ship with extra personnel out to them and back fixes that. I already got clearance to fly TOV Breckenridge from its CO. It’s all on the paperwork. Hour and a half and you signing off is all we need.”

  She looked at the forms on the tablet, then at the captain of Beagle, then back to the forms.

  “Come on, Ensign. Let me flap my wings. Go take a smoke break, we’ll be back by the time you toss your butt,” Dan said.

  “Fiiine. But if you take too long, or if anything bad happens, it’s your ass, not mine.”

  “Mind the rank, Ensign. I recognize your authority in the hangar, but I won’t take your bullshit.”

  “Yes, sir. Get your job done, sir.”

  “My pleasure. Thank you again. I’ll put in a good word with the hangar commander for you.”

  “Thank you. I’m going to go have that smoke.”

  She authorized the flight with a press of her thumb on the tablet, then handed it back. She walked away, already having forgotten about the exchange.

  Dan took his tablet, and ran across the flat steel grate of the hangar to Breckenridge’s open rear loading bay. The dozen marines disguised in technician overalls stood near the pilots on the ramp into the ship. Beside them were the flight crew that would be departing for Selva that ve
ry night. Melody came out of the crowd, a hopeful look on her face.

  “How’d we do?”

  “She signed off. Load up as fast as we can and let’s get out of here. I don’t want her to change her mind, and I definitely don’t want the hangar commander to pull rank and overrule her. The sooner we’re in vacuum, the better off we are.”

  “I love you. You’re amazing. Sir. All aboard people, on the double. Don’t piss off the pregnant chick.”

  After laughing, the crew loaded the ship with the last-minute supplies they’d gathered for the journey. Less than five minutes later, they were in pre-flight checks, and five minutes after that the hangar’s outer airlock door opened. Under the command of Captain Dan Aribella, TOV Breckenridge slipped into the endless nothing of space. They would dock with Titan, and depart Gharan space for Selva before anyone was the wiser.

  Now, TOV Breckenridge had detached from Titan, its contents and passengers disgorged into the larger ship. The smaller vessel departed back to the hangar under Pioneer 3 master flight control with a flight technician behind its yoke. He would be arrested shortly after the ship landed for his part in the conspiracy, but his crime was minor compared to what could be done to the people still on Titan.

  “As soon as we spin up the drives, Pioneer 3 will be up our ass like a bike seat. They’re going to slave our controls and steer us back. We need to be ready.”

  In the center of the bridge, Capt. Leah Kingsman steered herself in the zero-gravity environment into her command chair and buckled herself in.

  “I’ve detached the primary slave control, as well as the secondary, like we planned,” Andy said from his seat on the side of the diamond shaped bridge. “Physically pulled the system out. They’ve got no control over our helm other than yelling at us.”

  “Excellent, Andy, thank you. Make sure you hook that back up when we’re far enough out. Unless there are reasons for a delay, helm, please spin up the drives. Navigation, confirm that we’re dialed in.”

  “Drives coming online,” Melody said. She and Dan began the labyrinthine motions of activating all the switches, dials and buttons on Titan’s touch screen command consoles. Their precise, coordinated efforts amped up the reactors that powered the ship’s ancient drives. In sequence, Titan’s four subspace engines came to life, vibrating the freighter with a thrumming growl, sending a buzz of power through the air.

  “This never gets old,” Leah said, grinning.

  “Is this normal? Should I be shaking like this?”

  Dr. Herbert Maine’s narrow chest and feeble arms shook. He gripped the arms of his seat with white fingers and his expression was one of fear, not pleasure.

  “There’s nothing to worry about, Doctor Maine. Right now, your job is to tell me that our course is plotted, loaded into the system, and that we are safe to follow it.”

  “Oh yes,” Herbert said. “I apologize. I am a fish out of my tank here.”

  Maine fiddled with the screen on the console to his right. After tapping on several buttons to run routines and analyze data, he sighed, somewhat calmed.

  “We are, as you say, ‘good to go’ on our journey. I can recalculate trajectories and velocities as we progress. Fire away.”

  “Not even close to protocol,” Leah said. “Comms, how are we doing?”

  One of Leah’s original Titan crewmembers managed the ship’s complex communication center near Herbert. He turned to her and smiled.

  “Pioneer 3 is shitting a chunk of hull right now. I’m ignoring their hails. They’re threatening to take control of our helm and bring us back,” he said with a chuckle.

  “Perfect. Let them try,” Leah said. “Let’s get Senator Courser on the phone.”

  “Roger that,” the comms sergeant replied. After tapping in a series of codes on his control panel, and talking his way through several layers of the senator’s assistants, he turned back to Leah and nodded. “Senator Courser on the line.”

  “Broadcast it to the ship. Melody, please talk to your father for us.” Leah said.

  “Hey, Dad.”

  “Melody? I thought this was the captain of Titan. Did you get a new command? What’re you doing? Everything okay?”

  “It’s a matter of perspective. I’m here on the bridge of Titan and we’ve just spun up the engines. We’re headed back to Selva.”

  “What?”

  “We’ve decided that the senate’s decision to disallow an early return to Selva will cost expeditionary lives, and we can’t allow that. We’ve modified Titan to survive the magnetosphere, and we’re mounting a resupply and security mission.”

  “Are you crazy? If you’ve made one miscalculation, you’re all done for. And what will they do to you when you come back? Your career? Your life?”

  “That’s why we brought Herbert Maine. Against his will, of course..”

  In the bridge forward windows, the white hull of Pioneer 3 came into view. The station that was a ship once looked so massive it resembled a cliff they were going to fly past, not a movable, living vessel. Its white hull then slid by as the miniscule Titan pulled away from its gargantuan mother.

  “I see.”

  “These marines, these men and women . . . we gave them our word we’d do everything to protect them, and they did the same for us. The senate and the people can’t understand that, and that’s why we’re going back now.”

  “I understand, believe me I do but . . . you’re my girl. I already lost your mother. It’s . . . ”

  “It’s what’s happening. Dad, pass the message along that the next fleet to Selva can proceed on time with no changes. We’re bringing everything we need for the journey and then some. I think we’ve got some documents we’re going to laser to you as well. Explanations. Details. Now that we’ve left we want to be transparent.”

  “Captain, Pioneer 3 just launched an armed TOV to bring us back,” the communications sergeant said. “Urgent that we comply. They’re saying the senate has cleared them to fire on us.”

  The communications sergeant tapped his screens again, and two of the display panels flanking the bridge flickered and changed to a rear-view angle. A distant pip of white light grew brighter beyond Titan’s engine flare.

  “Dad, Pioneer 3 just launched a TOV. They’re threatening to shoot us down. They’re saying the senate gave the go ahead. They’re threatening to kill us.”

  “What did they say?” he sounded angry now. “Not true. It has to be a bluff. The senate hasn’t authorized anything. Pick up speed. I’ll call off the hounds. If they think losing a freighter on a rescue mission is a big deal, wait until they see what I’ll do if they hurt you. I’ll rip that station to shreds. Safe journey. Take care of yourself and Dustin. We’ll figure it out later. I love you, Mellie. Mi famiglia.”

  “Love you too, Dad.”

  The connection broke.

  “Power to full. The transorbitals will dance circles around us at this speed but they can’t match our top end,” Leah said, stern.

  Herbert Maine hadn’t let go of his chair’s armrests.

  “I must advise we proceed at a controlled pace. We will waste too much fuel slowing ourselves after we escape. It could affect our ability to survive reentry and adjust course later.”

  “Work the problem at hand, Doctor Maine,” Leah said. “We’ll work the fuel problem when we get to it.”

  “Yes, I apologize. You know best,” he said back.

  “They’re closing. I don’t see any weapons on the wing pylons,” the comms sergeant said. “But they could have their guns loaded. We’re about to match its speed. It’ll fall behind in a few seconds, or it’ll fire before we get out of weapons range.”

  “Faster,” Leah said. Herbert whimpered in protest.

  “Faster,” Melody answered, dialing up the ship’s thrust with a slow stroke of a finger on a smooth screen. Each of the crew was pushed back from the powerful thrust. The vessel shook and vibrated as the raw energy output ramped up and up.

  The crew stared at th
e two wall monitors showing the approach of the vessel to their aft. The smaller, more agile ship kept a javelin-straight course to keep up, and it even began to close, but the massive engines of Titan burned hotter, and faster. Soon the ship failed to close, and then dropped away.

  “I think we’re okay,” the comms sergeant said, relieved.

  Then, a brief klaxon sounded, filling the bridge with an ear-splitting assault. A series of tiny red lights illuminated around the bridge.

  “What the fuck is that noise?” Leah bellowed.

  “They have a radar lock on us. But I didn’t see any missiles . . . ” the comms sergeant said in disbelief. “Ship to ship weaponry hasn’t been fired in a hundred years. Not since the Pacifican sedition of ’58, and that missile downed an atmospheric plane. Damn near started a civil war.”

  “If they shoot at us, it will start a damn war, for certain. Melody, can your dad get this done?” Leah asked.

  “I hope so,” Melody said. She watched the monitors as the ship behind them angled out for a firing trajectory that wouldn’t risk the mammoth space station at their aft.

  “Helmets on. Prepare for impact and vacuum,” Leah commanded.

  Each soul did her bidding, reeling their helmets in on the cords that connected their suits to them. One by one, they reeled in and put their suit lids on, and sealed them. Herbert got help from the frustrated communication sergeant sitting near him. When they finished getting suited, they turned and watched with breath held as the ship angled wider and wider, preparing to fire at them.

  The klaxon sounded again, then went silent. the red lights flooding the bridge went dark. The pursuing ship that threatened to kill them all throttled down and let its prey slip away.

  “Ha. They were bluffing,” Leah said, relaxing her death grip on her chair’s armrests.

  “Listen to this,” the comms sergeant said, and piped in a broadcast from the station they raced away from. The speaker from Pioneer 3 sounded strained.