Grayson Sontang in Space Ch. 03

"Okay, Hal, let's shut the engines down and I'll need a damage report. Then we can flip so we can start breaking. We'll want to put the worst injured in gee chairs and figure out how fast we can decelerate after we get a more complete report. In the meantime, what's in our path and how far out? Give me a thirty degree arc. And it would be really nice if we could end up at speed near a wormhole to find our way back. Have you heard anything from the Feds?"

"Incoming supralight is still garbled, but indications are that the Fed is aware of an occurrence."

Hendon had put headphones on so that he could talk to Evans while Grayson was talking to Hal. He took them off and turned to her. "We have a problem. The kid is missing."

"What kid? And so help me, if you say the prince..."

"Sorry," he shrugged. "I'll go look for him," he said, standing stiffly.

"Sit!" she commanded and once again was amazed that he obeyed. She was going to have to check him again for a concussion. "Hal. Search ship for humans not in cargo holds."

Human in storage room Z. FaceRec positive for Pilot Evans. He appears to be acquiring a first aid kit. Human in your quarters."

"Mine? Show me."

"Camera is off at your request."

"Don't be snippy. Turn the camera back on and show me." She watched the screen. "Shit. It's the little rug rat. Hal, how did he get in there? Everything is supposed to be locked."

"Damage report indicates portal controls may have been bypassed."

"Little shithead!" she swore, jumping up from her chair.

"I'll get him," Hendon said.

"You sit here and drink your coffee," she snapped, but this time he just glowered at her.

"I'd rather not have to explain to the king that his son was thrown out an airlock. You and Hal work on the damage reports." Once he was up and moving, he seemed to be more functional, so she sat back down and began pouring through Hal's readouts on damage.

"Okay, Hal, we've got redundancy on the maneuvering exhausts but you'll need to calculate compensation for the busted ones until we can get them fixed."

She glanced up at the main screen that was showing their trajectory. "Hal, that wormhole at neg nine degrees arc and ten degrees declination? Can we get down to speed in time to use it? Where does it go?"

"Not given current condition of hydrogen engines."

"What!" She scanned the damage report scrolling down till she came to the main engines. "Hal, this should have been at the top of the list!"

"List is arranged by degree of damage. Incapacitated systems are listed first. Hydrogen engines are functional but thrust capacity is limited by valve damage incurred before full capacity provided protection from energy blast field."

"So, what, twenty percent? We'll never get this beast slowed down enough."

"May I also point out limited damage to gravitron field," Hal offered. She scanned further then moaned.

"Oh, Hal. If we survive we are so going to have to prioritize this listing."

"May I also suggest you review damage to supplemental systems for passengers?"

"Okay, I get it. I will read the whole damage report. Get me Evans on comm." She started back up at the top of the list and began speed-reading.

"Evans here."

"Can you spare Het and Sip to work on the oxygen systems, then water? It looks like everything tore loose."

"Sip is on it already. Het is helping Bogart triage injuries. I'll release her as soon as possible."

"Thank you. Can you take over the bridge as soon as you can be spared?"

"Sure. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, but the ship isn't. I need to make some repairs."

"You want Sip to help?"

"No, he needs to get that oxygen back on line. That's his priority."

"K."

"Hendon is fetching your wayward prince."

"Is Hendon okay?"

"He says he is. I have to go off-line for a while. Hal, close comm. Encapsulate the hydrogen and vent the engine room."

"May I point out..."

"I already know. That's where the gravitron field went down. Engines first. And Hal, nobody but me gets in the engine room. Nobody! Understood?"

"Understood."

"I'm going on ears," she said, pulling the gadgets from her drawer and hooking them around her ears. "All of your comm with me is by ears only. I want to hear all other comm on the ship, with yours on override. Got it?"

"Understood."

"Let me know when fuel is encapsulated and engine room air has been recycled."

"Engine temp is at twelve sixteen k and falling fifty k per minute."

"K. Should be cool enough by the time I get my tools. Throw up any information I will need on the big monitor down there."

Grayson ran for her quarters to get warmer gear and magnetic boots, listening to the drone of comm between the Confed officers. She was relieved to find that Hendon and the bratty prince were gone from her quarters. She also gave the control bypass a brief moment of admiration. Hers would have been neater, but the concept was solid. That prince was going to give Sirius Prime a run for its money before he grew into the monarchy. She grabbed what she needed and headed the long way around to the other side of the outer ring and the room where tools and spare parts were kept. The last thing she wanted was to run into any of her cargo. When she emerged from supply room X completely laden with gear and tools, she was no longer running.

"Hal, what's the situation now in the engine room? I'm going in on second level."

"Temperature is at three hundred K, cycling air now. Fuel is encapsulated."

Okay, open the door as soon as air equalizes. Is the entire grav field out in there?"

"Aft half of room."

"Doors locked?"

"Of course."

She glanced around to make sure no one was paying attention to her or the engine room. "As soon as I'm inside, open the vault. Hal, if anyone asks, I'm off comm until I tell you different. Got it?"

"Understood."

The portal slid open just as she reached it and snapped shut behind her. Grayson dropped most of what she was carrying over the railing to the lower level, more than a little pleased to hear it land with a gravity-induced clunk. She donned her mag boots and climbed down the access ladder, then picked her way gingerly toward the engine shell that was splitting and opening to greet her. Inside were her shiny, new, super-charged, malfunctioning engines. Gravity gave out on her before she was close enough to read all the meters and dials on the back side of the engine. She tapped her heels to activate the boots and crossed the last couple of meters with a peculiar sliding walk.

Grayson studied the dials, then stared forlornly up at the area where the valves were refusing to open fully. There was simply no easy way to get up there and work on them, magnetic boots or not, when gravity wasn't playing its part. The only good news was that if she slipped, it wouldn't hurt. Unless of course she drifted over to where the field was working, in which case she'd fall like a brick. She went back over to where she had left her equipment, donning a warm jacket and lugging the rest of the tools over to where the grav field stopped working. She donned a magnetic belt and began loading hand tools around her waist, then slung a large multipurpose electronic gadget pack over her shoulder. She clicked her heels again to activate the boots, then repeated her deep space manta.

"In space, it's not the weight, it's the mass. In space, there is no up or down. In space, throwing up is a really bad idea."

Then she began her sliding walk toward the aft part of the engine where stuck valves awaited her. She rounded the bulk of the starboard engine and gripped a rung of the access ladder. She took a deep breath and clicked her boots off, letting her body drift at will as she pulled herself 'up' rung by rung. She knew spacers who would have jumped to the top of the engine. She wasn't one of them. When she reached the vicinity of the valve, she rested her cheek against the cool metal and repeated the third part of the mantra a couple more times.

The top of the engine was a horizontal, cylindrical section leading to the external thruster. The valve was situated almost all the way to the wall of the ship. Grayson clutched at the broad rounded top and kicked her boots on again, swearing as the magnets yanked her feet against the metal of the engine. She wiggled around until she was straddling the cylinder and inched her way toward the valve, where she was finally able to slide her hand along the bulge that signified the valve section and find one of the handholds. With her other hand, she reached back to her belt and found the biggest wrench she had. Using boots, handhold and knees to cling to the engine, she gave the valve section a hard whack with the wrench. The noise echoed through the room, hurting her ears.

"Hal, did that do it?"

"Did what do what?" he asked. Grayson glanced at the monitor across the room. It showed no change. She sighed. Of course it couldn't be that easy.

"Never mind," she said, returning the wrench to its place on her belt. She managed to get the multitool pulled over her head and clipped to the handy utility hook on the engine without the pack or her body floating off to bang against wall or ceiling or floor. Gingerly, she sat up and wrapped her legs around the cylinder, wishing she exercised, or at least stretched, a little more often. Barfights didn't seem to contribute much to limberness. Eventually she got the appropriate probe inserted into the appropriate orifice and the valve rotated out of the cylinder. Grayson examined it gloomily. The valve was actually a series of six disks, all of which were scorched and each of which needed the scorching polished off so that they could once more slide against each other to function properly.

She pulled a grinder out of the multitool pack and settled goggles on her nose. As soon as she set to work on the worst of the carbon on the first disk, she realized she hadn't thought to bring a face mask, and, with no gravity, the dust floated everywhere, even getting inside her goggles. She paused long enough to pull the neck of her tee shirt up over her nose, and went back to work. Each disk required coarse grinding, then fine grinding, then polishing. Since the disks were closely placed, she had to do one side of each disk, rotate it back into its compartment, do one side of the next disk, and on till she did the last, then climb over the bulge of the valve compartment and start the whole process again from the other side, except now with the added irritation of being hard up against the wall of the ship, which limited movement. She was only on the second disk from the back side when she looked down and saw Hendon, standing at the edge of the grav field, watching her.

"What the fuck, Hal! I said no one in here."

"Portal controls were bypassed," the computer answered.

"Get out," she hissed at Hendon. "Get the fuck out of here!"

He spread his arms. "You think I'll suddenly develop amnesia? Forget I saw this? How many crates can you fit in here?"

"Can we please have this discussion later, because I'm this close to throwing up and trust me, it will not be pretty. If you want to survive this rocket-man ride, you'll get the fuck out of here."

He shrugged and disappeared behind the bulk of the machine. Grayson slumped - which isn't easy to do without gravity - and rested her head on her arm, trying to calm her breathing. 'Survival first,' she told herself, rolling her head to the side to look at the valve disks still requiring her attention. She straightened and fired up the grinder, setting to work on the next disk.

A moment later, she jumped and almost shot up off the of the cylinder. Hendon had appeared atop the cylinder of the other engine, moving much more gracefully in zero-gee than she could. He straddled the other cylinder, taking advantage of his longer legs and held out a hand for the probe that would rotate the valve to where it could be accessed. When Grayson only stared at him with the grinder whirring noisily in her hand, he pulled the multitool pack around and found it himself. Once he had the disks exposed, he found the coarse grinder and went to work. Grayson shook herself and went back to her efforts with the fine grinder.

Somehow, perhaps because he seemed perfectly comfortable in zero-gee whereas she fought it every moment, he finished his engine only moments after she had her valve back together and tested to Hal's satisfaction. She pulled herself head first down the access ladder, letting her boots slide along the metal of the engine casing, then all but crawled to where the grav field was working, laying on her back on the floor, waiting for her stomach to settle. Her eyes and nose and mouth were filled with the grit from the valves, and she was wondering if perhaps it smelled even worse that the hairy Siriun twins, when she realized Hendon was standing over her. He reached out a hand to help her up, but there was no way she was ready to make that concession. She rolled onto her hands and knees, but then his arm was about her waist and he was lifting her as easily as if she was still in the zero-gee field. Grayson didn't have the energy left to fight, but she could still swear.

"Let go of me, you fucking asshole!" She flailed with her tired arms, but her feet were stuck to the floor.

"Turn off your boots," Hendon said calmly. "If you want to kick me, you have to turn off your boots."

"I'm going to kick your ass," she threatened, but her legs still wouldn't cooperate, and he finally used his toe to tap her heels and turn them off. He released the belt from her waist and let it drop to the floor, then pulled her from the room. A moment later, she was on the floor just outside the engine room, and Bogart was kneeling over her, squirting a solution in her eyes, nose and mouth until she was sure he was trying to drown her. She coughed and spat and swore until he stopped. But then he had a mask over her face and was forcing something into her lungs that burned. She coughed even harder and spat out black gunk until she was sure her lungs would turn inside out. Her stomach certainly did, spewing what little she'd had to eat all over the floor. A distant, detached part of her mind was chortling, thinking that the bots would finally have something to do. By that point, all she could think was that the Confeds had decided to torture her, never mind that Hendon appeared to be going through the same torture. The shipboard emergency was a distant nagging at the back of her mind, struggling to get her attention through a fog of physical fatigue.

She didn't exactly remember how she got there, but reality began to slowly reimpose itself as she stood in her own shower, washing grit and vomit down the drain for the recycler to handle. Somebody - Bogart? - pulled her out a few minutes later and wrapped a towel around her. Even as she mechanically began to dry off, her mind started functioning again and she realized they were under significant deceleration. She rushed out of the bathroom, grabbing the first clothes she came to and running - as best one could against the vying forces of thrust and grav field - for the bridge.

"Hal, status report," she yelled as she ran. She was just beginning to pull her clothes on as she burst through the portal. Evans looked up, then quickly away as she finished dressing, staring at the main screen.

"Decelerating at thirty gees," Hal reported. "Deflecting nine degrees starboard, negative ten degrees declination to nearest wormhole. Secondary wormhole targeted at negative five degrees port, negative six degrees declination. Approximately two days additional travel time..."

"What? Why? Coffee."

"Nearest wormhole requires additional deceleration. One valve disk is cracked. Estimated risk of failure at additional thrust is thirty percent, increasing five percent per gee force. Human risk factors must be ascertained. I am not equipped with sufficient data to calculate risk."

"Huh?"

"He means the cargo," Evans explained. "He doesn't know how to calculate the risk/benefit of human cargo."

"Oh. Hal, do we have a replacement disk for the valve?"

"No. It was the defective valve that was replaced prior to leaving Harmony."

"Remind me to have words with the vendors. Do you have a complete injury report for the cargo?" she asked.

"No."

She retrieved a coffee from the dumbwaiter and sat, grateful for the physical comfort of the command chair. "Let's see the damage report again. Anything new?"

The readout scrolled on screen, but Hal added commentary, noting that most of the jury-rigged systems to accommodate the passengers were back on line. Hal had also been able to fix a few of the maneuvering exhaust thrusts, employing backup circuits. Grayson slowly began to feel better for having survived a wormhole destruct, being thrown parsecs off course, even for having Hendon discover her secret hold. Survival, she told herself. The first step is always survival.

"Hal, how far to that next wormhole?" she asked, sipping at her coffee.

"Estimated ten days."

Grayson was silent for a long moment. "Ten days? And where does it take us?"

"The vicinity of Hadir," Hal answered.

"Excuse me? Hadir?"

"Yes."

"As in Puppis Sector?"

"Yes."

"Plot a course from that wormhole back to Sirius, please."

A moment later a very convoluted course of six jumps was laid out on the main screen. "Plot a course from the next wormhole out, please." Another convoluted course of six jumps appeared on the screen. Grayson's skilled eyes traced and calculated the timeline for each plot. "Hal?"

"Yes, Grayson?"

"Twenty days? Once we reach either jump point? So, thirty, thirty-two days?"

"Approximately."

"And we have food and oxygen enough for?"

"Estimated fifteen to eighteen days, depending on rationing."

Hendon walked onto the bridge just then. He glared at Grayson. "You were supposed to be resting."

She glared back. "Injury report," she demanded.

He sighed and sank to the floor with his back against the wall, much easier than fighting the gee forces. "One critical but stable in what passes for a medical unit on this bucket. Hal reprogramed a bot to monitor his vitals. Four more in serious but stable condition, in gee chairs. Two more, elderly but with minor injuries in the remaining gee chairs."

"Where you should be," she snapped.

He waved a hand. "It's just bruising."

"With edema, under gee force."

"As long as I keep moving, it'll be fine. I instructed Evans to do a thirty gee burn for two hours. We can assess tolerance at that point, figure out how long and hard we can burn."

"We'll never slow enough to make that first wormhole."

He shrugged and winced. "I'd rather take two extra days and make for the second one anyway. Hadir Prime isn't exactly a vacation spot to stop for supplies." He peered at her. "Have you been there."

She wrinkled her nose. "Once. Not the easiest 'people' to deal with even when you're carrying something they want."

"Then we can agree on the next jump out?"

She glanced back at the main screen. "El Relha is the end point. It's puny but should have the basics." She scratched her head. "Maybe I could call in a favor, get someone to run a replacement disk out there. It'll cost an arm and a leg," she said, glancing back at Hendon with a raised eyebrow. "Unless you want to have your king meet us there and pick up this motley crew."

"You're not dumping these people on a planet to wait for a rescue that will take more than twice as long to get there and back as for us to get home."

Grayson knew he wanted to say it more forcefully, but pain and fatigue were etching his features. "Go take a nap on my bed. You can set it for low gee." When he scowled at her, she quickly added, "Please," though perhaps a little more sugary than was necessary, especially given she was batting her eyelashes at him.