Packmule

by Blaze Ward

  Okay, now it got interesting. Small crosswind. Cables as tight as a violin.

  Granville took both sticks in hand. He would have to do this by touch. The computer wasn’t fast enough for his needs.

  Deep breath. Settle everything into the earth and become the shuttle you are flying.

  He cut the autopilot and held the ship perfectly still, except for the heartbeat echoing through his fingertips on the control sticks. It was only a little crazy right now.

  More to come.

  Granville slid left and down. This was the human element. An autopilot computer didn’t have the subtlety to cut a clean chord of arc. Rather, it would stair-step down and over.

  That would shear off something. Probably a cable holding him, in which case he might turn turtle before he could react.

  Now, subtle. Soft. Easy.

  Drift until the system fights you and back off.

  Up and over and down the other side of the hill.

  Ignore your racing heartbeat. You are an Imperial pilot, serving your Emperor to the best of your ability. You are an Officer and a Gentleman.

  Touch and tug.

  Reverse. Up and over. Down and out.

  Tap like cutting a diamond.

  “One, I have movement,” Galin yelled.

  “Two, confirm movement,” Zubaida answered.

  “Caravan, stabilize now,” Heather ordered.

  “Roger that, Ground Control,” he breathed, letting the adrenaline flow out with his breath, since he couldn’t let go to do it with his hands.

  Granville centered again, felt the three cables come into harmony in a way they hadn’t before. A violin, perfectly tuned.

  “Towtruck, you are go,” Heather called.

  The cables pulled a little and then Granville felt the entire edifice shift in his fingertips. He was a balloon now, in a child’s hands at the park, as Markus slowly pulled the massive bow towards the truck.

  “One, I have daylight,” Galin called.

  “Two, confirm daylight,” Zubaida replied.

  “Towtruck, pulling them clear,” Markus answered.

  Granville thought he could feel Markus’s heartbeat through the cables as the truck began to tug, like pulling taffy before it cooled.

  Big silver balloon in the park.

  Something snapped loose as the front section cleared the bolts holding it. Granville felt the wind take hold of the bow section and begin to push it sideways, like a kitten rubbing at his ankles.

  “We’re clear,” Heather yelled to everyone. “Towtruck, pull him another five meters and then stop.”

  “Five and hold,” Markus replied. “We’re there and holding.”

  “Caravan, begin your drift,” Heather orchestrated. “Lean to starboard and drift around the chord until I hold you.”

  Granville adjusted the controls, moving like mud sliding across the field. He could feel where the truck was anchoring him, a human with a small terrier straining on his leash in the park.

  “Caravan, stand by,” Heather came over the line. “Towtruck, begin slacking your line now.”

  Granville felt the leash loosen, letting him rush over to sniff the new plant and see who had come by in the last few days. The harmonics below him shifted as the line loosened and he drifted some more.

  “Towtruck, hold there,” Heather called.

  Suddenly, the leash was taught again, keeping him just short of a kibble that had fallen on the carpet where he couldn’t quite reach it.

  “Caravan, you are clear to set your weight down,” Heather continued. “Everyone is clear.”

  Granville let the stick slide forward just a little, moving like a feather to the ground. The harmony changed as the lines slacked.

  “Caravan, lower one and hold there,” Heather ordered.

  Granville brought the shuttle down a little more and engaged the autopilot, letting the computer hold them for now. The stress in his shoulders finally released as he let the tension bleed out.

  “Caravan, I need you to come back ten and down ten,” Heather ordered.

  “Back ten and down ten,” Granville replied, touching the buttons and letting the ship drift back into the new spot.

  “Caravan, back eight more and then drop to five meters elevation.”

  Fingertips moved automatically as the ship relaxed almost as much as Granville did.

  There was a long pause as he hovered in place.

  “Okay, Caravan,” Heather called. “Down three and hold there for ground crew.”

  It was like they had done this every day of their lives, as he brought the ship down and the stevedores slid underneath him to detach the three hooks and their cables from his belly button.

  Granville watched them on the screen like the vessel was an extension of his being. Suddenly, he was back in his fighter craft in the old days, back to the magic he could pull in the days before Samara changed everything.

  “Caravan, you are flying free,” Heather said. “Good job and return to your landing zone.”

  He felt like a dragonfly, moving in three dimensions automatically and landing on his skids with a feather touch.

  Granville powered things down as fast as he could and moved out the side hatch. He wanted to see it with his eyes, rather than the cameras. Something just felt different that way.

  He locked through and stepped into the early morning sun of Three.

  The target ship was a third shorter now, missing the bow on a clean cylinder. And he hadn’t had to overheat anything getting the bow section clear, so they ought to be able to rig a proper net and lift it to orbit, where Kam’s crew could get in and take out the Type-3 beam that would make the whole extra effort worthwhile.

  “Damned nice flying, Granvie,” Heather said as he emerged to find her close by. “Add that to the resume, if a naval career turns out to be something you don’t want to pursue. Anybody that flies a crane like that will never lack for work.”

  “Thank you, Commander,” Granville replied, blushing inside his helmet.

  Deni was there as well, silent, but his smile meant everything in the world.

  Markus and Galin were standing in the spot where the bow had been removed, so Granville moved over to see what they saw.

  A big hole in the sand. But one filled with promise. If everything went well, they could just lift another bow section off and settle it into place here, letting the ground hold it in place while they lined up the bolts.

  Trying this on any of the ships on skids would have required that they build up a cradle for it, and hope it held up, or lower the damned thing to the ground like they had here.

  Galin gave him a big thumbs up as they finished a visual inspection of the bolts sticking out. None visually cracked or bent under the stress, so they could move forward.

  Kam walked over and touched helmet face plates with him. She didn’t say anything, just smiled, so it was more of a friendly thing, like athletes patting each other on the bottom.

  Granville felt an enormous energy in his stomach that he couldn’t name, but it was powerful and warm.

  “You want the bow off two or six?” Kam finally asked, this time over the radio. “Those are the best, and I can’t see any major difference between the two.”

  He finally had a name for that feeling. It had been absent for so long, that he had forgotten what it was.

  Granville Veitengruber belonged. He was home.

  “How hard would it be to drag the bow across the sand, rather than lowering it into place?” he asked.

  She turned and looked at the situation. Markus and Galin had heard the question, so they joined in.

  By the second sentence, Granville had gotten completely lost, as the conversation delved into obscure and arcane vocabulary absolutely over his head. He turned to Heather and Siobhan, but they both shrugged silently.

  Experts doing their thing.

  After a few minutes, the threesome achieved some consensus, at least according to their body language. At least he thought
so.

  “Bow two,” Kam announced. “We’ll do the same thing that we did here and slide it close. Then we’ll flip everything around and pull it down.”

  “Why not put some pulleys on the middle section and then drag it into contact without moving the truck?” Granville asked. “I can hold the hover reasonably well if I don’t have to do more than keep it light while dragging across the ground.”

  From the way Galin smiled and preened, he had asked the same question, and possibly been overruled. But Kam and Siobhan and Heather had put him in charge.

  Maybe he was pulling rank? Was that allowed, for an ex-Imperial, ex-slave, junior officer?

  “We could,” Kam allowed. “You’ll be doing that for maybe an hour, depending, rather than five minutes. Can you?”

  “The autopilot was doing most of the work, Chief,” he said. “I only had to step in when we needed to rock it clear. Nothing more when we go for the next section.”

  “All right,” Kam nodded. “Everybody take a break and get some food in you. Then a quick nap and some caffeine and we’ll start the next stage.”

  “Ground team, this is CS-405,” a voice suddenly overrode everything. “Burst message transmitted. Analyze and respond.”

  And then nothing.

  Burst message meant a text file had been transmitted, along with a lot of pictures, but that they needed to make it quick, so the line could close without giving the ship away in orbit.

  Heather and Siobhan shared a glance as Granville watched, and then took off across the field at a dead run for Queen Anne’s Revenge. Kam and Markus were a step behind them, but Galin had stayed with Granville, next to the derelict.

  The engineer looked over expectantly.

  “They’ll handle it, Galin,” Granville said. “Let’s figure out what we need to do to get that other bow over here before we run out of time.”

  Galin nodded and began to trot over to the second ship. Granville followed close behind. Admiral Kosnett wouldn’t have sent something like that unless there were problems in orbit.

  In that case, Packmule would vanish immediately, and their only hope of escaping would be aboard Queen Anne’s Revenge.

  Unless they had their own warship ready to come out fighting.

  Morning Edition (October 14, 402)

  Heather was in the left hand seat, across from Siobhan. Kam was in the hatchway with Markus. Outside, the rest of the crew was still at work with whatever they had been doing earlier. If time was up, they would abandon everything in a moment, but until then, they all had work that needed doing.

  The screen lit up with an orbital plot animation, with Phil’s voice as a narrator.

  “At present, a Hammerhead had entered the system and docked with the primary station orbiting Mansi-B,” Phil intoned seriously. “We do not believe that they have spotted us at present, or they would have already come to investigate. All of this occurred while you were in the period of radio silence three hours ago. Right now, CS-405 and Packmule are maintaining their vigilance, as we do not know if this is a normal pattern for a sector patrol ship, a special message being delivered relating to increased piracy, or perhaps a prisoner being transported. Given the circumstances, you are ordered to do two things. I appreciate that they are absolutely contrary, and I’m smiling as you roll your eyes at me when I tell you to deal with it anyway.”

  Phil paused there. Heather assumed Evan’s maniacal giggling had been edited out of the audio track.

  Probably.

  “Standing order number one: You are to prepare for emergency lift-off on two-minutes notice. I appreciate that you will have to consolidate your efforts to one site, since only Anna will be able to get you to safety if a problem does arise. Standing order number two: You are not to lift from the surface without an emergency until CS-405 has given you an all-clear notice, from either myself or Evan. If they don’t see us, you’ll have that much longer to complete whichever task you deem to be most important. If you complete your first task, you can move on to subsequent jobs, as long as you remain in compliance with order number one. I won’t ask if there are any questions, because we will be maintaining radio silence forward. You may record a burst response and send to orbit in an hour when we will maneuver to be directly overhead. Please keep the profanities professional and to as much of a minimum as you can. Phil Kosnett, commanding.”

  “I got a few profanities for you, Phil,” Heather muttered under her breath.

  Siobhan snorted and killed the line.

  “Maybe we should moon the camera in unison and send it up to him?” Kam asked.

  “There’s always that,” Heather laughed. “Siobhan, I’ll let you call Yamaguchi and get them headed over here as quickly as we can. I’ll go brief the rest.”

  “Should we pull one of the containers with missiles aboard Markus’s truck and stash it in the cargo hold?” Siobhan asked. “Just in case we have to abandon the two insertion shuttles on the ground.”

  “Yes, do that,” Heather ordered, adjusting all her tactical planning now that all her other options had vanished.

  “And Phil?” Siobhan asked.

  “Acknowledge in an hour, with whichever profanities seem most appropriate at the time,” Heather replied.

  Phil wouldn’t have given an order like that unless he was serious. They needed to be able to run at the drop of a hat, with everyone aboard, so that CS-405 wasn’t crippled by crew shortages. Packmule could be a technical loss at that point, except Heather figured that Andre would be the first one gone, so they would either catch him at the first rendezvous, or he’d make it to Bok and those folks could escape.

  Or cause more trouble themselves. It wasn’t like they didn’t have a good example in front of them already.

  She turned and rose.

  “Okay,” she said to Kam and Markus. “Our priority just became the cutter. Yamaguchi will bring everyone here to help, but the crew in place needs to skip breakfast and naps and crash right back into work. Anybody not working on detaching the bow from the other ship and moving it to our cutter can go aboard number one and start prepping it for liftoff.”

  “Do we have a name for the cutter yet?” Markus asked, almost as an aside as he turned and went down the stairs.

  “I do,” Heather called after him, over Kam’s shoulder. “Persephone.”

  “I don’t get it,” the engineer said. “Some literary reference?”

  “Greek mythology, Markus,” Kam said. “Bronze Age Earth.”

  “Correct,” Heather said. “She was the daughter of Demeter, who was kidnapped by Hades, the god of the underworld. When she is eventually released, she becomes a goddess of the spring.”

  “I still don’t get it,” Markus said as he stepped into the airlock.

  Kam followed and Heather triggered the lock mechanism

  “Buran styles himself the Lord of Winter,” Heather said to the engineer. “In ancient Russian, that’s what Buran means. But his time is over, and Persephone is going to herald the spring.”

  Persephone (October 14, 402)

  They had only been gone for about twenty minutes, but the look of surprise on their faces as they emerged from Queen Anne’s Revenge was one Granville knew he would cherish. Captain Lau had put him in charge, and he had over a dozen folks with engineering backgrounds and strong backs, plus an understanding that something bad might have happened.

  So he had put them to work.

  Welders were adding rings and hooks to the forward section of ruined derelict number two. Another team had already cleared the cables connected to the removed bow of number one, and were stretching them out to reach the pulleys Galin had just finished attaching.

  In a pinch, he would sacrifice the old bow, if that meant that they had a fourth ship, and one with guns.

  Heather and Kam walked over and viewed things. Markus kept going, back to his truck, where it was obvious he would be needed far sooner than they had anticipated. Heather touched faceplates instead of using the radio.
<
br />   “Siobhan is going over to the other site to retrieve the crew and Yamaguchi,” she said. “Phil’s ordered us to be ready to lift on two-minutes notice, so everybody is going to work here until your ship is ready.”

  “My ship?” Granville was surprised.

  He was just getting used to the idea of being a shuttle pilot. Staid and somewhat dull, he supposed, but far more likely to come home than a hotshot fighter jock.

  “Your ship,” Heather repeated. “Sweat equity, and I need someone with combat experience commanding it. Doubly so if we come back to rescue everyone else over on that planet. They’ll rally to an Imperial officer, and a man, faster than they will to Siobhan or I. The new Emperor can change their minds when they meet her. And I have no doubts she will, but that’s next week and we’re fighting a war today.”

  “Yes, sir,” Granville felt himself snapping to. Old habits did indeed die hard.

  “And she will have a name now, rather than a simple hull designation,” Heather continued. “Persephone.”

  “Goddess of Spring and Queen of the Underworld,” Granville felt the old knowledge bubble to the top of his mind from unmapped depths. “A formidable and dangerous foe.”

  “That’s the plan,” Heather said. “When Siobhan returns, everyone who is not attaching a new bow will be inside, powering things on and preparing her for flight.”

  “Roger that,” Granville said. “Already have this crew in motion.”

  “I can see that, Centurion,” she smiled. “Good job. This is why I want you commanding her.”

  “Aye aye.”

  “Now, get Caravan prepped for the next bit,” Heather ordered. “Somewhere there is a fuse burning.”

  Granville saluted automatically, for the first time in seven years, and ran across the quad to his shuttle. His old shuttle.

  That thing that had been his future, five minutes ago.

  Preflight wasn’t that necessary, as he had only powered the engines down to an idle state, and left all the onboard systems on a warm standby, so he didn’t have to redo everything in six hours. The fuel that he would have burned in that time would have been negligible.