The actual top speed of the Faith was a much less awe-inspiring 0.9c, or about 168,000 miles per hour. At that speed the Faith could travel between Earth and Mars in just over three minutes, a trip that would take six months in NASA’s fastest spacecraft. That didn’t count NASA’s cutting-edge ion engine, which by comparison was still lethargic, but so far that organization hadn’t fielded a working craft with one.
The Faith’s maximum speed inside Superspace of 1.56 million c was due to a massive increase in power output required to exceed that point. While accelerating in Superspace from a dead stop to top speed required only a small increase in power, going any faster than that increased the power requirement by a factor of one hundred. Since the Faith could only generate twenty times as much power as required, it was effectively limited to 1.56 million c. The crew had no doubt that technology would someday break that barrier, but it was hardly relevant to them. The Faith was plenty fast for their purposes.
The greatest drawback to the Superspace stardrive was that once superluminal (faster than light) travel was activated, it could not be reactivated until an equal amount of time had passed. Upon arrival at the Tarantula Nebula, the crew wouldn’t be able to reactivate the stardrive for six weeks, and would be limited to sublight travel. Why it took so long for the stardrive to recharge was a mystery. It was the sole reason why Byron hadn’t been deposited back on Earth after his discovery.
Beyond Seth, the stardrive, and the antigrav system, the only other really remarkable technology aboard was the exterior hull. It was designed to absorb and redistribute kinetic energy. It was primarily designed to protect against space debris and small objects, but it was also effective against projectile weapons. This was not really surprising, since spaceborne objects could be moving many times faster than bullets and have much greater kinetic energy. John had determined that the ship could absorb no greater than one million pounds per square inch of kinetic energy, a laughable conclusion since Earth’s most powerful projectile weapons came nowhere close to that number.
The Faith’s own weapons were very modest, as Ray was well aware. It had front and rear General Electric GAU 8 Avenger 30mm cannon, such as those found on A-10 aircraft. Those weapons were controlled at the gunner’s station on the bridge. It also had dorsal (top) and ventral (bottom) mounted GAU 19 fifty caliber guns in semi-articulated firing rigs. Each gun could be rotated 360 degrees horizontally and 180 degrees vertically. The GAU 19s could be controlled by gunner stations directly adjacent to them or from stations on the bridge. For all the crew knew, however, they would be completely useless in the Tarantula Nebula.
The layout of the ship was simple. The first deck consisted of the bridge, conference room, six individual crew quarters, the dorsal gun station, and the “zero-g” room. The zero-g room was actually a variable gravity room, from which the ship’s only airlock was accessible. Not only could gravity be suspended in space, it could also be negated planetside. The room also served as an observatory, as a 360 degree image of the exterior of the spacecraft could be projected against the walls, giving the occupant the sensation of floating in space. So far this had been used exclusively for recreational purposes.
The second deck started off with a small room for the forward-mounted GAU 8. Next was the forward cargo bay. This room was two decks high and included a large access ramp. The ramp was nearly the width of the entire vessel. It was large enough for two Ford Expeditions to drive in side-by-side. Next was the armory, which stored small arms, the orb room, which stored Seth, and the galley. The galley was sandwiched between two large water tanks, which supplied drinking and sanitation water as well as the hydrogen that fueled the stardrive. Behind that was the engine room, which like the cargo bay was two decks high. The rear-mounted GAU 8 was sandwiched between the engine room and the zero-g room, and was much less easily accessible than the forward gun.
The third deck began with the forward cargo bay, then the ventral gun station, the aft cargo hold, and the engine room. Besides going to check on Byron and pick up supplies, Ray and the others had little reason to visit this deck during flight.
There was a quiet series of raps on Ray’s door. Doorbells were completely forgotten during the design phase, so one was required to knock. Since the doors were solid aluminum (just like the rest of the infrastructure), one was required to use a hard object in order to be heard. Ray unlatched the handle and the door slid open. Christie was standing in the hallway, holding a soda can. Ray was eight inches taller than she, so he took a step back to make conversation easier.
“Hello,” said Christie, “am I disturbing you?”
“Not at all. Would you like to come in?”
“If you don’t mind.”
Ray gestured inside. Christie entered and sat at the desk.
“Lights to seventy percent,” Ray said, returning to the bed.
The light in the room increased significantly.
“Aren’t you going to close the door?” asked Christie.
“Do you want me to close the door?”
“Well, yeah.”
Ray shrugged, got up and closed the door.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“I wanted to talk to you about Byron.”
Ray sat down. “I know you’re not happy with letting him out of the cargo hold.”
“No, I’m not. You know he wanted a relationship with me.”
“We’re going to have to find a way to live with him. If he bothers you specifically, tell him in no uncertain terms that nothing will ever happen between you. If that doesn’t work, John, Ari and I will give him another firm talking-to and revoke his privileges. He’ll be back in the hold with nothing but emergency rations to eat.”
“I guess so.”
“Look at the bright side.”
“There’s a bright side?”
“Yeah. If it wasn’t for Byron’s interference, Richter would never have come aboard.”
“Richter!” exclaimed Christie, throwing up her hands. “We know less about him than we do about Byron. How do we know he’s not a CIA spy?”
“Are you kidding, Christie? I’m pretty sure that him ending up on board was an accident. Besides, what good would a CIA spy be aboard this ship? He has no way of communicating with Earth.”
“He must have had a better reason for deciding to stay, other than the one he gave us.”
“You were there. You saw what he did for us. If that was a ruse, he sure did a good job at it. He sure didn’t fake taking a round in the chest.”
“He was wearing Kevlar.”
“Look, Richter may be a wild card but we can at least trust him. He’s practically the only member of the crew who has absolutely no reservations or uncertainty about leaving Earth. I believe him when he says he would have been sent to prison back home.”
“I know. I guess I’m just playing the devil’s advocate. Chance is okay. He is, after all, teaching us a lot about squad tactics.”
“For all the good it may do us.”
“If nothing else we’re learning how to act under extreme pressure. I have no wish for violence, but I didn’t fare so well the last time we tangled with bad guys.”
“You did fine, it’s Dana that I’m worried about.”
“I agree. Has she tried another combat sim yet?”
“No. I’m thinking we’d have better luck arranging a simulation of the Faith being attacked for her sake. Being useless in a firefight is one thing, but we need her to be able to fulfill her duties aboard the ship much more than on the ground. If she freezes up at her station, it could cost us the entire ship.”
“That kind of sim would benefit all of us. Beyond running systems checks, none of us really have any idea how to handle an emergency aboard.”
Ray nodded. “The only problem is that in order to create an effective sim, the knowledge has to be in our minds to begin with. Our combat sims have been so realistic because between the six of us we’ve actually experienced combat. Richter fought in Pakistan
and Afghanistan, for God’s sake. I don’t know how well Seth will be able to create a scenario for the Faith, since he probably doesn’t know what will happen for sure himself.”
“Great, so Seth’s greatest flaw will go from annoying to deadly.”
“That’s a risk we all had to accept.”
“True. Actually, I think that running sims like that would be a good way to train Seth to react appropriately.”
“It might work, but we would be asking Seth to learn from a scenario that he’s creating. That seems like a logical impossibility to me.”
“I get your point.”
“Well, the only thing we can do is try. We’ve got just under five weeks left, so we’re certainly not limited by time. I’ll call a meeting after breakfast later this morning and we’ll give it a shot.”
“The other thing is that we’ve never tried to run a sim with more than four people before. It might get a little crowded down there.”
“I’m sure Seth can handle it.”
Several hours later, the crew sat in the galley, talking about Ray and Christie’s plan to train in the simulator. Breakfast was almost gone. The normally cordial atmosphere of mealtime was replaced with stiff formality, due to the presence of Byron. Christie had chosen to take her meal elsewhere, and the others were becoming jealous of her decision. Byron knew he was making the others uncomfortable, and his mind raced trying to come up with something to say. He found that he was a little afraid that Ari would do something drastic if he misspoke even a word. Ari was leaning forward on the counter in the kitchen area, and seemed to be staring directly at Byron all through breakfast.
Ari wasn’t staring at Byron, but she was intentionally trying to intimidate him. Ari strongly wished for the power to alleviate the Faith of the ailment known as Byron. He embodied the worst of humanity in her eyes, and she wouldn’t have felt the slightest bit of hesitation in getting rid of him. Ari knew other members of the crew felt the same way she did. Christie and Dana were really worried about what Byron might do, but John and Ray were way too ethical to take the easy way out. Richter was the only one who didn’t seem bothered by Byron, probably because Byron didn’t present a threat to him personally.
Ari liked Richter. A lot. He was, in her estimation, the classic warrior. Where others might falter, Richter would succeed. If they decided to deal with Byron the way she preferred, she had no doubt that Richter would be willing to pull the trigger. Richter didn’t keep one eye on Byron like the others did. Ari guessed, correctly in fact, that Richter had all confidence that he could handle anything Byron threw at him. Ari and Richter excelled in the combat sims when they worked together, an effect that wasn’t lost on John and Ray. When the chips were down, they could count on Ari and Chance.
Ari’s hard-boiled nature had come from experience. Life had taught her to take advantage of her skills and attributes, and take advantage of them she did. Her beauty and strength allowed her to get what she wanted throughout her life, which is why John and Ray were her only real friends. They were immune from her wiles, for the most part, and earned her respect for it. She trusted them implicitly, even if she didn’t always agree with their methods.
Her current environment was more than interesting enough for her. Her career on Earth obviously couldn’t compare with this opportunity. Byron’s ravings about destiny may have been lost on the rest of the crew, but Ari wasn’t so sure. Byron himself was insane, she was sure about that. She wondered, however, about her own circumstances. It was rather convenient that she had the skills required to decipher Seth’s code, never mind access to the hardware they needed to do so. Such romanticizing was tempting to Ari. If not for Byron’s clear lunacy, she might have been guilty of much more of it. Perhaps it was fortunate that Byron could provide that perspective for her. Being chosen to crew the Faith was a tremendous stroke of luck for all of them, but assigning the circumstance to the work of a higher power wasn’t Ari’s style. Still...
Ari shook off the daydream. She couldn’t let her ego get in the way of the mission. The idea that Christie and Ray were floating was excellent. Ari wondered why they hadn’t thought of it before.
“...so it’s settled,” John was saying. “We’ll reconvene in one hour in the orb room and give this thing a shot. Ari, I want you to monitor Seth from the bridge while we get set up in the simulation.”
“Why, exactly?” Ari asked.
“I want you to see if you can spot any problems that those inside the simulation might not be aware of.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, anything. Make a recording of the data stream so we can review it later. Show Dana how to do it so that you can both eventually participate in the sims.”
“You want both of us on the bridge?” asked Dana.
“Yes, if you don’t mind.”
“Okay, then.”
“So,” began Ray, “that means you, me, Christie, and Richter in the sim?”
“Yes,” said John.
“I suppose you want me back in the hold,” Byron said.
“No. You can stay here in the galley if you want.”
Byron shrugged. “Whatever.”
Ari smiled. “We do need somebody to do the dishes, you know.”
“Hey yeah,” said John, smirking. “Earn your keep, Byron. Do the dishes.”
“Oh, great. You want me to swab the deck next?”
“Sure, while you’re at it.”
“Damn it, I was kidding,” Byron grumbled, standing.
“I wasn’t.”
3. Day Seventeen
Money had no meaning aboard the Reckless Faith. When the crew discovered a need for currency, they found themselves resorting to means much like those unfortunate enough to be incarcerated back on Earth. Alcohol and cigarettes were the most popular, but tea, coffee, candy, and other desirable non-essential items were also of value. This entire system wouldn’t have been necessary at all if it wasn’t for the unexpected advent of a particular social event: poker night.
Poker night had been every night for the past two weeks. Driven by boredom and limited by the inevitable exhaustion that sims caused, the crew had soon settled on poker as a viable source of entertainment. All of the items they used for currency was assigned a value. A single bag of tea was worth one unit, as was a cigarette. One ounce of hard alcohol and one tablespoon of coffee were two units each. Candy was usually five pieces for one unit, as it was the most limited commodity aboard.
Alcohol was further divided by type. There were several cases of Bourbon, Scotch, and Rum, but only 144 bottles of beer. A single bottle of beer was worth ten units. Even more scarce was wine. Christie had purchased a mixed case of Pinot Grigio and Pinot Noir before they departed, and a single bottle was going for a hundred units.
The cigarettes had always been personal items, but the alcohol, tea, coffee and candy had to be reclaimed from the public domain by their purchasers once the competition had been standardized (which was about two minutes after the first game). This greatly annoyed Dana, as she hadn’t contributed anything towards the non-essential goods. She didn’t have any extraneous items she could bargain with, either, until they discovered the simulations. By offering sim time she had reserved, Dana eventually built up a nice base of possessions. That she never intended to use the sim time was beside the fact.
The poker games were usually held a couple of hours after the evening meal, in the galley. In the past nine days, Byron had taken to watching them play. He hadn’t been invited to participate, for obvious reasons but also because he had nothing of value. Instead, he spent his time studying the players carefully. Inside knowledge, he reasoned, was as good as gold. Nobody noticed him changing positions around the galley every once and a while, affording him a chance to observe everyone equally.
One of Seth’s more useful forms of technology was his ability to create a diffuse or directed light source wherever needed. While playing poker, John had instructed Seth to create a light facing down onto the
galley’s main table. John had also noticed that with a constant temperature of 67 degrees, the smoke from their various burning tobacco hovered in a sheet at the same height as the light. Ambience was not lost on him. The network terminal in the corner was often set to play jazz from their massive collection of music. There were also viewports into the water supply tanks, and when backlit the water cast ever-changing shadows about the room. The total effect was beautiful.
“I see your four units,” said Ray, “and I raise you two.”
Ray pushed two cigarettes, a piece of paper with “one ounce Navy Flake” written on it, and another piece of paper with “one ounce Barbancourt” written on it out in front of him. The rule was that the written vouchers had to be redeemed at the end of each session. Ray knew that if somebody thought they had a killer hand that they could write a voucher for more than they actually possessed, but so far it hadn’t been a problem.
“I’m out,” said Christie, tossing her cards down.
Richter, Dana and Ari had already folded. John looked over his cards at Ray.
“It’s just you and me, partner,” John said in a low voice.
“Quit stalling, you’re either in or not,” Ray replied, smiling.
“I call,” John said, throwing two tea bags into the pile.
Ray smiled even more and displayed his cards. There were an awful lot of numbers and the color red showing.
“Straight,” he said.
John threw down his cards. “Damn it. Unbelievable.”
Ray laughed and collected his winnings.
“Thanks, John.”
Ray stood up, to the distress of the others.
“Where do you think you’re going, Mister Lucky Son of a Bitch?” Ari said.
“Relax, your highness, I’m just taking a pee break.”
The nearest bathroom was off of the cargo bay, through the orb room. Ray carefully placed the several cigarettes he had just won in his shirt pocket and shoved the vouchers and tea bags into his cargo pants. As he crossed to the door, Byron intercepted him.
The Tarantula Nebula Page 3
