“Smolder?” Jim said.
“Yep, had ta load and fire ma musket so fast, not enough time to swab the barrel. Build up of ash sometimes kept on a smolderin’. Then when ya loaded another mini ball and rodded it, the ball pushed air down the barrel blowin’ on the smolder and lightin’ the new powder. Fellahs lost fingers and hands when that happened. That’s why we used the thumb and middle finger ta push the rod down. If’n it went off we’d still have our trigger finger left.”
“Ouch,” Jim said, “getting shot by the enemy is one thing, but shot by your own rifle?”
Jim was more relaxed because Karla had disappeared when the first few words of war talk started. He dreaded her reappearance while they were sill on the subject and seriously thought of exiling her to her cabin if she did.
All present looked up as they heard Captain Mull over the voice system. “Passenger now entering deck two airlock.”
Jim stood and headed for the lift tube. “Have to go and say hi to Halbert. I’m sure he’ll fit in quite well with this diverse gang.”
“Just what we need,” Earl said, “an old drunk.”
“He’s about your age, and dead drunk he’s more switched on than most people cold sober.”
* * *
“Stay low,” Peter said as he followed Celia down a rock strewn path in the corporeality room.
Jim, Carol and Sam closely followed making sure they stayed within the dimensions of the small chamber. Celia crept with laser pistol raised, her eyes darting back and forth searching the stony outcroppings on either side. Her face strained as if the harmless images were real and a threat to her life.
Out of the corner of one eye she caught sight of a shadowy figure bolting from behind a large rock. She turned and fired. The harmless ray made a clicking sound as it struck the rock.
“Damn, I missed.”
Peter pursed his lips and hunched forward, looking Celia straight in the eye. “It was good you did. That was Earl.”
The images of the party members had been added to the program to add further reality to the training. This was not the first time one of them had shot a friend with the pistol on its lowest, practice, setting. Jim had scored a direct hit on Sam and Sam had shot Carol’s image in the foot.
Peter drew his own pistol. “I told you that your head and eyes can move faster than your hand so look first. That’ll give you at least half a second to identify the target before your pistol gets there. What you’re doing is slowing your eye movement to follow the pistol as it swings around. Watch this. Computer, three rapid random targets left and right.”
A strange man appeared to the left. Within a second he was felled by a headshot. Another on the right met a similar fate. Peter’s pistol moved half way to the left again, stopped, then snapped back to the front as he recognized Chris.
“Oh I love this room,” Peter said, beaming as he holstered his pistol and did a shuffling dance. “People to shoot everywhere.”
“You’re weird,” Celia commented.
“You’re quite correct,” Peter said in a put on macho voice while straightening the slight wiggle from his backside and striding a few paces. “The fairy act, as Earl would call it, is just to cover the reality that I’m, in fact, a psychopathic killer.”
Peter relaxed again and placed a hand on Celia’s back, gently pushing her forward. “Now go ahead sweety, shoot some more bad guys. You’re doing just fine.”
The suggested training was met with mixed reaction. Total enthusiasm from Earl, Sam, Dr. Chin and Carol. A moderate interest from Jim, Chris, Celia, Halbert and Dr. Chin’s assistant Mort and complete rejection from Karla.
Levin reacted with complete indifference and the three members of the ship’s crew accepted the idea as part of their company duties. The suggestion was made just prior to the jump through parallel space. It was proposed during an update briefing session as practice for any eventuality. Their possibly hazardous position was now known by everyone. All, without exception, took the news with acceptance. As usual the briefing ended with a vehement argument between Earl and Karla. Jim had stepped between them as they jumped from their chairs and approached each other fists clenched. He was starting to regret including both in the expedition, especially Karla whose attitude toward Peter had soured.
They were thirty four hours away from their destination. The vessel’s long range scanners had detected the immense form of the ancient colony ship. The first mate continued to scan the vicinity for other possibly hostile crafts. Fortunately none were detected for now at least.
“No, no, no,” Peter said, stamping a foot, “don’t go slow and wide around the rock. Get in close, call for cover then jump out ready to incinerate anything that moves. Sweety you have to be more aggressive.”
Chapter 5
“It’s a lot bigger than I expected.” Carol said. “It’s even bigger than the space liner we took from Brougham’s Folly to La Raza,” She reclined her armchair to watch through the ceiling in comfort as the Lydia passed under the gigantic ship.
Levin looked up from the data pad he was intently reading. “Yes, they probably built it in space at a primitive orbital factory. Thousands of liquid and solid fuel rockets were used to transport the parts into orbit, then the rockets themselves were cannibalized and forged into bulkheads. We found a very interesting circuit in one. The wires had been spliced with copper coins. They were bent double then hammered with the wire ends in the middle. The connections were insulated by some sort of tree sap. Teeth marks in some indicated that the sap was chewed to make it soft before application. What we could not figure is that the sap was mixed with some sort of artificial flavoring.”
Both Earl and Jim burst out laughing.
“Chewing gum, spit and bailing wire,” Earl announced as he wiped his face with a hand.
“Is that what that type of aluminum wire was called, bailing wire?” Levin asked, raising his data pad and preparing to make an entry.
Jim leaned over and grasped him by the shoulder. “No, it’s an expression. It means to put something together with whatever’s available, no matter how unlikely the material used.”
Levin lowered his data pad while Chris raised his and made an entry.
“Sounds like my farm,” Halbert said while reading from another data pad. “The government has cut the budget for the Hebram colony so I’ve had to use my grid navigator as a farm tractor. The new equipment has been delayed pending the end of the problems on Rennes.”
“I forgot to ask, how the turnips are going,” Jim said.
“Doing quite well. They seem to like the planet and I like them. Very interesting flavor. I like the pears they’re growing on your farm too. By the way, I now own it.”
“My farm?”
“I bought it at a coroner’s auction six weeks after you died. The money I got for my first crop of turnips was quite substantial. It seems that any product with an Old Earth background gets a premium price.”
Pears and turnips were only two of the plants that Jim had reintroduced to the galaxy. They had become extinct in the years following the Exodus and revived from genetic material found in a can of fruit cocktail and another of turnip greens Jim had brought with him from the twenty first century.
Jim had owned the farm under an assumed name adjoining Halbert’s. It was part of a plan in which he had faked his death in a farming accident to mislead pursuers who were trying to kill him.
“Pears?” Earl said. “You told me that farm was only started nine months ago. Can they make pear trees grow that fast?”
Halbert smiled as he took another sip from his beer can. “Lab grown. They give samples to all farmers growing the product. It gives them an idea as to what they are trying to produce.”
“Lab grown?” Karla said in disgust. “I wouldn’t touch anything that was produced from toxic chemicals. It’s organic or nothing.”
Jim felt like grabbing her by the throat. Instead he calmed himself and spoke in a soft voice. “Your mind is more clo
sed than Earl’s. The labs now exclude toxins. I thought the revolution of your time promoted new ways of thinking. Instead I find that you surrounded yourselves with a set of rigid dogma and were one of the most stagnant cultures I’ve ever run across.”
“Labs use chemicals,” she stated defiantly, “Chemicals are toxic. I only eat foods that are natural.”
Jim’s mood suddenly swung to one of amusement. “Syphilis is a naturally produced organism. Are you going to insist on catching it next time you meet someone.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Karla snapped.
Celia jumped to her feet. “I have to get my bio detection equipment to the airlock if we’re leaving in an hour.”
“I doubt that you’ll find anything,” Levin said, settling back and returning to his reading. “They sterilized everything that was not in the cryogenics chambers or bio banks.”
“Why?” Carol said. “Any bacteria that got aboard was normal for them on Earth.”
Levin looked up again. “They were probably afraid of mutation caused by the unknown environment of interstellar space. That and sections were routinely pressurized by the computer to check integrity. They were concerned that they’d wake up to some monstrous bio nightmare.”
Sam was inspecting the patchwork surface that he said reminded him of one of the quilts his mother used to make out of bits and pieces of used clothing. “Cain’t see no door nowhere,” he said over his shoulder.
Levin inspected the exterior and systematically searched with his eyes. “There’s one in that red and white section. They were usually flush with the surface even though there was no air resistance. We do not know if they made them that way due to force of habit from building atmospheric flying vehicles or the doors were actually taken from existing machines.”
“They were taken from existing ones,” Jim said as he noticed the left half of a red maple leaf on the edge of the section. “An Air Canada owned plane. You can see how that section bulges like the side of a passenger jet, don’t know what type though.”
“An atmospheric airplane?” Levin said in surprise.
“Yes, I recognize the emblem.”
“Hmm,” Levin said. “Another theory confirmed. Atmospheric planes loaded with cargo that flew to maximum altitude on their own then solid fuel rockets took them the rest of the way into orbit.”
Chris looked around as the Lydia slowed to a stop then tilted until it was side on to the giant ship. “The Captain’s spotted it too. She’s lining up our airlock to be as close as possible.”
“One thing I’m concerned about,” Jim said. “I know that modern ships protect humans aboard from solar radiation, what we used to call the solar wind, by creating a sub-protonic field around them, but how did the people who built this do it? Is there some protective field we have to be concerned about?”
“There was no field,” Levin said. “They were protected by sheer mass. Remember, when they left Earth’s solar system, the ship was headed away from the sun. The tail end of the ships consisted of the large fusion engines. When they woke they needed water. The rear is where they placed the water tanks, also the waste processing equipment, oxygen production units and storage rooms.”
“And entering this system it would have been turned around so the engines would slow it down,” Chris said.
“One other thing,” Levin said. “Something this size made of metal would create its own magnetosphere. It’s the thing that protects planets from solar radiation.”
Jim stood and folded his arms suppressing a smirk. “Ok, the away team will assemble in the transporter room in fifty minutes to beam across to the ship.”
“All right, Captain Kirk,” Karla said, leaning back in her chair.
“No, the impersonation was Captain Picard.”
Karla shrugged. “Who’s he?”
“I’ve never heard of either of them,” Earl said. “Who are they?”
* * *
The team that donned their pressure suits in the deck two hold consisted mostly of those with experience of old style latches, valves and handles. Celia was the main purpose of the visit. She joined Jim, Earl and Levin for the first trip across. All on board had practiced the zero gravity maneuvers in the ship’s recreation room where the artificial gravity was turned off for the purpose.
They had difficulty in training with the individual propulsion devices known as jet bars. They reminded Jim of a motorcycle handlebar with a cylinder in the middle. The recreation room was too small to practice over any distance.
The team entered the airlock and stood listening to their suits pop and crackle as the air pressure reduced to near zero. Magnetic boots gripped the floor as the gravity disappeared and equipment attached to their belts slowly floated.
The outer door slid silently open. Beyond the door the colony ship filled their view. Levin leaned forward and slowly walked toward the great outside. He picked up a safety cord floating from a reel and attached it to his belt. He then leaned outside and attached the reel’s mounting bracket to a bar inside a small recess on the outer surface of the ship.
Jim slapped Earl on the upper arm. “You’re next,” he said over the voice communication system.
“I can’t do it.”
Jim looked through Earl’s faceplate and saw the beads of sweat on his forehead. “You did just fine in the practice.”
“That was inside, this is out there.”
“Rick’s out there in the excursion vehicle. He’ll bring you back if anything goes wrong.”
“You’ll do just fine Earl,” Carol said from the observation deck.
“It’s an old remedy but it does work,” Dr. Chin said, “three deep breaths.”
Jim watched as Earl inhaled and exhaled three times.
The next voice of encouragement was from Peter. “You come back through that airlock door dishy and I’ll kiss you.”
“That did it,” Earl said with a newfound courage. He stepped toward the outer door with determination, grabbing a safety line reel for himself.
The four assembled outside and one by one held their jet bars in front of them squeezing the control. Slowly the safety lines fed out the twelve meters distance to the ship.
Jim looked around and saw Rick in a small, two seat craft about the size of a four seater transit. He gave a quick waved which Rick returned.
The surface of the colony ship was pitted and holed in numerous places. Levin reached into one fist sized puncture and extracted a handful of pink fluffy material. He had to take care as he withdrew his hand as the edges of the hole were jagged with protruding shards of aluminum.
Jim swatted at small pieces as they floated past him. “That looks like fiberglass house insulation.”
Levin released the handful and watched it as it drifted away. “These ships were multi walled with this material between each. It acted as insulation as well as a shock pad for flying space debris. They later used the material for insulating dwellings on the surface.”
The three men inspected the recessed handle on the door as Celia floated nearby.
“I think you turn it counter clock,” Earl said. “That’s how it was on a DC3.”
“Try it,” Jim said.
Earl clumsily gripped the handle and turned but instead of it turning, he did.
Jim grabbed Earl’s boot and guided it into another hole in the surface. “Use this to brace yourself.”
Earl tried a second time. “I think I felt something sort of like a clunk.”
“I have never seen a door like this before,” Levin said. “Which way does it open?”
“It swings out,” Earl said, searching the door. “But I don’t see a handle to pull.”
“It’s not like a DC3 Earl,” Jim paused and thought for a long moment. He was trying to remember trips he had taken on Earth and watching the long dead flight attendants closing the door. “I think if it’s a 767 it pushes straight in then slides up. If it’s a 777 it pops out and slides left. If it’s an Airbus or was made after I left
Earth then I haven’t got a clue.”
Levin inspected the join between the door and the body. “It looks like it goes inward.” He said after a thoughtful pause.
Jim gave it a quick shove, which propelled him away from the surface. Quickly hauling on the cord connecting him to his jet bar he retrieved it and returned to the door.
Earl was looking around in all directions. “We need something long and rigid so we can stick it on the side of the Lydia. I can hold the other end and push the door with my feet.”
“Are you boasting again Earl?” Peter said.
Earl chuckled. It was the first time Jim had heard a positive reaction from him to anything Peter said or did.
Jim looked around and was fascinated by the scene of people casually standing, dressed in regular clothes, watching them from inside a transparent bubble.
“Rick’s coming up with the excursion vehicle.” This time the voice was Captain Mull’s. “He says that if you get something short and rigid, put it up against the door he can give it a push.”
Jim looked toward the forward end of the Lydia and saw the two remaining crewmen watching them at an angle from a large side window.
Earl waved his jet bar then turned to face their audience. “I’ve got it,” he said. “And no comments from you!”
“Just a second,” Jim said. “The surface of this thing’s aluminum. How can our magnetic boots stick?”
“It’s reinforced with steel ribs,” Levin said.
The small excursion vehicle moved up behind them. Rick waved from inside the bubble as it approached. “Put your short, rigid thing up there Mr. Benner while I maneuver into place.”
Earl placed one end of the Jet bar against the door. Steadying himself with the magnetic section on the back of his glove he moved out of the way while still holding the jet bar in the middle. The others attached themselves to the surface with magnetic boots and walked a few meters away. The excursion vehicle leveled then slowly edged forward until it came in contact with the jet bar. Jim watched the concentration on Rick’s face as he glanced back and forth between the monitors on the control panel and through the front of the transparent dome. The door popped inward with a sudden jerk and a small cloud of disintegrated plastic particles drifted away from the seams.
To Wake the Living (The Time Stone Trilogy Book 2) Page 9
