The Long Way Home

by Darrell Bain

  "All right, let's get started,” he said. “Let me introduce our newest crew member to those who don't know her—Lt. Commander Joyce Chambers, formerly Sam Johnston's astrogator.” He went on to acquaint the officers with the situation which had brought her aboard, and then continued. “First, I don't need to tell you what a hard task Captain Beauchamp set for us. I doubt that anything like this prospective voyage has ever been thought of, much less attempted. Even Captain Bligh's remarkable feat of navigation in a wet navy longboat after the Bounty mutiny in the eighteenth century pales in comparison. We have a very, very long way to go to Earth.

  "Our voyage will entail several major considerations. First is the route we take. I know it won't be the same as the way we came here, given the limitations of a longboat, but I'll let the astrogators talk about that. Next in importance is maintaining the boat and its life support functions over the time period entailed. This will be crucial, because we no longer have Sam Johnston's machine shops and its spare supplies and facilities to help us, nor do we have its big fabricators. And finally we come to the social considerations. You all know that despite its utility and sophistication, our longboat was not designed, equipped nor supplied for interstellar voyages of any length. The most that was ever envisioned was perhaps one or two jumps in a dire emergency or a few weeks away from the mother ship while exploring a system.

  "What this means is a long, long time of working and living together in close company. We shall have to maintain strict discipline and yet allow for the ... for human nature in our personal relationships.” Brackett purposely kept this part of his briefing vague. Better not to be pinned down on this, he thought. Some regulations would be violated sooner or later. It was up to him to make sure those violations didn't get out of hand and affect the boat's discipline. He wasn't even sure what he intended to do about the infringement he knew would take place eventually. Anyway, that could wait.

  He glanced toward Chambers, the astrogator from the ship. She might have to plan the overall voyage, even if it did mean stepping on Joe's toes. Or would it be? Sam Johnston was gone. Chambers was actually the next most senior person here. There had been a number of rather startled looks when the Explorer officers saw her. Joe might just have to live with ruffled feathers if it became necessary. He hoped not, because he wanted to keep Chambers out of the line of command for the time being. He was already thinking well ahead.

  "I'd like to hear from our astrogators first. We need to map out a rough plot back to Earth or the nearest home world, whichever is closest. Joe?"

  Joe Whistler brought up a gactoview on the lounge screen. He colored in Earth's approximate location in the Orion Arm, or more accurately the Orion Spur, and did likewise with the area Sam Johnston had been exploring—the first ship to go that far into it. He enlarged the view to only their present location, and then, with the concentration evident on his face, he mapped out a rough path among the nearby stars leading in a general direction toward Earth.

  He looked up and said, “That will let us continue in the direction we started from. We can work on a path farther along, as we need to."

  Brackett glanced at Chambers and quickly saw her tightened lips. A mistake? He had only the astrogational capabilities he'd learned years ago which all officers on the exploration ships were required to know, so he wasn't sure. He did know that Joe wasn't an astrogation specialist like Chambers. He was simply a boat astrogator. His knowledge, too, was limited. He was expected to pilot a longboat only among the planets of star systems, not over such distances as faced them. Brackett shrugged mentally. If he'd made a mistake, it couldn't be let go. Not when their lives depended on it.

  "Joyce?"

  She rubbed her chin and then twisted her body around and looked at Joe. She nodded her head in the direction of the screen. “May I?"

  "Go ahead.” Whistler said. He folded his arms over his chest in a protective manner.

  She had already interfaced her body comp with the boat's computer. She tapped her forearm, and then used vocal instructions for the most part to obtain a larger view.

  "Lieutenant Whistler, your map is well done, but I don't think we should head directly toward Earth."

  "Why not?” His tone of voice projected a challenge.

  "Well, as I said, it's a good map and good work without using a table, but you have us heading directly toward Earth on as near a straight line as possible. What if the aliens are able to follow us?"

  "How could they? We sure as hell couldn't unless we were following the exact same vector of another ship."

  "I don't know, but I've read some theory that says it might be possible to pick up traces of ships after transit. I think we should head inward but at a large angle from Sol, and then turn the corner, so to speak, back toward Earth when we're on a line across the arm from it."

  "But ... that would add ... damn, it that would add damn near a year, and it's going to take us two years as is! We can't do that!"

  "We have to, Joe,” she said quietly.

  Brackett interrupted. “Joyce, if you knew that, why did you let us start in the direction he's got plotted?"

  She shrugged. “One jump won't make that much of a difference. I didn't want to get in the way while we were running from the Monkeyclaws. Anyway, it's what we should to do. After seeing the Monkeyclaws in action, I'm certain of that much."

  "Joe?"

  The boat astronomer brought up his map again and studied where he'd ended it, but this time with the whole Orion Spur in the view. He enlarged and traced out the path she'd mentioned without trying to zoom in and pick out individual stars.

  "Skipper, it's just too far that way. I don't think we should try it. I vote for the straightest shot and take our chances."

  "I think we should try it,” Brackett said mildly.

  Whistler's face reddened. “All right, but we can use my map to start with. We'll turn toward galactic center before we get to the edge of the spur."

  Brackett shook his head before Chambers could. “No, we don't want even to start to go that way, just in case the Monkeys have the means to follow. Until we're pretty sure they aren't on our tail, I don't want to give them even a hint of a direction. I have no idea of their technology, other than what we learned when they killed our scouts and Shannon and Sam Johnston. I don't want Earth to find out the hard way, though."

  Whistler conceded. “You're right, Skipper. We'll fix up a new map for you."

  "Good. You two can work on it after the conference. Let's move on.” He turned to the engineering officer. “Terrell, how well are we fixed for spare parts?"

  "Pretty good so far as small boat parts go, Skipper,” Lieutenant Terrell Lee Wong told him, “but...” He spread his hands.

  "That tells me you'd better take good care of the power plant and the thrusters, huh?"

  "Absolutely, sir. Actually, the power plant and thrusters should do us fine. It's the environmental machinery I'm worried about. A boat wasn't meant to be lived in for so long. We've got two small fabricators, but we're short on rare elements and minerals."

  "I agree, but we'll manage. Lisa, you get with Terrell and Rufus afterward and set up a minimum use of our environmental equipment consistent with sanitation and such. No showers, for instance, unless we're down on a planet with plenty of water. You know what I mean."

  "Yes, sir, we'll do it,” Lisa said.

  "Fine. And that brings us to the fun part. Do we have a sociologist among our crew or anything close to it?"

  "What do we need with a sociologist?” Exploration Officer (EO) Gary Cantrell of the Coyote squad asked.

  "To keep us sane, Mr. Cantrell,” Brackett said. “I don't want any others of the crew to realize just how long this voyage is going to take, but they're going to know it will be a long time. Anything we can do to keep them working together without friction will be an enormous help.” He didn't think he should have to explain that, but many of the explorers were lost when they got outside their specialty and backup specialties.
Only the best of them were promoted into longboat or starship officer positions.

  When he still saw puzzlement on some faces he knew he needed to speak more directly. “Think of it this way. When we had Sam Johnston, there were lots of opportunities for privacy and um, intimate relationships. What happens here? We can't turn off human nature. Sex is going to rear its head and we don't have a mother ship with a much larger population for outlets. In time, some of it is going to be inappropriate, between ratings and chiefs or officers. I don't want any of you forbidding it, but I also don't want any of it being flaunted. In other words, I don't want there to be a bunch of hoorahs over who's sleeping with whom, but I damn sure don't want to see those relationships affecting the efficiency and morale of the boat, either. Speak to your chiefs, and make sure they're aware that they must walk softly while still maintaining discipline. And sex is just one aspect of living so closely together. There will be conflicts of personalities. When we were in the big ship, the ones involved could separate themselves. Now it's you and your chiefs who'll have to do the separating. Am I making myself clear now?"

  He gazed around the table, eyeing each officer in turn and getting nods or subdued “Yes, sir,” and “Aye, aye, sir” in return.

  "Any more questions?"

  There were none. Brackett returned to his tiny cabin. Now that he had everyone else thinking about his or her situation, he could take some time to think over what he and Joyce were going to do. He had been spending some of his off-duty time with her and lately, had spent a few nights in her cabin in Sam Johnston. What were they going to do now? Should he allow their relationship to continue, especially since some of the crew were already aware of it? He knew that whatever he did, his behavior would set the standard for everyone else.

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  Chapter Four

  There was no dining room as such on the longboat. It had been designed so that its crew would subsist on ration packs prepared by the ship's mess for a couple of weeks or the variously flavored food blocks turned out by the longboat's recycler. Jeremy had been surprised to learn that Hurricane Jack carried a two month supply of space rations, or spacerats, as they were called. He had heard of them, naturally, but had eaten them only in school as part of his training, and a few times on this voyage as a means of rotating stock. Now he was in one of the spaces where the little scout ship had lived before its destruction, helping to transfer spacerats, supplies and gear from adjacent storage alcoves in order to use the freed space for another little dayroom. It would be in addition to the one the enlisted explorers already had, giving them some more much needed room for off duty mingling.

  "It's nice to know we've got a reserve food supply,” he said to Marvin Bullock, a tall brown man and an E2, one rank lower than himself. “I hope we don't ever have to live on spacerats for more than a day or two, though.” He grunted as he stacked one case of the rations on top of another on a dolly. The concentrates were heavy.

  "Yeah. Guess it depends on how long it takes to get back home,” Marvin answered. “I'm hearing like two or three years."

  Jeremy looked over at Spacer three (S3) Juanita Martinez, who was in charge of the storeroom detail. “Is that right, ‘Nita?” He thought she might know more than Marvin. Spacers generally had less education and hung out more with the ship's crew than with the tight-knit explorer squads. They also advanced in rank through the mother ship's personnel policies, although if they were ambitious enough, they could study during voyages and eventually become explorers with only minimal time at the academy. Many tried it, because explorer pay was higher. He wondered how she felt about living with explorers for a great length of time rather than in the big ship with other spacers as she had been. He knew this situation must be quite a change for her.

  "No telling,” Juanita said and shrugged. “It took us eighteen months to get to where we are. Johnston could have gotten home a lot sooner, but we can't jump very far at a time and we're not going back the same way, so every new jump will have to be calculated."

  "What does that have to do with it? It's the same distance both ways, even if we can't jump as far at one time.” He took the opportunity the conversation gave to sit down on a cargo blanket draped over stored rations and examine the space more thoroughly. It's shaping up, he thought. Where possible, supplies had been stacked in higher piles and secured with wall brackets. Other material, like chemicals for the recycler, had been moved out and stored in another little nook that wasn't being used. He could see that once the rearrangement was finished there would be room for an improvised couch plus a few chairs and tables and several alcoves for gaming, study and simulations. It would be kind of nice to have two dayrooms and be able to leave one and go to the other if the people in the first didn't suit him, especially if they were going to be spending two years in such cramped quarters.

  Juanita shook a lock of her glossy, dark brown hair from her forehead and sat down beside him. He scrunched over to give her room—not that he would really mind getting closer. She was a lot of cuteness in a small package.

  "It makes a lot of difference, Jeremy. You just said it. A longboat can't jump as far as a ship. Not nearly. We might have to go way out of the way to find stars we can make it to, going back. And besides, not being able to jump as far at a time as the big ships means we'll take longer to get back regardless, because we'll have to stop more often. See?"

  He nodded unhappily. “Yeah, I guess. Damn. What else do you know, ‘Nita?"

  Before she could answer, another person entered the room: the leader of the Coyote squad, EO Gary Cantrell, his immediate superior officer. He was accompanied by the Coyote Explorer Chief Casey Dugan who, with her blonde pigtails, looked even more like a college coed when standing next to the officer. Cantrell was a big dark-haired Irishman with a long career in the Exploration Corps, beginning at the lowest rank, as all explorers did.

  "Costa, the Skipper and the astrogators want to see you. Get your top back on and come with us,” Casey said.

  "Have you got your Reader with you, Costa?” Cantrell asked as he stood up.

  "Yes, sir. I carry it most of the time, so when I get a break, I can study."

  "Good man,” the officer remarked. “Now let's go."

  Jeremy was apprehensive. He had no idea what Commander Brackett could want with him and certainly not why an astrogator would be interested. He couldn't think of anything he'd done wrong lately—or anything at all that might have drawn their attention. Surely no one was going to say anything about his sleeping with Siegfrer. She might be in the same squad and technically be his superior, but she was only one rank higher, and no one had seemed to mind up until now. Besides, she had already moved on, as she had told him she would to begin with. She was with Tiny Smith from the Tiger squad now.

  He followed the officer and chief out of the prospective new dayroom space, and then trailed behind them along the passageway separating the acceleration seats where added supplies were stacked willy-nilly, having been thrown into the boat before its launching from Sam Johnston. The seating compartments were on the middle of the three decks, not counting the gravity drive, impellers, topside thrusters and capacitors riding flush above the top deck and the upper and lower thrusters. Alternate impellers and converters rode equally flush along the keel. It was all familiar to him, but now he began looking at the boat as something other than a transportation vehicle from the starship to planets where the real exploring took place. The boat was going to be home for a long time, as was evident from the work he had been doing and tasks he saw other spacers and explorers were busy with in the boat. One crew was dismantling and folding some of the seats to make more room for living. He hoped he wouldn't be one of the unfortunates who would be left without seats and have to be closely stacked in a cargo bay and tractored into immobility during maneuvers, but he suspected he would, given his low rank.

  Below the deck they were on, running almost half the length of the boat, were little cabins that were li
ved in when the longboat was down on a surface. They weren't big, but they did have the virtue of offering a place to sleep and some privacy, albeit meager for the lower ranks. A cabin contained a narrow bunk, sink, fold-up seats and table and a bare minimum of storage space for personal gear. The spacer and explorer chiefs had marginally larger cabins farther forward, while the officers each had slightly bigger ones even closer to the control room one deck above. Commander Brackett and the XO had larger ones still. Where the cabins ended, more cargo bays began.

  Above the middle deck and running almost the length of the boat were other cargo bays, connections, and access spaces to the gravity drive impellers, capacitors, thrusters and compensators riding above it. The top deck also held the environmental machinery and the supplies that kept the air fresh and recycled human waste products. In addition, that deck also contained reaction mass, one of their two water reservoirs and one of the power cores. Almost everything in or on the longboat was duplicated in case of failure, including the explorers. There were at least two explorers for each major specialty, and for some there were three. His own specialties were xenomicrobiology and astronomy.

  The three of them entered officer country, where Cantrell halted.

  "Chief, I'll take him from here, but you may as well go ahead and join Mr. Shinzyki now. He's going to be calling a Chiefs meeting in a minute or two."