The Orpheus Plot

by Christopher Swiedler

  “Sounds good to me,” Rahul said. “I’m starting to feel a little—”

  He was interrupted by an announcement over the general radio channel. “Course correction in thirty seconds,” a tired voice said from the bridge. “Repeat for all hands, course correction in thirty seconds.”

  Rahul looked at Lucas. “Please tell me that doesn’t mean what I think it means.”

  Lucas didn’t understand. He’d checked the nightly announcements before going to bed. There’d been nothing about a course change. And why were they only giving thirty seconds of warning?

  He pushed the thoughts aside. Why didn’t matter—all that mattered was that they got back inside before the engines fired. “Go!” he shouted.

  Why had he agreed to let them come? By himself, he could have been back to the airlock in plenty of time. He and Elena helped Rahul along as best they could, but they were moving far too slowly. Lucas looked back over his shoulder. How much time did they have?

  An answer came in the form of an orange glow from the back of the ship. The engines were powering up. Whoever was making this course change, they were in a hurry to do it. Lucas found a set of handholds and pulled Elena and Rahul toward him. “Grab on and don’t let go!”

  The three of them laced their fingers around the rungs just as the thrust from the engines kicked in, nearly jerking Lucas’s handhold out of his grasp. A moment later an attitude rocket fired, close enough that he could feel the heat through his suit.

  “Climb!” he shouted, pointing up toward the airlock.

  In response, Rahul just moaned something unintelligible and clung to the hull of the ship. Lucas grabbed him under his shoulders with one arm and tried to pull him upward.

  “I can’t . . . ,” Rahul said, scrunching his eyes closed. “I can’t move—everything is spinning.”

  Elena reached the airlock and looked down at them. “You have to climb!” she yelled.

  “I can’t,” Rahul said. “I can’t!”

  The acceleration was increasing. Soon they would be struggling to hang on, and climbing might be impossible. Lucas craned his neck and tried to judge the distance to the airlock. How much force would it take to get both of them there?

  “Let go!” he said to Rahul. “I’m going to fly us up!”

  “What?” Rahul said, opening his eyes. “Are you crazy?”

  Lucas gathered his feet underneath him and pushed away from the hull. Rahul clutched at the handhold and gave out a strangled cry as he lost his grip. Immediately, the two of them started to fall backward, toward the tail of the ship. Lucas straightened himself out and ignited his thruster pack. Rahul grabbed on to him reflexively as the force pushed them back upward. Lucas craned his neck, trying to see past Rahul’s helmet. Where was the airlock? Where was Elena?

  A second later, they collided with the hull next to the airlock. Disoriented, Lucas reached out and snagged the edge of the doorframe entirely by accident. His fingers scrabbled against the smooth metal for a moment before a hand grabbed his arm. Lucas tightened his grip on Rahul as Elena dragged them both into the airlock, where they collapsed in a heap on the cold metal floor.

  “Oh, god,” Rahul moaned. “Oh, god. I’m never doing that again.”

  “Well, that’s good,” Elena said. “Because neither am I. Now please, get off me.”

  Lucas rolled away and pushed himself to his hands and knees. Rahul stood up shakily and reached down to help Elena to her feet. “Thank you,” he said. “I thought we were goners.”

  “We almost were,” she pointed out, straightening out her spacesuit.

  Lucas suddenly remembered the little device. What had happened to it? He put his hand into the pocket of his suit, but there was nothing there. It must have fallen out when they’d collided with the hull of the ship.

  “Come on,” Elena said. “We need to get back to our bunks.”

  As Rahul and Elena headed back, Lucas paused and put his hand on the window of the airlock. Tonight had been a complete disaster. They’d almost gotten killed, and he had nothing to show for it.

  Which meant that all he had left was a suspicion—and every sign was still pointing toward his sister.

  9

  THE NEXT MORNING, the ship was still under acceleration. Lucas swung his legs out of his sleep sack and jumped down to the deck. It was around a sixth of a gee, he guessed, about as much as Earth’s moon. It wasn’t much by planetary standards, but it was a lot for a ship. And only one month ago, it had been a lot for Lucas—apparently Palmer’s phys ed regimen was doing its trick.

  The existence of gravity made Lucas feel as if he was on an entirely new ship. In free fall, the interior of the Orpheus felt like a horizontal tube, with the bridge at one end and the engine room at the other. Now that they were under acceleration, the front of the ship was clearly ‘up’ and the back was ‘down.’ The circular bulkheads that separated the decks suddenly became floors, and you had to climb up and down the ladderways instead of just pulling yourself along. The big cylindrical rec room was perfectly safe and usable in free fall, but under gravity it had to be split into three levels by retractable floors, since a fall from one end to the other would be bad news, even at a sixth of a gee.

  Breakfast for the alpha-section cadets was unusually quiet. Lucas was bleary-eyed from lack of sleep and Rahul stared blankly at the wall, lost in some interaction with his AI implant. Elena, though, seemed more tense than tired. Sometimes it seemed like she was on the verge of saying something, but each time she just ended up sitting back in her seat. Other times she would look at Lucas as if there was something she expected him to say.

  Rahul suddenly gave a low whistle. “It’s true!” he said under his breath. “There really was a second attack.”

  “Second attack?” Elena asked. “What are you talking about?”

  Rahul focused his eyes and turned toward them. “Apparently some people tried to shut down the power on Pallas. Officially it was just an attempted prank. But some people are putting together the eyewitness reports and security camera footage, and it was definitely a serious attack.”

  “On Pallas?” Lucas asked. An uneasy feeling settled inside his chest. He and his dad visited Pallas at least a few times per year. The colony there was famous for its underground fish farms and sushi restaurants. Why would anyone try to shut down the power systems?

  “That’s crazy,” Elena said.

  “It gets crazier,” Rahul said. “The attack happened at the exact same time as the hijacking of my parents’ ship.”

  Lucas’s uneasiness was now full-blown anxiety. After weeks of constant news broadcasts, the story of the hijacking was finally starting to die down. But if Rahul was right, then soon everyone would be talking about it again. “Maybe it’s a coincidence?” he offered.

  “No way,” Rahul said, shaking his head. “This was coordinated.”

  “If it’s being kept so quiet, how did you find it?” Elena asked.

  Rahul glanced around and leaned toward them. “I’m part of a citizen-action team,” he said in a low voice. “It’s a group of people who put these sorts of things together. We’re going to find whoever was responsible and make sure they pay.”

  “You mean like those crazy people who post about the Loch Ness monster and Bigfoot?” Elena said doubtfully.

  “No—not like that. This is all based on real evidence. I’m telling you, there’s something big going on.”

  To Lucas’s relief, their wrist screens all buzzed simultaneously. He tapped at his and read the notification. “Apparently we just got a new assignment for this afternoon.”

  “Please tell me we’re not flushing out engine coolant again,” Elena said. “My uniform still smells like a used-car lot.”

  Rahul pulled out his pocket screen and scrolled through the message. “Wow. Bridge training!”

  This news brought Elena out of whatever funk she was in. She grabbed his screen and double-checked it as if she thought someone might be playing a trick on her. �
��I thought our turn wasn’t till next month.”

  “Delta section got hit with demerits or something, so they’re the ones stuck on engine-room duty. Which means we get their bridge slot.”

  “Is it on the actual bridge?” Lucas asked.

  “Well, no,” Elena said. “It’s on the backup bridge. But still, it’s fully functional.”

  “I wish I’d known,” Rahul said mournfully. “I would have studied up. This might be my chance to impress Hofstra.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Elena said. “This is our first training session. I doubt Hofstra will even be there.”

  Elena’s prediction turned out to be correct. When they got to the backup bridge, they were greeted by Ensign Weber, who waved tiredly at the crew stations. “Sit down, shut up, and don’t touch anything.”

  The readouts on the consoles showed them their spots. Rahul was assigned to the engineering station, which made sense. But the pilot’s console was listed as ELENA PRUITT, and Lucas’s name was displayed on the commander’s station.

  “Hey, I don’t think this is right,” Lucas said. “Shouldn’t I be piloting?”

  “Apparently not,” Weber said. “Sanchez picked these assignments herself.”

  A little disappointed, Lucas settled into the commander’s seat. The pilot was the one who actually flew the ship, and the engineer ran all the sensors and navigation. He liked Sanchez’s command training well enough, but he would still rather do the flying himself instead of sitting back here and giving orders. And so far all she’d taught him was history and theory—not a single thing about actually commanding a ship. He inspected his control panel and discovered that he could see everything that the pilot and engineer saw, but he couldn’t control any of it. Fantastic. Only the Navy could make a job this boring.

  He looked around, wondering how often this room was used to actually fly the ship, instead of just being used for training. Not often, he guessed—it would have to be a major emergency for the captain to divert control like that. Out of habit, Lucas adjusted the captain’s console so that it was positioned over his lap.

  “Before we get started, a few notes,” Weber said. “Right now we’re in observation mode, so we have full access to sensors, but no actual controls. In a moment I’ll switch us to training mode. First, though, some basics.”

  When Weber said basics, she certainly meant it. She started with a long-winded explanation of the responsibilities of the commander, pilot, and engineer. While she talked, Lucas stared at the giant wraparound video screen in front of them, which showed a replica of what the main bridge was seeing. It seemed silly to waste time with lectures in here when they could be learning how to actually operate the ship.

  “Contact bearing two-two-five,” a voice over a comm link said.

  “Well, looks like we’ll get to follow along with the main bridge,” Weber said. “That’s Lieutenant Feinman, the on-shift engineer. Apparently we’ve just detected another ship.”

  “Any identification?” Sanchez asked.

  “Negative,” said Feinman.

  “Well, this is interesting,” Weber said. “Our new friend isn’t advertising his presence.”

  She reached over Rahul’s shoulder and tapped at his console. The main view screen switched to a blurry view of a small gray dot. From this distance it was impossible to tell what sort of ship it was.

  “How often does this happen?” Rahul asked.

  “Every few weeks,” Weber said. “Usually it’s just miners operating illegally. This one’s pretty far off, though. It’ll be up to Sanchez whether we turn and chase or just let them be.”

  “Stay on course,” Sanchez said, as if on cue. “No intercept.”

  “Too bad. Would have been fun,” Weber said. She snapped her fingers as if she’d just had an idea. “Of course, we can still simulate an intercept.”

  Weber switched the bridge to training mode and set up a program with a ship at a similar distance. When everything was ready, she showed them how the navigator would plot an intercept course. Lucas was excited to see that there really wasn’t a lot of difference between navigation on the Josey Wales and here on the Orpheus. Despite all of Hofstra’s admonitions about needing to have a “deep understanding” of orbital mechanics, the computers still did all the hard work.

  “While all this was happening, the engineer would be keeping close tabs on the target,” Weber said, nodding at Rahul. “And the pilot would be reviewing the course to make sure she’s happy with it.”

  “What about the commander?” Lucas asked.

  “The commander is watching everything, because nothing’s going to happen until they say so.”

  “Don’t we have to warn the crew about the new course?” Lucas pressed.

  Weber nodded. “Unless it’s an absolute life-or-death emergency, the commander needs to confirm that everyone on board is ready for a change in acceleration.”

  Weber showed Elena how to initiate the course that had been plotted on Rahul’s station. Lucas watched with idle interest. When Elena ramped up the engines, it would only be a simulation. But it was supposed to be authentic, right? Lucas pressed the shipwide intercom button on the commander’s console and leaned toward the microphone.

  “Crew, prepare for emergency acceleration,” he said in a deep voice.

  Immediately, Weber whirled around and jerked Lucas’s hand away from the intercom button. She leaned forward and jabbed it with her own finger. “Belay that! No course change. Repeat, no course change.”

  “What’s the matter?” Lucas asked, staring at her in shock. “It’s just a simulation, right?”

  “Who gave that order?” Sanchez asked. “What’s going on?”

  “Just an overeager cadet on bridge training,” Weber growled. “Sorry about that, Captain.”

  “Bridge, this is hangar,” Moskowitz’s voice said. “Confirm no acceleration?”

  “All hands, that call for emergency acceleration was a mistake,” Weber said over the intercom. “No course change planned. As you were.”

  “Copy that,” Sanchez said. “Get me an incident report, please.”

  “Didn’t I tell you not to touch anything?” Weber demanded, stabbing her finger at Lucas.

  Lucas fumed silently for a moment. He’d done exactly what a commander was supposed to do. How could he have known that the intercom wasn’t part of the simulation? “I know what I’m doing,” he muttered.

  Weber put up her hands in mock deference. “Well, if that’s the case, then maybe I should step aside and let you run the mission like an actual commander?”

  “Sure,” Lucas said, much more confidently than he felt. But everything he’d seen so far was familiar to him. How hard could it be?

  “Then please, be my guest.” Weber moved to the back of the room and folded her arms across her chest.

  Lucas cleared his throat. “Elena, is that course ready?”

  “Yes,” she said, and then paused. “I think so.”

  “Initiate, please.”

  She slid her fingers over the control panel, and the simulated thrust began to increase. Lucas settled back in the commander’s chair. See? This wasn’t so hard. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a flashing light on the engineering console. “Rahul, what’s that reading?”

  Rahul looked at his screen and studied it for a moment. “I’m not sure—dust particles?”

  “How big?”

  “A few kilometers across, it looks like.”

  “No,” Lucas said impatiently, “how big are the particles? Is it safe to fly through, or do we have to route around?”

  “How do I tell?” Rahul asked.

  “It’s right there on your screen—average diameter or average mass, something like that.”

  “I don’t see anything like that.”

  “Elena, cut thrust,” Lucas said. He unbuckled himself from his seat and peered over Rahul’s shoulder. “Why don’t you have the high-frequency radar turned on? We’re not going to see anything small w
ith this sensor setup.”

  “You didn’t tell me to,” Rahul said defensively. “And anyway, I activated all of the—”

  “Here,” Lucas said, elbowing past him. “It’s on another screen.”

  Rahul sat back and glowered while Lucas searched for the right settings. Finally he found the sensors he was looking for and flipped them on. As soon as they were active, Elena’s console blared an alarm.

  “Collision warning,” she said. “Though I can’t tell what it thinks we’re going to hit.”

  “It’s the dust cloud,” Lucas said, looking up at the main bridge wall display. “Wait—why are we still accelerating? I told you to cut thrust!”

  “You didn’t say how much to cut it by,” Elena said. “So I reduced it to fifty percent.”

  “Cut thrust means turn it off.”

  “Oh,” she said. She started to slide the thrust level back down, but Lucas grabbed her wrist.

  “It’s too late. We have to adjust course. Rahul, can you give us an evasion plan?”

  “Um, sure,” Rahul said. He tapped at his screen, slowly giving it the commands to plot a course that avoided the dust cloud.

  “It’s an emergency,” Lucas said. “Just tell the computer to avoid collision!”

  “I’m trying,” Rahul snapped.

  Lucas clenched his jaw in frustration. Rahul was going through the niceties of working out an actual course that bypassed the cloud and then returned them to an intercept with the Belter ship, when all they needed was an emergency evasion.

  “Elena,” Lucas barked. “Four seconds of yaw, and then full thrust.”

  In response, Elena frowned and began to search through the commands on her display. Lucas pointed at the manual controls on the side of the console. “Right there!”

  “Collision imminent!” a computerized voice blared.

  Elena flexed her fingers and put her hands on the manual control stick. “Four seconds of yaw in five, four—”

  “Just do it!”

  She pulled back on the stick and then pushed the thrust controls all the way forward. There was a flash on the main screen and the overhead lights flipped to a dim red. Every console on the bridge began beeping damage warnings.