Challenger's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 2)

by David Feintuch

  I picked four crewmen I’d decided to trust with weapons: Mr. Drucker, Mr. Tzee, Emmett Branstead, and Elena Bartel. While Dray and Walter Dakko guarded the ladders from Level 2 we made a thorough search of Level 1. No rebels. It was a start; at least now I knew our uppermost Level was secure. I sat with a steaming cup of coffee to ponder my next move, wondering how much more time the mutineers would give me.

  My coffee finished, we proceeded cautiously down the west ladder to Level 2. I sealed the emergency corridor hatch between sections six and seven, east of the ladder. We proceeded west, checking each cabin and compartment. We shepherded all the passengers we encountered to the dining hall, on Level 1.

  The hatch to the launch berth was undamaged; that meant the cargo holds, accessible through the launch berth, were still in our hands. As we searched I tried to be everywhere, while Gregor, at my orders, tagged along as a gofer. After two tense hours we’d secured the remainder of Level 2.

  I assembled my forces at the ladder to Level 3, where Walter Dakko patiently let me show him how to guard the ladder wells he’d competently been watching for two days. At the sound of running steps I broke off my lecture. Dakko, ready to fire, eased his finger from the trigger as Charlie, a streeter, skidded to a stop at the bottom of the ladder.

  “Don’t be shootin’, Cap’n, it’s me! Dey comin’ out!”

  “The rebels? From the engine room?”

  “Someone comin’ out, yeah! I don’ wan’ be wid ‘em, dey gonn’ hurt some joe!”

  “Up here, fast!” The boy bolted up the ladder. “Who else is down there?”

  “Trannies? Annie, Scor, Dawg, maybe more. Inna room, allem.”

  I turned to my new cadet. “Gregor, have Ms. Bartel reinforce Dray at the west ladder. Bring the three other armed sailors to this ladder, flank!”

  “Yes, sir!” Attani sprinted off. Moments later Tzee, Drucker and Branstead hurried around the bend, Gregor trotting at their heels.

  I pointed. “They’re down on Level 3, somewhere outside the engine room. We’re going below. Be ready to fire, but don’t shoot a passenger. Let’s go!” I rounded the ladder well.

  The corridor speaker crackled. “Captain, time we did some talkin’.” Andros, the contemptuous deckhand Clinger had freed from the brig.

  I froze. Behind me my war party halted.

  “You hear me, Captain? What we got is a standoff. You got the food and the guns, I got the power and water lines. An’ a bunch of your passengers, them trannie kids. Understand?”

  I picked up the caller. “I hear you, Andros. Put down your weapons.”

  “Not a chance.”

  “What’s this about? We’re all marooned together; what’s the point in rebellion?”

  “Point?” A guffaw. “That frazzin’Admiral din’ care if we live or die. We got nothin’. It’ll be over soon enough. Think we—”

  “There’s hope. We’ll grow food, wait for resc—”

  “Think we want to live our last days poppin’ salutes an’ goin’ ‘yes, sir’ an ‘aye aye, sir’? We’re men, not Navy machines!”

  “You signed up.”

  “For the bonus, yeah. And like all the other joeys, I spent it ‘fore we left port. Now all we got is this mess. Well, I ain’t goin’ this way. There’s women aboard, enough food for some zarky parties. So, here’s the deal. Take—”

  “Andros, give it up. We can’t afford to have anyone else killed. You’ll ruin everyone’s chances.”

  “Nah. Like we said, we’re going our own way. There’s nothin’ you can do.”

  Abruptly I realized the whole ship could hear our dialogue. “I’m heading to the bridge. I’ll call you from there.”

  “Nah, let ‘em all listen; ain’t nothin’ to me. Let your precious passengers know how bad things are. And that fraz Drucker, he listenin’? I owe him.”

  I keyed the caller to the bridge. “Kerren, can you override the engine room circuit so they can’t page the entire ship?”

  “Negative, Captain,” the puter said. “Critical stations—bridge, comm room, engine room—have equal access in case of emergency. It’s a safety feature and I have no override.”

  “Very well.” I thumbed the caller back to the engine room. Andros might speak over the ship-wide circuit, but I’d be damned if I’d do the same. Let those who would listen decipher what they could from his end of the conversation.

  “Andros, you can’t get away with it. Surrender now and you’ll save lives.”

  He guffawed. “Sure. Sail us into port and we’ll surrender.”

  “There’s no way you can take the ship. I’ve got the upper two Levels, the bridge, the comm room, and all the guns.”

  “Not all the guns,” the speaker interrupted. “We got a rifle and the stunner, and we figured out how to recharge them. We have the machine shop. You don’t know what we’re cookin’ up here.”

  “I’m coming after you.”

  “The hell you are, fraz.” From behind him, a gasp. Mutineers they might be, but discipline died hard.

  “I’m done talking, Andros. Your choice is, surrender or die.”

  “No. Your choice is, leave us be or we cut your power. Sykes thinks he can disconnect the lines to the rest of the ship and leave us with power in the engine room.”

  I keyed the caller. “Kerren, can he do that?”

  An infinitesimal pause. “I judge it relatively complicated for human understanding, but the Chief Engineer could do it, with a manual. I don’t know what would result if an untrained seaman made the attempt. Power feed lines need to be rerouted with bridges. My records show Sykes with a grade five education level, marginal literacy.”

  “What about Andros?”

  “Grade nine overall. Adequate literacy. Diagnosed emotionally unstable at enlistment testing.”

  I thumbed the caller. “Andros, this is no standoff. We can do without power awhile; the bridge has emergency backups. I can keep my passengers and crew alive while we wait you out. You’ll starve soon enough.”

  “Maybe,” he said indifferently. “After we eat the trannies.” Gregor sucked in his breath. In the speaker, Andros giggled. “That girl, that Annie, she’s kinda scrawny. Except certain places.” His voice grew hard. “So don’t push, Seafort. An’ remember the hydroponics. We got them down here too. They’re sealed, sure, but how long you think it’ll take us to get in? How’d you like a chamber full of shredded plants? Worse come to worse, we could probably blow up the whole ship if we try. You going to kill us, what else we got to lose?”

  I wracked my brain, with no success. “I’ll call you back,” I said at last.

  “Do that, Seafort. And don’t get ideas about stallin’ while you set something up. I’ll be happy to fry a trannie for a demo.”

  Dazed, I left my attack party and made my way to the bridge, knowing that his broadcast had done incalculable damage to our morale. I’d been manipulated; I had lost the initiative to a demented sailor. How had it come to that? If I’d used sense last night, and put a guard at the engine room. Or attacked an hour earlier. Or—anything.

  Philip, watching the corridor camera from the bridge, opened the hatch, sealed it behind me as I dropped into my chair. He was diplomatically silent.

  In my humiliation, I found it hard to meet his eye. “It seems I have a problem.”

  “Yes, sir. Do you think he means it?”

  “I don’t want to find out. Call Dray.” I shut my eyes, tried to stir my dulled mind. I’d have to give in, or at least fashion a compromise, even if they were mutineers.

  I glanced at the blankened simulscreen. The same screen, I recalled, at which I’d shouted my defiance to Admiral Tremaine, forsworn my oath of obedience, and very possibly damned myself. I sat in the same chair in which I’d resolved never again to betray the oath that bound me.

  I was certain I knew the relevant section of the regs, but I called them up on my console and read the passage again.

  The Captain of a vessel shall assume and exert auth
ority and control of the Government of the vessel until relieved by order of superior authority, until his death, or until certification of his disability as otherwise provided herein.

  If I ceded part of my ship or my command to rebels, I’d be in blatant violation of the regs I’d sworn to uphold.

  But the regs didn’t contemplate a situation like ours. We were stranded, perhaps for a lifetime, without experienced officers, with only a few crew—

  Yet Challenger was a Naval vessel, and I was in charge.

  I couldn’t send my few untrained men into battle while I waited timidly behind the fortified bulkheads of the bridge. I’d have to lead them myself. But if I were killed, who would run the ship?

  No. I wouldn’t circumvent truth with sophistry; my duty was clear enough. What did it matter if I died trying to perform it? My responsibility was to preserve my oath, not myself.

  I would be dead a very long time, until the distant day Lord God called us all, and time ended.

  An inconceivably long time.

  But then I would be one with Amanda. And Nate. I tried to master the trembling in my limbs as I prepared to stand.

  The trannies. The streeters. I could accept, just barely, the probability of my own death. But in attacking the rebels I’d doom innocent passengers. How many hostages did Andros say he’d taken? I couldn’t remember. “Did you record, Kerren?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Play back.” When the grim exchange had replayed I realized Andros hadn’t revealed the number of his prisoners. We’d embarked with forty-two transpops; I recalled my fury when Alexi Tamarov had told me of them, centuries past. Three died in the raid by the fish. I’d enlisted Eddie and fifteen others. That left ... twenty-three. “Philip, who’s minding the passengers?”

  “I put Mr. Kovaks in charge, sir, the recycler’s mate. I couldn’t think who else to trust.”

  “Excuse me, sir,” Kerren interjected. “Chief Kasavopolous is approaching the bridge.”

  “Very well, let him in; Philip, find out how many transients Kovaks has in the dining hall.”

  As Dray entered I raised a palm, telling him to wait. In a moment the caller buzzed. “Fourteen trannies, sir.”

  Nine hostages, then. Nine amoral, uncivilized joeys plucked from filthy, crowded streets, clothed, warehoused, selected for a foolish experiment, and ferried nineteen light-years from home, to die abandoned on Challenger.

  Perhaps I could stall Andros long enough to organize. I might give my crew rudimentary training in weapons and mount an assault on Level 3. With luck I could retake the engine room, at the cost of some of my recruits and my own life.

  And the nine transpops.

  Their deaths would not be comparable to losing crewmen in battle. The crew, at least, had chosen this voyage. They’d accepted some risk, though they couldn’t have known how great and strange it would be.

  But the transients were pawns in a bureaucratic game of indifference. And not much more than children, at that. I couldn’t throw them away uncaring.

  But my oath?

  There had to be a way. I slumped in the chair, staring at the console, trying to recall the layout of the engine room.

  The speaker crackled. “Crewman in corridor, Captain.”

  “What the—thank you, Kerren.” I swiveled the camera. Eddie Boss, shoulders knotted through the folds of his new uniform, fist raised to hammer at the bridge.

  I spluttered, “A sailor, outside the bridge? Unescorted?” I pounded my chair in frustration. “How can I think, when—”

  Philip stood. “I’ll handle it, sir. Please.” He read my face, saw no refusal. He crossed to the hatch and slapped it open. “Well?”

  “Wanna talk ta Cap’n.”

  “You’re out of line, sailor. Get back to—”

  “Talk ta Cap’n. Not you.”

  Philip’s voice flashed. “You’re speaking to an officer, Mr. Boss. Come to attention and salute. You call me ‘sir.’ And don’t use that tone of voice or I’ll haul you to the brig!”

  I glanced at the image relayed by the corridor camera. Eddie’s lip curled as he stared down at the lithe midshipman. “Brig? You? You’re a sir?”

  Philip, as if fearless, shoved at Eddie’s bulk. “Me. Any officer.”

  Eddie scowled at the hand that had tried to move him. “Ya wanna use dat hand ‘gain, don’ go pushin’ ol’ Eddie widit.”

  Philip was silent a moment. Then he said, “I was there, Mr. Boss.”

  “Huh? Where?”

  “The dining hall. When you said, ‘I do swear upon my immortal soul.’ To give loyalty and obedience, and the rest of it. I remember, even if you don’t.”

  “Words,” Eddie said contemptuously. “Jus’ words.”

  “An oath, Mr. Boss. On your soul.”

  “To Cap’n, maybe. Not you.”

  “I’m his representative. What I say is what he says.” Well put, Philip. The entire chain of command, in a nutshell.

  Eddie hesitated. Then, “Could break ya in half, joey.”

  “You could, yes. I’m not all that strong. But I won’t change what I’m going to do.”

  “An’wha’s dat?”

  “Put you against the bulkhead at attention. See if the Captain is willing to talk with you. And if not, or after he’s done, put you on report and issue enough summary punishment you’ll think twice before pulling this stunt again.”

  Eddie glowered. My heart pounding, I dropped my hand to the butt of my pistol.

  We waited.

  Eddie sighed. “Go on, den. Do it.”

  “Over there. Stand to.” The camera eye swiveled to follow.

  “Dunno how. No one showed me.”

  “Eyes front. Chest in, like so. Hands at your side, fingers down. Toes pointing forward.” Philip frowned at the shabby attempt, but let it pass. “Now you say, ‘Sir, I’d like permission to speak with the Captain.’ ”

  Along silence. Eddie cleared his throat. “Allri, I sayin’ it.”

  “No. The words I said.”

  “A trannie don’ talk like dat!”

  “You’ll have to try, Mr. Boss, because I won’t ask the Captain without them.”

  Eddie cursed under his breath. “I can’t—How’d I get inna this? Sir! I like pum—permission speaka Cap’n.”

  “Captain.”

  “Cap-tain,” Eddie grated.

  “Wait here, sailor.” Philip paused. “Aye aye, sir!” he prompted.

  “Aye aye, sir,” muttered Eddie.

  Philip returned to the bridge, cheeks flushed. “Seaman Boss requests permission to speak with you, sir.”

  “Very well, Mr. Tyre.” I added quietly, “Don’t push him further; he could cripple you.”

  Still indignant, Philip paid no heed. “The nerve of him, barging in here! When I’m done he won’t try that again.”

  “Bring him in,” I said. Lord God, my cheek throbbed. I was so tired.

  “Aye aye, sir.” As if in response to Eddie’s slackness, Philip’s salute and spin were straight out of Academy.

  Eddie Boss shambled in. Under Philip’s persistent glare he puzzled for a long moment before comprehension dawned. Clumsily he brought himself to attention. From the corner Chief Dray watched with bemused indifference.

  “Well?” I let my voice remain cold.

  “Heard da man tella Cap’n ‘bout eatin’ trannies, an’ all.”

  “Yes?”

  “Gotta help ‘em. Cap’n gotta.” It was more plea than demand.

  “I’m working on it. Go back to the dining hall.”

  “Workin’ on it?” A sneer.

  I frowned. He glared back, unimpressed. “Whatcha gonn’ do, huh? Sit here, nice ‘n safe, let dem grodes eat my frens?”

  Philip’s voice was tight. “Enough of that, sail—”

  “Boolsheet ’nuf!” Eddie roared. “I took oath, yeah, savin’ ship, work fo Cap’n. Not ta sitroun watch—”

  “Now listen—” Philip.

  I swarmed out of my s
eat. “SHUT UP, BOTH OF YOU!” It silenced them, as well it might. One does not often hear a Captain go berserk.

  I rounded on Eddie Boss. “NOT ANOTHER WORD OUT OF YOU!” Something made him step back a pace, raise his arm as if to ward off a blow. I spun to Philip. “Or you, boy!” After a moment I realized I was pointing my finger like a fully charged weapon. For a moment I wondered how Philip would react if I holstered it. My lips twitched in a grin. The midshipman took an involuntary step back. Startled, I gaped, and he blanched. My grin began to congeal into a maniacal leer.

  “Are you all right?” we asked each other simultaneously, and for a crazed moment our eyes locked in mutual shock.

  I broke the resulting silence. “I’m fine, and you were told to be silent.” I dropped back into my chair. My legs trembled. I hoped he couldn’t see. I hoped it was only excess adrenaline.

  I glared at Eddie. “You think I’m hiding while your friends are in danger.”

  His glance fell on my blistered cheek. He muttered and looked to the deck.

  “What do you want me to do for them?”‘

  He licked his lips. “You knowin’ ship, Cap’n. Fin’ some way inna room, get ‘em out.”

  “How?” I stared at the console. “First we have to learn where they took your friends. If they’re smart they have them in the.engine room, but that’s a big place. There’s the outer control panel chamber, and off to the side the engine room stores compartment, and straight through the ladder down to the fusion drive chamber. Only two hatches enter it from the circumference corridor.”

  Unconsciously I stood and began to pace. “We’ve got the upper two Levels. There are two ladders to Level 3: east and west. First we’d have to mount an expedition belowdecks and try to secure part of the Level 3 circumference corridor. From there we could work our way around until we’d isolated the engine room. But if the rebels are in any of the interior cabins, they can burn through to the opposite side of the ship. Even if they don’t cut through, the hydro chambers are down below on their Level, and the rebels can destroy them. Then we’ll all die for certain.”

  “But—”

  “Shut your mouth, Mr. Boss, until I’ve finished. If we isolate the engine room we can assault and take it. But there’s no way to force our way in without a desperate fight. And we can’t afford to lose crewmen. There’s no way to replace casualties.”