by John Ringo
"Got it," Mimi said, picking up the wrench that was nearly as long as her arm. One of the screws, the size of her hand, went on the end and was held in place by another magnet.
"You will probably have to start it by hand," Tchar said, lifting the heavy magnet with a grunt and sliding it into the mount. "Now, if you will."
Mimi slid in the first screw and started it by hand, then slid three more in.
"And on the other side," Tchar noted.
She scooted under the magnet and picked up the screws on the other side, sliding them in. Then she got the screwdriver and tightened them as well as she could.
"That has it," Tchar said. "The pipes are braced at this point so they can hold the weight of the magnet." He picked up a communicator and pressed the button. "Red?"
"Here, Tchar."
"Try the pump."
A whistling sound started up after a moment and Mimi felt her hair blowing in a breeze.
"It's sort of . . . leaking," she pointed out. "That's going to the outside of the ship, right?"
"Currently it is bypassed to the internal air," Tchar said. "But, yes, that is a problem. But for this we have a human solution." He slid back and rummaged in his massive toolbox, finally lifting something out.
"You humans have the most amazing inventions," he said, holding up the roll of silver tape. "This is something called 'duck tape' which has, I have counted, over two hundred and sixty-seven uses. This makes two hundred and sixty-eight. I have always wondered: Why is it named for a water bird?"
"The ions can be selectively separated, but it won't be one hundred percent," Weaver said, gesturing to the large makeshift gas flow and separation system. "We're going to have to pump it down and separate it that way secondarily. This will just reduce the pumping problems."
"Commander, for once pretend I'm a fighter pilot with an English Lit degree and an interest in stars based mostly on how pretty they are," Spectre said.
"When you apply a magnetic charge to air molecules, it makes them sticky in different ways," Weaver said, grinning slightly. "So when you apply another magnetic charge to them, they pull away from each other. But they don't do it real well, unless you have a more elaborate setup than we can build. However, they will also turn into liquid at different temperatures and pressures. So we'll put them under pressure and some of them will become liquid before others. Nitrogen becomes liquid at a higher temp and lower pressure than oxygen. Oxygen goes liquid at a higher temp and lower pressure than hydrogen. So we're going to need three very high pressure, cryogenic pumping systems. Cryogenic means—"
"Really cold," Spectre said, nodding. "Know that one."
"So what we should get is mostly oxygen after the ion separation; then we'll pump it down to ensure we've separated it. Now, there's an alternative, if this works really well, to getting the water from ice. But it's kind of crazy."
"This entire mission is crazy," the CO said. "And I haven't had so much as a shower in a couple of days. Gimme crazy."
"Burn it," Bill said. "Put oxygen and hydrogen together and set them on 'fire' and you get water."
"Fire in a sub is not something most people like," the CO pointed out. "In a spaceship with nowhere to set down, it's even worse."
"Duly noted, sir," Bill said.
"So let's table that one, Commander Weaver," Spectre said, grinning. "And let's not tell the crew you even thought of it."
"Yes, sir," Bill replied.
"When's this going to be ready?"
"About four hours."
"We've got about sixteen hours of O2 left."
"Also duly noted, sir."
"Stable orbit around Sirius Echo," the pilot said as the ship coasted to a stop in an orbit around the gas giant.
The Saturn-sized planet was twelve AU from the AO class star, well outside the life zone and, like every gas giant they'd seen, was striped in broad bands. In the northern hemisphere there was a large spot, similar to Jupiter's Great Spot, that indicated a stable gas giant "hurricane." In addition to this gas giant, there were two rocky inner planets, either one massive asteroid field or two slightly larger than Sol's and four more gas giants in the system. But this one's atmosphere, Dr. Dean had assured them, was the one most likely to have a broad water belt. The rocky inner planets both resembled Venus with a fiery atmosphere and little or no water. The other gas giants were far enough out that water would be deep in the atmosphere and harder to extract.
Besides fourteen moons and counting, the planet had six rings. Four were aligned with the planet's equator, like Saturn's, but two more, very thin, were at angled orbits.
One thing that had been discovered in Sol's system during the shakedown cruise was that "white" rings were composed of ice moons that had been torn apart by tidal stresses. Darker "black" rings were composed either of older ice that had picked up dust or, quite often, of rocky material. Fortunately, the largest of the rings was bright white, indicating recently formed "clean" ice.
"XO?"
"Sir?"
"Find out how soon we can get oxygen," the CO said. "I'm in the mood for a cleansing breath."
"Will do, sir."
"We have one last problem," Tchar pointed out. "At least, one that we're aware of. The pipes have a plug on them. It's an airtight screw fitting that's designed to be removed. But it's on the exterior of the ship, actually up underneath."
"That's going to be interesting," Bill said, looking over at the chief engineer.
"I would recommend an EVA removal under microgravity," the ship's engineer said.
Lieutenant Commander Dan Schall was a career sub officer, a "nukie" to the core. Short with brown hair going gray and a florid face, he was phlegmatic to an almost insane degree. However, given that he had lived his entire career around nuclear reactors that were right on the edge of being nuclear bombs in a cylinder underwater, phlegmatic was good.
"I'm not sure that's the best idea, Commander," Tchar said, clacking his teeth. "The seals on the system are not the best I've seen. That could result in explosive decompression of the engineering spaces."
"Which would be, in sub parlance, bad," Weaver said, smiling. "But getting to the damned thing in anything other than microgravity would be a bitch. I'd recommend evacuating the reactor spaces before we try it. I'll handle the EVA with the CO's permission. I'm trained in Wyverns. Can I get a Wyvern to it?"
"Yes," Schall said. "The inlets are at the base of the ballast vents. All you have to do is enter through ballast vent fourteen. But the patch is heavily bolted. It's designed to be removed, but not easily. And please bring it back with you. We don't have a spare."
"Duly noted," Bill said.
"There are other Wyvern-qualified personnel onboard," Tchar said. "Not only security, but the mission specialists. In the event of explosive decompression, they could stand by to support repairs."
"Good point," the Eng said. "I believe we have a plan."
"The write-up on this one is going to be interesting," the XO said. "Item one: Some of the machinist mates need to be trained in EVA."
The ship was equipped with microgravity tools. Bill had ensured that. What he had not ensured was that they had tools for every part on the ship. When he had turned up at the air lock with his torque compensating wrench, the machinist mate assigned to assist him had just laughed and handed him the wrench that fit. It was about half as long as Bill was tall and was not torque compensating. In fact, under "not torque compensating" in the dictionary was this wrench. It was the essence of torque. Torqueness to the nth degree. Torque-sausage. Torquemada. If there was a Nobel prize for torque . . .
"Preparing to EVA," Bill said as he closed the airlock door.
"Door is remotely released," the XO said over his radio. "Good luck, Commander."
"Roger that, sir," Bill replied. He dialed down the pressure in the lock and checked his internal monitors. No leaks in the suit. This was a good thing.
"Ready to exit," Bill said as the gravity fell off. They were out of nor
mal space drive and in microgravity. He'd better get this over with, quick, or the crew was going to be bitching up a storm.
The air lock door opened and he clipped off a safety line, then exited. The Wyvern had been equipped with EVA "mag" boots and he got a boot on the hull, then lifted himself up to get the other in place.
"This is so cool," Bill muttered.
"Say again, Commander?" the XO asked.
"Sorry, sir, talking to myself," Bill said.
"Stay on mission, Commander," the XO advised.
Bill didn't reply as he started walking down the hull. He'd originally entered the fields that he had, hoping he could get into the NASA mission crews. Later he'd taken other paths when it was pretty clear he didn't get along with NASA. But he still wanted to get into space. He'd done a couple of EVAs before, but he never ever lost his love of the glory of the sight.
And this one was pretty darned glorious. The ship had taken up orbit well out from the gas giant but it was clearly visible, filling a quarter of the sky. For that matter, Sirius, the Dog Star, a star he'd looked at as a kid through his first telescope, was glaring blue-white at him off to his right. Cool didn't begin to cover it.
There it was. Sirius, the brightest star in Earth's night sky. The blue-white main sequence dwarf star that could be seen by almost every inhabitant of Earth except those living above about seventy-three degrees or so. Here Bill was, right smack in the vertex of the Winter Triangle or the constellation Canis Major or the "Big Dog." Weaver was as giddy as a school boy. The scenery couldn't have been more of a boyhood fantasy come true if there were naked women in it. Cool.
Hell, for that matter, climbing around on the exterior of a sub was pretty cool. He'd exited from air lock Four, which was another converted Momsen lock, and so he was walking on the "bottom" of the sub. It was the closest to Ballast Vent Fourteen but it was still a bit of a hike. For that matter, there weren't any clip points for his safety lines so he was having to use more magnets for those. Setting the magnets in place, in the Wyvern, wasn't the easiest thing in the world. He'd pretty much come to the conclusion that the Wyverns needed some work for EVA stuff.
Finally, he reached the entrance to the ballast vent. The thing was about six feet across and nine "deep." But getting into it was going to be tricky. And then there was the whole unbolting the thing under microgravity. Especially in a Wyvern.
He clipped in a safety line, then bent down and undogged his boots, getting one hand on the edge of the ballast vent and pulling himself inside. As soon as he turned on his external lights, he easily spotted the intake. It had six massive bolts holding it on and was about a meter across.
Bill pulled up his "legs" and planted them on the far wall of the vent, then got settled in a hard position where he could reach all six of the bolts but wouldn't shift when he applied torque with the torquiest wrench in the solar system.
"Command, EVA," Weaver said. "Preparing to remove patch."
"We see you, Commander," the XO replied. "Emergency teams in place."
He unclipped the wrench, which was tethered to the suit of armor, and applied it to the first nut. The nut didn't want to move, but the Wyvern had the power of a small machine press and it broke free easily enough. He slowly undid the nut all the way to the end, then removed it, carefully, and stowed it. There were spare nuts for the patch, but waste not, want not.
All six of the bolts came off easily enough after the first. But the patch was still holding. Bill tried to pry at it with the fingers of the Wyvern, but it wasn't moving. So he clipped the wrench back down and pulled out one of Tchar's massive flat-head screwdrivers. Placing it at the join he pried upwards.
The patch sprang off explosively, smashing into the far wall of the vent with a "Bong!" he heard through his armor, rebounding into his armor hard enough to nearly break him free from his position, then bouncing down into the depths of the ballast vent.
Along with patch came a blast of air and water. And it didn't stop.
"Command, EVA," Weaver said, as calmly as he could. "We appear to have explosive venting."
"Warning! Warning! Depressurization in Missile Compartment! All personnel to racks and suits!"
"Good thing we're already in the rack," Berg said. He had his zero-gee straps in place and, for once, wasn't nauseated in free fall. Apparently the effects of the pink stuff had finally worn off.
"No maulk," Crowley said. "So can you apply super-cold temperatures to a gate and shut it down? I mean, it's based on a boson, right? And under super-cold conditions they'll gather together."
"No way to do it," Berg replied. "Not that I've heard of. But there might be some experiments in it. I dunno. Guy to ask would be the astrogator. He's the world's foremost gate expert. But as far as I know, the only way to close one is the way he closed one in the Dreen War, drop a super-huge quarkium package through the gate and get it to explode on the other side.
"I wonder what happened to those Dreen worlds," Berg said.
"Blew the grapp out of them," Drago said. "I heard that was a big grapping explosion."
The inter-rack communicators could be set up for multi-person chat and it was a way to pass the time while waiting to see if the ship was going to completely depressurize. Also a good way to take their minds off of it.
"And it nearly went off on Earth," Jaen said. "At least that's what I heard."
"Most of it's still classified," Sergeant Lovelace added. "That's just the rumor."
"I saw it on CNN," Jaen argued.
"And we all know how reliable that is," Drago said.
"Grapp," Jaen said. "Point."
"Be interesting to see if cryogenics could do it," Berg said.
"Go up to the bridge and ask the astrogator," Drago said. "I double dog dare you."
"Maybe the next time we're on deployment," Jaen said. "You could side channel him if you get up the nerve."
"Hell, I'd be hard-pressed to talk to him at all," Berg said.
"You seem comfortable in this stuff," Miller said.
"I am," Miriam replied. "Even if the armor is big, it feels small in here. I like small. I'm not even nauseated, which is nice. I usually hate free fall."
"Makes sense," Miller said. He wasn't sure about being teamed with the linguist, but just about every mission specialist was placed at one of the likely break points.
"Response teams, Command," the XO said over the radio. "Commander Weaver is preparing to remove the patch."
"Point four," Miller said, when his count came up.
"I hope nothing breaks," Miriam said. "But I want you to know that if it does, I'm going to panic."
"That's reassuring," the former SEAL said, rolling his eyes inside the Wyvern.
"I have to panic first," Miriam said, calmly. "Then I can deal with things. I need the adrenaline."
"If this patch lets go, we're going to have all the adrenaline we can use," Miller told her, looking at the magnet. "I just wish we were in something smaller and more nimble."
"See?" Miriam said. "Small is good."
"In this case, definitely," Miller replied. "I'm not even sure we can get to that damned thing in this armor."
Just as he said that, the magnet shifted sideways and the outer mount broke inwards. As soon as it did, the magnet dropped entirely out of its mount and air began explosively venting out of the ship.
"Oh, damn," Miller said, getting down on the knees and elbows of the Wyvern and sliding forward. He could see how the mount went into place, but he wasn't sure he could get it fully mounted. The outboard mount was crumpled.
He lifted the magnet and slid the inboard mount over the pipe, but with the outboard mount crumpled there was no way to get an airtight seal. In fact, it wouldn't seat at all. He dropped it back down and slid the hand of the Wyvern into the mount; twisting it around to get the mount rounded again, he slid it up and got the thing mounted. But they were still losing air. And in the position he was in he couldn't do anything but look at the damned mount and try not to pan
ic.
The whole time he'd heard his "teammate" slowly going nuts over his local channel. There was a final shriek, then a clicking sound.
"Miriam?" Miller said. "Miriam!"
There was a thump on his back and a small hand holding a roll of duct tape came into view over his back. A human hand. The stupid bitch was out of her armor!
"Get back in your armor!" he shouted, realizing that she couldn't hear him. He wasn't sure what the pressure was outside the armor, but going from suit pressure to whatever was left in the engine compartment, ignoring the likelihood of dying from lack of oxygen, was liable to cause all sorts of medical issues that could be summed up with one word: "Bends." It was the equivalent of doing a deep dive and then coming up rapidly.
