The Colony Ship Conestoga : The Complete Series: All Eight Books

by John Thornton

  Eris thought and focused on the door. She wanted to call out a command to increase the hall’s immunization, then pull out a set of tools, and disassemble the pocket track for the door. Her mind saw all the ways it could easily be taken apart, cleaned out, and then reassembled. She knew exactly what implements would be needed to inactivate the energy couplings, and then what wrenches would lock onto which fittings. Each and every part, from the permalloy of the doors, to the seals, gaskets, bolts, and wiring, were recognized and categorized in her mind. Then she imagined getting assistance in fixing the jammed door. She would call forth a physical hygiene automacube and work right next to its gleaming orange chassis. She saw herself kneeling down and working on the door and frame while the orange automacube used its multi-jointed appendage to vacuum away all the trash, gunk, and other things which were clogging the door’s operation. She even imagined a sleek black automacube, a major repair model, rolling up to assist her by connecting gravity nullifiers and then lifting the door back into place. In her mind’s eye, she saw an engineering automacube, its slightly smaller, and blue, frame working with the black automacube as together they fitted the door parts into their proper alignment.

  “Oh yes, chaos driven out, and order restored.” Eris let out as sigh as her daydream continued. “Maybe a four-hour job, disassembly, reassembly, and testing. Easy repair, just time consuming.”

  She looked down at her hands, expecting to see the tools she was imagining. When they were not there, she looked around. Her mind whipped back to reality. She was unsure how long she had stood there, just staring at the one jammed door. A single broken mechanism, amidst the utter chaos that was now the Conestoga.

  “Eris, you must go on,” she said aloud. “Chaos will not overcome. Engineers restore order. We make chaos controlled.”

  She turned back and marched purposefully down the hallway, ignoring all the ruined things in the corridor. She was determined to reach the funicular and take that to the Command Bridge.

  Turning briskly left following the path in her mind, after a bulkhead door opened, Eris heard surprised screaming. She looked down the corridor, and there were two people fleeing away. The other direction was clear.

  “A wizard!” The closest one yelled, looking back over his shoulder.

  “She opened a magic doorway!” The other one cried while running.

  They only got a few meters away when they had to stop near a closed bulkhead door. Eris immediately thought the door must be broken.

  Eris stepped forward, and the door behind her hissed shut. She started to speak, but then saw the people’s dress. They were wearing some kind of brown clothing, perhaps leather, which had been poorly finished, but Eris was not quite sure. It was rough and inconsistent in color and texture. It was draped across one shoulder and worn like a dress or loose covering. Both had shaggy, unkempt hair, and were caked in the growth medium from the floor. Neither had shoes.

  “I am Junior Engineer….” Eris began, but the people turned and ran to the end of the side corridor. The pressure door there did not open for them either. None of the doors in that side corridor were activating, and it was a boxed dead end. Eris’s mind was tracing the energy channels trying to figure out what would cause that type of multiple door failure. Eris glanced the other direction, and the corridor extended far into the distance past where she had entered.

  Standing there she turned back to the people and said, “Eris is my name.”

  “Do not hurt us! See a wizard, run away. Live to see another day,” one of the people stated, and squatted down. He turned his back toward Eris.

  The other fell to the floor and quivered.

  Eris saw that the compartment doors, which lined the side corridor, like the bulkhead door and the pressure door, had not opened for those raggedly dressed and strangely speaking people. Even with the man squatting right next to the pressure door, it did not open. Looking down near her, Eris saw two knifes, and a corpse of an animal. The animal had a barrel-shaped body with short head. In the dim light its reddish-brown fur looked dark, especially where the blood had poured from its sliced neck. Roughly a meter long, and weighing about forty kilograms, she knew what it was. Eris was not a biology specialist, but did recognize a capybara. She looked from the dead animal to the people.

  “Please great wizard, take our cavy! We will hunt another, or stick with eating the chickens and eggs.”

  “Yes, consider it an appeasement to you. We are of the Chicken People and consider it our honor to give a meat sacrifice to you. Only please spare our worthless and miserable lives,” the other, a male of indeterminate age, apologized and fell to his face in the fungal growth. “We repent of our wrongdoing. We have seen the error of crossing out of our ordained place in life. We will report to Dick and Fedders that we have made atonement. We will eat another time. Oh please, let us hunt elsewhere, please?”

  Both the man and woman were prostrate on their faces, barely looking up. The man was visibly shaking in fear.

  Eris considered what they were saying. Their speech was somewhat accented, but understandable. However, their attitudes and the implications of their words troubled Eris greatly.

  “This is your meal?” Eris said as she walked closer.

  The pressure door reacted to Eris presence as she neared it. It smoothly slid open, revealing another dimly lit corridor with fungal growth on the decks.

  “The wizard shows mercy!” the man cried out and springing up he darted down the newly exposed hall. “Every thanks to you, kind wizard. Show thanks in every way, get more mercy that way. Every thanks!”

  The woman looked up and her large, dark brown, eyes were inquiring as well as laced with a touch of curiosity. “The cavy is yours, but may I please take my knife? If you desire that, I fully understand. You may keep everything of mine. I own nothing, in your sight. Forgive me if I am impetuous, but I do not know how to hunt without my knife.”

  Eris glanced back over her shoulder at the dead animal and the two knifes. She then looked back to the woman who was still bowing down in the muck of the floor. “Please get up, and just answer a question or two.”

  “A wizard tests me?” The woman trembled a bit, but did stand up. She was somewhere in middle age, although through the dirt and filth it was very hard for Eris to tell much beyond that.

  “Not a test as much as just an inquiry. Will you answer some questions?”

  “Answer true, it is best for you,” the woman replied ritualistically.

  “What has happened here?” Eris spread her hands out to the sides.

  “What has happened?” The woman smiled a bit and revealed some broken teeth. “A great wizard has shown mercy to a pair of worthless Chicken People, all for the sake of a single cavy. You are gracious and merciful., oh kind wizard.”

  Eris huffed a bit, but then drew in a deep breath. “I am Eris, and I want to know what happened to our ship, but start by telling me your name and occupation.”

  “I am Peggy, of the Chicken People,” the woman replied.

  “Chicken People?” Eris asked, but then went on, “What has happened with all these plants in the corridors and decks?”

  “Mushrooms grow, they are food you know,” Peggy replied in a singsong manner.

  “And animals? Animals should be in the habitats, not roaming the mechanical aspects of the ship.” Eris was irritated by the rhyming of the answers, as well as the now adoring looking Peggy was giving her. “Are there animals all over the ship?”

  “Goats, rats, chickens, and cavies too, all are meat for me and you.” Peggy grinned. “I have learned the lessons. Dick and Fedders are our leaders….well expect for you, oh great and kind wizard.”

  “I am a Junior Engineer, not some mythological wizard,” Eris snapped. “But you are saying the decks have all this vegetation, and various animals wandering all over. What else is in the corridors and decks?”

  “A great and merciful, kind and benevolent, wizard of the fabulous order, Junior Engineer! That is
who is in the corridors on this remarkable day! I am so thankful to have met a wizard whose spirit has sympathy for worthless hunters such as me.” Peggy knelt down and bowed her head.

  “Oh, get up,” Eris said. “Groveling is disgusting.”

  “Absolutely, oh kindest one,” Peggy said and stood up straight.

  “So there are some people, you call them Chicken People, and all this gunk, foliage, and wild animals…” Eris paused. Her mind was trying to make order out of the chaos she was learning. She stepped to the side of the corridor as she thought. Automatically the compartment door in the wall opened. Beyond it was dark.

  “Monsters lurk in dark and gloom, do not open every room.” Fear now edged in on Peggy’s words. “But of course, you know best, kind wizard.”

  Eris reached the side of the door and pressed the spot which would manually shut the compartment door. A foul stench had come from it, and she had no desire to inspect a crew’s living quarters.

  “So does water seep from every air duct?” Eris asked. “Is there any place on the needle ship that has not been corrupted by the gunk and water?”

  “Down off the walls, the water flows. It gives life to all that grows.” Peggy smiled as she recited. She was much calmer when doing her rhyming.

  Eris stepped over, and Peggy shuddered, but did not move away. “I appreciate your help, but please try not to answer in rhyme. Is there any location on the Conestoga where this, foliage, this biological graft, is not present?”

  Peggy looked back at her. “No. I do not think so. The world is like this. The Burning Netherworld, the Graveyard of Dead Minds, the Floating Wastes, the Land of Bad Air, all those have the plants, water, and animals.” Peggy could see the disappointment on Eris face. She dropped to her knees. “I do not mean to offend or anger the great wizard. I just try to be honest, answer true, is best for you. Please forgive me!”

  Gently, Eris reached out and lifted Peggy’s fallen chin. When they made eye contact, Eris said, “Please just stand up. I will not hurt you.”

  “You are so gracious. Show thanks in every way, get more mercy that way.” Peggy looked down at the knives and the body of the cavy.

  “Yes, take your animal, and your utensils,” Eris said. “Tell your companion he should have stayed here and spoken to me.”

  “You will not curse him from afar will you? Lovac, he gets fearful of spirit-ghosts, monsters, and wizards. Yet he is a good husband, father, and friend to me. I need him, so if you can forgive his worthless self, it would be most appreciated. Please spare his life.” This time Peggy looked right at Eris. “Please show mercy.”

  “I will not do anything to hurt your friend, you say his name is Lovac?”

  “Yes, my husband Lovac. Thank you,” Peggy replied. “May I leave?”

  “Yes.”

  Peggy stepped over and picked up the knives, putting them into the slot on her leather belt, and then hoisting up the carcass of the cavy. Peggy was stronger than Eris had estimated. As she walked away, Peggy turned her head back and stated, “You ask about other places, and I know not of any without mushrooms, water, and food, but I only know of the Chicken People’s world. Perhaps the Fruit People, or even those Goat People would know of some other places? Their worlds are unknown to me, but I am sure a great and kind wizard like you, a member of Junior Engineers, already knows of those other peoples.” She then hustled away into the dimness of the corridors.

  “Now that was very strange,” Eris said to herself. “I must make sense of this chaos. The whole ship cannot be like this.”

  Eris walked back and headed toward where the funicular access door was located. She imagined the hallway as looking clean, smelling normal, and properly illuminated. She tried to block out the sounds of dripping water, and the pesky buzzing of insects. Even trying to distract and occupy her mind, she could not rid herself of mentally analyzing the conversation she had with the hunter Peggy. Eris tried different solutions to the Peggy enigma, but all were unsatisfactory. Peggy was not just a wanderer from one of the habitats. She was not a crewmember who had gone insane. Nor was Peggy some masquerade or trick.

  “Well, I will get real answers when I reach the Command Bridge,” Eris said as she stopped next to a wall where the label ESRC was barely showing through the water stains.

  Placing her hand against the wall, Eris watched as a blue light lit up beneath her hand. It spread along a straight line in the wall, outlining the lettering. Then there was a snap, a screech of metal, and the door to the Emergency Supply Resources Cabinet opened up.

  “Finally, some real tools,” Eris said with a grin as she surveyed the interior of the ESRC. She had feared that it too would have been ruined or ransacked by some devolved human, for that was how she was thinking of Peggy and Lovac, the only living people she had seen on the Conestoga.

  “A series 17 ESRC, very good!” Eris stated.

  Lights lit up and shined out from the interior. Eris shifted the emergency medical appendage away and locked it into a side cubby. She was thankful she was not injured, or in need of that surgical treatment device’s limited abilities. She briefly wondered if the hospitals and clinics were in any better condition than the repository and noted she had not seen any medical automacubes anywhere. All three shelves inside the ESRC were holding the standardly dispensed equipment. The lowest shelf was half taken up by the red firefighting hose. Eris waved her hand over that, and a small scroll of letters appeared in the permalloy, ‘Fire Retardant Full Charge’ blinked in yellow. She pulled her hand away and released the clasps for the vibration saw next to that. The saw was fully charged as well. Eris opened the storage compartment beneath the saw, and removed the folded duty belt. It was a basic model, black with yellow edges, loops, pockets, and pouches for basic tools. She strapped it around her thin waist, and cinched it up. She locked the vibration saw, with its different blades, into the belt’s holder, and then added the tools which were stored in various other compartments around the shelves. She took inventory of her newly acquired supplies: she had two lufi amalgam batteries, an adjustable multi-tool, bonding gel, a small lantern, impact hammer, and a miniature testing kit for evaluating energy loads. She examined each individual tool, and they were all in good working order, although a bit dusty.

  ‘I have no pouch big enough to carry the first aid kit, and I want to keep my hands free, Eris thought as she moved the green box off the center shelf, and placed it into the same compartment as the surgical arm.

  Seeing the cartons of suspended animation ‘Emergency Rations’ on the top shelf brought a wave of sickness to Eris. The same basic technology which preserved the foods in front of her, should have protected her parents and all the other people in the repository. Eris was about to slam shut the ESRC, when she realized she could not just respond out of fear and emotional pain. ‘I cannot let chaos rule’ she repeated in her mind.

  Instead of slamming the door, Eris set the stored food containers down on the floor. She kicked some of the fungal growth away to clear a spot, even though the food containers were intact and their contents could not be soiled by the growth medium, water, or the mushrooms. Returning to the now somewhat emptied ESRC, she folded up the shelves, and slid them into hidden recesses. That allowed her to open the back of the cabinet. Doing that revealed a backup control panel which was in perfect condition.

  “Finally, some working equipment,” Eris said as she glanced over the controls. It was fully powered and on the top display was stenciled, ‘Level B Command Console: Authorized Users Only.’ There were three small display screens, a series of buttons, keypads, a nine-section color box, physical levers, and a yellow control knob. She placed her palm against the uppermost screen where she knew the interface was located.

  ‘Limited access’ flashed on that screen.

  Eris keyed in some command override codes. The screen blinked and flashed another message, ‘Unable to find lattice. Contact Machine Maintenance.’

  Eris pulled at her lip and considered. She t
hen entered the code for the ‘Captain Level Disaster Alert’ and pressed her palm against the screen. There was a swirling of colors on the screen and then it flashed in bold letters, ‘CAPTAIN LEVEL DISASTER ALERT IN PROGRESS’ in brilliant red.

  “Well, that says something,” Eris stated out loud. She keyed in another sequence.

  ‘Log unavailable.’

  Tapping another series of commands, Eris again pressed her palm to the display.

  ‘User recognized. Unable to process command.’

  She tried several other approaches into the nonphysicality, or the system matrix, or the general ship dynamics, but each time she received the same response, ‘User recognized. Unable to process command.’

  “I have to reconnoiter the area,” Eris said with irritation. “I finally find a functional console, and I still make little progress.” She offered up a prayer for help.

  Eris shut down that display and opened a smaller one. She knew this one did not connect to the Conestoga’s lattice of compeers, which from all she could ascertain was somehow disconnected in multiple places somewhere, which inhibited the console’s ability to interact in the nonphysicality. However, she thought that this local system should allow her to open up the surveillance systems so she could hear and see audio and visual signals from the apertures within the local knowledge node.