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

by John Thornton

  “What is that? Wind?” Eris stated as the flow of air from the opening of the doors rustled her hair. “That is a malfunction of the biome for sure.”

  “It is an equilibration of pressures,” Sandie replied. “With the teleportation orifice open, there is a gradient of pressures drawing air into the Goat Room where the receiving pad is, from this hanger bay, and from the biome via the cargo gangway.”

  Everyone entering mumbled thanks or other comments to Eris who stood by the now open pressure doors. The elderly and children proceeded in. The hanger bay had the shuttle NS-99 parked in one stall, but the main sight which drew everyone’s eyes was the already open orifice of the teleportation sending unit. It looked like a large rectangle outlined in white energy. Though that could be seen the dimly lit receiving pad on the needle ship.

  “Khin? We are going there?” Vesna asked.

  “Yes! Back home!” Khin cried out in joy. He laughed and laughed. He wanted to grab Vesna’s hand and race through, but knew the elderly and the children needed his help first.

  The horses and other animals looked at the teleportation sending unit with curious and mixed expressions. Toby was pulling a bit, and shaking his head against Monika who was leading him, but settled down as she stroked his nose and murmured soothing words.

  Old Bill pushed past everyone and just walked directly up and onto the sending unit’s grid. With a snort and a “brruuurr” he marched right into orifice. For a brief moment his body looked like it was elongated, with his front legs in the Goat Room, and his hindquarters in the hanger bay. Then the vision snapped and Old Bill was walking away from the receiving pad.

  “Get several hunters through there,” Jenna commanded. “Khin you know where we are going. Head in a secure that site!”

  “Happily!” Khin patted Vesna’s shoulder and together they ran through the orifice and ended up on the needle ship in orbit.

  Sandie announced through every speaker and display in the hanger bay, “Everything is safe. Please procced through. We do have a limited time for the orifice, but it should easily allow everyone to escape from here.”

  The crowd murmured, and then Jenna took command. “Children, help the elderly people get through, and everyone look out for each other. The animals will come last.” She said this as one of the tobianos chose that moment to defecate.

  As everyone moved through the teleporter, Jerome hugged Cammarry. “This is what we might have seen if we stayed back in Dome 17. An orderly evacuation to some safe destination.”

  Cammarry remembered that none of the people from Dome 17 would ever be seen again by Jerome or by her, but she smiled anyway. “Yes, I wish them all well, wherever they went. I only hope the needle ship is ready for us all.”

  The procession soon was nearly completed as the dogs followed the children, and the remaining horses all went single file through. The cow plodded along.

  Monika led the horse Toby past Jerome. “Thank you!” She winked at him with her uninjured eye.

  “Khin can make different cheeses,” Jerome commented. “I wonder what the Goat People will think of all these new kinds of animals?”

  “We will soon find out,” Cammarry said as she grabbed his arm. He turned back to look at her as Monika and the horse teleported away.

  Finally, only Jenna, Eris, Cammarry, and Jerome remained in the hanger bay.

  Eris had avoided speaking to directly to Jerome or Cammarry during the evacuation, but then said to them, “I am sorry I ran out like I did. You have done well getting these people here.”

  Cammarry replied, “I apologize for all the mistakes I have made. You have been through so much, and you got everything for this teleportation system built. You are indeed a true engineer! You rescued these people.”

  “It was a team effort, and we are just about done.” Jerome nodded to Jenna. “How long do you think Beta has left?” There was a knowing look in his eyes.

  “I have refrained from tapping the water,” Jenna said hesitantly. “Too many toxins, and too much death. Not long, I say. Not long.” A tear rolled down her face.

  “Then off we go,” Cammarry said and stepped toward the teleportation orifice.

  Eris held back. “I will be along shortly. I have one more errand to do.”

  “We will stay and help you,” Jerome offered.

  “No. This is something I can only do alone. Please go ahead. It will not take too long,” Eris said and stood to her full height. Meeting all three of the others with her eyes, they knew not to argue.

  “Blessings on you,” Jenna said as she hugged Eris. “And thank you.” Jenna tuned and ran through the orifice. From the other side she looked back and waved.

  Jerome and Cammarry took each other’s hand and walked up to the orifice. Just before stepping through, they turned back.

  “Go ahead!” Eris commanded. “I am linked in with Sandie, so no worries. I will be along shortly!”

  Jerome and Cammarry stepped out of Dardanella 135 and onto the needle ship.

  Eris walked smartly over to the control console. She pressed her hand against the interface surface. “Lord, let this be the right thing.” The green light flowed around her hand. She tapped in a command and looked up. The teleportation orifice winked off. The room was very quiet.

  “You used your Captain’s grade command override to shut off the power to the teleporter,” Sandie said with astonishment. “That closed the system. I am surprised by your actions.”

  “Yes. My errand will take me away from this location, and I do not want any threats to go through. Also, what I am going to do will take longer than you can keep this open. We will reopen it when I get back.” Thinking of all the people she had seen die in the suspended animation repository, Eris proclaimed. “Now I am going to get SB Cotard. That synthetic brain is coming with us.”

  18 last flight through beta

  “Eris? Jerome and Cammarry are screaming to know what happened to you,” Sandie stated. “I have informed them that physically you are not injured, but that you shut down the sending unit. I do not understand your motives. What should I tell them?”

  “I am not emotionally or mentally unstable, if that is what you are implying,” Eris replied. “I am going to get SB Cotard, and I will do it with or without your assistance.”

  “I apologize if I insulted you. I conjecture a low probability for success in walking back to the Special Care Unit. We have lost the links to SB Cotard, although the last report was that it was still functional and intact. The condition of the biome is of supreme concern. The size of the whirlpools and their observed rate of growth indicate that the roadway along the sea will not be passable for much longer,” Sandie answered.

  “I am not walking back there, that would be suicide. I am not suicidal,” Eris stated. “And just because we lost the link to SB Cotard does not mean it has been destroyed.”

  Sandie stated, “I am still uncertain of your plan.”

  “Watch and learn, my artificial friend. In my school there was an inscription over our main lecture hall. It read, ‘Scientists dream about doing great things. Engineers do them.’ I have never forgotten that. I am doing this.”

  She briskly walked back into the alcove where the smaller teleporter was sitting. Its disassembled parts neatly stacked in various places. She grabbed the spacesuit and its bubble helmet and carried them out to the hanger bay. Then she walked back into the alcove and pulled open several drawers and a cabinet. Taking the items from inside there she brought them back to the hanger bay.

  “The AFA-16,” Eris said as she quickly assembled the jet pack. It consisted of a round, saucer shaped disk with shoulder, groin, and waist belts. The disk was no wider than Eris’ back, and about twenty centimeters thick. One side of the desk had a thick insulation and padding layer, while the other side had a set of nozzles which Eris extended up, and then snapped into place. She tested the nozzles, and they rotated freely in a track all around the disk. “This is a backup system for inspection of the ceil
ing and sidewalls of the habitat. I am going to use it, as well as the spacesuit to fly to the Special Care Unit.”

  Eris then made sure the AFA-16 jet pack had a full load of fuel, and that the straps and harness were long enough to extend around the spacesuit. Satisfied that that would work, Eris walked back into the alcove. She pulled open an ESRC which was in the corner. Digging through all the supplies and items inside there, she found the small compartment at the bottom of the first aid kit. Opening that she pulled out the folded flat inflatable stretcher.

  “This is how I will bring back SB Cotard’s central memory core,” Eris explained and laid the uninflated stretcher next to her pile of equipment. “All I need now are a set of gravity manipulation nullifiers. We use those to hold up shuttle engine parts or other machine parts for servicing. A basic set should easily offset the central memory core’s weight and mass. My basic tools will fit in the compartments on the spacesuit, so I will have everything I need.”

  Sandie quickly ran some conjectures, “Your plan has merit. However, the conditions in the biome are not favorable for flight. Air currents are unstable. There are indications of vast fires in the bow area, and the whirlpools in the stern sea. Those make for a great many unknowns about what you will experience, not to mention possible other gravity sink holes. Are you certain you want to attempt this?”

  A touch of anger swelled up, but then quickly subsided in Eris’ feelings. “Sandie, you are a friend to ask. Thank you. If there had been a functional synthetic brain in my suspended animation repository, my parents may not have died. SB Cotard is the only AI or SB we have found which is designed for medical care. I must rescue it to save anyone else who is still in suspended animation. Who knows how many people are waiting in cocoons in various places on the Conestoga?”

  Sandie replied, “As I said, your plan has merit. Through the nonphysicality, may I connect into the spacesuit’s communication links to offer my assistance? SB Pinaka has made a connection like that possible.”

  “Your help would be appreciated.”

  Eris pulled on the spacesuit, leaving the bubble helmet off for now. She adjusted all the environmental controls, and the suit parts locked and sealed into place. She could feel the interior of the suit pressing gently against her muscles. Then she strapped on the AFA-16 jetpack. She stepped though leg straps and bucked it together in front of her. Wrapping the control cords around her suited arm, she placed the control mechanism over her gloved left hand. It snapped around her palm allowing her to access the toggle switches as well as the pivot. That kind of application was much bulkier than it was designed for, by being over the spacesuit’s glove, but with a few adjustments it worked. Testing the controls, without firing the jets, she saw the nozzles on her back were rotating in response to what her fingers did.

  “That is an ingenious combination of technology,” Sandie stated with admiration. “The jetpack will allow you flight capability, while the spacesuit has the gravity nullifiers to give you a zero gravity bubble two meters in diameter.”

  “Yes, but that sphere is not big enough for the central memory core, so I will bring the inflatable stretcher. I load the physical part of SB Cotard into the stretcher, inflate it, attach the portable gravity nullifiers, and I should be able to fly it all back here easily. Or at least to the gangway. From there I can walk back here. Then we reopen the teleportation sending pad and I go to the needle ship,” Eris outlined while she attached the devices to the straps of the jetpack.

  “Final step, bubble helmet,” Eris said and placed in on. She snapped the rings around the neck and checked the air supply. Everything was working as she expected. Eris prayed that it would all continue to function. “Sandie? Can you hear me?”

  “Yes. The links and couplings are connected. These are not as secure as the previous com-links, but it is the best we can do,” Sandie answered. “My processing ability is vastly superior to the synthetic brains, so, if it is acceptable to you I will serve as intermediary. May I also display your progress to the people on the needle ship?”

  “No. This is my mission, so no spectators,” Eris said. “I am no hero, but I do not mind you serving as intermediary. I am heading out.”

  “Understood. Jerome is angry, and Cammarry wants to be first to know your story, but they will have to wait,” Sandie answered. “Jerome also insisted I tell you, ‘Your mission is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and you do it all with passion, compassion, humor, and classy style.’” Sandie paused for a moment. “As is often the case with Jerome, his recitation is not as historically accurate as he believes it to be, but his intentions are good.”

  Eris smiled inside the bubble helmet and began jogging away. She passed through the pressure and bulkhead doors and into the gangway. Going past the corner, she then skirted by the wagons which had been left behind. As she continued on down the gangway she encountered the sheep who had dropped dead. She hoped that was not an omen, and prayed for safety and success in her endeavor.

  Reaching the end of the gangway, she caught her first direct sight of the whirlpool which was devouring the sea and now had started ripping rocks and shoreline away in front of the ruins of the town of Quady. The power and magnitude of the whirlpool surprised her. Its growing maw was frightfully gaping. In her mind she saw the decks beneath the sea and wondered how much force they could withstand before the hull of the habitat itself was breached.

  “Here I go!” Eris flicked on the gravity nullifiers in the spacesuit. She immediately felt the loss of weight. Then with a small movement of her finger the jet on her back came on. She rocketed upward at a speed greater than she expected. She backed off the finger control, and understood it was quite sensitive. Then it occurred to her that by using the spacesuit’s gloves, she lost much of the subtly and dexterity the jet pack’s system had been designed for. She remembered any tools designed for use by people in spacesuits had oversized controls. Yet the jetpack’s systems had been made for fingertip precision. So she made minute movements with her fingers, and the jetpack responded.

  “I must be especially careful,” Eris said. Looking down at Quady, she saw every building was in a shambles. Sections of the forest around the town were ripped to shreds as if some giant scythe had mowed down the trees. The road leading in from either side was cracked and blistered looking, even from the height she had reached.

  With a minor and carefully implemented adjustment, Eris altered the course of her flight and tipped her body forward slightly. The nozzles on her back propelled her along. Soon she was out over the sea, and the huge whirlpool was just ahead of her.

  “Eris, it is not absolute, but there are indications that the gravity sink holes may be columnar in configuration,” Sandie stated. “I suggest making a wide passage around the whirlpool.”

  “Already thinking that,” Eris replied. Her heart was racing, as she was now feeling the air currents striking her spacesuit as they were getting drawn into the vortex above the watery whirlpool. The gray color of the sea was perturbed by the two whirlpools, the one which had swallowed the village on the side of the habitat was not a large as the one eating up the coastline in front of Quady. Curiously, the two whirlpools were spinning in different directions. Eris did some mental calculations, but could not account for that fact. She knew she needed to avoid being over either of them. And so onward she flew.

  Glancing up, Eris saw smoke and haze that was accumulating around the apex of the habitat. It stretched out all along the sky tube. The light was flickering and inconsistent. Eris wondered if it was just the smoke blocking some of the light, or if the sky tube was also beginning to malfunction. What had been a beautiful, living, growing, and dynamic biome was now something much different. Everything looked broken, faulty, or like it was under immense stress.

  Onward she flew using the sky tube as a reference. She headed straight bow-ward. Midway across the sea, she was struck by high speed water drops. Rain was coming down, but at a steep angle heading for the closest whirlpool. Eris
toppled over from the force of the unexpected shower, but corrected her flight and then continued onward. She knew rain should only fall over the entire habitat, on a schedule, but again, something was broken. Looking back and up, she adjusted the magnification on the bubble helmet’s face plate and traced the rain flow to the very ceiling. Some of the weather spigots were fractured and there were fissures across that part of the ceiling. Eris looked away, and changed the magnifying section back to normal.

  From her altitude, the Special Care Unit, on its hill, surrounded by what should have been sculptured and manicured lawns, gardens, and a park, looked more like a scene from history records of the Great Event, or the 90 Hour War, or some lessor war in the long history of humanity killing itself. The complex was scarred, crumbled, and scotched. The river next to it had such a low water level, it was no longer flowing at all. There were long oily streaks in its stagnant pools, as well as numerous slabs of debris jutting up from what had been the riverbed. It was now just the shattered remnants of the channel where the life giving flow and movement of an essential element had happened. Like a dead and rotting cadaver, the riverbed glared up as Eris overflew it to reach the Special Care Unit.