by Alan Black
Sno said, “Three. Okay, college boy, how big is the feed chamber from garage door to back bulkhead, sixty maybe sixty-five feet, right? Add onto that, twenty to thirty feet from Nod’s ass to the rock face. Suppose you break off a chuck of rock that weighs six hundred pounds earth standard. Remember, when you break it off, it is going to fall down past you. What kind of damage will a six hundred pound rock do against the back wall of Nod’s feed chamber from a ninety foot fall into a gravity flume at three times your Earth’s gravity?”
Doc hesitated, “Well, I would have to do the math, but we have to calculate the inertia and mass-”
Lee interrupted. “We don’t have to calculate squat. We are going to start damaging our ride home pretty quick if we start throwing big rocks. I see that part. But, I don’t relish the idea of hanging upside down for four or five hours.”
Sno looked over at the short earther; then she rolled her eyes upward and said in her best grumpy voice, “Honest, your Honor, it was self defense. The ignorance was contagious.”
Sounds of smothered laughter came over the comms.
“Think, would you?” Sno said, “You set your own EVA suits to whatever gravity you feel is comfortable. You will feel like you are working right side up. The loose rocks will look like they are falling up. Keep you suit’s boots set to stick to the surface. Everyone must, and I repeat, must keep themselves attached to a well grounded tether or you may fall down into your own rock pit.”
Chapter 14.1
“No. No.” Lee shouted. “Oh, my…what are you doing?”
Sno shrugged. “You said it was my turn to fix lunch.”
Lee shivered until his whole belly shook. “You are supposed to cook lunch. Tossing a box of something into the microware is not cooking. That is just reheating.”
Sno replied, “Yeah, well, it is either this or we send out for pizza, because if it doesn’t come in a box with ‘reheating’ instructions, then I don’t know what to do with it.”
“Amazing grace, girl, didn’t anybody teach you to cook? At least, someone should have taught you about food values.”
“Why should anyone teach me to cook? No one has starved around me yet. Besides, the nutritional values are on the side of the box. And don’t tell me you care about eating healthy, mister jelly belly.”
Lee poked himself with a stiff finger in his ample belly. “This is flavor. Someone should have taught you to cook because food has more value than nutrition and eating is more important to the human soul than just keeping the body’s fires stoked.”
Sno said, “I see that. I know bonding over a meal. It’s a ‘breaking bread together’ thing; like sharing a beer. But that is eating; this is cooking.”
“True,” Lee said. “However, the amount of effort you put into cooking amplifies the bonding result of the dining experience. It has an affect on your attitude to your companions. If the effort you expend is no more than a quick moment with no real thought, then you, as the hostess, have not and will not give any great thought to your guest.
“Besides,” he continued, “I am not sure I trust your microwaving skills. I don’t think I would even try anything called mandarin orange squid. I don’t think we have anything like that in our pantry and I am not sure I want to find out.”
“It wasn’t that bad-”
Lee interrupted, “Doesn’t matter. First, let me introduce you to this piece of equipment. It is called a stove…”
Chapter 14.2
“No. No. No.” Sno shouted across the engine room. “Marlon, freeze! What are you doing?”
Jackson shrugged. “Just getting ready to hit the transmit button on the transmission chamber to send this load to the warehouse. See, I just set the chambers grav-stat back to zero gravity like you told us.”
“That is good, Marlon. Where is Allan?” Sno knew Lee was still outside the ship.
Jackson looked puzzled. “He is outside. See the garage door light indicator. He just shut and locked the door from the outside. We have a full chamber, so we send it right?”
Sno shook her head, “We have been chewing rocks for four days now. This is our twelfth chamber. You should remember to check the location of every crew member before you hit the button. Allan won’t survive a transmission to Ceres.”
Jackson said, “Yeah, but he just shut the door right? So, I know where he is, why ask him?”
“Right,” she said. “But if he hit the door closed button and you hit the grav-stat at about the same time, he could have been drawn off balance and fallen into the chamber, with the door closing behind him. If you can’t see your partner, then you don’t know where he is. Call him.”
Chapter 14.3
“No. No. No. No.” Lee shouted. “You may be wheels on fire in a mining camp or the bridge of a ship, but you are all thumbs in here. First you put the thread through the needle and then re-set the bobbin…”
Chapter 14.4
“No. No. No. No. And above all, no.” Sno shouted through the comms in frustration. “This rock is shrinking fast as we chew through it. If you blast where you marked, then you risk fracturing the whole thing and sending the pieces spinning off on who knows what trajectory.
“We can’t work this way with repulsar fields on because of the contact by the nets between the asteroid and the ships. Shattering this rock might spin off chunks big enough to hole the hull.
“We can’t bust it up completely until our nets can connect…”
Chapter 14.5
“No,” Cooper said. The fat man had slipped aboard the Winkin since everyone except Joey was on the asteroid. “Sit right where you are, boy.” He had even been able to make his way to the bridge of the ship without anyone realizing he was on board.
Cooper pointed a gun at the teenager sitting at the bridge controls. But the boy hadn’t been close to any of the ships functions. A zombie appeared on the screen and slashed viciously. The screen appeared to bleed and turned red with oozing letters reading ‘game over’.
Cooper chuckled; his fat double chin jiggled and said, “Sorry boy, I think you lost. This is the mining vessel the Winkin, right? And you are Joey?”
Joey nodded, anger and courage showing in his eyes. “How did you know my name? And how did you get in here? My Dad is coming right back and he is going to be mad-”
Cooper reached across and slapped Joey hard across the face sending him sprawling onto the deck. “Shut up, Joey. It is easy enough to figure out who is who with the eight of you chatting over the comm units like you’re in an old ladies quilting bee chat room. But now it is time to shut up. Hunter, lock this ‘zoid into a closet somewhere.”
Joey shouted, “I’m not a tard-o-zoid. I’m not. And you shouldn’t be here.”
Cooper patted his round belly and said calmly, “No, I shouldn’t be here. I should have been born rich instead of handsome. I should be on a beach in the Caribbean. But I ain’t. Do you want me to smack you across the mouth again?” Without waiting for an answer, he reached down and slapped the boy across the face.
Joey shriveled up, all courage gone.
Cooper nodded. “Okay, Hunter, get him out of here. If I see or hear him again I will beat him until he can’t stand up ever again. And then you’re next, got me?”
Without further thought to Joey or Hunter, Cooper turned back to the bridge. With a flick of a finger he shut off the flashing light that showed the approach of their ship. No alarm had sounded on the Winkin, just the flashing light.
The four men had approached the asteroid at an oblique angle and a slow speed so it wouldn’t set off any alarms. The ship had not appeared to be a collision danger. With all of the exterior running lights off and at the edge of human visual range, it would have appeared to be a slow moving rock.
They had gotten close enough Cooper and Hunter had been able to get into their space suits and jet across to the Winkin. The repulsar fields were off since the crews of the Nod, Blinkin and Winkin were in an active mining state, allowing Cooper and Hunter to enter t
hrough the first unlocked hatch on the side of the ship away from the asteroid.
“Well,” Cooper muttered to himself, “that was a hell of a lot easier than I thought. Guess I had best go around and lock all of the doors behind me. Then it would be time to see what is in the kitchen cabinets.”
Chapter 15.0
McNally nodded to Franklin. “You okay? We got the signal from Cooper. He has the Winkin locked down tight.”
Franklin nodded back, “Almost okay. We’ve got a remote patch into the Nod’s computer. Those idiots left their comms open with a dozen links scattered about between them. I was able to patch into one of the gaming links they left open. It was that ‘Zombies In Space’. Cool game, but child’s play to hack into an external link. From there I just toggled over into their command network. With Cooper on the Winkin giving us open access it was easy-peasy, Mac. Without Cooper and Hunter over there this might not have worked. As it is I am able to use the same Zombies patch to get into the Blinkin’s command net; almost ready…there. Nope. Ah, got it now.”
McNally said, “Shut down the Nod; lock it up tight. Don’t do anything on the Blinkin yet. We have been lucky so far, but let’s not tip our hand too soon.”
Franklin smiled and ran his fingers through the non-existent hair on his bald head. “The Nod is already done. No one will get in that ship and since there wasn’t anybody inside, then no one is getting out either. I left the repulsar field off and all external signals are still showing normal. No one’s gonna know we have command of that ship unless they try to open a door and find themselves locked out. You sure we don’t need to strip anything out of it before getting rid of it?”
McNally shook his head, “No. Not even with the way that fat jerk Cooper can eat. We can salvage the consumables we want from the other two ships. Three ships counting the Sedona, except there wasn’t much to take from Whyte’s ship except this sweet little beauty.” He patted the shotgun he was cradling in his arms. “Come on, man! If we tried to salvage everything off all four of these ships we wouldn’t have room to move around. We would have so much food we could be out here for years and I don’t plan on being out here that long.”
Franklin said, “Yeah, I know. We talked about it plenty. No reason to keep the extra ships. We’ve got nowhere to fence them and there aren’t enough of us to pilot them if we did know of any decent chop shops. Plus, it would take more effort to collect the extra consumables off all of them than it is worth. Besides, how much food and air are the four of us going to need, even if we are working mining shifts instead of zipping along through space doing nothing. Oops, maybe I mean four and a half what with bringing Whyte along for entertainment. She only needs half rations, since all of her work will be on her back.”
“That would be three and a half of us.” McNally said.
“Three?”
“Yeah, what good is Hunter? The man whines like a mosquito on crack. His only value has been for the entertainment, but with Whyte along, what do we need him for? Eighty-six him just like the others.”
“Huuhnmm? Well, okay! Why not? He really is a waste of air anyway and can’t give a decent blowie to save his life.” Franklin snickered, “I guess he really couldn’t to save his life.”
McNally nodded, “I ain’t gay anyway. I’ll take a woman over a dude if there is one available no matter how good it is, or in Hunter’s case, how good he isn’t.”
Franklin pointed at the command console. “We got full control of the Nod and the Blinkin. I got the Nod on remote with a lazy course laid in to send it below the ecliptic and arcing toward the sun. All of the external signals are ready to go silent. To find that ship someone will literally have to be looking out the window and see it fly by. It might take a few hundred years to hit the sun, but it will be gone for good. I got it set to go on a command codeword that we can send from the Blinkin.”
“I guess we have been just about as sneaky as we are going to get away with. Park us somewhere we can find the ship after we take over the Blinkin.
“Do we need to keep this ship once we have that one?”
McNally looked sideways, “Are you nuts? This ship is more than four times the size of that puny little thing there. We have more equipment, more rooms and more of everything.”
Franklin laughed, “Yeah, but haven’t you heard that size isn’t everything?”
McNally snorted, “That is what your girlfriend told you, is it? Well, she lied; guess she didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
Franklin said, “We’re parked. They shouldn’t see us as we jet across. They might see us if they are looking for us, but so far they don’t have a clue that we are here. Ready to jet?”
The two men ran through the corridor, their excitement building. They had both worn EVA suits and both had been outside of the hull, but this was the first time they would use the jetpacks and leave the solid safety of the hull. Neither man would admit to the other they were nervous, but both were sure the rewards were well worth the risks.
McNally slid into place next to the giant space suit in the personnel ready room. He pumped a shell into the shotgun chamber and squeezed the shotgun, more for reassurance that any necessary action. He didn’t want to admit to anyone, much less Franklin and Cooper, but this part of his plan made him nervous. Even after having worked in space environments for half a dozen years, jumping off a solid surface into open space just did not feel right. He slid the shotgun into an open compartment in the suit’s leg.
Neither he nor Franklin connected any of the suit contacts or the plumbing. They knew they weren’t going to be in them very long and they needed to get to the Blinkin’s bridge as fast as possible. They had all agreed they should have good control of all three ships at that point, but there really was only three against eight of them, counting the boy. Eight people made just too many variables to trust until they could be sure they were firmly in control of all three ships.
He stroked the suit’s leg compartment that held the shotgun. The suit had the feel of solid comfort. He sealed the suit’s face plate and looked up at Franklin.
Franklin nodded back. “Let’s do this. We are locked in tight. We have their ships on bridge lock out and we have the only password. I am right behind you as soon as I send the password across. It will lock down their open hatches and only let us in. We have a different password to send the Nod on it’s journey.”
Once they were sealed in the airlock, McNally yanked open the outer hatch, not realizing he had taken in a lungful of air and held his breath. He experienced a brief flash of panic as a gust of air tugged at his suit, but it stopped quickly as a remnant of air escaped.
McNally stepped onto the hull and jumped toward the asteroid. He felt open to space and he felt his bowels loosen. Tightening his mind and his sphincter muscles, he triggered the suit jetpack and shot forward to the Blinkin.
They had been careful to time their attack when all seven of the adults were outside on the asteroid surface, but McNally was not going to waste a good plan just because someone had quit work early and was back on board. Once on board the Blinkin he unsuited as quickly as he could. He was almost out of the suit by the time Franklin was finished locking down the outer hatch.
McNally swept the business end of the shotgun around and followed the shotgun muzzle into the ship. Even from here he could hear the miner’s voices coming from the open comm on the bridge. No one was answering, so he was sure no one was on board. Still, he pointed the shotgun into every room, nook and cranny from the engine room to the bridge.
When he finally reached the bridge, the voices coming over the comm had progressed from questioning to concern and were bordering on panic.
McNally pressed the all comm button and said, “We are experiencing some minor communications difficulties, please bear with us for a moment. Please remain where you are and everything will be just fine.” He snapped off the open comm, pressed the one-to-one button and punched in Franklin’s code. “You just about ready?”
&nb
sp; Franklin’s voice came from right behind him. “Right here, Mac.”
Startled, McNally swung around, pointing the shotgun at Franklin’s face.”
Franklin slid to a halt and raised his hands, “Whoa, dude. It’s just me.”
McNally lowered the weapon quickly, “Man! Don’t sneak up on me like that. You scared the pee-waddling out of me.”
“Sorry, I thought you heard me coming. No big deal, this isn’t the first time I did something stupid that might have gotten me killed, but I am still here. Let’s move on, shall we?”
McNally nodded, “Yeah, sorry and all of that. Do your thing with the Nod.”
Franklin sat in the captain’s chair, leaned over the console, punched in a code and hit a button. He sat back and looked at McNally.
McNally said, “What?”
Franklin replied, “What do you mean ‘what?’. That’s it. The Nod has blasted away into space. If anyone was in it or on it, they are going for a long ride with no way back. And if anyone was near those nets, they had real problems when those nets snapped loose. I don’t know how an EVA suit stands up to a cable snapping free, but I doubt if it is pretty. We might not have to personally waste some of these screw ups; the Nod may have just done it for us.”
Chapter 16.0
Sno had not seen the Queene Mining ship approach, or the two men jetting across from it to the Blinkin. She had been focusing on shaping a blasting charge to the exact dimensions necessary to crack loose an avalanche of rocks to drop into the Blinkin’s open rock chamber. Her first indication there was a problem was when she felt blast vibrations through her suit’s contact with the asteroid.
“Who is blasting without giving warning?” she asked calmly over the communication net. She had reviewed procedures with all of the Earth miners until she was getting hoarse from all of the talking. It did not seem to be sinking in, but something as important as announcing an explosion should have been self evident.
There was a flurry of “No.”, “Nope.” and “Not me.”
