Irons felt the shudder and looked up. Shudders aren't supposed to happen in a starship, and especially not in one in hyper. That was a sign of a bad thing.
“Turbulence?”
“I locked the emitters down, we're smooth as a baby's, well, you know,” Ciera Dawn said, looking decidedly put out.
“No, that was something else. Inside,” the captain said sitting up. “Report...” As he spoke alarms began to howl. “Shut that off!” he growled.
“Reports coming in from the boat bay, accident, something about the shuttle and a plasma conduit!”
“Crap,” Irons said, feeling the blood flow away from his face. A hull breach in hyper was bad. Very bad. If it did the wrong kind of damage or if things got out of control it could spell the end of the ship.
“Damage control is on it. The shuttle's been locked down now. We've got fires in several compartments, DCC says they are on it. We've lost control runs in that area as well.”
“What the hell happened?” the captain demanded.
“I think we should find out,” Irons said grimly. “But I can guess. I was supposed to be in there right about now.”
“Captain, DCC reports casualties and at least one fatality,” the communication's tech said looking drawn. Irons jaw tightened as he noted the captain's hands clench until his knuckles were white.
“It's crewman Dallas. He... he....” the pale kid looked suddenly confused and small.
“He's dead. All right. Tell them I want a report on the damage ASAP. Ed...” the captain looked up to the security chief. “Ed we're going to need an investigation. See what you can get but don't step on any toes down there.”
“On it,” Chambers growled, heading for the hatch. “You coming Admiral?” he asked.
“Yeah, thought you'd never ask.”
In the lift he closed his eyes briefly. He didn't remember a lot about Dallas, he was an annoying man, lazy, one of the spades set and had a tendency to shoot his mouth off. He'd been one of his suspects. Now it looked like he was ruled out, unless he'd accidentally set off something he'd been putting in for Irons...
“Sprite?” he asked after a moment.
“Security and electronics are out for most of that deck Admiral, chief,” Sprite said from the overhead. “And before you ask, I didn't get anything. The buffers for the cameras were with them physically and were cooked off when the plasma conduit went off.”
“The same attack as before?”
“No, this time it came from the shuttle and a grav plate.”
“Oh?”
“DCC found something suspicious and you'll know more when you get there. I don't want to spoil the surprise.”
“Sprite...” he said tiredly. Chambers gave him a look. He stopped just as the lift stopped.
“Off you go. The lift can't go to the next deck, it's sealed. You'll have to go to the escape ladder and climb down.”
“Okay,” Irons said as the hatch opened. They were met with a barrage of nervous people shouting questions. “We'll know more when we get there, now move!” Irons said, shouldering his way through the crowd. Chambers followed in his wake.
In the boat bay he grimaced at the damage. It was bad, paneling was scorched, he looked up, ceiling tiles were missing, dangling, or shredded. Wiring and plumbing were dangling. Some of the plumbing leaks were still being brought under control, workers were moving around sealing leaks. Hopefully none of the dangling wires were still live.
He glanced at the shuttle. It had shifted position, rolled on it's side against the bulkhead. There was a massive dent in the armored wall. He could see the damage extending up the wall. It looks like the shuttle bucked up and to the right, slamming it's top against the wall and then sliding down. What a mess.
His eyes found the black body bags and lingered there a moment. He counted three, one was a veraxin. Dallas and the others deserved better. Damn.
“What happened?” Chambers demanded of a woozy looking Harry. Irons turned to listen.
“I dunno. One minute we're looking things over and the next I'm flying through the air like something kicked me and there is this bright light. Must have hit my head 'cause the next thing I know alarms are going off and this one here's standing over me,” he pointed to the firefighter trying to hold his head still to keep the head wound from gushing. Her partner was spraying it with biofoam to seal it.
Proteus scanned the wreckage and then put up a tentative simulation of the incident. The AI played it back on his HUD, slow. From the look of it Harry had been lucky, he'd been in the back, not looking at the flashpoint. So far his story checked out.
“All right...” Chambers turned in place, puckering his lips, hands on his hips. “What the hell...”
“Chief Chambers over here,” Bailey called looking up. “You too Admiral, you'll want to see this,” he said, pointing at something in the decking.
Irons and Chambers picked their way through the flooring and personnel. “All right what am I looking at Chambers asked, hunkering down beside the chimp chief engineer.
“This,” Bailey said, lifting a melted grav plate. “This here's a battery and it's not supposed to be here. A one shot, but we found another in the shuttle. They're both toast,” he pointed to a melted block of composite materials with his finger.
“Don't touch it!” Chambers said. Bailey gave him a disgusted look as he eased the plate back down. “What ever you think you're going to get from it you're dreamin'. Fire cooked em off.”
“Why the plate?”
“You askin' me?” Bailey asked getting up and brushing his hands off. He adjusted his skin suit, grimacing at the gloves. He took them off and tucked them into his waist belt. “Well, let me see now...”
“For me,” Irons said grimacing. They both looked at him. “The grav plate was supposed to disrupt my shields and fix me in place while the plasma hit. Right chief?”
“I think so,” Bailey said, nodding slowly. “It looks like Harry caught the edge and got blown back as the others around it tried to compensate. Dallas and Gus weren't so lucky.”
“Ouch.”
“Bruno's in sickbay. Doc's not sure about him. Dieter picked up a piece in the face. It probably improved his looks if it didn’t' kill him.”
“Sorry to hear that,” Irons said. From the sound of it April would have company on their way back to Pyrax. The ship didn't carry a lot of stasis pods either. He'd have to check later. If things kept going this way he might have to replicate more. Chambers glanced over his shoulder to the shapeless bag. It was missing a head. He gulped, looking a little green.
“I'm not sure what the hell happened, but it's a doozy. Lucky the pilot was in the shuttle, he managed to do an emergency override and get it shut down. He's a bit knocked up though,” he indicated the knocked over shuttle.
“I'd imagine.”
“Did he set this off?” Chambers asked, getting himself under control.
“I doubt it. He said he wasn't even in his seat when all hell broke loose. If he hadn't crawled inside to the cockpit the pre-ignition would have kicked in and and the shuttle would have ricocheted around the bay or torn itself through the walls.”
“Out of the ship?” Chambers asked. He was pale now. He was fairly sure that a big enough breach would have doomed the ship.
“More likely through it. The hull has more layers of metal in the outer skin than the interior does.”
“Oh,” Chambers said looking wide eyed. “So this could have destroyed the ship.”
“Oh definitely. Who ever did this is insane, desperate, and stupid. We need to put them out of our misery before they get lucky.”
“You've got that right,” Irons growled.
“April, I'm recording this so you'll understand what I'm going to do. To tell you the truth, I don't know,” Irons said, resting his head against his arm as he leaned against the wall. “I really don't, that's the thing that sucks.” He clenched his fist and then sighed and turned back to the recorder.
He didn't need a recorder, his implants could have recorded everything but he'd gone with an external one anyway. Old habits die hard.
“I know you were trying to arrange to come with me beyond Triang. Hon, some things just weren't meant to be,” he paused, feeling remorse. “I didn't mean it the way that sounded,” he said, voice rough.
He waited a moment and then cleared his throat, getting his emotions under control once more. “I don't honestly know what the future will bring. My plan such as it is, is to find another system like Pyrax, set up shop there and dig into rebuilding. If it's close I'll send word to you and Logan so we can link up again.”
“I'm not holding my breath though, Pyrax was my number one because of the industrial presence and well, things worked out with Firefly and the others,” he grimaced, feeling a bit sheepish over covering ground they'd gone over many times before. “I need to replicate that, but finding a similar system with potential is going to be hard. A needle in a haystack. I need an El Dorado. From what I've heard Pyrax was the only orbital industrial system left in the sector. I'll hunt around though.”
“I've already ruled out New Dublin, the captain and majority of the Io 11's crew are from there and had very bad things to say about the political situation there. I'd be walking into a viper's nest worse than Pyrax. I'd spend most of my time watching my own back instead of getting to work helping people.”
He rolled his shoulders and then straightened. “I've arranged for your treatment to be covered by the Navy fund. You're going to wake up a new woman April, with a full rejuv and restore, antigen metafactors, and even civilian grade implants.” He smiled knowingly at the camera. He knew that would be very appealing to her female vanity. “I know you wanted them, now you've got them. Enjoy them hon. The first reporter to have implants. Use them well and wisely dear.”
“If the fates conspire to bring us together once more I'll cherish every moment with you. However don't hold a candle for me dear, we both know such things are, well, hard to arrange.” His lips twisted in a bitter smile.
“Enjoy your life love, live it to the fullest.” he stroked the camera field with his fingertips, blew her a kiss and then shut the recorder off. He waited a moment, feeling his emotions unravel and his body relax.
“Time to get to work.”
The captain smiled slightly as his crew shook down. This was their fourth break out, they were now veterans and had shaken down into a good team. He didn't have many faults. Right now the only thing bothering him was the saboteur. That had everyone on edge.
It had been an edgy, highly fraught couple of weeks, everyone was tense. Going into hyper had more than one person on edge. They hadn't breathed a sigh of relief for long though, the thought of what could happen in hyper was all to fresh on their minds after their first trip to Agnosta.
One more day, three shifts to go until break out. He could smell the fear in the air. They needed to get this situation under control now. He didn't want to take the ship into hyper again without the bastard still in play. Ed had yet to come up with a suspect and was incredibly frustrated.
Hopefully something would break soon. He glanced at the chrono counting down. Everything was coming to a head now, they were about to exit into Triang space, their last stop before their return journey. Irons was getting off here, he'd made that perfectly clear. So whoever was trying to kill him would have to come out into the open soon.
One week, one short week in hyper. He'd wished this transit had been the first in their journey, it was the shortest. It was strange that Briev was so close to Triang. Normal hops lasted nearly a month. This, this was nothing.
The music he had been idly listening to dropped in volume. He looked up, knowing Sprite had something on her mind or something to report.
“Admiral, a thought. I was thinking about each occupied system we go to. Maybe we should create a care package. Sort of a good will gesture,” Sprite said.
“Oh?” Irons asked setting the stylus he had been playing with down. They'd thought of this before in Agnosta but other things had taken precedence and he'd forgotten about it. Now it seemed either Sprite wanted to revisit the subject or wanted to distract him. Or it could be both.
They had worked on a basic pack, but it was just that basic. He'd tried to tailor it to each planet's needs but had eventually given it up to work on his other project. When Destiny returned to Agnosta it wouldn't return empty handed. There were over five hundred tons of cargo he'd made sitting in two of her holds. If he could he'd grab a handful of asteroids in Triang space and use them as well.
Some of the parts were for Destiny. Bailey had sicked Harry on him, asking him to make parts that the ship couldn't make on it's own without his keys. He'd grudgingly taken the time to do it but had insisted he receive compensation in the future. They weren't sure what he wanted but they would find out soon enough.
He could trust Bailey with the cargo. Bailey and a few others. Ferguson he wasn't sure about. Mayfair would probably try to seize the cargo if she could, which would put Ferguson in a pickle. He'd have to take steps to prevent that from happening.
“Yes. I could make a list. For instance, a copy of the Encyclopedia Galactica.”
He nodded. “Which we gave to each of the colonies we've visited so far. Including those when we were on the Io. Also copies of basic medical texts,” he said with a shrug.
“Also your holo instruction vids. I could squash them down to 2D for viewing on a tablet. Even strip the audio and convert it to text for that matter. Grab some stills for pics for an E-book.”
“Which we did on Io a time or two. It is an educational boost. Also the medical library we've got.”
“Which you mentioned handing out before.”
“Correct.”
“And we can then create two package types. One for a space colony, one for a planet,” Sprite replied getting into the idea and sounding more enthused. “Maybe solar blankets, ration packs, and a portable food replicator?”
“And other things. Provided we have the raw materials and energy to produce them,” Irons nodded. “A micro fusion or fission reactor comes to mind. Or a gas giant refinery.”
“And the plans as well Admiral. Copies of manuals, blue prints, the works. Unclassified stuff of course.”
“You are really getting into this Johnny Appleseed idea aren't you?” Irons asked amused.
“Let's just say it grew on me,” Sprite replied.
“Cute. Okay. We've got a boring two weeks crossing this system. It's empty, no rocky bodies in it to get anything from. So we'd better stick to the light list for Triang.” They had made good on their escape but Destiny had only enough fuel to get to Triang. Hopefully they could pick some up there. Otherwise the crew would be stranded in the system. At least until he whipped up a gas giant refinery and put it to use, he thought with amusement.
“The data will make an impact. That is if we distribute it widely enough,” Sprite replied. “Which calls for hard copy, tablets, and projectors.”
“Basic tool kits,” Proteus added. “Since you are recommending data as the primary gift item I would also suggest data on history and engineering concepts as well.”
“Unusual to hear that come from you,” Sprite said.
“You overlooked it,” Proteus replied.
“I didn't overlook it, I just hadn't got that far down the list,” Sprite replied.
“Kids,” Irons replied with a patient sigh. “Okay. Data is the biggest thing. And the means to access and distribute it. Medical supplies, food, tools...”
“No weapons or classified materials,” Defender interjected.
“Obviously,” Sprite answered dryly.
“Agreed,” Irons said with a nod. “But I am going to throw in portable fusion power supplies and replicators with those I trust. They will need it and it will make a localized impact. If they attempt to abuse the trust they will lock down or self destruct.”
“Agreed,” Defender replied curtly.
“His
tory... we can also give them a copy of current events. From our perspective.”
“Don't play press agent,” Irons replied with some heat.
“I wouldn't dream of it Admiral,” Sprite sighed. “But we can give them a log of where you've been, descriptions of other worlds, and events that transpired. That will give them an interest beyond their colony and get some parties interested in building trade and social connections.”
Irons rubbed his chin and drummed his fingers on the desk. “Keep it clean and impersonal. Downplay the events in Pyrax if possible. And don't...” He held up a finger. “Don't have anything classified. Minimize the events in Pyrax, as short as possible. Keep the Navy plans and ships as vague as possible.”
“You said that already Admiral.”
“I mean the pirate attack. They jumped in they got their butts kicked. No tactics, no ship descriptions. Just that the fleet and marines were reborn in Pyrax.”
“Oh.”
“You could leave bread crumbs for the Navy as well Admiral. Dead drops,” Defender replied.
“Encrypted?” Sprite asked.
“Of course. We could leave them with the colony or in a message module in orbit where a passing fleet vessel could access it. Any other ship would activate a self destruct.”
“I did that. In the satellites I gave Agnosta.”
“Which gives you a means to do it again. In other systems,” Sprite replied. “I see what Defender is doing. We can give them a log, and pass on orders. Maybe give them reports on suspected activity, or potential sites for bases.”
“If that fell into enemy hands...” Irons replied.
“Hence the encryption and self destruct if someone unauthorized attempts access to it. But we can add a layer on top of it as camouflage. Or embed it into every communication and data system you build. An IFF module that when a fleet ID trips it it dumps a copy to the user.”
“Which is an interesting idea, but we've got a problem. The pirates have a copy of fleet IDs as well,” Irons replied.
“But we modified the ID tags in Pyrax,” Defender replied.
Destiny's Choice (The Wandering Engineer) Page 46
