CHAPTER FOUR
Orbital Aid 370
There came what must have been a final transition warning, a mild beeping unlike the military klaxons to which they were accustomed, followed by deep vibration in the nearby equipment. The beeping, and then just a shudder and the familiar feel of entering transition, a cessation of external things—now no sense of weapons bearing on them or being fired in defense, in truth, little sign that the ship existed as lighting faded and fell to backups, and air systems sighed—and stopped. These were not good, or usual, conditions, for a ship in transition.
The wall-mounted comms were silent, not even yielding static. Chernak and Stost sat, strapped in, perhaps less patient now than worried, for they were pilots, and the ship was far too quiet around them.
They held for as long as they were able, but eventually even the patience of such pathfinders as they must break. Air was leaking, loudly, somewhere out in the corridor—yet the ship paid no heed, producing neither siren, nor hazard lights.
The scream of escaping air increased, and it was then that they released their straps and rose as one. There was no need to speak; their necessities were plain.
They commandeered the two work suits able to accommodate them, barely fitting, each dressing one-handed, for neither dared let go their prizes—the hard-won cases—helping each other with the seals.
That done, and still no word or warning from the ship, nor any crew, they stepped out into the hall, Chernak at the lead, heading for the bridge.
Gravity wavered; strange vibrations wandered fore and aft around the structure of the ship. The scream of escaping air was muted by the suit. Surely, Chernak thought, the ship was dead around them. There was nothing more for them to accomplish on this side of glory.
Save the orders, as yet unfulfilled.
Orders.
The orders had been given by Pathfinder Over Commander Jevto.
“Pathfinders, we have a mission from Third Corps Headquarters, specifically for you. You are to retrieve particular items, transport and preserve them, not merely from the Enemy, but from destruction. There are travel orders, here—cash and gems, there are passes…”
He’d handed over those things, stalked around the room, turned on them. The vingtai on his left cheek was overlong and corded—the weapons master who had blooded the new soldier’s grace blade had been careless, or making a point: it stood out now like a length of rope under the skin, as his jaw muscles worked for greater control.
The quivering stopped; the commander thrust his hands out, encompassing the dozen of them, not the eldest, nor the wisest, nor even the luckiest of all pathfinders in the corps. No, they were only the ones who had been at hand. They would have to do; there were no others.
“You are not fools. I will not tell you that you will ever see Headquarters again, or that you’ll long see familiar stars. It is essential that you be in space on the day and time identified in your orders…and in transition.
“Your duty in this war now is to survive and to outlive it, for our defense will soon fail here. You will survive, and you will become the Troop where you…arrive, pledging your services to established civilian authorities, if any can be found. If there are such with Troops already attached, those you will choose. They will need your skills, I have no doubt.
“Absolutely you must be in space, shipboard, at the times indicated. This is the last duty Third Corps can perform in the service of life; our last strike against the Enemy. Survive to serve in what we are told will be a bold new universe.
“Follow your orders, Pathfinders.
“Now, go.”
* * * * *
It had been a ship, and a big one, many times larger than Bechimo. Theo raised a hand, calling for weapons—then curled her fingers tight: abort.
“Increase shielding,” she said aloud, eying the random debris traveling along the wreck’s transit path.
Damage…
Damage that included bent and shredded metal, whole sections of what looked like laminated hull-metal split and wrenched into unnatural shapes, as if half the ship had imploded and half had exploded. It spun on a twisted, limping axis, moving away from them. It was not at first obviously any kind of ship in particular, then the splintered stump of the spine and the cargo pod mounts came to the fore.
Theo blinked, suddenly seeing as Bechimo saw, the data from multiple sensors merging, turning the view of sundered metal fabric into a tunnel through the wreckage. Halls, walls, equipment trailed into the depths of the thing.
She blinked again, banishing that input. The view on the screens—the same view that the crew had—was horrific enough.
“Ought we…” Win Ton began, “match and search—” He cut his question short, having gotten his answer as Bechimo vibrated slightly—the impulse drives, that would be…
“Acceleration and rotation engaged,” Joyita announced. “Is there a point we particularly wish to inspect?”
“Survivors,” Theo said.
“Still outgassing, looks like,” Clarence said quietly, nodding toward what was likely the prow of the ship as it rotated by. “Look there—that’s not collision damage; they took fire!”
That was Clarence’s experience speaking, and now Theo could see it: that had been the crew compartment; the signs of targeting lay in trails of dents and shred-rimmed holes. And that section, blasted, looked to have been the lifeboat mounts, and no way to know if the boats had been gone by the time the ship was hit.
“I am receiving no distress signals, no life signs, nothing that scans as a functioning computer system,” Joyita said, his eyes downcast, as if he were tracking data on his own screens. “Perhaps it was abandoned and destroyed on purpose…”
He paused. Overlays were appearing on Clarence’s number two screen, showing foggy bright spots.
“Timonium,” Bechimo stated, “in a non-trivial quantity. Equipment and devices leeching energy from what appear to be leaking storage units. I see no signs of active weapon points. There is subetheric static; the devices are attempting to speak to each other, but the network is in fragments.”
Kara leaned forward, frowning at the image.
“There!” she said sharply, pointing. “There were letters or symbols there! What does it say?”
Bechimo and Joyita answered simultaneously, words over words.
“Unit Three Hundred Seventy,” said Joyita, “Orbital Services.”
“Orbital Three Seven Zero,” said Bechimo, “Service Unit.”
Theo snapped her gaze toward Joyita. He was smiling, perhaps even chuckling.
“Captain Theo,” he said with a nod, “we’re extrapolating. The symbology is old space, the craft damaged, pieces missing. We are recording, and we shall attempt to do a reconciliation.”
“And salvage?” Kara asked, adjusting sensors, taking measurements. “There’s so much of it, we ought to be able to…”
“Salvage at this location is out of the question,” Bechimo broke in. “We lack the crew and equipment required to properly assess the wreckage, and we cannot be locked to the task, unable to move at will. Also, we should not bring others to this balance point. And…”
He was talking too fast and giving too many reasons, Theo thought, and what she could hear through their bond was more chaotic still: a confusion of concerns, a chaos of possibilities. Yet even as he panicked on the human-interface level, he was, on a whole other level, calmly evaluating the mass and dimensions of the wreck, methodically searching for a clue to the proportions of the crossing point, and analyzing the tenor and touch of the Old Tech devices.
On yet a third level, he was overdriving the life sensors, and his scans found the escaping gasses of crew atmosphere, of propulsive units, as well as the likely remnants of incinerated plastics. He was judging the spread of the debris, estimating that no more than seven hours had elapsed, Orbital Unit time, since it had been destroyed.
“For safety, Kara, it is best that the flotsam continue along its course, undisturbed,” Bechimo continued aloud. “We must not touch it. We certainly must not search, board, nor deflect it. That is my suggestion, Captain. Avoid entanglement.”
Theo stared at the wreckage, wondering if it had been a battle, a piracy, or the actual end of a universe that had brought the ship to this. She shivered.
“Agreed; let it take its own course. We’ll record, and log.”
She took a deliberate breath, and tried to pitch her voice for brisk matter-of-factness: the same tone Kamele used to cool overanxious students.
“Clarence and Kara—it’s your off-shift.
“Win Ton and Joyita—please monitor the…debris. Look for recognizable markings, objects, or writings. Bechimo, please continue recording, as much and as deeply as you can. I’ll take flotsam watch.”
“Captain,” Clarence acknowledged. He locked his board and rose, waiting while Kara did the same.
“Captain,” she said, throwing one last look over her shoulder at the tangled wreckage that had, until very recently, been a ship.
Clarence touched her shoulder lightly. She took a breath, nodded. They left the bridge together.
Theo slid into her own chair and leaned forward to the board.
* * * * *
The passage beyond the undogged door was lit in pulsating red with the green glow of a fading emergency light tube providing a steadier light. The man who held the tube was leaning against the dogged door at the far end of the passage through a cylinder of stasis units. The red strobe was a warning light: the units were failing rapidly.
They hurried, this section having no obvious bends or dangers, Stost nearly overstepping Chernak’s lead. The light bearer raised his face at their approach, and Stost barely recognized the engineer who had brought them aboard. His face was battered behind the strap-on mask, his eyes holding no certain focus, his forward leg bloody and half bare in shredded uniform, his booted foot at an odd angle—sprained, broken, or worse.
He raised a hand against their motion toward him; their intention to assist—
“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t touch me.”
He flinched, as if speaking damaged him further; froze, and shrugged himself heavily into a seated position against the door.
They waited, Stost wondering if that deliberate change of position had killed the man—but no.
He breathed—rasping and haltingly, but he did breathe, trying his lungs into a harsh cough. Chernak’s hand twitched, and the engineer waved her back.
“No sense going on. They’re dead up there. The crew, all of them—bridge ripped open. Took a blast; shrapnel, too, I guess. Lifeboats are gone, cut loose or destroyed.”
He’d let the light fall; it rolled and lodged against the heel of his broken foot. For a long moment, he stared at his gloved palm, then raised the other hand and touched finger to palm, counting his points. “Passengers dead—they were all in commuter pods, dammed fools, couldn’t have lasted a long transition anyway! Comm—didn’t try—the bridge is ripped open.”
His breath rasped, voice sinking. Stost leaned forward to hear.
“Should have stayed in my cabin.”
That was a touch point, and the man seemed to draw energy from it. He raised his head and focused hard on them, breath rushed.
“Should have stayed with you; damn the luck…”
He moved then, fumbling at a shirt pocket, until he pulled out a medi-disc. Deliberately, he crushed it against his leg, sighing and closing his eyes. Another moment and he opened his eyes again, and sought them.
“But the transition?” Chernak asked. “The timing units?”
“Self-contained, in this section. The captain had a coord set, strange coords, trick coords. Shouldn’t have taken us beyond the cometary clouds…so they ought to time back soon. Surprised they got us anywhere at all.”
A buzzing came then, growing gradually louder. The engineer snatched an instrument from his belt, cursing weakly.
“Grab on,” he gasped. “Transition ends.”
Stost snatched a grab bar with one hand, Chernak’s arm with the other, as she braced herself against the wall.
It was a bad transition.
The sense of leaving elsewhere and arriving here ran through their bodies, accompanied by nausea, then a lurch, and a twist. Stost hung on, though he wanted to curl into a ball and hide his head, and again it came—the sense of arriving, the sense of falling, a stuttering, a moment in which he was certain his heart had stopped; his sight went grey; the universe twisted into nothing—and suddenly he began breathing again, in great, tearing gasps, without any recollection of having stopped.
He blinked; found his fingers strangling the hold-on, and Chernak’s hand over his, easing his grip on her arm. The engineer—
For a wonder, the engineer lived, well braced against the door, the lightstick yet resting against his boot. He sighed, gave a low laugh, coughed, and looked up to them.
“Ten tens. Salute me, if you will, Pathfinders, my hundredth transition ends successfully. I retire, effective immediately.”
One hundred transitions was a life mark, indeed. Stost straightened and saluted, as did Chernak, ignoring all else a moment longer, to show proper respect, and pay what honor was due.
The engineer began to speak again, initially too low to hear, then gained strength.
“Just you two and—” A gasp here, and a small silence, while the man ordered himself. “…you and Grakow. Keep him happy as long as you might, please.”
He gathered himself, voice steadying as he reached to his belt: “You’ll want this.”
This was a snap ring. He raised it, before unsteady fingers betrayed him. Stost swooped forward and caught it deftly in the failing gravity.
“I give you command of this ship,” the engineer said. “Used to be nicer.”
That came with a head shake and what might have been a failed smile, but the light was dimming.
“Bleeding bad,” he said then. “No facilities, no blood. I’m on my fourth jolt of stim, triple-dosed on painless. Dog the doors on your way, and I’ll take what I got left. It’ll do me fine.”
“We—we have our grace blades…” Chernak offered, as gently as she was able, aware that what was mercy to a soldier was…not always so, to others.
A weak smile and a strong cough.
“Scared of blades, soldiers. My call. Ship’s yours.” Another cough. “The unmarked key—my quarters. Grakow’s. My possessions are yours.”
An attempted salute or a sudden new pain jerked the man’s hand up, and he leaned harder against the door, crouched against strain behind the mask.
“Purple-striped key does the hatch on Jarbechapik, ’spector’s bug’s there. You’ll want it. Power-up keys is zero and as many sevens as it takes. I give you it.”
The engineer paused, winced, said words Stost didn’t know, couldn’t hear. It seemed that he had forgotten them entirely as he pulled drug packs into place on the floor.
That done, he raised his head and gave them a long look.
“Go,” he said with breathless harshness. “My job is done.”
They went, back the way they had come, the light fading into darkness behind them.
* * * * *
Theo stared hard at the image of the hulk, the camera’s varying magnification making it appear just a moment or two away, and closing. She knew better, reflexively checking other views in other screens to be sure.
She sipped her tea, staring into the main screen, trying to gauge size, wondering how they might begin to search something of that scale, that had taken so much damage. Who knew what might be lurking inside the wreckage? There could be a hidden armada of ships Bechimo’s size…
The possibilities rode with her as Bechimo’s full sensor array was brought to bear as…
The touch in her mind was one she knew…and welcomed: alien and familiar at once, comfortable and demanding as it could be, curious and—
A tap, just above and behind her knee, not in her mind.
“Hevelin, what are you doing here?”
The norbear looked up, arms outstretched, hands open. He murbled at her attention, and she received the impressions of joy and concern, and a demand to be lifted to see what she saw.
She reached down and helped him up, allowing him to perch with his weight on her left hip; sadness touched her then, and she knew his attention was on the screen, watching the overlays with as much interest as she was. Might he have an idea of what they looked at? Did he recognize a dead ship when he saw one? Was he understanding, through her, that they overlooked a tragedy?
The other presence at the edge of her mind now fretted. Bechimo was less than happy; he had argued vociferously against becoming involved with the ruined ship, arguing also that any crew must have died instantly when the hull was breached. Joyita, Theo, and Win Ton had all talked with him: survivors were possible; there were several sections that seemed intact; it was their duty, as pilots, to offer aid, or to be certain that there was no one left to aid.
Together, they’d worn him down, and he’d closed the distance between himself and the hulk, worked out a scanning regime to differentiate between what were likely left-over automatics and any potential live signals.
“Joyita,” Theo said, her eyes on the screens, “I have a visitor. Has he arrived here without assistance?”
Not mere curiosity, that question. She honestly wondered if Hevelin was in league with Joyita, or with Bechimo, or if the greying old norbear was operating ship’s access controls himself.
From time to time Joyita took longer answering than he might, and this was one of them. His image on-screen looked toward her, unfocused, then to the ambassador.
“In general, on alter-shifts,” Joyita finally said, “if Hevelin wishes to join us here, I open the doors. I’ve assigned a subroutine to it.”
She looked speculatively at the comm officer, shook her head.
“So he’s not sleeping as much as I thought he was?”
Joyita showed a brief smile. “Unable to compute, Theo. We haven’t discussed it.”
“Clarence doesn’t mind having Hevelin wandering about?”
Joyita grabbed the nuance.
“I believe not, generally. Clarence discusses fine points of piloting and dark-watch with him, then assigns him a seat for the duration of the watch. He’s sat in all of them but yours, to my knowledge. Generally he naps after being brought up to speed.”
A tiny murble in her right ear, a chuckle more hinted than delivered, a celebration of clever Hevelin.
“Is it the same for Win Ton and for Kara?”
“Often, yes.”
A jolt went through her—direct from Bechimo. Joyita turned his head, canting an ear as if he heard some distant storm rumbling.
“What?” she demanded, with Hevelin holding on tight as she scanned all the screens, seeking some new ship, or teapot, or—
“We have a power pulse!” Joyita said excitedly.
Screen Two went to zoom, as all the other screen scans, external video and radiation scans focused on the same section, the rest of the hulk left unobserved as the absolute stern of the dead vessel came under intense scrutiny.
The quality of Bechimo’s thought went from intent to precipitate. Shields came up, sensors detecting a movement more definite—more purposeful—than drifting flotsam ought to be.
“All crew to bridge,” Theo thought—or whispered. She was in her chair with no clear memory of having gotten there. Webbing was tight and Hevelin was on her knee.
“All crew to bridge,” Joyita said, his voice ringing across the in-ship. “All crew to bridge.”