East of the Sun, West of the Moon

Chapter Twenty-Five

“Nicole, what’s going on?” Herzer asked.

Maintenance was bank after bank of mesh-screened enclosures and a small personnel area. Several of the enclosures held repair bots and he could see three of them lighting off as he watched.

“I had to fire the secondaries on shuttle five to get rid of some orcs,” Nicole replied. “The engine room is thoroughly trashed.”

Herzer watched as the vaguely humanoid bots floated out on anti-grav and began collecting materials. When one of them got to the bin that was supposed to hold injectors it paused uncertainly, as if surprised by the dearth of injectors in the bin, and then wandered off to grab a coil of heavy wire.

“Repair bots headed your way,” Herzer said. “Don’t get in their way.”

“They’re going to be busy in here,” Nicole admitted. “I’m going to see if my suit is still functional. If it is, I’ll join up with Josten and we’ll head for Maintenance. I think we’ll probably circle to the starboard side and enter over there. Any friendlies around?”

“Van Krief is over there with Richard and her security team,” Herzer said. “Join up with them. Take care.”

“Will do,” Nicole said. “Out.”

“Herzer, I need to go override the controls on the shuttles,” Megan said. “That’s next on the program, right? And I’d better hurry or they’re going to leave.”

“Take Joie and Michelle and go override eleven and twelve,” Herzer said. “Take Jacklyn for computer backup. Captain Van Buskirk, secure the councilwoman and her team. Take your team and Yetta.”

“Yes, sir,” the captain said, nodding and getting up from the station chair he’d appropriated.

“If you don’t run into resistance, cross over and override nine and ten,” Herzer added. “I’ll send Kristina and Irvin over direct. Cruz.”

“Yessuh?” the lieutenant said.

“Take your team and head out to the port-side shuttles and start shutting them down,” he said. “Take Evan as your tech. Link up with Van Krief and get back here pronto.”

“Will do,” Cruz replied, donning his helmet. “I live to serve.” It was the motto of the New Destiny orcs and it got a chuckle from the Blood Lords donning their helmets.

“That only leaves you and Layne here for security,” Megan pointed out.

“We’ll have to live with that,” Herzer said. “Get going, please.”

“Yes, sir,” Megan said, dimpling. She donned her helmet and let him buckle it in place. “You be careful.”

“I’m the one sitting in Maintenance,” Herzer pointed out. “You take care.”

When the team was gone he wandered over to where Linda and Geo had set up some sort of engineering project.

“Working on the whatchamacallits?” Herzer asked.

“The Tammens, Herzer,” Geo said, chuckling. “I know you know what they are.”

The device was about two meters long and a quarter meter wide. Currently they had three of the side panels off and were bent over, removing portions of the interior. From Herzer’s point of view, the interior looked something like a wire-form human anatomy. Including the nervous system.

“You really think this thing can give us a field generator?” Herzer asked.

“Oh, it is a field generator,” Geo said. “But it can only handle a bare megawatt of throughput. What we’re doing is using that megawatt of throughput to form a secondary field generator that can handle, oh… a few gigawatts at least. Control is going to be spotty, however. I hadn’t realized how antiquated the interfaces were. This version uses copper base molycircs. Very very antique. We’ll have to hook them up to the primary engine busses for power. They’ll give Megan some significant power as long as the engines aren’t firing.”

“The engines are firing,” Herzer pointed out. “You hadn’t noticed?”

“No,” Geo said, finally noticing the rumble under his feet. “Why? I mean, why are they firing?”

“No idea,” Herzer said. “I don’t think there was a burn scheduled.”

“Not that I recall,” Geo agreed, frowning. “We need to find out where we’re going, Herzer.”

“Well, we’re not going anywhere fast,” Herzer pointed out. “This is an ion drive, remember, low thrust.”

“But it builds up a good deal of a velocity over time,” Geo pointed out. “They might be crashing the ship into the Moon, for example.”

“Oh,” Herzer said. “We need to override a console… shit. I just sent Megan down to the shuttles. We can’t override without her.”

“Can we look out a window?” Geo asked, looking up from the complicated field generator.

“You can’t figure out where you’re going by…” Herzer said then paused. “Josten?”

“Go,” the pilot said. He was breathing hard.

“You’re on the surface still?” Herzer asked.

“Yeah,” Josten replied. “We’re headed over the ship to starboard. Why?”

“Can you more or less tell where the ship is pointed?” Herzer asked, carefully. “Like, is it pointed at the Moon?”

There was a long pause and then Josten chuckled.

“Nice one, Herzer. No, it’s not pointed at the Moon. But we have been maneuvering. The latitude thrusters are firing, as well as the main engine. If I had to make a guess, I’d say we’re maneuvering towards Earth.”

“Damn,” Herzer said, frowning. “Thanks, Josten. Hurry and join up with Van Krief. We need her team back here, pronto.”

“I can get into a console and call up a navigational program,” Geo said. “Or Courtney can, for that matter. But it won’t tell us what the ship is doing unless we override the navigation controls.”

“And we can’t hack nav until Megan gets back,” Herzer said. “Joie.”

“Joie here,” the pilot replied. “Megan’s overridden twelve. There’s another thirty-seven minutes until it detaches.”

Herzer thought about the fact that the shuttle really needed to be secured and then shrugged.

“We’ll put a picket outside the shuttle. If New Destiny heads for it, punch even if you’re not full. Get back to Earth and get me some reinforcements. But for now, can you figure out the ship’s navigation from there?”

“Not really,” Joie said. “I don’t know how long their burn is going to be. I can tell we’ve been adjusted towards an Earth orbit. But, depending on the burn, we could be pointed to pass the Earth, go into an orbit, or even crash into it. It just depends on the burn.”

“What happens if the burn stops, soon?” Herzer asked.

“We’ll head on past Earth well outside orbital,” Joie answered after a moment. “If it stops any time in the next forty minutes. After that there’s a period when ending the burn will direct the ship into a degrading orbit around the Earth; effectively we’ll crash unless we adjust course radically. Then, after about ten hours or so, we’d pass right by again. I’ll take a look at the Moon’s trajectory, but I don’t think it’s going to be an issue.”

“Thanks, Joie,” Herzer said, frowning. “Geo… no, Linda.”

“Yes?” The engineering tech looked up.

“Go with Layne to Engineering,” Herzer said, looking into the distance. “Stop the burn.”

“That’s a tall order, Herzer,” Linda said. “The controls are…”

“Just stop it,” Herzer snapped. “We do not want the ship heading anywhere near Earth, okay? Bad things can happen. You’ve got about thirty minutes to stop it. After that, things get bad. Just go.”

“Okay,” the redhead said, frowning. “I’ll go.”

“And try to avoid orcs,” Herzer said, looking over at Layne, who was already putting his helmet on.

“Will do,” the Blood Lord said. “And scorpions. And maddened elves…”

“Linda,” Geo said, smiling. “Throw the main power breakers on the left-hand panel—”

“I know how to turn off the engine, Geo,” Linda said. “I just don’t know how to keep them from turning it back on. The breakers are set for remote reset.”

“When they’re locked down, pull the primary power buss,” Geo continued. “That means even if they try to reset, the safeties will prevent it. And if they override the safeties, they still won’t have power. The safeties aren’t going to let them reset for a minimum of five minutes. That’s how long you have to fully disengage the busses.”

“That’s not going to be easy, is my point,” Linda said, donning her helmet. “But I’ll do my best. But when we start screwing with the engines, they’re going to react.”

“Cross that bridge when we come to it,” Herzer said. “Just get going.”

“Nicole.”

“What?” Nicole asked tightly. She was really not enjoying climbing around on the outside of the ship. She kept feeling like her suit, which had to have taken some damage in the shuttle’s engine room, was going to fail at any second. And they were in direct sunlight so the icepacks were getting a workout. The sun was to starboard of the ship and they were passing over the first support ring from starboard to port. As soon as they were over the “meridian” they’d start cooling off and the icepacks would be turned back into ice as the thermal controls sucked heat out of them for the system.

“We need to get the inner blast doors closed,” Herzer said. “The primary door node is on the upper section of the forward structural member, under the upper crew quarters. Can you find airlock nine?”

“I think so,” Nicole said. They had been climbing over the forward structural member, to steer clear of the midline member and the control section. Hopefully the orcs and scorpions were staying close to Control.

“Enter airlock nine, go to the crew quarters. There’s an access hatch to the control nodes on the floor towards the port side. Number twenty-eight. Lock down all the doors and pull the control assembly and destroy it. We’ll keep the bots from repairing it from here. Once you’re done, get out of the area. Reyes will probably react.”

“Will do,” Nicole said, sighing. “You hear that, Josten?”

“I heard it,” Josten replied resignedly. “I don’t know diddly about door controls, though.”

“Well, you’re about to learn,” Nicole said. “And at least it will get us out of the sun. Come on, I think the airlock is to our left…”