Archaea (20 page)

“What's the air like over there Shorty? Do we need EVA suits?”

“Well sir, O2 levels are pretty low, and pressure is dropping, so we're definitely venting... the way it looks over here, I am not sure if you'd want to breathe the air anyway, it's full of smoke, and probably smells as bad as it looks.”

I could only imagine how bad it would be over there. As much of a pain it was to work in EVA suits, at least you only smell your own sweat.

“Shorty, I'm sending you a shopping list to your handset now, we're going to want to tap their tanks, raid the larders, and pull over any reactives we can find. I'd like to get some tactical EVA gear to replace the old work-suits we have, and Gene has another list he wants to run through as well.”

“
Sir that should all be doable, it doesn't look like the pirates had possession of it for long, and it's a newer model than we served on. We ought to be able to lay our hands on some good gear here. I don't know if we have room for it, but there's a mighty nice little captain's gig in the topside hangar that might fit on our racks.”

“I'll ask Gene to take some measurements on his way over. Is there anything else you need?”

“No, other than his tools we ought to be good to go. I think we'll bring everything up to the top hangar for offload to the Archaea. Will that work, sir?”

“Sure thing – and Shorty – good job over there.”

*****

Shorty and Yak met me at the lock, and helped me maneuver my 'toolbox' across into the destroyer. It's a well-worn snaplock case I've hauled from ship to ship for 30 years, and has just about every tool you might need to have, from auto-wrenches to torque drivers, and a whole set of pneumatic tools for a counter-rotation driver – it even has integrated pressure tanks so it can be used in places where there's no pressure line handy.

Dak had briefed me on what to expect over here, but it was way worse than I expected. This deck was scorched; it looked like the aftermath of an alpha-class fire that had burned itself out of oxygen, which is pretty much what had happened here. Pretty much everything combustible had been burned or melted, and in some places the framing and deck plates were warped. The forward sections of all decks from the bridge down were completely slagged.

Shorty and Yak had cleared through the compartments they could access, and cut their way into some of the compartments they couldn't open.

“How many KIA did you guys find”, I asked as we wrestled the toolbox past a section of deck that had partly collapsed.

“About thirty or so – though it's hard to get an accurate count, in the forward compartments.  The crew decks are especially grim, if we don't have a pressing need to recover anything from there, I'd prefer it if we didn't go there again”, said Shorty.

“Sounds good to me, Shorty – it's pretty bad?”

“It's absolutely terrible, Gene. These people had no chance, they literally roasted in place. Some are charred to the point where you can't even recognize them.”

I had no desire to get an image like that in my head, but even so, it was impossible not to see the grim reality of what had happened here.

“Where should we start, Gene?” Shorty asked, as we lugged the toolbox up to the open elevator port. “Down, or up?”

“It doesn't much matter – but it's going to be a big job pulling those turrets, let's get you started up there, then I'll head back to engineering and get to work pulling spares.”

We wrestled the box up and through the hole they had cut into the bottom of the car, it was a close fit, but we got it through. They had cut a hole forward in the car, but the companionway was gone, blocked solid with a mass of wreckage, the bulkheads, wall sections and deck plates all folded back and twisted together, fused into a solid mass of metal, thoroughly slagged. The car itself was completely out of round, warped by the heat, and probably welded to the shaft.

We had to move aft on our hands and knees for the first section, as it was almost completely blocked when the outer hull and frame structure had partially collapsed in the heat, but as we moved aft towards the skiff hangar, the sagging ceiling stopped and it opened back up and just looked like a  burned out hulk.

Shorty was right about that gig, it was a sweetie – a little 10-meter runabout. Dak was going to want that, definitely.  The hangar itself was in pretty good shape, as the inner locks had been closed, it wasn't too burned out. There was some blistering and heat damage, but nothing looked too bad.

As we moved aft to the rear turret compartment, it looked almost untouched, which gave me hope for the stern compartments in engineering. I left the toolbox with Shorty and Yak and kicked on back to the core compartment. This far back, through all the locked down doors, there was hardly any damage at all. 

“Pauli, this is Gene – we're at the nexus core compartment now, and it looks good, really good. Do you want anything else in here besides the core?”

“Gene, I know we're going to want as much of the rack it's mounted on as possible, so we can set up a second core in the engineering space – but you'll know best what we will need for that. I am not sure how much of it is salvageable and what we'll need to fabricate...”

“Pauli, this is all modular, bolted on. All I will need to do is drill and tap mounting holes, and it should drop right in. Is there anything else we might want out of here?”

“How about the enviro unit in there? It's probably modular as well, and we'll want independent controls in the compartment we set up as well.”

“Sounds good Pauli, I'll hack that out of here as well.”

I got to work on in the nexus room, grinding off welds and disconnecting everything I could reach. The nexus core was pretty similar to the model we had aboard the Archaea, and should plug right in, though I'll leave the wetnet connections to Pauli. The rack came right off, and the enviro unit in this compartment was self-contained with a standalone fuel cell. I made sure I grabbed everything that looked useful and started carting it forward and making a pile in the hangar.

“Gene, are you at a point where you can give us a hand?”

“I sure can Shorty, be right there – just making my last load from the hangar now.” I kicked back to the turret compartment and weaved my way through a sea of tool tethers. Yak was on tool patrol, and Shorty was somewhere up in the framing – only her boots were visible out of an access panel.

“How's it coming Shorty?” I ask, giving Yak a look.

“Good Gene, I am just working loose the last mounting bolts now. Do you think we can use that gig to pull these out of their sockets?”

I didn't really like the thought of trying to conn Dak's new baby around in a cloud of debris, twisted hull plates and framing members... I couldn't face those eyebrows if anything happened.

“No, I can't Shorty – I'm nowhere good enough on the stick to handle that. We're going to need to get the captain over here for that, I think.”

“That makes sense, well – we're done here, so let's move on down to the gun deck and engineering.”

She came wriggling down out of the hatch and untwisted the tool leash she had tangled around her neck.

*****

Pauli had gone aft to engineering to take a look at the new core compartment he and Gene were going to try to set up, and for a rare moment aboard the Archaea, I found myself alone, with no one to talk at. This wasn't really an ideal situation for me – I had an overwhelming urge to tell people what to do, but no people to tell it to.

Surely someone needed some leadership around here.

I chased down another cup of coffee and reviewed the remainder of our course for this leg. We only had a few more hours left before we could slip out of here, and I was raring to go, eager to get a move on from this horrible place.

“Captain, we're going to need you over here to pilot the gig for us”, Gene said in a burst of static.

“Sounds good Gene, I'll suit up and head over. How's it coming along?”

“We're making progress, I am going to walk the core over and will meet you at the lock, Shorty and Yak have the turrets loose and we'll pull them with the gig and just lash them down in the cargo bay for now. They're on the gun deck at the moment
, pulling spares, and I will be heading down to engineering shortly to do the same thing.”

“Do you need my help over there Captain?” Pauli asked, floating up with a fresh coffee in hand.

“No, I don't think so – I can't really leave the bridge empty, Pauli. I think I need you here to keep an eye on the screens for me.” The last thing I want to have happen, is for something to happen while I am not there to save us in some epic, heroic manner. The thought of us all stranded on that hulk watching the Archaea drift away...that's the stuff of nightmares. No thanks, I think I'll pass.

I suited up and met Gene in the lock, and helped him man-handle the core and its enviro unit down into the Archaea, and we headed up through the destroyer to the skiff bay. They were not exaggerating when they said this bird was slagged – it was disconcerting to crawl on my face through the smoke-filled top companionway, though it looked like they cleared it out a bit for me.

As we locked through into the flight deck, the first thing I noticed was the sweet little captain's gig on starboard rack – the other seven things I noticed were the other empty racks.

“Gene, did you notice the other skiff racks are empty?”

“Not really, but we've been working pretty hard in here”, he said, looking up at the empty racks. “Do you think they might be the same seven bogeys we chased off earlier?”

“It certainly seems likely. We never did get a good visual on them... they sure acted like skiffs...”

I popped the hatch on the gig, and wormed my way up to the helm – it was a tight fit for my heroic shoulders, but not too bad.

“Gene, let me pre-flight this baby, and stand by to drop her off the rack. I'll just take her out on maneuvering thrusters – let me know when you're clipped on.”

As I went through the routine of checking levels and charges, making sure jets were free and controls were clear, Gene clipped on a set of tethers to the utility ring by the top hatch, and gave me the thumbs up through the forward hatch.

“Ready to go Gene?” I asked, and he nodded in return, looking a little pale. “Settle down man, this is nothing. Easy as falling off a log.”

I talked the talk, now it was time to walk the walk. The gig wasn't the Archaea, that's for sure. It was way lighter on the stick and I had to spin and translate up through the top hatch, then invert for a pick on the turrets. All of this, through a cloud of debris ranging from dust size particles to multiple-ton sections of deck plating slowly tumbling along.

Gene gave me a full blast of concerned face, though I waved him off and whipped her around smartly, dropping velocity right on the dot, inverted above the turrets. As he worked on hooking them up, I swiveled the command chair back to the crew compartment, and took a look at the gig.

She was a sweetie, all right. Brand new and looked like she rolled off the line last week, she was rigged for atmo with ramjets and lifters, and even had dual railers. The crew compartment had six couches, and looked pretty well-appointed, as a captain's gig should be. I sure hoped Gene could make her fit in the Archaea's hold, but if anyone can, it'll be Gene.

Gene was done hooking us up, and on his high-sign, I eased her back and took up the slack, then slowly pulled away as the turrets came loose from their sockets like strange teeth. Gene flagged me to stop once they were clear, and I let her drift slowly away while he strapped them together.

Once he was done, he grabbed back on and gave me another look, so I babied her back through the mess of debris to the Archaea.  Seeing her from out here, I was struck by the contrast in size between our little frigate, and this massive wall of ship she was docked to. She looked like a small remora holding station at the side of a giant shark, but she also looked like home, and I was glad to be headed back.

As we rolled under the Archaea's open cargo bay, Pauli was suited up and waiting at the crane controls, looking down with wide eyes at Gene perched on the top of the gig, a turret in each hand. I pushed her gently forward until we were in reach of the cargo crane and they hauled up the turrets and secured them to the bulkhead while I cooled my jets and watched them work. If there's something I never tire of, it's watching other people work.

Once they were situated, and Gene gave me another look, I waved them aside and brought the gig in just as easy as a leaf, hardly rubbing the paint off the rails. From the look on Gene's face, you'd have thought I tore a wing off.

*****

Jane and I met Gene coming back through the lock, and  he helped us off-load an assortment of stepper motors, pumps, tanks of plasticine, ferrene, water, gear oil, and various boxes and crates of tool, parts, and other assorted odds and ends.

Shorty was disassembling everything she could get her hands on, and I was doing my best to keep up, but she was a gearhead and all I was really good for was heavy lifting.

“Are you guys just about done taking her apart?” Gene said, looking over the growing pile of parts we were amassing in the cargo hold.