Angeleyes - eARC (14 page)

When we reached SolJP2, Lucashab, there was another remote scan of our manifests, and a query from Jump Control, then a “tax” on our overload based on our approved capacity. I don’t get it. It’s not as if it takes any more energy to open a jump point for a larger ship. Open, closed. Those are your options.

CHAPTER 16

We jumped for NovRos and started in to their station. It’s in orbit around a large dwarf.

The mesh loads updated, and news came through. Someone had just blown up one of the cargo linkers at SolJP3. Then they’d damaged one of the dockways. Station efficiency was down four percent.

“Was that our passenger?” I asked.

Mira said, “They don’t have any suspects.”

“Right, but I meant . . . never mind.”

Either they didn’t know or they weren’t saying.

Four percent was a significant down, on top of the usual repairs that are always ongoing. If they had no suspects, there could be more.

And I may have given him places to hide out between attacks.

I actually felt pleased. I was pretty sure my conclusion was correct. We were starting to hurt them, even if only in small amounts. I wondered what was next.

We joined the queue and did routine maintenance and management. Earth had managed to mis-tetris some of our tainers, so we’d have to undog, unload, reload and redog. We’d be doing extra work because of them, and no compensation. Roger and I worked out a plan for that.

They were all better at math than me. I can do cargo stuff. He came up with an algorithm for moving the tainers to minimize time and movement. Then he drew up a flowchart for it.

We pulled into orbit and Mira started the delicate process of sneaking up on a satellite. I know the rough problem is that faster takes you to higher orbit. So you slow to drop into a lower, faster orbit, then accelerate to match. It’s a lot harder in low orbits. At a million kilometers it’s not that interesting.

We moved in with little burps of engines and retros, chemically fueled. That gave her about sixty Earth seconds of maneuver time. It’s not a lot.

It was also disorienting in an old ship. I was dizzy and slightly uncomfortable, not quite nauseous when she got us to the davit and it snagged us.

Mira had IDed us moving in. Once docked, Juan took over, zipped down the manifest and reported to station control.

He concluded with, “Admiral Bertrand is aboard.”

“Uh . . . understood,
Pieper
. We’ll have a receiving party ready.”

“‘Receiving party?’” he asked me, looking confused.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve never heard of that for him.”

He asked back, “Traffic Control, what do you need from us for receiving?”

A different voice said, “
Pieper
, please disregard. New crew were unfamiliar with the Admiral. They know who he is now.”

“Oh, good.”

Really, it was. Actual honors would have been a problem. But we’d pranked a new guy without even trying. Funny.

Once we connected the tube, Bert was all ready to head off on his next adventure.

“Bye, Bert,” I said. He rubbed his head against my knee and waited for scritches. He woofed once, did the same with Jack, almost bowed to Roger, then trotted down the tube for the lock to the station.

There were a lot of UN uniforms here. Several had Engineer insignia.

“They are building that station you mentioned,” Juan said. “It looks like they plan to have rapid response in every system.”

“So they can do to others what they did to us?” I asked.

“I would assume so. Though the threat of it is likely to pre-empt the need.”

We unloaded, ate, and waited for cargo. Roger had several contracted loads waiting. We apparently had dock time to spare, because Juan was in no hurry. I asked.

“I’m juggling dock fees against potential loadout,” he said.

“How full are we?” I asked.

“Seventy-three percent.”

“Right. I’m guessing with this frame you’d like to hit eighty.” It was a wild-ass guess based on feel.

He said, “At least. Want to show us around?”

“I can. What are you looking for?”

“Surface access or crust.”

I couldn’t think of any positive reasons for that. But that was why we were there.

“I’ll need to explore, but I have ideas.” I’d been outside the hull of another station once before.

“How many?”

I understood his question.

“I can take two, I think.”

“Jack and Mira.” He waved.

“Okay.”

They looked at me, and I said, “Basic coveralls, we’ll hide our ship suits once we’re away from the dock. What do we need to take?”

“Vid and notes,” Jack said. “And I have a small probe.”

“They track phones closely.”

He nodded. “Yes, this one doesn’t connect, it only has internal functions.”

They both also had small backpacks with water and protein bars. The coverall they handed me was the exact leaf green color station staff wore. So this had been planned well ahead.

A few minutes later, after a head break and some water, we were ready.

The dock runs through the axis and they use centrifugal force for gravity, like most stations. Since it’s an inflated rock, it’s a long cylinder with irregular surface inside and out, so the inside has a pressure hull. There’s a gap between that and the rock that’s mostly sealed, but there are access hatches. At least, I was sure there were, but I’d never looked for one.

I went looking through zen, I guess. I didn’t know where they were, but I knew where they might be. There’s a large cargo lock actually through the surface from when construction was first done. It’s mostly sealed, but they leave it in case they have to do a really major repair. It’s at .2 G, 500 mils from the zero meridian.

There’s a ring of reinforcement around it, and seals. I figured outside that ring would be some kind of access between the hulls.

The passages were a maze, twisty and all alike. They all led toward that huge lock, then turned down or past it. We went around, and up, and around again. I didn’t want to do that too often. We’d get noticed. After the second pass we found a bathroom and slipped out of our shipsuits to the green coveralls.

On the next loop, I found it. There was a hatch back into station maintenance, with someone just coming out. Past him I could see where the outer hatch was. There was stuff piled against it, tools and scrap, so it wasn’t used often.

Jack walked right in, and said, “Clear that stuff, and make a note for production control that it was blocked.” He had a tablet with screen up, and made marks on it as we moved the junk. He grabbed a tool belt that was on a shelf and hung it over his shoulder. He grabbed two harnesses off the rack and gave one to Mira.

One guy walked by, saw the tablet, and kept moving.

It’s unbelievable how well that trick works.

Jack even had some real-looking safety tags, or they may have been real. He opened the latch and clipped one to the lock mechanism so it wouldn’t close, and marked it with initials “URF, 1426 hours.”

I followed him through, and Mira followed me. He opened the outer hatch and left it.

“You can stay inside if you want,” he said. “If anyone asks, we’re doing a hull survey and will be back soon.”

“I can do that or come along and help.”

“It’s probably better if you stay here,” he said. I took it as a strong suggestion.

So I stayed there, while they latched onto a channel rail and started bounding low-G-ward between the hulls.

I waited, not diddling my phone, because it was turned off and unpowered for privacy. I had no idea what was going on or how long it was. Now and then I heard voices on the other side, and hoped we weren’t going to get locked into deadspace.

And it was cold. The pressure was okay, but a bit low. But that rock was dull gray, painted with some sort of air and crack sealant, and directly in space. It had to be bright outside to be visible, in addition to having beacons, so it had a high albedo, which meant it didn’t absorb even the light that was available.

There was frost on that outer wall, and I wished for more insulation. I was cold, and not moving made it worse.

It was a long time, with me shivering and bored and my ears, toes and fingers going numb, before I heard them coming back.

“You go first,” Jack said. “Tell us if we’re clear now, or need to wait.”

I popped the lock, scanned around as I stepped through, faced him and nodded. They slipped out behind me, and Mira started off ahead. Jack waited about twenty seconds and took the other catwalk. I hung around a few moments and then followed.

A local hour later, we were back aboard.

The crew were nervous. I doubt anyone outside noticed, but I’d been with them long enough to pick up the tingles. The other two had already cycled through a hot shower to warm up. I went in as Mira came out. A deluge of tub-hot water took the chill out of my bones and ears.

We loaded cargo, and Mira called for an early slot.

“We can still pack more in,” I said.

Juan said, “We’ll be fine.”

That night, we detethered and queued for ram.

As we shoved out, there was a strong vibration, a massive bounce, and then alarms started howling.

“That’s a bit close,” Juan said, as an emergency flash ordered, “ALL OUTBOUND IN STAGE THREE CONTINUE UNDOCKING.” There were other alarms, including, ATMOSPHERE LEAK, PRESSURE FAILURE, CONTROL FAILURE, HULL INTEGRITY FAILURE. RUPTURE OVER CONTROL CENTRAL. CASUALTIES. MEDICAL RESPONSE. ENGINEER EMERGENCY RESPONSE. MAN OVERBOARD. EMERGENCY SEALS ACTIVATED.

It just kept going.

I asked, “Did we plant a bomb over their space control?”

“They seem to have had a rupture right over the military management cell.”

I was sure Jack and Mira had mined it.

“Casualties?” I asked.

“Oh, yes. There were sixty-seven people in that pressure, all of them management and control, and I doubt any had pressure suits.”

I’d helped kill them, and I felt worse than if I’d done it myself.

I reminded myself this was war, and those were military personnel.

We weren’t in uniform, though.

There’d also probably been some maintenance personnel either in the hull like we had been, or near open locks.

We were bound for Alsace, and this was a major test, because it was our “native” space.

Juan and Mira spoke what sounded like flawless Alsacien French as we docked. It flowed like water.

Still, this ship had come from here, and it wasn’t impossible we’d run into former crew.

They also didn’t know their way around the station. They’d seen maps, but that’s not the same as being aboard.

“We’ll follow you, Angie,” Juan said. “We’ll gaggle around and you lead, just toss your head for directions. We’ll be fine.”

“I haven’t been in Alsace from this direction in several years. I may be out of date.”

“Understood. Do your best.”

Alsace is a younger colony, and still growing. The station had originally been a hubbed ring. Now it was a double. The styles were slightly different due to improved construction methods, which probably irritates artistic types, but it meant newer tech, so I liked it.

A lot of business moved into the newer ring. Established outfits remained in the old one, anyone who could move to the new one easily, had. Both sides were only about half occupied, with large gaps not even built out, much less populated.

“I can’t help much,” I said, once I’d looked around. “I know where access hatches and such should be, and there’s lots of empty cube I’m sure isn’t occupied yet.”

“That’s fine. We don’t have any business here yet. It’s good to just be shipping.”

True. If they struck a target at every station, they’d be IDed in three? four? And done.

What I did do was show them some of the businesses I knew. Mo and Roger took parts to several shops for “repair.” That got them introduced and on file as clean. The repairs were basic, recurring maintenance that wouldn’t draw attention.

Alsace can’t afford to ship a lot in, but they try to ship out for the trade balance. They have exotic woods and a few mineral stones, local fish that’s human compatible and apparently very tasty, and the outer planets have easily scoopable methane. Gas divers are yet another breed of spacer, though a lot of people don’t think of them as spacing, since they stay so close to planets.

We did dinner, and I got to try flarefin, one of the fish. It was tasty, and I can’t describe it. Nothing like any Earth fish. The flesh is more rubbery than flaky, but tears a bit like squid, with texture like clam, and the flavor is milder but . . . I don’t know. It was good, but not better than good salmon, which is a lot cheaper.

We were loaded light mass wise, but full value wise, which is ideal.

But we were headed back for NovRos. That scared me.

CHAPTER 17

We queued, jumped back, and didn’t get immediately tagged. They did have tight security with actual guards around every lock and access, though. Well, not all of them, but anything that I thought would go anywhere critical. The ones left open were okay for hiding and sleeping. I made a mental note just in case. Just keep in mind that it’s not just the local gov and UN you have to worry about, but the vors and mafia.

We unloaded volatiles and some of the meats. Then Juan had us stop.

“It took a bribe, but I think we’ll come out ahead. We’re going to take it in-system ourselves.”

“Okay.” I wasn’t sure why we’d do that, but I guess profit was a thing, to keep us in space.

We weren’t using the spacewheel—it was a considerable way around the system, built for cargo from Caledonia. They’d probably build one eventually.

We had enough fuel, so Mira did a combination maneuver that braked us in orbit so we’d drop straight in, and reoriented us to insert into orbit around Novaja Rossia itself.

It was a long, slow fall, and odd, as boost G started at once only barely present, then increased in odd plateaus, then tapered off the same way. The bulkheads shifted to decks and overheads and back, but nine days later we were in close proximity to their high orbital, which is in orbit around their poor excuse for a moon, a glorified captured asteroid that is barely massive enough to be spherical. It makes a good anchorage, though.

It is a grav anchorage, too. We took a parking orbit, and a lighter came up to meet us. Some of the heavier built craft can actually land. It only pulls about .03 G. But for orbiting, you move little and are easy to track.

The lighter made three trips, loping up to pull pods and haul them down on tether. They literally were that casual about the local mass. Then Roger and I got into archaic eva-exos and transferred stuff from the hold. An eva-exo is an exoskeleton for EVA use. It doesn’t have maneuver capability, but does have tethers, latches and grippies. You can stay linked easily enough. Just never forget to attach one before detaching the other. They were actually made for old inflated pressure suits, instead of modern skintight vac suits. I rattled around inside even with the lashings fully taut.

We made a bit more money for this leg of the trip, though some of it had gone in bribes. We loaded up on raw mineral chunks that could be cut, polished, whatever. It’s interesting how stuff is semi-precious on its home planet, and outrageously expensive in space or outsystem due to lifting cost. We declined a couple of passengers, and I didn’t blame Juan. They looked mean.

But we pulled out almost empty. That’s not a savings at all. I think we still came out slightly ahead even with fuel expenditure on the return, but then you add in wear and tear, spaceage and time. I don’t think it was balance positive.

But, as I found out later, that wasn’t the point.

We took a long, fuel-saving route toward JP6 for Earth. Most systems have JP1 with Earth, but NovRos was settled secondarily by contracting through Caledonia. Anyway, the numbers are just tags. They opened one with Earth a long time back, but it was number six at the time.

That station is also a considerable way from the point. They used an existing planetoid and just built domes, and use the same grav anchor system—parking orbits. I’m told the engineering is interesting, because the domes sit on a plain of frozen nitrogen, which would sublime to vapor if it got heated at all. They use insulated blocks for the foundations. I guess it’s not any less safe than a ship, but the idea makes me twitch.

It was a fifteen-day coast with periodic course adjustments to gain shreds of economy from a couple of gravity wells, though we were distant enough from any planet I have no idea how that stuff is calculated.

I cooked, checked status on the hold—it was still there—and watched a lot of vid.

And showers. It was during a shower we had the excitement.

The shower was necessary for cleanliness in close quarters. It was a luxury, since we had few others, and a great chance to be alone. I had vibrations going and was quite filled, almost too filled behind, with hot water trickling all over. It was five segs a day when I could close my eyes and just ride my mind. I did wish we had a recspec on board, though. Some massage at least would make it even better.

I guess I’m what they call a hedonist.

Something happened, and it took me a moment to put it all together.

There’d been a loud, echoey clang. You don’t get clangs in ships, unless they’re metal hulled. We had modern composite molecule weave and boron shelling, with active rad shielding between. A clang wasn’t possible. Then there were two more, one after the other.

Then over shipcom I heard Roger shout, “Hull breach! Hull breach! Hull breach! Seal and secure! All hands prepare for vacuum!”

Yes, echoes. Shock waves down the passageways.

His voice got higher and quieter as he shouted, because we were losing air fast.

Klaxons sounded, lights flashed, locks shifted then slammed. We were still losing air, though.

I yanked out my toys, punched the water shutoff, and noticed the cube was steaming up but cold, as pressure dropped. I wiped my face off with both hands, and headed straight for the nearest emergency O2 on the bulkhead, punched it, stretched the mask over my head, and had to do it a second time because I was shaking, and things were getting blurry. I panicked when nothing happened, then the emergency valve in it sensed the drop and popped, and oxy blew against my face. It was dizzying, sweet, buzzy. At the same time, the pressure drop made my guts ache, I farted and probably had some leakage, and my ears felt as if someone stabbed them. All in all I was about useless, but I was breathing. I could taste and smell soap and shampoo.I sucked in hard with my mouth closed, then opened it and yawned, and the stabbing pain in my ears eased off a notch or two.

“All hands to command deck.” Juan’s voice was tinny and high sounding.

I opened the hatch from the head, moved forward, and crap, it was even colder. There was frost in the air and condensing on surfaces.

Teresa, Mo and Jack came toward me and shoved past with patches and smoke dye. I watched it drift and swirl and suck, and she slapped a patch on an inner bulkhead. That was Shannon’s stateroom. I hoped he was alive. Whatever had hit had come through the shell, the inner hull, and that bulkhead, and left scars on the passage side, too.

Teresa stared at me for a long moment, then shoved me into the lock ahead of her. With both of us in, it was tight, and our masks bumped. I was in a panic in case we dislodged them. Her skin was splotchy from pressure damage, and she seemed really nervous against naked me.

She punched to dump air in from the C-deck, and that hurt my ears the other way. It got us into pressure fast, though. The hatch popped, we shoved through, and she set it to cycle and pump so Mo and Jack could follow.

“We have pressure here,” Dylan said. He was closest. “Stay masked, though. Need a coverall?”

I was still soap-smeared but dry and greasy. The water had boiled off me, and I was fucking freezing now.

“Yes,” I said, as he lobbed one to me. I shimmied in and zipped, and it helped a bit, but my toes, fingers and ears were still cold. Wrists. Ankles. It felt like I was outside in a blizzard, though it was warming up again in here.

Juan said, “Engineering is the problem. Bast says there’s a punch through a control console. We’re going to have to seal three breaches. Plus the one outside Shannon’s cube.”

I started to ask, “Is he—”

Juan said, “Yes, he’s in engineering. His repair can wait.”

Jack said, “I can EVA. We’ll want to sandwich seal.”

“Go.”

“What can I do?” I asked.

Juan said, “Please understand I am very serious and will be very grateful if you can reach the galley and make some sandwiches. This is going to take hours and possibly even divs.”

“I’m on it,” I said. Yes, we needed to eat. I wanted to be clean, but that would have to wait for reliable pressure.

Most spaces were up now, except Shannon’s stateroom, engineering and the utility hold next to it. We used the locks but only as safeties. There was no pressure diff. I cycled through, down the passage, into my cubby to take off the coverall and put on some worn, sweaty underwear and a polo, then the coverall back on top. I wiped off my feet, used dirty socks and got my spare shlippers on. I was sticky and nasty, but warm. And if you’ve ever tried to put on a polo over a mask, it doesn’t work. I was about to stretch it up over my ass, when I realized I could unmask for the ten seconds it would take.

Dressed, I felt more functional, and warm. I went past the head and grabbed my phone, ticked at forgetting it earlier.

“Angie on open chat,” I said. “I’ll take sandwich orders in a moment. Can you tell me what happened?”

Mira said, “We think it was a Volume Denial Dispersed Mass Weapon. VDam. Tungsten pebbles.”

I sort of knew what that was.

“Someone seeded the area?”

“Like jacks or four-sided dice meant for three D space,” she said. “It’s even slangly called ‘jacking off.’”

Roger said, “Well, I’m guessing their logic was that warships have heavier mass shields, and no civilian ship should be in this space, and if anyone requested a variance they’d be told ‘no.’”

“So they’re on to us,” I said. I guessed we were in a space we shouldn’t be in, and ran into the space equivalent of barbed wire.

Juan said, “They’re on to something. But they’re using a lot of delta V and mass, not to mention operation time, to do this. Unless it was a lucky leftover from something else.”

I didn’t want to think about suffocating to death while jilling off in the shower. Totally not my play. Would we ever be found? And what would the recovery crew think, finding me like that? What if they were serious thirty-fours? Video for the mesh? Violate my frozen corpse? What if one of the chunks hit me at flight velocity? I’d be a crimson splash. And what about the engines?

Or was I just seriously fucking scared because I’d almost died from enemy fire without even seeing them? When would we eat a nuke?

“One at a time, tell me what you want for food,” I said.

I couldn’t even spread mustard or mayonnaise. I was shaking to shivers.

Jack came in and I fed him. Teresa went out to take over. A div later, Mo went out with Sebastian.

Jack went back out. It took that long to seal the hole outside, pull an access plate, seal it from inside as well, seal the two together, seal the inner hull, and then through the dead space behind the controls in engineering.

I spent the rest of the afternoon ruining baked trout. The butter cooked until it was sharp and they tasted like bad lobster, not good trout. No one complained.

Shannon said, “Next we need a clean, blended repair on each.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because if it looks like a patched hole, someone may ask. If there’s more than one, they might guess.”

“Oh, yeah.” We’d been in a combat zone and had damage. That wasn’t good for our cover.

“Then, three pods took damage. I don’t know of a way to deal with the inside shell or the ‘tainers in flight. We’ll have to fix the outside as best we can and go from there.”

“Will this affect our schedule?” I asked.

“No, because changing it would be noticeable. We’ll continue through to Earth.”

I went out with Bast to help with one of the pod repairs, handing him tools and acting as backup and company.

I do EVA to fasten cargo trains at times, and have done some routine maintenance. This was different. There was no one anywhere nearby to rescue us if anything went wrong, I understood if we came loose we’d stay in the same orbit as
Pieper
, since we weren’t under boost. Still, hanging off the tether a kilometer back from the ship, which was pretty much invisible, was enough to make me clamp down and make regular use of my suit plumbing.

The hole we dealt with was a tear rather than a punch. It was long and oblique. He cut off the ripped poly, laid a patch over it and sealed it in place, and then buffed all the edges to blend it. He used vac paint very creatively to make it look old and worn.

“Doing okay, Angie?” he asked.

“Best I can,” I said.

“Yeah, I hate it, too. Let’s crank back up.”

Cranking back up the line was straightforward. He ran the winch, we moved very slowly toward the ship. Watching the pods move past while we rotated was gut-clenching. We only had a pair of cables and strap harnesses, not a proper maintenance cage. Pieper had a small maintenance tug, but we didn’t want exhaust wash over the pod, and those things are notional anyway. They barely hold one person, two if they’re friendly, and can let you adjust a stinger or remove jammed matter from a lock.

I was very, very glad to get inside, and take another hot shower to warm up from radiating all my heat away.

We coursed back toward the Jump Point and queued up, as if we’d done a legitimate delivery on a slow orbit. I knew they didn’t cross-reference schedules unless they had a reason to, but eventually, we’d give them a reason to.