Dominion (16 page)

Twenty-six

Several hours later, everyone had taken their places throughout the ship.  An hour prior, they learned that the gravitational-reflex ring would not come online unless someone acknowledged the bridge’s command from inside the control room itself.  They discovered that there was another safeguard in place that required a person to acknowledge their presence in both the reactor control room and the ion thruster control center.  It took three attempts to bring the gravitational-reflex ring online before they realized that they all needed to respond to the command
from the bridge within thirty seconds.

Hawke sat at the Captain’s chair with Light Bender seated next to him in the other chair. 
Fire Dragon manned the thrusters.  Sky Listener manned the navigation controls.  Kashuba sat in the back of the bridge with the pack of survival gear, which included plenty of rope, a bane saw, a bane torch, knives, and lights.  Winter Grass carried an identical survival pack, waiting in the engineering room with Ocean Song and Rain Dancer.  Kashuba and Winter Grass were responsible for supplying the tools for a quick escape in the event of a crash landing.  All the rest kept nearby positions throughout the ship to be of assistance if needed.

“Let’s see if they can all hit their acknowledge switches this time,” Hawke said, breathing out a long slow breath.

He tapped the icon for the gravitational-reflex ring, then tapped the two ignition functions.  He waited as a trio of black circles showed up on his screen.  Immediately, the ion thruster circle turned green.  Fire Dragon was seated at his station nearby, so his immediate response had been expected.  Hawke stared at the screen for a moment before the engineering control circle turned green.

“We’re almost there,” he said, watching the screen as the butterflies danced in his stomach.

He couldn’t imagine what was taking them so long down there.  If the reactor control person didn’t hit the switch, they would have to wait another fifteen minutes until the coils warmed up again.  Suddenly the third circle turned green.

The ship itself groaned all of a sudden as though the metal itself was preparing to twist apart. 
Metallic squeals reverberated all around, though nothing seemed to be happening. 

Light Bender inadvertently screamed when the windows to
his left erupted with a violent shattering sound.  Nothing had changed in the integrity of the windows or in the structure of the ice beyond.  All eyes were on the windows around them, fearing the worst.  After several seconds of silence, the bridge erupted in a brutal concerto of crackling and shattering glass.  Hawke covered his face, absolutely certain that the windows had fully imploded.  Kashuba shouted when the creaks of twisting metal blended with the crashing sounds all around them.

Suddenly, as if the ship
itself was instantly brought to life, their world trembled.  A vibration resonated throughout the ship, reminding everyone that they might not have been on solid ground anymore.  A tremor rocked the ship while they watched the ice beyond the windows start to break apart and fall away.

“All fourteen thrusters are now online
and I’ve got them all set at thirty-three percent like we agreed,” Fire Dragon hollered.

“I show that we are actually moving now,” Sky Listener offered.

“One has to wonder,” Light Bender turned to Hawke, “what this all must look like from the surface.”

“I
’d like to believe there are some Shomani up there succumbing to the unimaginable power of a disastrous quake even as we speak,” Hawke said.

The last of the
ice fell away from the windows, revealing a dark cavern that was still smooth in some areas from where the ship had been settled.  They could now see the bottom of the ship, but only in the areas surrounding the six blue thrusters before them.  Unlike the thrusters Hawke was accustomed to, these ones radiated only a minimal amount of light and lacked the secondary cloud of burned gases. 

“There’s land out there,” Light Bender pointed.

They could see dark patches of dirt and crushed foliage for only a moment before it was covered by an avalanche of ice.  The ship continued to shudder and quake as the dark cavern grew beneath them.

“Try increasing the thrust to fifty percent,” Hawke hollered over toward Fire Dragon.

He immediately complied, the six blue Vs of the ion jets becoming brighter and more prominent beneath the forward portion of the ship.  The tremors rocked the ship more violently just as the sunlight peeked through in random sharp beams.  Enormous boulders of ice continued to tumble down the newly formed valley beneath the ship while the sun continued to increase its presence.

“It’s beautiful,” Kashuba said, walking toward the front of the ship with her survival bag in tow, “It’s like a valley of virgin snow.”

Suddenly, an enormous white glacier dropped into the side of the valley she spoke of, causing the ship to instantly angle upward.  She tumbled backward due to the abrupt incline just as Fire Dragon shouted an expletive. 

“I’ve got it
,” he hollered, adjusting the thrusters, “Hold on.”

Hawke shot from his seat just as the floor became level again.  He helped Kashuba back to her feet, checking to see if she was all right.

“Get back to your seat, Hawke,” she admonished him, “I can take care of myself.  You’ve got a job to do.”

She was right, of course.  He returned quickly to his seat.  It was then that he realized the bridge itself was finally above the level of the land.  It was midday in the world above and
the sky was clear.  They now witnessed firsthand that the Cheronook villages that hadn’t been overturned by the ship’s ascent were indeed burned to the ground.  Even the furthest villages near the mountains could be seen in charred ruin.

“Oh my,” Sky Listener exclaimed, “The Shomani left nothing.”

They all gaped out at the absolute destruction of all they once held dear.

“I wish we had weapons on this thing,” Light Bender stated, pointing to the fleeing figures in the distance.

That’s when they saw the two Shomani aircraft on the ground and the four Shomani Navy ships in the nearby waters.  It appeared that they had been busy raiding the villages or perhaps coming to inspect the totality of their kill.

“Well, they definitely see us,” Hawke chuckled.

Kashuba stood near Hawke, staring with tears in her eyes. 

“We need to get out of here, people,” Fire Dragon stated, pointing to the ships in the water, “I’m increasing thrust before they start firing on us.”

“They already started!” Hawke hollered, pointing at the flash from the side of one of the ships.

The ship rose quickly as Fire Dragon increased the thrust to presumably a hundred percent.  Ice chunks and snow continued to fall from the ship as they rose rapidly into the sky.  Hawke rose from his seat as the Frozen North fell away
beneath them.  He made his way to the window, staring out at the shrinking world below.  He could now see three zeppelins that had been far beyond the horizon at ground level escorting a large convoy of inbound Cheronook vessels.  From what he’d seen of the Cheronook’s naval skills, the Shomani were about to pay dearly for their attack on the North.

The zeppelins were no larger than grains of rice beneath them by the time the ship stopped advancing upward.  The thrusters were still firing at their maximum potential
but the ship merely hovered at a significant height.

“Are we still rising?” Hawke asked.

“Looks like we’re as high as we’re going to go,” Sky Listener stated, “We’re stuck at six and a half miles and hovering.”

“And it looks like whatever these thrusters use for fuel is dwindling fast,” Fire Dragon stated, “They went from full to fifty percent in the time it took us to get where we are at.”

“Does anyone see a control for aft thrusters?” Hawke shouted, returning to his seat, “We need to get away from the convoy beneath us as soon as we can.  I don’t want to disrupt them.”

“I’ve got that control over here also,” Fire Dragon stated, “But we never went over that one.”

“Well, we don’t have time right now.  Hit it and get us away from the convoy,” he replied, bringing up the controls for the gravitational-reflex engine.

“What speed?  Thirty-three percent like we did with the-”

“Seventy-five and do it now before we run out of ion reserves,” Hawke hollered, “I intended on us making an unorthodox jump while still in low orbit.  It would most likely be destructive to the surrounding area, but I didn’t count on friendlys being anywhere around at the time.”

Hawke hadn’t even finished his statement before the Fire Dragon brought the rear thrusters online.  G-forces tugged everyone backward as the ship shot forward.

“You’re going to do one of those space-folding jumps right here?” Sky Listener asked, “Has anyone ever attempted something like that?”

“I couldn’t know the answer to that
,” he replied abruptly, “But we have no choice.  The ion thrusters are going to shut down pretty soon and we don’t know how to launch this thing into orbit.”

“We’re down to twenty-five percent of our fuel left,” Fire Dragon hollered, “If we want to land somewhere, we should start our descent now.”

“Do you have one of those radio stars targeted in the navigational display?” Hawke asked, turning to Sky Listener.

“I
figured you were going to ask, so I’ve got it already targeted,” he replied, “The closest one.”

Hawke tapped the
green icon twice on his display, engaging the gravitational-reflex drive.  Then he flipped the switch that released control to the navigational computer.  He looked up from the display and immediately realized he’d forgotten to lower the window shields.

The sky around the ship melted into a shimmering pool of
maroon light that seemed to invade the ship through the walls as well as through the windows.  It was as though the ship had lost all substance.  Then, a moment later, everything went pitch black.

Twenty-seven

Silence.  Although Hawke hadn’t moved an inch
from where he was seated just moments ago, he felt as though hours had passed since he’d last been alert.  It seemed as though he’d just awoken.

Suddenly, the sounds of the ship caught up to him
.  Everyone was asking what happened as they rose from their seats.  An alarm was chiming incessantly from one of the control panels.

“Where did we end up?” Kashuba asked, staring out at the starry field before them.

Hawke rose from his seat and walked slowly toward the window.  This was only his second trip into space but it might as well have been the first.  He was gaping out at the awesome expanse, amazed at how beautiful it was.  The stars were spread out before them and shimmered as though a careless jeweler had tore open a bag of diamonds and strewn them across a blanket of black velvet.

Fire Dragon broke the
somber mood with a reminder that they were currently aimlessly adrift in an unknown sea.

“The alarm is stating we have no more thrusters at the moment
.  Zero. Nothing at all.  The ion engines are recharging, but that means nothing to me,” he said, “Who knows how long that takes?”

Hawke tu
rned to Fire Dragon where he still remained seated at his station.

“Does it look like it’s requesting an
y action on our part?” Hawke asked.

“No, I guess it just wants us to know that if
we wanted to land somewhere, it’s not a currently possibility.”

“Do we know where we are at the moment?” Hawke asked, looking to Sky Listener.

Sky Listener switched from the targeting display to the icon labeled
“Locator”
.  It displayed the local view of stars and then began overlaying several maps that were probably programmed in its memory.  After scrolling through several comparisons, it brought up the closest approximation and returned with an answer.  Printed at the bottom of the map it displayed
“98.3% accuracy - Weingard System; 73,820 ly from Earth; Terraform Proj 36 – abandoned 6802
CE
”

Hawke read
the screen over Sky Listener’s shoulder, surprised by the confusing information.  The star comparisons were exact minus the presence of two dim background stars.  He had no reason to expect that the maps would be identical after thousands of years had passed, though with stellar lifecycles, they very well could have been.

“Is any of this familiar to you?” Sky Listener asked.

“Of course not!” he blurted, then placed a hand on his shoulder in apology, “I’m sorry.  I keep forgetting that you aren’t from the same world as me.  In my time, no man had ever gone further than our nearest planet called Mars and even that local mission was not without casualties.  A quarter of that crew never made it home.”

“That word ‘abandoned’
is making me wonder then if we should target one of the other radio stars instead,” Sky Listener said.

Hawke stepped back from the chair and looked out the window.  He hadn’t checked the status of the reactor or the gravitational-reflex engine, but he was fairly certain they would be ready for another jump before the ion thrusters were ever back online.

“Hold that thought while I check something,” Hawke said, seating himself at one of the other control panels. 

All the monitors had an icon in the corner that changed
it from a touch screen to what resembled a DOS display.  He then typed in the word Weingard and pressed enter.  Nothing happened.  He then typed Terraform Project 36 and pressed enter.  Again, nothing happened.

He typed a dozen different DOS action words just to see if it operated like computers of his time.  After no success, he shut off the panel and turned it back on.  He tapped random icons, moving through various sub-screens in the search of anything that could assist him.
  Finally, although he had no idea how he’d gotten there, he discovered a library icon.  He tapped it, bringing up a screen that offered dozens of categories to choose from.  He went straight to the search bar and typed in the words “Terraform Project 36.”

The next thing that c
ame up might as well have been the Wikipedia page for the project.  It was titled
“Terraforming Project 36 – Weingard.”
 

“I’ve got something here,” Hawke said,
bringing everyone to his workstation.

The page was extremely detailed, offering more information than Hawke could even understand.  He knew nothing of terraforming or the technologies they possessed to accomplish such things.  What he gleaned from the
information however was that this system contained an Earthlike planet with an atmosphere that was too rich in Carbon Dioxide and lacking in sufficient oxygen.  The planet also lacked water and the amount of ozone necessary to sustain and protect living organisms.

There were a lot of terraforming projects going on when 36 was started and the others
were showing more signs of success than this one.  After devoting nearly half a billion man-hours and more than two hundred years to Weingard, it was abandoned in favor of others that were showing more evidence of success.

“Why are we even reading about a planet without water and oxygen?” Light Bender asked, “Let’s move on to one that offers us a place to land and survive.”

“Because the computer in my ship told me that I’d been sleeping for almost two hundred thousand years.  If that’s true, the information in this particular ship is telling me that Weingard was abandoned more than a hundred and eighty thousand years ago.  We still don’t know how old this ship is, so we can’t tell if its computers have been updated in just as long of a time,” Hawke stated, “We might as well take a look at the planet while we’re here to see if they decided to pick up the project again later.  I’m hungry and I’d like to believe there’s a chance that the planet is populated with millions of people willing to share some food with us.”

“Couldn’t hurt,” Kashuba added with a shrug.

“But where’s this planet?” Fire Dragon asked.

“Already on the task,” Sky Listener hollered, working furiously at the navigation display, “It has records of this system and it’s telling
me we are positioned about two hundred million miles from the central star.”

Winter Grass and the nameless paramedic from the repulsive animal lab had joined them on the bridge at some point during their discussion.  They were acting as spectators, more intrigued by the beautiful scene beyond the windows than by the decisions they were trying to make.

“We’ve got more than zero power on the thrusters now,” Fire Dragon offered, glancing at his station as he walked past, “Maybe five or six percent.  At least we know it operates on some form of replenishable fuel.”

“Can you operate the rear thrusters again in a way that would turn the ship twenty
-six degrees to the left?” Sky Listener asked.

“Why do you ask?” Hawke perked up at this.

“If we can turn twenty-six degrees and head about seventy-three million miles in that direction, we would meet up with the planet we’re searching for as it advances its way around the star,” Sky Listener replied.

Hawke rushed over to Fire Dragon and watched as he brought up his thruster controls again.  They examined the
various aft thruster controls for a moment, trying to determine a way to manually move the ship in that direction.  Fire Dragon continued reminding him of how little power they had available to the thrusters.

“Moving in space isn’t like moving at sea or in the air,” Hawke said for all those in earshot, “
There is no friction whatsoever, so thrusters require significantly less fuel.  If we shoot this ship forward at a thousand miles per second and then turn off the thrusters, we will continue to move forward unless the gravity of another body takes hold of us and alters our course or slows us down.  We only need enough fuel to start us in the right direction.”

“If we use this thruster,” Fire Dragon said, pointing to the rear thruster on the right side, “We would turn the ship.  But according to your statement about the lack of friction, wouldn’t we keep turning after we shut it off?”

“Yeah, that’s the tricky part,” Hawke muttered, turning to Sky Listener hoping for a suggestion.

Sky Listener looked at the two of them and grinned.  Hawke held out his hands, pleading for the man to share what was on his mind.

“Seventy-three million miles is a long distance and thus, it offers us lot of time to make course corrections,” he stated, “You turn a little too far to the left?  Give it a burst from the left engine to move it toward the right!  If it’s too much in that direction, push the ship in the other.  I’m sure you’ll get it perfect before we’re even a million miles from where we started.”

As usual, Sky Listener offered the common sense they needed.

“Then let’s go find this abandoned planet,” Hawke stated, “And once we get on the right course, I want some speed from those thrusters.”