Empire of Bones (13 page)

“How much warning would we have before it fails?”

Baxter shrugged. “Who knows? Probably time enough to get out of there. Possibly not. Personally, I’m willing to take the risk. I already have a team of volunteers standing by.”

Kelsey couldn’t fathom why people could be ready to risk death that way, but she also didn’t understand why firefighters ran into burning buildings when there weren’t people inside. From his expression, Jared did understand the urge, though.

The Captain turned his attention to the tactical officer. “Zia, anything to add to our scanner take?”

“Quite a bit, Captain. The life pods are all still in place and so are the ship’s boats. Another ship must’ve done whatever evacuation they could manage. The interior is frozen. Life support is not online. Other than the power readings from the fusion plant and the distress beacon, everything else seems to be offline.”

“We’d go in wearing suits anyway, but that’s good information. Thanks. Lieutenant Reese, we’ll want volunteers from the marines to help provide security and some muscle if we need it.”

The marine officer nodded. “I have two squads ready to go in armored vacuum suits.”

“Do you have anything to help us get inside? I’m certain that the hatches are locked and we don’t have the keys, even if we had power for their systems.”

“We can cut though a hatch with boarding cutters. It won’t be pretty, but it’ll be quick.”

Lieutenant Commander Graves gave Jared a look. “You’ve said ‘we’ several times, Captain. You aren’t planning to go over there, are you? Not before we make sure it isn’t going to blow up.”

Jared nodded. “Actually, I am. I’ve made a study of all the material we have on pre-Fall Fleet ships. It might not be much, but I might be able to make a difference. Besides, you heard Dennis. We’ll probably know before it goes critical.”

“I heard him say ‘probably’,” Kelsey said. “You can’t risk yourself like that. You’re the mission commander.”

He turned his attention her way. “Actually, I can. My orders regarding the recovery of pre-Fall technology are crystal clear. I’m to do everything within my power to do so, even at moderate risk. The ship can get along without me, and my personal knowledge might be critical to recovering this ship. In any case, I’m the one that makes that call.”

Graves didn’t look particularly happy at that response, but he nodded. Grudgingly. “We’ll keep a close eye on the situation from out here. If I make the call to evacuate the wreck, will you override me?”

“Probably not,” Jared responded. “I don’t want to die for a piece of junk any more than the next guy. If you say run, I’m not waiting to ask how fast.”

Kelsey didn’t like this one bit. Her elation at the find evaporated. She might not know him that well, but part of her quailed at the idea of her half-brother taking such an awful risk. Even if he wasn’t her blood, she didn’t want to lose him.

“What about the scientists?” she asked. “Could some of them help with defusing the power plant?”

The engineer shrugged. “Possibly, but most likely not. They’re theory, not hardware. I’ll have them available if I have a problem. Like not knowing whether to cut the red or blue wire.”

Kelsey gave him a quelling glare. “That isn’t funny.”

He grinned for a moment before his expression faded back to seriousness. “No, it’s not. We need to get a move on, Captain. We might regret chatting an extra few minutes later.”

Jared stood. “Bring the ship to alert status and back off to a safe distance. We’ll depart as soon as the teams are in the marine pinnaces. Dismissed.”

Kelsey wanted to follow him and say something, but she had no idea what. Be careful? Duh. She’d just have to trust him to do his job and come back safely.

Instead, she followed Graves back up to the bridge and commandeered one of the empty consoles. She’d watch every step of their mission on the big screen.

Graves stepped beside her console. “Let me enable the visual controls for you. Then you can pause, rewind, and zoom what we see on your console if you feel like it. The suits all have helmet cams.”

“Thank you. May I call you Charlie?”

He smiled. “I’d like it if you did.”

“Charlie, has he lost his mind?”

He chuckled. “I sometimes wonder. No. He wouldn’t be going if he didn’t think he had a reason to and a good possibility of coming back. He wouldn’t risk his crew for nothing.”

She took a deep breath. “Okay.”

“
Athena
, this is
Marine Two
. Both pinnaces are ready to depart.”

Graves walked back to the command console and opened the channel. “God speed,
Marine Two
. Come back safe.”

“Roger that.
Marine Two
out.”

The main screen picked up the two pinnaces shortly after that as they made their run to the wreck. The marine craft were significantly larger than the passenger cutters. Marines were armed and their ships armored. Perhaps if the ship blew up while they fled, that would give them an extra chance of surviving.

Kelsey sat back in her seat and tried to loosen her tense muscles. This was going to be a long, stressful day.

Rather than displace the marine pilot, Jared sat in the back with the rest of the marines and engineering techs in
Marine Two
. They’d be docking on the forward half of the derelict while Baxter went aft. If their way was blocked, Jared’s team might make it to the fusion plant faster.

He had the small screen in his vacuum suit tuned to the visual from the external cameras. The wicked spin on
Courageous
made matching course a challenge. One miscalculation and the wreck would swat them like a bug.

The pilot eased close to the derelict and then lined up with the tumble. Thankfully, the rotation wasn’t too bad or they might not have been able to match with it at all. The pinnace corrected for the spin and made contact with the other hull hard enough to rattle his teeth.

“We’re locked down, Captain,” the pilot said on the mission frequency. “We’re about a dozen meters from what looks like an emergency hatch. You’ll need to use magnetic boots and tethers. The centrifugal force is powerful.”

“Roger. Be ready to haul ass if we come running back.”

“Aye, sir.”

Lieutenant Reese stood and began hooking the men together with tough lines. “If someone comes loose, I want everyone to grab the hull with your hand clamps. We’ll always have half of us holding onto the ship, just in case.”

They all checked one another’s suits again. Only then did the marine officer pump the atmosphere out and open the assault ramp.

The stars spun crazily over the steady horizon of the derelict’s hull. It made Jared a little sick to his stomach so he focused his eyes on the back of the man in front of him. That settled him down. The floodlights on the pinnacle brightly illuminated
Courageous’
hull.

They made their way slowly onto the old Empire ship and toward the emergency hatch. The team moved at a snail’s pace. A man broke loose halfway to the hatch, but they pulled him back down.

When everyone stopped moving, they hunkered down and activated their hand clamps. A bright red line surrounded the large hatch and rescue instructions were painted right on the hull. It looked very similar to the ones on
Athena
.

Jared didn’t expect it to work, but he twisted the emergency handle as instructed. The hatch slowly pulled into the ship revealing a large airlock with dim red emergency lighting.

“That’s useful,” Jared said. “It must be internally powered. Quite a tribute to its designers.”

He switched to the mission frequency. “Team One, we’ve opened the external hatch. We’re going in.”

“Roger that,” Baxter said. “No joy back here. We’re cutting ours open.”

Jared pulled himself into the airlock and wedged his arm through a handhold. The airlock had bags and boxes full of equipment, and probably rescue supplies. The interior hatch wouldn’t open while the outside one was open, so the team had to split up. The half that followed Jared inside held on tight as he closed the hatch. He held his breath, but the inner door opened as easily as the exterior.

The corridor beyond was in total darkness. Any emergency lighting had failed. He advanced inside far enough to plant his feet against the wall and turned his helmet lamp on. They’d need to be very careful of the centrifugal force inside, too. One inattentive moment could maim or kill.

Once the second team made it inside, Jared sighed in relief. “Okay, let’s start working our way back toward engineering.”

Movement inside was almost as slow as outside, if less nerve-wracking. Baxter reported that they were inside a few minutes later.

“We’re seeing some damage,” the engineer said, “but I think we’ll make it to engineering without too much trouble. Why don’t you head for the bridge? You might be able to bring some controls online from there.”

“Agreed,” Jared said. “Let us know when you get there.”

A hatch ahead of them was open. With the wicked spin, the wall it occupied was more of a floor. He looked inside and recognized a personnel cabin. It looked normal, though the spin had thrown everything against the outside bulkhead.

He started to edge past it, but something caught his eye. There was a body in the detritus. “Hold up. We have a body. I’m going inside.”

It occurred to him as he lowered himself down the steep slope that the person below was centuries beyond his ability to help, but the impulse to go had be instinctual. A minute wouldn’t hurt them and the video might be helpful to the scientists.

He managed to get inside without injuring himself and moved the debris until he could see a woman’s face. At least he felt certain it was a woman. All the moisture in her body had evaporated in the vacuum leaving her remains mummified and frozen solid.

She wore a uniform very similar to the ones hanging in his closet. She was Fleet. A glance at her arm showed her to be a Senior Petty Officer. He moved the junk around until he could see all of her. There were no obvious injuries.

He climbed back up to the corridor. “Let’s press on to the bridge.”

Jared found an internal diagram near the first lift they encountered. It indicated they needed to climb five decks from the next lift forward.

“Captain,” Baxter said. “We’re in main engineering. That shot damaged the flip drive, but didn’t destroy it. It missed almost all the major equipment. I’m somewhat surprised they weren’t able to make repairs. We have some bodies in Fleet uniforms. It looks like the damage exposed them to space.”

“We found a body, too. We’re almost to the bridge lift. Find the fusion plant and get it shut down.”

“Aye, sir.”

They had to pry the doors apart when they reached the lift. Luckily, the platform wasn’t between them and the bridge. The particular nature of the spin made getting there an easy walk.

The lift doors at the bridge level were hard to open from the shaft, but they finally gave up the ghost. Jared stepped out onto the bridge and froze. It was significantly bigger than
Athena’s
bridge, but that wasn’t its more striking feature. Each seat held a dead Fleet officer.

“Baxter, we have bodies on the bridge. Something is very wrong.”

“Sounds like. We’re at the fusion plant. I’ll call you when I figure it out.”

Jared turned to his men. “Fan out in pairs. Explore the nearby areas. Be careful.” He singled out one of the men to wait with him.

He climbed to what he thought was the Captain’s console and studied the man strapped in there. His body was in a very similar condition to the woman they’d found earlier. His uniform indicated he was a full captain, though there wasn’t a nametag. He wore an odd-looking headset. There were no microphones and it didn’t cover his ears. He couldn’t determine its purpose. There was no obvious sign of injury that Jared could see.

A trip around the bridge told him none of these people had battle wounds, yet they’d all died at their stations. The damage to the ship wasn’t bad enough to kill them here. Or that woman. Something else had caused their deaths. All wore the strange headsets.

Maybe he could bring the Captain’s console to life and find something. Fleet built all the critical systems on
Athena
with small power units to operate with if the main systems went offline. Surely the old Empire worried about battle damage taking out the main power grid, too.

Dust coated the console. He brushed it away with his gloved hand. It was a flat panel, very sleek and futuristic. The irony of thinking that about a 500-year-old wreck made him snort a little.

He felt around the sides and under the rim for an emergency power switch. He found it on the right side up front where no one could unintentionally hit it, but it was still within easy reach by the Captain.

The consoled flickered when Jared flipped the recessed switch. He didn’t think it would come on at all, but it slowly brightened. The layout of the virtual controls was unfamiliar to him, though he thought he could figure them out.

This was a ship’s status screen. The pattern of the red and amber dots formed a ship. Almost all the dots were red so he picked one of the few amber ones toward the aft of the ship. The display expanded at a touch and showed what he guessed was engineering. The dot remained amber, but some text appeared beside it.

It was the fusion plant. The safety interlocks were disabled. It said so right there. The output was fluctuating and there was a lurid warning about the danger of explosion.

He opened a channel to the Chief Engineer. “Dennis, I have the Captain’s console up and running. I have a reading on the fusion plant. It says someone overrode the safety interlocks. It has a warning about the output fluctuations.”

“That’s more than I’m getting here,” the engineer grumbled. “The controls seem fried. At least the displays are. Perhaps that’s why they overrode the interlocks. This plant shouldn’t be operating without the local controls.

“Are you going to be able to shut it down from there?”

“Probably not. I’m accessing the video from your helmet cam. That looks bad. I want to shut down the plant right now. You’re going to have to drive for me.”