Quest for the Conestoga (Colony Ship Conestoga Book 1) (25 page)

“What were they trying?”  Cammarry asked in wonder.  “Is it about making planet fall, or getting into orbit, or what?”

“Those messages are missing a lot of vital facts,” Jerome said. “What brains are they speaking about?  Is that all there was?”

Sandie continued, “The final bit of information is very sad.  It is Captain Lance Lechner speaking.  He states,
‘Ship’s Brain trust under habbie insurgent attack.  Security overrun.  I will hold them off while the gig’s gizmo does its work.  Sara is dead…. …we have failed miserably… Brains in habbies acknowledged….Unknown for future …cannot believe it comes to this….  I do not know which is a worse fate, that planet or being trapped on this needle ship….   May God in his mercy let the habbies survive….’
That is the end of the information which was reconstituted.”  The emotion was thick in Sandie’s artificial voice. 

“Sandie, keep analyzing that and make some conjectures and extrapolations.  What are habbies?  What brains is he talking about?  Can you access anything that tells us about the secondary systems so we can make course corrections?”  Cammarry asked. 

“Nothing on that device.  Can you connect the com-link to another access port on that work station?”  Sandie replied.  “There looks to be several which are undamaged.”

Cammarry unjacked the cable and walked to the work station.  Khin was standing there with his hand on the light controls.  She located another access port and connected in the cable. 

“Entering this section of the nonphysicality,” Sandie said.  “Jerome, please connect in a fusion pack.  I believe I have found something very helpful!”

Jerome set a fusion pack on the end of the work station.  He connected it to a different access port.  The work station came alive with readings, lights, the needles on gauges sprang to life, and the monitors blinked on.

“Much more wizard work!”  Khin said and pulled his hand back away from the light controls.  “You understand all this?  You two must be the greatest wizards since the Old One.”

Cammarry and Jerome ignored him as they concentrated on the work station.  Systems were starting to power up, and readings were being displayed.  On the left side monitor, there was a column with twenty different names.  All were highlighted in bright flashing red. 

“I think those are the twenty dead AIs in that other room,” Jerome said as he looked carefully at them.  “The list does read like primary artificial intelligence systems.  What a waste!”  He reached up and touched the first one on the list with his finger. 

An annoying sound came from the monitor.  “I bet that is a negative function warning.”

“Yes!  Yes!  That sound means the spirit-ghost will not answer.  Some doors and other things sound that way when they are broken.  After a time, the sound does not come anymore, no matter how much you push it,” Khin said.  “It comes at first and for a while, then does not come anymore.  Were you trying to open that bright door?”

“In a way I was trying to open it, yes,” Jerome responded.  “I was looking to interface or gain control over one of the systems.”  He pushed the next one down, and it too gave off the annoying sound. 

“You wizards are so brave!  Trying to control a spirit-ghost?  Oh what courage!”  Khin’s face shone with adoration. 

Cammarry had been studying the bank of controls.  She pushed a slide lever to the right and then twisted a dial.  With each click of the dial the monitor on the right flashed a new image.  Many images were highlighted in red, and some were wavering and crisscrossed with lines of static.  After several more adjustments, a green screen came on with basic white lettering.  ‘Bypass secondary lattice?’ the monitor blinked in green.

Cammarry reached up and tapped the blinking green letters.  “This really is an antique.  Touch activated and confirmed.  I am into the tertiary system auxiliary controls.”

“That was new and innovative in its time.  Evolution and innovation go hand in hand. Success is to think like they did yesterday and make it apply to what we need to be sufficient for today,” Jerome said as he watched Cammarry work.  “You would have fit into the twenty-first century well.”

“Before or after the Great Event?”  Cammarry laughed.  “Or during?”

“We are in our own Great Event right now.  If we can change the Conestoga’s course, our future and everyone else here will be better,” Jerome said. 

“But not Dome 17’s future,” Cammarry replied.  “Unless we can find out how that Captain got the message through. I came here to save all of them.”  Sweat was running down her face as she made miniscule adjustments.  “Sandie, can you assist me in these modifications?”

“I apologize, but I cannot help in that way.  To be crude, you are on manual.  Your physical adjustments are outside the nonphysicality, and while I can see what you are doing, from the com-link, I cannot influence any of the things you are altering.  I do see some of the aftereffects in the nonphysicality, as larger places have opened, but I cannot connect to anything more useful than the operations board at the work station.  I will keep probing.”

The monitor shifted again as Cammarry clicked the dial another time. 

“You just opened a conduit to the main engines!”  Sandie exclaimed.  “I am able to assess them now.”

“Finally.  Now Sandie can do the course corrections,” Cammarry said with relief.  “Use the scouts scanning and then fire the engines to correct course.”

“Sadly, that will not work.  It is an excellent idea, however, I cannot make any course corrections.  The main engines are in a similar state to the gallery of memory cores, and the command bridge.  It is a barren wasteland of broken connections and shattered linkages.  I conjecture that the attackers that Captain Lance Lechner called ‘habbie insurrectionists’ destroyed the main engines.  They show a very similar style of damage.”

Cammarry readjusted and modified again what she was doing.  “I am back in tertiary auxiliary control.  I see life support, gravity manipulation, and two other systems running, they are marked in green.  I am afraid if I try to adjust them, or use their subsystems, they may very well shut down.  There is a manually initiated program here, outlined in yellow, which is called ‘per aspera ad astra! tutum deficient circum propositum’ but I have no idea what that means.”

“That is a very old Earth language,” Jerome said.  “It means roughly, ‘Through adversity to the stars! Fail safe circles the objective’.”

“Jerome, that is not quite accurate,” Sandie started to say. 

“I see it is connected to orbital adjustment rockets!”  Cammarry explained as she slightly altered the setting.  I am initiating it!”

Cammarry turned the dial, slid the lever back to the opposite side, and then pushed in on the dial.  The monitor screen flashed and the yellow outline around the words on the screen shifted to brilliant blue color in a steady glow.

The left monitor shifted and a view of the green planet was seen.  The right monitor kept glowing the brilliant blue color. 

Cabta 3F awoke.  A dormant system which was over one-hundred years old, responded to the call.  It actually worked.  Cabta 3F, a barely sentient, redundant fail-safe system, a tertiary artificial intelligence, sprang into action.  Its agenda was simple.  Assessment, planning, implementation, and evaluation were its next steps, in that order.  It had been resting quietly, not thinking about anything, just waiting for the time it might be needed.  It was not even aware enough to know there was a passage of time as its central memory core sat in a remote corner of an engineering closet, deep within the bowels of the needle ship.  When it awoke, the fluids began to bubble and move, and its mechanical and artificial brain started processing.   It used its links and couplings for assessment to determine the ship’s position in space, and looked for the target world.  Being rather simplistic, for an artificial intelligence system, and being that the green world was close, Cabta 3F identified that as the target world.  It complied the information and compared the ship’s location to the planet.  Assessment completed. 

Planning took place.  The goal was to insert the Conestoga into a stable orbit so the habitats could be jettisoned and landed on the planet.  The original builders of Cabta 3F designed it to be used in case there was limited human leadership at the end of the generations long voyage through space.  Cabta 3F did not notice that there were no habitats connected any longer to the needle ship.  That was irrelevant to the goal of establishing a stable orbit.  It followed its programming by calculating speed, conditions, and trajectories needed to make the course corrections.

Implementation of the plan was the next step.  Cabta 3F tried the main engines.  There was no response.  Since Cabta 3F had no emotional components or even the ability to understand emotions, it just switched to the next algorithm.  It called for the orbital adjustment rockets.  In sixteen places on the needle ship section of the Colony Ship Conestoga, Cabta 3F linked to huge rocket motors.  It had looked for all twenty-two of the original orbital adjustment rockets, but only sixteen responded.  Cabta 3F modified its calculation to use the sixteen.  Each of those immense rocket motors swiveled into precise positions.

In a choreographed dance of timing and meticulousness, set by Cabta 3F, the signal was sent for those rockets to fire. 

Thirteen responded appropriately. Two rockets fired, but their power sheared off the permalloy connecting brackets which held them to the frame of the needle ship.  Both of those swooshed away on a wild ride into space, fortunately not striking any part of the Conestoga.  The last rocket exploded.  That explosion tore a huge section of the needle ship into pieces and exposed some compartments to vacuum.  Automatic sealers clanged shut, bulkhead doors locked, and pressurization was maintained, although a slow leak of atmosphere resulted.

Back in the deck level under the command bridge, Jerome, Cammarry and Khin first felt, and then heard, a deep and low vibration.  It built and built until the shaking and rattling wobbled everything.  The floor quivered so badly it was difficult to stand up. 

“Is this the end?”  Khin called out as he fell to his knees.  “Have I failed in my service to you wizards?  Are you destroying the world?”

“Sandie?  What is happening?”  Cammarry yelled. 

“I think that system kicked it,” Jerome yelled over the roar that was vibrating through everything. 

“There are rockets firing,” The AI Sandie answered.  “Using the scout ship’s observation equipment, I am configuring what the course corrections will do.  In the nonphysicality at this location, I see nothing to indicate what has occurred.  I conjecture you did activate some kind of system which is altering the course of the Conestoga.  I am not sure if it will land the ship on the planet, head it to deep space, or keep it in orbit.  Should it attempt landing, I conjecture a high potential for failure, as the needle ship was not designed for use in an atmosphere.”

Cabta 3F evaluated its actions.  The stable orbit was not established.  So the old and limited AI started the process over.  Assessment, planning, implementation, and evaluation were repeated. 

Measurements were taken, rockets were re-aimed, and rockets were fired.

The massive shaking of the Conestoga continued. 

Cabta 3F evaluated its actions again.  The stable orbit was not established.  It repeated the process.  The fail-safe, backup AI did assessment, planning, implementation, and evaluation.    The cycle was repeated. 

Cammarry, Jerome, and Khin was sitting on the deck trying to brace themselves and hold onto the work station.  The mummified body of Captain Lance Lechner crumbed into chunks which jittered and skittered across the floor away from the uniform which once held them in.

Nine times, Cabta 3F went through the same process.  On the tenth time, the evaluation showed, ‘Stable orbit achieved’.

The shuddering stopped. 

The monitor in the work station flashed ‘Stable orbit achieved’ in bright blue colors. 

Cabta 3F went back to sleep.  It had no programming to continue any other functions.  It did not even feel a sense of accomplishment.  It just went back to sleep.

“Wizards?  You have shaken the world!”  Khin said.  “Is it finished now?”