Two Weeks; Three Years; In the Blink of an Eye
Chapter Two
Chloe
Eli stood at the controls to release Chloe from her stasis chamber, wanting desperately to awaken her, but at the same time, fearful that if things didn't go the way they wanted, he would be sentencing her to death, her and everyone else. He could face it, barely, but he just couldn't do that to the woman he loved - having her know that going back into the pod, there was the almost definite possibility she would never wake up again.
But at the same time, what if she was the one to save them all?
Time was growing short. He had to make a decision - forget about it and try to repair the final pod in the short time that was left. Or trust his calculations were correct and head back to the star. Or bring Chloe out of stasis and hope, and pray, it was the right thing to do. In frustration, Eli turned, took three steps toward the bridge, then turned back and hit the controls that awakened her before he could change his mind again.
As the door slid up, Eli could see the confusion on her face. To her, she had just stepped into the chamber but a heartbeat ago.
Seeing Eli, she asked, "Has it been three years already?" Then realizing he was the only one there, she continued, a worried look on her face and in her voice. "What's wrong? Why am I the only one awake?"
She then began to panic - something wasn't right!
"It's all right," he answered, trying to keep her from losing control. "Everything's fine. Trust me, it's great!"
But it wasn't working.
"What the hell's happening, Eli? Tell me!"
"Okay. Look I have an idea, a good one, that ..." Eli was having trouble getting out what he needed her to know to allay her fears. He started again, taking a deep breath. "Okay, I'm having more trouble that I thought I would have trying to fix the broken pod."
"And you need ME to help you? What about Dr. Rush? I'm sure he... "
"No. You don't understand. Just let me finish, please. I need more time... "
"How long has it been? How long have I been asleep?"
"Um, not sure, nine, maybe ten days."
"But I thought two weeks was the limit."
"It is, but if my idea works, I'll have plenty of time to fix it. Just don't interrupt, okay? Let me tell you."
Chloe nodded, but crossed her arms over her chest, letting him know it had better be good!
"Okay. Like I said, time is running out on me. We are out of the galaxy, but Destiny passed a single star way out here. And I was thinking that if we were able to go back to it, we could dip down into it and replenish Destiny's reserve power, and then not only would I have enough time to repair the chamber, but there would be enough power left over that when we got to wherever it is we end up, there won't be the mad scramble to find the right star. But I need you to look over my calculations. I keep looking at them and I know they're right, but what if they aren't?"
"And you don't think Dr. Rush would be a better choice than me?"
"No, I don't. There's just something about him I just don't trust. And besides, you solved calculations he couldn't, a couple of times. Who else is here?"
"You're putting an awful lot of pressure on me. Do you think that's fair?"
"No. It isn't fair, Chloe. This whole - Destiny thing isn't fair, to any of us. But you're the only one I trust."
Chloe took a deep, troubled breath, closed her eyes for a second, opened them, and said, "I suppose it wouldn't hurt to look at them."
With a big grin, Eli brought out the six pages, filled on both sides with equations and calculations. Chloe shook her head and began to go over them line by line.
"How about we go to the observation deck?" she suggested after a few minutes. "This may take a while."
"Okay, but be ready for a surprise things look different now that we're in deep, deep space."
After her initial shock of seeing no passing stars and no colors, she sat on one of the benches to begin again. But Eli was hovering, distracting her.
"Do you think you could get me some water or something, and maybe something to snack on?"
"Sure," he replied happily. "Be back in a jiff."
"Take your time," she said to his disappearing back.
After bringing her the requested food and drink, Eli returned to the stasis chamber needing repair, something to keep him busy. He had realized she needed time alone, with nothing to sidetrack her. After an hour of basically doing nothing useful, he couldn't stand it anymore and went to see how she was coming.
She looked up at him when he came back in, then went back to her reading. He saw that she was nearing the end of the last page, so he waited patiently, looking out at the empty void until she spoke to him.
"Well, I don't see anything really wrong. These calculations are, well, they're perfect. But there is one thing."
"What?" Pride in what he had done suddenly turned to panic.
"According to what you've done, if we're going to do this, we should have dropped out of FTL about four hours ago."
"What? No! Are you sure?"
"I think so. Look here." Chloe turned the next to last page and pointed out the figures on the bottom half of the page.
"Of course! How stupid of me!" he chastised himself. "Now everything has to be refigured. It will take days! Days we don't have."
"No it won't," Chloe argued. "Do you have something to write with?"
From somewhere Eli produced a pencil.
"Okay," she said as she returned to the first page and carefully circled several lines of equations in three different places. "All we have to do is rework these figures to correspond with these." And she then went to the last page and again circled a block of equations half a page long.
Eli looked at the first page, went to the last page, and back again, twice.
"You're right," he agreed. "My god, you're a genius!" He started laughing. "This will work! We can do this!"
"Okay," Chloe said as she joined in laughing with him. "It won't take me that long to rework these, so why don't you go back to the bridge and drop us back into normal space, and then turn the ship around?"
"I'm ON IT!" he exclaimed as he all but ran out of the observation deck back to the bridge.
To Be Continued