Adrift
Orie, the galley steward, hardly a day over sixty and just out of the academy, was singing to herself as she prepared the crew's first watch meal when Essa woke. It was an old, old song, but that still rang true, as far as Essa was concerned. She sang:
When I was a maiden, I put out to sea,
My love waited by the shore,
And when I came home,
We built us a house,
I don't to go sea any more.
She knew, Essa thought. She knew, and that meant that soon the whole crew would know. Neela was gone, as Essa had expected, though she hadn't expected her bag to feel as cold and empty as it did. It was almost as though it hadn't happened, Neela's skin against hers, the two of them panting in the moments afterward, both of them as giddy as if all they had to worry about was being discovered by their mothers. Essa made sure her uniform was on straight before she slipped out of her bag, and pushed herself toward the companionway to the bridge.
Orie called out to stop her. "Captain!" she said. By the time Essa had turned around, Orie was there behind her, two small pouches in hand. She was short, but so narrowly built, Essa imagined she could slip into the space between the interior and exterior bulkhead. Her skin was a darker shade of blue, almost purple, and she had yellowish markings over the bridge of her nose, and on her chin. She smiled her lopsided grin then seemed to remember suddenly that she was addressing the captain. "Captain," she said again, sounding nervous. "I was going to wake you, but now that you're up, I have your breakfast." She smiled and gave Essa a brief salute before she returned to her work. Essa tucked the two pouches into a pocket designed specifically for that purpose, and entered the companionway to the flight deck.
No good news. Broadcasting on all open channels had turned up no responses from anything in their vicinity. Navigational data suggested their momentum was carrying them toward the center of the system, though their path would intersect with one of the outer gas giants in a less than thirty-six hours, if they didn't take action. A burn long enough to vector them out of danger would see at least a quarter of their current fuel stores depleted.
Worse even was that the system reboot they'd experienced before the event—Essa could think of no other word for it—appeared to have altered their navigational software. The navigator sent the data to Essa's screen. She thought the plotted path looked all right, but the numbers didn't add up. The vectors and burn-times were wrong: the vectors were too long, the burn-times too short relative to the output of their engines.
"What do you make of it?" Essa said. She looked at the navigator, who shook her head as she examined her own panel.
"I don't know," she said. Essa looked across to the second mate, now the Nixia's acting XO. "Your watch is supposed to be over," she said, "but I will need to impose upon you for a little while longer."
"Aye-aye, Captain."
Essa rose from her seat. She'd scarcely had time to strap herself in.
"Where are you going?" the navigator said.
"Captain," Essa shot back.
The navigator blinked, but nodded and said, "Captain."
"That will be all for now. I will be in the cargo bay. Raise me on the comms if you need me."
#
Through the companionway again. On the crew deck, the science team, the commandos, and the engineering crew had assembled for the morning meal. Orie darted here and there, and flashed Essa a smile and a salute. Almost everyone—save the commandos—rose to a standing position to do the same before returning to their conversations. Neela was sitting with her team, her back turned. Essa paused a moment to see if she would come over to say hello, but Neela was discussing something on a datapad that hovered in in the air in the midst of her team.
Down through engineering and the aft observation and storage. Down into the cargo bay, where Razia was seated with the two technicians. No one was talking, but instead studying screens they had deployed on the console in front of them. Essa approached close enough to see they were showing the same data the navigator was studying on her console, far above on the flight deck.
"I hope I'm not interrupting," Essa said.
Razia looked up and shook her head. The two technicians turned around, but said nothing, and soon returned to work.
"You're studying our problem, I see," Essa said.
"You could say that," Razia said. She slapped her palms to her knees and let her body drift upward from her seat. "Care to join us?"
"I even brought breakfast," Essa said. She got out her pouches and showed them to Razia, who again shook her head.
"We're fine, Captain."
Essa took Razia's seat. She sipped from the pouches, while she watched the technicians work. They were, it seemed, trying to determine which were the corrupted lines of code.
"So you know our navigation software has been rewritten."
"We are aware," Razia said.
One of the techs turned around in her seat. "We were actually wondering when you were going to come down to see us."
Essa glared, but said nothing.
The tech smiled. "I have something to show you," she said.
She pushed away from her console and moved over to a little rig that rested on a workbench. It didn't look like much: two copper coils, spaced just so, a small power source, a few instruments attached.
"I've seen an electromagnet before," Essa said with a sigh.
"Not like this," the tech said. She pulled a piece of the mineral from her pocket: it had been pressed and shaped into a sphere the size of a large marble, and in the light appeared to shimmer light blue and white. She carefully placed the marble between the two coils before switching on the power. Nothing remarkable happened.
"I don't see how this is going to fix our navigation software," Essa said. "Or solve our fuel situation."
The tech only smiled. "Everything," she said, "every piece of matter in existence, has mass. It makes things hard to move around. Even in space."
Essa only shrugged. That much was obvious.
"What if you could shed all your mass? Or increase it substantially?"
"What are you suggesting?" Essa said.
"This mineral," the tech said. "It's everywhere on Thessia. It's all over High Rock. It's in our bones, and our bloodstreams. It's odd how little we understand it." She took out another piece of the mineral from her pocket, a small bead of metal no larger than the head of a pin that she placed near the larger sphere. After a moment, the bead began to orbit the larger marble. Essa still wasn't impressed. The tech adjusted the power to the coil, causing the bead to fall inward, into a much tighter orbit. Reducing power flung it back outward, until the bead stabilized again.
"Now watch," the tech said. She reversed the polarity and the bead was hurled away from the coil. In fact, the force shot it up into the empty space above them, where it struck a support with a loud crack, and bounced around here and there for another few seconds.
"What am I looking at here?"
"What just happened," the tech said, "Is, on a very small scale, what happened to us. The installation and the ship interacted much in the same way. The installation trapped us in a negatively charged field, increasing our mass astronomically, then it flipped the polarity, stripping all that mass away, and the—call it the recoil—of that action launched us at tremendous speed toward a linked installation that sent us another signal that told us to reverse the polarity again and slow us down to a reasonable velocity."
"Us?"
"Well, it happened automatically. That box, and this—" The tech gestured up at the probe that had been mostly taken apart, except for its drive system, and welded into its bracing. "We think we've worked out a way to use the drive system in the probe to cast a similar field, to help the ship shed some of its mass. Coupled with the antiproton output from the probe's drive, we may be able to do what the navigation system is suggesting."
"What about fuel?"
"Antimatter annihilation is a lot more efficient than our typical drive output."
Essa nodded. Efficiency mattered very little, when the fuel tanks ran dry. For a split second Essa considered voicing this concern, but decided just as quickly, that this was the moment for her act like a ship's captain: she was the woman who was worried by nothing, surprised by nothing, afraid of nothing—not even ordering her crew into certain death. Everything, even scientific mysteries that had recently been revealed to them and the near certitude that they would all die a thousand light years from home, were merely problems to be solved by being broken down into small manageable tasks. "Inform me of any resources you may need," she said. "Now get to work."
#
Dissatisfaction on the engineering deck. Essa made her rounds, checking in with the different stations, trying to gauge what materials they might have on hand, or be able to salvage if they needed to construct something for the technicians down below.
Same on the science deck. Everyone in the labs hovered over their work, staring at data and images. Everyone shaking their heads, and pretending that everything was all right. When Essa left each compartment she heard the voices start up again. The rumors and speculation. They were talking about her, she knew. Everyone talked about the captain. No matter how exciting the mission, after a while, everyone wondered when they would get a chance to step on land again.
But now—what a day to be captain of a ship. They were likely stranded in this system. And even if they weren't, another encounter with the installation in this new system might send them another thousand light years farther away. Their trusted, stern, and confident captain was dead, and this untested nymph, scarcely two hundred years old was meant to lead them to safety, when really, all she had been able to think about all morning long was having another roll with her chief science officer.
On the flight deck, things were similarly grim, only here the officers had information the rest of the crew was starving for, and that was even less reassuring than having no information at all. The third watch navigator was at the console with her first watch counterpart, studying the observational map. They'd detected a total of seven planets now: three rocky inner globes guarded a belt of asteroids and dust. Beyond the belt: two massive gas giants and another composed of clouds of methane ice, each with their own extensive coteries of satellites or rings or both, and finally an outer planet, the tiny frozen world they had just passed, where hydrogen and oxygen lay frozen in the pits of craters, even on the sunny side of the planet.
The only good news, according to the navigation team was that they might be able to break down some of the frozen solids on the surface of that outer planet to use as fuel, provided they were available in sufficient quantity. It wasn't much, but it was something. Meanwhile they had a rough map of the orbital paths and their distances from the parent star, and after the next cycle, they would have a reasonably good idea of where everything in the system was. On the main scope, the operator was watching auroras blooming red and green at the northern pole of the planet where they would soon crash, if they didn't sort out their navigational situation.
Essa left the bridge. Somehow six hours had passed without her noticing; in eighteen more they would become ensnared in the gas giant's gravity well, and from there, they would either struggle to break free, slingshot themselves toward the interior of the system, or be pulled beneath the clouds, where they would eventually become incorporated into the planet's already huge mass. Essa visited the crew deck, and took the time to speak with the different team leaders, all while carefully avoiding Neela, who also kept her distance.
Essa gave orders for the commandos to sweep the exterior of the ship for damage. "Tell them to take the XO in the launch, if they have to," she told Razia.
After the crew had eaten, Essa made her way below to meet again with Razia. Orie was there in the main lab space, rubbing at the stained spot where the captain had struck the floor. She didn't seem to know what to do with her hands when the captain approached her.
"Captain," she said, "I—good afternoon."
Essa gestured for her to be at ease.
Orie smiled again. As first officer, Essa had rarely ever dealt with her, and up until now her perception of Orie had always been that of a country girl, desperate to get away from home. The scrappy girls who grew up alone in the rough lower layers of the great cities, typically turned to the armed forces. There were too many like her in the research flotilla, young, just out of training, and willing to do just about any job on a ship if it meant the chance to get offworld. These stories only ended well about half of the time in the entertainments girls like Orie watched. Essa knew the ratio was skewed much farther in the direction of unhappy endings.
"I came to ask about our food stores," Essa said. "I'd like to see how much we have left."
"Captain," Orie said, likely buying time to think. "I—I can do an inventory, if you like. Is this an inspection?"
"No, steward." It was, in fact a matter of much greater importance, only she couldn't say so. "I just wanted an estimate."
"All right." Orie thought again. She said, "All the fresh fruit and vegetables are gone. We're down to about half of our stores of rations. So maybe another month's worth of food. If we're careful, we could stretch them to six weeks? Then there's the stuff we keep around for emergencies. That's another week, maybe two."
Essa put her hand on Orie's shoulder and said, "Good work, steward. As you were."
A call came in from the astronomy lab, and Essa pushed off in that direction. In the science compartments, someone was singing, When I was a maiden, but stopped abruptly when the captain entered. Essa made directly for astronomy, pretending to ignore Neela, who also kept her distance.
One of the science team was bent over the display from the telescope. Essa saw that she was focused in on the auroras forming over the gas giant.
"Beautiful, aren't they?" she said. Essa nodded. "This is strange, though. I thought you might want to see it."
"What is it?" Essa said.
The astronomer drew a circle around a small part of the aurora with her finger and the screen zoomed closer, to an area where bolts of lightning seemed to be forming, showering down on the planet's night side, but from far above the upper reaches of its atmosphere.
"It could be a moon, close in," Essa said.
The astronomer shook her head. "It's within the planet's gravitational limits. A moon in that close would be torn apart by tidal forces." She seemed disappointed that Essa hadn't already known that. Essa, for her part, remembered a moment too late that the captain never speculated. She would only ask questions, gather the necessary information, and then speak decisively. Lesson learned. The astronomer drew another circle, this time closer to the source of the electrical storm. There was a dark shape, catching some of the reflected light.
"It's not a moon," she said. "And it's small, too. Maybe less than two kilometers."
"Keep an eye on it," Essa said. "Alert sensors as well."
Now she went to speak to Neela. It seemed she had waited the appropriate length of time, but as she approached her station in the lab, her comm pinged again, and the tech she'd spoken to earlier said, "I think we've figured it out."
#
Down below, Razia was standing on the outer wall of the cargo bay, hands on her hips, and looking proudly at a piece of equipment her techs and some of the science team and engineers had cobbled together. It didn't look like much: a shiny cylindrical tube, with feeder conduits leading directly toward the fuel system.
"What is it?" Essa said.
"It's an antimatter trap. As long as we have enough electrical power, we can generate store enough to propel the ship." After a moment, she said, "We will need to get outside the ship, to finish rigging the conduits."
"What about the navigation problem."
"One problem that seems to have sorted itself out on its own. With annihilation fuel, the ship can run at a higher acceleration."
"And we'll make the appropriate numbers?"
"I actually think we might be able to do better."
"How soon until it's operational?"
"Tomorrow morning at the latest. My team is prepping for EVA already. Then we'll run a test-fire."
Essa frowned. It was too close to their anticipated contact with the gas giant. After a moment, Essa said, "See that you get the work done on time."
#
Another ten hours had gone by, and most of the crew were retiring from their long workday. Essa stretched. She had missed the evening meal, and this had not gone unnoticed by the crew, many of whom were waiting for her on the science deck. They had heard the news from someone—probably the third watch navigator—about their intercept with the outer gas giant. They wanted to know why the ship hadn't changed course already. Neela was floating nearby, as though she had the same questions. Essa paused to speak to them, without answering directly, before returning to the flight deck. Neela caught up to her in the companionway.
"Essa," she said, her voice a whisper. "I know they're planning to use antiproton fuel."
Essa nodded.
"Do you trust them?" Neela said. "Because a even a small droplet of antimatter could destroy the ship."
Essa reached for Neela's hand and found it wasn't there. She understood the risks, she said.
"I don't think you do," Neela answered. "It could kill us all."
Essa reached again. This time Neela didn't shrink away. In less than ten hours they'd be dead anyway, she said. It was either this or crash into the outer gas giant. "We don't have a choice," Essa said.
"We do," Neela said. "We could fire the engines now. It will send us on a longer path, but it will still allow us to return to the installation."
Essa thought. "The navigation system isn't working properly," she said. "And anyhow, a burn of that length will leave us with less than a quarter of our fuel. If we make a mistake our options could become very limited."
"Like what?"
"Like praying one of the inner planets has a breathable atmosphere," Essa said. "That it has things growing on it that we can eat, and acceptable weather, and places where we can establish temporary shelters. I know you've been examining the planets. Do any of them look even remotely habitable?"
Neela nodded. The second planet looked like it might be worth exploring. There were tears in her eyes. She wasn't a natural spacer. She often threw up during maneuvers and on long burns. Microgravity played havoc with her body, in ways that it didn't with others. Ever since they'd met, all Neela had ever wanted to do was to teach planetary science at the University of Serrice. In her expression now, Essa thought she could read the signs that Neela understood she would never get there. She found Neela's hand, pulled her close, and briefly they floated there, embracing cheek to cheek.
"Neela," Essa whispered. "We have to try this. Who knows if anyone will ever come for us."
Neela held tight and wouldn't let go. "I—I don't want to die out here," she said.
"We won't," Essa said. It almost felt true.
#
In another hour, the commando team was prepped for their second EVA in less than twelve hours. Some of the science team had suited up as well, to help move the necessary materials to the exterior of the ship. The work would continue for another six or seven hours, they estimated. Essa saw them off then monitored their work first from the aft observation post, and then later from the flight deck. During that time the outer gas giant went from a modestly sized speck in their viewscreen, to a distinct object Essa could scarcely block out with her thumb.
The planet was tilted sharply on its axis, and streaks of clouds, brown and yellow and red, the products of violent winds, streaked across its southern limb. They had five hours now, perhaps a little less. Meanwhile the sound of the work outside rattled through the hull.
The second mate came to relieve Essa, and she went to the crew deck to have something to eat and try to get some sleep. She found herself unwilling to retire to her bag in the alcove behind the galley. She felt sick, but didn't want to show it, so instead went looking for Orie, who was still awake, and standing at her station, her feet fed through the cloth loops that held her in place while she worked.
"Captain?" she said. "Is everything all right?"
"I'm fine, Orie. How are you holding up?"
She shrugged. "You know me. I go wherever the wind takes me."
"I suppose you do."
"Did you need anything, Captain?"
"No," Essa said. "I just thought I'd see how the crew is doing."
Orie smiled. "If we make it through this, maybe I'll tell you."
Essa rose. She wanted to go back to the flight deck, but her body wanted to sleep. She hovered in the middle of the crew deck until a commotion on the exterior of the hull made the decision for her. A moment later the comms came to life.
"Captain," it was the acting XO, "you're needed on the flight deck."
Essa hurried up the companionway. The gas giant loomed ahead, directly in their path now, filling the viewscreen.
"One of the commandos lost her footing," the XO said. "She's adrift behind the ship."
"Can we reach her?"
The XO didn't answer right away. "Maybe in the launch."
It would take almost an hour to prep the launch for flight. Essa shook her head. "How is the work on the drive going?"
"All but done," the XO said. "They were getting ready to bring in the remaining materials when the accident happened.
Essa thought for a moment. She said, "Tell the crew to space all non essential gear and come inside at once." To the XO she said, "Can you prep the launch?"
"That's the other problem," the XO said. "We're going to have to execute our burn in the next twenty or thirty minutes to avoid—contact."
"If we wait, there are two moons whose orbital paths would block an easy exit from the system," the navigator added.
"She's trying to catch us with her own thrusters, but they don't have much power. They've slowed her rate of separation, but it's unlikely she'll catch up to us in time."
"We have disposable thruster units," the XO said. "One of our team might be able to catch her if she took more than one."
Down below, was the sound of the airlock cycling. The first group of the EVA crew was returning. Two more and they could secure the ship for acceleration. On a jury-rigged and as yet untested system. Goddess, what had she been thinking? The words, lost with all hands passed through her mind, a horror to anyone who had ever ventured out to sea, or into space, but infinitely worse for the captain giving the orders.
"We can't risk losing another," Essa said, "when one is already lost for certain. As she spoke, Razia came onto the flight deck.
"I just heard about Nerai," she said. "What are your plans?"
"We will have to execute our burn before we can secure her," Essa said.
"You're not going after her?"
Essa shook her head. "She won't catch up to us with the thrusters on her suit," she said.
"No," Razia said. "She used to up too much fuel earlier during the work."
"Everything else we might try is too risky," Essa said.
"What about in the launch?"
"If we send the launch, we risk losing your commando, the pilot, and the launch. If we wait, we'll be captured in the gravity well, and pulled in toward the planet, where we will eventually crash, if the electromagnetic radiation doesn't kill us first. The only other option is to use personal thrusters. I'm not asking anyone else to risk her life for—for anyone."
"You're not going to do anything?"
Essa held Razia's gaze until she looked away. "I'm not," she said. "We have no good options. Down below the airlock cycled again. "Prepare the ship for acceleration," Essa said. "Five minutes. The final team will have to sit through the burn in their suits."
Razia reached down and grabbed Essa by the collar of her uniform. Her eyes were wild with despair, anger, resignation—something—as she tried to pull Essa up and out of her seat. The straps held her down.
"Get off my flight deck," she said. "Unless you wish to join her."
Razia pulled herself together. She let go of Essa's uniform and drifted away from her, coming to rest against the navigator's console. "No—," she said. "It's—I'm—Just give me a moment to say goodbye."
Essa nodded, and the sensors operator handed Razia a headset. Down below the airlock cycled as the last of the EVA team came back inside. Essa gave the secure ship order. In three minutes they would be underway, or dead, whichever.
Razia put on the headset. She said, "Nerai, can you hear me?"
"I can, Commandant."
"Can you make it back to the ship?"
"I've reversed direction, but it will take me some time to catch up to you."
"The captain—we—we've talked over the situation. We can't reach you."
There was a pause, and Nerai coughed. "I know, commandant."
"We—are going to have to leave you behind."
"I know, commandant." Her voice was soft. Not calm, almost a sob, not quite.
"I'm sorry. We're all sorry."
There was a long pause, no sound, as though Nerai had shut off her radio. Then they heard her breathing, fast, then getting control of herself. "I know," she said. "It's all right."
"Ninety seconds, captain," the navigator said. Their path projected onto the screen in front of Essa's seat. Something about it looked wrong.
Essa said to Razia, "You need to be strapped in."
Razia nodded. "Farewell, Nerai."
There was a sound from Nerai's end. Not quite a word.
Razia shook her head and took off the earphones. Handing them back to the sensors operator, she said, wiping a hand over her eyes, "I'm sorry, Captain. You think it gets easier, don't you? It doesn't. It only ever gets worse. Remember that."
She disappeared down the companionway, and ten seconds later reported she was secured on the crew deck.
"Execute the burn," Essa said.