Chapter 6: That's not a good start
After a bit he was dead to the world. Not asleep; curled up and uninterested in anything but his own misery. I couldn't really blame him.
His parents had been on Caprica.
So had mine, of course, but I had stopped caring about them years before. Maybe that made me cold, but it also meant I wasn't mourning for them any more than I was mourning for everyone else.
It wasn't real to me yet. It was a notion, a damn scary notion. But I hadn't seen it.
I got up and finished the sandwiches, then went back to the Viper. Even if I wasn't sure what to do about the wing, there were still a lot of other things wrong with it, and I had to rig up some kind of launch platform so we could actually get it to fly.
After a while Jesse came over, subdued and red-eyed but coherent, and I instructed him. I had to do a lot of stopping and trying to remember things, tracing circuits, testing things. I'm sure any true Viper mechanic would have had the thing repaired in a tenth the time, and wouldn't have made any of the stupid mistakes I did. The problem was, quite simply, that what I knew was book-knowledge of a different model with all the truly classified parts carefully excised.
Which meant I could get things like weapons, fuel lines, life support systems and thrusters working, but the shorted control panels and computers were beyond my league.
"If this one uses integrated computer systems, how come it's still working?" Jesse asked me at one point, passing me a circuit tester. No one can mourn forever, and Jesse wasn't the truly emotional type.
"My guess is that it was in need of an overhaul," I said. "Yep. Definitely in need of an overhaul."
"How can you tell?"
"In every overhaul they replace the runners under the seat."
"Why put runners under the seat?"
"You think all pilots have equally long legs?"
"Alright, that was a silly question, but what does that have to do with this?"
"They don't really get replaced otherwise, just oiled. Impurities in the oil collect around the bolts down here, and this is the result." I straightened up with a finger coated in crud. "Apparently you can tell the length of time between overhauls by how much black stuff collects down there, and this one has gone without for a long time."
He shook his head in bafflement. "Why in hell didn't you just join the Fleet?"
"A lot of people in the Fleet don't do the really interesting stuff like spacecraft design, they do things like laundry and floor-cleaning and fixing busted water pipes. I did seriously consider it, but then I got that engineering scholarship and I could study what I wanted to study without taking my chances on the Personnel Department. It seemed a good idea at the time. Oh, crap."
"That's not good."
"What's not good?"
"Hearing you say 'oh, crap'. I've heard you swear more today than I have in seven years of knowing you."
"You'll probably hear a lot more if you stick around. This batch of wiring - I have no idea what it does, but it's half-melted, half-scorched, half-warped and half I don't know what but it puts me in mind of the dorm hot plate the cat peed on."
"I did not need that image. What do the wires connect to?"
"I don't know. If I twist any further I'll break something. I can't get in to see. It's not wiring I remember. On the Mark 2's there's just a set of banded cables connecting to the engine mounts. This is more like computer linkages. The wire's fine, mostly fiberoptic instead of metallic. I don't know what it does. I'll have to wait until the lieutenant wakes up."
"How do you know his rank?"
"It's written on the side," I said. "Now, you're better with computers. See if you can re-route the power and run a diagnostic routine. I can't find the malfunction."
"You checked the circuit breakers?"
"Please. You think I'd still be here if it was something simple? See if you can pull up the schematics for the fuel lines. They changed the piping style and I don't know if I can safely rig a patch."
"Alright. Anything else?"
"A miracle?"
"Do me a favour, please?" he asked. "Turn the wireless on. I want to hear what's going on."
"It'll make for depressing hearing," I said, but I did as he asked. "That's why I turned it off. I don't think I could stand to hear it right now."
"So why'd you turn it on?"
"You asked," I reminded him mechanically. "There's not much but static. It's not a long-range one."
"What about the ship's communications system?"
"Tap into it if you want to. I'll settle for this." Part of me wanted to know; wanted to know how long I could expect to live. I had a whole new appreciation for the fragility of life. One small speck of dust hitting the hull at the right speed and we'd be dead. One small blow in the wrong place, and we were dead. Three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food, and we were dead. One minute of depression around something lethal, and we were dead.
That thought seemed to come on its own, but I was like my grandfather; I was the type to commit suicide in anger, not fear or sadness. I wasn't giving up so easily. There was no good reason not to give up - it would certainly be easier, and everyone died eventually - but I didn't want to.
My mother once said that pigs were the most stubborn of God's creatures, and I made them look easy-going in comparison.
I shook that thought aside. I couldn't afford to mourn. Not then, maybe not ever. "What's that?" Jesse asked.
I twisted the tuning knob on the small portable set. "Some ham operator on Caprica. Last-ditch broadcast, I guess." I could barely make it out. It abruptly cut off. "I guess the Cylons are still dropping bombs."
"You think they're going for orbital bombardment?"
"There's no Fleet left to stop them. If there's any of them left, they're either somewhere else or hiding. The first bombs might have been smuggled in somehow, but I doubt it."
"Why?"
"How would they arrange it? Cylons look like new garbage tins on legs with a headlight. They can't pass for human if they try."
"Yeah. I guess. What about humans doing it?"
"Why should they? I dare say there are - were - people who don't realise how dangerous Cylons are. I know my parents never saw it. But what could the Cylons offer them? Money? Power? Things like that - where would they get them? Why bother? Missiles are far easier to build and use, and a lot less risky."
"You think they care about risk? They're machines."
"Risk to one's self and risk to one's mission are entirely different things. This whole war - we had no clue it was coming. No warnings, no announcements, no rumbles, no deploying Fleet ships for manoeuvres or anything - hell, they were decommissioning the last ship that's specifically designed to fight Cylons yesterday afternoon. If the Fleet suspected something, they'd probably have put that off for a few days at least. Discovering someone trying to smuggle in a nuke would be disastrous for secrecy, and this whole thing had to have been calculated and planned to a tee in advance. Why risk your only chance that way when you can get the same effect far more easily if you wait for a few hours?"
He looked away, his face darkening. It matched his hands. "Change the channel, please," he said hoarsely. "I think I found your schematics."
I hopped up and peered over his shoulder. "Right. That bit, I need more detail." He enlarged the image.
"Did you know this is probably a felony?" he asked, his hair tickling my face.
"I know it is," I said. "Now I need a systems diagnostic of the controls."
"Just the circuits?"
"I need to know everything that's wrong with this ship. The more I can fix, the better. It's possible that pilot may never wake up."
"What do you think was wrong with him?"
"Given the back of his helmet was cracked and the fracture on the cock-pit roof, I'd say he hit his head. Without the helmet he'd probably be dead. My guess is that after that he passed out. What I don't know is why he unstrapped himself."
"But there's not much damage under the craft, though."
"One of the fuel tanks blew. The force went mostly outwards, or this would be a cinder right now. I think I've got the replacement fitted - one of the other ships had an intact tank."
"You think."
"It's not exactly the same size. I had to rig some brackets to hold it in place."
"That's not a good start."
"I couldn't come up with a better idea. The only other thing we've got that's remotely the right size and shape is the emergency water bottles stored behind the galley, and they're made of a plastic that fractures in extreme cold."
"You actually know that? How?"
"I looked up the ship's inventory just in case. Some of the parts I've replaced from on-board stores rather than cannibalising hulks."
"You really think we can fix this thing?"
"No."
"No?"
"But I can fix part of it."
"You can?"
"I know more about these things than you do. If it were part of a bigger ship, you'd know more than me. Vipers are the only space-craft I know in any kind of detail." I realised something. "You're jealous."
"No, I'm not."
"Yes, you are. You're sounding just like you did when Ari asked Cara out."
"Amy? As a friend, will you do me one really big favour?"
"What's that?"
"Shut the frak up."
After a bit he was dead to the world. Not asleep; curled up and uninterested in anything but his own misery. I couldn't really blame him.
His parents had been on Caprica.
So had mine, of course, but I had stopped caring about them years before. Maybe that made me cold, but it also meant I wasn't mourning for them any more than I was mourning for everyone else.
It wasn't real to me yet. It was a notion, a damn scary notion. But I hadn't seen it.
I got up and finished the sandwiches, then went back to the Viper. Even if I wasn't sure what to do about the wing, there were still a lot of other things wrong with it, and I had to rig up some kind of launch platform so we could actually get it to fly.
After a while Jesse came over, subdued and red-eyed but coherent, and I instructed him. I had to do a lot of stopping and trying to remember things, tracing circuits, testing things. I'm sure any true Viper mechanic would have had the thing repaired in a tenth the time, and wouldn't have made any of the stupid mistakes I did. The problem was, quite simply, that what I knew was book-knowledge of a different model with all the truly classified parts carefully excised.
Which meant I could get things like weapons, fuel lines, life support systems and thrusters working, but the shorted control panels and computers were beyond my league.
"If this one uses integrated computer systems, how come it's still working?" Jesse asked me at one point, passing me a circuit tester. No one can mourn forever, and Jesse wasn't the truly emotional type.
"My guess is that it was in need of an overhaul," I said. "Yep. Definitely in need of an overhaul."
"How can you tell?"
"In every overhaul they replace the runners under the seat."
"Why put runners under the seat?"
"You think all pilots have equally long legs?"
"Alright, that was a silly question, but what does that have to do with this?"
"They don't really get replaced otherwise, just oiled. Impurities in the oil collect around the bolts down here, and this is the result." I straightened up with a finger coated in crud. "Apparently you can tell the length of time between overhauls by how much black stuff collects down there, and this one has gone without for a long time."
He shook his head in bafflement. "Why in hell didn't you just join the Fleet?"
"A lot of people in the Fleet don't do the really interesting stuff like spacecraft design, they do things like laundry and floor-cleaning and fixing busted water pipes. I did seriously consider it, but then I got that engineering scholarship and I could study what I wanted to study without taking my chances on the Personnel Department. It seemed a good idea at the time. Oh, crap."
"That's not good."
"What's not good?"
"Hearing you say 'oh, crap'. I've heard you swear more today than I have in seven years of knowing you."
"You'll probably hear a lot more if you stick around. This batch of wiring - I have no idea what it does, but it's half-melted, half-scorched, half-warped and half I don't know what but it puts me in mind of the dorm hot plate the cat peed on."
"I did not need that image. What do the wires connect to?"
"I don't know. If I twist any further I'll break something. I can't get in to see. It's not wiring I remember. On the Mark 2's there's just a set of banded cables connecting to the engine mounts. This is more like computer linkages. The wire's fine, mostly fiberoptic instead of metallic. I don't know what it does. I'll have to wait until the lieutenant wakes up."
"How do you know his rank?"
"It's written on the side," I said. "Now, you're better with computers. See if you can re-route the power and run a diagnostic routine. I can't find the malfunction."
"You checked the circuit breakers?"
"Please. You think I'd still be here if it was something simple? See if you can pull up the schematics for the fuel lines. They changed the piping style and I don't know if I can safely rig a patch."
"Alright. Anything else?"
"A miracle?"
"Do me a favour, please?" he asked. "Turn the wireless on. I want to hear what's going on."
"It'll make for depressing hearing," I said, but I did as he asked. "That's why I turned it off. I don't think I could stand to hear it right now."
"So why'd you turn it on?"
"You asked," I reminded him mechanically. "There's not much but static. It's not a long-range one."
"What about the ship's communications system?"
"Tap into it if you want to. I'll settle for this." Part of me wanted to know; wanted to know how long I could expect to live. I had a whole new appreciation for the fragility of life. One small speck of dust hitting the hull at the right speed and we'd be dead. One small blow in the wrong place, and we were dead. Three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food, and we were dead. One minute of depression around something lethal, and we were dead.
That thought seemed to come on its own, but I was like my grandfather; I was the type to commit suicide in anger, not fear or sadness. I wasn't giving up so easily. There was no good reason not to give up - it would certainly be easier, and everyone died eventually - but I didn't want to.
My mother once said that pigs were the most stubborn of God's creatures, and I made them look easy-going in comparison.
I shook that thought aside. I couldn't afford to mourn. Not then, maybe not ever. "What's that?" Jesse asked.
I twisted the tuning knob on the small portable set. "Some ham operator on Caprica. Last-ditch broadcast, I guess." I could barely make it out. It abruptly cut off. "I guess the Cylons are still dropping bombs."
"You think they're going for orbital bombardment?"
"There's no Fleet left to stop them. If there's any of them left, they're either somewhere else or hiding. The first bombs might have been smuggled in somehow, but I doubt it."
"Why?"
"How would they arrange it? Cylons look like new garbage tins on legs with a headlight. They can't pass for human if they try."
"Yeah. I guess. What about humans doing it?"
"Why should they? I dare say there are - were - people who don't realise how dangerous Cylons are. I know my parents never saw it. But what could the Cylons offer them? Money? Power? Things like that - where would they get them? Why bother? Missiles are far easier to build and use, and a lot less risky."
"You think they care about risk? They're machines."
"Risk to one's self and risk to one's mission are entirely different things. This whole war - we had no clue it was coming. No warnings, no announcements, no rumbles, no deploying Fleet ships for manoeuvres or anything - hell, they were decommissioning the last ship that's specifically designed to fight Cylons yesterday afternoon. If the Fleet suspected something, they'd probably have put that off for a few days at least. Discovering someone trying to smuggle in a nuke would be disastrous for secrecy, and this whole thing had to have been calculated and planned to a tee in advance. Why risk your only chance that way when you can get the same effect far more easily if you wait for a few hours?"
He looked away, his face darkening. It matched his hands. "Change the channel, please," he said hoarsely. "I think I found your schematics."
I hopped up and peered over his shoulder. "Right. That bit, I need more detail." He enlarged the image.
"Did you know this is probably a felony?" he asked, his hair tickling my face.
"I know it is," I said. "Now I need a systems diagnostic of the controls."
"Just the circuits?"
"I need to know everything that's wrong with this ship. The more I can fix, the better. It's possible that pilot may never wake up."
"What do you think was wrong with him?"
"Given the back of his helmet was cracked and the fracture on the cock-pit roof, I'd say he hit his head. Without the helmet he'd probably be dead. My guess is that after that he passed out. What I don't know is why he unstrapped himself."
"But there's not much damage under the craft, though."
"One of the fuel tanks blew. The force went mostly outwards, or this would be a cinder right now. I think I've got the replacement fitted - one of the other ships had an intact tank."
"You think."
"It's not exactly the same size. I had to rig some brackets to hold it in place."
"That's not a good start."
"I couldn't come up with a better idea. The only other thing we've got that's remotely the right size and shape is the emergency water bottles stored behind the galley, and they're made of a plastic that fractures in extreme cold."
"You actually know that? How?"
"I looked up the ship's inventory just in case. Some of the parts I've replaced from on-board stores rather than cannibalising hulks."
"You really think we can fix this thing?"
"No."
"No?"
"But I can fix part of it."
"You can?"
"I know more about these things than you do. If it were part of a bigger ship, you'd know more than me. Vipers are the only space-craft I know in any kind of detail." I realised something. "You're jealous."
"No, I'm not."
"Yes, you are. You're sounding just like you did when Ari asked Cara out."
"Amy? As a friend, will you do me one really big favour?"
"What's that?"
"Shut the frak up."