Wandering Engineer 6: Pirates Bane (2 page)

The power situation wasn't grave yet, but it was aggravating.
They were getting about eighty percent of t
he minimum they had projected for the jump. They could see pockets
of dense energy far off their chosen course. In order to gather the
free-floating electrons or pick up the grav sheer with the ship's small hyper
collectors they would have to wander off course. Since they had little
waypoints to navigate with in the first place that wasn't an option.

Transitioning up and down the bands was draining their power
reserves faster than the little ship's hyper collectors could replenish them.
They had no choice, the AI could only navigate the ship in the lower bands of
hyperspace.

The Admiral gradually increased his helm time in the higher bands.
Several times they found a harmonic or variation in a sensor reading would
curtail their trip up through the bands. But as they ironed out the issues one
by one he found more and more time in
the upper bands. Manning the helm was tedious and exhausting in the upper bands
for someone without augmentation. With implants he could man the helm for much
longer, effectively increasing his endurance by a factor of 10, but even he
needed rest.

Sprite tried to help by taking control of a robot to bring him
food or in taking the helm while he ate. Unfortunately the AI lacked the skills
and mindset to handle the helm at high speed.

Irons had considered an IV drip but then discarded the idea. He
wasn't going down that path; he wasn't going to meld himself to the ship like a
cyber. If he had to get up due to an emergency it would be in the way, and if
he became too fatigued it could be deadly for him and the ship.

<----*----*----*---->

Every week one of them did inventory. The rotating duty wasn't
just an onerous chore; it was a mental distraction that allowed them to focus
on something for a period of time.

They also attempted to find new ways to conserve fuel and power
in their spare time. Most of the ideas failed once they brought them up, the
systems on the ship were necessary and you couldn't skimp on them without
affecting the ship's function and safety. They did cut back on life support;
with the Admiral's implants he didn't need a normal shirtsleeve temperature of
68F. They dropped it to near 32 before the threat of freezing and condensation
on components shedding excess heat forced them to bump the temperature back up.

One thing that did make a small impact was dropping the light
level. The cats could see in the dark, as could the Admiral. However his skin
required some UV light, and living in the dark tended to affect his mood.

The Admiral hit on the idea of replicating additional heat
exchangers to help pull away waste heat and convert it into recovered
electrical energy. It took away from the heating of the habitable portions of
the ship, and using the replicators to make them was a high front end
investment, but hopefully the long term investment would pay for itself over
time.

The distraction was worth it in one respect, it allowed the Admiral
to work on something with his hands while he installed the hardware... and
allowed Proteus time to do d
etailed
maintenance checks of the various pieces of hardware as well.

The Admiral talked to the AI about the past several years, with
Goldie or sometimes both cubs in his lap. “Is this a regret session Admiral? Or
are you just getting your memoirs in order?” Sprite asked.

“No, no self pity. Not that I know of,” Irons replied.

“Okay so what is this? We were there remember?” Sprite asked,
quirking a virtual eyebrow.

“Phoenix wasn't there,” the Admiral reminded her. She shot a look
at the ship AI and then shrugged.

“Did it bother you, being adrift in Senka?”

“At the time,” the Admiral shrugged. “Everything happened to fast.
Yes, I was pissed at feeling so helpless. Frustrated,” he exhaled noisily,
shaking his head. “You have no idea.”

“I do,” Sprite murmured. “Watching the only friendly ship getting
torn apart while we float in a pod...”

The Admiral grimaced, eyes vacant and lost with his own memory.
“Yeah, not fun,” he replied hoarsely.

“But it eventually ended well,” Phoenix interjected.

“Yeah, seven hundred years later,” Sprite said dryly.

“Do you think if you had been found you would have further
influenced the war?” Phoenix asked.

The Admiral frowned thoughtfully, thinking that question over. He
understood the context, Phoenix knew about his involvement with engineering
projects that had led up to the war, and also his development of the Nova bomb
in an attempt to end it.  “I... I think I'd be of some use. I wouldn't have
been on the strategy board, but now that we know what we know, it was obvious
that cutting off the Xenos and destroying the gates was the way to go.”

“But, and I'm admittedly basing this on supposition,” Sprite
interjected. “We don't know that for certain. The Xenos were fiendishly clever
at copying Federation technology. If you show someone it can be done, their
researchers are halfway to recreating it.”

“True,” the Admiral replied. He wasn't certain if the Xenos had
created their own gates. “And you are right, it is supposition, but it is very
plausible. We do know one thing, despite what the peace and unity parties
thought, the Xenos weren't destroying others out of self-protection. They
themselves could have destroyed the gates. And let's not forget, they spent
decades scouting us, inserting clones... learning our strengths and
weaknesses.”

“True.”

The Io11 in Senka had picked him up six years and four standard
months ago. He sniffed softly. So much for his centennial birthday he thought.
He'd passed it sometime in the past couple of months... he check the dates,
yes, in transit between Centennial and Gaston. A bit of an irony there, a
Centennial birthday near Centennial space. Whatever, he thought, putting the
bit of whimsy aside.

He smiled though, remembering the crotchety old female Captain of
the Io 11 and her all human female crew. Well, mostly all female crew, at the
time he'd been on board there had been three other human males.

He'd departed the ship in Pyrax, recovered Firefly, recruited
people, old friends there, built it up, only to be exiled on Destiny. He
reminisced of events since his awakening, his mind wandered through several
critical moments, and how things could have been done differently. His single
greatest regret was now Antigua. That departure haunted him. He had arrived on
Kiev 221, a bulk freighter. By an accident of navigation they had come out far
from the normal jump point and had stumbled across the lost station city,
Antigua Prime.

He'd had a few adventures there getting it sorted out and back on
track. But then politics had reared its ugly head once more. Things could have
easily been different had he kept his temper in check. Or, he could have just
thrown it all out and been a bastard; taking control as the tyrant they had
labeled him as. It wouldn't have worked, he knew that an officer never gave an
order that he knew wouldn't be obeyed.

No, it wouldn't have worked. In Antigua he had lacked the
supporting structure he had built in Pyrax. Oh, he had had friends. Associates,
people to talk to, people sympathetic, but even the Warners had been hands off.

His leaving Pyrax bothered him as well, as an Admiral he should
have taken a stern hand and been a cold bastard. Cleaned out the corruption
root and branch and damn the civilian casualties.

They'd gone on from Antigua, taking Phoenix, the courier he had
recovered south to Epsilon where political corruption had given way to a shared
crisis of a Xeno nanite bio-weapon. They had just barely survived it. He shook
his head in memory of such a close call for the millions there. Hundreds of
thousands of people had perished.

“Still, it would have been nice to have picked someone up in
Epsilon,” Sprite said slyly.

The Admiral winced in annoyance. They were treading dangerously close
to a familiar argument. “True,” Irons replied, stroking the kit’s soft fur as
he conceded the point. The kit's eyelids finally gave in and they drooped, she
drowsily drooped her head. She yawned, fighting the sand man, but eventually,
nature won the battle and her eyelids drooped once more. Irons couldn't help
but smile a little at that. It never got old, seeing a baby fall asleep. “I
couldn't see taking someone from their home. Spacers are a special breed.
Trying to get someone to fit the role...” he shook his head and looked away.

“Yes, but even one of the genies would have been nice right about
now.”

“And we would have to adapt the ship to them. They'd be on their
own, unless we had picked up more than one. But yes, having extra hands would
be nice.”

“Tell me about it,” Sprite said dryly. Even Proteus and Defender
had been press-ganged into manning a shift or post. The other two AI had
protested briefly, but they knew doing the work was an activity and it kept
them busy. Proteus was designed to go into sleep mode or even shut down for
extended periods of time, but Defender and Sprite were mentally active and
needed stimulus like any other sapient being. Trapped in the confines of a ship
was hard on them. The fortunate side effect was that they didn't need to sleep
as much, or for very long. There was little new input to integrate into their
long term memory or core programming.

“I... have to admit I was also concerned about putting myself
forward if the applicant's or applicant was female.”

“April?” Sprite asked softly.

Irons sighed, trying to relax. “Yes.” April O'Neill had been his
most recent lover, a woman who had been fascinated by not only his life, but in
him the man. She had been a bit forward, but he always did like a woman who
knew what she wanted. She had tried to help him when an assassin came after him
on the freighter Destiny, only to get injured. The last he had seen of her had
been when she had been placed in as stasis pod. By now she had returned to
Pyrax and if Thornby had done her usual best, April was now hassling
politicians in Pyrax.

He shook himself. He had to be adult about things, but there was
still a lingering... romanticism in his soul. The part that said he had someone
and should be happy, even if she was light years away.

“Admiral, I think Miss O'Neill would understand. You would
understand if the tables were turned right?”

“It's happened to me before Sprite. Before your time and yes, I
can understand, to a degree. The emotional level.” he paused and then shrugged.
“I admit, we like to think we're completely logical about such things, but
well, I am human.”

“True.” There was a long moment of silence as he looked around.
“But, statistically speaking, the majority of applicant's would have been male.
Males tend to be the ones looking for adventure more often than females Admiral.
Young males.”

The Admiral smiled. “Was that a dig at me?” he asked, eying her
avatar. Sprite shrugged.

“No, but if the uniform fits...”

He chuckled, looking down at his coverall. He was wearing his
normal engineering coverall, despite his exalted rank. He was a wrench turner,
he preferred keeping it real and getting his hands dirty.

“But that ship has sailed. Literally.”

“Definitely.”

“You sound put out Commander.”

“Yes and no Admiral,” Sprite replied. “As I said, the additional
help would have been nice, and the distraction of training would have made part
of the journey easier to endure mentally. But having someone with no
experience, and we wouldn't have time to do a proper psych interview...”

“We could if we had lingered in Epsilon longer,” Irons said,
knowing she was hinting about that. “I didn't want to wear out my welcome.”

“You mean you were itching to get out of there before they had
you do something else,” Sprite teased.

“That too. It does get old.”

“You could have ordered one of the new recruits...”

Irons frowned. That was true to a degree. In order to save the
planet's population, and it's ecosystem from a Xeno nano attack he'd been
forced to induct medics into the Federation Navy. They had received basic
implants with medical codes that were stored in him and in Sprite. It was
ironic; they had the codes, but didn't have the training and therefore were
restricted from accessing it themselves. It had taken the third party rule to
get around it.

“All of them are medics Sprite. Even the ranks were medics. Not
going there.”

“Agreed,” Sprite sighed. “Besides, they are setting up a nice naval
hospital and dealing with the aftermath of the nanites...”

“True.” Irons frowned. He didn't like how they had solved the
problem; it went against his experience and history. But desperation... he
shook his head putting the thought aside. Again, it was over and done with,
there was no point dwelling on it.

Sprite recognized his maudlin thought lines the Admiral was projecting
and decided to switch roles. She played devil advocate, essentially breaking
down his major actions and gaming them out. Phoenix listened to them and
occasionally interjected comments or questions.