Penance (RN: Book 2) (20 page)

“So what does mean for the gate drive?” Denz snapped anxiously.

The chief engineer glanced at Denz with all the indifference of a mechanic informing a difficult client his transmission is shot. “We’ve got no gate drive.”

Denz was momentarily taken aback. If the situation hadn’t been so serious, he would have laughed at the blasé manner in which the chief engineer had informed them the Bristol had been knee-capped. A man of great experience, the chief engineer had delayed his retirement to manage the Bristol’s refit well before he himself had been assigned, to ensure the ship launched on schedule, even if many of her systems were incomplete. Yet despite his experience, he had spent the majority of his career within the SOL system where he appeared to have developed an apathetic appreciation of urgent circumstance. He had come to believe that even the most dire of situations could be resolved by hopping on the radio and calling for a tow to the nearest repair platform.

Denz stared into the uncomprehending watery eyes with a sense of wanting to shake some sense of urgent reality into the man, but such avenues could never be considered. Never the less, he had to bite his tongue to keep his attitude officer like and expedite what repairs could be made without needless time wasting. “Chief, we are in something of a lion’s den here, so tell me what we need to do to get the gate drive back.”

“There’s nothing we can do,” the chief said matter of factly. “We can repair the tears in the capacitor skin, but we’ve got nowhere near enough fluid to refill them.”

“How many capacitors are there?” asked Hewton.

“Eight.” The chief responded.

“How many do we need to jump?”

“Eight.”

“Eight!” McWhitney snapped in his usual bitter intolerance. “You mean there’s no leeway in case a capacitor fails?”

“No. Why should a capacitor fail? It’s just a roll of metal in oil. Nothing to go wrong.”

“But in circumstances like this were a capacitor is damaged, surely there must be some –“

Sensing a pointless argument brewing, Canthouse intervened, “Can we not just drain some fluid from the other units as an emergency measure?”

“No. The coils need to be completely submersed or they’ll overheat as quick as you like.”

Hewton crossed his arms over his barrel chest and asked, “Can we use an alternative: water, a different fluid from another system?”

“No. The fluid is a mineral oil specific to Royal Nay gate coils. Even if we had another ship here it’s unlikely we could use their fluid, unless it was a newer class RN ship that is.”

The chief’s apathetic attitude was even beginning to irk Canthouse, who suddenly moved to a smaller wall display at the side of the room.

“So what
can
we do?” asked Denz a finger tapping with his rising annoyance.

“As I’ve said; nothing! I suppose we could get on the radio and –“

“There will be no need for that as I’ve located some fluid.” The group turned to Canthouse who tapped a data cell with the back of a finger. “Chief, will this oil do?”

The engineer moved to the display, his bushy eye brows forming a V as he squinted at the information. “Yes. That’ll do.”

Denz moved to join them, “It’s on the
Jeramiah
.”

“Yes, sir. I remembered seeing something on the manifest regarding mineral oil as part of her cargo for Port Beka. The Jeremiah was delivering their six monthly resupply, so she has,
had
, a little bit of everything. The bandits pretty much stripped her of consumables, but it looks as if they then chose to use her as a cache for the other commandeered vessels. There’s nothing left of the consumable supplies, but some of the periodics still remain including a few drive coils and a dozen vats of mineral fluid. I guess they had no use for them.”

Denz eyes roamed over the detailed manifest, “Looks like that’s where they got the class fives, too. Well done Malcolm.” He gave the first officer an appreciative nod and turned to address the gathering, “Gentlemen, I know many of the systems under your control are compromised, but until we have gate functionality I’m redirecting all none critical resources into the repair. Do what you can to assist with this and we’ll deal with the other repairs when we arrive at Trent. “Chief, when can you access the secure areas?”

“Anytime now.”

“Good.” The retrieval of the fluid gave an excellent excuse for returning to the Jeremiah for the accomplishment of other tasks and … Denz eyed Canthouse’s strapped arm. This injury would complicate the recovery of the unity device but that could be solved by placing Stavener in charge of the second launch. He could identify and return all of the required materials under the guise of retrieving bandit intelligence. “Chief, do what you’re able in the secure areas whilst the launches bring back the fluid. Malcolm, I’d like you take charge of immediate repairs. Mr Avery can go with the launches once he has…”

To Avery, Denz’s voice had been little more than a distant lounge conversation as he lingered as far to the rear as he could, his body rigid with his arms crossed about his chest so as to grip opposite elbows. He did his best to appear attentive, but his worst nightmares were coming true and there was little he could do about it. Anytime now the best specialists on the ship would enter the secure zone where they were sure to find the cause in areas he had sole jurisdiction over. He could envision it now: he would be summoned to engineering where he would find an engineer talking to Denz or Canthouse, a hand would open to reveal the Judas bolts dripping red. They would stare at the incriminating threaded metal before slowly shifting their accusatory gaze to him.

He would die for this. They would say he had sabotaged a King’s vessel during hostilities and they would condemn him. He would feel the hand on his shoulder and be led away to the sudden stop.

Avery felt faint with his traitorous mind unrelenting in its Old Bailey vilification with the gavel ringing his guilt again and again. He felt as if he were bound to some great ratcheting device with every passing second an irresistible hand jarring him forward in tectonic imperative, step by incessant step to a suffocating benthic oblivion. He rubbed his eyes and attempted to control his erratic breathing, but the dizziness prevailed. And to think he had been in favour for the return of capital punishment.

The second officer bit the white knuckle of a balled fist as he considered flight or reallocation of blame, but the ship was too small with insufficient opportunities and there was nothing he could do.

In his wildest imaginings he had never envisioned his career ending with him executed as a traitor.

Yet his fevered mind continued to dig and there could possibly be a way out of this. They still hadn’t found the other three, or the girl, and he was certain they had her in one of the secure areas. If he could somehow locate them, draw them into the LAW area and …and. And what? He had no idea, He’d have to wing it and see how it went. But he’d need to be alone to do it. Absolutely nobody else could be permitted to know what he was doing, but how to keep them away …how to keep them away?

“Lieutenant!”

The shout caught Avery by surprise and he snapped back from his reverie with a start, his hands automatically smoothing his overalls as he glanced about the curious faces. Someone had called him and he had no clue as to who or why. His gaze roamed about the silent but inquisitive faces wondering what action to take, when it came to him.

“WHAT!” Avery cried; his eyes wide as he stared about them with the stupid incomprehension of a man who had stepped backwards into insanity.

The people stared at him and each other in bewilderment.

“Are you alright, Mr Avery?” Denz asked.

Avery backed away from the group, his eyes wide and face set in complete alarm. “What’s going on! What’s happening around here!” He raised his hands as if in self-defence, his fingers forming claws as he bumped into and moved along the wall.

“Christopher.” Denz said in a calm voice as he pushed between the other men. “It’s OK. There’s no problem here. Nothing to be worried about.”

“No! It’s not alright. Nothing’s going right on this devil ship. Monsters try to eat us. Pirates try to kill us. People disappearing and equipment exploding. It’s not right. There’s something wrong. We’ve gone to Hell!” Avery backed against a tool chest near the door, his body tensed cat like with a countenance of feral insanity as his eyes darted from man to man.

The commander stood at the front of the semi-circle of men, his hands raised in non-provocation. He caught the words one of the officers whispered to a neighbour,
gate
madness, and he couldn’t help but agree. He spoke in as a soothing voice as he could, and just hoped one of the others was on the comm to the surgery.

“Christopher, I know things may seem a little odd right now, but it’ll all be OK. I promise. Star ships have equipment failures all the time. These things happen.” He took a half step forward with every passive nod of the head.

Avery crouched, a fine mad smile filling his imp like face as he glanced at the door hoping to give the impression of making a break for it. “Stay away from me!” he raked his fingers at one man who attempted to circumvent him. The man stopped his advance and fell back on blocking the exit.

With his eyes still on the encroaching group, the second officer ripped open a drawer of the tool chest, a hand searching blindly until it found the longest and sharpest toll there was. Avery brandished the slim pry bar at anyone who gave the impression of stepping forward. “No, you’re wrong,
Sinner
!” Avery wailed in a degenerate before god voice, stabbing the tool toward Denz. “This ship is cursed. It’s haunted and possessed. We’re all going straight to hell!”

An arrival at the door distracted him and the man to his right sprung forward grabbing the makeshift weapon and forcing him down. Then they were on him. Restraining his thrashing limbs as he kicked, clawed and screamed for best drama. He fought as he believed a lunatic would, and it all ended when a white vested figure squeezed between the struggling men and he felt a burning sensation in his left thigh.

Denz swallowed hard as he watched the two medics and three of the attending officers ferry the limp Avery out the door to the surgery. Even sedated, his barbed condemnations echoed down the passageway, with a final “You’ve doomed us all!” choked off by the closing air tight door.

He leant against the inner door frame, eyes closed and pinching the bridge of his nose to clear the fatigue that dogged him and help clear his mind. It helped a little and he turned to face what remained of the section chiefs with every man in the room appearing shaken to some degree or another as they passed quiet remarks amongst themselves. Hewton and Canthouse stood near the handrail overlooking the engineering space, from where concerned crew members who on having heard the commotion, snatched glances at the gathered officers. Hewton’s face was an anxious red with both hands splayed vertically as he repeated “It will work” to a seemingly sceptical Canthouse, who shook his head in response to Hewton’s insistent comments.

“Gentlemen,” Denz said to regain their interest. The men formed around him. “As concerned as we all are in regards to Mr Avery’s well being, any conjecture at this point does nothing to help us with our current situation. The surgery will keep us apprised of anything we need to know. So if we can leave the incident with Mr Avery aside for the moment, we need to continue our discussion in regards to the retrieval of the fluid and other items of use from the Jeremiah.” Denz turned to the chief engineer who stood by the main display with his arms crossed and bore a look of dour alienation. “Chief, you were telling us how many vats we needed.”

The engineer’s cheeks hollowed with his mouth making the usual munching motion as he gave Denz a distant confused look. He had an air of severe disunity and after several seconds of apparent consideration, he spat onto the floor, gave a none committal sniff and said, “Well young man, what I think we should do is get on the radio to the nearest platform and request they send a truck to give us a tow.”

Denz bit back his automatic remonstration of the senior engineer’s actions, as the man obviously had little idea as to who or where he was. He had never seen anyone’s mind transition to the B side quite as seamlessly as the chief engineer’s had, with this a clear cut case of displacement dementia as he had ever witnessed. The chief’s mind had the inability to process distances beyond a certain point, in his case beyond the Royal Navy’s operational limits within the SOL system, and no matter how much time they spent away from Earth or went without contacting any other RN resource, he believed that they were still within the solar system. The chief may have been a borderline case with the powers that be likely aware of his condition when he was assigned to the Bristol. Possibly believing that he would be fine on a bland tour of the stations if he were sufficiently distracted, and the Bristol with her dozens of unfinished systems would keep him occupied and ignorant to the fact he was no longer within the home disc. The Avery incident must have been the catalyst for him to realise there would be no immediate dropping off of injured personnel at the nearest Sol base.

The countenances of the men around him ranged from knowing to incredulous, with those who had not quite figured out what had taken place leaning towards those who had whispering “How dare he?” and “Who does he think he is?”.