Blake’s 7: Warship (17 page)

‘Vila’s right,’ Avon snapped. ‘
Liberator
is spinning out of control. All the instrumentation on the flight deck is failing or unreliable.’

Blake’s eyes narrowed. ‘What are you saying?’

‘I’m saying it’s time to leave.’

‘What do you mean?’ Blake insisted.

‘INFORMATION. NAVIGATION COMPUTERS NOW AT SIX PERCENT EFFICIENCY. LIFE SUPPORT IS AT ELEVEN PERCENT. AUTO-REPAIR SYSTEMS REMAIN CRITICAL.’

Avon smiled grimly and pointed at the flashing display of the main computer. ‘Zen is saying it’s time to leave.’

‘You mean abandon the fight?’

‘I mean abandon ship.’

‘Abandon ship?’ said Vila. He’d retreated from the fire at the front of the flight deck, and dropped the extinguisher to the floor. ‘What, just run away?’

‘Think of it as playing to your strengths,’ Avon told him.

Jenna felt Blake tense. He gently disengaged from her embrace, but his voice was anything but gentle. ‘We can’t run.’

Avon rounded on him. ‘Then stay here and die on your own, Blake. A glorious death, witnessed by no-one, signifying nothing. Hardly your style.’

Blake was furious. ‘That’s not what I meant.’

Their argument was interrupted by another insistent alarm.

Jenna scanned the readout quickly. ‘System malfunction. Blocks four through six are offline.’

Vila peered at the readout too. ‘That’s not good, is it?’

Avon was already moving across the flight deck, checking additional displays and making swift decisions. ‘The evacuation protocols are cutting out.’ His tone was crisp, efficient, calm. As though the argument had never happened. ‘Vila, you’ll need to prepare the life-support capsules manually.’ He looked at Vila, who was frozen with indecision. ‘Go on!’

‘You don’t have to tell me twice,’ Vila said. He took a few steps towards the exit, then spun round again. ‘Er… wait a minute. Port or starboard?’

Avon glared at him. ‘Does it matter?’

‘All right,’ admitted Vila, ‘you do have to tell me twice. It’s all very confusing.’

Avon was no longer in any mood to argue. ‘Port side,’ he snapped. ‘Go on!’

Jenna heard a further alarm ring out. Cally was already rushing to check the indicators. ‘It’s getting worse. System malfunction on blocks two and three.’

Avon stared at Vila, who was still hesitating by the exit. ‘Vila,’ he ordered coldly, ‘go and check the life-support capsules.’

Vila’s seemed to shake himself into action. ‘On my way.’ And then he was gone.

Avon didn’t even watch him leave. He was already looking at the main computer. ‘Zen, status report.’

‘DAMAGE TO THE NAVIGATION COMPUTERS IS BEYOND THE PRESENT CAPACITY OF THE AUTO-REPAIR SYSTEMS. THE TELEPORT MALFUNCTION IS NOW TOTAL. AUTOMATIC SHUTDOWN HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED.’

‘Jenna, bring Orac.’

Jenna watched Avon slide Orac out from the side cabinet. It had protected the computer from the worst of the beating that
Liberator
had received. Her quizzical expression must have told him she didn’t understand why he was entrusting Orac to her.

‘I’ll go and fetch the protective case,’ he explained, and started for the exit.

There was something missing, thought Jenna. Something important. ‘Wait! Where’s Orac’s key?’

Avon waved the thin transparent block at her over his shoulder as he left the flight deck. ‘Where d’you think?’

Blake sat down heavily at a control console next to Jenna. ‘Did you suppose he’d trust anyone else with that?’ he grunted.

The grunt became a groan. Jenna saw that he was in a very bad way. His face was ashen, and sweat plastered his curly hair across his forehead. A bright red patch had seeped through the side of his tunic.

‘Your wound is bleeding again, Blake.’

He gestured to dismiss her ministrations, but she eased his hands aside. ‘Stop waving your arms around, and remain seated.’

Blake’s shoulders slumped in acquiescence. ‘We can’t just abandon
Liberator
,’ he protested. ‘Not after all this.’ He unwisely chose to gesticulate around the flight deck again, and winced in agony.

‘Here.’ Cally crouched down beside them. She held a flat blue box with a small indicator screen and attachment clips. ‘The portable medipack will stabilise the wound, until you reach the life capsule.’

‘No,’ coughed Blake.

Jenna was pleased to see that Cally accepted no nonsense from her patient. She placed the medipack across Blake’s injury and affixed it to his tunic with brisk efficiency. The device activated with a shrill warble, and Blake sighed deeply.

‘All right, it’s working.’ Jenna watched Blake’s face relax, the tension seeping away from him as the medipack took effect. She knew that it could give patients the illusion that they were less injured than they actually were. Blake would need to be supervised closely, or his over-exertion could kill him.

Jenna put her hand on Cally’s shoulder. ‘You take Orac. Please. I’ll make sure Blake gets off the ship.’

Cally hesitated for a moment, looking at her earnestly. Jenna hoped she wasn’t going to quibble.

‘We’ll see you soon,’ Jenna insisted.

‘Very well.’

Cally straightened, and went over to pick up Orac. She hefted the computer in her hands, getting the balance right before she left. Jenna thought Cally might make one last attempt to argue with her. To persuade Jenna that she should stay.

Jenna shook her head. Cally smiled sadly, and walked quickly up the steps from the flight deck, on the way to her rendezvous at the life capsules.

She didn’t look back. Jenna watched her disappear through the exit. She almost called after her, but then she heard Cally’s soft voice in her mind.

‘Good luck, my friend.’

A fresh explosion rocked the flight deck. Sparks rained down from the ceiling like a summer shower. Jenna leaned over Blake to protect him from the debris, which scattered over her shoulders and back.

‘All right, Blake. We can’t stay on the flight deck any longer.’ She helped him carefully to his feet. ‘And just for once, do as you’re told!’

Blake stumbled through the
Liberator
corridors, half supported by Jenna. He didn’t want to lean on her too heavily. That would slow them both down. But the knifing pain in his side meant that he could barely stand. He hardly liked to think what it would be like without the medipack. It continued to trill its warbling, high-pitched note against his ribs.

Nor did he like to think what they were doing. Abandoning ship. It had been all he could do to let Jenna lead him from the flight deck. He’d fixed his eyes on the route ahead of them, determined not to look over his shoulder. Not to take a final glance. He would see it again, he was sure of that. Once the auto repairs had been given time to do their work.

And there would be plenty of work to do. The corridor lights around them flickered and failed. The sounds of explosions rumbled through them, distant echoes of the rumbling destruction wrought by the alien attack and the plasma wave.

The pain in his side stabbed again. Blake staggered to a halt, gasping.

‘Not far now,’ Jenna said.

He took his weight off her for a moment, and slumped against the wall. It felt hot through his tunic. They couldn’t wait here much longer.

Jenna smiled encouragingly, but her eyes suggested she had doubts. ‘You can make it.’

‘Or die trying,’ he muttered.

‘Where’s that famous Blake optimism?’ Jenna’s scolding look made him smile.

Above their heads, the ship-wide intercom chimed, a distorted version of its usual cheerful sound. The speakers crackled, and Vila’s voice was barely audible over the growling of
Liberator
‘s dying engines.
‘Avon?’

‘Speaking of optimists…’ Jenna said.

‘The life capsules are operational!’
Vila was saying.
‘Let’s get out while we still can! Avon? Avon!’

‘There, you see?’ Jenna positioned herself so that she could support Blake again. ‘Your carriage awaits.’

They shuffled slowly down the corridor to the next junction. The floor had tipped at an awkward angle, so it was like walking uphill. Blake wondered if the artificial gravity was failing. If that went completely, they would be floating around helplessly with no easy way of getting to safety.

But it wasn’t the artificial gravity. The corridor had been forced upwards because the far end had ruptured from its housing. He could feel heat singeing him as they approached.

‘Stay back,’ Jenna warned him. ‘It’s a sheer drop.’ She peered tentatively over the ragged edge at the end of the corridor. A gust of scorching air shot upwards. Jenna ducked back down the corridor, pushing Blake fiercely out of the way. Behind her, a gout of flame roared up from the depths and spread like liquid across the ceiling. The walls began to char, and molten drops started to drip down onto the angled floor.

They scrambled backwards, staggering around the previous junction. The unforgiving slab of a thick fire door slammed into place beside them. Even then, Blake could hear the savage roar of the inferno beyond it.

Jenna coughed and hacked as she cleared the smoke from her throat. ‘Are you all right?’ she was able to gasp.

‘I think so.’ Blake gritted his teeth, determined not to let her see the intense pain he was in. ‘There’s no route through that way.’

Jenna looked across the junction. ‘And that one’s filling with smoke. We can’t allow ourselves to get trapped between fire doors.’

Blake considered their options. ‘Back this way,’ he suggested. ‘We’ll have to hope the starboard life capsules are working, too.’

The fire door opposite was beginning its determined descent. Jenna darted beneath it, pulling Blake after her before it slammed shut.

They continued to make steady progress, cautious enough to avoid plunging into any further abyss, but with enough pace to stay ahead of the chasing flames.

Blake lost track of time. All these
Liberator
corridors, so familiar over the years, now looked the same. Had they doubled back? Just as he was beginning to think they were going to arrive back on the flight deck, they tumbled into the starboard launch bay.

The area was small and utilitarian. An arched walkway with four access hatches to the life capsules on either side. The capsules themselves were long, silver-grey caskets aligned horizontally, awaiting their passengers. The far end of the bay was scorched, blackened and tarnished where a small fire had broken out some time earlier and been extinguished by the automatic safety systems. Nevertheless, the room stank of charred plastic, and there was an odd metallic tang in his mouth. He put a hand to his mouth, and found blood where he had bitten his tongue.

Blake looked down the bay. He wondered if any of the capsules would still be working, or whether this was where his and Jenna’s journey would finally end.

The capsules were stacked in pairs, one above the other, with a short access ladder to reach the upper one. Like bunk beds, thought Blake. He felt tired enough to fall asleep right now. Or perhaps, he reflected, they reminded him of the boxes on Megiddo, holding their silent human operatives in a sleep of centuries. Well, he wasn’t quite that exhausted.

Jenna lowered Blake to the floor, so that she could close the doorway to the corridor behind them. ‘Rest there for a minute, Blake. I’ll check the capsules.’

The public address system crackled and spat, echoing oddly around the small bay.

‘DAMAGE CONTROL ESTIMATES BREAKDOWN IS NOW BEYOND THE CAPACITY OF AUTO-REPAIR SYSTEMS IN ALL AREAS. SERIOUS MALFUNCTION IN LIFE SUPPORT WOUD INDICATE EVACUATION BY LIFE CAPSULE A PRIORITY ONE REQUIREMENT.’

‘I don’t think we need persuading, Zen.’ Blake grimaced as a spasm of pain shot across his midriff and up over his chest. He couldn’t stop himself from shouting in pain.

Jenna was at his side in an instant, full of concern.

Blake noticed that the high-pitched hum had faded to nothing. ‘Oh dear,’ he winced. ‘It’s the medipack…’

‘What’s happened?’ asked Jenna.

‘It’s packed in.’

No point in carrying it with him any longer, decided Blake. It was just another thing to carry, or that would get in the way. He tugged at the fastenings, and was satisfied to hear the clips ping open. He peeled the device away from his torso, and dropped it onto the floor.

‘So much for that.’

‘Never mind the medipack,’ Jenna said brusquely, ‘the life capsules have their own auto-medical systems.’ She held out both hands to help him stand again. ‘Two of these are undamaged. Get in that one. I’ll prepare it for launch.’

The first was on the lower level. Jenna activated the power switch, and the access hatch slid slowly open. Blake saw rudimentary flight controls in front of a long, low impact seat. He ducked his head to avoid hitting it on the roof overhang, and rolled into the space.

His body sank into the cushioning of the impact seat, and the material began to mould itself around his back as the chair fashioned itself into the perfect fit for its new occupant. The flight control pedals moved up to meet his feet. The life-support system flicked into life, scanning his wounded body and providing him with a heads-up projection that told him in alarming detail about the current state of his various injuries. It was supposed to be helpful, Blake supposed, but it was all a bit disquieting. Nonetheless, even at this point, he was still amazed at the simple efficiency of the ship’s systems.

‘Do you remember first boarding
Liberator
, Jenna?’

‘How could I forget?’ She was busying herself with the external controls, fine-tuning the settings in anticipation of the launch. ‘I’d never seen anything like it. I didn’t know if we were looking at a racing ship, or a transport, or an exploration vessel…’

‘Or a warship,’ added Blake. He wriggled slightly in his seat, and found that the material had now shaped itself perfectly to cushion his whole body. He looked out into the launch bay, beyond where Jenna stood, and could see the scars and marks of the earlier fire. ‘She’s fought bravely today.’

Jenna smiled in at him. ‘We all have.’

He thought he saw something in her expression. Acceptance, now, rather than defiance. ‘I didn’t expect to be leaving like this,’ he admitted.