Hold the Star: Samair in Argos: Book 2 (32 page)

              She leaned back, resting on her hands.  It had been a long road from Ulla-tran.  Tamara rolled her head around to the right, slowly, stretching the muscles of her neck and shoulders, and then rolled it back around to the left.  It was a little awkward, doing so with the device bumping against her collarbone and her jaw, but after the weeks of working with it she was starting to get used to its constant annoyance.

              She rubbed her fingers over the smooth metal of the device, over the round edges, feeling the bumpiness of the tendrils as they penetrated her neck.  Tamara found herself rubbing it when she was nervous or bored.  She shook her head rapidly, annoyed that she was doing that.  It was a habit she didn’t like.  She didn’t like this thing on her body, interfering with her implants and the otherwise relatively smooth operation of her life.  Damned pirates.  The ones who had boarded were dead.

              But the rest were not.  The part that worried her was that it might not take a lot of effort to figure out where the ship had gone.  If Verrikoth expected
Grania Estelle
to go to Amethyst, he’d soon figure out that they hadn’t and start to work out their possible destinations from there.  But with no means of communication unless another ship physically made the jump from hyperspace from Amethyst to Byra-Kae, it could be months before the nasty bug figured out they never showed up.  That was her hope anyway.  Perhaps the plan had been for the corvette to break off from the bulk freighter once they’d reached their destination and jump for Byra-Kae immediately.  Still it would be a while before the small warship would have been able to reach the pirate flotilla even on its own, so for the moment, anyway,
Grania Estelle
would have a small amount of breathing space.  What exactly they could do to protect themselves from the pirates in the future, Tamara didn’t know.

              Looking up, she eyed the fighters.  These ships here would be a start.  They would have to work hard to recruit zheen who were willing to learn to fly them.  Maybe with a small fighter escort like this, they could keep the ship safe.  Maybe there were other things, safer routes they could ply to make their living.  There was nothing anywhere saying that
Grania Estelle
had to be an itinerant merchant, flying hither and yon across the entirety of the Argos Cluster.  If they could find two or three systems, maybe as many as five to work as a steady route, delivering trade goods from system to system in each, they could make a good profit and keep the danger levels down.  It would be something to discuss with the Captain and with Taja once they got things settled in Seylonique.  After the awful experiences of the last few months, Tamara was sure that the both of them would be very happy to discuss something like that.  The Cluster was getting too dangerous to simply wander aimlessly, as they all had discovered. 

              With a grunt, Tamara got to her feet, scooping up her datapad in one smooth movement.  Without a backward glance at the ships in the bay, she headed for the doors leading into the ship.  She wanted to be on the bridge for the drop back into normal space.  The last several trips had been dicey, and she wanted to see things for herself.

Chapter 11

              “Four, three, two, one, disengaging hyperdrive,” Isis called, pressing the controls.  There was a jolt, the ship bucked and the faster than light engines shut down.  The
Grania Estelle
burst forth from hyperspace back into normal space in a wash of color. 

              “Whoa!”

              That one word, spoken by the Captain at the exact moment of breakout from hyperspace encompassed the whole of the ship.  The massive burst of energy required to down jump back into regular space shook and rattled the ship in one massive lurch, compromising the already stressed and weakened frame. 
Grania Estelle
twisted as she tore free of hyperspace, the entire starboard side shredding, all along lines of damage, the hull ripping open as atmo inside the ship burst free.  Alarms shrieked and howled, drowned out as the air inside rushed out into the void.  Debris and a few crewmen flew out into the vacuum of space, forming a small cloud of what would look like mist on the starboard side of the bulk freighter.

              “Seal off those sections!” the Captain roared, getting to his feet as the ship shook violently.  No one argued, everyone was stabbing frantically at consoles.

              “What the hell just happened?” Serinda cried from the communications console. 

              Tamara shoved her aside, roughly, the dark haired woman slipped and fell hard against the deck.  She didn’t complain though as Tamara slapped her hand down on the console and got that faraway look she often did when she accessed her implants.

             
Stella, what happened?
Tamara asked, sending a mental communication to the AI.  She
missed
speaking with the female AI through her wireless uplink.

              [Oh, Tamara, the hull.  My hull!] the AI shrieked.  [We missed a few of the weak spots.  The hyperdrive was a little off in its calibration and with the constant flight and slipshod repairs…  The release of energy from breakout caused my superstructure to buck like a serpent!  The weak points fractured and breached and the damage just spread.  And when the atmosphere vented, it just accelerated the damage.]

              “Give me a casualty report!” Eamonn demanded of George at the Operations station. 

              Tamara began issuing commands to the ship’s computer, while simultaneously trying to sooth the frantic AI. 
I know it’s bad right now, Stella, but getting hysterical won’t help.  We need you here and we need you now!
  Her mental voice cracked like a whip and Stella forced herself to calm down.

              [Sorry, Tamara, but I’m just so afraid!  My hull is so damaged!]

             
I know, and I’m sorry about that, but we have to stay focused right now if we’re going to save this ship and you and the rest of us.  Now, I need you seal off all of the affected areas near the breached sections.
  Checking status feeds, Tamara saw emergency bulkheads sealing, hatches closing.  Crewmen on internal security cameras were evacuating all the damaged areas and hustling for safety.

              “Four are missing,” George reported, his eyes flitting back and forth over his displays.  “Six injured from flying debris and it looks like they had to drag two people out of one of the breached sections and they’re suffering from brief vacuum exposure.  They’re being brought to sickbay now.”

              [The breached areas are sealed off.]  Stella’s report made Tamara sigh with relief.  Sending a mental command to the computer, she shot the report to George, who repeated it to the Captain. 

             
Reroute power and life support around those damaged section, Stella
, Tamara told her.  She could do it herself, but she needed the AI to stay focused. 
How is the reactor holding up?
  Tamara checked the feeds.  The reactor was operating at sixty-one percent, the output having only just been dropped a moment earlier.

              [It’s holding steady.  I’m keeping it stable, but there are a number of control lines that had been damaged or outright destroyed due to the damage.]  There was a pause.  [I’m going to have to reduce power levels to twenty percent, Tamara.  I can’t maintain stability on the reactor at the current higher power level.]

             
Understood.
  Tamara opened her eyes.  “Captain, Stella and I have sealed off the damaged sections.  There’s a lot of structural damage, as well as damage to the control lines and a few of the life support junctions.”

              “Great,” Eamonn said, scowling.  “Are we in danger of breaking apart?”

              Stella appeared on the Captain’s chair display.  “No, Captain, structural integrity is holding.  But there is damage to the power control and distribution system.  There’s also minor damage to the reactor, which means I have to keep the reactor stepped down to only twenty percent.  That will mean minimal shields, sensors on passives only and power to life support.”

              “I can make sure that it’s also enough to give enough juice for the sublight engine, Captain.  We can still maneuver,” Tamara piped up.  Eamonn looked over at her, frowning, then nodded. 

              “Captain!” Isis called, her voice demanding.  “Starboard thrusters are off-line, but port ones are locked open.  We’re in an uncontrolled starboard roll.  I’m attempting to compensate, but my controls are only partially responding.  And I have a lot of ship to try and control.”  She was fighting with her controls, her eyes never leaving her displays.

              Tamara closed her eyes again, accessing her HUD again.  Subroutines popped up, activated, systems powered up, rerouted, or shut down.  The control systems for the helm came back up, though the starboard maneuvering thrusters were still out.  In many cases, either the thrusters, the control systems themselves or the power conduits running to them were physically damaged. 

              “Helm’s responding!” Isis called again, surprised beyond measure.  “I’m trying to slow our spin.  I suppose it really doesn’t matter…”

              “No, that’s fine, Isis.  Slowly,” the Captain replied.  “Don’t burn out the thrusters.  Nice and easy.”

              “Aye, Captain.”  She eased off on the thrusters, slowly bringing the big freighter out of its spin.  “At this rate of velocity and the puffs on the thrusters, I’ll have us back at station keeping in a little over an hour.”

              “Understood,” the captain replied.  “Keep an eye on it and sing out if there are any changes or new problems.”

              “Aye, Captain,” she said again, not turning away, hands moving steadily over the controls.  “Easy, girl,” the pilot soothed.  “I’ve got you.”

              Eamonn blew out a long breath, slumping back down in his command seat.  “Well, that was fun.  Get engineering teams out to take a look at the damage.”

              George nodded, though the captain couldn’t see him.  He was already on the line with Quesh in Main Engineering.  “Sir, there’s a fire in the galley, DC party is there handling it.  No one was hurt,” he reported, much to everyone’s relief.  There was an aching moan that went through the entire hull and the whole ship began to shiver.

              “What the hell is that?” Eamonn demanded, gripping the arm of his chair in alarm.

              Tamara, Stella and George all got the answer at the same time and spoke all at once. 

              Tamara: “The attempt to compensate for the roll is putting way too much stress on the hull.  We need to stop that now.”

              George: “Captain, stop the roll!”

              Stella: “Isis is ham-fisting my controls, too much thrust against the compromised hull.”

              Isis ducked her head, flushing in humiliation.  “Sorry, Captain.  Powering down thrusters now.”  Her hands flew over her controls.

              Tamara nodded as her displays on the console as well as on her HUD showed stress levels reducing on the hull of the ship.  They weren’t in the green, not yet, but they were much better than they were.  The shivering slowed and then stopped and after a long moment the moaning of severely overstressed metal went silent.  Indicators moved out of the red and back toward the green.  “Stress levels are dropping considerably,” George reported.  “We’re well down into the yellow now.  As long as we don’t do that again and we don’t get any more serious jolts, the ship should hold together.”

              Stella appeared, looking haggard.  Her program hadn’t been damaged, but she seemed to be reflecting the condition of the ship.  “I concur, Captain.  I think we’re going to be okay.”

              Tamara released the console, and her HUD deactivated.  She’d gotten better with using her implants despite the disrupter on her neck.  She didn’t need the HUD right now, but she would later when the damage control and repairs would begin.  Tamara stood and turned to Serinda, who had climbed to her feet and was hugging herself, her arms in tight.  She glared at Tamara as the engineer touched her arm.

              “I’m so sorry, Serinda,” she said to the other woman.  “I didn’t mean to knock you over.  Are you all right?”

              The younger woman shrugged, still angry.  “Is the ship all right?” she finally asked.

              Tamara swept a hand over the console.  “Not really.  See for yourself.”  And she stepped back, away from the console.  The other woman stepped up, sitting down in the seat.  Her face fell even further as her eyes absorbed the status of the freighter on the displays.  Tamara touched her shoulder and the younger woman didn’t flinch away.  “I know,” she said, trying to give some comfort, but knowing her words didn’t sooth any of the fear.  She felt stupid even saying them.  “Captain, permission to leave the bridge?”

              “Go!” he barked.  “Have all stations report in!” he ordered as Tamara rushed for the hatch.  “And get everyone in suits!”

              Tamara pelted down the corridor, racing for the berthing areas and her stateroom.  After this crisis, she vowed, making a note on her implants and logging it, they were going to make a whole mess of disposable suits that could be hung in various areas throughout the ship.  A personalized suit was great and obviously preferable, but the ability to step into a one-size fits all suit that could hold atmo was far better than needing to race down every corridor of the ship and hope you could get to your own suit in time. 

              A few minutes later, she was in her room, shucking her clothes and pulling on her skinsuit, wincing as she rushed through getting the plumbing connections in the proper places.  Sealing the suit, she grabbed her helmet and ran out of her quarters.  Grimacing at the chafing from the suit, it took a few moments for her to adjust to having the suit in place.  Tamara hustled down the corridor, running headlong into one of the damage control teams, working to seal up a shattered bulkhead. 

              “Report!” she shouted.  The two workers turned to her as she came in, nodding at her arrival.  One of them only spared her a quick glance before returning to her welding.

              “Tamara!” one of the others shouted over the noise of the welding.  She recognized him immediately as the large engineering tech Lorcan, who had helped to rescue the crew of the
Emilia Walker
from the fueling station back at Ulla-tran.  The bulkhead was being patched together with a variety of patch plates, none of which were large enough to cover the entire mess, but overlapping the plates into a patchwork quilt of sorts, it seemed to be holding.  It looked as though the team was getting a handle on this and would soon have it sealed up.  Her implants helpfully pointed out the remaining amount to seal, only a crack about twenty centimeters long and less than one centimeter wide.  It wasn’t a huge breach, as things went, but they couldn’t afford to keep bleeding atmo out into the void.  One more patch and this section would be sealed, without having to lock down a whole other section.  “We’re nearly done here.”

              Tamara nodded.  “Looks good.  Report in to the chief once you have this,” she replied, squinting against the bright light of the welding torch and the shower of sparks.  Her implants were indicating that the air in this section was getting very thin.  “You’d better get that done quick.  You’re almost out of air!”

              “Roger that!” the man yelled back, giving her the thumbs up.  The two men bent to their work and in the space of two minutes, the hole was sealed.  No further air was escaping and Tamara’s optic implant sensors confirmed it.  Lorcan leaned one hand against the bulkhead, one of the sections that hadn’t been welded or patched. 

              “Damn that was scary,” the big man said, looking up at Tamara, who clapped him on the shoulder.

              “Come on, big guy,” she said.  “You too,” she pointed to the other technician.  “We’ve barely begun.  “We’ve still got sections that are open to space.”

              “We can’t possibly fix the whole damned ship!” the man demanded.

              Tamara glared at the man.  “We already did that once,” she pointed out, her voice harsh.  “We can do it again.  Now stop whining and get moving.  Report to Ka’Xarian on deck four.  We’ve got breaches and damage all over.  Move!” she gave him a shove.