Mechanical Failure (6 page)

“I wouldn't know,” the pilot said. He made a couple of quick corrections on the control panel and spoke some jargon-riddled pilot-speak into the communication system. He received similar gibberish in reply and seemed satisfied. The
Flagship
took up the
whole of the cockpit window now, its dull gray surface washing out the colors of the shuttle's interior.

“You don't play games?”

“Not while I'm on duty.”

“That's the best time!”

The pilot turned and regarded Rogers with something between confusion and contempt. He pointed mutely to the passenger compartment, and Rogers sighed as he turned around.

“Might as well have a droid as a pilot,” Rogers said under his breath as he sat down and fastened his seatbelt. Crossing his arms, he grumpily looked out the window and watched as the docking bay swallowed the tiny shuttle like a whale swallowed plankton, padded clamps fastening around the hull like baleen. As Rogers had suspected, the whole procedure was as smooth and automated as it had been when he left the military. Seatbelts . . . pfuh.

Speaking of droids, Rogers couldn't help but notice that the docking bay had quite a few of them running around. Almost humanoid, their tin-can bodies moved around on either a wheeled base or a convincing pair of bionic legs with the knee joints reversed to offset their heavy torsos. Some of them wielded welding torches or wrenches, and some others had their data extension cables plugged into consoles operating cranes and various machinery. Rogers had expected to see some of his old engineering troops running around, but there was barely a human in sight.

“Damn,” Rogers said. “Shinies everywhere.”

The pilot cleared his throat.

“What?”

“I'd thank you not to use that term on my ship,” the pilot said. “I don't tolerate racism.”

“Racism? They're droids! They don't have a race.”

The pilot made some final adjustments on the control panel, and Rogers felt a rush of air as the passenger stairway extended down to the docking bay floor.

“Enjoy your stay,” the pilot said coldly.

Shaking his head, Rogers collected his meager belongings—most of his stuff was still on the
Awesome
and he hadn't been allowed to retrieve it—and made his way down the plank and through the docking bay, carefully avoiding any contact with the droids. Not only did they creep him out a little, but they were boring.

According to Tuckalle, his orders had been transmitted to the
Flagship
, but he didn't tell Rogers much more than that. The first stop, of course, would be the supply depot. He'd need to be reissued everything from uniforms to hygiene supplies to flashlights and tools for his engineering duties. The supply depot had always been his favorite place; it was where he moved the best contraband and where he had the most friends. Of all the people on the ship he wanted to keep happy the most, the supply clerks were of the highest priority, which is why Rogers never, ever gambled, swindled, or dated any of them.

The manifest technician monitoring personnel entry and exit from the ship wasn't actually a manifest technician at all. It was a droid, plugged into the central computer system via a cable that extended from its torso to the wall, and it held up a shiny steel-alloy arm to indicate that Rogers was to wait.

“C
ALL FUNCTION
[
PERFUNCTORY GREETING
]. T
ARGET
[
HUMAN, UNKNOWN NAME, UNKNOWN RANK
].
PROMPT:
N
AME
. P
ROMPT: DESTINATION
. P
ROMPT: PURPOSE OF VISIT
.”

The rough, broken speech of the droid was like biting into a cookie full of nails. Rogers wondered how, in a few thousand years of speech recognition and replication technology, they hadn't been able to make the droids sound like anything other than brain-damaged gorillas. Even the personal computer terminals sounded better than shinies.

“R. Wilson Rogers,” he replied, not feeling comfortable at all that he was having a conversation with a robot. “Reinstatement and reassignment.”

A moment passed, the droid's glowing blue eyes staring at Rogers.

“R
EJECT FUNCTION
[
MESSILY DESTROY INTRUDER
]. C
ALL FUNCTION
[A-156
AUTHORIZED ENTRY AND COURTEOUS ADMISSION
]. O
UTPUT STRING:
A
PPROVED
. E
NJOY YOUR STAY
. P
LEASE REPORT TO
S
UPPLY FOR UNIFORM ISSUE
.”

Rogers rolled his eyes and walked away, wondering why they would trust something so important as personnel manifesting to a machine with no human oversight. It made him uncomfortable.

That unsavory encounter behind him, all of a sudden Rogers was back aboard the bustling hive of activity that was the MPS
Flagship
. It smelled like carbon, processed air, and home. The first two were expected; the latter was a bit of a surprise to Rogers. Maybe he
had
missed being in the military just a little bit. He wondered when the beer light would go on, signaling the noontime cessation of all work-like activities and the commencement of binge drinking and carousing. The peacetime military was hard to beat for work-life balance.

Someone jostled Rogers as they rushed by him, nearly knocking him back out into the docking bay.

“Hey!” Rogers said indignantly. A female spacer, whose rank he couldn't see, kept walking down the corridor without looking back. Rogers shook his head. Some troops had no manners.

The jolt brought him out of his semi-nostalgic reverie, anyway. Rogers gave another head shake and let his legs take him the direction he needed to go. It had only been a little over a year since he'd left the military, so there was still a bit of muscle memory left. He had spent so much time in the supply depot that he was pretty sure he could have, for example, stumbled there in a state of blacked-out drunkenness with no problem. Just as an example.

The supply depot and most of the docking bays were located on the same level of the
Flagship,
so there was no need for Rogers to take the larger up-line intra-ship transportation cars that went
between decks. There was a smaller system of zipcars, the in-line, that moved along through the center of each level, and Rogers set his course for the nearest terminal. The depot wasn't that far of a walk, but Rogers preferred simplicity over . . . well, most physical exertion. As he approached the terminal, however, he was met by a stern-faced young woman who he didn't recognize, dressed in a typical dress uniform and wearing an old-style train conductor's hat. There seemed to be an awful lot of new folks around for only being gone for a little over a standard year.

“Hi, there,” he said. “I'm headed to Supply.”

“It's that way,” she said, pointing down the hallway. She didn't move to let him into the boarding area.

“Right. I'd like to ride.”

The woman—a starman first class, someone with only a couple of years in the Meridan Navy—looked him up and down with a disdainful eye. “These are for official use only.”

Rogers fought to keep the smile on his face. “It is official use. I'm being reinstated and I need to go to the supply dock for my official equipment issue.”

“Do you have orders?”

Rogers' smile almost slipped. “Since when do you need orders to ride the in-line?”

“It's the regulation. If you have business, you should have been given orders or at least be wearing a uniform. That's the way we do things.”

In no way was this the “way they did things” from what Rogers could remember. Hell, they used to ride the in-line back and forth just to get back to the beginning of the “landing strip,” which is what they used to call the section of the hallway they slicked down with cleaning fluid in order to slide along it on their bare chests for fun. Walking back was dangerous—you might get plowed over by a wayward soldier tittering with glee as he spun out of control.

“Just once,” Rogers said. “I need to get my stuff.”

“No.”

The woman looked at him with such implacable indifference that Rogers wondered if she would have reacted had he stripped naked in front of her. What was wrong with these people?

Rogers sighed. “Come on, it's just—”

“These transportation systems are for the orderly movement of personnel and supplies through the loading deck. If I let every joker on, what would happen if fighting broke out? The cars would be crowded with loitering slobs like you.”

Letting the insult slide off him, Rogers pressed on. “What fighting? There's no fighting.”

The woman narrowed his eyes at him. “That's not funny. Are you really that dense? Now, if you don't mind, I'm very busy.”

“You're not doing anything at all!”

“My position is, as all positions are, crucial to the war effort. Please make your way down to the supply depot that way”—she pointed again—“or go and find whoever assigned you here and get orders to use the in-line.”

Resisting the urge to make an obscene gesture, Rogers turned in a huff and stomped down the hallway.
War effort!
That was like saying you were stationed on a communication station to help with the heat wave.

He realized he was starting to sweat after the first couple of minutes of speed walking, and he slowed his pace, shoving his hands in his pockets and grumbling to himself. A pair of droids rolled down the hallway, their incessant beeping and whirring making him want to knock their metal faces off (if he had been wielding a torque wrench or had ever visited the gym).

A poster on the wall made him stop for a moment to examine it. There was nothing strange about having motivational posters on the wall—every organization
D
id it despite its utter ineffectiveness—but something about this one seemed different. It read, in all capital letters, EVERY POSITION IS CRUCIAL TO THE WAR EFFORT. Above it was a dramatically shaded portrait of a
young soldier licking envelopes, a look of fierce determination in his eyes. Rogers shook his head and moved on.

The supply depot finally came into view ahead of him, an unremarkable door bearing the inscription
SUPPLY
above it in yellow letters. Rogers punched the door lock with the bottom of his fist, and the door opened into a small waiting area packed with spacers and marines sitting in rows of chairs and looking annoyed. He couldn't remember a time when there had been so many people in the waiting area. In fact, he couldn't remember a time when there was anyone staffing the desk, either. The supply room was just sort of the place where you went to get stuff. You went in, got stuff, and got out. There was no need for waiting.

The broad counter stretched the length of the back wall, behind which Rogers could see various cargo crates being moved back and forth through the different warehouses. It all seemed very busy, and he could have sworn that the same container was being moved over and over again.

A bored-looking corporal stood behind the terminal at the counter, not doing anything apparently useful. A sign above his head showed
NOW SERVING 103
, and a vidscreen off to the side was streaming a muted news channel with no subtitles.

“Can I help you?” the corporal asked in a voice that absolutely crackled with nonchalance.

“Yes,” Rogers said. “I'm here for my equipment issue.”

“Are you a new recruit?”

“Not exactly. I've been reinstated after a . . . break in service. R. Wilson Rogers, sergeant.”

The clerk asked Rogers for some additional personal data and started typing away at the terminal keypad.

After a moment, the clerk paused and frowned. “Roger Wilson Rogers? Your name is Roger Rogers?”

“R. Wilson Rogers,” he replied tightly. “Are you new here? Where's Quintal? He was in charge here last time I was around.”

“Sergeant Quintal was transferred,” the clerk said. “I'm Corporal Suresh, the new supply chief.”

“Who put a corporal in charge of Supply?” Rogers said. In the Meridan Navy, corporals were just barely above starmen, who mostly had achieved the dubious accomplishment of being able to lace their boots properly.

That didn't brighten Suresh's day at all. “I am fully capable of the duties assigned to me, Mr. Rogers.”

“Sergeant Rogers.”

The clerk ignored him and continued typing away at the terminal for what Rogers thought was a very long time.

“Is there a problem?” Rogers asked. “I know where everything is back there. I'll just go and get what I need, and—”

“Nobody not in the supply corps is allowed back there,” the clerk said.

“What are you talking about? Just about everyone in the whole damn ship has been back there at one time or another.”

“Not on my watch,” the corporal said.

Rogers bit the inside of his cheek. He had been betting on his old pal Quintal being here so he could reestablish all his old connections. Things were not going to go well for him at all if he couldn't have a hand in the goings-on inside the supply depot. He changed his approach.

“I think we got off on the wrong foot,” Rogers said. “A corporal as chief of Supply is a very prominent achievement. I mean, for you to be put in a position of such power and influence at your rank is very impressive.”

“I'm just doing my duty,” Suresh said, his voice flat and his face expressionless.

Well, flattery didn't seem to work. Maybe Rogers could bribe him.

Without warning, however, Suresh pressed a button on the keyboard and began shouting.

“Supply room, A-TEN-HOOOOAAH!”

Instantly, everyone in the room jumped to their feet and stood at strict attention, arms at their sides, feet together, their spines as rigid as engine support braces. Papers and personal effects tumbled to the floor. He felt his muscles stiffen in reaction to the command but realized that since he was still in civilian clothes, it didn't really matter. Rogers spun toward the supply room entrance, positive that the charismatic and powerful Admiral Klein, fleet commander of the 331st and the only military man Rogers had ever feared, had walked through the door. But nobody was there.