Captain Patel watched the last people leave the service. His dress uniform was stiff and had a weight that had nothing to do with gravity.
As he walked out, Commander Randell walked up next to him. Randell looked almost as bad as the captain felt. They both had been working long days, trying to figure out how to make it through the trip.
"Sir, the chemists say they can do it. We should be able to grow enough algae for the trip. It may take everything organic we have, though. It's not going to make anyone happy; no one likes eating algae, let alone destroying good food to do so."
Patel sighed, "I know, but it's the only way to make it to Helvetios with any reserve at all, and who knows how friendly the natives will be. I'll take it to the council tomorrow."
"The signals team is wanting some Q cycles; they want to create a computer program to translate their language, if we need to figure it out ourselves once we get there. I know it's busy holding everything together now, but we need to be ready when we get there."
"Is Chief Thurll dragging his feet?" The captain had partial authority over the quantum computer. He could only give the programming chief orders if the quantum computer was needed for shipboard operations. He might have to talk with Thurll, and he'd would rather not get the council involved if he could help it.
Helvetios' signals still confounded the team studying them. The language had no references anywhere to any known language. After at most a few hundred years, that would only be possible if they made up a new language from scratch. That was the current theory, but the captain had doubts. He preferred to be ready for anything.
"I'll have a talk with the Chief Programmer..."
Not a moment later, the ship started to shake.
---
Patel bellowed, "Report," as he and Randell entered the bridge.
There were more alarms going off than even during the nova.
Lt Rose responded, "Sir, engineering reports a resonance is building in the plate. They didn't dump it. I've paused displacing."
"Quite rightly, Lieutenant. We can restarted the torch once, they will have to find a way to fix the problem without shutting it down."
The ship shook again, and Patel held onto a console, barely managing to stay upright. The captain shuddered to think of what must be happening to the more sensitive instruments.
Acceleration suddenly cut to half a G, causing most of those who were not holding onto something to stumble. The thrust then shifted, making the deck feel like it was tilting. More alarms went off and several indicators on the large status screens showed damage.
"Sir! Two degrees off true and climbing!" Rose yelled out even as the ship shook.
The main status board showed the Erikson tilting. The lines that showed the shadow of the front shield, that kept them safe from the small impacts too small for the forward laser to take care of.
Part of the Erikson was going to come out of the shadow if nothing was done.
"Relay Officer, tell engineering we are going to be adjusting our angle of approach to bring us back up normal.
"Helm, I want you to start to gimbal us back to optimal at one half degree a minute. On my mark only."
The captain hit the shipwide button on his wrist comp, "This is the captain. Everyone, please brace yourself. There is a problem with the torch, and we are engaging the gimbals to correct it."
The captain waited a few seconds and said, "Helm, begin gimbaling us over."
Helm answered, "Gimbaling us over, sir."
"Ride it manually, son, I don't want your eyes to leave those displays.
"Rose, monitor and take over everything else from Helm."
"Aye, aye, sir."
He felt the ship start to turn and shift under his feet even as he saw the diagram change, moving them slowly to true.
"Keep all gimbals spinning! Backups included! We're going to give engineering as long as possible!"
The relay Officer spoke. "Engineering reports they have the problem under control. They request control of the gimbals to bring us back to true."
"Granted."
The thrust changed a few more times, but their angle did not. It then settled back down to something that felt just a hair less than one G.
The chief engineer, Harden, called the captain's wristcomp. The captain put in his earpiece and accepted the call.
Without preamble he said, "We managed to dampen the vibrations, but we have a major problem. The only reason I can think of for this happening is if we have a flaw in the plate, maybe a major one."
Patel could hear the chief moving around and yelling at people. Mostly variations of "Get the fuck off your asses and work," or "Don't do that, you don't want to blow us up do you?"
"I've got some of my best people riding the controls manually for now. Should be able to hold us together at just under one G long enough to get up to a tenth light without having to dump."
At least it would keep the engineers busy. Engineers were never happy unless there was something to fix.
"I could use more help. If you could send my lieutenant back."
Harden was talking about Randell, of course.
The chief had not gotten over how his right hand became the captain's.
"I will send Commander Smith to help, keep me informed." The captain then swiped his wristcomp to end the connection.
Turning to Randell, he said, "Make sure he keeps me informed, and get him whatever he needs."
Randell saluted stiffly then and left with an almost unnaturally sober look on his face.
---
The captain exited the lift and passed through the hatches leading to the engineering block.
He passed through several compartments; very few workstations were not filled.
He heard the chief before he saw him.
"Do the sim again. I don't care what the best-case scenario says, do we look that lucky?" A few crew members went back to their job when he entered the compartment. He saw both commander's talking over a large tank with a diagram of the plate.
Both snapped to attention when they saw him. They looked like they had not slept in the two days since the plate shook.
Knowing them, that was probably the case.
He asked, "Commanders, how are the repairs going?"
The chief made some motions with his hand over the sensor and the diagram changed, a crack was highlighted, "This is the problem. It's small but we can't fix it when in motion. Hell, we'll be lucky to fix it outside of a real repair facility."
Smith spoke up, "We think it was caused by some of the more exotic radiation we took from the nova, but to be honest we can't be sure. There's a reason we do a long inspection before we leave systems after all."
The chief said, "We think the plate will hold for decel, but it's going to be touch and go."
"Worst case?"
"It cracks down the middle all the way through and we have to improvise a way to forge it back together once we enter the system."
Smith looked at him oddly and said, "I thought worst case was it cracks during boost and we can't slow down."
"In that case, we would just die outright. No point in planning for that."
"Proceed at your discretion, reassign any personal you need, Chief."
The captain made his rounds of engineering. The least he could do is make sure they all knew their work was appreciated.
---
"I said I was fine. You can sit right back down."
At that outburst from Kat, Kyle sat back down. Kat checked on the lasagna again and Kyle visibly restrained himself from commenting.
"You're doing well, Kyle, and from what I have read, most people take longer to pass advised psychology and leadership fundamentals," Nadica quipped.
Kyle was in his ensign uniform, and looked exhausted. He sat back and took a drink from his beer.
"Thanks, although it's engineering training that I'm wary of; I never had your talent for math," Kyle said as he rubbed Nadica's head as she smiled.
Kat walked back over to the table and slid in next to Roger. Putting his hand around her, and she relaxed around him.
"I'm sure I was good practice. If you can get me to study history, you can get anyone to do anything," Kat said, still too quiet for Roger's liking, but at least she was talking.
"In the end, you succeeded, like you always do; just took some prompting, Kat." He started to smiled mischievously and continued, "...or should I say Kitty?"
"No, you shouldn't, I know where you live." Kat's tone was level, but she was smiling.
"I'll be right back," Kat said as she kissed him and left for the bathroom.
A bit after she was gone, Kyle asked, "How is she really doing?".
Roger paused and, then sighed. "Better, but I don't know if she'll ever forgive herself, not really."
"She will get better," Nadica said quietly as she looked up from what she was working on. "She is better when she is with you. I can see it in her eyes and in her voice. Theirs's a...deep loneliness in her that you never see because she does not have it when your around."
---
The Alice lined up a shot and fired the modified probes. Then Roger burned to stay abeam and several kilometers away from the Erikson.
He breathed deeply several times and waited.
The two warships were several light seconds out and getting closer. They did not wink; he must have missed.
The warships got closer; Roger randomly altered his course while keeping his ventral section facing the ships. It didn't matter. They fired their lasers and he lost his sensors, then his jets, then and his screens went blank and reported, "Simulation Failure."
They were back in freefall and still on their way to Helvetios. Roger was one of a few pilots who were being checked for the combat pilot job.
"Not bad, not bad," Adrian Moisey said after clapping Roger on the shoulder.
"Did you miss the part where I died?"
"I was talking about you, not the simulation. There was a reason I wanted to see you do a sim before we went over even basic tactics and strategy. You have good instincts for this; you're always moving, always trying something, and you're not forgetting the mission. You're learning from your mistakes faster than I would have thought.
"I wasn't Navy, but I knew more than a few pilots. I admit, you're not as much of an asshole as they were, and I think you do have what it takes. You can keep track of several changing vectors simultaneously while doing maneuvers. That's rare, most people can't track more than two at once. Their brain's just aren't made to handle it. And, of course, I have no doubt about your bravery or ability to fly while under stress. You'll need training and a lot of practice, but I think you're going to be our best candidate for combat pilot."
Unspoken was the real reason. Most of the pilots, particularly the ones with real experience, were dead. Only a few were left.
He Unstrapping himself, and he looked Adrian in the eye and said, "Do you really think we will need the Alice? We don't exactly have a full complement of boats anymore."
"I don't know. I sincerely hope we will never have to fire her lasers, or use the rail gun in anger."
"Will they even do any good? I mean, they're just lasers, not relativistic plasma or nukes or anything like that."
"You fight the war with what you have. You should have seen the look on the council's faces when I suggested we take apart some generators to get at the uranium to make some nukes.
"Remember that this is a dark colony; they won't have modern weapons, but they might have nukes. There is every chance they'll only have the tech they left with. People that isolationist as a rule don't develop technology quickly.
"Even if all it does is hang out there in the void and show our strength that could be enough."
---
Roger mag-walked into the converted cargo bay and put on a set of noise cancelers that were hanging by the door. He went to where Kat was shooting, being careful not to push off too hard and set himself floating.
Even after visiting Kat a couple times a week for more than a month, people still acted odd around him. Like they expected him to pull a rabbit out of his hat.
Kat looked almost relaxed. If one could look relaxed when in a crouch, shooting, then changing positions randomly, just to fire again. Even sweating and tired, she was beautiful.
Every day, there seemed to be a little less of the bouncy, happy, woman he had met aboard the Hermes.
"Ready for dinner?" Roger asked, hoping the answer would be different this time.
"Almost, just need to get a little better. I almost beat my record."
"You need to eat."
"I'm fine," she said as she loaded a new clip in her gun and fired again.
"You need to take care of yourself."
"I'm busy..." She looked distracted and sad as she continued shooting.
Roger stared at her, thinking.
When she learned to shoot, he was glad; he thought it might help her cope. But he had been wrong. She was getting worse.
"You're angry. More than anything, you're angry at yourself for what you think is your failure. You don't know what you could have done wrong, but that doesn't help.
"You think if you do something, you might be able to get over it. But it's not working, all you can think of are those moments when you feel like you failed. Over and over, they play in your mind until that is all you are.
"You're not in this alone, Kat." He put his hands on her shoulders and looked her in the eyes deeply. He hugged her tight and stroked her hair.
"You are loved, and you are valued, and I will not let you sink into yourself again. Come on, you have someplace you need to be."
---
They were silent as they left the shooting range and traversed the ship all the way to the white ring. They went past their quarters and to the next block.
"Why are we here?" Kat asked as they entered Roger's new studio. It was a gift from the crew and passengers of the Snowball, along with a plaque that hung on the bulkhead.
There was no easy way to say what Roger had to say, so he did it quick. "I tried to kill myself when I was fourteen, a year after my father got custody of me."
She looked shocked by the truth.
"After...what happened, I couldn't stop thinking of it, I would just play it back, again and again, blaming myself. There was nothing I could have done, but I still blamed myself. I grew angry and hated myself as much as I hated her. Talking about it helped a little, but what really helped me was when my father taught me how to draw. It helped me focus, helped me forget. It helped me learn to put it behind me, to not allow the pain to define me.
"Drawing...art, is pure creation. You're bringing something new and wonderful into the world. To do it well requires focus, concentration. You'll forget about everything else except what you're making, and it can help you.
"You need more in your life. You deserve more than anger," he said as he gripped her shoulders, looking her in the eyes.
"You teaching me how to dance has helped me more than you can know. Now, I am going to help you."
She picked up a pencil and sat down.
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