Aces (9 page)

The bridge
speakers crackled, and Gina exchanged a look with Schroeder. He nodded.

“Audio only.”
Gina said, and gave her captain an OK sign when the channel was open.

It was the
now-familiar voice of ‘
Ted Miller
’
,
the innocuous looking captain of the supposed medical research ship he had
insultingly called
Nightengale
. “
Atlas
Challenger
, or should I say
Ace
, like you do?” Miller began, showing
off how well he knew his prey. “You have something I want, and I have-“

Schroeder
interrupted indignantly. “You have attacked a civilian vessel, and tried to
kill my crew! I will-“

”You will shut
your mouth and listen, Captain! I do the talking, you listen.” The voice of ‘
Ted Miller
’
was not so sweet this time. “I
hold all the cards here, in case you haven
’
t figured that
out yet,
mein kapitan
. Do not insult me, or I will fire another missile
at your command section, and blow you all into dust. Are you listening now? A
simple yes or no, please. You can do that, right? You open your mouth, and you
say ‘Yes
’
, like a good little boy.”

Schroeder fumed
inside. Out of the corners of his eyes, he saw the people whose lives he was
responsible for. He swallowed his pride and growled “Yes.”

“Very good! That
wasn
’
t so hard, was it? Aboard your ship, or in one of the
cargo bays in what is left of your ship, there is something I want very much.
Enough to kill for it. My crew and I are coming aboard, we are going to take
what we want, and then we will depart, and leave you alone. The Navy will be
here eventually, and I do not intend to be in this star system when the Navy
arrives. In case you are thinking the
Tigershark
is on its way soon, it
’
s not. That ship is busily engaged in searching for a ghost,
and they will be there for quite some time. This is what I want: you instruct
whatever crew you have aboard your ship not to interfere with us when we come
aboard. I could simply shoot them, but I would prefer not to make a mess in
your fine ship.” The pirate laughed. “You will have a short time to consider,
and then I want your answer.
Nightengale
out.
”

There was silence
on
Ace
’
s bridge as everyone came to terms with the
situation. Finally, Seth spoke. “Captain, you were right. They wanted us here,
and they decoyed that frigate. I wish we knew what the hell they wanted.”

Schroeder had
been wracking his brain, trying to think what cargo could be worth killing
over. More important, what cargo could be worth what had to be a very
considerable expense on the part of the pirates. “I wish I did, too. Nothing
aboard this ship is worth anyone
’
s life!”

“I have some good
news.” Gina said hopefully. “While the
Nightengale
was talking, they had to drop their radio jamming. I picked up a faint signal
from the surface.” She played the recording, and Nelson
’
s
voice boomed out. “
Ace
, this is Nelson, we got out of the shuttle in
time, thanks for the warning. What the hell is going on, over?
Ace
, do
you read? This is Nelson, respond, please.”

“They
’
re alive!
” Joy shouted, and would have
fallen to her knees if the artificial gravity had been on. “Call them back!”

“I can't, the
message is a recording, Nelson must have set it to repeat until we responded.
Next time they drop the jamming, I
’
ll try to get through.”
Gina said, not taking her eyes off the instruments.

 Not for the
first time, Schroeder was extraordinarily proud of his crew. There were Navy
warships that didn
’
t have people as resourceful or
experienced as his lowly freighter. “You do that. Were you able to locate the
signal?”

Seth answered.
“Checking now. It
’
s hard to say, because the signal is
weak, and we
’
re no longer line of sight to the source, but
they
’
re real close to the mining camp.”

Schroeder turned
to Joy. “Your husband has a very good chance, Ms. Sanchez. Nelson and Sam will
get him to safety,” he said soothingly, not knowing that it was Rick who was
leading the surface party, “and they should have plenty of oxygen, enough to
get to the mining camp.” He didn
’
t express his own fears
about the mining camp being hostile.

Joy nodded,
letting out a long breath. She was over her initial shock, and was now able to
think clearly again. “Call me Joy, please, I don
’
t think
this is the time for be formal. Is there any way we can contact the cargo
section, find out what is going on there?”

Schroeder turned
to Gina, who held up her hands. “Ms.-, Joy, with the radio jamming, we can
’
t talk to anyone aboard the cargo section, or establish a link
with the computer there. Ms. Olivetti, did you pick up any radio signals from
the cargo sec- let
’
s just call it the ship, shall we?”

“No, nothing from
the ship.” She added, “Sorry, Joy.”

Schroeder floated
over to look out the viewport. They were drifting further away from the ship.
“We do know the rest of the ship is intact, I can see her running lights are
on, and she stabilized her spin. That means she has power, and thrusters, and
at least enough computer function to control the thrusters. I didn
’
t see any signs of air venting, so while your children may be
frightened, they have air, heat, and light. And Jen will be taking care of
them. Our own situation hereis far more serious.”

“How serious?”
Joy asked.

Schroeder saw
that, whereas before she had hugged her arms tightly around her and looked
scared, now she looked focused and determined. Tough lady, he thought. He
glided over to his console and pointed to the display. “The command section we
’
re in has no independent power generator, no propulsion, and
only emergency life support. We received main power, propulsion and life
support from the ship we were attached to,” he said without a trace of irony in
his voice, “and now we
’
re on our own. What we do have is
four powercells, one of them isn
’
t online, but that could
simply be a loose connection. Some of the aft compartments have lost air, they
are sealed off. We have an emergency oxygen supply, and filters to remove
carbon dioxide, I estimate we have enough breathable air for eight days.”
Schroeder paused, when he continued he seemed to be summarizing the situation
to himself. “What else? Let
’
s see. It will start getting
cold, as our heat slowly radiates out into space. The heaters drain a lot of
power, so we will be running them at a low level. No artificial gravity. No
weapons. No radar, and no other external sensors, other than looking out a
window with our own eyes.” Schroeder paused a minute to scratch his head and
think. “We can stabilize the spin with thrusters, eventually, that will help.”

Joy looked at
Schroeder in surprise. “The command section has its own attitude control
thrusters? Why? And, yes, I know what an attitude control system is.”

“I," the
captain raised and eyebrow in surprise, "yes. The original operational
scheme for this ship, the original company plan, was for the
Ace-
class
ships to travel from one planet to another, and once there, swap an
entire cargo section
, for a cargo section that had been pre-loaded
for us.” The conversation was irrelevant to their situation, Schroeder spoke
because it gave him time to think. “The forward command section, and the aft
propulsion section, can detach from the main frame of the ship. The design was
for the ship to get into orbit, detach the cargo section, and tugs would attach
them to a pre-loaded cargo section. Starships are wasting money if they
’
re not moving, so the idea was to spend minimal time out of
hyperspace. The attitude control system is merely to assist the tugs in keeping
us stable during the transfer.”

Joy still looked
puzzled. “So what happened?”

Schroeder held up
his hands. “Like everything else, plans changed. It was cheaper for the ship to
stay in orbit a few days than it was to build and maintain all that
infrastructure at every planet on our route. Just because you can do something,
doesn
’
t mean it makes economic sense to do it.”

“So, the command
section is designed to be self-contained. Then why can
’
t-“

Schroeder
cut her off.
“I know what you
’
re saying, but
remember, the command section was only supposed to be self-supporting during
the few hours while the tugs were moving it around. This,” he gestured around
the bridge with one hand, “isn
’
t actually a spaceship. The
thrusters are only cold gas, nowhere near powerful enough to bring us back to
the
Ace
. We do not have any environment suits, and even if we did, we
don
’
t have a way to get from here to the ship.”

“Could the ship,
or the propulsion section, come get us?”

“Unfortunately,
no. The navigation system is here in the command section. Jen would have no way
to run the reactor, the engines, or to navigate. The fusion reactor should have
shut down when the connection to the main computer was lost, I suspect the ship
’
s auxiliary power units kicked in automatically, as they are
supposed to when main power is lost.”

“Are there space
suits aboard the ship? Could Jen reach us?” Joy suggested.

“Yes, there are
space suits, and maneuvering units, what are called jet packs. If Jen had
reacted immediately, she might have been able to reach us. We
’
re
too far away now.”

“So that
’
s it? We just wait for rescue?” Joy asked, disappointed.

“Uh, not
exactly.” Seth spoke up. “Captain, we
’
ve got another
problem.”

Schroeder turned
to his navigator. “What is it, Mr Putri?”

“The inertial
navigation system is  functioning again.” He hesitated a moment before
delivering the bad news. “We
’
re going to fall out of orbit
in six, maybe seven hours.”

“What?”
Schroeder exclaimed.

“We were in a low
orbit to start, and the explosion caused us to slow down, and knocked us toward
the planet. The low point of each orbit will have us kissing the top of the
atmosphere.” Seth shook his head. “ Eventually, the drag will pull us down.”

They found Jen
laying right in the doorway of her workshop. Kaylee screamed and ran when she
saw Jen
’
s slumped form, Manny followed right behind her.
When they got to the crew specialist, she was barely conscious, bleeding from a
deep gash on her right temple, and she had blood on her right side, soaking
through her blouse.

“Kaylee, what do
we do?” Manny asked his big sister.

Kaylee stood
locked in place for a moment, unable to move, her hand over her mouth. Then she
dropped to her knees and touched Jen
’
s cheek hesitantly,
with tears running down her face. “Jen? Jen, can you hear me?”

Jen groaned,
whether in response to Kaylee or not, the teenager couldn
’
t
tell.

“We need to get
her to sickbay.” Manny declared. “I
’
m going to get one of
those stretcher things.”

“Yes, yes. Good
idea.” Kaylee nodded her head vigorously, and Manny ran off down the corridor.
What should she do in the meantime? The gash on Jen
’
s
forehead looked nasty, but had clotted up, and wasn
’
t
bleeding much anymore. What looked worse was Jen
’
s right
side. Moving gingerly, Kaylee got Jen
’
s lower blouse
buttons unfastened, and peeled the material back from her skin.

It was ugly. The
woman must have broken ribs, in addition to the head wound. There was a long
cut running along one rib. Kaylee looked up into Jen
’
s
workshop, the normally neat and tidy place was a bit of a shambles now.
Ordinarily, Jen had a place for everything, every tool, every piece of
equipment she was working on. There was a heavy-looking smashed something on
the middle of the floor, a big cabinet, is what it looked like. Jen must have
had it on her bench, and it fell on her during the accident, because the
cabinet had blood in several places along one edge.

Now what to do?
She didn
’
t know.

Stop the
bleeding. Jen had a first-aid kit in one of the drawers, could Kaylee remember
which one?

Yes. She
scrambled to her feet, found the kit, and tore open a large bandage. The
package said t was supposed to seal itself to a wound, stop the bleeding, and
it contained a medical salve to prevent infections. The wound along Jen
’
s ribs was long enough that Kaylee needed to use two bandages,
side by side. Kaylee used another bandage on Jen
’
s
forehead, after gingerly pulling matted hair away from the cut. She was daubing
away sticky blood when Manny came back.

He was pushing a
stretcher, it hovered over the deck, suspended in the air by isolating itself
from the ship
’
s artificial gravity field. Manny pushed it
next to Jen as Kaylee instinctively pulled the woman
’
s
blouse closed. “Can you lower it to the ground?” She asked her brother.

“I
’
m
trying. I think this is it.” He said, and, with the press of a button, the
stretcher sank slowly to the deck beside the injured woman. “Can she move?
Kaylee, we have to roll her onto the stretcher.”

“
I
don’
t think she can move by herself. Jen? Jen, can you hear me?” The
woman didn
’
t respond. “
Help me, we
’
ll move her feet onto the stretcher first.”

They got Jen
’
s feet and lower legs onto the stretcher, and strapped her feet
in securely. Then, they knelt on the deck and, holding her under her shoulders,
struggled to slide her gently sideways, until she was off the deck and
supported by the stretcher. While she was being moved, Jen
’
s
eyes briefly fluttered open, unfocused and unseeing. Then she passed out with
an anguished grunt, her head slumped to the side.

Manny now was
confident he knew how to control the stretcher, he set it to one meter above
the deck, and it rose smoothly. Brother and sister pushed it along the corridor
and around several corners, taking care not to bump it into any walls along the
way to sickbay.

Manny had left
the sickbay door open. Both children had been to sickbay on their tour of the
ship in Earth orbit, and had not been back since. It was normally an
over-eagerly cheery place, with brightly colored walls and soothing landscape
pictures. Now, the picture screens were blank. There were two rooms off the
main sickbay reception chamber, they pushed Jen into one of the rooms, and the
stretcher slid right into place along rails jutting out from the wall, and became
a bed.

“Doctor! Doctor,
hello?” Kaylee waved her hand in front of the robot doctor, the only on aboard.

“It
’
s
not working, Kaylee, the ship
’
s computer is down.” Manny
stated disgustedly. “Remember, Jen told us all the robots are controlled by the
ship
’
s AI.”

“Then what good
is it?” Kaylee asked angrily, and kicked the inert robot with her foot.

“Is Jen going to
be OK, Kaylee?” Manny seemed hesitant to get close to the unconscious woman.

Kaylee stood
beside the bed, hands on her hips, in an imitation of her mother. “I think she
has broken ribs, I put a bandage on that. And she got hit in the head. We could
clean that up, and put a bandage on that, too. Yeah, we should do that.” She
looked around the sickbay, at the myriad cabinets and drawers. All the computer
screens were dead, useless. “Manny, look around and see what supplies are in
here, don
’
t touch anything.”

“
I
won
’
t. What are we looking for?”

Kaylee looked at
Jen. The woman
’
s mouth had drooped open, she was breathing
evenly. If she had a concussion, which was likely, Kaylee knew not to do
anything to make it worse. She had seen girls get knocks on the head while
playing soccer, and the coaches always only kept the injured girls calm until
the medics arrived. Head wounds were serious.
First, do no
harm
. She had heard that somewhere. “
I don’
t
know. Something. Anything.”

Gina shouted from
her position, floating in the air above her communications console. “Radio
jamming
’
s down again!”

The once again
smooth voice of the pirate came over the speakers. “Time
’
s up,
kapitan
Schroeder. What is your answer?”

Schroeder knew
what his answer had to be, he hadn
’
t needed the extra
time. Safeguarding the lives of passengers and crew was a lot more important
than cargo. While he didn
’
t trust the pirates to keep up
their end of the bargain, he didn
’
t have any choice. “You
can take whatever cargo you want, the crew won
’
t interfere.
”

“Excellent!” The
pirate laughed. “I knew you were a reasonable fellow, Hans, a business man,
like me. If I allow you to talk to, well, to the other piece of your ship, you
will order your crew there to not interfere?”

Schroeder gritted
his teeth. “Yes, you damned pirate.”

“A pirate I am,
now? Ha! I like that. Aaargh, shiver me timbers, avast yee scurvy dogs!” He
laughed again, enjoying himself. “Good. You may speak to your crew.”

“Wait! This...
part of the ship, the command section, is in an unstable orbit. I have a
passenger and crew aboard-“

”One thing at a
time!” The pirate interrupted. “You keep your end of this bargain, and I am
willing to discuss a rescue later. I am going to open a channel for you to
record a message, and you instruct your crew to keep out of our way. Be brief,
and to the point. Is that understood?”

Schroeder found
all of this very difficult to swallow. He forced himself to say a simple “Yes.”

“Channel is open
for recording, now.” The pirate
’
s voice was taunting.

Schroeder cleared
his throat, and tried to speak quickly, to keep his voice firm and calm. “This
is Captain Schroeder, calling
Atlas
,” he caught himself, “calling the
cargo section. Our shuttle has been destroyed by a missile, the crew is alive,
and on the surface. The command section is in a decaying orbit, we have people
injured here, but everyone is alive. Listen to me. These, these
pirates
,
want to extract an item from our cargo. They are going to board the ship, take
what they want, and leave. Do not interfere with them in any way. Repeat, do
not
interfere with them. Stay out of their way, and out of sight. That is an
order.”

The pirate spoke
again to cut him off. “That was a very moving speech, Hans, seriously, I got a
tear in my eye.” He sniffed mockingly. “That is enough for now, we will relay
your message to the, what did you call it, the cargo section? Pray that your
crew there knows how to follow orders.
Nightengale
out.
”

“Wait! What
about-“ Schroeder started to protest, but Gina interjected.

“Jamming
’
s back on, they can
’
t hear you.”

“Bastards. They
never had any intention of rescuing us.” Seth said in disgust.

“No.” Joy added,
in a voice drained of emotion. “They expected us to be dead by now.”

“
I
don’
t think so.” Schroeder responded, in a voice so low he might have
been talking to himself. “If they wanted to kill us, they would have used a
bigger warhead on that missile. As it is, they used just enough to separate us
from the cargo section. No, they wanted us right where we are, in trouble. When
the Navy shows up, they will have to rescue us first, and that will delay their
pursuit of the pirate ship. Whoever these people are, they have thought about
this very, very carefully. But they made one mistake so far; Nelson and the
others survived the attack on the shuttle. I think they did mean to destroy our
shuttle, that would be one less thing for the pirates to worry about.”

In
Ace
’
s sickbay, Jen had awakened long enough to ask that Kaylee find
a medical stabilizer unit and attach it to Jen's left arm. Kaylee had been
skeptical that she could do anything to help the injured woman, but Jen had
explained that the stabilizer was a first-aid device, for use when the
sickbay's AI was offline. Kaylee found the bulky orange box, followed the
instructions on the top, and clamped it around Jen's arm. The device inserted
lines into the woman's blood vessels, and flooded her with artificial blood,
drugs, and nano probes to prevent further damage from her head injury.
Unfortunately, the stabilizer's tiny but powerful computer insisted that the
best thing for its patient was sleep, and tried to inject her with sedatives.
Jen kept having to press an override button every five minutes, to prevent the
device from sending her into a dreamless slumber. At Jen's request, Manny 
had run back to her workshop and retrieved her remote control console, since
Jen's bComm wasn't able to connect to the ship's computer. Her bComm was working
fine, which meant the higher level functions of the ship's computer were down.

With her console,
Jen had accessed the ship
’
s backup systems, and determined
the cargo section of the ship was in no immediate danger. Their shuttle, she
told the children, would be able to come back up, and rescue people from the
command section. Except she couldn
’
t contact the shuttle's
pilot Nelson, or anyone else, on the radio. And the radio was working fine.
What was going on?

"Can you try
a different frequency?" Manny suggested unhelpfully.

"The radio
automatically cycles through the range of frequencies the shuttle's radio
uses," Jen snapped, more harshly than she intended. She liked the
children, but she was tired, and ached all over, and had a splitting headache.
"Maybe the antenna isn't-"

The wall-mounted
speakers of the ship
’
s intercom crackled, followed by
captain Schroeder
’
s amplified voice “This is Captain
Schroeder, calling
Atlas
, calling the cargo section. Our shuttle has
been destroyed by a missile, the shuttle crew is alive, and on the surface. The
command section is in a decaying orbit, we have people injured here, but
everyone is alive, for now. Listen to me. These, these
pirates
, want to
extract an item from our cargo. They are going to board the ship, take what
they want, and leave. Do not interfere with them in any way. Repeat, do
not
interfere with them. Stay out of their way, and out of sight. That is an
order.”

The message began
to repeat, a shocked and groggy Jen used her console to cut it off. Jen wished
the children had not heard the message. They shouted for their parents, until
Jen told them their radio was only receiving, not transmitting.

Jen's head was
spinning. She'd assumed whatever happened to the ship had been an accident.
Nelson, Sam, and Rick Sanchez had been shot down by a missile? Schroeder had
said the people in the command section were alive “for now”? What did that
mean? Jen figured it meant until they ran out of oxygen. And the command
section was going to fall out of orbit? When? Schroeder hadn
’
t
had time to say.