Renegades, page 2
“We don’t know anything yet, dear. I’m going to Rear, and we’ll have a look,” Len said. Messia offered him a small smile and nodded. Len finished his coffee, kissed his wife again on the cheek, and stood to leave the extensive lodgings.
Once in the transport, Len told his driver to make haste to Rear Command. The operator only nodded, sealed the transport doors, and started the navigation system to get them out of harm’s way and prepare for the flex drive jaunt.
4
Chuck Simms wiped the sweat off his forehead and jumped when the door behind him opened. It was a senseless reaction; Bellinger would come via transport. He spun around to see Jerrick, a twenty-five-year-old man in the prime of his physical fitness and health, as opposed to the sixty-something, portly, and balding commander. Jerrick was walking through the door with sleep still in his eyes. The rigging operator nodded to Chuck as he walked to the locker room to put on his flight suit. Relieved that Jerrick had beat Bellinger to Rear Command, Chuck finished sweeping the floor and put the broom back in its place.
He returned to his office in time to hear a loud, sharp buzzer indicating that a dock door had been remotely assigned to receive a craft. He poked his head back out to see the light above Door 4 flashing red rapidly. Bellinger had arrived. As he turned back into his office, he became aware that his efforts to clean up the dock had resulted in him sweating so much that his shirt was soaked through. He thought of the three shirts he kept in his locker and raced to change before the Commander’s transport docked.
He arrived in the locker room to find Jerrick half dressed in his flight suit. He appeared more awake than when he had arrived but with his normally neatly kept hair a brown mop going in every direction.
“Do we know who it is?” Jerrick asked.
“No, I have no idea. It might not even be an envoy. There are still seventeen transports on the DNR list. It could be one of them.” Chuck did not look at Jerrick as he made the assertion.
“Come on, Chuck,” Jerrick had paused his dressing procedure. “We’re never going to see any of them again. You know that.”
The DNR list was a record of the transports and crew that ‘Did Not Return’ from their missions. Of the seventeen, only two had disappeared within the last fifty years, and the most recent was about to celebrate its twentieth anniversary.
Chuck did not reply. He straightened himself in front of one of three full-length mirrors in the men’s locker room and walked back out to the dock floor. He nodded when he saw the light above Door 4 still flashing red. When it turned a solid amber, it meant it was waiting for airlock, which had to be initiated from the dock side. With three steps left before reaching the operator panel for the door, he heard the clamps engage the Commander’s transport and witnessed the bright lamp illuminate a steady amber.
He keyed in his credentials and executed the airlock’s pressurization procedure. He then rocked back on his heels at attention and waited for the door to open, praying that his sweating had caused no foul odors to linger about him.
A high-pitched whine squealed throughout the dock as the door disengaged. Chuck felt a light breeze when the door pulled back, revealing that the pressure in the vessel was slightly higher than ambient on Orris. Len Bellinger then stepped through the doorway.
“Mr. Simms,” he said. He was neither smiling nor scowling, but only looked content.
“Good morning, Commander,” Chuck said, and nodded once.
The Commander looked around the dock and noticed that both Jerrick and Todd had appeared in doorways but were staying quiet. “Gentlemen,” he said, and nodded to them. They did not make a sound or react at all. “Let’s step into your office, Mr. Simms.”
“Yes, sir.”
The two men strode across the greater dock floor toward the small office on the back wall that Chuck shared with the other two shift supervisors. The floor itself was almost completely empty and swept clean thanks to the efforts of Chuck himself and a freshly threatened Todd Bixly. The Commander’s polished shoes clacked loudly off the reinforced concrete floor, as though they themselves were demanding the respect that was due to the highest officer aboard the mechanical world. He walked into Chuck’s office first, and after Chuck stepped over the rounded threshold, the Commander promptly swung the heavy door shut. Neither man sat.
“We have an opportunity tonight, Mr. Simms.” The Commander leaned against the only wall that did not have a piece of furniture pushed up against it and folded his arms.
“Sir?”
“An opportunity, Chuck. Depending on how this all goes, we could end up being very good friends.”
Chuck was having trouble understanding what the Commander was referencing, but it was a much better exchange than some of the scenarios he’d imagined in his head while cleaning. “Yes, sir. That would be ideal,” he said, and straightened his posture.
“Where did you grow up, Mr. Simms?” The Commander looked directly at Chuck. He did not smile and did not frown. The conversation was purely free of emotion.
“Um, Dex-12, sir. Until I was fourteen, then I enrolled in the junior maintenance school and moved to Rhodes-1 for six years.” Chuck could not tell why, but exposing this small history of himself to the Commander made him uneasy.
“Really? Smart guy, then? JM is difficult to get into.” A hint of a smile appeared on the Commander’s face. “I ask because I want to know if you grew up around agriculture, but more specifically, if you know what gnats are.”
If Chuck had been given twenty years to guess the line of questioning that the Commander would ask during the encounter, he would never have gotten close to gnats. “Um, yes, sir. I know what gnats are. Dex-12 was residential, but I have been to three of the Ag cylinders in my past. I’d rather not go back,” Chuck said, and risked a short, quiet chuckle. The Commander surprised him by returning a smile.
“Yes, they are not the most pleasant-smelling places, but back to the gnats. Do you know what the EOB is? Or are you familiar with the term?”
Like a lightning strike, understanding poured over Chuck. EOB was the Executive Oversight Board. It was only a few years old, but it was the talk of the more educated within societal circles on the ship. Conflicts between the Board and Command were a common topic of conversation, and Chuck suspected that this was where the “gnats” dialogue originated.
“Yes, sir. The Board members are gnats.”
Len Bellinger let out a loud and genuine laugh. He shook his head and collected himself. “I think I’ve underestimated you, Chuck. You saw right through that.”
“I connected the dots.”
“Yes, you did. They’re not watching us now, Chuck. Right now, during the most important event to happen on Orris in the last ten years, they’re all sleeping soundly. This is our moment to shine. When they first pop open their sleepy eyes, our mission will be complete, and they’ll be none the wiser about it. They can watch it on the news like the rest of the people.”
Unsure of how to respond, Chuck offered a small smile and nodded.
“Your rigging operator…” the Commander said.
“Jerrick Yunis.”
“Yes. I want you to go with him to retrieve the transport. If there are any complications, I’d like to know that the two of you are there to address them.”
Taken off guard, Chuck scowled and shook his head. “Sir, I have to remain here to support Jerrick. If I go with him, then there will be no support from Rear at all.”
Len walked past Chuck and sat in his chair. “I will be your support. There is no other function on Orris that requires my attention more than this. And, as you must know, I haven’t been an administrator my whole life, Chuck. I’ve had many technical jobs in my past and supervised the GL-17 receiving dock when I was in my twenties. I know what I’m doing.”
Chuck nodded as he processed the order given to him by the Commander. He had done no rigging in five years, and he did not know if his flight suit would even fit him. He nodded at the Commander, lifted the handle of his door, and walked back to the locker room.
5
Twenty minutes later, Chuck Simms was stepping into Jerrick’s rigging tug and strapping himself into the support seat. Jerrick was going through his start-up routine and completing his checklists. Familiarity settled over Chuck, as he had been in this situation many times as a younger man. Jerrick put his checklist back in its place between the seats and started the operation. First, the door slid shut and locked, then the cabin filled with a hissing sound: the pressurization of the vessel.
“Ready?” Jerrick asked.
Chuck nodded, and his rigging operator threw a large, yellow-handled lever forward. Chuck felt the machine release from Orris.
“How long until we get there?” Chuck asked.
Jerrick tapped the operator screen in the lower left corner, and Chuck read, 7:03. Less than ten minutes. It was close, maybe fifty miles behind Orris.
Jerrick lit the hydrogen engines, and they were off toward Transport 5. Chuck got as comfortable in his seat as possible. During the next several minutes, until the craft came into view, he discussed the staffing plan for the following day with Jerrick. His operator was concerned about the prospect of working a fifteen-hour shift.
After only five minutes, the craft appeared as a bright white dot in a sea of black. No artificial light traveled that far, but they were positioned above a solar system that they were preparing to mine for resources. The system’s star was particularly bright.
“It’s still fifteen miles away. I can’t believe we can see it so well,” Jerrick said.
“Unless it’s big…” Chuck did not finish his thought. He waited another minute and could see more clearly that he was right. The transport was huge. Much bigger than a standard, one- or two-person craft, even for an intergalactic machine. He pressed the “talk” button on the radio.
“Rear Command, this is RCT-4, do you copy?” Chuck prayed that the Commander was as capable an operator as he had promised.
“Copy, RCT-4. Go ahead,” Bellinger answered.
“Sir, this craft is much larger than we expected. I can’t tell yet, but we may not be able to dock it. We may have to put it on the floor.”
Rear command’s dock floor space was not the biggest on Orris, but it could accommodate much larger craft than its docking bays were capable of.
“Copy, RCT-4, keep me updated.”
“Copy.”
As Chuck pulled his finger off the talk button, Jerrick was maneuvering the rig around the Transport. It was huge. He rolled the rig so they could look up through the transparent panes above their head and into the Transport cockpit.
“Is he dead?” Jerrick asked.
“No, he’s under.”
“How can you tell?”
“He looks like he’s sleeping, not like an eighty-year-old corpse.”
As part of the transport’s beacon, it displayed its flight duration: 81.3 years. Chuck called the Commander again.
“Rear Command, we are about to start our inspection and then hook and lock. Be advised, the Transport’s operator is incapacitated, likely under Sterilex.”
“Copy, RCT-4, I have medical on their way to Rear right now,” Bellinger said.
“Copy on the medical team, sir. Please have them stage in the briefing room. This transport is going to have to land on the floor. Please get a nuclear remediation team on site as well. This thing has a bad reactor.”
There was no immediate answer from the Commander, but Chuck assumed he was calling in the nuke team. Chuck pressed the talk button again. “Sir?”
“Go ahead, RCT-4,” Bellinger did not hesitate.
“Sir, you are going to need to evacuate the dock. Depressurize it and operate Door 10 from the terminal. Are you comfortable with all of that?” Although he knew how important it was to be sure, he could not help but feel he was antagonizing the leader of all Command operations.
“Copy, Mr. Simms. Todd is in here with me. The dock is already locked down and the pumps are running. I got this, Chuck.”
“Thank you, sir. Sorry, sir.” A sheen of sweat broke over Chuck’s face as his nerves got the better of him.
“No apologies, please,” Bellinger said.
While Chuck contemplated the most recent communication from the Commander, Jerrick touched his elbow.
“We’re good to hook and lock. The inspection is complete.”
“Go ahead,” Chuck whispered at first, then cleared his throat and repeated the acknowledgement.
6
“Why did you tell him not to apologize?” Bixly asked the Commander.
“Because he is in charge.”
Todd laughed so loudly in the small office that it made Bellinger’s ears ring. He turned in his chair and looked at Todd. “What about that is funny to you, Mr. Bixly?”
The smile on Todd’s face softened but did not disappear. “Well, because you’re here. You’re in charge… of everything, I think.”
“I am in charge of Orris, the greater body. Do you think that’s something that would be possible for any one person without an enormous staff of supervisors and managers?”
Todd stood still and did not answer. Bellinger turned back to the operation terminal. “Just because I’m here doesn’t mean your boss doesn’t have to do his job. He was doing his job, and that’s why I told him not to apologize.”
“It’s a pretty easy job, then,” Todd mumbled.
Len Bellinger stood and turned to face the young dockhand. “Have you, ever in your life, had a single responsibility? Have you, ever in your life, been responsible for the safety of another person, or many people? Have you ever had to be accountable to anyone, for anything?” the Commander asked. “Because every word out of your mouth further convinces me that you have not. How old are you, Mr. Bixly?”
“Twenty-six.”
“Ha!” Bellinger said, sitting back down at the operator terminal. “A twenty-six-year-old man with the maturity of a twelve-year-old. But don’t worry, Todd, we’ll fix that tonight. We’ll get you fixed right up. I promise.”
Todd’s face went pale, and he took a small step backward. The radio crackled back to life.
“Rear Command, we’re five minutes out. Is the dock clear?”
Bellinger keyed the microphone. “Copy, RCT-4, five minutes out. The dock is clear and I’m preparing to open Door 10.”
“Copy, Rear, make sure to open the bleeder valve before executing the Door command. It’s labeled ‘MBV’ and is immediately to the right of the Door 10 panel.”
Bellinger had to hunt for a moment, but he located the switch Chuck had described to him. Upon its activation, a loud screeching followed by a louder bang sounded from the dock side wall, accompanied by a strong shuddering in the floor.
“Copy, RCT-4, bleeder valve is open. Executing Door 10 opening procedure.”
“Copy.”
More banging and squealing could be heard from the dock side, the sound propagating through the steel and concrete of the ship. Vibrations coursed through the office as the largest Rear Command door opened itself.
“Two minutes.”
Bellinger flipped the terminal to the video feeds, as he could do no more until the craft was landed. There were nine live feeds arranged in a grid on the large panel.
“One minute,” Chuck said over the radio.
Anxious realization appeared on the Commander’s face, and he slammed down the communicator’s talk button again. “Should I have activated a beacon? I didn’t activate a beacon for navigation!”
“Copy, Rear, no need for a beacon. Jerrick is hand-flying the rig. Twenty seconds.”
As Chuck said the word “seconds,” Todd and Len saw the dead transport with the rig locked atop it pass fully by Door 10 and disappear again.
“They’re going to crash!” Todd yelled, pointing at the screen.
Len stood, crossed his arms, and watched the screen. He shook his head slowly and pointed at the screen just as Todd had done. “Watch.”
“Four seconds to intercept,” Chuck said on the radio.
Todd drew in a large breath that he did not release. The rear of the transport then reappeared in the opening to Door 10 and, as the last second expired, Jerrick swung the nose of the vessel into the interior of Rear Command. The nose of the transport missed colliding with the doorframe by only eight inches. Once the nose was in, the space filled with a fog of vaporized propellant. Jerrick navigated the rear end of the transport into the space and then to the dock floor of Rear Command, where the centripetal “gravity” took over.
“Rear Command, the package is delivered. We’re going to unhook and dock the rig.”
