We Should've Run: Part 2

It's taken me a few weeks to actually sit down and work on this, but I have been planning Serial Psyence. And playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution. It's awesome, and time consuming, and far too distracting.

Anyway, here's part two.

The Cat’s Eye had half a dozen spacesuits. Each suit consisted of a single piece, tear-resistant bodysuit, to which was attached plates of impact armour; the suit provided no protection from kinetic trauma. A chest plate with a wide collar attached to the torso, containing the suit’s power supply and air recyclers in a small backpack unit, as well as a small thruster unit. They were big and bulky, and in a way, a lot like the Cat’s Eye: old but well maintained, having seen plenty of use during midflight repairs to the ship’s superstructure. Lorenzo was loath to replace them, even though there were better, less bulky models on the market. But he just couldn’t bring himself to get rid of them, despite his crew’s protestations. Although, considering the way the suit pinched, he was beginning to consider coming round to their way of thinking.

Once he was suited up, Lorenzo put on his shell helmet. Everything went dark, then there was a hiss as the suit sealed. An array of activation lights lit up, and the faceplate cleared. Yeven was staring at him, holding out an SIPC. He gave his sensors officer a thumbs up, and took the rifle, clipping it to his chest.

‘Ready?’ Lorenzo asked.

‘Aye Captain,’ came the replies through his suit comm.

The three moved into the airlock, the door sealing behind them. Lorenzo watched his tactical display as the airlock cycled, and once the external pressure dropped to zero, he opened the hatch.

The Cat’s Eye was holding station three hundred metres away from the ragged hole in the side of Sintra station. Two external lights were focused on it, but he could barely make out anything. With luck, they would find an entrance point in there.

‘Captain,’ Katria’s voice spoke in his ear. ‘I’m burning a lot of delta v holding position with the station.’

‘Alright. Once we’re clear, drop down to a trailing orbit a thousand kilometres back. We’ll holler if we need you to come get us.’

‘Roger.’

Lorenzo stepped up to the edge of the airlock. He paused for a moment, staring straight at the space station. It was only a few hundred metres, but at right this moment, it could just as well be a hundred thousand. It was impossible to gauge. He took hold of the side of the airlock, and jumped.

Once he was clear, thrusters in his backpack fired, rotating round to stare back at the Cat’s Eye. Both Riko and Yeven had followed him out, and now the three of them floated in a loose formation, steadily retreating from the bulk of the ship.

‘We’re clear, Katria. You’re free to break position.’

‘Roger Captain.’

Bright pinpricks burst to life as the Cat’s Eye’s manoeuvring thrusters fired. The big ship began dropping behind and below them as it turned away. Then the main drive lit up, and the ship rapidly dropped away.

Lorenzo watched it for a little while longer before he fired his thrusters again, reorientating himself back on the station.

With the Cat’s Eye moving away, they had lost the ship’s searchlights, turning the ragged hole they were heading for into a gaping, black maw. Suddenly, Lorenzo’s perception changed, and he was no longer heading toward the station, but it coming for him, to swallow him. Lorenzo’s fingers twitched toward his SIPC.

Twisting his head inside his helmet, he looked away and toward the bulk of Heathcliff. The Station was just heading into the planet’s nightside, the thick bands of storm clouds disappearing into the darkness. When he focused on the station again, it was back to just a blasted, ragged hole of twisted metal and composite.

A glance at his suit telemetry told him that he was now only 50 metres away. Gripping the controls for his suit thrusters, he began firing the jets. Both Yeven and Riko did the same, the trio drifting into the maw at less than a metre per second. Their suit lights came on, playing across the interior.

‘Fuck, it’s like the station was cored with a fusion lance,’ Yeven said.

He was right, Lorenzo saw. In the beams of light, he could see that the surface of the hole looked as though it had been melted. A glance at his display told him that the melted structure wasn’t emitting any radiation. He’d been wrong in his first impression. A compressed muon explosion would never have done this sort of damage. Never so cleanly. It was as if a miniature star had blossomed momentarily against the side of the station, disintegrating everything it came in touch with before it winked out.

As his lights played across the damage, he spotted a corridor, leading deeper into the station. Activating his thrusters, he flew over to it and manoeuvred inside, Yeven and Riko following. Halfway down the corridor, he began to drift toward the floor. Instinctively he brought his legs out to brace for the landing, realising only at the last second that it was the wrong move. His boots touched against the floor and he bounced back up to the ceiling, his helmet knocking against it with a thud. Lorenzo winced and pushed himself back to the deck and activated his boots just as he touched down again. This time he didn’t float back off.

He ignored the grunts of laughter from his two crewmen and stomped off down the corridor, feeling weight return with every step.

‘Still gravity,’ Yeven said. ‘It’s weak, though. You reckon the gravistar is still spinning?’

‘Maybe. That would assume there is still power to it.’

‘Sintra’s got a vacuum motion generator attached to the gravistar. Even if the main reactor goes down, the gravity stays on,’ said Riko as he peered at a melted intercom. He poked it with the finger of one gauntlet and little black flakes erupted out in an expanding cloud.

Both Lorenzo and Yeven turned to look at him.

‘What?’ Riko said defensively. ‘I went on a date with one of the station engineers a while back. Hey, I do have interests outside of the ship, you know. Plus I thought we might get a VMG as a backup, so I wanted to get to know about them.’

‘Was she pretty?’ Yeven asked.

Riko grinned. ‘Yasmin Denehey.’

‘Oh. How’d you manage to pull that off?’

The grin turned malicious. ‘I borrowed a page out of your book.’

‘Cheeky bastard.’

‘Stow it, you two,’ Lorenzo said.

There was a bulkhead door at the end of the corridor, sealed shut. Taking out a sensor wand, Yeven pressed it against the door. ‘No atmo on the other side. I’m guessing it closed when whatever it was exploded, but the compartment vented anyway. Some organic residue on the other side. Can’t tell what. It’s hard to tell, but I think there’s trace atmo further in.’

‘Alright, Riko, see if you can get it open.’

‘You want me to cut it?’

‘No. Let’s see if we can use it as a makeshift airlock.’

‘Got it.’

Moving over to the bulkhead door, Riko braced one foot against the side of the corridor and tugged at the service hatch next to the door. It came away abruptly. He reached inside and pulled on the manual release handle. The doors shifted apart slight, and as Riko continued to pump the handle, they slid back into their recesses.

Once the doors were open enough, Lorenzo, Yeven and Riko moved inside, resealing the hatch behind them. Riko paused as he passed through the airlock, one foot having come down on something uneven. Moving his foot, he looked down.

‘Er, I think I found your organic trace.’

It was a hand. Or what was left of it. The skin was very pale, and covered in a layer of hoarfrost. The thumb was missing, sheared off in whatever incident had removed the hand from the owner.

‘Keep it,’ Yeven said.

‘Now the next one.’ Lorenzo detached his SIPC from his suit and flicked off the safety.

It took another ten minutes to open the second blast door. The manual release had seized up and wouldn’t budge. In the end, Riko took out his SIPC and switched to his under-barrel plasma beam, and cut a hole in the door. Air hissed through as he cut, a torrent that sent globs of molten metal flying.

When the three crewmen climbed through the hole, they found a scene of utter devastation. Light fittings hung from the ceiling, some still flickering on and off. Emergency lights pulsed away on the floor, heading deeper into the station. Conduits in the walls had ruptured, spilling fluids into the corridor, dribbling down the walls and pooling on the deck. Some had frozen the moment they burst, freezing in iridescent water bursts that glittered in their suit lights. There were, fortunately, no bodies.

‘Any signs of life?’ Lorenzo asked.

‘Six decks down, I think,’ Yeven replied, frowning at the readout from his sensor wand.

‘You think?’

‘I’m not sure. There are some readings the deck below, but they’re weird, you know? Like they’re not quite there.’

‘Some trapped, maybe nearly dead?’ Riko suggested.’

Yeven shook his head. ‘No, the sensor read’s biologicals, not life signs. It’s more like it can’t make its mind up.’

‘We’ll take a look as we go,’ Lorenzo said. ‘Let’s move.’

This place gives me the creeps, he thought, but didn’t say it.

*

A short interlude

Well, turns out it wasn't as easy to get back into writing sci fi as I hoped. Not too impressed with my first go at the next scene, but hopefully I'll get it posted soon.

Doesn't help that I went on holiday to Centre Parcs, and we still haven't finished moving.

Right, no more excuses! I'm on holiday from work next week; a perfect time to do some writing. And that's what I'll do.

I hope.

Some other news though! I've just done my very first author interview.

Pop over to jeanzbookreadnreview for a look.

We should've run

Captain Lorenzo Sheldon was strapped in at his station when the Cat’s Eye reverted 10,000 kilometres above Sintra station. The indistinct blue glow of the shuntspace conduit abruptly disappeared, replaced by the harsh light reflected off Heathcliff’s thick atmosphere. There was no sign the tiny pinpricks of distant stars; the immense bulk of the gas giant stretched far beyond the edge of the bridge viewport, giving a fabulous view of streamers of blue and brown and red and cream clouds, tearing across the face of the planet at hundreds of miles per hour. Each one many times the size of the Cat’s Eye, and more than capable of tearing the transport apart were Lorenzo stupid enough to venture into the raging torrent.

           

Ridiculously, he was suddenly struck by the mad urge to hit full thrust and dive into the atmosphere, test his limits and the capabilities of his ship. He could already feel his fingers twitch toward the control pane, ready to input the command that would ignite the primary fusion motors, sending the ship hurtling down toward the planet.

Inevitably, it was the voice of his co-pilot, Katria Fey, which broke him out of the spell. ‘Shunt drive spinning down. Sensors coming online. You want me to open a channel to Sintra, Captain?’

‘Do it,’ Lorenzo said. He shook his head to clear the last few wisps of madness and tore his gaze away from the viewport, concentrating on the sensor data appearing on his panes. Infrared showed few heat sources around Sintra station, which was surprising in itself. There were normally hundreds flitting about the station, most the exhaust plumes from short range tugs and shuttles and the station’s fleet of atmo-miners, either returning from a successful dive into Heathcliff’s atmosphere, their tanks full of HE₃, or on their way out, the big, saucer-shaped craft with their force fields up and riding brilliant lances of plasma. Even more significant, there were no signatures for other ships in the local volume. Sintra was one of a dozen independent HE₃ stations, and made a big trade in fuel and goods. Sometimes, it was difficult to see the station’s heat signature amongst all the other emissions. Except, the sensor was having a hard time differentiating the few sources from Heathcliff.

Lorenzo frowned at the infrared display. A frown that deepened when the radar return matched the infrared. There were very few objects near Sintra station, none more than a hundred metres in length. That was wrong. Very wrong.

Feeling his guts twist, Lorenzo tapped a command into his pane. An alert sounded throughout the ship. Katria glanced at him.

‘Captain?’

‘Something’s not right. Better prepared than not, eh? Do you have that channel for me?’

Nodding, Katria’s fingers danced across her pane, then gave him a thumb’s up.

‘Sintra station, this is Cat’s Eye on approach. Requesting docking permission, over.’ Lorenzo waited a moment, but the only response he got was the low hiss of background static. ‘Repeat, Sintra Station, this is Cat’s Eye. Requesting docking permission. Please respond.’

Still nothing.

He shared a look with Katria. ‘Antenna trouble?’ he asked.

‘Ours is working fine.’

‘I meant with theirs.’

‘Oh. Maybe. They should have a backup array, or a communications laser.’

‘Are they shining anything our way?’

  

Katria shook her head. ‘Not even a dazzle.’

Leaning back in his acceleration couch, Lorenzo scratched his chin. Right now, they were far enough out that they could spool the shunt drive and be gone in ten minutes. If he took them down into the gas giant’s gravity well, then they would be committed. It would take at least three hours to either reverse course or divert onto a parabolic curve that would slingshot them out the other side of the planet.

At the back of the bridge, the hatch hissed open, and Yeven and Riko rushed in, dropping into their stations. The Cat’s Eye’s bridge was typical for its class, laid out in a horseshoe pattern, with pilot and co-pilot at the front, and the other two stations behind at the tips.

‘Tactical and sensors online,’ Yeven said.

‘Engineering up,’ said Riko. ‘What’s going on, Cap?’

‘Nothing good. Yeven, bring the defences up and warm up the pulse cannon.’

‘Aye aye.’

‘Katria, spool up the drive. I want to be ready to jump at a moment’s notice.’

‘Captain, if you’re about to do what I think you are, we can’t shunt in a grav-well.’

‘I know. But spool it anyway. We’re too far out to see what’s wrong with Sintra. And we have friends there. Unless anyone has a good reason why we shouldn’t take a closer look?’

‘Not one you’ll listen to,’ Katria muttered. Lorenzo pretended he hadn’t heard her.

Resting his arms on the edge of the control pane, he sent a series of commands to the ship’s nav.

The Cat’s Eye’s three fusion motors ignited, accelerating the ship in at a steady 6G. Three brilliant spears of fusion flame stabbed out. If no one at Sintra station had detected their arrival or transmission, they couldn’t miss the exhaust plumes. For anyone looking in their direction, it would seem as though a dim, moving star had flared to life.

The ship was an old Humpback transport, its name given for the way two of the three primary fusion motors bulged out of the wedge-shaped hull. Two engine nacelles rode low on either side of the hull, housing the twin shunt field generators. The transport was a venerable model, well respected for its durability. Some had been known to still function, despite damage to 60% of the hull structure. The design would never be considered pretty, festooned with unsightly bulges and protrusions as if it had some metallic fungal infection, but for most people who operated them, that didn’t matter. They were easily modified, and the protrusions often hid weapon systems. Plus the cargo holds were big enough to hold 300 metric tons. Whatever they couldn’t outrun, they could outshoot. The perfect craft for smugglers and mercenaries.    

At 4,000 kilometres, Lorenzo brought up the visible spectrum sensor telemetry on the main display. Sintra station was a blurry spec at first, until various filters kicked in and resolved the image.

‘Oh fuck me,’ Katria breathed. Both Yeven and Riko echoed her.

The main structure of the station was relatively intact, though despite the filters it remained slightly vague; there was nothing they could do about the cloud of debris and gases. Some of it appeared to be wreckage from the station’s complement of vessels, except for the obliterated wreckage of a GammaStar freighter. Its back had been broken by whatever explosion had destroyed the ship, the drive block now at right-angles to the rest of the ship.

Fiddling with the controls, Lorenzo refocused the display.  

Sintra station had picked up a slow spin, and as it rotated, a gaping hole blown into the side came into view. The edges were ragged and black. A few pinpricks of light flickered inside, and as they watched, there was a sudden outrush of pale gas as some compartment breached. Most of the station was dark, but for a few dimly flickering viewports at the base.

‘Who could’ve done this?’ Yeven asked.

‘Trenkarists, maybe? Or Sivian Templars? They both have a hard on for getting rid of the independents,’ Riko suggested.

‘Except the Order wouldn’t let them. The independents signed a peace-pact, remember?’

Riko scoffed. ‘Yeah, like that’d stop ‘em.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Lorenzo said, turning to face his crew. ‘What matters is what we’re going to do now.’

‘Cap?’

‘Shouldn’t we get out of here? The drive’s all spooled up – all we have to do is alter course and we can slingshot out.’

‘There might be survivors. And these people were our friends. We owe it to them to find out what happened.’

An uncomfortable expression crossed Yeven’s face, but he schooled it quickly, rather than arguing with Lorenzo. ‘You’re right, Captain. We look after our own.’

Turning back to his console, Lorenzo entered a new sequence in to the flight computer.

Thrusters fired on the Cat’s Eye’s hull, altering their trajectory to take them to an interception point 3,000 kilometres further along the station’s orbit. The braking motors fired as they closed with their rendezvous, slowing the ship until they were travelling at a few kilometres a second. Ten minutes later, the Cat’s Eye caught up with Sintra station. It took another thirty minutes to match the station’s slow rotation.

Once they were 200 metres away, the exterior spotlights came on, playing across the ragged hole in the station’s side. At this distance, the hole was much larger than it had first appeared, easily 80 or 90 metres across. But then, Sintra station itself was a kilometre-tall tiered cylinder, with an array of thermal cooling towers at the base adding another 150 metres. Now that he was closer, Lorenzo muttered a curse under his breath. The hole was the result of a compressed muon warhead. The explosion had left it hot, radiating a lot of x-ray radiation. Their hardsuits would be able to protect them from it, but that wasn’t the problem. The missile had struck above the docking bays, and now they had been obliterated. They weren’t going to be able to dock with the station.

Taking a deep breath, Lorenzo made his decision. ‘Katria, stay here. You see any ships pop onto the sensors, and we’ll come running back.’

‘Yes captain.’

‘Yeven, Riko, with me.’

‘Where’re we going, Cap?’ Riko asked as they left the bridge.

‘We’re going for a walk.’

Something to do

I've not been writing much for the past few months. Well, truth is, I've not actually written anything since February, when my writer's block hit.

That finally cleared a month later, and since then, I've been planning Serial Psyence, which doesn't leave me much time to do any actual writing. I suppose I could start writing the bits I've already planned, but after having done that with Liberator's Ruin, and discovering continuity errors because of it, I want to finish the plan before I start writing.

Which leaves me in a bit of a quandary. then I came up with an idea.

I'm not quite sure where I'm going with it, and I'm not sure how long it's going to be, but as often as I can, I'll be putting up new scenes (chapters? sections?) on this blog over the next few weeks. If I like it, I may spin it out into another book.

We'll see

Moving on up, moving on out

Yes, I just quoted a song by M-People. Hey, it's on the radio, and seemed oddly appropriate.

Been really busy at the weekend. We got the keys to our new flat on Friday, and started moving all our stuff over. Fortunately had the help of two chaps with a van to move our big stuff (there's no way I'd get the washing machine up the stairs - I still have no idea how they managed it).

I think we're about two thirds in now, but there's still a lot of stuff still at our old place which has to be boxed up and moved over, including clothes and various bits of crap. Let's face it, most is mine, not Heather's. I hoard, I know.

Annoyingly though, we cant' take our two-seater sofa with us. The stairs up to the flat are far too narrow to get it in, which means a trip to Ikea for one of their nice flat pack sofas.

In writing related news, I've still a lot to do on Serial Psyence. I'm less than halfway through my plan, so I'm having my doubts about starting the actual writing bit by September.

I've never actually written a thriller before, so it'll be interesting to see how this turns out.