Metal Boxes (24 page)

Jay launched up
ward. Peebee raced forward along the deck. Both drascos squeezed through the hatch at the same time.

“They sure can be focused, can’t they?”
Stone said.

Wright nodded. “They sure can.
If they get much bigger they won’t be able to fit through that hatch at the same time. What I am really curious about is how they determined which one went through the hatch high and which went through low. I wonder if they worked it out between themselves or if it was just a chance occurrence. I mean, it did look planned.”

Stone shrugged. “That is your area, Commander. You are the animal expert.”

Wright punched him gently in the arm. “You can’t have it both ways, Stone. You already claimed to be the drasco expert in this pod. I think I need to run some more scans on your pets if you are not using my p.a.”

“Actually Commander
, I was thinking you could melt down a dozen of the ooze bars to a paste consistency for sealant while I climb down and check the engine.”

Wright nodded. “Okay, Senior Partner Stone. Are we in a rush to jump again?”

“No, sir, there isn’t any reason to delay the repairs to the engine. The navigation system says we should have only about six hours relative until we could try another jump. It will take most of that time for the sealant to dry, assuming something is not broken beyond my capability to fix it.”

“Relative time?” She waved a hand to stop Stone. “Don’t explain again. I don’t get it. But if the engine survived we can try another jump and we are home in human space, right?”

“Yes, sir, but that is where the problem is. Human occupied space covers a lot of…well, space. The odds are very good that we will jump into the middle of nowhere. We will then have to try and re-convert the engine back to sub-light and try to reach somewhere.”

He moved to the engine hatch and began undog
ging the locks. “We will be able to broadcast a distress signal for any passing ship, but that shouldn’t be much of a help. Depending on how far away we jump, we could be days, weeks or months trying to get somewhere. This engine was not designed for much speed.”

“True
,” Wright nodded. “But, it also wasn’t designed for what we have put it through. I really need to write a thank you note to the manufacturer. Hey! I should be able to buy stock in their company, right?”

Stone laughed as he started down into the engine room. “Stock! I don’t know much about the
company that built this engine, but you can probably buy the whole shooting match.” He hesitated before dropping into the engine room. “You know, that might not be a bad buy, partner. That may be a really good idea. With a few manufacturing changes we could offer an engine that converts to jump capable and back again. Or maybe just license the design so we aren’t doing the manufacturing ourselves. I need to run the question past Grandpa. Either way it would eliminate the need for having two complete sets of engines in smaller ships.”

The drascos slid to a stop at the engine room hatch, their talons screeching against the deck plates. They hung their heads over the hole and sniffed the air.

“Sorry, girls. I am not going to turn the engine on this time.” He blew his breath into their mouths. “You will just have to make do with what I breathe out.”

He dropped the rest of the way
into the engine room. He was shocked to see how much damage the engine sustained. It bulged and was twisted at odd angles. He crawled to the rear of the space near the exhaust ports. The plugs jammed all four ports.

He shook his head
thinking. “I must have pounded the plugs in too tight. It didn’t have a place for the gas to escape. It had to build up and blow out somewhere.” All four exhaust tubes were ballooned out. The metal stretched and thinned. He grabbed a metal ingot and hammered loose the plug that should have blown free. A blast of hot, stale air puffed against his face. He put the plug back in and pounded it in with his fist.

He crawled around to the back of the engine. His cobbled together jump port was lying on the
deck. It looked like it was in one piece; the engine had just blown it free from its temporary housing. He managed to hang it back again, pounding it in place with the metal ingot. He tried crimping the metal housing to keep it in place.

“Crap!”

Wright’s voice floated down from the hatchway. “Bang your head again?”

“No,
sir. I smashed my thumb. The next time we take one of these little jaunts into the wild unknown let’s take a crew to do this kind of stuff for us.”

“No
,” Wright replied with a laugh. “That is why your parents sent you off to the navy so you could learn to do these things yourself. If you smash your thumb often enough you will learn not to do it anymore.”

“I guess. How are we coming with the paste?”

“Ready when you are, Mister Stone.”

Stone crawled all the way around the front end of the engine, checking, poking and prodding
every lever, port and switch.

When he reached the open hatch area he stood up and stretched. He sucked on his aching thumb and looked up to see Wright’s face squeezed between Jay and Peebee’s faces.

Wright laughed. “Does that thumb taste good?”

“No,
sir. It tastes like dried drasco poop, but it hurts and this makes it feel better.”

“Speaking of drasco poop…” Wright pointed with her thumb toward the main cabin. “Don’t worry, it can wait. Besides, it might be easier to clean up if it dries a bit.”

Stone nodded. He was too tired to react.

“How is the engine looking?”

“Sorry, Commander,” Stone replied. “I don’t think it will hold together another time.”

“So we are done? We are stuck in the
nothing? We are right back where those animals who attacked us put us the first time? I don’t like that, Mister Stone. I don’t like that one little bit. Fix it.”

“
Aye, aye, Commander,” Stone nodded. “Pass me down the paste and I will try and seal the engine up again. But we have too much metal fatigue, too many twisted components and way too much damage for the engine to survive another hyper jump, much less convert back to sub-light if by some miracle it does make the hyper jump.”

Stone took the bucket of ooze paste from Wright. Using his hand he began smearing the goop on every seam, seal or stressed joint he could find. Occasionally he pulled out
a metal ingot and tried to hammer a piece back into place. Sometimes he succeeded and sometimes, he made it worse. When he banged something out of shape, he smeared it with paste.

He was on his second time around smearing paste on the engine when
he finally emptied the bucket. The paste was drying much faster than before. He wondered if it was due to melting it into a paste, boiled down to a concentrated brick, and then remelting it to a paste. Three fingers on his right hand had already dried together and he was unable to pull them apart.

He crawled back to the hatchway. He looked up to see Jay and Peebee staring down at him. He held his hands up to the drascos. They stretched their necks down and took his hands in their mouths. It was a weird sensation to have his hands in their mouths, but when he pulled free he could wiggle his fingers again.

“Thanks, girls. Now back up and give me room to climb up.”

Back
on the tiny bridge, he dogged the engine room hatch shut again. Wright was sitting in her command chair, scanning the drascos, frowning as she manipulated the data.

Stone did
not want to lie to Wright. Still he said, “We can get one more jump out of the engines.” He did not believe it. Earlier he had joked about the engine blowing up and killing them. This time he was sure that is what would happen, but he did not say so. “However…”

Wright looked at him. “However what? I am a big girl, Mister Stone. Just tell me.”

“However, we won’t be able to convert the engine back to sub-light. Wherever we come out, we will have to float around until someone can find and rescue us.”

Wright nodded. “Well, that is why we labor
ed to get all that food and water.”

Stone
wanted to smile, but he felt too tired. He reached across the bridge console toggling the engine control switch on and slid the power feeds to full power. He flopped into his command chair and closed his eyes. He felt Wright’s hand slide into his. She squeezed. He wanted to look at the engine gauges, but he was afraid to open his eyes. He sat waiting for the engines to explode. He wondered what happened when you burst your hyperspace bubble while still in the gray. At least it should be fast.

He heard a
n alarm screeching throughout the little ship. Jay and Peebee hissed in anger. He squeezed Wright’s hand waiting for the end.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Light flooded the bridge through the view screen.

Stone’s eyes flew open as a strange voice shouted over the open communications. “Reverse course. Hit the brakes, you moron! Collision imminent!”

The view screen
filled with the side of a space station getting closer as the pod raced towards it. Stone’s hands flew to the bridge controls. He hit the reverse thrusters, pushing them to the maximum. He knew it was useless to try, but he did it anyway. Nothing happened except that the station bulkheads loomed closer.

The voice came back on. “My station has shields fully operational. You are not even going to put a dent in me, but you better have your systems up or you are going to get squashed like a bug in that little tin can.”

Stone glanced at the bridge gauges. The inertial dampeners were running off the batteries as was life support and shields. The engine was registering zero output. He hoped the gauges were reading right.

The
ir shield slammed into contact with the station’s shield. They bounced at an odd angle and sheared the top off a sensor tower sticking out beyond the station shielding. Wright and Stone did not feel a thing. The drascos were hissing and waving their arms around. Stone was sure they had not felt anything either, but they were definitely unhappy.

“Dang it, Jerry.” The voice
on the comms shouted over the noise on the little bridge. “I told you to retract everything on the southwest corner. I don’t know who you are, but you are going to pay for that tower. Your trajectory is going to send you into my traffic lanes if you don’t get that P.O.S. under control.”

Wright reached forward and snapped open their outgoing communications microphones, just as Stone slapped off the collision alarm.

“Shut up, you two,” Stone shouted.

The voice shouted back. “Who are you telling to shut up? This is my station-”

“Not you, signore,” Wright interrupted the man.

Stone shouted again. “Jay! Peebee! It is okay. You two calm down. That’s better. Now sit down and behave. Good girls.”

“Sorry, signore, we are having engine problems,” Wright said to the station voice.

The voice dripp
ed with sarcasm, “Really? I hadn’t noticed. You are still heading for my traffic lanes. Are you going to do something about that or should I just shoot you out of my sky?”

“
Signore, thank you for the suggestion,” Wright replied with a grin at Stone. “I am sure we will take it under advisement. Give me a second, will you?” She looked at Stone.

“Sorry
, the engine is shot,” he shrugged. “We are going to go wherever we are headed, unless we get a tow from somebody.”

“
Station, did you get that?” Wright said into the microphone.

The voice replied “Yeah, we got that
the engines are gone and you don’t have steerage. Toni, you and Billy, take a sled out there and latch onto that piece of flotsam before it hits something worse than a sensor tower.”

Stone leaned into the microphone. “Sorry,
signore. We are jetsam, not flotsam. But, we do have means to pay for that tower, plus tow and docking fees if you can squeeze us in somewhere.”

“Well, s
ignore,” The voice took another tone completely, “welcome to Brickman’s Station. I am Andrew Brickman. We have the best little bed and breakfast this side of the Maggio Drift. Toni, get a shake on it. They are drifting fast. You need to get a line on them before they smack into the Arc of Heaven. Captain ShinShu will skin us alive if she has to deviate to miss this pod. And if they hit her then they are going to ping-pong around traffic and you are never going to catch them.”

Wright began, “
Signore Brickman, this is Commander Dan-”

“Excuse me,
Signore Brickman,” Stone interrupted Wright with a shake of his head. “This is Blackman Stone and Danielle Wright of the Stone-Wright Partnership based on the planet Allie’s World. We are experiencing catastrophic engine failure and we appreciate your assistance, which we will be able to pay for based on your standard published rates.”

“Standard
published rates, huh?” Brickman said. “Well, I figure there is more to your story than you are telling me, Stone. You pop into my little piece of space from hyperjump in a beat up old military surplus pod that shouldn’t, no couldn’t, be hyperspace capable. You talk about a business I never heard of on a planet that doesn’t show up on my registry of planets. You disrupt the day-to-day traffic patterns around a peaceful station and you think standard should do it?”

Stone shrugged even though the man
could not see him. “Well, Signore Brickman, we could claim to be in distress and then you would have to pull us in and feed us for nothing. But, we just have some minor mechanical issues so it seems to me standard should be fair. Besides, with Allie’s World soon to open in your backyard you might just not be so peaceful anymore. I guess we could build our own station around Allie’s World instead of using Brickman’s as a layover. What do you say, Signora Wright?”

“Whoa up there, Signore Stone
,” Brickman said. “I meant no disrespect.”

“None taken
, Signore Brickman,” Stone said.

Brickman shouted
, “Get a move on, Toni. They are drifting fast. What is the hold up, girl?”

Toni’s voice shouted back. “
Cool your jets, old man. Billy is just about to toss them a lifeline. We got ‘em. Billy snagged a clean hook on the top stanchion. I’ll have them back in hanger…where do you want to put this pile of junk?”

“Who are you calling old,
young lady?” Brickman shouted into the open comms. “Your late sainted mother would tan your bottom if she heard you talking that way to your father. Put them in hanger twelve.”

“Signore Brickman, if you don’t mind I would prefer you put us in your most remote hanger
,” Stone said.

“Okay by me, you are the customer
,” Brickman replied. “Toni, drag them around to hanger thirty-six.”

Toni shouted back, “
Thirty-six! Aw, come on, Dad. Billy and I have reservations at Maggie’s for lunch. If we have to go all the way around to thirty-six we are going to miss our reservation time. And Mom is not sainted and if she is late it is because you two rabbits are going to pop out another brother or sister. It’s your hide she will tan if she hears you have been talking about her like she is dead…again.”

Brickman said, “Okay, Stone
-Wright Partnership space craft. You are headed for hanger thirty-Six. You be sure to log in at the guest registry by the hanger’s hatch. You let us know if there is anything you need.”

“Signore Brickman, do you know of the United Empire Naval Ship Periodontitis
?” Stone asked. “Does she make a port of call here?”

“You betcha. The
navy is our bread and butter. Not so much for hotel space but they do use every other service we offer. Why?”

“Oh, we have friends aboard and w
e were hoping we would bump into them.” Stone answered.

“Well, you missed them by a couple of weeks
,” Brickman added. “As you know we orbit New Wheatfield. They have a huge navy contract so the Ol’ Toothless drops by every now and then to pick up a load.”

“Can you tell us where the
ir next stop is or when they will be back by here?” Stone asked.

“I can, but I won’t. Too much talk and I lose my contracts with the
navy. This station is too backwater to do without our military contracts. There is an EMIS office on station if you really want to know. Check with them.”

“Thank you, Signore Brickman. Stone
-Wright Partnership out.”

“Thank you
, Stone-Wright Partnership. Standard station service searchable databases and maps are right next to the guest log. Welcome to Brickman’s. Stationmaster out.”

Wright snapped off outgoing comms. “Okay, Mister Stone. Why did we not tell them we are
navy?”

“I don’t know who stuffed us in this metal box and killed us
,” Stone shrugged. “I am just being cautious. You heard the man, this is a backwater station. Most little places like this get by on commercial contracts, but the military contracts can be a huge part of their budget. Somebody on the Periodontitis is stealing from the Emperor. They are not doing it without civilian help.”

Wright nodded. “And you think Brickman is one of those contacts?”

“I don’t think so,” Stone shook his head. “I don’t think not. I just don’t know. I am going to be cautious until I find out who killed us.”

“You mean tried to kill us.”

“No. I think they succeeded in killing us. Brickman recognized this pod as military. Our identification numbers are clearly marked on the outside of the pod. Brickman would have run the numbers through his database to see where we came from. We didn’t pop up as navy so he assumed we were military surplus. Therefore this pod is not on any navy manifest. They wouldn’t have written this off without writing us off as well. I would be willing to bet we are officially dead.”

“Well
, our names didn’t set of any alarms with Brickman,” Wright said. “Nice touch about naming our partnership. I imagine being registered that way will add legitimacy to our claims.”

“I don’t know, but I didn’t think it would hurt
,” Stone replied. “The question is do we go to the EMIS field office and report what we know?” He pronounced it e-miss.

The Empire’s Military Investigative Service analyz
ed all manner of crimes by, for, or against any of the Emperor’s military services. They were primarily tasked with protecting the military and to stop crimes before they happened. Failing to stop a crime, they were to investigate, report and aggressively prosecute offenders in the name of the Emperor.

He continued, “How do we know we can trust them
? Maybe they are involved with whoever killed us.”

Wright shrugged. “I don’t know. We have to trust somebody, right?”

Stone watched as Toni’s tow sled dragged them into hanger thirty-six. The hanger bulkheads towered around the small pod. Its design was for ships much larger than their escape pod; much, much larger. He felt like they were a pea on a tennis court.

The sled pushed them all the way to the far inside
bulkhead near the station hatch. Toni hovered her sled in front of the pod and waved at them view screen to view screen. Then she shot up and over the pod and back out the hanger doors.

Stone and Wright watched
the external vid console as the giant hanger doors closed.

Stone breathed a sigh when they finally slammed shut and the cross bolts slid into place.

“You more comfortable inside a station?” Wright asked.

“Yeah. I mean,
yes Commander. I know I am in a metal box that just got put inside another metal box, but what really makes me more comfortable is that they shut the outer hanger hatches. That means they are planning of putting atmosphere into the hanger.”

“That would be nice since we don’t have environmental suits to reach the station hatch.”

“Yes, sir, plus batteries are going to go down pretty quick without our engine running. We will lose life support, anti-gravity, and shielding. None of which we will need inside the hanger.”

“Well, Mister Stone
, I don’t see any reason to stay on board the pod. Once the hanger is pressurized, we can log into a couple of rooms. Preferably we can find rooms with working showers and are near a restaurant that serves something other than nameless tubers and drasco jerky.”

“Yes,
sir. We will need to find a place that takes pets, but that shouldn’t be a problem on a place like Brickman’s Station. I am not sure how we are going to pay for any of this.”

“Why not? I mean I realize we haven’t made anything from Allie’s World yet, but you were rich anyway, right?”

“Yes,” Stone replied. “Blackmon Stone was a navy midshipman who was probably reported dead. I can’t prove who I am, since my personal assistant had a memory wipe, remember? All of my identification was in there.” He picked up the offending p.a. from the console where it had laid for weeks and he put it in a pocket. “I guess we are going to have to go to the EMIS office and submit to a bioscan for ident verification. I hope it is a large EMIS office.”

“Why?
” Wright asked. “The more people there are there the greater the chance one of them is involved in what is going on, on the Ol’ Toothless.”

“True.
However, the more people, the greater the chance that not everyone is involved. There are a lot of people on the Periodontitis. I am sure not everyone on board the Ol’ Toothless is involved in theft and murder.”

“
I believe it is attempted murder.”

“Yes,
sir, that too.” The pod’s sensors chimed to show the external atmosphere had reached earth standard with gravity settings to match. He shut down the pod’s life support, anti-gravity and shields. There was no sense in draining the pod’s batteries as long as the station was providing the service.