The Army Of Light (Kestrel Saga) (4 page)

    
Looking to the engine status display, he could see the computer rendered
diagram of the inoperative starboard engine sitting lifeless, its centermost
impellor unmoving and mocking him as the port engine whined under the strain of
pushing the ship forward. Likewise, the soft voice of the computer was
judicious enough to remind him of the state of the overtaxed engine every
fifteen seconds. Neither of those reports were helping his frustrations any, so
he quickly switched off both the monitor and the computers voice output. Trying
to relax, he inhaled a deep breath and released it slowly.

    
Finding a modicum of calmness, he opened his eyes and glimpsed down to verify
the internal guidance beam was still locked on the centerline of the hangar.
Just as he did so, there was a reverberating thump from somewhere deep within
the bowls of the ship. The Mark-IV immediately shifted up ten degrees and began
to drift starboard. Shawn felt another thump as the computer compensated in an
attempted to right itself—apparently only marginally successful, based on the
five degree list the ship now displayed.  A quick check of the computer
confirmed exactly what Shawn thought the problem was, but also gave him a new
one to be concerned about: one of the hover thrusters was fluctuating and would
soon fail. If that happened, the remaining thrusters wouldn’t be able to hold
the craft aloft. A small light on the right of the control panel illuminated,
informing Shawn that the computer wished to speak to him. He could only image
what kind of berating it would give him over their current condition.

    
So much for remaining calm.

    
Outside the craft, Trent continued waiving Shawn into the hangar despite the
look of concern he gave the sputtering thruster. Trent knew that if they didn’t
get the ship in the right spot now, they might not get another chance. From
above, Shawn watched as Trent leaned to the right, staring disapprovingly at
the half extended strut that was probably leaking fluid all over the hangar
floor. Trent shook his head in disgust, then directed his full attention to
making sure the ship was still centered. The ventral thruster was failing fast,
causing 
Sylvia’s Delight
 to dip down and drag the starboard
strut across the hangar floor, which in turn caused a jarring squeal that
echoed off the hangar walls.

    
Trent threw his arms up, waving them back and forth rapidly over his head
in the universal sign for the captain to stop his forward momentum. Shawn only
hoped the ship was where they needed it to be as he throttled back on the
thrusters. The ship slowly came to a halt precisely over the predefined center
of the building,
then
began to drift toward the hangar
floor. With one bad strut, the ship listed several feet to port, putting the
ship off kilter as the remaining three pads made solid contact. Once Shawn was
satisfied the ship was immobile, he began shutting down all of the thrusters
and internal systems. When the final computer powered down a few moments later,
and the drone of the engines spun down to near silence, he opened the small
hatch aft of the control deck and exited the ship.

    
The two men walked towards the damaged landing gear and began inspecting the
area. As soon as Trent caught sight of the full extent of the damage, he let
out an exasperated sigh. The entire cylindrical strut, which extended out from
the underside of the vessel, was coated in a film of viscous black grease.

    
“Looks like the internal seals went out,” he said as he kneeled and wiped a finger
across the struts otherwise smooth surface, scooping up a gob of the dark
material and rubbing it between his finger and thumb. “We’ve got a spare in the
back I can slap on. It should do the trick.”

    
“It’s nice to know we have parts to fix something around here.”

    
Trent nodded in agreement. “It won’t help her fly, but at least she’ll be
level.”

    
“How much time?”

    
Trent rocked his head from side to side as he contemplated the answer. “We’ll
need to put the ship up on her mag-jacks, but it won’t take much longer than
that. Two hours, I’d say. Maybe a little more to get it all squared away.”

    
“Good,” Shawn replied with a nod and leaned down next to his mechanic. “What
about the gauges? I had to fly her in by feel alone. I’m not getting anything
from the instrument panel at all.”

    
Trent knew that there was nothing worse for a pilot than flying blind.
“It’s probably electrical. You know how this damn sand can muck up things.”
Trent waved a hand contemptuously at the distant beach beyond the hangar,
causing some strut grease to fling off of his fingers and land near Shawn’s
feet. “Sorry.”

    
“Right,” Shawn replied with a soft smile. There was hardly a time when Shawn
could remember seeing Trent entirely clean and presentable. However, it’d never
bothered him. Trent was as fine a mechanic as Shawn had ever known. If that
meant Shawn had to accept Trent as being covered head to toe in grease and
filth—which he’d seen on more than one occasion—then so be it. The captain got
up and looked from the bow of the Mark-IV to the stern, then back to Trent. He
was impatient to get the minor repairs completed, not that it was going to do
him any good in the long run. Regardless, anything was preferable to standing
around with their hands in his pockets and waiting for a bag of credits to fall
from the sky. “Let’s get started.”

    
Regrettably, forty eight hours later they were only marginally better off than
when they’d started. In fact, they’d hit a standstill. The leaking strut seals
had been repaired, and 
Sylvia’s Delight
 was once again sitting
level. However, the electrical gremlin that was affecting the flight
instruments was still plaguing the ship—and the duo hadn’t even begun to examine
the damaged starboard engine yet.

    
“What about now?” Trent yelled from the back of the ship. He’d removed several
floorboards and two ceiling panels in 
D
’s cargo hold in an attempt
to trace the offending electrical short. There were bundles of optic cables and
copper cored wires running like spider webs inside the open panels all around
him. It was a wonder that Trent knew where they all lead to—most of them,
anyway. In his hands, currently beyond sight in the ship’s overhead
compartment, he held an optical splicer that never seemed to work as well as it
should have. Trent’s extensive training told him that his hands should be clear
of the device when the repaired circuits were being tested, but the lack of
consistency in the splicer’s operation made that precaution untenable.

    
Sitting in the plush pilot’s seat on the flight deck, Shawn flicked at the
internal lighting switch on the control panel in front of him. He was half
expecting the switch to illuminate and be bathed in the soft embrace of the
overhead fluorescence. Instead, his optimistic view was dashed to pieces when
the switch indicator remained unlit. He pressed the intercom button to his
left, once more connecting the flight control deck with the cargo hold.
“Nope.
Nothing yet.
Are you sure
you know what you’re doing back there?”

    
“
Am I sure
, he says,” Trent muttered to himself, not bothering to speak
up loud enough for it to register on the intercom. “I got your nothing right
here.” He pulled out a thick section of faintly glowing cable from the
overhead, found the silvery connector at its end, and then plugged it into a
bypass port on the floor. “Okay, let me try something real quick,” Trent
finally offered loud enough for the captain to hear.

    
Shawn heard the shifting of equipment and a few indiscernible grunts. Seconds
later, Trent’s voice came back through the intercom.
“Alright.
Try it again.”

    
The captain once again reached for the switch. As soon as the circuit became
active, Shawn heard a loud thump from somewhere behind him. His eyes moved up
in surprise just as the overhead lights flickered on. Shawn, always thankful
for small miracles, smiled at the hum of the lights as he turned back to face
the microphone. “The lights are finally on. Good job back there.”

    
Not getting an immediate reply, he slipped out of his chair and exited the
control deck. After walking through the passenger lounge and the mid-ships
connecting passage where the berthing area was located, he arrived at the cargo
hold airlock. If, for whatever reason, the hold became depressurized during
space operations, this compartment sealed itself automatically from the vacuum
of space. Once he’d made it through the small doorway, he found his mechanic
sitting on the cargo deck floor near the starboard side of the hold, stunned
and rubbing his forehead vigorously.

    
“What are you doing sitting on your ass?” Shawn chuckled. “This is no time for
a coffee break. We’ve got work to do, you know?”

    
“I think I got shocked by the live wire I was touching,” Trent replied wearily.
“I swear, that blasted computer has had it in for me ever since that bad
software
flash
a few months ago.”

    
Shawn smiled mischievously. “I keep telling you that the ship didn’t take it
personally.”

    
“You say that, but then I see you smiling like you are right now and I feel
that somehow you aren’t being entirely honest with me.” Trent began to scratch
at his head briskly. “Are the lights on?”

    
Shawn nodded. “They probably came on about the same time yours went out. The
whole control panel is lit up like its Christmas. Well done.”

    
“That’s fabulous,” but Trent’s tone was less than thrilled. He looked up at
Shawn as if seeing him for the first time. “Are you going to stand there
smiling down at me all day, or are you going to help me up?”

    
The smile on Shawn’s face morphed into a smirk as he reached down and helped
Trent to his feet. “I guess we should take a look at that engine now.
You up for it?”

    
“Yeah, I think so. Besides, it’s in about a dozen pieces, so it’s not like you
can start it up with my hand stuck inside it.”

    
Shawn chuckled. “I couldn’t afford to lose you now.”

    
“Why?
Because I’m the only mechanic who knows how to fix this
beast?”

    
“No, because you’re the only person on this whole planet I get along with and
who isn’t trying to kill me or get something out of me.”

    
“I wouldn’t mind getting a paycheck out of you, if it’s all the same.”

    
“Get my ship in the air and you can have whatever you want.”

    
Trent gave him a look of contemplation. “Be careful what you say. I have
lofty dreams.”

    
It took a moment for those words to reverberate in Shawn’s mind. His smile
faded as he took a quick gander at the open access panels and the exposed
wiring. “I did, too.
Once, anyway.”

    
“No kidding,” Trent replied with raised eyebrows. “What happened?”

    
“Somebody killed them,” he said still glancing around and then finally leveling
his eyes back at Trent. The look on the mechanic’s face was anything but
jovial. Shawn flashed his friend a warm smile. “Don’t worry about me. Let’s
concentrate on 
D
.”

    
Minutes later both men were standing near a large metal
table, the remains of the starboard engine strewn across its surface like the
discarded entrails of some
techo
-beast.
More
specifically, they were the dissected remnants of the four magnetic
stabilizers. Each of the stabilizers, in their normal condition, had the size
and shape of a watermelon, but weighed as much as an armful of bricks. Inside
each unit was, amongst many smaller components, turbines used for heat
dissipation. Two of the stabilizers were cracked from top to bottom, exposing
the fragile drive units inside of them. The other two, while externally
undamaged, had seized cooling fans, rendering them all but useless. On the
floor behind the table, the engines cylindrical cowling had a large chunk taken
out of its lower half.

    
“It still looks to me like you ran into something,” Trent was saying, his hands
stuffed into his dirty pockets.

    
Shawn didn’t bother facing his friend. “For the third time, I didn’t hit
anything. Whose side are you on, anyway?”

    
“Hey, I’m not the one who broke the ship.”

    
“If you want to blame someone, blame those bloody pirates. They put me in the
situation in the first place. So just drop it, okay?”

    
“Fine,” Trent quickly agreed, but his tone told Shawn otherwise.

    
With his frustrations quickly mounting, Shawn wanted desperately to avoid any
further arguments. “Do we have any spares?”

    
Trent slowly shook his head and tittered. “Let me check.” He turned his
head to the pair of shelving units that were the sum of their spare parts. Both
of them were completely barren, save for one small cardboard box that was more
than likely empty as well. “Gee, skipper. Sorry. Looks like were all out.”

    
The sarcasm was not lost on Shawn, who only stared blankly at Trent as he
waited for a more appropriate answer.

    
Trent harrumphed and straightened his ball cap as he turned back to the
fragmented engine. “I did make a vid-call to
Antara
Axa
, though, and I think we can get some. But, it’ll cost
us.”

    
Of course it will
, Shawn thought. It was also no small surprise to him that
Jacques De Lorme would have exactly what he needed. Shawn narrowed his eyes at
the mechanic.
“How much?”

    
Trent shrugged his shoulders. “Probably more then we have,” his gaze never
left the jumble of broken pieces littering the table. “And, by the way, I still
think you hit something. You know… just in case I forgot to mention it.”