His wife looked down at the floor, embarrassed for him. At the same time she had to know that the worst thing she could do to undermine his new command would be to side with the crew. So she stayed silent.
It wasn’t the most uncomfortable moment Daniels could have chosen to finally join them, but it was close. No one said anything, which was the best approach. Business now, grieving and consolation later.
She looked damaged and on edge as she looked from face to face, taking a seat next to a conspicuously empty chair. When she addressed the others, however, her voice was firm.
“The terraforming equipment module is stable,” she said, “although the, um, connecting struts took some damage. Can’t tell for certain without an EVA inspection.”
“I can handle that remotely,” Walter assured her. “If anything was critical, Mother would have told us by now.”
She nodded. “I still need to check the clamp lockdowns for the heavy machinery and the vehicles. I’m not worried about the small stuff. If some of it got knocked around, we’ll just reposition it. Bay monitors don’t show any damage, but I want to be certain. We were rocked pretty good.”
“I can also help with that if you like,” Walter told her. “Mother will inform me if my attention is required elsewhere.”
She glanced over at the synthetic. “Thanks.”
Oram queried him. “How long before we can make our next jump, Walter?”
“I should have a better idea within hours, as Mother is still compiling final damage reports. We must remain here until recharge is complete. Fixing the damaged collectors will of course speed our departure. Assuming the most significant issues can be addressed swiftly, I would say that a few days would be sufficient to allow us to get underway again.
“Once all vital repairs have been completed,” he continued, “we should make an effort to vacate this sector, in case there may be subsequent flares that prove as undetectable as the one that just struck us. Secondary repairs can be made in the course of the journey.”
“I agree.” Oram eyed each of them in turn. “We can complete minor repairs the next time we come out of jump to recharge. Let’s go to work.” They had a plan of action. Oram absorbed it the way others might down a pill to relieve constipation. “Dismissed.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a wry Tennessee silently mouth, “Dismissed?” He decided to let it ride as they dispersed to their stations and tasks.
Daniels started to rise to follow the others.
“Danny?” Oram murmured softly. “A word before you go.”
She sat back down in her seat as the last of her colleagues filed off of the bridge. Leaning toward her across the table and lowering his voice, Oram spoke earnestly. He was trying, in his maladroit fashion, to be comforting.
“I know there’s nothing I can possibly say—but I am so sorry. He was a genuine leader and a fine man. Jacob and I didn’t always see eye to eye, as you know. Even when we disagreed on some technicality, though, I always respected his decision. When his reasoning differed from mine, it was always elegantly presented. In the end he always managed to get people to come around to his way of thinking, and he did it without shouting or having to pull rank. It was an honor to serve under him.”
She struggled to muster a smile. “I appreciate that, Chris. I know Jacob would’ve, too.”
His tone changed. “You should take a few days off,” he said firmly.
“I’d rather keep busy.” The smile, what there was of one, faded instantly.
“That wasn’t a request.” He tried to keep his voice level, lest his new tone contradict his earlier compassion.
She stared back at him. Ordinarily she would have been more vocal, he knew, more defiant in her response, but right then she did not have it in her. Noting her expression, he felt moved to explain further.
“I’m responsible for the mission now,” he reminded her, “and for the lives and well-being of everyone on board, be they operational crew or sleeping colonists. I didn’t anticipate being put in this position, and I need everyone’s help. That means I need everyone functioning at their best, including you.” He essayed a smile of his own. “When we don’t want to take a break is usually when we need one the most. Take a couple of days. Cry it out, okay?”
She gaped at him.
“‘Cry it out?’ Here’s an idea, Chris—Captain. Maybe it will prove ‘helpful.’ How about I mourn the loss of my husband in my own way? I don’t think I’ll be contradicting any formal guidelines in the general crew manual… sir.” Rising from her seat, she turned sharply and walked quickly from the bridge in the wake of her crewmates.
Oram watched her go, realizing he hadn’t handled that as well as he could have. “New to this…” He had confessed as much. Not that it had made any difference. A little while ago he had been a member of the crew. Now, with the death of Jacob Branson, an unavoidable gulf had opened between him and his shipmates. There was nothing to be done about it. That was the way of command.
He was going to need Karine’s advice more than ever.
Removing a pair of metal worry beads from a pocket, he absently began to roll them together in one hand, listening as they clicked. He couldn’t let such episodes as the encounter with Daniels distract him from his new duties. Everything from now on depended on focus, focus, focus. That meant staying calm and analyzing in depth every situation, be it human-to-human interaction or a report from engineering. Despite his new position and responsibilities, he very much wanted to remain friends with his crewmates.
Only time would tell if he would be able to manage it.
* * *
Emerging from a service lock, Tennessee and Ankor moved away from the massive arc of the Covenant. In the blackness of interstellar space their bright yellow EVA suits, laden with gear, and their oversize heavy-duty helmets gave them the appearance of giant cyclopean beetles.
External antennae would have cemented the similarity, but as a safety measure everything—including multiple informational readouts—was built into the suit or its headgear. The suits’ rounded shapes meant they could bump up against the ship or any other solid object without fear of dislodging or snapping off something critical.
Tennessee lined up a course that would take him to the tip of one collector extension, while Ankor headed for the mast core. Each man had his own predetermined tasks. Unless an unforeseen problem arose, there was no need for them to operate in tandem. They knew their jobs. Toiling separately would see the necessary work go twice as fast.
Around them was arrayed the firmament: an endless sweep of stars and nebulae, glorious and overpowering in its beauty. Rendering it all the more awe-inspiring was the knowledge that for them, what they were viewing effectively had no end. The galactic magnificence proceeded almost infinitely in every direction, the view unmarred by the adjacent presence of a planet or moon.
Magnificence, and a cold indifferent emptiness that was held at bay only by their suits. They could marvel and fear at the same time. Concentrating on the work at hand always helped to prevent distraction, though Tennessee couldn’t keep from voicing his reaction.
“Damn. Y’all should see this view.”
Upworth’s voice, crisp and familiar, sounded on his suit’s speakers. “We can’t see anything until you get the external camera array fixed. It wouldn’t be the same anyway. Contemplating it via projection is a long way from actually being out there.”
“Projection, smojection—why don’t you look out the damn window, hon?” With that, Tennessee continued suit-to-suit. “Ankor, let’s get the power back on so those poor folks canned up inside can take in the sights. I’m gonna give up on trying to describe it.” He paused briefly to check one of the brightly glowing readouts inside his helmet and near his chin. “Let me know when you’re in position.”
Efficient as ever, his colleague was already there. “I’m in position. Maybe because I’m not goofing off, enjoying the view. Let’s get to work.”
Grinning
to himself, Tennessee used a power trimmer to cut away a damaged portion of one collector panel, then gave it a tug. While the diaphanous material was infinitely greater in expanse than the tiny figure of the spacesuited human, it also weighed comparatively less. His single pull was enough to send the torn section he had just excised drifting off, away from the rest of the panel and the Covenant.
Unspooling some thread-like cable behind him, he fired the propellant unit on his suit and, accelerating rapidly, headed for the far end of the mast. It took a while to cross the now collector-less gulf. Reaching the end of the damaged section, he secured the cable-thread and signaled to Ankor.
Receiving the directive, the other man commenced to draw the repaired collector taut.
A good start, Tennessee told himself. Now swing about, rotate the cosmos around your head, try not to get dizzy, and repeat. Operating as a single unit, both men moved methodically toward another damaged portion of the collector.
IV
Rooms and corridors inside colonization ships were sizeable out of psychological necessity. This didn’t matter to the colonists themselves, however. They slept on in their pods, dormant and oblivious, knowing they would not be awakened until the ship reached its destination.
Transitory coffins with transparent lids didn’t have to be expansive. All that was needed was enough room for a body to lie in comfort, and for the machinery and instrumentation that would sustain it in that biological dreamworld called hypersleep. The colonists could be—and were—packed together as closely as was technologically feasible.
It was different for an awakened, working crew. Whenever they were revived to perform maintenance, checkup, recharge, or other ship’s duties, it was important for them to have room to move about freely, and adequate personal space in which to relax. Otherwise, cosmic beauty notwithstanding, the fact that they were dozens, perhaps hundreds of light years from the nearest breathable atmosphere, the closest gurgling stream, the next cool falling rain, could drive even the most highly trained and well-prepared individuals quietly insane.
So Daniels’ cabin, like those of their colleagues, had been made as large as was physically and economically possible. Within reason, it included every possible creature comfort that could be included in its design. Adjustable lighting at the head of the bed allowed for easy reading, or a change of mood, or whatever kind and color of illumination its occupants desired. The bed rested against the far wall of the room, beneath a hexagonal port that featured a multipart view of the cosmos beyond.
The spectacular sight, the adjustable lighting, the wonderfully comfortable bed—none of it mattered. Because like all of the crew cabins on the Covenant, this one had been designed and built to accommodate the needs of a husband and wife. Instead of comforting Daniels, its comparative luxury only reminded her that she was now half a couple. Her life, like her marriage, had been truncated in the most abrupt, unexpected, and violent manner possible.
“Cry it out,” Oram had told her. As far as she was concerned, such advice had the emotional equivalent of going to the bathroom. She had been too deadened even to slap him. Not that she would have done so, anyway, she told herself. She was too well trained for that. Too well trained, perhaps, to cry—even had she felt like acting on his suggestion. When it came to serving on a starship, emotion was more likely than not to prove a liability.
She knew she shouldn’t really blame Oram for his clumsy attempt to console her. At least give him credit for trying, she told herself. More than an efficient drone and less than a natural leader, he had been thrust into the unwanted role of captain. Like every member of the crew he was extremely proficient at his specialty. Forced now to engage outside the realm of life sciences and biology, he had to deal with organisms more active and more contrary than his beloved specimens.
She allowed herself the slightest of smiles. It wouldn’t be too bad with him in command. Karine would always be there to give him quiet counsel and offer corrections.
Ignoring the splay of stars outside the port, she sat down on the king-size bed. It was a real bed, its reassuring mass made possible only by the wonder that was artificial gravity. There would be no sleeping while floating in nets, not for the crew of the Covenant. Yet the bed was no longer comforting, and she couldn’t bring herself to move away from the edge and toward the center. It beckoned behind her, a wide homey expanse that could no longer be filled.
Her gaze, open but indifferent, took in the rest of the cabin. Duty boots stood carefully placed beside hers inside the open storage area; left boot always on the left side, right boot always on the right. A man’s clothing hung neatly above them, his always on the left, hers on the right. Nearby rested Jacob’s prized collection of antediluvian vinyl records and their lovingly restored player, its parts cannibalized over the years from half a dozen similar devices.
Stored elsewhere, but likewise visible from where she sat on the side of the bed, was their climbing gear, brought along in expectation of being able to resume an old hobby on a new world. Neither of them would have been happy settling on a world without mountains.
“Doesn’t matter what the ambient temperature is, or the geology, or anything else,” he had told her on more than one occasion. “Anywhere the colony settles, there’ve got to be rocks to climb.”
“What if it’s a water world?” she had countered playfully. “Or what if it’s so old that the mountains are all worn down and it’s as flat as the Great Plains?”
“If it’s the first, I’ll build scaling walls out of salt or calcium carbonate. If it’s the second, I’ll pile up dirt and silicate it.”
Always optimistic, was Jacob. Always showing a cheerful side. Wonderful qualities to have in a captain. Wonderful qualities to have in a husband. Her gaze came to rest on a hard-copy printout of the exterior of his pet project.
The throwback log cabin.
Her husband’s dream.
Ex-husband, she corrected herself silently. Deceased husband. Cremated hus—
The door chimed melodically and without apology at the interruption.
Now who could it be, at this hour of the night? That had been one of Jacob’s running jokes. In interstellar space it was always night. But it had never been this dark.
She stepped to the door and opened it. It was Walter. She saw that he carried a small box.
“Good evening. Do I intrude?”
Pleasant, polite, considerate. Why couldn’t he be the replacement captain? But that was not possible. Synthetics, no matter how efficiently programmed, were designed to serve. To follow, not to lead. Never to lead.
She contemplated sending him away, then decided that any company was better than being alone with her own thoughts.
“No. Come in. Good to see you.”
He entered, waited for the door to slide closed behind him, then held out the box. “I brought you something.”
She took it, opened it. Inside were three perfectly formed 4Cs—combustible chemical channeling cylinders. Or, as the remarkably persistent terminology from another time declaimed, joints. She couldn’t keep from smiling.
The personification of droll, Walter explained. “The atmospheric conditions in Hydroponics are ideal for cannabis growth.”
“I could acquire the same cannabinoids via a pill,” she told him.
“True, but I believe there are certain aesthetics attached to this mode of consumption that can augment the overall experience, and thereby add to its efficacy. Also, it will require that you focus mind and fingers to consummate the act. It is an ancillary benefit to the ingestion.”
“You think of everything.”
“It’s just my programming.”
As was the modesty, she told herself. “That’s not true.”
“If I may…” He hesitated just long enough before continuing. The pause was also a consequence of good programming, she knew, but she didn’t care. “I understand that keeping active can be an effective method in helping to process trauma. Would it be useful to
go back to work?”
“Oram took me off the duty roster.” She made a face. “Captain’s orders. Bawl, don’t work.”
“I wasn’t suggesting we inform him. It’s a big ship. There is a great deal to do in places that are infrequently scanned.”
She was still doubtful. “I’ll be seen on security monitors.”
“It depends where you work. The ship’s security coverage is ample, not ubiquitous. There is also the fact that security is monitored by Security. I doubt Sergeant Lopé will care where you choose to spend your downtime. As for our new captain, he has a great many other things to do. I believe you said earlier that you wanted to check on the status of the heavy equipment in the terraforming storage bay? Considering the general damage we have suffered, I agree that area is certainly in need of closer, hands-on inspection.
“As I said earlier, I will accompany you, if you wish.”
Her expression was full of gratitude.
* * *
The terraforming chamber was enormous. Huge vehicles of all descriptions, intended to build the colony not just from the ground up but from out of the ground itself, were clamped and tethered in position. At least, Daniels hoped they were.
As she and Walter moved through the bay she was gratified to see that despite the violent, momentary unsettling of the ship’s equilibrium as it rode out the flare, everything appeared to be in place. No tie-down clamps had released prematurely, no chains or straps had come loose or snapped. Everything was still positioned as it had been when first loaded on board the Covenant.
Sometimes, she reflected, old tech worked best. Electronic fasteners were stronger and easier to maintain—unless the power went out. There was something, she knew, so basic and primitive and human and functional about a rope. She smiled to herself. In lieu of vines, mechanical clamps and carbon fiber and metal chains would have to do.
The tires and tracks of giant earth-moving and stone-grinding vehicles loomed above the two figures as they made their way down one row of machinery before turning to walk back along another. As chief of terraforming, Daniels knew the name, purpose, and cost of every piece of equipment. She could zero in on their respective operations manuals without having to sort through the ship’s computer or, if necessary, go right to a specific component or control in any of the equipment cabins. Her excellent memory was one of the reasons she had been chosen for her current position. She was also very much aware of her limitations.