Derelict

[Sarah McFarlen]

17th July 822 – VRS Chardon

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Sarah McFarlen couldn’t feel her arms. What’s more, she was blessedly grateful for the fact. The engineer tugged at the straps securing her to her seat, idly rolled a shoulder. Twelve days of droning engines, and Coronado’s sun was nothing but another faint point of light in an enveloping pool of black. This far out, a solar array might, if you were lucky, net you enough energy to power a wristwatch. That way you would at least know exactly how long you had until you ran out of food, air, fuel or all three. How long until oxygen consumption outpaced dwindling life support. How long until all that was left was to lay down and die, and broadcast a distress signal that would be weeks dead before help could arrive. No sane crew strayed this far from the jump network. There was nothing but vacuum this far out.

Nothing but the Adventure Galley and her quarry.

Chardon was finally close enough to see unaided. A huge, cylinder-shaped length of black against the star-speckled night. She wasn’t as big as a modern carrier, but the ancient transport could have looked a dreadnought in the eye without blinking. Chardon was little more than a small crew and cargo capsule strapped atop a fuel store that could have swallowed the entirety of the Galley and come back for seconds, and thirds, and fourths without breaking stride. Sarah felt a sudden kinship for the minnows that travelled in the shadows of whales.

Rangefinders and ladar bounced off the long-dead ship’s hull like rain, and each second bought sent another surge of information to the Galley’s computers.

”Nine hundred and twenty meters long. No obvious weapons. Reactor’s deader than a morgue.” Sarah’s eyes flicked across the display, noting and discarding, chewing through the deluge of information as surely as any machine. ”Three kilometres and closing. Looks like we’ve got two possible entry points. Cargo port amidships, and what’s probably a maintenance airlock near the engine.”

James made a low whistle, strapped in and fully armoured save for his headpiece beside Sarah. ”She’s not right small, is she? Any reads on deck layout, or do our sensors not get that deep?”

Sarah shook her head. ”Shielding, I’m guessing. Chardon was built pre-EM shields, so it’s all solid matter. We’re blind as far as anything past the hull goes, and I couldn’t get access to deck plans for the Lincoln-class.” She waved at the readout. ”I can tell you it won’t be anything like the Galley. Probably vertical layout on the decks, though. Think skyscraper instead of wet navy ship.”

James nodded. ”Where should we start, though… If we want to make a thorough sweep, I’d go bottom up.”

”No arguments here.” Sarah said. ”Going in amidships puts us closer to command and cargo, but… There’d still be a lot of bird on either side. I’d rather start at the engines and work up. It’ll be easier to hook up power from there, too. If this thing’s even compatible with what we’re putting out.” And we can see how she’s still managing to talk. She didn’t say it. Seeing the ship out the window was enough without drawing attention to it. Gone gone gone gone…

”And that’s presuming most of the electronics on this boat still work after eight hundred years. Bring a flashlight.” He shrugged, straps straining against the movement.

Sarah glanced across the bridge. ”Thoughts, skipper?”

Leslie did not respond immediately, keeping a keen eye on the radar and various readings that were flashing across her screen. After a moment, she nodded and turned in her chair to face Sarah. I suppose heading to the bridge of that thing would be the first step. Take a few of our portable batteries along with you and hope that something boots up long enough for us to get some info.”

She tapped her screen, zooming in on the ship. Any thoughts on where the bridge might be?”

Sarah shrugged. ”Bow, probably. Ships of that era were usually rigged to dump the crew clear if something went bad during a burn, and the bridge is where they’d be. Makes sense to put it somewhere you can get out of the way quickly.” The engineer nodded at the readouts. ”God, I was still in high school when I last looked at something like this.”

Leslie nodded. This thing is ancient. If we could tow it back to civilized space, Sotheby’s would pay a killing for this kind of relic. But that’s hardly possible…”

”Unless you’ve got a century to kill.” Sarah confirmed.

”We’ll just have to make do with whatever we find on board.” James murmured.

Leslie turned to James. Do you agree that we should look for the bridge first? I’d rather not go around without having a map of some sort, and that’s where we’ll get one.”

James took a slight pause to consider. ”The problem with going to the bridge first of all is that there’s no guarantee we can power the computers from there. It may be better to try and hook up power directly from the reactor area, then hit the bridge. It also makes searching less of a problem, and we’re less exposed if we’re not going in from the middle. I don’t know about you, but I like knowing everything behind me has been secured while I move forward.”

Leslie tapped another area of the ship’s image. So you want to try working your way forwards from the reactor core?”

James nodded. ”By boarding from the bottom, yes. If we’re not in trouble, we have the time. If we are, we’ll be a bit safer.”

”And sitting next to an engine bigger than a cruiser.” Sarah added. ”But, I’m with James on this one, Skipper. If there are any functioning systems left on Chardon it’ll be easier for me to hook into them from engineering, which means the engine room.”

”And you said it yourself, Sarah… that reactor is as dead as dead can be. Even if someone were to try and reactivate it, we’d definitely notice, and it’d take time to fire her up. Right?” James said, turning his head to look at the drive engineer.

”Yeah. Think months.” Sarah jerked her head back toward the Galley’s engine room. The motion was almost enough to send her drifting from her chair. ”Entirely different system to what we’re using now. Ships in Chardon’s era ran colder and messier. Deuterium-tritium birds. Nastier fuel, nastier waste. To get it going again you’d need to find somewhere that still produced tritium, for one. You know, without the LSF coming to ask why you’re building a bomb. Better off building a new reactor from scratch, really, unless you’re into re-enactment. It’d be quicker, cheaper, cleaner, and less likely to explode in your face. Which is always a nice advantage.”

She gave a disappointed shrug. ”If there’s anything left in there, it’ll be easier just to hook it up to the Galley than to try and bring Chardon back to life.”

Alright then. We’ll have to decide how to approach this. We know we have pursuers...we’ll have to be quick, but someone also needs to stay on the Galley,” Leslie said, raising a finger.

Sarah’s eyes darted over the dead ship and a shudder wandered up her spine. Gone gone gone gone… ”I can stay. Not much good me going until we know there’s something I can hook the Galley to.”

”I’m not going to argue, but I am going inside. It’s kind of what I was brought along to do, besides being pleasant company.” A crooked smile crept onto the soldier’s face at the last part.

Leslie raised an eyebrow. I can’t say I’m too fond of the idea of me going inside that thing. And I’m not exactly technically qualified.”

”I can see where this is going.” Sarah shifted in her seat and tried to ignore the part of her mind still running action replays of the derelict’s transmission. ”James, you didn’t bring another engineer in your gear, did you?”

James shrugged. ”JADE would qualify if she had hands. Or tools. Or a degree. Otherwise, no.”

”And I have two of those things.” Sarah gave a long-suffering sigh and tapped the display. ”Alright. So, we’ll go in through the maintenance airlock here and work our way out. The reactor chamber’s big enough to fit a city block inside, so it should be easy enough to find. Once we’re there, I can tell you what we’re working with. Sound okay?”

Leslie nodded. It’ll be better if we work in shifts. If you can establish a general pattern for us to look, I can go in while you take a breather. Four-hour shifts, maybe?”

”What about James?” Sarah twisted to look at the Bretonian. ”He can’t watch both of us constantly, and I’m kinda creeped out by the idea of leaving anyone alone on that thing.”

”True. I’d rather not have to pop chemicals just to stay awake, either. The stuff in those combat stims is not good for my health, long-term.” He recalled the weeks after Gaia. The twitching, the nausea. The dreams. He suppressed a shudder.

”So, JADE can’t just take control of the suit and meat-puppet you around the decks?” Sarah raised an eyebrow. ”Good to know. Maybe we’d be better off locking up the ship and all going once we’ve established a beachhead. Is that the right term?”

”A bit grandiose in this context, but sure. So are we about ready to proceed? Leslie?” He glanced at the ship’s captain.

Leslie nodded. "Go ahead. Stay on comms, I’ll monitor you...and return in four hours.”

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"This is really sort of a personal project of mine."

- James Arland, on single-handedly engaging an enemy regiment.

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