Midshipman's Hope (The Seafort Saga Book 1) Page 20

  “Yes, sir,” Derek said meekly.

  “It’s ‘aye aye, sir,’ and that’s two demerits. Ten demerits means the barrel.”

  “Aye aye, sir!”

  “No, that’s ‘yes, sir’. I didn’t give you an order, I told you a fact. Another two demerits.” Each would be worked off by two hours of hard calisthenics.

  “Uh, yes, sir.” Derek began to look apprehensive.

  I followed them down the corridor to the wardroom, feeling a bit sorry for Mr. Carr.

  Vax put his hand on Derek’s shoulder as he steered the boy into the wardroom. “Derek, tell us about your sex life,” he purred. The hatch slid shut behind them.

  I walked back to the bridge. I had four middies now. Well, three, and a cadet. Close.

  16

  “LORD GOD, TODAY IS MAY 14, 2195, on the U.N.S. Hibernia. We ask you to bless us, to bless our voyage, and to bring health and well-being to all aboard.”

  “Amen.” We took our seats.

  As I spooned my soup I counted my blessings. Our crew had settled back to normal. We remained in Fusion, riding the crest of the N-wave toward Hope Nation. The Chief and I investigated his artifact from time to time, in the quiet of the evenings. Alexi was working through a rigorous course of navigation under Pilot Haynes; I looked forward to the day he might make lieutenant.

  On the other hand, we hadn’t dealt with Darla’s parameter glitch. Though I pressed the Pilot at least to investigate the state of her computational arrays, he argued that we should wait until we reached Hope Nation, where he was sure we’d find a more knowledgeable puterman. As long as we calculated our adjusted mass ourselves, Darla’s misprogrammed parameter was no hazard. I was uneasy, but wasn’t ready to force the issue.

  Meanwhile, Derek Carr had vanished into the wardroom under the gentle tutelage of Vax Holser. As the Captain never visited the wardroom and a cadet was not allowed on the bridge, I had no way to determine how Derek was managing.

  Occasionally I caught a glimpse of him hurrying down a corridor, immaculate in a cadet’s unmarked gray uniform, his hair cut short, hands and face scrubbed, wearing an anxious expression.

  When he saw me he would snap to attention, at first in a slipshod manner. Within a week, his stomach was sucked tight, his shoulders thrown back, spine stiff, his pose perfect in every particular. How Vax taught him the physical drill so quickly, I was afraid to ask.

  My responsibility was to leave them alone, and trust Vax to do his job. Derek was learning ship’s routine, Naval regs, cleanliness, discipline, and how to cope with a wardroom full of frisky boys all his seniors. That would be the hard part. He would pull through or he wouldn’t, and I couldn’t help him.

  Nonetheless, I gave Vax one caution. “Those demerits you’re giving him—make sure he has a chance to work them off. He shouldn’t get up to ten. Not for a couple of months, anyway.”

  “Aye aye, sir. That’s kind of how I figured.” I let them be.

  At times I passed Amanda flirting and laughing with various young men among the passengers. If she saw me she gave no sign. I missed our confidences, our physical intimacy, our caring.

  With the departure of Derek from the Captain’s table, I passed April with only two dinner companions. On the first of May the normal rotation brought a surprise; ten passengers had asked the purser to seat them at my table.

  My siege was lifting.

  I chose seven guests for the remaining places at my table. I now dined with a full complement, amid animated conversation.

  But I had to sleep.

  My cabin hatch wouldn’t stay fastened. I slapped it shut; it bulged open. I had to lean all my weight against it to force it closed. Something pushed back. I backed away, stumbling into the bulkhead behind me.

  In the dark corridor beyond the ruptured hatch, something moved. Seaman Tuak shambled into the cabin, face purple, eyes bulging, rattling the cuffs that bound hands and feet. A blackened tongue protruded from torn tape covering his rotting mouth.

  I cowered against the bulkhead. A cold, damp arm reached through the hull behind me, wrapped around my throat. Seaman Rogoff pulled himself into the cabin to hold me while Tuak came near.

  I woke screaming. My sounds were barely audible whimpers. I staggered out of bed, fell into my chair, and rocked, hugging myself, until the corridors lightened with day.

  I could think of only one way to deal with that. I buried myself in work, trying to exhaust myself so completely I wouldn’t fear sleep. I assigned myself two four-hour watches each day. I explored the entire ship, bow to stern, memorizing every compartment, all the storerooms, each of the airlocks.

  I disconcerted Alexi and the Pilot by joining their navigation course; in the back of the room I quietly worked the problems Mr. Haynes gave the middy. Alexi solved them more quickly and more accurately, but I persevered until I improved.

  At first, the Pilot was uncomfortable at my presence; a careless comment had already earned him a rebuke and a stinging punishment, and now I demanded that he correct my mistakes. After a while he found the balance between elaborate politeness and scorn, becoming an excellent teacher.

  At my insistence, Chief McAndrews loaned me holovids explaining the principles of fusion drives. They remained a mystery, no matter how hard I studied. I made the Chief review them with me, step by step, until even that phlegmatic man’s voice took on an edge.

  I inspected all the nooks and crannies of the ship: engine room, the crew berths, the infirmary, the wardroom. There, with the midshipmen and cadet standing at rigid attention, I pretended to search for dust on a shelf or creases on a bunk, feeling for a few moments that I had wakened from a nightmare without end.

  I was tempted to take my dreams to Dr. Uburu. Perhaps she could find grounds to relieve me on grounds of mental disability. I didn’t make the attempt because I knew my dreams were a sign of tension, not mental illness. I was afraid she would see through my cowardice.

  I turned my attention to the one piece of work I’d been putting off. I called the Chief and the Pilot—away from the bridge, of course—to consider reprogramming Darla to eliminate her glitch.

  Reluctantly, the Pilot sketched out our task. We’d have to strip away her attitudinal and conversational overlays, find the improper input for the adjusted mass parameter, and override it.

  I demanded the tech manuals, glanced through them. They made the steps clear enough. Had I known how clear, I wouldn’t have allowed Mr. Haynes so long a delay. Still, I could understand his caution; an error on our part could make matters far worse. Reprogramming a puter was no job for an amateur; that’s why the Admiralty had Dosmen in the first place.

  The Pilot argued his point. “Darla is locked in the dockyard figure for ship’s mass. But as long as we keep feeding her calculations by hand, we can Fuse. Better a devil we know than one we don’t.”

  “Mr. McAndrews?”

  “I’m no Dosman, sir. With respect, neither are you. I’m concerned about creating more problems than we can solve. We can calculate by hand; I’d leave her alone.”

  “You’re both right, as far as you go. But we have no idea how deep Darla’s glitch goes. What if the ship’s mass isn’t the only parameter that’s fouled? When we display her inputs, we’ll have to check every one to be sure.”

  The Pilot snorted. “Sir, do you realize how many parameters she has? Sure, some are straightforward, like ship’s mass. But others are odd tidbits like the length of the fusion drive shaft, hydroponics chamber capacities, airlock pump rates ... My God, we couldn’t check all of them.”

  “She stores all that?”

  “And operates from them. Every time we recycle a glass of water, grow a tomato, track energy fluctuations, we rely on Darla’s parameters. If we inadvertently alter them ...” He left the sentence unfinished. The dangers were obvious, and chilling.

  It was my decision, and I needed to sleep on it.

  That night the nightmare struck with terrifying force. At the point where I usually w
oke trembling, I came struggling out of it, as always. Weakly I crawled out of bed to fall in the easy chair. It was there the icy hand of Mr. Rogoff found me, toppling me onto the deck screeching in terror.

  I woke in my bed, gasping and shaking, realizing I had still been asleep. I looked up. Mr. Tuak opened the hatch and staggered in, rotting eyes boring into mine, his cuffed feet shambling toward my bed. I woke again, paralyzed with fear.

  It was a long time before I was sure I was truly awake. I threw on my pants, pulled my jacket over my undershirt and hurried to the infirmary, dreading to meet Mr. Tuak on the way. Pride was no longer an issue; I woke Dr. Uburu and demanded a sleeping pill. In response to her questions I told her I’d been having nightmares.

  She gave me a pill, warning me not to take it until I was actually in bed, and to sleep as long as I wanted. About my nightmares, she mercifully said nothing.

  When I reached my cabin I couldn’t stop the chills from stabbing at my back; I opened the hatch with caution and entered, knowing nothing was waiting but still, like a child, unable to trust in knowledge to dispel my demons.

  I swallowed the sedative. A few minutes later the cabin disappeared.

  Someone was attacking my hatch with a sledgehammer. Annoyed, I tried to open my eyes, but they were glued shut. I lurched out of bed and felt my way toward the hatch. Somebody had moved the bulkhead about two steps closer; I caromed off the cold metal and flung open the hatch, ready to break the sledgehammer into tiny pieces.

  I forced open my eyes, a snarl and a scream battling in my throat for priority. The ship’s boy stood patiently in the corridor.

  “Ricky! Why in God’s name are you here in the middle of the night? And stop that banging!” I propped myself carefully against the bulkhead.

  “It’s morning, Captain, sir. Same time I always come.” The ship’s boy held his breakfast tray with both hands, waiting expectantly.

  “Uhng. Come in.” I staggered back to sit on the bed. “You didn’t see a man with a piece of rope around his neck, did you?”

  Ricky put the tray on my table. “No, sir. If I do, should I tell him anything?”

  I focused on my bedside table, trying to hold it still. “Tell him I’m sorry.” The table slowed, but didn’t stop rotating. “On second thought, don’t tell him anything, just try not to see him.” I lay down in my bunk. Now only the ceiling was spinning. “Never mind, I’m not sure this is real either. That’s all, Ricky.”

  “Aye aye, sir. Oh, by the way, sir, I’ve decided I want to be a midshipman.”

  “Very good, Ricky, come back after you grow up; I’ll ask the Captain. I’m tired now.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” he said, his voice uncertain. He left.

  I woke some hours later, relaxed and refreshed, recalling a peculiar dream involving the ship’s boy. I stood, slowly. Cautious tests indicated my motor systems were functional.

  After visiting the head and the shower I returned to my cabin. Two congealed eggs stared reproachfully. I decided I’d work today on distinguishing reality from fantasy. A morning chore for the Captain.

  On the way to the bridge I stopped at the infirmary. “Doc, what did you give me?” My tone was plaintive.

  “Were there side effects?” Dr. Uburu asked coolly.

  “I think there may be one next to my nose. I couldn’t wake for breakfast. Someone else woke instead.”

  “You shouldn’t have tried that.” The Doctor was reproving. “I told you to stay down until you woke naturally.” She studied my face. “I think you survived, Captain. You needed the rest.” I had to admit that was true.

  Later in the day I called Chief McAndrews and Pilot Haynes to a conference in the officers’ mess. “I’ve thought it over,” I said, sipping coffee. “We’ll strip Darla for reprogramming. I don’t trust my own Fusion calculations and I’ve got to be able to rely on her. While we’re at it we can recheck her other parameters.”

  “There are hundreds,” the Pilot reminded me.

  “We’ve months ’til we reach Miningcamp. There’s time to check them.”

  A silence. The Pilot said carefully, “Captain, I protest your order, for the ship’s safety. I request that my protest be entered in the Log.”

  “Very well.” It was his right. I didn’t remind him that if he was correct there was a chance no one would ever read the Log.

  Chief McAndrews cleared his throat. “Sir, I request you to enter my protest in the Log as well. Meaning no disrespect.” He had the courage to meet my eye.

  “You feel that strongly about it, Chief?”

  “Yes, sir. I do. I’m sorry.” He looked sorry, too.

  “Very well.” My tone was sharp; I tried to dispel a sense of betrayal. “I’ll enter your protests. Bring the puter manuals to the bridge. We’ll start this afternoon.” I left the mess, knowing my evening sessions with the Chief could never be the same. I pushed aside my loneliness; if I dwelt on it I would march back to the mess and cancel my orders.

  We met on the bridge. “Mr. Holser, you’re relieved from watch. Leave us.” My nerves were strung tight. I slapped shut the hatch, leaving the Chief, Pilot Haynes, and myself alone with Darla. I switched off the ship’s caller. I tapped a command on my console, saying it aloud at the same time. “Keyboard entry only, Darla.” At this juncture we couldn’t risk stray sounds confusing the puter; in deep programming mode, who knew what glitch could be set up by a misinterpreted cough?

  “Got it, Captain,” Darla said. “Something special you want to tell me?”

  I typed, “Alphanumeric response only, Darla, displayed on screen.” A sentence flashed onto my screen, “KEYBOARD ONLY, CAPTAIN. WHAT’S UP?”

  I tapped, “Disconnect conversational overlays.”

  “VERIFY CONVERSATIONAL OVERLAYS DISCONNECTED.” Darla’s answer was dull and machinelike, stripped of her usual banter.

  I indicated the manual open in the Pilot’s lap. “What’s first?”

  Three hours later we were ready; we’d bypassed the warnings and safeties, entered my access codes, stripped away the interconnected layers of tamperproofing the Dosmen had built into her. Darla lay unconscious on our operating table, her brain pulsing and exposed.

  I typed, “List fixed input parameters, consecutive order, pause for enter after each.”

  “COMMENCING INPUT PARAMETER LIST, PAUSE AFTER EACH DISPLAY.” The first parameter appeared on the screen.

  “SPEED OF LIGHT: 299792.518 KILOMETERS PER SECOND.”

  I glanced at the Pilot. “Any problem with that one, Mr. Haynes?”

  “No, sir.”

  Keying through the long list of parameters, I realized that checking them as we went wasn’t possible. As I tapped, Darla flashed one parameter after another on the screen. After a while I merely glanced at each one, waiting for “SHIP’S MASS” to appear. I tapped for a full hour and a half, my wrist beginning to ache, before the figure finally showed on the screen.

  “SHIP’S BASE MASS: 215.6 STANDARD UNITS.”

  “There,” I said with relief. I typed, “Display parameter number and location.”

  “PARAMETER 2613, SECTOR 71198, GRANULE 1614.”

  I tapped, “Continue parameter display.”

  “FIXED PARAMETER DISPLAY COMPLETE.”

  I swore. Ship’s mass was the very last parameter in the list. If I’d started at the end of the list and worked backward I’d have saved hours of tapping.

  “That’s the last one, Pilot.”

  “It can’t be!”

  “Why not?”

  “Adjusted mass should be a parameter as well.”

  The Chief said, “Not if she derives it from base mass.”

  “We know she’s using the wrong figure for base mass,” I said. “How do we change that?”

  “The quick fix is to delete base mass as a fixed parameter and input it as a variable, sir.” The Pilot had the manual on his holovid in his lap. “Then we instruct her not to adjust the variable except after recalc.”

  The manu
al provided a step-by-step example of how to do that. “Read me the instructions exactly.”

  “Aye aye, sir.” The Pilot magnified the page so it was visible to all of us. “There are fourteen steps for deletion, sir. Input takes six.”

  “Any reason not to proceed now, gentlemen?” I asked. A few seconds hesitation; I added, “Other than those stated in the Log?”

  Pilot Haynes said reluctantly, “Nothing else, sir,” The Chief shook his head.

  We took great care with each step. Both the Pilot and the Chief checked each of my keyboard commands against the manual before I entered it, to make sure I had made no mistake. I was so nervous I could barely contain myself; we were barbarians engaging in brain surgery. I began to wish I had followed my officers’ advice.

  Finally we were done, “VARIABLE INPUT COMPLETE,” the screen displayed. I let out a long breath.

  “Hardcopy input parameters and input variables,” I typed. The eprom clicked on. A moment later a holochip popped into the waiting tray. I handed it to the Pilot, who slipped it in his holovid. We keyed to the list of parameters. Base mass was absent. We checked the variables, found it at the end of the list.

  “To put her back together, we reverse the steps that took her apart,” the Pilot said, consulting his manual. “Here’s the list.”

  “No.” They looked up in surprise. “Darla stays down.” My tone was firm. “We check every one of the input parameters before she goes back on-line.”

  Chief McAndrews said, “Captain, Darla monitors our recycling program. We need that information daily, to make adjustments.”

  “Hydroponics too, sir,” added the Pilot. “We’ve been on manual all day; if a sailor’s attention wanders, he could foul up the systems. We need to get back to automatics.”

  “We have manual backup procedures.” I tried to quell my irritation. “The hydroponicist’s mates will stand extra watches. So will the recycler’s mates. We’ll do without Darla.”

  The Pilot. “Captain, the longer it takes, the more—”