Duty, Honour, Love

Danielle, Jaye and Loader Cain walked through the deserted corridors of the Orinoco. The Ezaran Wenasi walked with them. It was a bit of a homecoming but not in a good way. Each of them carried a tool case. It was dim with only the emergency lighting on. There was a stale quality to the air and their footsteps drummed on the floor. They were having a conversation thanks to the earpieces Wenasi had given them. They were able to hold the conversation because the earpieces were translating their words. They were far superior to the commercial models the Empire sold. Able to translate in real time without the lag the others often had to cope with. They stopped at the junction outside the bridge.

“I’ll head to engineering and get the reactors online,” Danielle declared.

“We’ll take Wenasi with us and see if we can get the weapons systems restored,” Jaye said with a wave of her hand.

They parted company Danielle heading deeper into the bowels of the ship. The rest went to the forward torpedo launchers.

The loading bay was exactly as they’d left it the last time. Two loaders standing idle their tubes closed and sealed against space. Or in their current situation sealed against the atmosphere. Torpedoes could be auto launched or manually launched from this station. The torpedoes could also be checked and their warheads changed or that was what they were originally designed for. Jaye set down her tool case on one of the loaders.

“Right what do you want for us to do first?” Cain asked.

“Reconnect the cables and reinitialise the consoles,” Jaye replied. She was nominally the senior here. Hopefully we can recall the torps.”

“Torps?” Wenasi asked sounding intrigued.

Jaye laughed. “Torpedoes looks like your translator isn’t one hundred percent perfect?”

“I can correct that?” Wenasi replied.

The lights flickered on overhead making the place less dingy.

“Looks like Danielle got the power back up,” Jaye said opening her tool case. They were a present from the Ezaran. Frankly she’d been surprised when he had given the cases to them. “Ok Cain get that console open and I’ll run a diagnostics.”

Cain opened the console and peered into the gaping hole that had been left.

“I’m certainly glad the LT decided to disconnect and not just yank the cabling out.” He began the laborious task of reconnecting the cables to the panel. Red lights lit the console, as he was about to set it back into the gap.

“If I may,” Wenasi said politely pulling out what could only be called a datapad plus out of his tool case. “I can run a diagnostic with this. His data pad had a number of cables with various cable attachments running out the top.

“That’s a real fancy do-hickey,” Jaye said in admiration.

Again Wenasi’s comms translator failed to translate Jaye’s words. “Do-hickey?”

“Your device,” Jaye told him. “I’ve never seem the like?”

“Oh I see I made it myself,” Wenasi answered proudly.

Cain stepped out of Wenasi’s way letting the lithe Ezaran go to work. His datapad showed a schematic of the launcher system and the two torpedoes in place. A 3D-holo image of the whole assembly appeared to float above his datapad.

Cain whistled in appreciation. “We could definitely get one of those?”

Wenasi tapped the screen and the image enlarged showing more detail. The holo itself was mostly green but they could see a few red sections.

“Are those where the faults are?” Jaye asked.

“Yes,” Wenasi replied. “If we re-route the power through here?” he explained.

Cain was already on it, tapping icons on the control console. Suddenly the two pressure hatches on the launcher opened and two torpedoes were expelled. The torpedoes were about three metres long. Pointed at the front with oval curved sides and engines at the rear. Leaving the console Cain stepped across to one of the torpedoes and examined a small console panel on the top of it.

“This one is good,” he said repeating the procedure with the other. “Both good.”

“Launcher exits show green,” Jaye said relieved. There had been a chance the launcher would have been blocked or damaged on landing but there seemed to be none of that.

Cain put the console back after Wenasi had removed his device.

“At least that’s a go.” Jaye gave the Cain and Wenasi a thumbs up. “You finish off in here. I’ll be on the bridge. Get me when you are ready to remove the PD guns.” With that she left.

Wenasi was alone with Cain. He had question he wanted to ask Cain, Questions that weren’t of an engineering nature.

“Engineer Strong she is Human?”

Cain stared at Wenasi confused. “What?”

“Engineer Strong is a Human?”

“As far as I know,” Cain admitted unsure what Wenasi was asking.

“So she has no Valkyrie blood. I know she does not have their skin colouring but is she one. She has their quick blood?”

“Quick blood, temper you mean. I can’t really say. I’d rather not ask her that. I like my blood inside if you know what I mean?”

“Of course, I was just asking?”

Cain shook his head. “Come on we’ll need to get this finished. I’m not looking forward to removing the PD guns.” He regarded the console giving it a critical look.

“About Engineer Strong? Wenasi enquired.

“Best you ask her yourself. Just let me know and I’ll be on the other side of the planet when she explodes.”

“Of course I’ll let you know.”

Cain wasn’t sure if the Ezaran was joking or being totally honest. He thought he’d better not try it. He packed up his tools and headed to the bridge Wenasi following. Jaye sat at the weapons console when Cain and Wenasi entered. She glanced at them then at the weapons console.

“Reinitialised the system we have green across the board.” Frankly she was glad something actually functioned after that landing. From the looks of it they weren’t getting off this world. She yearned to be at the weapons console of a Capital Cruiser all that power in her hands. A distant dream but she had to be practical about their chances. She stood regarding Cain and Wenasi practicality reared its ugly head. “Now we dismantle the PD guns. That will take us a handful of days,” she groaned wishing they had more help. The rest of Wenasi’s Ezarans had other tasks. “I’m unsure what condition they’ll be in?”

“Dismantling is the easy bit. I’m not looking forward to lugging it through half the ship. Then getting it through the emergency exit is going to be a bitch,” Cain stated.

“If it comes to the worst we’ll cut through the damaged part of the hull,” Jaye answered thoughtfully. It was a plan of sorts.

“Is that wise some of that section is under water?” Cain told her.

“We do what we can and figure the rest later.”

Cain nodded resigned. “Where to first.”

“Aft section PD nine.”

They left the bridge and headed deeper in to the ship.

In an innocuous corridor near the rear of the ship they halted. A man-sized hatch stood recessed into the wall. It had the letters PD nine stencilled above it. Next to the hatch was a smaller version of the hatch. It was where they loaded canisters of railgun rounds. Jaye punched a code in on a panel next to the man-sized hatch and it slid open to reveal a round chamber about one metre in diameter. The railgun had the appearance of a tuning fork. Two long prongs consisted of the barrel of the gun that reached into the housing of the gun. The prongs a series of electromagnets propelled the round out of the barrel. The housing had a belt attached to it the fed rounds into the gun. A piston pushed the gun through a hatch below it and out into space. It had been designed so the railguns could be repaired from the inside.

“I’m glad I don’t have to do this in a suit,” Cain said as he squeezed into the space around the railgun.

“Suit?” Wenasi asked.

“Vacc suit,” Jaye told him. “A better version of a space suit but not a good a combat armour.”

“Yeah the recycler on the vacc suit often gets in the way,” Cain added. He grabbed hold of a prong. “Is it left or right I can never remember.” He twisted it but I didn’t move. “I guess it was the other way.” He twisted the prong again and it unlocked. It came apart easily Cain grunted. “Damn this is heavy.” He undid a cable trailing from the prong. “One down and another nine hundred to go,” Cain grouched passing the prong to Jaye.

With Wenasi’s help she laid it on the floor of the corridor too narrow for what they were doing.

“That was the easy bit,” Cain told them passing the second prong to them. “Ok extend the housing.”