Giant of the Stars
28. Modern pressures
The shuttle captain brought along Vince and the remaining supplies Perseus Train could offer. Took a while for them to plan an entry to the Giant. Especially after the close call Vince experienced when the first time they approached the central spine.
While Talm, the XO was confrontative, he still promised his teams to clean up the central dock. As the hours go by, even a day, and others smaller ships started to show up, ordered and eager to help, Vince still remained cautious.
He convinced the new arrivals to stay back and let him and the shuttle to establish a safe process. The shuttle captain was new to the job, he switched from being a senior operations officer in a drive factory, so his experience came handy. They discussed ways to mitigate the runaway neutron activation.
Vince heard of the process, yet possessed only rudimentary understanding. When a fusion reactor runs over an extended period of time, the containment structure drowns in neutrons fired from the reaction. And over time, the entire containment structure becomes radioactive. Regular maintenance will prevent this to contaminate the entire ship, while the reactor is sealed off safely, so all modern ships use a form of fusion for most energy needs.
But if maintenance is not done, or the outer shells are damaged, punctured, the radiation leaks onto the entire ship and starts the same process on its hull. At this point, many docked shuttles, passenger crafts and even the sturdier maintenance crafts shown signs of runaway neutrons, essentially making these ships like pressure cookers. Ready to blow out any moment, filling space with radioactive shrapnel around them.
The shuttle slowly maneuvered to line up with the spine of the Giant. Vince asked Perseus Train to send in one of their drones. To play the part of an early warning sentry. Sharing the drone data with all approaching ship, they essentially created a traffic light, and the time of test came. The shuttle crew, ready to switch to full reverse at any moment, approached the first docking clamp in the rotating center drum.
After a nail biting five minutes, they were docked, seal secured and under a few percentage of gravity along the centerline. This helped securing the ships to the side of the docks when in orbit. Shore-mounting, as the dock workers called the process between themselves.
- “Captain Pier to all ships in vicinity, we report successful docking. For now stay in line and dock one by one, let the ship ahead of you leave first to safety. Dock workers will assist you to speed up packing. I will check in with engineers, hope we can clear a few more safe harbors.” — Vince waited for all four waiting ships to acknowledge before he left the shuttle.
While he had no established rank to order anyone, everyone so far out in deep space had learned to self-organize. And to quickly decide who to follow. Vince led the first responding ship so all subsequent civilian captains regarded him as the senior. Especially that still no-one communicated from the Giant’s bridge.
Vince noted that Talm was not coordinating the rescue efforts, but gave him the benefit of doubt. He just lost his captain, unknown number of crew and passengers and the situation is still not under control. Cut him some slack, how would I feel in same shoes? — thought to himself as he saluted the line of workers walking past to pack life saving medicine and equipment.
- “Vince, Maria here.”
- “Go ahead.”
- “A navy cutter, the Bendeghuse arrived and wants to connect with you.”
- “Why me… put them through.”
- “This is Captain Mounthy, Captain Pier, I have the presidential cabinet on line. What can you tell us about the situation?”
- “What… you should talk with the executive officer of the Giant, he is the senior rank.”
- “We can’t reach anyone on board for hours.”
- “Wait, are you at the Giant?”
- “Affirmative.”
- “Then help us, we need organized access to the docks. Lot of injured waits for evacuation and the new arrivals need directions.”
- “Understood. Do you have any footage of the ship? And the fleet of rescue ships?”
- “What are you talking about? We have only five small civilian shuttles, and the Perseus Train, would not call it a fleet.” — his sound betrayed his annoyance with the inquisitive robot on the line.
- “Captain Vince, this is Secretary of Internal Affairs Maurice Vaunt, please share all recordings your ship made so far.”
- “Madam secretary, we have all hands working. Did you got the reports from the Admiral? The Giant is still falling toward a moon, docks are unsafe to use, probably everyone suffered at least major injuries on board. Send us all the help you can and we will share records and documentations afterwards.”
- “Captain Vince, I understand the peculiarity of the situation. However I have to press on, to help you the best, we need live feed of the situation. We checked, your ship is equipped with drones that capable of doing just that.”
- “Yes, however we have limited number of those and they need extended maintenance if we run them continuously, I can’t spare that much of my crew. And I won’t have those drones when we need them the most.”
- “Take it as presidential order, set up continuous live feed through the Bendeghuse, or I order the navy to take over your ship.” — even without seeing her face, the voice suggested she was serious.
- “The he… understood. Maria, did you hear the request?”
- “Yes, I did.”
- “Start working on it. I will get to the XO, we need the docks.” — Vince sped up his steps. A double ping in his ears noted a private connection coming in on hold, from Maria.
- “Got it, take care there!”
- “Always, you too!”
- “Captain Vince, thank you in the name of the president for your cooperation and leadership in such a hard times…” — Vince cut the channel and put on Maria.
- “Cap’, something is going on.” — heard Greg’s voice, so the bridge joined. — “The politicians are in cleanup mode, the Net is full of people complaining that the state does not do anything.”
- “So they want to put up a show? Netstreamed rescue operation? Wasting resources on that instead of helping…”
- “Going to be worse, you remember the craze of theories going around when that planet blew up a few years ago?” — Vince had some shades of remembrance, they were en route to there too but told to stand down around halfway. — “It was the Giant that evacuated the planet and now half the Net argues about false flag operation another half goes on a secret experiment tangent.”
- “Nothing changes, compile a welcome data pack, a few messages to send to all new ships. We may address their misinformation before we get a full chaos here. And tell the same to the navy ship. They better start to take over charge here.”
- “I will do it, Uncle Greg can review it.” — Eddy spoke up in the background bringing smiley on to Vince. One day he will be a great man others can rely on.
- “Thanks Eddy, keep in touch!”
As he turned to the bridge of the Giant again, unable to reach or find Talm anywhere, only a few young officer sitting resigned. When he asked for situation and what’s next, the boy in the captain’s chair did not even noticed for a few minutes that he should be answering. Or just at least put up a confident face, he is now the active captain on the bridge.
Vince gave up after a few minutes and headed toward the docks himself. What could he expect from a boy who should be a cadet still and less than half aged as he. Nowadays the companies want cheap labor and skimp on everyone. And now when the crew has been decapitated, the inexperienced have no clue what to do and panic. Or just unable to take any steps.
Vince could not find or connect with Talm, so took a few engineers he found on his way toward the central docks with himself. Ran through the steps they had to take to remotely shut down any craft’s fusion engines. They could modify emergency fire extinguishers to dampen the radioactive hulls’ heat. Not a solution, at best a stop gap measure claiming a few hours or days, still better than nothing.
Shortly Vince organized a small contingent of engineers, four groups able to work parallel on crafts, and one more half an hour behind them who volunteered to disconnect the docking clamps. They got a small tugboat on the line too, every few hours able to pull out a ship Vince and team cleared. In a few hours, the newly organized group managed to clear at least five more docks, and Vince was about leave them and bring a replacement group from when one of the engineers screamed from afar:
- “We have a runaway core.”
- “Cut the clamps of bay nine. Now.” — Vince radioed the team below them. — “Tug Beetle, we have an emergency, bay nine, core about blow, will take out half the docks. I cannot order you to do anything, but we need you.”
- “On our way, sir, and sir. We know.”
- “Will guide you in.” — Vince took up a position at bay eight, able to see the clamps as the tugboat approached. He told all teams to leave at least a few decks. Maybe the bulkheads stop the majority of shrapnels saving some of them.
He himself did not think anything else than focusing on the next step. Danger be damned, they can lose the entire dock in moments.
Coordinating with the tug was fluent, they had some practice over the day working together. He just got to know the master of the tug. Their sons played the same online game and supported the same group in the championship.
- “Greg, do you have eyes on bay nine?”
- “Yep, cap’, estimates show around ten minutes till the magnetic field collapses. But it’s the onboard computer and it was damaged, wouldn’t trust it.”
- “Tug Beetle here, we will be clear in three minutes.”
- “Just drop it and run away.”
- “On it.”
The seconds counted. One by one, the chance of success slimmer. The line of civilians spread like water droplets as the rock enters a lake.
Then the entire Net saw the fireball. The tugboat consumed by it. The nearest ships experienced a metal rainshower.
All silent for moments.
- “Beetle, come in.”
Vince tried, no answer. He almost broke his fist on the bulkhead with a right hook. The drowned stress came out on him as he felt like he let them down. Yet the docks were safe. For now.
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