Loyalty to the Cause (TCOTU, Book 4) (This Corner of the Universe) (19 page)

Lombardi placed a
reassuring hand on his shoulder.  “I understand, Garrett.”  She smiled brightly
and said in a loud, optimistic urging, “Then let us hope that fortune favors
the bold and we sail under the noses of our would-be captors.”

*  *  *

The
die had been cast yet time still crawled for Heskan.  He hoped, foolishly, that
since he decided not to second-guess himself, his perception of the sequence of
events would play out more rapidly.  Instead, the minutes became hours and the
distance between the two ships decreased at a glacial pace.

Space
is so damned big,
Heskan reminded himself as he looked at the system plot for the hundredth time. 
It’s easy to forget that.
  Tearing his eyes away from the wall screen, he
reread the draft of a message he feared he would transmit sooner rather than
later.  Blowing a cleansing breath out his nose, he examined the anxious mood
on his bridge.  If the strain caused by the approaching corvette was not sufficient,
the tension between Vernay and Lombardi threatened to rip the fabric of space
apart. 
Just please let us make it into tunnel space,
Heskan beseeched. 
Once we get there, I’ll have time to attempt to defuse that powder keg.
 
He was reluctant to broach the subject with Vernay before then.  Heskan had
more than enough to occupy his time without trying to sort through an
additional distraction.

Jolting
him from his gloomy thoughts, an ominous electrical buzz sounded loudly inside
Truesworth’s console, causing the sensorman to squirm quickly from inside the
open panel.  He sat up and immediately pounded on the IFF unit’s keyboard sitting
inside Heskan’s briefcase.  The buzzing stopped but a pungent electrical tang
filled the bridge.  The fresh scorch mark near the opening of the panel matched
the older one on its opposite side.

“Jack,”
Heskan asked interestedly, “everything okay?”

A grimy
Truesworth nodded and grinned.  “I think it’s ready, sir.”

Heskan’s
eyebrows arched up in surprise.  “Really?”  He sniffed the air.  “I don’t seem
to remember this aroma on Kite or Anelace.”

“Yeah,”
Truesworth said sheepishly, “well, the IFF is going to burn out pretty quickly
when we use it.  It’s just not meant to run on civilian ships.  As it is, I’ve
had to rig the connections so it will accept power from two different sources. 
That’s the smell, sir.”  Truesworth began collecting the extraneous equipment littering
the deck around him.  “But the IFF will work, Captain, at least for a little
while.”

Heskan
smiled at the lieutenant.  “Better than nothing, Jack.  Good work.”  He looked
at the approaching corvette symbol on the plot.  “We might need it sooner than I’d
hoped.”

“We’ll
know in about three minutes, Captain,” Vernay confirmed as she wiped at her
brow.  “That’s when she’ll be at her closest.”

Lombardi,
who had paced behind Heskan for the last hour, muttered, “I am going to need a
chair if these types of occurrences become more common.”

“Sorry,
Komandor,” Heskan said.  “I don’t think the designers of Hussy’s bridge anticipated
scenarios like this.”  He pointed at his captain’s chair.  “You care to sit?”

Lombardi
shook her head and teased with a whisper, “As tempting as it is, Garrett, I
hardly think it appropriate for me to sit on your lap.  Besides, I am not sure
those bolts could withstand the strain.”

The
minutes continued to pass and Vernay’s voice approached hopeful.  “You’d think
we’d have received a heave to command from them by now.”

“Good
point,” Heskan said as he watched the plot.  It was maddening to be mesmerized by
such a tiny symbol on a wall screen.

“Lieutenant
Truesworth,” Lombardi asked, “does this bucket of rust have an optical suite?”

“Sort
of, ma’am.”

“Sort
of?” she questioned.

“Well,”
Truesworth explained, “it does have an old Encountrix Fifty-five but, and this
may shock you, Komandor; it doesn’t work.”

“That’s
a Republic commerce violation,” Vernay noted.  “But they, uh, I mean we, can get
away with it because we fly a corporate flag.”

“We
still have a fixed optical array that covers about ten percent of the field directly
in front of us,” Truesworth noted.

Lombardi
waved a hand.  “It is too late now, Lieutenant,” she said.  “That ship is outside
the angle.”

The
discussion had taken them to the brink.  The svelte corvette was just 58
ls
(light-seconds) from
Hussy
.  “Still no orders from her,” Truesworth
noted.  “This is as close as she’ll get.”

“She’s
actually fifty-eight seconds farther away from us by now.  She’s not going to
stop us,” Heskan predicted with a relief that was shortly echoed by the entire
bridge.

Vernay
grinned at her captain.  “Glad we stayed true.  I guess this was much ado over
nothing.”  After a moment, she shrugged slightly and apologized, “Sorry to have
bothered you, sir.”

“No,
no, Stacy.  You did the right thing.”  Heskan could not help but notice
Vernay’s eyes shift victoriously toward Lombardi as he commended her.  “Okay,
Stacy, you have the bridge again.  The komandor and I are going below to see if
there are any navigators capable of piloting this crate in tunnel space while
Diane is asleep.”

“Aye,
sir.  I’ll call you when we’re close to diving.”

The
remainder of the trip through Lysithea passed uneventfully.  During their
transit, Heskan searched for candidates among the Hollaran crew to help pilot
Hussy
while in t-space.  Although well-stocked with engineers, only two personnel with
navigation expertise had escaped from
Phoenix
.  Both would sit next to
Selvaggio during their first four hours of t-space as she reviewed the
fundamentals of propulsion via light sail.  Upon conclusion of her instruction,
Selvaggio would select the best student to pilot
Hussy
during the twelve
hours that she would be off duty.  Heskan suspected that Selvaggio would spend
every waking moment attached to the freighter’s navigation console but someone
had to pilot the ship while she slept.

The sensors
and communications talent was in much better shape with fourteen qualified
individuals on board the freighter.  For Operations, Chief Brown was sorting
through dozens of candidates and assured Heskan that the freighter would be in
good hands.  Those not selected to perform duties were asked to restrict
themselves to the cargo holds until Operations could assign
Hussy’s
living quarters and the wardroom, which had been converted into extra sleeping
quarters.  Between the three cargo holds and the other compartments,
Hussy’s
passengers would have a bearable, if overcrowded, journey.

The
food stock situation was far more critical.  Even though
Hussy
would be able
to create enough water to see them through their trip, the galley held barely
enough stores to last until reaching the Federation.  Heskan agreed with Brown
to limit meals to one thousand two hundred calories, once a day.  Brown
suggested the meal come right before each individual stood his or her watch. 
Heskan agreed, knowing that the subsequent rise in blood sugar would aid
concentration, at least for a while.

All of
these issues paled when compared to
Hussy’s
most pressing concern.  Heskan
knew that life support would be the biggest, long-term problem.  However,
discussion with
Hussy’s
chief engineer would have to wait as
Hussy
had closed on the tunnel point to Bree and was cleared to dive
.

Heskan bit down hard as disorientation swept over him. 
Three
jumps in eleven hours,
he thought bitterly. 
And we still have more to
go.
  Swallowing bile, he heard Selvaggio confirm their destination and,
when finally able, he looked up toward the wall screen.

Bree’s
yellow-orange star was a K0V main sequence star.  The system contained thirteen
planets although only one could sustain life.  That planet, rich in volcanic
activity, was a true “super-earth,” nearly four times the diameter of Terra.  Spewing
forth from deep inside the planet’s abundant magma chambers, jet-black obsidian
belts dominated the surface’s equator to give Bree her threatening nickname. 
Past the Obsidian Planet, an enormous gas giant provided enough heat for one of
its many, large moons to harbor an atmosphere that could also support life.  Orbiting
far from the system’s star, a nearly constant twilight shrouded the living moon
as if hiding it from the ominous, capital planet.  Dozens of defense
fortresses, space stations and orbitals garnished the home system of the Brevic
Republic.

As
individual ship beacons began to paint themselves onto the system plot, Heskan
said, “It’s too bad, Isabella, that our front optical can’t rotate enough to see
her.  Bree is quite a sight.”

What
might have been a shiver passed through Lombardi while she said, “I have seen
enough holo-vids of it.  Enough to be thankful that Hollara is a beautiful,
green water world.”

“Looks
can certainly be deceiving, Komandor,” Vernay muttered just loud enough to be
heard.

“Indeed,
Lieutenant,” Lombardi answered boldly, “sometimes the smallest, most innocent-looking
thing can be the most treacherous.”

Heskan
cut off Vernay’s reply.  “Time to transit the system, Diane?”

“At
point one-five-C, five hours, thirteen minutes, Captain.”  She looked back at
him while moving her hand toward
Hussy’s
propulsion controls.  “Shall I
increase speed?”

“I’d
really like to but I’m worried about fuel consumption,” Heskan answered.  “We
still have four more systems to transit before we can replenish.”

Selvaggio
nodded in agreement.

“How’s
the crash sailing course going, Diane?”

“We’ll
find out when we dive,” she answered cryptically.

Heskan
returned his attention to the system plot.  
Five hours until a Type A tunnel,
he groused
.  Has it really been only eleven hours since we fled the Anthe
orbital?
 
When we dive into tunnel space, I am going to bed for an
entire day.
  The stress of the phantom pursuit was taking its toll.  The
relative security of the tunnel space between Bree and New London seemed like
an oasis to the ragged captain.  It was an illusion, he knew, for when
Hussy
dove into New London six days later, their situation would be unchanged.

Seemingly
privy to Heskan’s thoughts, Lombardi asked quietly, “How far can we run before
they catch up to us?”

Heskan
turned in his chair sideways to look back at her.  “That depends on what you
mean by catch up to us.”  His eyes drifted to Lieutenant Vernay, sitting
dutifully at the auxiliary station. 
They may not like each other but I need
both of their opinions for this,
he told himself.  He pointed toward the
portal on the left side of the bridge.  “Komandor, Lieutenant Vernay, please accompany
me to the chartroom.”

The
trio moved through the cramped walking spaces of the bridge.  Like most portals
on
Hussy
, the chartroom’s door opened not by proximity sensors, but by
old-fashioned controls on the wall panel next to it.  Heskan ushered Lombardi
and Vernay inside and quickly passed command authority to Truesworth before
stepping inside the room himself.

The
chartroom rested directly across the bridge from the captain’s cabin.  A
throwback to an earlier naval era, the compartment was identical in size to the
captain’s cabin and contained barely enough room for the stellar cartography
table unit and the four chairs placed around it.  Steeped in history,
chartrooms were once used by freighter captains to plot courses and compute
orbits, trajectories and other associated necessities of stellar travel. 
However, with advances in technology, those tasks had become easily accomplishable
at the navigator’s station on the bridge.  Despite the high probability that no
captain of
Hussy
had ever used the chartroom for its original purpose,
the ancient freighter had been built during a time when tradition insisted upon
its inclusion.

Heskan
sat at the end of the table, its worn surface doubling as a stellar map, and
Vernay and Lombardi sat on opposite sides.  The metaphor in their chosen
positions was not lost on him.  “To answer your question, Komandor, it will
take quite a while for Secretary Brewer to physically catch up to us.”  He rubbed
his jaw as he spoke.  “By the time they noticed we were missing, figured out
what we did and got organized to pursue us, I think we’ve got a good five- to
seven-hour lead on the team at Anthe.  However, tracking us won’t be
difficult.  We have to file a dive plan at every tunnel point so we’re leaving
an easy-to-follow trail.”

Lombardi
bobbed her head in full agreement.  “It is the same in the Commonwealth. 
Disappearing in the middle of controlled space is nearly impossible.”

“Unfortunately
for us,” Heskan agreed.  “If Brewer really is chasing us, his ship is much faster
than ours and he will eventually overtake us.”

This
time, Vernay dipped her head in dismal acknowledgment.  “Even though we’ve made
three jumps over the last dozen hours, we’ve really only traveled a little over
ninety light-minutes actual distance if you don’t include our tunnel dives.”