“What’s that?” he asked, cringing as she injected the medication into his leg.
“Promise me it’s only temporary.”
“No problem,” he assured. “The minute we return I’m sure they’ll replace us all with more experienced officers.”
“Good, because I don’t want to be in charge any longer than I have to.”
Nathan wanted to tell her that he felt exactly the same way. But he had no idea where they were, or how long it would take them to get home. And the last thing the crew needed was to know that their captain didn’t want to be in command.
“Well, I think I should warn you that it might be a little longer than you think.” Nathan braced himself for her reaction, but got nothing more than a concerned look from her tired eyes.
“What are you talking about?”
“It may take some time for us to get back to Earth.”
“But they’ll come for us as soon as the fighting is over,” she surmised. “I mean, Jupiter is only a few hours out, even by our slowest ships, right?”
“Well, we’re not exactly orbiting Jupiter anymore,” Nathan admitted as she finished bandaging his leg. “Maybe you’d better sit down.”
Doctor Chen had taken the news of their situation, and the details of how they had gotten into trouble better than Nathan had expected. In the end, she had realized that despite her misgivings about her own abilities, she was the only person on board even remotely qualified to do the job. Nathan had thanked her for his treatment, and left her to tend to her numerous patients. As he left medical, he had a feeling that the petite, soft spoken Doctor was far stronger than she realized.
Getting to Engineering had been more challenging than Nathan had expected. Because of the size of the hangar bay, most of the corridors skirted around it, between the bay and the inner hull. Unlike medical, which had been located deeper inside the ship, these sections had taken a considerable beating. Most of them were still intact and passable. However Nathan had been forced to make a few detours to get around some of the more severely damaged sections. He wished that he had thought to go through the hangar bay instead of around it. Not only would it have been easier, but he also would’ve gotten to see the rebel ship that was still parked inside.
Nathan worried about what he would find when he got to engineering. It was located at the uppermost edge of the amidships section, just forward of the massive propulsion section at their stern. The location had been chosen to facilitate quick changing of her reactor cores. But that left the area more vulnerable to attack. Captain Roberts had been aware of this weakness. During their battle with the Jung patrol ships, he had protected it by attacking head on, and later by rolling the ship to show their reinforced belly while passing over the enemy.
The smell of burnt electronics became noticeable as Nathan approached Engineering. Once he stepped through the main hatch it became almost overpowering. There were signs of burnt out panels and exploded consoles everywhere. Several of the damaged consoles had multiple data pads wired into them to act as temporary interfaces until they could be properly repaired. There were several expended fire suppression bottles laying about, along with a few pieces of burnt clothing. In the corners were piles of circuit boards so badly burnt that they could not be repaired.
A half dozen crewmen, most of them engineers or technical specialists, were busy trying to repair the most urgent systems. In the middle of it all was Vladimir, bigger than life, barking out orders to at least three different work teams simultaneously. In contrast to Doctor Chen, Vladimir appeared to be enjoying the challenge.
“Vlad!” Nathan called out as he came toward him. Vladimir spun around to see Nathan limping slightly on a bandaged leg and sporting bloody captains bars on his collar.
“Nathan!” he smiled. To Nathan’s surprise, Vladimir gave him a big hug. “I’m so glad you survived, my friend.” Before Nathan could speak, his friend turned and barked more commands to a nearby work team before continuing. “And you are a captain now?!”, he added, slapping Nathan on the back. “But still, I am not going to salute you.”
Nathan noticed one of the rebels scurry past carrying some type of wiring harness. “How are they doing?” he asked Vladimir, tilting his head toward the passing man. “Are they much help?”
“Yes! They are very good! Not as good as me, of course. But they seem to know their way with such things. It makes me wonder what they have in their ships,” he added under his breath.
“You think they might be more advanced than us?”
“Nathan, everyone is more advanced than us!” he exclaimed.
Nathan hadn’t thought about it before, but now he realized that Vladimir might be right. The people of Earth had only started getting back into space about thirty years ago. And there had been little research and development done beyond the technologies found in the Data Ark. With the threat of Jung invasion looming over them, there hadn’t been time. They had heard that a few of the fringe worlds had been less impacted by the plague. So it made sense that some of them could’ve developed more advanced technologies over the last millennia, while the people of Earth were rebuilding from the ground up.
“But with these people, I think it is sometimes yes, sometimes no.” Vladimir could see by Nathan’s expression that he was confused. “At some things, they are amazed, like they cannot believe what they are seeing. At others, they cannot believe we are still using them!” he laughed.
“How are the repairs going?” he asked, getting back to the reason for his visit.
“Oh, terrible! So many things not working! No engines, no maneuvering, only two good reactors. And as you can see, many consoles are badly damaged. It will take weeks to repair! But do not worry, Nathan. We will fix it. We will fix everything.
“How long until we have maneuvering again?”
“A few hours at the most. Main propulsion, I do not yet know. But soon, we will have all four reactors online, so we will have full power once more.
“Then do we have weapons?”
“Soon, soon,” Vladimir promised. “First rail guns, then torpedoes. Missile batteries, they must still be installed. But since we have no missiles to fire, it does not matter.”
“Well, the sooner you can get us moving, the better. I have to tell you, being a sitting duck out here makes me nervous.”
“Just try to keep us out of trouble for awhile, Nathan. That would be of great help.”
“I’ll do my best. But our intel says we’ve only got about a day at the outside.”
“Intel? What intel?”
“Our guests, they tell us the Takarans will come looking for us soon.”
“Who are these, ‘Takarans’?” Vladimir had spent the entire time in engineering, and still had no idea of what they had been through. All he knew was that he and his fellow engineers had been bounced around on three separate occasions. “What is going on, Nathan? Where are we?”
“I wish I knew. My best guess is somewhere out on the fringe.”
Vladimir looked at Nathan like he was crazy. “The fringe?…”
“…I know it sounds crazy…”
“…It is not possible!”
“It’s complicated…”
“…It’s got something to do with that evil doctor woman, yes?” Vladimir surmised.
Nathan again recounted the day’s events for the benefit of his friend. Vladimir took the news far better than Doctor Chen had. In fact, he seemed more excited about the existence of the Jump Drive than anything else. And it appeared that his new chief engineer was looking forward to the challenges ahead with absolute glee. It had not been the reaction Nathan had expected, but it had been a refreshing one.
“So how bad off are we?” Nathan asked Cameron as she followed him into his ready room. As he entered, he was suddenly struck by the starkness of the now empty room. It had been at least sparsely decorated when it had been occupied by Captain Roberts, but now it had been stripped of even those few mementos.