The announcement had just been made when the first wave hit.
“Wow,” the XO said, grabbing a stanchion. “What in the hell was that?”
It had felt as if they had turned sideways, but the boat remained “upright.”
“Standing wave,” Bill said. “That was the first one.”
The crew had been briefed that there might be some unusual effects and warned of the possibility of damage. But that was different from experiencing the effects.
“Whoa,” the CO said, shaking his head. He’d installed himself in his command chair and now brought up his chicken straps, buckling himself in. “XO, all hands, brace. That last one was—”
“Holy maulk!” Weaver shouted as the world seemed to buck. He slid into his chart table, then started to slide back. In the distance there was a crash as some equipment that had been improperly stowed spun across a compartment. “That was at least a G, sir!”
“Drop out of—” The words from the CO were too late as the boat suddenly seemed to twist. The grav wave stretched everything in the boat, pulling forward and aft and creating a miniature tidal effect even on the human body, pushing blood into the head and feet. On the boat, and the engine, it had much worse effects.
Berg hunted through the menu on the computer until he found what he was looking for.
“Hey, Jaen,” he said.
“You found the communicator,” Jaen said. “What you got?”
“How do I ask Top about the physics?” Berg asked.
“You’re serious?” Sergeant Jaenisch said. “You ask Top about the physics some time when we’re not talking about the ship coming apart. Clear, Marine?”
“Clear, Sergeant,” Berg said. “Sorry.”
“Not a problem,” Jaen replied. “Just sit tight and—”
“All hands! All hands! Prepare for bow-shock entry.”
“What in the hell… ?” Jaen said.
“Shiny, we’re going into the bow shock,” Berg said happily.
“What in the hell is a bow shock?” Jaen asked.
“Aw, hell,” Berg said. “There’s probably an explanation on the system. Is there a way to look out?”
“Look it up, Two-Gun,” Jaenisch said, then gasped. “Whoa! What in the hell was that?”
“Maulk,” Berg said. “That was a—”
Then the second wave hit and he stopped talking. All he could do at first was hang onto his position by bracing against the door and bulkhead. But as the ship went into what felt like flips, he could feel his stomach, normally cast-iron, start to flip with it.
“Oh, God,” Berg moaned, fumbling for the puke bag compartment. “I’m sooo tired of thisss!”
It tasted like a soprano note.
9
“Wegurcaingl!” Tchar shouted as the grav wave hit. His arms flew to their limits from tidal stress and he watched in horror as the coryllium sphere began spinning out of control.
At the first movement, the world seemed to tear apart. The massive Adar flew through the air of the engine room, spinning as tidal forces began to corkscrew. The air seemed to turn violet and the bulkheads seemed to stretch. By luck as much as anything he landed on his back, his helmet slamming into position and automatically locking. He slid across the metal floor feet first into the rear bulkhead as the air began to smell like yellow.
The shearing forces of whatever had hit them had caused a cascade failure in the lighting system, but red emergency lighting came on automatically. When Tchar looked up the coryllium sphere was spinning like a top, a blue glow filling the air around it.
The shearing stress and the random distance fluctuations caused by the confused warp field left an odd residual effect on the boat, which either was tossing end for end or felt like it was. The difference was only semantics and Tchar didn’t feel like debating it at the moment. He was pinned to the far bulkhead, and the engineer on the reactor console was crumpled in the corner, unconscious or dead.
Tchar stretched out one arm and grabbed a stanchion, waving his hand back and forth to figure out where it was, then dragged himself across the compartment by main strength until he got a hand around the pedestal of the engineer’s chair. With two hands he chinned himself up to the chair then reached up and hit the chicken switch on the reactor, cutting all power to the engine.
The weird sensory effect and gravitational stresses fell away immediately. Of course, it was replaced by microgravity.
“Oh, this is much better,” Tchar snarled. He pulled himself into the engineer’s too-small chair and began the laborious process of stopping the spinning ball and getting it realigned.
“What just happened?” the chief engineer asked from across the compartment.
“Dr. Weaver, what in the hell just happened?” the CO asked, shaking his head. He’d popped his helmet into place as had most of the conn that were still at their stations. “And is it just me, or is the bow shock gone?”
“It’s gone, sir,” Weaver said, slowly lifting himself up with one hand. At the very beginning of the strange effect he had hunkered down to the deck, slammed his helmet down and held on for dear life. Fortunately, most of the conn crew were strapped into their seats. The only three people on the conn who didn’t have seats were Weaver, the XO and the COB. Weaver had hunkered, the XO had grabbed a stanchion for dear life and was now holding on with one hand, frowning. He did not like microgravity.
The chief of boat was standing by the diving board, legs spread, his arms folded, one hand holding a cup of coffee. He was floating about two feet off the deck, though.
“That was interesting,” the command master chief said. He slowly turned his coffee mug over, then reached up and lowered himself to the deck by pressing a finger on the overhead. A careful wrist twist and he had his mug back upright with the coffee held in place by microgravity forces. He still had his helmet open so very, very slowly he took a sip. The black coffee rippled and glimmered oddly, but friction between the cup and the liquid held it in place as he lowered it again. “Damned interesting. Reminded me of one time we hit this tsunami off Sumatra…”
“I saw all the viewscreens blank out,” the CO said. “The indicator lights were still going so apparently there just wasn’t anything to show. There are apparently benefits in this job to being a fighter pilot. I’m not sure if we were actually tumbling…”
“Neither am I, sir,” Bill said, bringing his tracking system to life. “But I’m pretty sure we’re not where we were.”
“And by that you mean…” the XO said.
“I mean we’re not anywhere near where we used to be, sir,” Bill replied. “I’m working on tracking right now, but so far I can say that we are nowhere within five light-years of Sol…”
“You okay, Miriam?” Mimi asked.
“No,” Miriam said, folding up the plastic bag. “I’m dying. Oh. My. Goddd!” She hastily pulled the bag closed and reached for another. “I hate zero G!”
“I don’t think it will repeat,” Mimi said. She lowered her feet from where they’d been planted on the overhead. “I think we went through a dimensional shift. I hope we get gravity back soon, though…”
“Normal space drive coming on-line,” the COB said over the 1-MC. “Prepare for gravity in all compartments. Repeat, prepare for gravity in all compartments.”