Enigma Ship by J. York (small books to read .TXT) 📕

She pointed at the rack in the locker room wall behind him. “Excuse me, Sir Talks-a-Lot, but you’re standing between the fair maiden and her lovely helmet.”

He stepped aside as she plucked two helmets from the rack, handing one to him, and putting the other over her head, twisting it until the molecular seals engaged. She tapped the wrist panel again. “You hear me, Kieran?”

“Loud and clear, milady.”

She tapped again. “Gomez to Soloman. Communications check.”

“I—” Soloman seemed distracted, but not, as she had feared, distressed. “I hear you well, Commander. My module is checked out and ready to fly—I believe.”

Just then, P8 Blue scuttled through the outer door into the locker room. She stood up on her hind legs, and made an annoyed clicking noise. “Aren’t you ready yet? It must be very bothersome being so sensitive to vacuum.”

Pattie’s exoskeleton allowed her to endure vacuum with no special gear. All she needed was a special communicator with a pickup inside her breathing cavity, some safety gear, and she was ready to go.

Gomez grinned. “Not according to Lt. Commander Duffy. He likes the outfit.”

That annoyed sound again. “Clothing, also something I find difficult to fathom.” She strapped on a simple equipment harness. “I find this confining enough.”

The locker room had two outer doors. The right-hand one led directly to service airlock two, the other to the shuttlebay. Duffy followed Gomez through the left door.

One of the Augmented Personnel Modules had been rolled up to the doors on its service stand. The module’s hatch was closed, and Duffy could see Soloman through the cupola windows in the top, his bald head reflecting the blue interior lighting. The module was spindle-shaped and about three meters tall, with a control cupola at the top. The wide midsection was ringed with specialized work arms, the narrow base surrounded by maneuvering thrusters, and tipped with the orange glow of a tiny impulse drive. The module was more spacecraft than space suit.

Pattie tapped a wall panel, activating the force fields across the main doors. A warning klaxon sounded as the outer doors slid open, revealing the stars beyond.

Duffy stared, trying to decide which of those stars was real, and which was the holographic surface of Enigma. He couldn’t be sure, but he trusted the module’s instruments would get them where they needed to be. He could see Soloman working inside the control cupola, then a series of grab-bars and footholds folded out from the module’s smooth sides.

Pattie’s voice sounded over everyone’s comm. “Everyone attach your safety lines.” She climbed onto the side of the module.

Duffy let Gomez go first, then climbed up himself. The force clamps made the footrests feel slightly sticky as he moved his feet. He snapped his safety line into an attachment socket. “I’m secure.”

“I’m go,” Gomez said.

“Secure and ready,” said Pattie.

“Away team to da Vinci, ” said Soloman. “We are ready to disembark.”

B.J. O’Leary, the engineer on duty at the control gallery, replied, “Ready.”

As they waited, Duffy could only hear his own heart and breathing, the whir of the suit’s fans, and his comrades’ voices in his helmet speakers.

“Disengaging artificial gravity,” said O’Leary.

Duffy felt his stomach jump, and fought the instinct that said he was falling. He looked down to see the tractor beams lift the module from its cradle and sail it smoothly out of the shuttlebay.

“I still don’t see why we didn’t just beam out,” P8 said over the link. “It really makes much more sense.”

Duffy manager to catch Gomez’s eye, and winked, though he doubted she could actually see him. “I suppose we could have,” he answered. “But where’s the fun in that?”

“Lt. Commander Duffy.” Soloman’s voice was tight, a little strained. “I really do not see that a discussion of ‘fun’ is appropriate at this time.”

Duffy knew when he had pushed far enough. Pattie was right. They could have beamed out, instead of riding the module through the force field. But the sensation of his suit pressurizing as it passed from the atmosphere of the shuttlebay to the vacuum of space was a rare experience, and not one he would pass up easily.

With Enigma almost impossible to see with the naked eye, Duffy’s gaze was drawn back to the da Vinci. The shuttlebay opened the front of the saucer section like a misplaced grin, the two shuttles just inside reminding him of teeth. The da Vinci, which seemed so small from inside, was huge from out here. The saucer swept out on either side of them, and he could see the warp nacelles and the engineering hull trailing away from them in the distance.

They climbed above the plane of the saucer section, and he looked down at the bridge, suppressing the urge to wave.

“You’re doing very well, Soloman,” said Pattie.

“This is much easier than the simulation,” replied Soloman, his voice calmer now that the tractor beams had released them and he had control of the module. “Nothing is exploding. Nothing is trying to crush us. None of my systems are undergoing cascade failures. My direct computer interface is working.”

“Better to be overprepared,” said Pattie, “than underprepared.”

Duffy and Gomez shared a chuckle, and he glanced over at her, her face just visible inside the bubble of her helmet. She grinned bright enough he was sure they could see it back at the ship. She’s loving this too.

“Stevens to away team.”

“Gomez here.”

“Commander, the deflector modifications are done, and we’re ready to take a picture of Enigma.”

Duffy saw Gomez’s eyes widen. “I thought you wouldn’t be ready for another two hours, or I would have delayed the mission. Should we head back to the shuttlebay?”

Stevens chuckled. “Somebody named Scott once told me to always pad my repair estimates. Anyway, no need for you to return to ship, the neutrino flux is harmless, and the direct EM burst from the torpedo will be very localized. In fact, this times out pretty well. Just pull back a couple kilometers and enjoy the show.”

“Soloman,” ordered Gomez, “get us out of