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

The warp core slid out of view beneath the window, but smaller pieces of debris bounced noisily off the hull around him. He flinched as a jagged piece of metal bounced off the window just over his head, but the transparent aluminum held. In a moment, he was clear of the debris field, looking down on the shattered saucer section of the Galaxy-class ship. “Very well then, I fear this assignment.”

P8 made a dry, crackling sound. Soloman suspected the sound corresponded to a human sigh, though he wasn’t certain. Bynars had no exact equivalent to either noise.

“Only a grub is mastered by their own fear. Well, grubs and green males, but that’s another matter. In any case, while you failed to handle that situation the way I would have, it all worked out with only minimal damage registering on the pod.”

Soloman muttered a string of binary code that did not have a direct translation, but could best be rendered in the human tongue as, “Dammit.” “I failed to recover the data core. We will be unable to determine why this ship broke up.”

“The wreckage isn’t going anywhere, Soloman. Safety is always the first concern.”

“Now, but what if the lives of my teammates depend on me?”

“Then I have every confidence you will do what is necessary. Besides, in a real emergency it isn’t likely you’ll need the joystick.”

There was a clunk and a whir, and the EVA pod’s hatch swung open. Soloman blinked against the glare of the da Vinci‘s shuttlebay, and looked down at P8 Blue, standing on her hind legs just outside.

“Enough simulations for now. We need to work on the mission planning for Enigma.”

Soloman nodded gratefully, and climbed down the steps to the shuttlebay’s deck. The da Vinci’s two shuttles were parked just a few meters away, leaving little room for anything else in the small bay. He took one last look up into the pod’s cupola, and watched the simulated starfields projected onto the windows flicker and vanish.

Soloman took a step, and nearly stumbled. Bynars were not a strong people, and the session had been taxing. His hands ached from manually operating the controls.

P8 watched him flexing his fingers, and made a comforting sound. “Sorry to push you so hard, but time is short. The simulation programs we have on hand are very advanced, worst-case scenarios that would challenge even an experienced pilot. And I know that operating the controls manually, rather than through direct computer interface, put you at a disadvantage, but that was something you had to learn. Under the circumstances, you did well.”

They stepped through the pressure doors into an interior corridor, and headed toward the workroom where they had set up shop for their part of the mission.

“Thank you.” Soloman still felt uncertain.

“How did it feel?”

“Feel? Do you mean in the tactile, or the emotional sense?”

“In the less tangible sense. Operating a spacecraft, even one this small and limited, is a profound experience, from both a sensory and emotional standpoint. Sometimes the best way to evaluate it is on a nontechnical level. How does the pod feel to you?”

Soloman hesitated. There had been fear, excitement, and exhilaration, but something else nagged at him, some aspect that colored all the rest. “It felt—lonely.”

P8 dropped down to scuttle on all eight legs. “That’s not what I would have expected.”

“Nor I. I thought that since—losing my bond-mate, I thought I had become somewhat immune, or at least numbed, to the feeling of being alone. Yet I have spent most of my time on this ship, surrounded by my crewmates, interfacing with its computers. I’ve not been truly as alone as I imagined. In the pod, immersed in the simulation, hearing only your voice, without even the pod’s pathetically limited computer for company, I was more alone than I think I have ever been, and I know that in a real mission, it would be even more extreme.”

P8 stopped, then scuttled around in a semicircle to look up at Soloman. “I am sorry. I didn’t see what a personal challenge this could be for you, and I’m sure Commander Gomez didn’t either. I will talk with her. I’m sure we can get someone else to go out in the pod.”

“No,” said Soloman, surprised at his own resolve, “that will not be necessary. I look forward to the mission not with dread, but with anticipation. Flying the mission, operating the manual controls, that feeling of being alone. I felt—empowered.”

P8 stood on her hind legs, antennae waving excitedly. “Good for you, my friend! It is amazing what this Enigma can teach us about ourselves. I have heard it said, that when one looks into the abyss, they see only themselves.” She turned and walked through the door of their workroom.

Feeling just a little dizzy, not from fatigue, but from amazement, Soloman followed.

Chapter4

To Captain Gold, the da Vinci‘s shuttlebay seemed like a giant’s closet: crowded, and badly in need of being cleaned out. There were two shuttlecraft wedged into the compact space, plus a Work Bee and several EVA pods. Along every wall and in various alcoves, all manner of large equipment was stowed: phaser drills, portable tractor beam emitters, cargo-sized pattern enhancers, magnetic grapples, spools of carbon nanotube cable, color-coded drums of lubricants and plasma coolant, and other tools of the S.C.E. trade.

On most Federation starships, the shuttlebay was a neat and spacious hangar, kept clear of all but a few shuttles and perhaps a visiting ship or two.

Well, Gold smiled to himself as he threaded his way through the clutter, most shuttlebays don’t have to work for a living.

He stood before the closed bay doors, and glanced over his shoulder at the observation windows. As he expected, the station was not staffed, and he was alone. Good. “Computer, active force field, open shuttlebay doors.”

“Command authorization required.”

“Authorization Gold, ten-forty-five.”

With a whir, the doors parted. There were many