29. Miners keepers

Giant of the Stars

29. Miners keepers

• “Again, what are our options… We can try the main ion drives. Or to tow the ship to higher orbit. Evacuate everyone before the fall?”
• “Maria, we were running the numbers all day. Even I need rest sometimes.”
• “Gopher, we don’t have much time. Already trying for weeks to…”
• “And you should spend some time with your family too.” — Gopher’s avatar pointed behind her.

Vince stood in the door silently, waiting for the girls to finish their work. His melancholy set in again as he watched love of his life to grind away on a problem close to her heart. Never giving up, even when she was out of her depth.

• “Okey, let’s leave the computer run a few more towing simulations, how many ships we need today, tomorrow, next week to be able to correct the Giant’s course?” — friendly beeping confirmed the computer took the command — “Night, Gopher!”
• “Nighty night! Gopher out.” — Vince walked up to Maria and hugged her from behind, still sitting. Stayed for a few moments, just enjoying each other and the silence.
• “How are you two progressing?” — his eyes were fixed to light years away.
• “Not good. We wasted weeks, would have simpler to tow the ship by the Perseus Train, but now it racked up too much momentum. Now it looks slow, but in a month, things will go down quickly.”
• “You want to stay till the end?”
• “Vince, that does not sound like you…”
• “Maybe. I just thought, the idea of staying planetside is not that bad.”
• “O-okey” — Maria would have jumped up and down by happiness, in any other circumstances, she knew Vince too long to not see he is conflicted — “While I would love that, we can’t just leave.”
• “Why not? We are not owing anything to anyone.”
• “But we started something. You know, we would both go crazy in no time if we would not finish it.” — her warm smile was infectious.
• “You are right. As most of the time.” — Vince’s smile turned to grinning. — “Okey, after Giant or the passengers are safe, we find a nice lush planet. With good school. And a waterbed, just for us.”
• “You dirty…” — their long kiss interrupted by the proximity alarm.

A dark metallic body appeared right next to them. Vince felt he could touch the plates if he extended his arm a bit. The new arrival was unusually large, yet still just a tiny ship next to the Giant’s rotating body. Further contrasting the Giant’s sleek design, the new arrival looked like an industrial sector of a capital city in space.

• “This is Captain Morgan Cadaver from the miner command ship Steiger.”
• “Finally” — sigh let out of Vince as they listened to the open channel.
• “We monitored the situation on our way. Taking over the command of the rescue efforts. All ship in vicinity, coordinate with my crew on your tasks.” — continued firmly Cadaver.
• “Civilian ship, you have no authority here. Order you to stand down. The ship in question registered under federal code…” — joined in the federal cutter Bendeghuse while taking up a position between the miners and the crippled cruiser, joined by three smaller escort.
• “We are far from the federal space. Let us handle the rescue…”
• “Federal code stipulates that the damaged ship’s captain is in charge of rescue operations…”
• “Who is dead. And the XO disappears for days, no-one getting organised here, so don’t throw the book at me. Regulate your people first…”
• “This is Captain Vince Pier from first responder ship Perseus Train, gentleman, we are here to help those in need. Steiger, I suppose you have methods to handle high FTL traffic. And large number of drones. We could use your help here.”
• “Yes, deploy the signal buoys, my crew trained to manage the incoming ships. Captain Pier, transfer command to us.”
• “I have nothing to transfer, I am not in command here. Let’s focus on the practical steps anyway.”
• “Bendeghuse here, federal navy command accepts Captain Pier as field commander in absence of Talm Shibar, Giant’s XO. Until Irondome arrives at scene.”
• “Steiger agrees, if that’s what it takes. Captain Pier, transfer onboard to us, you can overview the operation from our command facility.”

Vince and Maria exchanged surprised looks.

• “Accepted, we dock in ten minutes and two to board. Maria will need your engineers to pull the Giant to higher orbit.”
• “I am not a leader.” — Maria privately mumbled to Vince in a shock.
• “You don’t have to be. Just focus on the problem. And share what you already planned and what needs to be filled in.”
• “I can do that.”
• “That is the spirit!”

The docking went fully automatically in a breeze. Vince left the Perseus Train in the hands of Greg, but stayed docked till the next day. While Vince and Maria stay on the Steiger, Perseus can make a trip to the colonies, deliver the original cargo of industrial machines and pick up further supplies and medicines for the injured. They can make it under a week easily.

The very next day a few passengers tried to board a supply ship. The pilot managed to secure himself in the cockpit, but it took a day to convince the terrified people to leave the cargo ship. Vince had to convince the Bendeghuse to post guards to the now operational docks to avoid similar incidents.

Then he started to share regular updates to the Giant. At first only a few shelters had radios to get the news. That changed in a day, as a few injured engineers mocked up new radio receivers and distributed to the passengers.

Finally getting public announcements cooled down the civilians. It was reassuring that a lot of people were there to help them.

But Vince never talked about the fall in those updates. He thought it would only cause panic, as there is nothing those people could do. Yet.

He wanted to avoid the crowd boarding supply ships, endangering themselves and the crews. Ultimately scaring away help. While under the law everyone was obliged to render assistance when a ship got into an accident, there were loopholes. So they relied a lot on wilful cooperation and Vince knew that. A few would help even in perils, most would not.

And they needed every bit of help. The Giant was housing on average seventy thousand souls. A third of that may be untrained passengers. Mostly wealthy or elites, but ultimately untrained for the harsh survival deep space necessitates.

As so many times in history, humans were adept to hide the risks, create comfort and popularise otherwise perilous acts. Just as centuries ago, thousands took to a cruise liner without able to swim and paraded along the seven seas. Now the same type of people paraded along the sea of stars in a metal can, designed to hide the risks and provide comfort.

It is all good and well, until the comfort can is in one piece. This can was teared wide open at one side and already poured out a few drips of souls. No-one can see ahead how many will perish until the end.

Vince got used with his new role, even enjoyed it despite the circumstances. He was always keen on adventure, freedom to do whatever he wanted. But not on the cost of others’ lives, he was taught all life worth equal and he firmly believed in that. His values shined through so far, maybe that what he earned the trust of both sides.

Both sides, we are a single race, under a single government and I am thinking of two sides. Vince stopped his train of thoughts right there. The divide was felt by ordinary cogs in the machine, but was too far, too abstract to articulate. And if you can’t articulate the problem, then too scary for a solution.

• “So, we won’t have enough ships to evacuate everyone.” — Maria was thinking loudly in a circle of engineers. Middle of them a virtual avatar shaking her head.
• “No, we won’t. Many are not stable enough to move, let alone to transfer to anything without gravity. We have to adjust the Giant’s orbit.”
• “Actually we can do that with the current fleet.”
• “What is your idea, Zack?” — Maria’s unease subsided over the days working with the smartest astro-engineers and miners
• “While the Giant suffered structural damage, we can use the centerline to ensure it stays intact and pull back from the moon. We need to create just a tiny bit stronger pull force than the gravity generates now. And we have a lot of tensor cables on board to hook up every available ships.”
• “There are still a lot of injured, and they need food and other supplies too. We can’t use the entire fleet.” — joined in Hugh, the senior engineer. — “We could use the ion drives instead of half the fleet. But none of our drones were able to check them out yet if they work at all.”
• “Maybe we can get some help from on board.” — Vince stepped in from the side — “Gopher, a few guys helped me when we transferred medicine the first time, you could look for their lead, guy named Dan. They seemed experienced navigating the Giant.”
• “Good idea, on it.”
• “Let’s recruit then the first ships and start to connect the cables. We don’t have much time anyway.”
• “Will be a tough sell. The government could do something? Maybe offer a compensation or insurance?” — Zack voiced the common concern of the group.
• “Don’t think the colonial ships would take it anyway. How about a good example? The risk should be low anyway, it is more about our time only.” — Vince gave a side look to Maria if they think about the same. When he got the silent nod, continued:
• “Let the Perseus Train be the first. They are back tomorrow, it should be already worth two ships when disconnected from the cargo. The others will follow. Hopefully.”

If you enjoyed this scene, read the story leading up to it so far here:

Giant of the Stars

Fictional story of a luxury starliner’s catastrophy

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