Just outside the CHRISTO'S bridge room, Joshua paused to peer at a flat display bolted to the left wall. Some ship designer evidently thought it might cut down passenger intrusions onto the bridge, if they could see the forward view from here.

It is, noted Joshua, an impressive aspect. The ship was now skimming the very outside of the distorted local arm, the heavens crowded with stars. The Andromeda Galaxy, millennium ahead of prediction, spiraled through the vast dark to start its billion year long collision with the Milky Way. Like two buzz saws at angles, the view showed them twisting and distorting each other, as slowly, the universe changed. There was no vantage point from which the text book side-view of the M-51 disk cold be clearly seen. The spiraling minions of Andromeda rose up before him, countless and bright. Trying to predict the changes this cosmic crash was bringing to the individual settled systems preoccupied the age. Not all the predictions were innocuous; many were dire. Joshua pushed open the door and invaded the control bridge.

"Ah, there you are, hard at work, I see," said Joshua, feeling a bit uncomfortable in announcing himself. "You were missed in the commissary."

The backside of Ferdinand's bald head rose somewhat at this. "Twelfth bell, Cardinal. Sail deployment, make we now. God's fishnet spreads as we prepare to leave slip space. Safe changeover envelope, we maintain. Must be no debris to clutter sail's path, must have hydrogen stream behind us, so to navigate when we emerge, and turn off slip field. Abasement make, for lack of courtesy, but necessary. Missed Vespers also."The back of Ferdinand's head then declined, and the Monk murmured, "Do penance later."

Luminescent panels covered every surface of the room. The Captain and Navigator seats were fixed affairs, set at a twenty degree angle to each other, facing front, so as to conveniently cover the sweeping control bank. The console itself looked to Joshua like the product of an amorous interlude between a theater organ and a giant computer keyboard.

Overall, the only things that truly looked out of place were the two monks, whose brown cassocks differed from their 12th-century counterparts only by the Velcro that held their robe sashes to the gowns, presumably to keep them secure in the low gravity of the bridge, one of the few core area compartments. Most cabins faced floor outwards, built into the rotating ring sections that surrounded the core.

Joshua watched the colorful displays flash across the monitor banks as Ferdinand and Tiel's fingers danced over the consoles. The most interesting of the bridge displays were the bank of external view screens. Joshua's eye was pulled to the activity in the ship's side viewers. Against the blurred background of the slip field, thin nano-fiber sheets of the ship's Solar sail spooled away from the ship's core.

Compact, almost weightless, the graphene based network would fan out mile after mile, supported by thin bucky-tube masts.

Like spokes of a bicycle wheel, thought Joshua. The sails were controlled by clutched digital motors sensitive to the pressure of solar winds. Flares and surface eruptions created streams and solar currents that needed to be navigated, just as sailing ships had always contended with.

None of this knowledge detracted from the awe-inspiring view of the deployment. The naturally high albedo of the sail material shimmered with an ethereal beauty in the weak light of the approaching Arrakis system.

Even in the views of the small monitors a vertiginous sense of distance and grandeur flowered. Normally, the viewers showed nothing that hinted at the endless vastness of open space. For one thing, once out of orbit, there was nothing to provide a real sense of perspective. A ship with sails deployed really did that. On a commercial liner with an observation lounge, the sight of acre upon acre of gossamer sail running off into the distant void, shook you to the very depths of your soul. Many a convert to the church traced their moment of conversion back to standing before the observation port of a solar sailor.

Joshua tore his eyes from the displays, saying, "Father Logan mentioned that we would be at the first survey position within ten hours. Ah, bells," he corrected himself. "This will still stand true?"

Tiel tilted his tonsured head somewhat away from the forward monitor bank to flick brown eyes at Joshua. "Nine bells now, to first station. Yes. Slip field will be off next bell. They can start anytime after, if they wish. Will announce, also changeover alert will sound."

"I'll leave you to your duties, then. Sorry to interrupt. I look forward to your company in the lounge after your shift finishes." With this, Joshua exited the bridge to make his way to the main lounge.

***

At work in their cabin, Father Logan, with Arlyis acting as the spectral physicist's assistant, completed final adjustments, and compared the oscilloscope input and output screens. The Priest straightened, eying the flickering patterns.

"The waves match, connectors seem tight; I guess that's that. How is the data graph coming? You know how much I like hard copy."

Arlyis pressed the test button and watched as the sixty wavering lines registered across the output paper. "Looks right, Father. Soon as Brother Tiel gives us the OK, I'll connect the hull web adapter in, and we'll be ready to go."

Father Logan wiped his forehead with a piece of packing tissue. "Well, some hours yet; nothing to do but wait." Logan's features brightened. "I still have my new recordings to listen too. I left the best for last, you see. I barely managed to scoop up the latest addition to my Celestial Wave subscription before we left New Vatica. Lifetime subscriber, you know - been waiting for the chance. 'Fraid my bunk-mate, Dr. Ammens, does not share my love of music. Strange for a mathematician, most of them are avid music lovers, you see."  With that Logan swayed out into the corridor, whistling a motif from Beethoven's fifth, the Andante Con Moto, in an off key C minor.

Arlyis frowned at one of the system test panels.

Shit, she thought.The first stop coming up, and already problems with the equipment! It's that old logic box I rigged up. It's dead as a doornail. I'll have to get Sir Colmer to send someone to drag it back inside.

She picked up the ship's com set, and paged Colonel Colmer, who responded quickly, and in person.

"Fredric, I hate to ask, but I am going to need someone to go out and dismount some of our detection gear."

Sir Colmer instantly agreed. "What is it you need removed?"

"Oh, it's a dark gray box, about four inches square. There's a legend on it, Module C."

"Can I ask what it does?"

"It's supposed to be digitizing the antenna flows, and relaying them to me, but it appears not to be working."

"I live to serve. Just let me suit up. Do you have a replacement to refit? I can stop by and pick it up, if you like."

Arlyis sighed. "No and that's an issue. If you can bring it in, I'll try to repair it and then it will have to be remounted. I'm sorry, that means two trips, doesn't it? I am so sorry, Fredric."

"Repair it yourself? I am further impressed, Miss Denies. Two trips it is."

"Arlyis. Just Arlyis, OK?"

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

"Arlyis. If you can call me Fred, my day will be complete."

Arlyis smiled. "Is that what your sweethearts call you?"

A fleeting mask of introspection crossed Colmer's features. "Absent. I have no Sweetheart, but in the end, the girls in my life have always ended calling me absent."

"Strange nickname."

"Not a nick name, a condition. A military life is hard on relationships. It's something I've become resigned to, I suppose." A note of regret crept into his voice. "Can't blame a girl for wanting her man around."

Arlyis in turn fell silent, biting her lip. What am I doing? Why am I getting so curious about this man's personal life? She hunted through her mind, looking for a graceful way to redirect the conversation. "I guess it's something that rears up in all professions, at some point. Dedication seems to have it's down side. Well, Fred it is, then."

She put forward her hand with a sunny smile. Colmer looked at it briefly, then reached out and took it. "Ill be back with the dastardly device in no time, worry not."

Rare, that direct and honest outlook, she thought. He carries no grudges, and automatically considers everyone else's point of view. Damn! Sure makes it hard to ignore his interest.

The free-space equipment room of the CHRISTOS was also its ready room. It contained not only deep space gear, but the external maintenance locks. Sir Colmer extended one of the equipment racks, and began pulling the parts of a Near Vehicle Vacuum suit out, laying them on the assembly table. Privates Street and Eldon were still there, testing their own suits. Both looked up when the Colonel entered. Now they watched with increasing curiosity as he began decanting equipment.

"Spot inspection, Sir?" Eldon piped. We'll have these other two NVVMR's done pretty soon, just finishing up the seal inspections, Sir."

Colmer grunted, and continued assembling the suit he was working on. "No inspection. A new repair order. Have to go out again."

Street looked worried."Something we missed, Sir? Should we re-kit?"

"No. At least, I don't know that's the case." He looked up from the table. "Go on with post testing. I'll do the E.V.A."

Still wary, Eldon pressed, "Might I ask what unit is in question, Sir?"

Colmer stopped his prep, and stared at the two. There's no getting out of this, he thought. He had hoped they'd finished re-prep and been gone by now. The two would be on pins for the rest of the day, as long as they felt their work was in question. Normally, he would have booted one of them back outside, unless incompetence was suspected. Also, all these questions were breaking his concentration on the prep, an invitation to a quick internment in the morgue.

"Look you two. Arlyis reported an equipment malfunction. Something internal to her C module on the down-linking array. Maybe a micro-meteor impact, I don't know. I told her I would handle it myself. Tell you what. I'll give you two hours R&R in the lounge. You can watch it all from there, so in case there's some problem, I'll know you two heroes have my back. I trust you can get those suits finished before I'm prepped, if you put your mind to it?

"Two hours extra R&R? Hell yes," Blurted Street, "I mean, we'll be done in a jiff, Sir."

"Good Lads."

Both were done well before the Colonel stood, fully kitted, before the lock. He did the final power, leak and lights check, then stepped into the lock. They watched Colmer cycle through, then burst into a fit of snickering.

"Man, the old boy must really have the hots for Arlyis. Come on Brian, the cards are getting cold, buddy."

Later, in the Lounge, the tall Monsignor Ammens and Bishop Wile also watched Colonel Colmer's space walk, as he struggled to free the impaired assembly. Through the view port, all they saw of the Colonel, save for his shadowed outline before the star field, was whatever his shoulder light touched on, a bit of his stark white helmet, and some research equipment, clamped to one of the ship's struts.

Ammens made a sour face when he turned to see Privates Street and Eldon taking their ease at a nearby table.

"It's a terrible state of affairs," Ammens stated loudly, "when a Military Colonel can't count on his own men to do such things for him!"

"Jeez, yer honor," said Street, "the Colonel wanted to do it hisself. Think he's taken a shine to Miss Denies."

Monsignor Ammens raised his eyebrows at this, and looked down to swap amused glances with Bishop Wile.

"What do you think, Benn? Does Colmer have a chance?"

"Eh? Why not? Nice enough chap, is Sir Colmer. We should invite him to our cabin for tea tonight. I can break out the Sousa marches and let him regale us with his military stories. Perhaps hear a bit more about this romance of his, eh? Arlyis, eh? What are the odds of that, I wonder."

Ammens pursed his lips in thought. "About 14 to one against, with a standard deviation of two point three, actually, for shipboard romances."

"Pah! You can't put a number to a thing like that!"

"Indeed I can."

"Nonsense. No statistic can predict a singular case, and Fredric is a most singular fellow!"

Meantime, the Colonel continued his examination of the defective logic box, and found the temporary clamps that held it to the equipment pod brace. As he worked to remove the assembly, his shoulder lamp flared and dimmed. Cursing, he reached to tap the lamp, but all that achieved was to slowly revolve his suit away from the brace, and wrap the safety line around his calves. Colmer tried to free himself, reaching down to grab the umbilicus. This caused him to start revolving forward, so he quickly tried countering the inertial dynamics of the move by straightening his legs.

This worked to some extent, at least it kept him from going into a two-axis spin. The freed slack in the line now kinked up, threatening to loop around his head. This was truly dangerous, for further difficulties could then get him garroted if the line coiled there and tightened. Grabbing the line, he freed it, but this activity began a sideways revolution. With the addition of this, the line momentarily grew taut, exerting a pull that started him floating back and away from the ship, into the pitch black of space, and out of sight of the startled cabin audience.

Brian stood, looking worried. "Mebbe we better get back to the dock lock."

Private Street nodded and joined him. Both walked briskly out of the commons towards the ready room.

The slight drag of Colmer's line slowly ended the gentle side spin, though he now receded from the ship upside down. Taking advantage of the hiatus in his rotation, Colonel Colmer risked a few small puffs from the suit's attitude jets, pushing off toward the ship again. The suit had monitors, the bridge knew his position, oxygen balance, temp, heart-rate and position, but such tell-tails didn't equate to an assurance of safety. The view ports of the lounge were starkly visible, and he had a fair estimation of where the brace was from that. Rotating in space, with no external gravity, sense of up and down, or light, often meant a rescue was called for, line or no line. Sweat was beading up inside his helmet. I wish I could see where that line is now, he thought. Damn this scow, no external running lights.

He slowed his breathing and focused on the view port. His aim had been good. The bright square enlarged as he approached . He was moving just to the right of it, as he had hoped.

The black outline of the strut became visible, and another couple puffs lined him up with it. The beam grew in size uncomfortably quickly, and Colmer cursed again, applying a forward counter jet. Suddenly he was on top of it, and the suit pressed forward onto the strut, dissipating his forward momentum by pressing him crushingly into it. There was a hiss of air from his wrist seal where some hundred and sixty pounds of moving mass, traveling at an unknown velocity, focused its attention on a quarter inch area of the gland, caught between his torso and the strut. Colmer felt the seal kink. A chill pain ran around his wrist. At the same time, the escaping gas tried to propel him away from the brace. He grabbed on to it, with his freezing hand, and reached for the E-seal pack at his waist with the other. The emergency external seal-pack came free, and began to heat. He quickly pressed it against the seal rupture, squeezing the activator and pressing down against the escaping suit air. His ears popped. Foam bubbled forth, hardening around the E-seal, and the hiss stopped. On the bridge, Mendel noted the pressure drop, but also the immediate stabilization.

"Colonel Colmer, is mission status OK?"

"I'm Fine. Small suit leak, fixed it."

Inanely he thought, Well,I'm back where I started, at least. Serves me right -- teach me to try and grandstand for a woman!

Unperturbed, but without benefit of any illumination save starlight, he managed to finish removing the offending unit, and pulled himself to the service lock.

Back aboard, aided by a fretting Street and Eldon, Colonel Colmer de-suited, and after allowing some time for the hard-frozen box to warm up, returned it to Arlyis.

"I heard about your adventure getting this back," said Arlyis. "I wish you hadn't needed to go out there, probably my fault too. I feel terrible having had to ask. Thanks." She shyly smiled and reached out to touch Colmer's wrist briefly. Colmer kept his face relaxed, refusing to wince at this, despite the soreness in the wrist. There was a good deal of swelling there, but beneath the ace wrap, no fracture.

"Think nothing of it, Arlyis. Wouldn't have been a problem, had the light not died on me. Odd that. All part of the job; besides, I'm out of practice. Good thing I went. It reminded me to step up my training exercises. All that desk work has taken my edge off." Sir Colmer grinned, and immediately lost five years off his age. "Let me know what the problem was. You will have to take lunch with me now, you know. So you see, a benefit for me all around!"

Arlyis laughed. "I suppose that's only fair. Thanks again." She turned the module around on the desk and squinted at it. Looks OK on the outside, she thought. Better call Brother Mendel, and get this benched. Arlyis lifted her gaze, and watched the retreating back of Sir Colmer.

Another time and in another place, I could let myself feel differently about that man...