Stocky got to the access bunker in Propulsion Four (they had already completed the work in Propulsion Three) together with Patterson and Chandna, and he carried his pouch of tools as well as a thick coat, gloves, and ski mask. Mankind had made slow and difficult (but useful) progress in superconducting materials research since the first “high temperature” superconductors were discovered in the late 20th century. Back then, they were happy enough to be able to use liquid nitrogen for cooling. On the Nineveh they used liquid carbon dioxide at pressure – fifty-five degrees (Celsius) below zero. He wouldn’t be exposed to the full extreme temperature conditions in the maintenance service access, but he still prepped his mind for another stint at working in deep cold.
He put on his cold weather attire and then affixed and LED light to his head so he could see. He ripped the control unit out of the door just like he had done with Propulsion Three, and he hotwired the drive motor. The door opened, and he crawled into the dark corridor, pushing his tool pouch up ahead of him
“Be quick about it,” Patterson said. She and Chandna remained outside as a watch.
“As quick as I can.” He began to pry off the hatch to the maintenance access and its freezing cold. A snowflake icon painted on the hatch made the conditions beyond unquestionable.
Holly called for them over the intercom. “Patterson, Stocky, Chandna…what is your status? Over.”
Even wearing the ski mask, Stocky could hear her call. It was nice that mankind had given him so many advantages. He listened while finishing with the hatch.
“You keep watch,” Chandna told Patterson as he stepped over to a nearby comm console and switched it to allow transmission. “We’re just finishing a few things up and we’ll be joining you shortly. Over.”
Good, don’t lie. Just be vague. He just barely cracked open a trio of coolant valves to bypass coolant flow to the superconductor magnets in the FTL drive. He confirmed his work by taking a quick glance at the blueprints. He then watched the corresponding local indicators of the flow transmitters for the corresponding magnet cooling valves drop and then did some quick math in his head to decide how to maliciously calibrate the instrument to read normal.
Stocky didn’t understand how the spacetime geometry engine worked. He knew that it generated a strange form of matter and forced it into a geometric distribution to contract spacetime in front of the ship and performed an opposite effect to expand it behind. Just bare bones theory. And he reasoned it was incredibly difficult to do because otherwise all spaceships would have such a drive.
But he knew what it needed. The drive used superconducting magnets for both generating and shaping the required magnetic field. Because of what he did, flow irregularities between the many branches further down the line would cause the field shaping superconductors to enter into a mixed state – where they weren’t fully superconducting. This in turn would lead to irregularities in the generated magnetic fields, and that would put greater strain on the system. And nobody would know because he would make sure the instruments monitoring the magnetic field read “correctly” too.
While he worked, they continued the conversation outside. “I tried to reach you down in Sci-Med,” Holly said. “What is your location?” Over.”
After a pause, Chandna answered her, “We’re in Green Gate. We needed to grab some plant life for an experiment.” It was a lie, but it had to be. None of them wanted anyone else to know about sabotaging FTL propulsion.
“Are you all together? Over.”
“That’s affirmative. Over.”
“Are you ready to begin this experiment now? Over.”
“Not yet, over.”
“Then get up to Command. There is too much risk in us being separated, and I want everyone to understand how we are going to defend this Gate. Bring equipment for establishing a secondary research area and hospital here. I only want people in Sci-Med when it is absolutely necessary. Every man’s first priority is defending the Nineveh’s control center. Over and out.”
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
He wished they hadn’t lied to the Captain. But it was their call. And he knew they had to keep them from learning about this. And it wasn’t just to prevent Pazuzu from learning of it.
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Holly and her team clustered on the Bridge for the call with Sci-Med. She remembered their plan for sabotage and wanted everyone to witness this.
“Now watch,” Holly said to them. “TURING, patch me into Green Gate only.”
“Connection established.”
“Patterson, come in. Over.”
They waited in silence for several seconds. Nothing. She looked into each of their eyes to make sure they understood the gravity of the situation.
“Patterson, Chandna, respond. Over.”
Again, no reply was forthcoming.
“Anyone in Green, please respond. Over.”
Only silence answered her. Chandna had lied, and he had done it in the presence of the others. “See,” she said, “they aren’t there. We can’t trust them.”
They were all silent for a moment as if waiting for instructions. Moussa spoke first. “Alright Captain, what do you want us to do?”
Holly was silent. She wasn’t sure. She knew they needed to avoid violence. They had to prevent any fighting among themselves because that would amount to giving Pazuzu the ship. She glanced at Samoylova for her opinion.
“It’s too dangerous to risk a fight with them all together at once,” Samoylova said. “I don’t think we could even win it. We must split them up.”
She looked at Moussa and could see him considering it.
“Getting Stocky by himself is easy,” he said. “I can take him with me to get tools and supplies from the Workshops or go prep Aux One for long term operations.” He folded his strong arms across his chest. “The only thing is that I have to go with him in order for it to not look suspicious. And then you would have to split up the others, and I think that will be hard.”
Holly looked around for anyone to speak with ideas, but nobody did. “I’ll think of something. How can we secure them?”
“We can use safety line,” Moussa said. “It’s rated for EVAs…nearly impossible to break. I don’t even think Stocky can get out of it.”
Holly nodded and the others seemed confident about that too. “We lure them into being calm and putting their weapons down. Nobody makes a move against them while they’re armed. Let’s pop some stims and get ready. And let’s dress for concealment. Does anyone have anything else to say.”
“Yes,” Nieves timidly said.
Holly waited for her to go on and everyone else gave her their attention.
Nieves looked more timid (or possibly guilty) by the second but she finally spoke again. “We have to disable their comms.”
Holly, and the others looked stunned as if they had just narrowly missed a bullet. Thank God I asked one final question.
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Patterson watched as Stocky crawled out of the access. She was relieved to be finished. He looked straight at Chandna and asked, “Why did you lie to her?” His voice seemed accusatory.
“None of us wanted to,” Patterson said. “I’m sorry for it.”
Chandna showed no remorse. “We set out to disable the FTL drive. We’ll only succeed if Pazuzu doesn’t know about our work. Considering that it can affect people’s minds, the less who know about this the better.” He gave a little smirk and then added, “Don’t tell us how this works, Stocky.”
Stocky passed him an icy glare and then he gathered his things.
She looked in his eyes and saw that he was taking it hard. It was that twisted replicant conditioning. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do. She would talk with him more about it later, since he had to finish his work now, and help him reason through it. So she just reminded him of Sci-Med’s authority right now. “Pinnacle is in effect. Your orders are to maintain the fiction that we were in Green. We need to prevent anyone else from learning what we did. I’m sorry, but it’s necessary.”
“I think we’re all sorry,” he answered as he turned back around to finish the job. “Anyways, give me a few minutes to place this access hatch back on and install the locking panel over the computer I smashed. Then I have to tweek some sensors and we’re done.”
She took a deep breath. It wasn’t comfortable being so close to Command Gate right now. “Okay, work fast.”
“This will, with full certainty, disable the FTL drive?” Chandna asked.
“No, the ship can jump into FTL, she just won’t be able to stay there for long.”
Patterson’s eyes widened. “How long?”
“A few months,” Stocky said with no hesitation. “No way will it last a year. though”
“OK, but would it be possible to repair?”
“This is a vital auxiliary system that I’ve compromised,” he said. “The FTL drive will now suffer excessive degradation during use. Parts of the drive are replaceable and are serviced when needed. But other parts are designed to last the life of the Gates, and these will also suffer degradation. There is no way to fully repair it out here.
There will be no trace of anything being wrong until long after we jump into FTL. And it will be hard to determine the cause of the degradation and fix it before the FTL drive suffers catastrophic damage. It might not be failsafe, but it’s certainly close.”
Patterson sighed, realizing that they had not fully mitigated the risk of Pazuzu bringing the ship to FTL. But she was also glad they weren’t stranded. “God, I hope it really is that easy. Finish quick and let’s grab supplies from Sci-Med and join Holly.”