Life Ship

Where going? Red route. Getting dragged to life ships. Ah. Why? The

explosion, yes the stupid shutdown of the engine protection systems. Lose job

over that. Then the old, out dated fusion shields started shutting down too.

The field reversal should take effect any minute. Well, tried did the job

and tried to get the shields up long after the others fled. Then the second

explosion. Hit the wall, thrown into the corridor when the two men came

dragged me, no. One man, one GEPH, that white hairless head, yellow eyes no

iris, soft nearly fat features. Damn hate GEPHs. Should have shot him when

he came on board. Could have. Was within rights of security officers, even

part timers. Other could be a security officer too. No, soldier. Well

muscled, lithe, black hair, black eyes. The med grid hadn't got to him.

Would have fixed those scars, and the broken nose! Must be thirty, at least,

to get leave. That black smoke's getting thicker. Air vents should clear it.

If only that damn computer warning would quit. Why didn't they get a human

voice for the ship's computer? Everyone hates that monotone. Hated that

monotone. Damn.

"ALL PASSENGERS! THIS IS THE SHIP COMPUTER. FIREBIRD, THE COLONY TO

EARTH TRANSPORT SHIP YOU ARE ON, IS SUFFERING FROM UNEXPECTED STRESSES. THIS

IS NOT A DRILL. PLEASE GO TO THE LIFE SHIPS, SLOWLY AND DO NOT RUSH. THERE

IS NO CAUSE FOR ALARM. THE DANGER IS VERY SLIGHT BUT WE ARE TAKING EVERY

PRECAUTION."

Even the computer lied. The damn ship was about to be vaporised and the

crew had already fled. Stupid, took the main escape ship. The oxygen tanks

were empty after the refit. Forgotten in panic. All dead by now. If the passengers heard that would they panic, and how! At least the passenger ships

were guaranteed flight ready.

"He is dying." That GEPH could show some feeling in that statement,

couldn't he? Sounded almost unconcerned.

"Shut it, we're nearly at t'ships." Defiantly, a soldier, used to

giving orders. But they shouldn't talk about a Colony officer. Impolite.

They should be punished. When they got back to civilization on the outer

planets they'd pay. Speaking about a Colony officer like that. Why are they

stopping? Ah, the airlocks. Someone beat us to it. Young girl. There

should be room. If that door isn't fused shut.

"Open pox you open!"

The door was opening. Good. Not that it would be worrying if it didn't.

Nothing could be worth worrying about now. Careful, put down gently in the

ship. The engine's starting. That black smoke's in here too. Getting

thicker. Can't see. Want to see my wife. Sarah!

"He's dead. Plague take it!"

"Carver, time for grief over the dead is secondary to helping the living

survive."

"What?"

"Please double check the course I am setting for mistakes. I have only

third class flight training."

"How did you know my name?"

"I remember everything, I am a GDH. Those checks please."

"They're fine. Hit the gas."

"I am sorry?"

"Launch."

Why were GEPHs so irritating? To say their nickname came from

Genetically Engineered Perfect Humans they never seemed smart enough to use

contractions. The lack of hair, gender or emotions was enough to drive you

insane. No that wasn't quite right. They had emotions, just didn't show

them.

"What's your name GEPH?"

"We are not perfect so that nickname is inappropriate. We are

genetically designed lifeforms. My name is J 4 9 H 6. To humans I am known

as Jay."

"Whatever." Ah, at least the view screen works.

"I spy with my little eye. The view screen's undamaged."

"What happened to the ship?"

"Some form of reactor damage."

"Do you know of a type which causes a blueish light?"

"Field reversal causes some weird effects. We'd better get quickly.

Setting to max acceleration"

"The ship is exploding."

"Yeoww!" The light blinding, literally. The ship's shaking. The

artificial gravity reversing. The ceiling wasn't designed to be hit, ouch, too hard.

"Hold on humans the gravity pod is damaged. Reversing polarity. Gravity

switching back... now!"

The floor's even more painful. That shaking's stopped. Praise God. What was

that moaning. Oh the other one. That girl.

"What happened?"

"The ship blew up what d'you think. The fusion reactor, you could say,

blew up. The council claim f-gen units can't but it can do something similar

and the shockwave caused is nearly the same as a fission explosion."

"You called it field reversal."

The woman does have a voice - amazing.

"Yeah, the containing field collapses in on itself, slowly at first, then

speeding up. The energy in it is compressed until it can't compress more.

Then the field flips inside out, well the effect is the same. Then the energy

escapes in one pulse, self destruct on fleet craft work that way."

Now what was the GEPH doing? Oh yes, they were all doctors. All

believed in saving as many lives as possible.

"Neither of you suffered any fractures. Carver, your eyesight will

return in a moment. You were only dazzled. What is your name female? I did

not see you on board ship."

"My name is Cali. I, I stowed away."

"Great, stuck in a box for God knows how long with a pox mad GEPH and a

plague ridden stowaway. Just what I needed. Nice way to start a holiday.

All I need to do now is catch the plague."

Ah, can see, eyes clearing. Now, what does she look like? Young,

probably 15 - 25, (these new aging control genetics made dating to within years

difficult), brown hair, green eyes, slightly discoloured skin. Miss Average.

Still soon all be that way if the GEPHs get to fiddle with the gene pool.

Probably no natural blonds left, or redheads.

"How many other life ships escaped?"

The girl sounds as though she's close to a total breakdown. That'd be

the icing on the cake.

"None. The heat flash that hit us was enough to burn out the coolant

tanks of all the ships closer than us. In sunlight those who survived would

be burned alive. We were lucky. We were the first to launch and were

protected from the main force of the heat wave by distance. Even so our

coolant tank is practically empty."

"So that's all the damage? No way we could have gotten off that lightly.

That shock wave seemed powerful."

"We may have suffered more damage than that", replied Jay, "I know

little about space craft design..."

What's that, oh, the radio. That's really showing age. It's ITB instant

transmission beam. Radio waves have nothing to do with it. What does it

matter?

"This is sub relay station 23 bravo, echo, zulu. This is a wide angle

transmission. To all survivors."

"So not everyone died."

Woman grasping at straws.

"They don't know. The shielding on these ships prevents accurate counts

and the flash won't have helped any sensors pointing this way. They

might be able to tell there are still some alive, but that's all. At least not

until they get closer."

"...Repeat, help will arrive soon. The Excelsior recovery craft is

within 23.5 hours of you. The after effects of the field reversal will settle

in shortly making further ITB contact impossible. You have not been

forgotten."

O.K. for you to say mate, you're not a million miles from anywhere.

"This is life ship 47, please respond. Repeat, this is life ship 47,

please respond. Damn the aerial must have fried. We're on our own."

"How can we receive then?"

"Don't you know that Jay? Tut tut tut."

"I do not. Viral control is my speciality."

Why did men always turn everything into a contest. O.K., the GEPH was neuter but they always seemed more masculine. Perhaps it was their ever present logic. Although when lives were at stake they did become more feminine. Like a mother protecting her children.

"Just tell us Carver, please."

"For you lady, anything. The design of a life capsule basically is a box

to protect people. As such it's tough. Able to stand up to re-entry without

heat shielding or survive an explosion of up to 4 megatons, well bits of it

can. The box contains the vitals, oxygen tanks, temperature control and other

life support systems. But.."

"Some of the bits are on the outside and just got fried."

Where did Carver's accent come from? Wherever it was he knew about ships.

"Go to the top of the class Cali. The small fusion reactor which powers

us has to be on the outside to give thrust. That's been reduced to molten

metal."

"How can we receive and not transmit? I would assume it is due to one of the peculiarities of transmitting ITB signals." GEPHS always looking to learn.

"Good guess. It's simple. To receive a ITB.."

"A what?"

He must be an army mech. Of course. That explains why he was such an

argumentative... Explains his ship know-how as well. The GEPH probably figured it out from the start.

"Instant transmission beam." Are all civilians this stupid? "Without them long range messages would take minutes to travel from ship to ship. Try having a discussion with four minutes between each answer. The message travels as a pulse. To receive a message you need a large, flat surface area, 'bout 2 metres square. Like the side of the ship."

"So the ship acts as a receiving dish."

"Yep. To send though, a controllable aerial must be pointed in exactly

the right direction to provide the concentrated beam needed or you've got to

have major power to send a wider beam. Either the controlling motor got wiped

or the whole aerial got totalled."

"Is that all the damage?"

"The only things out are the engine, aerial and the feeder pipe. Theoretically, Computer access. Give state of waste gas feed pipe."

"OBJECT IN QUESTION HAS BEEN DAMAGED. WORKING AT 200% EFFICIENCY."

"I don't understand. If it's blasted it shouldn't work but it's twice as

good as normal?"

Why was Carver so pale, and the GEPH too? What's going on?

"The pipe gets rid of poisons and carbon dioxide. It must have ruptured

and is spilling out oxygen as well. Computer, give state of air system."

"VALVES HAVE BEEN FUSED OPEN BY THE HEATFLASH. OXYGEN IS DRAINING

STRAIGHT THROUGH."

"Shut off the flow!"

"EMERGENCY SHUTTERS ENGAGED."

"What happened?"

"Instead of removing waste gases and taking back remaining oxygen the

recycler system was removing any air in the ship. The tank got drained.

Computer how much oxygen is remaining?"

"30 HOURS OXYGEN. HOWEVER THE CARBON DIOXIDE BUILD UP WILL MAKE THE SHIP'S ATMOSPHERE UNBREATHABLE IN APPROXIMATELY 20 HOURS AT CURRENT

CONSUMPTION LEVELS."

"Great, the build up of carbon dioxide will kill us 4 hours before

rescue arrives."

"Unless, computer give time remaining assuming two thirds consumption."

"27 HOURS TILL FATAL CONCENTRATION."

"Someone must die to save the other two."

"Great." If a GEPH could do advanced maths in its head, why couldn't it

put emotion into the statement that someone was going to die? It may be

better only one dies, but even so. Cali wouldn't have the bottle. The GEPH

would wiggle out. Might as well try.

"Here's a gun, it's your idea. You do it."

"If I thought it was the best course of action I would. But who has the

greatest need or reason to live? I suggest we sit down and talk."

"Yeah, waste some more air while we're at it."

"Carver, assuming one death, there would be a surplus."

"Stop arguing the pair of you. Jay is right, Carver. You wanted to talk Jay, so talk. Carver, you listen." Men! Man and it. Whatever. How can two so different act the same?

"I presume both of you know of the plague. Your discoloured skin shows

you have suffered from it Cali, and I have heard it is rampant on the battle

fields."

"Yeah, half my squad died of the pox on a Confed colony, more than the

Confeds got."

"I thought you were a mechanic?"

"I was. Then a Confed transport landed near my station our line broke.

I had the highest rank at the base. The rest were training in deep space. I

took out a squad of rookies. Held the Confeds until the corpse got back.

Saved the base from a massacre bigger than San Drian. Two thousand in the

station and the corpse would have walked into an ambush. All alive thanks to

me and those rookies. To show their thanks the officers gave us medals and

sent us on a revenge mission to a Confed colony. Quarter of the men died

outright. We got pinned down. Took a week for the reinforcements to arrive.

Only thirty of us left. Rest dead of sniper fire or pox. After a day most

showed the black marks. Then the blood poured out like sweat. Then the

dehydration - more they drink more the blood, no medicines, they died. I got

out, figured I'd given enough to the Corpse. Decided to settle in the Moon

colony. Safe. No radiation, germ war, bombing."

"My family went a year ago. I just wanted to see them again. Its well

protected, I've done my bit I just want out."

"Do you reckon the Confeds will win? Put the colonies back

under Earth rule?"

"Won't matter. The colonies are stronger, at least in space than Earth.

To tell the truth I no longer care. I saved a colony for the councils cause.

What more do they want? Anyway what's your story Cali?"

"I was in Australia. Jay was right, I caught the pox. Most of my family

was living in the slums of Sydney. The pox struck, they died and I didn't.

I'm one of the ten percent who have some natural resistance and now I've had

it I'm immune. After a couple of weeks I was the one of the only ones alive

in the district. The council bulldozed the area.

"My sister had managed to scrape together the money to get to the Moon

colonies a couple of months before the plague struck. But she got sick

anyway. Apparently a blood transfusion may transfer my immunity. Nothing

else will save her. The medicines are only effective for the initial stages

and then only on certain strains. I had to go. I had no money so I stowed

away. Figured I'd donate blood to the hospital, let them find out why I'm

safe, get paid to stay there. There's a demand for immune blood, specially

from those who are dying. Better than staying on Earth. What about you Jay,

you said you worked with viruses?"

"As you know all the genetically designed lifeforms are designed for one

purpose. I was designed for viral research. Recently a breakthrough was made

at the colony medical centre. We may be able to cure numerous viral

infections by engineering viruses to destroy each other rather than human

cells. Particularly one strain seems capable of destroying strains of what

you call the pox. As this was my field I was asked to help. I agreed."

"Don't tell me the work will grind to a halt without you Jay?"

"I fail to see the need for your sarcasm Carver and it is not true. The

work will carry on. However my help could speed up work by weeks."

"Big deal."

"A life could be saved with each passing day."

"Sounds a good idea."

"I see." Great, woman and GEPH agreeing.

"So what you may do in the future is more important than what I've done

in the past?"

"I don't know."

"it seems logical Carver."

"So you want to kill me. How nice, here's the gun. Do you want to shoot

me in the back, the head - Jay take your pick."

"I cannot. Mental safeguards prevent me from killing. Directly, and in

some cases indirectly."

"What about you Cali?"

"I can't. Just can't."

"So you want me to shoot myself?"

"I, I'm sorry."

That's it. Must use the gun. Die now, a hero. Gave life for others.

No! Shoot one of them. See family. Live. Which choice? Must do something.

Take off the safety. Pull trigger.

Choose.