Ringship Discretion Page 6

  Attie pulled a chair, but one of the magnetic foot locks wouldn't let go. He kicked it and spilled the soup. "Dammit!"

  Amelia reach her hand out to his waist. "Attie, can you just lay with me".

  He set the food down and began taking off his corn covered pants when Doc walked by. He saw the captain, but said nothing. He just reached in and closed Amelia's door. Attie climbed over Amelia and laid against her back. She pulled his arm over her to her breast and squeezed tightly. Attie whispered "I love you" and hugged her tightly.

  When the captain awoke Amelia was gone. He slid across the bed and looked at the floor. His pants and the food were gone. He turned into a sitting position and got up. His left foot was cold and when he looked down, he only had one sock on. He opened the door and looked down the corridor. He was stumbling towards his quarters, when from the galley he heard "Good afternoon Captain!". He peaked around the corner and everyone was eating what looked like dinner. He felt his hair and said "How long have I been out?"

  Ben responded "Oh, about 17 hours!"

  The captain took a deep breath "I feel like hell"

  Ben joked "And you look it too!"

  Helen interjected "Captain, put some damn pants on, we got children on this boat!" and she covered AJ's eyes. Everyone started laughing.

  Atticus looked down. "Oh, Shit. Sorry. Wait! Where the hell are my pants?." Amelia turned and handed him his now clean pants. He gently smiled "Thank you." She kissed him on the cheek and a gave him a small smile back.

  After dinner the captain, Ben, and Amelia went to the bridge to check on things. Amelia sat down in the pilot's seat and the captain in the co-pilot's chair. Ben leaned up in between them both. Amelia spoke up. "I was afraid of this. We are off course by more than four degrees. The four panels on the starboard are putting out just a bit more power than the two new ones at the moment, but that's not always the case. When I set them yesterday, they were equal. In either case, we could use a third panel on the port side. Then I could set both sides to higher thrust".

  The captain thought for a second. "Well, all the sensors are still useless, which means no one has shut off the jamming signal. We could shut the engines down, replace the third panel and then get back under way."

  Amelia looking at her display, "Well, with the extra thrust, it would certainly make up for the time we would have lost by course correcting and the hour or two we spend putting the panel on

  The captain looked back at Ben. "Up for another space walk?"

  Ben said "Actually I am. With the doc's help, I was able to fix the hole in my suit. I recharged all the packs we used yesterday, although I still haven't fixed AJ's."

  An hour later, the captain, suited up again, walked up to the back of Amelia's chair. "You ready?" She looked up at him and nodded. The Captain hit the intercom "Everyone get ready for zero G. We are going to cut the engines. Ben and I are going back out to install the third panel." He let go of the intercom button, gently put his hand on Amelia's shoulder and whispered "OK, shut them down". The thirty second alarm sounded.

  As Atticus and Ben exited the airlock with the new plate and their equipment, the Sun shined in Ben's face. "The Sun sure is getting small. I always feel a little uncomfortable being so far from its warmth."

  Atticus looked also, wincing. "But it's still bright as hell!" They rounded the edge of the ship to it's plate and thruster nozzle covered underbelly. Atticus pointed. "There, that's where we are going to put this plate. At least we'll be working in full sunlight with the ship's attitude the way it is." As they made their way over to the half melted stanchion, the captain said "Shit! Look!" and pointed to one of the plates Amelia and him had installed. "The rods have bent under the strain."... "Amelia?"

  Amelia's response had a touch of static. "I copied that. You guys will have to reinforce them. So that means will be shutdown for a while longer. I am going to turn the internal plating on so we can get some cleaning up done in here"

  The captain paused. "Roger that."

  Ben and the captain worked for about three hours and managed to get the new plate on and the others shored up. The captain clicked his radio. "OK Amelia, I think we are done. We are coming back."

  She responded "Good, we managed to make the place more presentable. Hopefully, we won't be breathing in anymore bits of glass either."

  The captain cocked his head "Amelia, can you repeat that whole sentence?"

  She asked "Why? Did you not copy?"

  He said "No, I mean yes, that's just it. It was crystal clear"

  In a raised voice she said "The jamming. It's stopped!"

  The captain in a hurried voice, "We're coming in now."

  The captain and Ben threw everything into the airlock and quickly pulled it shut. They stood on the floor adjusting to the gravity once again while they waited for the lock to pressurize. Once the airlock hit 40 kPa, it turned green and they removed their helmets. Ben looked at the captain "Ready to go to full pressure?" The captain reluctantly nodded. The pressure slowly rose. They stood in there for what seemed forever equalizing their ears. The captain looked through the portal at Amelia sitting at the controls, frustrated at the pressurization taking so long. In reality, it was a lot shorter than when they had to depressurize to go out, but they hadn't been in an anxious hurry then.

  Amelia said over the comm "Attie, I'm picking up ships again and hints of gamma rays. There must be one hell of a firefight going on back there."

  The captain started to pace "Come on already!" Then the lock turned green once again and the captain instantly opened the hatch. He stumbled over the welding equipment, started to fall forward, but kept trying to catch himself until he slammed into the back of Amelia's chair. Amelia was jolted forward from the impact, then she looked over at Ben and they exchanged looks before she looked at Attie. Attie made a fist and shook it at the airlock, but didn't say anything. Then he looked back at the console "What's the situation?"

  Amelia pointed to the display. "It looks like some of the BB ships met up with some of Big Sis ships and they are duking it out . There are more ships coming from here and here.." The screen suddenly filled with random noise and bogus information.

  It took a second for the captain to realize what had happened "The jamming signal is back up. No doubt the BB ships are using it against the Big Sis ship again. Good! Let's get going while they're blind and confused." The captain hit the intercom. "We will be turning the engines back on, but we have to turn the internal plating off first. Get ready." He looked at Amelia. "Do it".

  CHAPTER 3: The Run to Io.

  Whom Do I flee?

  What can the cargo be?

  To kill the Big Three,

  just to get at me.

  Two days later the captain knocked on Amelia's door. She quietly replied, "Come in". He opened the door to see her putting down a picture of her husband.

  She turned while wiping her face. "Hi."

  He looked at her and wanted to comfort her, but instead just said "The jamming signal. It stopped again." She took in a deep breath, got up and followed him to the bridge.

  She changed the settings on the passive sensor suite and ships appeared. "Well, I would say that is one of the BB ships coming after us, but look behind him. There are so many radar echoes, but they aren't moving. I'm getting no difference in doppler shift relative to each other. My guess is that they are all disabled or destroyed. There are several more Big Sis ships coming from here and they seem to be heading to cut off the BB ship, but he's accelerating too fast."

  Atticus zoomed the display out. "What about catching us?"

  Amelia pushed a display control button and it read out the relative speed and accelerations. "He is out accelerating us, but not by much."

  "Will he catch us before we get to Io?"

  If we maintained our current rate of acceleration and they maintained theirs, no. But we have to slow down to make the rendezvous. We will have to start braking in..." She ran some numbers "in 9 days at the latest, or w
e will overshoot. We do have a three day head start, so that will buy us some time."

  The captain thought for a second. "Hmmm, won't they have to start braking as well or over shoot us?"

  Ben scratched his head. "Well, they could take some shots as us while they screamed by. Who knows how accurate their lasers are or what kind of range those things have."

  Amelia's intensity of concentration grew. "Captain, I had the computer analyze this and if the BB ship starts to decelerate with us, the Big Sis ships will catch up with him. So I figure he has to play a fine line between getting us and them not getting him. I asked the computer to predict the optimum situation for the BB ship."

  The captain and Ben listened intently. "Go on..."

  She continued. "If we slam on our brakes in 9 days, they should hit theirs in 13. If that is the scenario, then they will catch us in 18, but they will blow by Io station with so much momentum that it would take them more than a week to turn around and get back. If however, they didn't bother slowing down at all, they would catch us in 14 days."

  Ben asked "So, if the BB ship were to brake with us and try to meet us at Io station, when would the Big Sis ships catch up to her?"

  She ran some more numbers "Hmm..if the Big Sis ships didn't bother decelerating and the BB ship did, they would catch up to her in about 15 days. Therefore, the BB ship has to keep her acceleration up for as long as she can.

  The captain sat down in the co-pilots seat and thought for a while. "Hmmm..what if we altered course to the other side of Jupiter and did some aerobraking? We could keep accelerating for longer before having to brake."

  Amelia balked. "Aerobraking in this piece of crap? I don't know. Maybe we could do some, but I don't think she can take much more punishment; plus, we would have to turn the drive plates away from the atmosphere or they would just rip off, especially with the jury rigging we've got going on. And that would defeat the point. If we could add the aerobraking and the grav deceleration, that would help, but substituting one for the other wouldn't."

  The captain with frustration in his voice, "Crap. Any ideas Ben?"

  Ben shrugged. "You guys are the geniuses at this kind of thing, I just fix the ship. You're the ones who figure out new and exciting ways to break it!" The captain looked down at the deck with a smile while Amelia watched him with a big grin of her own.

  Amelia straightened up. "Wait, we can't use the atmosphere, but there is something else of Jupiter's that we can use."

  The captain looked up at her waiting for her to tell them...."Well?!"

  She put her hand up and said "Hold on...Thinking." She brought up displays of Jupiter's and Io's magnetic field. Atticus leaned over her shoulder trying to figure out what she was doing. After a minute, she turned excitedly, almost banging heads with him. She recoiled slightly, pushed him back, and spoke. "OK, so Jupiter has a huge magnetic field and we now have two MFGs on board, but, why did we bring a second one in the first place?"

  Ben spoke up. "To protect us from the ion stream around Io."

  She nodded her head. "Yes! Well, that ion stream leads all the way around Io's orbit, so if we inject into Io's orbit on the other side of Jupiter and come around, we could use it to give us extra "magnetic field brakes". The intensity is huge too, so it should really make a difference. We were just going to head right at Io and use our brakes, but now that we are going around the planet and using the magnetic field, I bet we could get an extra couple of days acceleration before we have to turn and decelerate."

  The captain looked at Amelia stunned. "Damn. I love you! You're bloody brilliant. Do you have the exact measurements? "

  She smiled. "I'm good, but not that good. I have to make a hell of a lot of calculations and see if I can get current data from Io station as to the field strength. I'll work with Ben on the MFG configuration and I will have something by tomorrow."

  Attie grabbed her face and kissed her. She openly smiled, and Atticus thought how wonderful it was to see her happy, even if just for a minute.

  Ben and Amelia worked on the problem the rest of the day, with AJ quietly watching and following them around like a puppy dog.

  Atticus alternated between listening to them, watching the sensor displays and eating junk food in the galley.

  That evening Atticus was asleep in his bunk, when the door opened. Amelia came in and closed the door behind her. "Can I lay with you?".

  Attie looked up and watched her details appear as she came closer. "Of course". He scooted over and opened the covers. She kicked off her shoes, unzipped her jumpsuit and let it fall to the floor, then she pulled her tank top over her head and let it drop. Attie watch her intently. He could see the bottom of her breasts being lit up by the display next to the bed. Her nipples were getting hard from the cold and her breasts bounced as she jumped on her socks to take them off. She then slipped her panties off and jumped into the bed. "Attie, can you cuddle with me in the naked way? I just want to feel your warmth against my skin."

  Attie took off his undershirt, threw it across the room and kicked his underwear somewhere down the bed. "Sure!" She scooted her bare back and butt up against him. The coolness of her skin sent sensations up his spine. He put his arm around her and could feel the soft warmth of her breast. He asked, "Do you want to..?"...she interrupted, "Not tonight Attie. I'm sorry. I am just not ready. Can you just hold me and make me feel safe? I feel you, but I am really sorry, I just can't right now".

  Attie whispered in her ear. "I love you and being with you is the best thing that has ever happened to me. Please don't be sorry. Making you happy is all that I need." She turned over, kissed him and hugged him intensely. She began to cry..."I love you too."

  In the morning, Attie woke up to find Amelia not there. He looked on the floor and saw her panties and tank top still laying there, but her jumpsuit was missing. Just then the door opened, and in she came. "You're awake! I made some french toast for you and I have some orange juice." Attie sat up in eager anticipation of the delicious smelling food. She gently set the tray down in his lap.

  He asked "What about you?"

  She smiled and sat down next to him. "I had mine."

  He forked in a mouth full, "Mmmm that's good" and with his other hand pinched her butt through her jump suit.

  She giggled a bit and said "Eat up, we have a big day of planning ahead." She grabbed her clothes off the floor, hopped up, and on the way to the door, she turned and said "Hey Attie.". He looked up from his food and she unzipped her jump suit. Attie jumped and the plates of toast slid across the tray. He lunged to catch it. As he caught it, he looked back up, she laughed and went out the door. He yelled "Hey! That's not fair!"

  Then Ben popped his head in. "Having fun this morning Captain?! Well come on, get your ass out of bed. We have ideas."

  The captain said "I am. Hold on just a second. I'll be right there." and he mumbled to himself "I just have to find where my underwear went..."

  Ten minutes later the captain walked up to the bridge, his hair a big mess, and saw Amelia sitting there, her beautiful shoulder length straight red hair. It was in perfect condition. She was wearing a cobalt blue top with two rows of buttons with the top button undone and the flap opened to expose her cleavage. Attie gulped at the sight of her while thinking, "Damn, she's gorgeous this morning!" Amelia saw him standing there with his mouth open and when Ben looked away for a second, she pulled her blouse forward. Attie's eyes got big and she giggled.

  Ben turned back. "What?!" He looked at them both. "What is with you two today?"

  Both of them chuckled and Amelia pushed a button and pointed at the display. "OK, so after going over the power outputs Ben measured from the MFGs, and getting up to date Io and Jupiter magnetic field data, I built this model. If we change course in 12 hours, we can easily enter into this part of Io's orbit in front of Io. With both MFG's running at full power it will slow us down enough to give us an extra day of acceleration. That means that the BB ship, assuming it doesn't follow us and predicts
our destination is Io, will intercept us only two hours before we get to Io. But the interesting thing is we will be heading back toward them at that point."

  Attie said "Damn, that's close! Can we get a little more power from somewhere to shave off those two hours? Or, wait. We would want to add to those two hours at that point, to be as far away from Io as we can when they pass. Right? Damn, this gets confusing."

  That's when AJ said "Excuse me. Can I ask a question?"

  The captain said "Sure."

  AJ spoke up "Well, I don't know if I understand this right, but don't each of the MFG's have a built in backups? Could we run the backups also?"

  The captain thought and looked at Ben. Ben said "Holy Shit, I don't see why not? Assuming, I can get enough power to them. I may have to run a second set of power feeds, but yeah."

  The captain looked at AJ. "You just got yourself a bonus kid! Alright, let's get to work!"

  That evening in the galley the captain spoke. "OK, everyone, we have a great plan, thanks to Amelia, Ben and AJ here. Helen and Doc congratulated AJ with pats on the back and Aunt Helen even kissed him on the head, which he pulled away from.

  The captain continued. "Here's the plan...."

  CHAPTER 4: The Jupiter system

  The giant in the sky,

  round which we fly,

  does not care whether we live or die.

  On day 11, after leaving the wreckage in the asteroid belt, and 9 days before their expected arrival at Io Station, Amelia turned the Discretion 180 degrees and began to decelerate with full power. They had altered course to intercept Io's orbit, on the opposite side of Jupiter, a number of days earlier.

  The captain asked Amelia "What is the status of the BB ship?"

  Amelia looked at the display. "Well, they are still on an intercept course with Io. They are probably wondering why we have taken so long to brake, and if they smart, they are also wondering how we are going to swing around and actually make it to Io. They haven't started braking yet and the four Big Sis cruisers are still behind her, but not gaining. In fact, one has already begun to brake. Maybe that one is after us?"