Starmind Chapter 28 (Patreon)

The other Crew stood silently after Temeri laid out her plan, looking uncertain and thoughtful. I didn’t love the plan myself — it seemed riskier than I was comfortable with. But it was daring, creative, and if it worked out the way Temeri hoped we’d be in a much better position going forward. It also relied on Temeri trusting me, and I’d get something I’d wanted for days, which were both nice bonuses!

“Well?” Temeri said, looking to each of the others in turn. “I’m not hearing any enthusiastic support, exactly, but silent concern is not something we can afford. Our window is small. If you have any creative criticism, now is the time.”

What Temeri wanted to do was this: first, we would burn hard to put ourselves on a fast intercept with the Small Ship, with the goal of scaring them off. According to Harvin they were already scared of us, so hopefully that would work. That was of course the first thing that could go wrong: what if they stood their ground?

Simeon asked just that question, and Temeri’s answer was quick and confident: “Then we intercept them and take them prisoner while Star assimilates as much of their ship as necessary to replenish our reaction mass. Then we continue, somewhat delayed.”

I wasn’t entirely sure about that part. I’d convinced myself that I might be comfortable with it, morally, as long as no one got hurt, but the actual interception might be tricky. But Temeri sounded so confident that no one, me included, said anything about it.

This first part also relied on a pretty big assumption: that the Small Ship, once it ran, wouldn’t have the reaction mass to get out of its escape trajectory. Once they were on their way around Avara — a low orbit slingshotting them toward Erebus would be the fastest, safest way for them to run — it would be very expensive for them to change that. If they had more reaction mass than we estimated, they might just come back around. Or they might run in a completely different direction, but when Varlanda brought that up, Temeri suggested that if whoever our enemy was let someone that unintelligent pilot a ship, then our problems were a lot less serious than we’d feared.

Then came the tricky part. Once the Small Ship was on its way, we’d stop burning and continue on our same trajectory until they lost sight of us. As soon as they did, we’d turn and burn to put ourselves on a new trajectory, one that intercepted the mysterious mana signature. I was very excited about that part, and really hoped that we’d get to it! Then, once we were on our new trajectory, we’d shut down the reactor.

This was another point that I was nervous about, where things might go wrong. I’d take manual control of absolutely everything, using only as much mana as absolutely necessary. Even though I’d suggested that same thing to Temeri, it was a lot more real now. What if something went wrong? There was no reason to think that anything would, but what if it did? What if I couldn’t do it?

Okay, realistically we’d start the reactor again. The Crew might be a tiny bit uncomfortable as it became a little colder. But what if?

While all this was going on, Varlanda and Harvin would be setting up an enchantment which I really didn’t understand at all, but would apparently keep Diviners from detecting us as long as we fed it mana crystals.

I didn’t like that part. I wanted a nice, big stockpile of the things, and even though we were producing more than ever, our demands were also higher. Keeping the local mana field strength up used about six-and-a-half small basic mana crystals per day. The Teletic Fabricator needed one every twelve hours at the rate Bekeri was using it, and this enchantment, they told me, would need about one every eight hours. And if we didn’t feed it, we would not only not be hidden, but the whole enchantment would fail and dissipate. That all added up to eleven-and-a-half small basic mana crystals per day. We were producing just under thirteen.

The Crew all insisted that getting one-and-a-half mana crystals for free every day, even small ones, was a wonderful bounty. They were rare enough that a well-to-do family might keep a single one in their home for emergencies, if they had the talents to make use of it. Otherwise they were the kind of things only guilds, churches, and governments could afford. But I needed them, dang it! Everything needed them! Especially Developments, whose costs increased with every level, which meant that unless I could keep increasing my mana regeneration they were going to start getting really slow, really fast. Every crystal that went to something unexpected was another crystal that couldn’t go to increasing my mana regeneration, and…

I was going to have to ask Varlanda to make another Mana Condensation Matrix, after all. There was nothing for it.

But that would have to come when we were somewhere stable again. Which would hopefully be somewhere close to the mana signature, but that was far from certain. Even if every step of the plan went just as we hoped, we only knew three things about our target: its orbit, the fact that it was radiating a very large amount of spent mana, and that it was spinning around a single axis. Well, four things, if we included that Harvin hadn’t been able to sense any minds there.

We didn’t actually know that it was safe. If we saw anything that indicated that it wasn’t, we’d have to abort, keep burning, and find someplace else to hide. Which, starting from our expected range of trajectories when we aborted and assuming that we wanted to use as little reaction mass as possible, meant aiming for Tara. All of the Crew agreed that was a good Plan B, but I really, really hoped that we wouldn’t need to do that.

Not that Tara was some horrible place, from what we knew of the moon. It was the sixth of Avara’s seven major moons, about the same size as Lunaris — much larger than Erebus — and would probably work great to hide behind. With a low gravity we may even be able to land, which was an exciting idea! I’d been designed to be able to land on Lunaris or larger asteroids, after all. Some of my landing struts were gone, but we could fix those. And not only would setting down on the side of Tara facing away from Avara and the inner moons be an excellent way to hide, but I might even be able to set something up to harvest materials from the surface!

Anyway, that all might make Tara sound like a very attractive option. The Crew certainly thought so, and I would have agreed if not for one thing. The problem with Tara was that her orbital radius was about three hundred and ten thousand miles. That far from Avara, the ambient mana field was going to be a lot weaker which, again: mana! I needed mana!

In the end, no one had any good arguments against Temeri’s plan. That was good, not only because it hopefully meant that they thought it might work, but because I was pretty sure she would have ordered them to go through with it anyway. That was her right as the captain, of course, but everything was going so well recently! I didn’t want them to be at odds with each other again. And in the end, the plan relied on me going along with it. If Temeri and the rest of the Crew disagreed on what to do, I’d have to pick a side.

I panicked a little just at the thought of it.

“Alright,” Temeri said. “Time is of the essence, and I see no reason to delay. You all know the drill by now. Make what preparations you need for hard acceleration, then return and get in your couches. Bekeri, let us know when you’re standing by at the drive.” With her orders given, Temeri’s voice softened a little as she added, “And, ah… sorry for getting in the way of lunch; I was looking forward to it myself. Now, get to it!”

“Star, did you get everything from the gunship?” Temeri asked as preparations got underway.

“Almost done,” I told her. “There’s just one last thing I need to do.”

“Great,” she said, not asking me to specify. “Let me know when you’re ready to detach, please.”

The last thing I needed to take care of was the crew I’d killed.

I’d been avoiding even thinking about them, except in the abstract of what I might do. The crew of the first ship to attack us, the ones who’d boarded me, to try and take me, had killed themselves. I was partially responsible, and I would have preferred that no one got hurt at all, but I didn’t feel any guilt. When I sent them into the void, where they were presumably still drifting on a slowly decaying orbit, I hadn’t felt bad about it. But I didn’t feel I could do that to people I’d killed myself.

There wasn’t much more I could do with their remains. I’d sealed off the areas where they’d died, then used some strategically placed radioactive elements to kill all the bacteria and such inside them and removed all the air. I hoped that would stop them from decaying for as long as possible. I’d done the same to the crew cabins, and neither Temeri, Simeon, nor Bekeri had wanted to go through the dead crew’s personal belongings too much, so everything of theirs was still there… except for the one cabin that had a hull fragment go through it. I’d sealed up the holes, but there wasn’t much I could do for the scattered bits and pieces.

The last thing I was going to do for them was something big, but which I hadn’t discussed with Temeri. I was pretty nervous about that. It shouldn’t interfere with her plan at all, but I suspected she wouldn’t like it. It was something I felt I had to do, though, and in this case I was going to apologize afterward rather than risking having to ignore her if she didn’t give her blessing.

I told Temeri that I was ready. Soon enough, everyone but Bekeri was in their couches. Temeri gave the order. Bekeri cast his spell on the drive and rushed to the bridge, and when he was secured we put the plan into action.

With one small modification. I didn’t immediately detach from Gunship Me and turn and burn. Instead I executed my own little pre-plan.

“Star, what’s going on?” Temeri asked after a few seconds. She was watching the navigational readouts, and sounded very concerned.

“Nothing to worry about!” I said cheerfully as I turned so that I could accelerate the hulk into a stable orbit. “Just one last thing I had to take care of. Won’t take but a moment!”

With Bekeri’s spell boosting the thrusters it really didn’t take long at all. When I detached, the orbit I left the gunship in was as stable as I could get it in such a short time. It wasn’t perfect; my Navigational Matrix told me that even without outside interference it would decay over the next ten to fifteen years. But it was more than good enough if any friends or family wanted to retrieve the remains of the Crew for a proper goodbye, and it would have to do.

“Okay, all done!” I told Temeri as I started her planned maneuvers. “Sorry about that, but I really couldn’t just leave them to fall into Avara.”

“Star, they—”

“They attacked us. I know. And I killed them. I had to do this.”

The whole bridge was silent as the rest of the Crew exchanged uncomfortable looks. Then Temeri asked, “Have you adjusted the maneuvers for the change in relative position and velocity?”

“I have. And, speaking of: burning hard in five, four, three…”

“Fine,” Temeri said, in a tone that sounded more like, “We’ll talk about this later.” She didn’t get a chance to say much else, because at that point I put a lot of G’s on them, and breathing became hard enough without trying to speak at the same time.

We shot out of our previous orbit on an intercept course for the Small Ship, one which would have us meet in just under eleven minutes.

“Alder!” Temeri forced out. “Observer! Reactions? Regular reports!”

“Confusion,” was Harvin’s immediate reply. Then, a minute later, “Fear. They’re… arguing. No orders. Younger one… more afraid… of us… than… a name. Aspari. Lord… Aspari.”

“They’re maintaining position,” I added once Harvin fell silent. “Time to intercept: eight minutes, thirty-two seconds.”

Two minutes later the Small Ship still hadn’t moved. When Harvin reported again his voice was noticeably weaker and more strained. “Anger,” he managed. “Hard… thoughts… toward… each… other. And… Aspari. Still… no… orders.”

Even with the acceleration couches helping pump blood around their bodies, and with their training and conditioning, the Crew were starting to look worse for wear under the constant six G’s of acceleration. Temeri had insisted that they could take it for as long as necessary, but I was starting to get worried. I was about to speak up, when the Small Ship lit up brightly on both my visual and mana sensors. To be that bright, their thrusters must be going full blast.

At the same time as I excitedly told the Crew, “They’re maneuvering! Burning hard!” Harvin choked out, “Relief! Lots… of… relief! Orders! Running!”

“Trajectory?” Temeri asked.

“Just like you predicted! Hard prograde, out of the ecliptic and coming at us at about sixty by fifty degrees. If they can maintain this acceleration I couldn’t intercept them if I wanted to.”

“Yes!” Temeri’s triumph was a little blunted by the way she had to force the air out of her rapidly tiring body. “Continue… as… planned!”

“Are you all okay?” I asked.

“Fine!” Varlanda gritted out.

“Every… body!” Temeri said right after.

“Here!” Harvin said, followed closely by a “Holding… on!” from Simeon.

Bekeri didn’t say anything. His eyes were closed, legs clenched, and he was breathing actively from his stomach, but the only sounds he made were forced, hissing breaths.

“Artificer… Bekeri!” Temeri said. “Report!” When he still didn’t say anything, she said, “Star! Vitals!”

“He’s struggling!” I told her, feeling terribly concerned as I looked and listened in a way I should have been doing all along and paying attention to how the blood spread throughout his body. He was still awake… mostly. He was still breathing, anyway, but that was about it. “His heartbeat is becoming irregular. Temeri, I don’t like this!”

“Healer! Reco—” Temeri couldn’t even get the word out. Instead she went with, “What do?”

Simeon’s reply was immediate, if a little weak: “Cut… G’s!”

“Do it!” Temeri’s order was almost more of a plea, and I immediately started a controlled down-throttle, reducing our acceleration until the effective gravity on the Crew was Mundus standard. Groans of relief escaped some of them as they all breathed more easily.

Simeon was out of his couch in seconds, and he wobbled over to Bekeri, where he began casting some spell or other. “You with us?” he asked softly after a few moments, gently shaking Bekeri’s shoulder.

Bekeri opened his eyes. He was breathing rhythmically and didn’t speak, but nodded confidently.

“Alright! You gave us a scare, there,” Simeon said with a smile, before clapping Bekeri’s shoulder firmly and standing up. “He’ll be fine,” he declared, “though I don’t recommend any high G’s for a couple of minutes at least.”

“You shouldn’t feel anything above three for the rest of the maneuver. That should be in… thirty minutes or so, when the Small Ship goes behind Avara. Is that okay?” I asked, watching anxiously as Bekeri’s pulse and blood pressure stabilized.

“That should be perfectly fine,” Simeon confirmed.

“Alright,” Temeri said. “Let’s move. Alder, Enchantress Tell, get started on the shrouding enchantment. The faster it’s done, the better. You can pause work for acceleration, yes?”

“Yes, Captain,” Varlanda confirmed.

“Good. Bekeri, head down to engineering and prepare to shut down the reactor. I want it down the moment that observation craft goes below the horizon. Healer Tell, stay with Bekeri and make sure there are no lingering side effects. Star, please keep an eye on the observer and on the sky in general. We have to assume that there’s at least one ship incoming, possibly more. If they show up before we’re shrouded and running dark, we’ll have to abort and shoot for Tara. Any comments or objections?”

With a chorus of “No, Captain!” the rest of the Crew set off down the access tube, with Harvin and Simeon keeping a watchful eye on Bekeri as he climbed. They all got to work, Bekeri going through a controlled shutdown of the reactor, and Varlanda and Harvin beginning the rune inscriptions that would form the enchantment to hide us from any Diviners out there.

Alone on the bridge, Temeri asked me, “Do you think this will work, Star?”

I thought about what to say. I did think it would work, but simply telling her that didn’t seem like enough. “I think…” I said carefully, then started over. “A couple of days ago Varlanda joked that you all aren’t too good to be expendable. I think she’s wrong. I don’t think you all are the Crew because you’re expendable; I think you all are the Crew because Command wanted the Crew to be as capable as possible, while risking as few lives as they could. Every one of you is one of the most competent people in your role. I truly believe that. And that includes you, Temeri. You’re brilliant, and this is your plan. Yes. I think this will work.”

Temeri took a deep breath; when she let it out, it came as a shuddering sigh. “Thank you, Star,” she whispered.

Four hours later we were entirely dark, drifting along a trajectory that would intersect with the mysterious mana signature, when a whole squadron of unknown ships came over Avara’s horizon. The Crew barely dared to make a sound as seven ships slowly spread out. Not one of them changed their course to intercept us.

For the moment, at least, we were safe.