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Prologue Chapter 2

Alternity - Chapter 1

Good Luck Charm

"There, that's better," said Trance. It had been four hours since they had lifted off, and they still had eighteen hours to go until they were far enough from Bathsheba's sun to initiate a jump into slipstream. As Trance had predicted, Harper had become sick from the effects of the Anoxahol. After he had stopped vomiting he had made a beeline for the coffeepot, only to discover to his horror the pot was broken, and that he was facing the prospect of nearly two days of traveling to and from slip points without caffeine. Mumbling curses, he had retreated to the engineering spaces.

With Harper in the engineering spaces and Beka and Rev on the command deck, Trance had been left by herself, and had quickly become bored; so she decided to attempt to repair the coffee pot. She hadn't seen anything obviously wrong when she had disassembled the pot, so she simply tightened all the connections, and then plugged the pot into an electrical receptacle. As she plugged the pot in, there was a crackling sound, and smoke began to stream out of it. She quickly unplugged the pot, but as she did so the lights dimmed, and for an instant it seemed as though gravity had rotated 90 degrees, and she started to fall. Then the artificial gravity ceased altogether, and she found herself floating in mid air in the middle of the common room.

"What the Hell! Rev, stay here while I go aft and find out what happened," exclaimed Beka.

"*&*%!%*" Harper's voice came over the intraship communicator.

Beka unstrapped herself from the pilot's chair and began using the grips set into the bulkheads for zero-g locomotion to pull herself aft towards the common room. "Trance, do you have any idea what happened?" she asked the younger woman who by this time was flailing around frantically trying to reach a handhold.

"I'm sorry Beka, I didn't mean to." Tears were starting to form in her eyes.

"What do you mean you didn't mean to? What did you do?"

"I was trying to fix the coffee pot. I plugged it in, there was a spark, and we started floating. I'm really really sorry. I didn't mean to wreck anything. It was an accident." By now she was openly crying, because there was no gravity the tears didn't fall, but as she thrashed around trying to find something to hold on to they were breaking free and floating around her. Everything that had been lying around loose in the room was drifting around. In addition to Trance and her tears, the air was filled with silverware, flexies, a box of doughnuts, a deck of cards, and the still smoking coffee pot.

"Trance, calm down, and stop crying. There's no way shorting out the coffee pot could affect the artificial gravity generators. It wasn'tyour fault."

"Are you sure?" She had stopped crying when she saw Beka wasn't going to be angry with her, but was still sniffling.

"Quite. Now quit thrashing around and let me grab you so I can pull you down." Trance's struggles to find a handhold had turned her upside down so that she was floating head down in relationship to Beka. Her arms and tail still flailing around trying to get a grip on anything that would help steady her.

As soon as Trance was no longer floating in the middle of the room, and had her tail wrapped around a handhold, Beka continued aft towards the engineering spaces. About 30 minutes later gravity was restored.

The sudden resumption of gravity caught Trance by surprise and she fell, landing on her posterior and emitting a loud 'OW'. All the other items that had been floating fell to the deck as well, and she narrowly missed being brained by the coffee pot.

Beka's voice came over the intraship communicator. "Trance, can you come back here and help Harper finish up while I get back to the command deck?"

Trance ran through the short passageway into the engineering room anxious to be of assistance and still feeling somewhat guilty for the loss of gravity. The engineering compartment was, with the exception of the cargo pod, the largest space on the Maru, taking up over a quarter of her 42 meters of length. The room was divided into two levels. The lower level was filled with numerous pieces of machinery, some of which was humming mysteriously. The machinery ranged in size from pieces that looked small enough that she suspected she could pick up and carry them, to others that were large enough that the entire crew of the Maru could have fit inside them with room to spare. Reason told Trance that lower level included not just the craft's three engines and their matter-antimatter power source, but the auxiliary equipment that ensured the crew had gravity, lights, air, water, and power, but all of it was completely unfamiliar and more than a little bit intimidating. The bulkheads on the upper level, which as accessed by a catwalk that ran around the perimeter of the room, were covered with controls, gages, monitors and computer terminals many of which were blinking cryptically or flashing incomprehensible messages. The room smelled faintly of ozone and Trance had to suppress the urge to sneeze. Entering the engineering room, she saw Harper and Beka huddled over a piece of machinery sandwiched between the starboard and centerline engine. There were a large number of tools lying on the deck around the two of them.

"Harper's almost done, Trance," said Beka. "You just need to hand him the tools when he requests them."

As Beka left Harper gave Trance a big smile. "How's my purple pixie?"

"What's a pixie?" Trance wasn't sure if she had been complimented or insulted. It sounded like Harper was being friendly, but she really didn't know him so she couldn't be sure.

"Well on my world they were supposed to be magical beings that could grant wishes."

"Were they nice?"

"Well most of the time they were supposed to be. You make me think of one whenI see you."

"Ok, I guess you can call me that."

Harper commenced making the final adjustments with Trance handing him tools as needed, making only the expected number of mistakes of handing him the wrong tool.

"All done," Harper said, straightening up from his labors. "Thanks for your help, babe."

"You're welcome, Harper." Trance looked around the engineering room for a minute. "It's all so complicated. I don't know what any of this stuff does. Can you explain some of it to me? Like, what's that thingy over there?" She pointed to a flat topped cylinder about half a meter in diameter and about one meter high with a control panel embedded in the top, located near the artificial gravity generator that she had been assisting Harper repair.

"That's the inertial damper my grape goddess. It dampens the effects of …. Hey wait a minute that gravity polarity change right before the AG generator went. We were accelerating and… Oh my God." He ran over to the intraship communicator. "Beka, whatever you do don't kick us into gear. The inertial damper might be blown." He didn't wait for a reply but began running diagnostic tests on the mechanism. Trance was standing behind him looking over his shoulder, a worried look in her eyes.

Some time later he looked up. "Maybe you are a pixie. The damper was blown. If Beka had started accelerating again we would've been turned into strawberry jam. Grape jelly in your case I guess."

Trance gave him a puzzled look.

"The acceleration would have killed us. But, what made you pick that particular piece of equipment to ask about?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "It looked interesting."

"Well, you just saved all our lives. Let's tell Beka we can get going again."

"Here you go. Trance," said Beka. "Dawkinstown Drift, just like I promised you."

After the incident with the AG generator and the inertial damper, the rest of the trip had passed smoothly. Trance had proven to be both a cheerful and hard worker, first cleaning up the mess caused by the unexpected loss of gravity, then cleaning the Maru's water recycling system's filters. The last job was messy and required the person doing the cleaning to work in some very uncomfortable positions yet she had done the job well and with no complaints.

She had also been good to have around during their off time as well. Harper taught her how to play poker and much to his chagrin, she promptly cleaned him out. She no longer flinched when Rev moved in her direction and that evening when Harper began to have one of his periodic nightmares during their sleep period, she had been to one to try and comfort him.

The more Beka thought about it the more she wondered if letting Trance go on her way was a good idea. She really was an innocent and Dawkinstown Drift was an even harder place than Bathsheba. She would almost certainly end up walking the avenues of the orbital facility selling her body, and this time there might not be anyone to rescue her. It wouldn't be as if she was offering the girl charity, with Vexpeg's death the Maru was shorthanded. She could be trained, and she did seem to have more medical skill than any one else on board. She decided to see how the girl felt about staying on.

"You don't have to leave if you don't want to, Trance."

" What do you mean, Beka? I don't have to leave?"

" I mean I'm offering you a job here on the Maru. Since Vexpeg's no longer with us we could use the extra help. The Maru's best run with four people so we really could use you."

"Who's Vexpeg?"

"He was our environmental systems technician," answered Harper who had come up from the engine room to see Trance off. "He bought the farm shortly before we arrived on Bathsheba."

"He bought a farm? You mean he retired?"

"No, he bought the farm. A ripped vacuum suit and a faulty emergency seal."

"Oh, I see. But I don't know anything abut working on a starship. What would I do?"

"You can have Vexpeg's old job," answered Beka. "We can teach you what you need to know. Think about it. We're giving you a better offer than anything you're going to find out there". She pointed to the row of sleazy shops and bars at the edge of the landing zone. Then with a smile she added "And after how you saved all our lives I'd hate to loose our good luck charm"

"It does sound like fun. Do you really think I'd be useful?"

"You will be after I train you."

"Ok then. I'll stay. I think you're right, it is a better offer than what I'd find out there."

Harper let out a war whoop when he heard Trance's reply and Rev broke out into a big smile. Trance had to make an effort to control her shiver. A smiling Magog truly is a frightening thing.

Trance did a little dance as she put her backpack back on her bunk. Her vision of the probable future had been correct. These were the ones who were going to help her find her perfect future.

Prologue Chapter 2