The Space Between Page 32

  Kim heard a noise and spun to see Meledrin and Tuki watching her.

  "What is the matter, Kim?"

  She went up to the captain's chair, as if the different angle might change what she saw, change the significance of what she was seeing. "We need to go get Keeble up here."

  "I will get him, mo'shi." Tuki disappeared down the stairs, but the light of his lamp seemed to linger for a long time.

  "Mel, you might as well take a seat. Up here."

  The elf sniffed but made her way to the second central seat. The others arrived a few minutes later.

  "Will the two of you please sit down over there," Kim said, pointing to the side of the ship with the larger chairs.

  While Cuto loitered by the door, Tuki did as he was asked, selecting the seat in the sphere, perhaps because it reminded him of the skyglass.

  Keeble stayed near the alien. "Why should I? What's going on?"

  "I think I've worked something out." Though it was crazy.

  "So? What's it got to do with me?"

  Kim sighed. "Everything, Keeble. Just sit down."

  He grumbled, but stumped across to the seat. "Dwarves have known about chairs for centuries. I could have told you about them and saved you the strain of thinking." He sat down and looked at the seat. He wiggled a bit and swung his feet. They were well off the floor. "It's a bit big."

  "Yes. Isn't it?" Kim chewed on her thumbnail for a moment. "Okay. Now, both of you swap to the chairs over the other side, please."

  "For Whistler's sake, woman, make up your mind."

  But Keeble and Tuki walked across to the other side of the bridge and stepped up onto the platform.

  The dwarf sat down and nodded. "That's much better."

  But Tuki couldn't even get his knees under the console.

  Keeble noticed straight away. "That's interesting."

  Kim nodded. "Isn't it?"

  "But what does it mean?"

  "It means this ship was made for us."

  "How could they know we were coming?" Tuki asked.

  "No, not us in particular, but people like us. We're from four of the six tribes. A long time ago humans were genetically engineered, or changed by the gods or whatever, so we could help fly this ship." She slumped back into the pilot's chair. Was she supposed to be sitting there? She didn't know what the controls in front of Meledrin's chair were for, exactly, but seeing she wasn't about to let the elf drive she gave no thought to switching.

  "Does this assist us in any useful manner?"

  Kim looked about, as if knowing the secret of the seats might have let the ship start on its own. Nothing happened, so she went to stand near Keeble. She chewed on her lip as she thought.

  "It tells us that these controls are for engineering." She hoped she was right, otherwise they were back to square one and going nowhere. "When they're working, Keeble, you can keep track of all of the systems on the ship. Do you understand? In a car there is the oil gauge and the temperature gauge and fuel gauge. This is where all those things will be for this ship." Keeble was nodding his head and studying the layout, as if it would mean anything without power.

  "Tuki, your seat is one of those two back over there."

  Unlike the seats for Keeble and his missing partner, the seats on the opposite side were obviously at two different sets of controls. Kim looked from one to the other but was unsure where Tuki should sit.

  Tuki was in the sphere chair again, studying the dozen or so controls on the armrests as if each would bring on a different, equally hideous form of torture. Among all the buttons there was what appeared to be a trackball on each side, and two pedals. The other seat faced three monitors. There was a clear space right in the middle, as if somebody had forgotten to install a very large keyboard or, perhaps, forgotten to install another trackball. There was a large depression in the console where such a thing might have fitted. To either side of that were a few buttons and a joystick.

  Kim looked from one set of controls to the next, looking for some clue as to what they were for. Finally, she saw it.

  With an excited laugh, she crossed to Tuki and took hold of the skyglass. He was reluctant to let it go, but Kim smiled. "It's okay, Tuki. You're in the wrong seat, though, and I'll need this for just a moment."

  He let the ball go and Kim took a deep breath, gave a small prayer, and slotted the skyglass into the depression on the console. It fitted perfectly and clicked satisfyingly into place. Kim took another deep breath and smiled to herself. Three quarters of the ball was visible above the counter.

  The console beeped. A single light flashed.

  Kim almost cheered. She gripped the console so tight her fingers hurt.

  Cuto said something and finally moved away from the stairs to look.

  "I hope this thing doesn't run on Windows," Kim said, voice quavering. The joke was lost on everyone else.

  "What did you do?" Keeble raced across the room.

  "I think I found the key." It's a strange sort of key, she thought, but perhaps there were other ways to get it started as well.

  All around, systems were coming to life. Light flooded the room.

  Kim smiled fully now, more relieved than she thought completely necessary. She felt like doing a jig but didn't think it was appropriate — she was in charge, after all. Apparently. She tried to sound businesslike. "Alrighty then. Let's see what we've got."

  She looked up and discovered Keeble standing by Tuki's seat, examining the skyglass and its new home. The image shown in the 'glass was also hanging in the air above it in all its 3D glory.

  "Why are you standing here, Keeble? I'm pretty sure you'll have a computer over at your console that tells you how everything works."

  The dwarf glanced over to the other side of the flight deck, then back at Kim. A broad smile split his face, and he ran back to his seat. Kim followed at a more leisurely, dignified pace, to see if she could help get him started.

  When she got there, crouching down so she didn't feel like a teacher looking down at a preschooler, Kim found herself looking at a screen full of meaningless writing and what looked like iconic buttons. None of it meant anything to her.

  "So, how do we start the engines then, woman?"

  Kim chose to ignore Keeble's tone. "No idea. It might not even be done from this console." Kim made her way back up the stairs to the pilot's seat and examined the brightly lit array of controls while Meledrin puzzled her way through menus on Keeble's computer. She listened vaguely as she chose a button at random and pressed it. She was fairly relieved when nothing happened.

  She chose another button, and when she pressed it a buzzer sounded from various speakers. It sounded more like a paging system than an alarm and came from speakers at all the consoles and probably all around the ship. She spoke into what might have been a microphone. "Hello." She wondered if she could be heard from outside.

  After that, she decided to quit while she was ahead. She didn't want to start the engines then find out the ship was in gear.

  Over at the engineering console, Keeble was making progress with Meledrin's assistance.

  "Propulsion," Keeble said, and hit the button himself.

  Meledrin struggled with the next list, spending a long time with her eyes closed and talking silently to herself. "Clocks, Gravitic Field generators, Ohoga Engines..."

  "What does Gravitic mean?" Kim wandered back over to look, as if it would make a difference.

  "I am unsure. But the tree on Sherindel where the gate is located is called the Ohoga tree."

  Kim wanted to say something enlightening, but nothing came to her.

  Meledrin shrugged.

  "Maybe the guy who invented the engine found the gates?" Kim suggested.

  She shrugged again.

  "Try 'Ohoga Engines,' then."

  They did, and Keeble spent the next five minutes examining what appeared to be a wiring diagram.

  "Not very detailed," he complained.

  Kim had to agree. If there were ten wir
es in the 'Ohoga Engines,' then being able to point out the Big Dipper would make her an astrophysicist. "This is probably a simplified version. All the good stuff will be in the engineering bay. Or in some other section."

  "Good. But this won't let me start anything. The Ohoga Engines are those two bits at the front connected to the batteries and the antennae." He looked closer. "They are connected to the clocks, as well, and one button."

  "Really?" Kim said. "Well, these clocks just keep getting more interesting, don't they? What about the other one? What does Gravitic mean, Mel?"

  "I told you, I am unaware of the meaning."

  "Doesn't help a lot, really. And 'clocks' is in the propulsion section?" That didn't mean a lot either, without more information to go with it. "Try the gravity thing then."

  31: Alignment

  Keeble fumbled through some menus with Meledrin looking over his shoulder and carefully reading each heading in her self-important voice. He knew he wouldn't have made any progress without the elf's help, but that didn't mean she was any less annoying. Eventually they made their way to a diagram that told Keeble what he wanted to know. After examining the screen for a moment, he got out of his chair, crossed to the pilot's console and counted buttons. It was Kim watching over his shoulder this time.

  When he found the right button he pushed. The whole ship hummed quietly for a moment. Then it shuddered violently. Lights dimmed and an alarm sounded. Keeble quickly hit the button again and stillness returned.

  "What just happened?" Kim asked.

  Keeble shrugged. "I think something's wrong."

  "You don't say."

  Keeble looked at Kim. It looked as if she wanted to solve all their problems in a moment.

  She gave a decisive nod. "Okay then, here's what we need to do. Keeble, you need to get to the engineering bay and see if you can find out what's wrong with the engines. For that, you'll need Meledrin to help with the reading."

  "I don't need her help. I think I'm starting to understand the writing already."

  "Maybe, but Meledrin will make it quicker and easier." Kim laughed. "She's our communications expert. So bloody obvious."

  "You learned to speak this language in a matter of hours yourself, Kim," Meledrin pointed out. "As did Keeble."

  "Yeah, I know, but you're still the expert. You seem to be able to learn any language. Maybe when the gods redesigned man, they wanted to make sure we'd always be able to understand each other enough to get by, so they hardwired a language into us. And into elves, they hardwired the ability to learn any language."

  Keeble thought it sounded a bit ridiculous, but then so did so many other things that were happening.

  "Very well."

  "Well, let's all get down to engineering then, shall we?" Kim said with a smile. "Let's see about getting the engine started. I'll be your assistant, Keeb'."

  "I don't need an assistant." How could she assist? She'd do nothing more than get in the way.

  "Yes, you do, and we need to learn as well, just in case."

  "Do you even know what the Gravitic Field Generator is?"

  "No. Do you? Maybe 'Gravitic' has something to do with gravity. Or antigravity?"

  "Antigravity isn't possible." But Keeble wasn't willing to bet what might be possible any more.

  "The CIA seems to think the aliens use antigravity."

  Keeble wanted to know more but wasn't about to show that. "And what is Tuki going to do during all of this? If you knew anything about leading, you'd know that it isn't good to have one person just sitting around doing nothing. It's bad for morale."

  "Tuki can continue doing what he's doing. It may be the most important job on the ship."

  Keeble looked across at the moai. It didn't look like he was doing much at all. Ever since his silly globe had clicked into place, he had stared at the projected image that hung in the air above it.

  Kim seemed to suddenly think the same thing, for she went over and encouraged Tuki to play and experiment.

  "But what if I do something wrong?" he asked. "What if I break something?"

  Kim smiled for him. "I doubt it's possible to do either. Just play with the controls and see what happens."

  As if to demonstrate, Kim did something and the suspended image changed, scrolling to the left.

  "There you go, see?"

  Tuki's eyes lit up. He smiled and nodded and hesitantly reached out to do something himself.

  Meledrin was talking with Cuto, waving her arms about as she did. "Cuto wishes to assist with the repairs," the elf said eventually.

  "Great," Keeble muttered.

  Kim said it as well, but she sounded as if she meant it. "Maybe you should start teaching us Cuto's language as well."

  "The spoken words may be beyond all of us, in the end. Just a minute of conversation hurts my throat tremendously. But the hand signs will perhaps be easier."

  "Just as long as we can start to understand each other. Which will mean the hurgon leaders will understand us as well."

  Meledrin nodded. "In the future, I will talk in this language and do the hurgon signs. I shall, for a while, try to use the signs as much as possible when others are speaking." She was already suiting words to actions, waving her hands as she spoke. Keeble tried to match them up. The alien interrupted her, and she stopped to listen. "Cuto says the hand signals are called ini rituals. The kil'ini are unable to hear, so the rituals were designed to make it possible to communicate with them."

  "Cool. Be prepared for lots of questions, too," Kim said, and the elf waved her hands.

  Sick of waiting, Keeble headed for the engineering department. The others, except for Tuki, hurried to catch up. Now that there was power, the elevators were working so the trip was quite a bit quicker than it had been previously. One elevator from under the captain's chair down to level one. Then another to level 7.

  Down in engineering, Keeble immediately took charge. He took a seat at the computer, Meledrin and Kim towering over him as he started to go through the menus.

  Like Kim had said, the computers up on the flight deck showed only the bare essentials. It would have taken him a lifetime to discover anything important on them. But in engineering he was able to power forward. The computers told him everything, slow process though it was.

  Cuto watched as well, occasionally offering suggestions, but hanging back for the most part. When a dull boom reverberated throughout the ship the alien hardly seemed to even notice. The lights dimmed, then came back to life.

  Meledrin stopped reading for a moment. "What was that?" She forgot the ini rituals but corrected her mistake a moment later.

  "The Americans, probably," Kim said, "still trying to get in."

  Keeble grunted. "Not much we can do about it."

  But Kim had other ideas. "Maybe not, but the computer will probably tell us if they're doing anything we need to worry about."

  "Really?"

  "Yep. Somewhere."

  They went back to the start of the menus and, in 'Maintenance', found 'Hull'. According to the diagrams, the hull was slightly damaged, but whether that was recent or fifty thousand years old was impossible to tell.

  The muffled thud a few seconds later helped.

  "Looks good," Kim said.

  "How?" Meledrin asked, waving her arms and flicking her fingers. She looked slightly shocked, which was a lot for her. "Surely this graphic indicates that the vessel is damaged." She obviously didn't understand.

  "Yes, we're damaged," Keeble said with a sigh. "But nothing changed with that last explosion, so the Americans didn't cause it."

  "If you are sure?" Meledrin looked to Kim, as if Keeble's explanation wasn't enough. She remembered the ini rituals after a moment of hesitation, and Keeble tried to follow.

  "I think we're safe for now."

  "Right, but we should still get out of here," Keeble said. "What does this say?"

  "Let me know what you come up with," Kim said. "I'm going down to the hold to see what I can find."

>   Cuto said something.

  "You were going to help with the repairs," Meledrin translated.

  Kim looked at the computer. "Yeah, but I guess I know my limits. If Cuto is a radio technician, he should be able to help more than me."

  "Cuto is not a male," Meledrin pointed out, again.

  "Whatever. Look, I'm going. Let me know if you do actually need me."

  Keeble was back at work before she had left the room.

  Another half an hour in the 'Maintenance' program, and he discovered that the Gravitic Field Generators were out of alignment by 9.67 percent. He didn't quite know what that meant. But he thought he knew how to fix it.

  Another explosion shook the ship as Keeble got up from his chair and went to find Kim. He found her talking to herself in a huge metal packing container.

  "How desperately do we want to fly?" he asked poking his head through the door.

  She nearly brained him with a metal bar.

  "What do you mean?" Recovering her composure, she wiped sweat from her brow and sat down.

  "I think I could have us flying in a couple of hours, but not in optimum circumstances."

  "Meaning?"

  He sighed. "Meaning, the two Gravitic Field Generators are out of alignment. If I disconnect them and we run off only one, that should solve the problem. I think. But then we're left with the question of which generator is aligned correctly, and can I realign them once we're flying." Keeble knew what he'd choose. He'd be flying as soon as possible and worry about the rest later.

  But he had to admit that Kim was in charge and probably the best person for the job. It wasn't something he wanted to admit. It wasn't something that he should have to admit. It wasn't right. But Kim had managed to get them all to this point. She was the only one who understood something of all the areas they might happen to need. She could fly a plane, and she'd worked out other things.

  But there was more to leading than knowing things. There was also acting, making a decision and running with it, and Keeble had never known any woman who could do that when it was really needed.

  "Worse case scenario if we go with the one generator?" Kim asked.