R.S.S. Moonstone

by Mr. David R Dorrycott

Chapter Eight

We have mice in the walls!

First Officer Sandra Mathersit was currently relaxing in the Captain’s chair. It was shift three, thus finally Captain Roberts was sound asleep, and the better news was that they had linked up with Warheart late the day before. Now both ships, as always appearing as ghosts to each other, flew through Null Space. Both en-route to a destination still several weeks ahead. It had been a dull shift so far, as even in space humans tended to remain on the same biological time cycle as their Earth based ancestors. Nice and quite, exactly how Sandra...

Abruptly an unexpected clatter behind her caused the woman to spin around, only to fight to repress a laugh as a shapely rear end, tail wagging for balance, eased out of an access hatch. Unlike Captain Roberts, Sandra had made a point to memorize every crewman’s name, face and race. Of course, as Captain there was a greater workload she quickly reminded herself, and she certainly wasn’t looking at a face right now. As there was only one member of the Rodentia family aboard Moonstar that meant....

“Chief Ka. What do you think you are doing” she snapped in her best command voice.

Pulling herself, and a tangle of cables, from the hatchway Elleen Na Ka snapped to attention, having the forethought to drop her cables even as she formed a sharp salute. “Repair sector thirteen sensor channel” she reported.

“I see” Sandra commented. “And you entered through that access port when.” She threw off her own salute, noting with repressed pride how the mouse’s paw beat her own hand back to the ready.

“No Mam. Entered Sector ninety-one access port. Originally.”

“Which is in Engineering Two as I recall. How long have you been working Ka.”

“Fifty-one hours, nine minutes Mam.”

“Without a single break?”

Ka hesitated, a certain sign to the very few who really knew her that she was thinking about lying. After all, Sandra was only a woman. But Republic training held. “Standard five minute breaks each hour. As listed in Republic orders” she finally responded. “One half hour meal break every shift.”

“Sensor thirteen is?”

“Still not on-line” Ka reported. “Needs a buffer card replacement. On my way to find one now.”

Sensor thirteen Sandra knew, was one of the long range sensors only useable in Null space. However it faced aft, and Z minus if she remembered correctly. In her mind an image of the sensors and their positions formed. Yes, Z-minus. That anything would be below and behind them was normally unimportant. For almost a minute she toyed with the thought of ordering the little rodent to bed, but something Lt. Whikersham had mentioned a few weeks ago came to mind. Ka would be unable to sleep unless she had finished her work, or was completely exhausted. Currently, from her own observation, Sandra determined that the mouse though close to exhaustion was not quite there. “Repair the sensor, then get to your quarters and sleep” she ordered. “Full sleep cycle.”

“Yes Mam.”

As soon as the mouse had left there was a general muted laughter, and one rather nasty remark. Turning to the woman who had made that remark Sandra quickly worked through her options. “Rose. How would you like it if I called you a nigger” she asked calmly.

“I would report you to the Captain” the coal black skinned woman responded. “And send a letter of complaint to my Assemblyman.”

“Very good. The next time you call Ka a rat I am reporting you to the Captain. Then I am writing a letter to your assemblyman myself Do you understand?”

“But Mam. She is a rat.”

“No Ensign. Chief Ka is a mouse. On her world rats shared space with her kind for nearly seven thousand years. Until the mice decided that being both slaves and a mobile food source, wasn’t right. There are now no rat’s on dHar. Do you fully understand the meaning of that?”

“Yes Mam.”

“Very good. This conversation is officially over. Now, how long until we make our destination?”

“Eleven days, nine hours forty-one minutes plus before we drop to normal space” Rose responded, though as Science Officer it wasn’t really her responsibility to keep up with such data. “At sub-light speeds it will depend upon where we emerge as to the time to arrival. From weeks to a month I would guess.”

“Lets hope weeks. Our null generator needs repair and Chief Ka will need a stable platform to work on. I think she will also need some help. Would you like to volunteer Rose?”

“Yes Mam.”

“Very good. Until the generator is back up and running, from the moment it shuts down until it returns to service, you are her trainee. Congratulations, your going to learn engineering from one of the two best aboard this ship.”

“Yes Mam.” Suitably punished Rose Harrison went back to her computer. ‘Mom always said shooting off my mouth was going to cost me one day’ the black human told herself.

A few minutes later Chief Ka returned with a card in one paw and her tool kit on her shoulder. Reaching up with her free paw Elleen, who stood perhaps half the height of an average human, pulled herself up into the open access. Minutes later navigation reported that sensor thirteen was back on-line. A few minutes later the mouse woman exited again, sealed the access grate and carrying off hre gear departed for places unknown. Hopefully her bed Sandra told herself.

Sensor thirteen had been online less than thirty minutes, barely long enough for calibration when the sensor tech reported a ghost.

“Could it be a malfunction” Sandra asked.

“No Mam” the older crewman answered. “I’ve seen this before, in the wars. That’s a ship following us. He’s tucked in nice as you please. Just inside detection range.”

Sandra mulled over that information. Battle in Null Space was impossible. Ships were no more than ghosts to each other. Detectable ghosts yes, but still ghosts. Energy or matter fired from one would almost always pass harmlessly through the other. There were chances, but that would require hours of firing at a ship that would not be sitting still, or extreme luck with the first shot. Following a ship required one of two things. Knowing their destination and energy signal, or a damn good navigator. In this case she was betting that other ship had a damn good navigator. That they might know Moonstone’s destination was a nightmare she decided not to imagine. “Inform Warheart. Give her your data and keep an eye on her.”

“Yes Mam.” Turning to the communications officer he motioned for a channel patch. Like weapons, radio waves were useless in Null space. They were simply corrupted too badly for user, being stretched or compacted wildy by the energies just outside each ships screens. But you could transmit binary data with nothing more than an old fashioned searchlight and Morse code, as light was both a wave and a particle it was less disturbed by Null Space energies. It was slow, as the light shifted all along the visible scale, extremely short ranged but completely dependable. Though it took fifteen minutes for the entire conversation to be completed, soon Warheart was watching the same ghost, and looking for more.

More they eventually found. Two more. Chances that this might be a friendly ship dropped from maybe, to not in this life.