Weathering Storms Read online

  This time Ajjek curses weren’t sufficient. She let loose a string of curses from several galactic languages all invoking the wrath of many goddesses and gods to every demon that caused any type of bad thing to happen to anyone. She tried command after command, finally quit typing and just banged her fists against the console. But of course it did no good, the computers stayed down. Finally Sesha got up, checked the rest of the comps and left the almost useless Bridge.

  The Nestram woman mulled over the meaning of ‘primitive’ the computer gave her as she walked towards the shuttle bay. Her supplies were bundled in the blanket; she’d left the tools and other assorted items on the Bridge because she didn’t need them now. So – she pulled her mind away from the problem with the computers and refocused.

  Since there were no radio waves it meant this world was pre-electronic. That could mean all sorts of phases this world was going through. The woman remembered a report she heard the Head give - a spiel on this system a few trips ago – something about the culture being barbaric and paranoid, even about each other, so it was a strict avoidance policy.

  “…very backwards culture here, people… we pass through the middle of the system now as they can’t detect us unless they just happen to be looking through a powerful telescope and right at us, but in a few hundred years I’m sure we’ll be routing around here. Not all the continents are settled, our scans keep picking up wars breaking out all over the world. They appear to be very self-centered, so the thought of other-worldly peoples is not of great importance. This is an A-3 felony if contact is made with them, meaning mindwipe and imprisonment…”

  But what was she to do? How to get the water she needed from a backwards, paranoid culture? She’d try to land in an area that held no population, load some on and fly back. That would work – if the computers kept working. Hopefully the shuttles wouldn’t be affected by the BrainPan failure. Right. And the majority of suns in the Null don’t give off heat.

  First Sesha knew she needed clothing. Her blanket had been great the whole time here, it had even served to carry some of the stuff. But just a blanket wouldn’t be good enough unless the culture down there was like hers, where nudity was a non-issue. “Highly unlikely.” She snorted to her Wrist-Gem.

  “You know it d-darling,” he answered back sexily. Alarmed, Sesha looked down at her Gem. It was the first time ever she’d heard the computer glitch!

  Hoping that wouldn’t happen again for a long while, she first went back to Medical and picked up something she’d left there, then stopped at the uniform bunker. In her first sets of foraging, Sesha had found an ancient instrument in the Engineering section and recognized it. These crewmembers down here loved to pick up old artifacts in junk stores. They sold some too. when the more eccentric Uppers wanted to see what it was like in very barbaric times. This thing was just a bar of metal slightly bent on both ends. She’d taken it with her and used it to pry it open the unsecured lockers in Medical Bay. Worked great to wedge between the doors and push, pull or yank while swearing at the cabinet, and Sesha had done it all.

  Now she went to the Uniform locker in that section of the ship and did it all again. As she cursed and swore while leaning her weight against the door, she felt her back wounds tear open again, but she didn’t stop. Then the unit popped open and Sesha fell over backwards and again went into contortions from the pain. This was getting tiring… but she had to carry on. Nineteen lives depended on her.

  She started paging through the many types of body cover they had to find the one she needed. Hanger after hanger was shoved aside as she went through the many types of clothing in this closet. While she looked she thought about trying the pry bar on the TravelSleep beds and decided against it, remembering what happened when she'd used the metal pick before. If the shock had been that bad with a tiny metal pick, what kind of damage would be inflicted on her using the huge metal bar? No itenning way! And then Sesha swore again for the one she wanted wasn’t hanging up. Furious, the woman snatched down everything and flung them on the floor. Flush against the back of the locker was a small door with a keypad and smiling suddenly, Sesha typed in the code, the door swung open.

  Ah – here it was. She smiled as she lifted the folded item. The Model Aga Zero, a camouflage/light armor/multi-function type of suit. It was very thin skin-tight material, connected to her Wrist-Gem and whatever she aimed the Gem at, it copied. Even skin was copied well. Any color too, so she could even make that change if needed. Sesha sat and pulled the suit on, working the ultra-thin white material up over her body with much wincing and gasping as it tightened up around her injured areas. Her Gem was covered by the sleeve, but then the material right at that point split and reformed around the thin band so she could access it, and at the same time the Gem linked up with the computer in the suit’s hip band. There the material was three times thicker to accommodate the computer components that spanned her there, two inches wide.

  Now her Wrist Gem lit up, alarmed about her injuries again. Connected with the Aga Zero, it immediately assessed her injury fully and started the suit on taking minor first aid measures. It thickened itself slightly and put a little extra pressure on her back, knees and other cuts deeper than the dermis. After which it formed packing which was pressed into her uterus. As Sesha went down on her knees in agony, only inappropriate thoughts went through her mind.

  If I scar up, I’m going to be real angry. No amount of that expensive skin cream would ever make my skin as nice as it used to be.

  Then of course, reality intruded.

  If you can’t get the water back to the ship before it passes out of shuttle range, how soft your skin is would be a moot p-point, again, my dear. Damn the logic program, sometimes… she didn’t like the thought of living in a barbaric age completely planet bound. She didn’t like the thought of having to cobble up some kind of story to cover what differences she might have compared to the natives, or one about her back and lower injuries, and she truly didn’t like the thought of living without her Wrist Gem Computer! It looked like there was a chance of all that or never come in contact with the peoples down there if that was possible.

  No, dear Sesha… I hear what’s in your deepest desires. If we cannot effect the rescue we can come back, send the ship on a course out of the system so it won’t be discovered if the planet continues to evolve. If we can’t, then dear, we’ll go to sleep together. You know.

  I do, Gem. Thank you.

  From the clothing locker, the walk to the shuttle bay took one-half of a standard ship hour because she ate and drank while she walked, and when she arrived she found two other shuttles in the way of the one she wanted to use. Sesha tried the computer; there was a rotational system to shuffle the vehicles around but it wasn’t working at all. The only part not shut down was the ability to open and shut the Bay doors. All she could do was stand there and stare at the next stroke of terrible luck she had been dealt.

  Seriously depressed, Sesha crawled into her favorite shuttle and turned it on anyway.

  “There’s my program, safely cached in the hidey-hole I made for you. Not even Head knows it’s there!” She opened the file and skimmed through it. “I wonder… could I transfer the program to the first shuttle in line?” and decided she’d try. It moved just fine, as the problem with the main computer hadn’t reached the shuttle comps yet, and the less she used them, the better chance of their small Brains staying functional. Then she crossed to the one in line for launch and called up her program. But this shuttle only had half a load of fuel – just enough for a straight flight to the planet and back if she didn’t have any other problems. Like the ship moving on, slowly out of range. Which it would…

  “What about a parking orbit for the ship?” she wondered out loud. “Can I manage enough computer juice to get this thing into a parking orbit on the outer fringes?” She jumped out, determined to try and ignored the pain that went along with energetic movements.

  In Medical, she used the old tool artifact to smash ope
n cabinets until she found the containers of bloods and electrolyte fluids used when a critical medical emergency came up. “Yes… she compared the labels to the ones the computer had shown her. “These have enough of the components of the brain fluid, blood keeps our brains alive too and this one…” she picked up one that was different, “is one small container of real person fluid for the brain! Sorry guys… hope no one has a bad accident or gets an infection before we get home.” She took that too. Into her trusty blanket it went and over her shoulder onto her aching back the load settled. Off Sesha went again.

  “I figure,” she panted, “by the time I’m done running all over this damn cargo ship I’ll not have a single gram of fat anywhere! Even my breasts and tush are going to be flat flaps of skin from all this cardio work I’m doing.” She paused a minute to catch her breath, shifted the blanket to the other shoulder and trotted off again.

  Down in the BrainPan she dumped all the fluids she had into the device and waited with bated breath to see if her wild idea would work. The fluids were thin, and she could see them running through the tubes that sent the vital fluids to the computer parts that used them to run. Instead of electrical currents like so many ancient or otherworldly devices used, a simple fluid full of certain elements gave the computers the energy and speed to run a whole planet from one mainframe.

  A few lights came on, then a few more, and she heard the normal soft hum of the computer. It wasn’t steady – she could hear it stutter and hesitate, but maybe, just maybe it was enough. She quickly typed into the console there where to put the most power.

  Now Sesha ran, ran like all the demons in her curses were after her, ran for the Bridge and hope. Ran till she thought she’d fall flat from exhaustion and pain but kept going.

  Yes! The Bridge Nav comp was running so she programmed in the numbers and set the course coordinates. Watching with bated breath – again – she saw the star field change as the ship slowly responded to its new objective. “Come on, ship, move… yes…”

  But she waited until she was sure the course was taken and the ship firmly set in orbit before she went back to the shuttle. Her last chore was to shunt most of the computing power left to life-support, keeping the TravelSleep beds running, the atmospheres needed circulating and the tubed fluids flowing through the other nineteen crewmembers so they could stay alive for however long this would take her. Everything else got shut down, and then she laid down in the shuttle for some sleep. She’d been up for two standard days now and before going on, it was necessary that she rest.

  Now – now it was time to go planetside. The girl was doing it so far.

  5

  Of course, Sesha thought sourly, something has to go wrong. In the course of all the butt dump I’m getting, something else just has to go wrong.

  This line of thought came on the heels of two more problems –the shuttle’s automatic computer suddenly shut down, necessitating a fast switch to manual. It also meant she lost all but her own eyesight for where to land the shuttle, check the weather and other whether-or-nots she’d have to handle as they arose.

  So of course she ran into foul weather because she wasn’t watching her line of sight, but kept turning the shuttle – well, bouncing it back and forth off wind currents actually – to find a place to land.

  And flying in a squall meant she couldn’t see very well, so as she angled lower a forest was suddenly in her way. With much swearing she managed to skim the tops of most of the trees for several miles before her carefully allotted amount of fuel ran out and it was time to land now.

  So Sesha landed. Not really even that, more like slammed down into a thicket of young trees after she cut off the engines. About ten standard Alliance miles from a southern coastal ocean, she figured, from the brief glimpse of the land mass scanner before it shut down too. After she’d unstrapped herself from the seat and her head stopped its rattling, Sesha looked at what readouts she had, and Glorious Bemmen Goddess of Luck Arish’ia, she’d done good. A little fuel in reserve just in case the ship was on the far side of the orbit when she got her load in. Of course now getting the amount of seawater she needed from the ocean to here was going to present a new challenge. She’d get to that when the time came.

  Sesha crept out of the shuttle, a flash tube at the ready. These weapons gave mostly non-lethal painful burns on low and medium settings. It was a rough sort of laser beam, crude compared to the weapons the officers carried. Those could completely disintegrate whatever they applied it to if it was set that high. Sesha liked this kind of miniature flame thrower, though. She enjoyed knowing whomever she used it on would hurt for a long, long time. Would make anyone think twice if they ever saw or even heard a victim of a flash tube. Even death was preferred over a flash burn.

  So what type of savages live here? Sesha pondered that as she ventured out. When no one appeared, she pulled down branches and threw piles of leaves until the shuttle was covered up pretty well. Even if it was found, the entry was set up with a force field that would knock them for a loop and not let them in. Only Sesha knew how to disarm it before entering. She sat down with a sigh and gave her back a break after all the activity. She was beginning to think her back would never heal because everything she had to do kept breaking it open again.

  Setting off through the woods, Sesha periodically marked trees with a burned on backwards arrow as she walked, trying to keep a straight line. This way she’d see how to get back to the shuttle without tramping all through the forest chasing a homing signal on her Wrist Gem that might give out anyway if the comps kept degrading.

  After about a standard hour’s tramping she came to a sort of road. It was apparent that large animals, indigenous people and even some sort of heavy-wheeled ground vehicle used this. So Sesha followed it, hoping it’d lead where she needed to go. Here the Aga Zero helped immensely… one of its programs allowed the wearer to alter their body’s gravity. Sesha set it a bit higher and experimented as she first walked, then finally was making great strides that ate up the miles quickly. It would have been nice to use on the ship, but the chances of running into a bulkhead was too great, she would have knocked herself out if that had happened. The suit also helped by holding her injured back firmly while she strode along; it also lessened the impact on her whole body, so she was able to move along easily.

  Whoa, she told her Wrist-Gem, which instantly relayed it to the Aga Zero’s computer and even as Sesha was using her legs to stop her forward motion, the suit compensated and slowed her down rapidly. Ahead of her was a crude camp, with small homes staked on slender young trees cut down and de-branched, and almost naked reddish-skinned people going about their quiet business. Sesha stepped into the trees so they wouldn’t see her, then aimed the jewel on her Wrist Gem at surrounding bushes, scanned them and tapped in the code for camouflaging her Aga Zero. Suddenly everything but her face and hands looked like the vegetation and she had the suit ensure no body odor escaped either. Those medium sized brown and black four-legged animals appeared to use their noses a lot, meaning she could be detected. But her suit was working well and she trusted that she would not be discovered.

  So Sesha sat back in the bushes and watched until it grew dark. This was a relaxed people, everyone doing something but lazily – the chill could be a factor, Sesha surmised. After a while everyone went to their own place and settled for sleep, secure in the fact that their world would be the same tomorrow as it was today, and that no one would want to wreck their lives. Sesha crept out when all was silent and used her light on the Wrist-Gem to see the road as she headed back at a slower pace.

  To her relief the road passed within several yards of the shuttle, so Sesha spent the night in her own little world, almost as secure as the people she observed were. She slept in the Pilot’s chair, her feet propped in the Co Pilots chair; her favorite position, and the one that had gotten her the last write-up Head had given her. Well now she had no fear of that and slept fairly well.

  The next day Sesha went the othe
r way down the road. As she bounded along at low gravity she thought about the red-skinned people she’d seen and their quiet life. Of course, thousands of years ago her people had been just as uncivilized, but she was glad she was living in a technologically advanced time.

  This time as she was striding she found a ravine that extended partway into the road. She was going to ignore it except it caught her boot just as she was pushing off again and she fell sideways, hurting her back as she twisted. The trapped heel yanked free and Sesha tumbled – but lightly- down the rest of the way. Laying quiet finally the Nestram woman swore as loudly as she could over the pain – not looking at her Wrist Gem, she already knew it was it was recording alarms about almost every inch of her body.

  Quieting, Sesha started moving gingerly to rise and heard a noise, an animalistic one, so she carefully – cursing under her breath – crawled forward and down a little more.

  There she found the ravine held a secret – a small but almost whole traveling wagon. As Sesha got on one knee and parted some dead, stiff vegetation, she discovered a large creature that was attached to the conveyance. Almost dead from exposure and starvation, the beast was wild enough that when she approached it, it made an awful noise and lashed out its front legs at her, so she backed up. It awed her that something this huge and so close to dead could be so vigorous. Sesha crept around the once-beautiful creature, thinking how it resembled an Alicë from the planet Ven-ven except this thing had only four legs, and the Alicë had six. It could run fast on four, but when it put down the middle pair riders often fell off if not secured well enough! Maybe in its prime this thing would be quite powerful…

  The wagon contained three bodies, two males and one female. All three had bloody wounds in bodies that were decaying, and Sesha guessed they were maybe a couple standard weeks deceased. Who they were and why they were there was and always would be a mystery. Sesha shook her head at the sight of it all after carefully examining them and left it just as it was. These people, whatever the skin color were close in makeup to her, she noted. Blood was somewhat darker though and body shape appeared identical.