Ships of My Fathers Page 11

  “Well, if it’s going to be significant or for more than an hour or so, yes, we can make course adjustments, but in a ship this size, it’s better just to reorient the sails a little. Otherwise, the shearing forces along the spine can start to cause damage.”

  He thought about the kind of twists and slews the Sophie used to do in flight and tried to imagine the Heinrich attempting that. “I got it. So you’re here to change the polarization?”

  Zane nodded. “Kind of. The navigator can actually drive it from her station, but we’re here to do any hands-on recalibration if the sails don’t respond to her orders.”

  “Her orders?”

  He nodded. “In fact, here comes one now,” he said pointing to the monitor. “See that line dip there? That’s the tachyon capture rate on the port ventral sail. If that doesn’t come back up in another few seconds…”

  Several more lights jumped to life on the display as Gabrielle’s voice came on over the speaker. “Navigator ordering sail change, port-side ventral, two degrees clockwise, one degree starboard.”

  Michael sat upright. “What do we do?”

  Zane eased him back down with his hand. “Hopefully nothing, but watch the panel. See the sail adjusting?”

  He looked back down at the displays and heard the whine of shifting motors above him in the sail generator. The polarization angle was adjusting, first one degree, then one and a half, and eventually two degrees clockwise of its original position. Meanwhile, the sail had tilted itself starboard by a degree. The tachyon capture rate display began to trend back up and after another moment or two settled in on the center line where it had been before.

  “See,” Zane said. “We’re here to make sure it responds according to her orders.”

  “And if it doesn’t?”

  “Then we’ve got a lot of work to do, and we have to do it fast. Usually, of course, there’s no hitch, but on that run out to Taschin we hit a nasty patch of turbulence and had both the upper sails lock in the wrong position. We had to drop to about half-speed for two hours while we sorted it out.”

  Michael nodded. Sophie’s sail had jammed on him a few times, pushing them off course, but he knew how to smooth it out. There was a feel to it, he thought, where you could time the power fluctuations to dampen out the sail vibrations.

  But looking up at the four massive generators around him, he knew that it would take him a while to learn the feel of these engines.

  He caught up with Gabrielle after dinner. After that day in engineering, navigation was taking on a whole new dimension.

  “Yeah, I heard you were down in engineering today,” she said as they settled into the small common room at the end of his section of deck four.

  “Was that typical? I mean, the four sail shifts?”

  She considered it. “Pretty typical. Sometimes there are more, sometimes less. I almost never get through a shift without moving the sails at least once, but like today, they’re almost always small shifts. Anything more than that and we would change course.”

  He nodded. “How often does that happen?”

  She shrugged. “Depends, maybe every two or three weeks. We’re almost always in the main shipping lanes, and we have good data on those, so there’s rarely anything to skirt around that we didn’t already plan for when setting out from port. But then last week we got surprised by a transient eddy moving across the lane.”

  “And can you order a course change on your own?”

  “Technically no. Whoever has the bridge gives that order, usually the XO on my shift, but I’ve never had a course change overridden on the Heinrich.” She smiled to herself. “On my last post I had a captain who was always second guessing, but Corazon has confidence in me.”

  He thought about it. He did not think the XO had much confidence in him. “What’s she like, the XO? I’ve really only talked to her once,” he said. He did not add that it had almost devolved into insubordination.

  “She’s good,” Gabrielle answered, glancing around lowering her voice. “She’s practically a captain on her own, licensed and everything.”

  Michael let his confusion show. “Then why is she here?”

  “It’s how S&W selects new captains. They pull a stint as XO for either Dad or old man Williams, but since he’s been flying a desk back on Callista Prime, it’s pretty much just Dad. If they pass muster, then the next captain slot that opens is theirs.”

  “And if they don’t?”

  “Usually they end up serving as first officer on another of our ships, but Dad bounced the last one right out of the company. I never heard the full story, but she had to cash out all her shares at a discount.”

  “Shares?”

  “Yeah, ship shares as opposed to corporate shares. You know about ship shares, right?”

  He shook his head still not understanding. Malcolm had simply been the owner, no questions asked. Sure, he gave out bonuses after particularly successful runs, but no one else had any claim of shares on the Sophie.

  “Wow,” Gabrielle said. “I guess when you grow up with it, it’s all part of the background of life. Corporate shares are shares in the S&W company, and they give you certain voting rights along with a dividend from corporate profits. Ship shares are shares in your own ship. They don’t have voting rights or anything — after all, the captain’s word is law — but they give you a share of the ship’s profit. Corporate always hangs onto at least thirty percent of the ship’s shares, but it’s common for the crew to hold the majority.”

  “Which kind is better?”

  “Depends on the ship. For a good ship like the Heinrich, ship shares make you a lot more money, so I’ve been shifting as many of my corporate shares over as I can.” She must have seen his confusion, so she went on. “You can move shares back and forth between ship and corporate at a rate based on the ship’s past performance. The Heinrich buy-in is a steep price, but I think it’s worth it.”

  Michael thought about it, trying to understand the shifting ownership structures between corporate and crew. “But wouldn’t you be better off buying into a poorer ship and turning it around?”

  She shrugged. “I’d have to be on that other ship, or course, but if I could bring in enough of the right crew, maybe. That’s actually how a lot of our newer captains make their mark. Captain Kashari did that on the Jack of Diamonds two years ago. She got her posting, hand selected four officers to buy in with her, and they turned it from the laggard of the fleet into the third best earner, which given its smaller size is saying something.”

  Michael was not about to give up on Sophie, but he was curious about his own prospects. “What about me? Do I have any shares?”

  Gabrielle shrugged. “Dad would know. Since you’re family, you automatically earn a few ship shares, but not very fast. Still, you’re bound to have some corporate shares from your folks. Uncle Pete died young, of course, but I think Grandfather staked him out pretty well.”

  Grandfather? That was a bit much to take in. “And how is Gramps?”

  She shook her head. “Died two years ago. Dad took it hard. I think that’s why he was so glad to find you.”

  Michael shuddered. “He’s got a funny way of showing it.”

  She frowned. “I don’t know what happened in the past, but I can tell you the future. Sooner or later, you’re going to have to make peace with him.”

  “Why should I?” he scoffed.

  She set her jaw. “He’s family, just like I am, and we’re the only family you have now.”

  He shook his head. “He’s the one that walked away. He’s the one who has to make peace with me.”

  Chapter 12

  “I once thought I’d found my place in life, but then the place moved.” — Malcolm Fletcher

  THE REST OF THE WEEK went by in a blur. He pulled shifts in mechanical, technical, aft environmental — little more than a watch-stander — and one on the bridge. He observed the pilot and got a few simulations from the communications officer, but mostly he sat nex
t to Gabrielle and watched her at the navigation console.

  He had seen displays like it before on Sophie, but he did not understand them any more now than he had then. Still, she was patient and tried to explain as it was happening. “See that inflection point on the crosswind third derivative,” she said, pointing. “If that holds, we’ll get an inflection on the second derivative and may have to shift sails to compensate.”

  “But… why do you care about the crosswind? I mean, the whole point of the polarization filters on the sails is to only capture the on-axis wind, right?”

  “Yes, but you have to understand the shape of the tachyon winds in all four dimensions including spin. See there,” she said, pointing again, “we’re heading into a second derivative inflection on the crosswind. See how the on-axis capture is starting to slacken off?”

  That much he knew how to read. It was almost an exact duplicate of the readout in engineering. “Yeah, but how could you tell it was coming?”

  She shook her head in disappointment. “Because the inflection points on the crosswind derivative told me we were riding through the leading edge of an eddy curve.”

  He shook his own head. So much math. “And you knew it was an eddy curve and not shock front because...?”

  She shrugged. “The coefficient curve looks different. I can show you the proof in the integrals later, but right now I have orders to give.” She nodded to the XO and opened up the comm to the drive section. “Navigation ordering sail change, starboard side both, three degrees up, eight degrees counter-clockwise.”

  It went on from there. He never saw his uncle, but he felt him twice. It was something in the way the rest of the bridge crew stiffened when he came on deck. At one point, he would swear Hans had been standing right behind him, but he never turned to look, and his uncle never said a word.

  Michael spent most of his evenings split between the gym and his quarters studying names and faces. With all the shifts he had pulled, he had already met everyone, and most were becoming familiar, but he did not want to take any chances. He kept flashing through the crew manifest on his monitor until he felt he could remember them all.

  By the sixth day, the rest of the crew had taken on a new ritual in the corridors. Every time they approached, they would cover up their name patches, and call out, “Hey, new guy!” He would then call back with their name, department, and shift. It was a little maddening, but he was growing in confidence that he would pass whatever test they had in mind.

  The sixth night, he got a message from Corazon. “Report to my office, 08:00. Not 08:01.”

  He set himself an alarm for six and ran through the faces one more time until he was confident. It occurred to him then, that in all the faces he had looked at, there was one he had never pulled up: Peter Schneider. He was not on the crew of course, but he figured there had to be some records of his biological father in the computer. He started to type the name into the search field but stopped himself.

  “No,” he said aloud. “The last thing I need right now is one more face.”

  He woke before his alarm, decided against running through the faces again, took a shower, and got dressed. He was the first in line at breakfast. They had not even finished setting out all the food, but he could see what he was in store for. All three of the galley crew had taped over their name and department patches.

  He took it as best as he could. While waiting at the counter, he greeted each one in turn. Name, department, shift. He snagged three kolaches and some eggs.

  He sat where he could watch the doors, and sure enough, each crewmember coming in had taped over their patches. They would wave and call out, “Hey, new guy!” and he would respond with name, department, and shift.

  It seemed like everyone cycled through breakfast that morning, even those on the third shift. His neighbor Karen called out from the line, holding two steaming biscuits, “Hey, new guy!”

  And so it went. Name, department, shift. Name, department, shift.

  He had not kept count, but when the line stopped growing, he felt he had gotten them all but two, his uncle and the XO. It was still only 07:20.

  He thought about going up then and seeing if the XO was in yet, but he did not want to look desperate. Instead, he wandered around deck three for a while, peeking in at the clock in the galley on every orbit. When it finally reached 7:45 he went up.

  He pressed the signal on the XO’s door, but he heard no response. A flip-down seat hung from the wall outside her office, so he took it. The shift change was well underway, but most of them ignored him as they filtered past. The one person who did pause to speak was the last one he would have expected.

  It was his uncle.

  He paused upon entering the hall at the rear of the bridge. He glanced down at him, but he did not try to make eye contact. “Michael,” he said.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Good luck,” he said, and then walked into his own office.

  The XO walked past at 7:55 and paused at the door. “I told you to report at oh-eight-hundred.”

  He hopped to his feet. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “It’s five ’til.”

  He nodded. “Yes, ma’am. You also told me not to report at eight oh one. You did not give any orders about not arriving before that.”

  She took a sip of her coffee. “Very well then, I’ll see you in five minutes.”

  He watched her go into her own office and leaned back against the bulkhead, banging his head against it softly.

  At 7:59 he stepped to her door and looked forward at the clock on the center viewscreen of the bridge. With ten seconds left, he put his finger on the chime, and when the clock ticked over, he pressed it.

  The door opened, and he walked in. The XO looked up from behind her desk. “Well, I see you’ve learned the lesson of punctuality.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And did you learn any other lessons this week?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Several.”

  She took another sip of her coffee. It was already half gone. “And what would you say was the most important lesson to you, personally?”

  His eyes went wide. The list of names and faces flashed by, of course, but that hardly counted as a lesson. He had definitely been impressed by the off-axis sail polarization, but then there had been that glimmer of insight when he finally saw that the navigation math truly could tell you about the shape of the tachyon winds. Of course, he also remembered matters of water pressure, multi-user computer management, measuring lubrication viscosity on the lift rails, and algae life cycles.

  He had already known many of these skills. Most were a little different on Heinrich than they had been on Sophie, but Malcolm had taught him well. That, of course, reminded him of one of the very first lessons, with Harry taking him in hand and showing him how to run the patch-stitcher. Without that he would not have even had his own name.

  He opened his mouth to tell the XO precisely that, but he caught himself. Harry could have told him he was out of luck. Charlie could have let his uncle find him on that first shift, deep in the plumbing, but he had not. And then Zane had guided him back along the spine to report to his first engineering shift, and Gabrielle had gone to great lengths to show not merely how the math worked but why it mattered. Yes, he was family, for whatever that mattered to the various cousins, but he was fundamentally the New Guy, dumb and useless.

  He realized he was standing there with his mouth hanging open as Corazon looked up at him, so he closed it, blinked a couple of times and said the first thing that rolled out of his brain. “The crew looks out for each other.”

  She smiled. “That’s a good answer. Not your first one though?”

  He shrugged. “I thought about the name patch machine,” he confessed.

  She chuckled. “Fair enough. Let’s get to the names.” She pointed to the wall display at the end of the room. “I’m going to flash their pictures on that wall. I want to know the crewmembers name, their department, their shift, and anything els
e that comes to mind.”

  He nodded, bracing himself.

  The first image came up. It was the upper third of an environmental suit, with a strong light shining against it, obscuring most of the faceplate in a shiny reflective white-out. He blinked twice and starting panting, his heart surging towards panic. How was he supposed to pick out the faces in this? He could barely even spot the chin, covered in a dark goatee. His mind raced. He could think of three men on board with goatees, but Richardson was a red-head. That left Majors and Brookstone.

  And then he realized how stupid he really was. The environment suits all have the occupant’s name painted onto the chest plate right along with their departmental symbol. He started laughing, and he kept laughing almost to the point of bending over. He was finally brought up short by a curt “Ahem!” from Corazon.

  He looked back at her, completely unable to contain his grin. “Yes, ma’am?”

  “Is there something funny about the test you’d like to share?”

  He shook his head and did his best to regain his composure. “No, ma’am. That’s Walter Brookstone, comm and computers, first shift.” He remembered him clearly, including his uniform gaffe at that first disastrous dinner. “He looks good in his dress uniform, but I think the vest is too tight across his belly.”

  Corazon nodded, and the screen changed. It was another environment suit. “That’s Roxy Collier, mechanical systems, first shift. She has a daughter who raises pigs.”

  “Pigs?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he replied, all of it coming back. “Her son-in-law has a farm on Arvin.”

  Then came Billy Mason and his card tricks, Karen Larkin and her kickboxing, Maggie Nelson and her grandmother’s sourdough recipe, and on through the rest of the crew. For his uncle, he merely said, “Hans Schneider, Captain.” He could have said more, of course. At a minimum he probably should have mentioned that he was his uncle, but he was not ready give ground on that yet.