Chapter 07: Restoration

"Engage primary power systems," I ordered.

"Primaries initialized and online," Philip replied.

"Start up secondary systems, and put tertiary systems on standby," I told Philip.

"Acknowledged," he answered. After adjusting several controls, he checked his display panel. "All indicators are green."

"Very good," I said. Taking a steadying breath, I gave the order. "Philip, take us to Jupiter."

"Aye, Captain," he responded smartly. He placed his hand over the console interface, and the recessed link on his palm connected his artificial brain to the computer systems of the Endurance.

A deep, vibrating hum rumbled through the deck plating under our feet as multiple engines fired. Beginning at lower power output and gradually increasing, the engines were slowly pushed to maximum. I knew Philip was starting out easy because a good portion of our vital systems had suffered damage, and the question of whether they would hold up under stress still remained.

As the ship began moving faster, it became clear the repairs were holding. Philip didn't need to check any gauges or displays after hooking into the console as all relevant information was sent directly to the central processors of his brain.

I shut my eyes for a moment and took several slow breaths. After all our difficulties, we were on our way. Engine output had been reduced by missing or nonfunctioning thrusters, but progress was still being made. Elation filled every cell in my body. Although challenges still lay ahead of us, the largest obstacle faced by man while colonizing the solar system had been conquered. We were through the asteroids and headed for Jupiter. It was a spectacular moment.

"ETA to first colony site, fourteen hours," Philip reported.

My eyes snapped open. I'd known we were moving slower, but the time requirement was more than I'd expected. Even at full speed, there'd been doubt our environmental systems would endure to the end, so measures needed to be taken quickly to reinforce or replace them before the ship proved unable to support its human occupants.

I turned on the central hologram, bringing up a current image of the Endurance. Turning a knob on my console enlarged the portion of the ship where the heaviest damage had been inflicted.

"Hull collapse crushed three decks in section nine through twelve," I said more to myself than anyone around me. "New supports are in place, and all feed lines into the area are either intact or junctions are nearby. It might work."

I turned on the intercom. "Commander Pierce, please report to the central hologram room."

While I waited for Sheila to arrive, I checked the inventory manifests for environmental construction supplies. The plan I had in mind might work, but it could also cost us the resources to establish one of the potential colonies. If the crew was dead by the time we reached Jupiter, it wouldn't matter what supplies we'd preserved or not, so I decided to take the chance.

Sheila entered the room, and her long legs let her cross the space in only a few strides.

"How can I be of assistance?" she asked me.

I stood from my chair and pointed out the damaged section of the forward hull.

"How quickly can we put in place some of the ecological construction material in this portion of the Endurance?" I questioned in return.

She spent a moment studying the translucent image hovering above the console, checking figures, and examining all relevant information.

"It would take at least two hours to put in the initial staging," she answered. "Depending on the workforce available, we could have the absolute minimum functioning five hours after that."

"Philip?" I asked. "Will our atmosphere last that long?"

"Negative, sir," Philip stated coldly. "Atmospheric levels will become critical in six hours."

"We'll just have to do better," I said, forcing as much resolve into my voice as I could manage. My job was to make the impossible reality, and here was another opportunity to do so. "I want every crew member not required at their post to assist in ecological construction. Tell them if they want to live, they'll report for work."

"Aye, Captain," Sheila acknowledged.

***

The damaged section of the ship where I'd chosen to build an artificial environment was extremely spacious due to several decks being flattened together by the asteroid impact. Exterior plating had been hastily but effectively placed on new, curved support beams positioned over our heads. The entire ordeal had cleared a significant portion of the forward sections of the Endurance.

The repairs to the hull had been minor, simply enough to maintain atmospheric integrity. Lighting, artificial gravity, and temperature control were all nonfunctioning within the cavernous space, but its size suited my purposes.

Sheila and I floated into the dark room, and I clicked on a flashlight I'd removed from a supply locker on the way here. Strapped to my forearm near the wrist, the twin lights created a cone of illumination surprisingly powerful for their size.

"First thing we need to do is establish some gravity lines in here," I stated.

"What about the lights?" Sheila asked.

"They're third after gravity and environmental controls," I answered. "We can work in the dark, and the plants will survive the cold temporarily, but everything is forced to wait until we get gravity back online. We can't put anything down yet without it floating away."

Sheila nodded thoughtfully.

"Where do you want to start?" she inquired.

"Over there," I replied, pointing my wrist mounted light in the correct direction. "Power lines from the nearby corridor are still intact, so it should be a simple matter to splice in and feed power into the gravity lines in here."

I removed a fist sized sphere from my pocket and held it up. Taking a hold of the top half with my other hand, I twisted in opposite directions to unlock it. Pulling straight up, I elevated the upper portion of the chrome sphere on four telescoping rods located inside the device.

Projected within the interior space of the open sphere was a miniature hologram of the Endurance. Transparent lines of blue light composed the image, and although not as impressive as the one in the central hologram room, it served well enough.

I placed my fingers into the heart of the image and spread them apart to zoom the projection to a tighter focus on one area rather than maintaining a view of the full ship. Repeating the action several times, I altered the image to show only the area where Sheila and I floated.

"Once gravity is functional," I explained, pointing to the areas of the chamber where we would be working, "we'll run conduits for environmental systems and water pipes at the same time. We can cut through the bulkheads here to make the connections and use the unnecessary plating for additional shielding around our thermal units."

"Where do you want the first plants to be placed?" Sheila questioned while studying the image in my hand.

"I'm not sure how everything is going to be arranged to get it all in here," I admitted. "Let's start with a small cluster of trees in the center and build outward. If we run out of room, I want it to be at the edges, not the middle."

"I'll start organizing what we need, and formulate a pattern for optimal coverage," Sheila volunteered.

"Good," I responded. "I'll get the crews working on the gravity systems."

With our plan of action in place, I collapsed the holosphere, twisting it closed and returning it to my pocket. We pushed off a nearby wall and floated back to the entrance where the first members of the crew were arriving for work details.

"Alright people, we need to hook into the power grid at the first junction under there," I explained, pointing to the deck plate needing to be removed.

I hadn't told them to bring their tools, but they'd come prepared. A small group broke away and began removing the bolts securing the deck plate to the ground. I divided the remaining people into teams for either electrical or water conduit construction. Directing them to where connections to the ship's functioning systems needed to be made, we got to work removing cover panels or gathering pipes from the cargo holds. There wasn't a person onboard who didn't have a job to do.

***

Putting in an artificial gravity system wasn't hard, simply time intensive. It required a sufficient amount of energy to maintain, so a stable and effective power grid was essential. The power connection terminal we planned to hook into was under the deck plating in the corridor. Due to either crushed or collapsed passageways, we were unable to bring one of the bulky gravity lifts into the forward section. Instead, we had to move the plate the hard way.

"Lift, lift, lift!" I growled through gritted teeth as my team heaved the solid slab of metal off the floor and into a vertical position. "Clear the other side!"

Everyone stepped quickly out of the way as we pushed the plate further. It fell heavily against the deck in an ear hurting crash. The sound was magnified by the close walls of the hallway. The ship shook under our feet, but we managed to stay standing.

"Bring in the lights," I ordered, and a pair of technicians handed over the devices.

The magnetic power cell on each light allowed us to stick them wherever we needed them. I slapped one against the wall and pressed a button on its exterior housing to turn it on. Light flooded the darkened corridor. Positioning a second light on the opposite wall, I made allowances in case the first was blocked by those working on the electrical systems.

Kneeling down next to one of my crew, I watched as she expertly removed the junction cover with a specially designed tool. The slender implement inserted into a lock and unfastened the covering panel. Withdrawing the tool and placing it back in her equipment belt, the technician held out her hand to me.

Standing by with a cable as thick as my arm, I placed it in her waiting hand. The exterior of the canister shaped connector at the cable's end was wrapped in plastic to avoid conductivity. Two handle grips flared out from the sides, and she took hold of them both as she slotted the cable onto the terminal. Twisting it to lock the connection in place, she waited until an indicator light above the connector turned green before nodding to me.

I got up from the floor and headed into the room my teams were overhauling. While I'd been working with one group in the corridor, gaining access to the much needed power systems, a secondary squad had been working diligently in preparation for the next step.

The huge cable we'd connected in the corridor split into a hundred smaller cables once it entered the room, and the work crew had spread them out across the area, holding them in place against the walls and floor with magnetic clips. Access junctions marked the cables every three feet, allowing the gravity lines to be hooked in without requiring splicing of any wires.

Although my teams carried wrist mounted lights identical to mine, they'd put up additional lighting. The small, magnetic boxes affixed to the walls had larger power cells than the personal lights used by my crew, so they provided considerably more light for longer durations.

Those not working on laying the power cables were busy bringing in the large spools of the gravity lines. Housed in flexible, transparent polymer, the gravity lines could be stretched across a room as easily as a string. I watched as two crewmen in the deep blue uniforms of the engineering division each took an end of a gravity line and pushed off the wall. In the weightless chamber, they flew gracefully to the other side where they gently stopped themselves against the far wall. The lines were pulled tight and clipped magnetically to the floor. Other team members jumped up, dragging gravity lines up and across the rounded ceiling.

When the lines were in place, they were jacked into the access junctions on the power cables, hooking them into the grid. The crew spaced the lines four feet apart across the entire width of the room. Their speed and efficiency had the job done in minutes.

"What do you think?" Sheila asked, floating over to where I hovered by the door. "Since we need all the space we can get, I thought we could install some grav units on the upper curve of the hull and use it as well."

"Brilliant," I commended. "We'll use every inch we can."

"Gravity test!" shouted a technician. A momentary pause occurred while everyone in weightlessness found an anchor point to steady themselves.

"Ready!" I shouted back when everyone in the room signaled with hand gestures to their being prepared.

A switch was thrown, and orange light flowed through the gravity lines as they powered up. Our weightlessness ended instantly, and our boots touched down on the floor. I directed my gaze upward and thought it very strange to see people walking upside down on the ceiling.

"Very good," I said approvingly. Covering plates still needed to be put down over the gravity lines, but it was a minor task to protect them from snagging anyone walking past, and it could be completed in short order. The first phase of the room's transformation was done.

The hum of the engines suddenly ceased. All across the Endurance, the thrusters shut down. I stepped carefully over the gravity lines to an intercom panel.

"Philip," I spoke into the transmitter. "Why have the engines shut down?"

Silence greeted my question. I asked again, but the eerie silence remained.

"Philip!" I called with more insistence. "Respond!"

No answer. I turned to Sheila.

"Keep them working," I ordered. "I'm going to find out what's wrong."

Sheila nodded, and I squeezed past the people working in the hallway to reach one of the maintenance tunnels. Ducking into the confined space, I moved as fast as I could manage. The silence bothered me, and I had to know what was happening with my ship.