The Big Sleep

Finding One's True Self: Part 11

By Xan Steel

Everyone ran to the cockpit to see why the alarms were going off. Daniel jumped in the head seat to get a readout from the computer. Mathew sat next to Daniel and began looking over the sensor log. "Well, according to the sensors, there are no stars in range?" He said confused.

Daniel brought up the map of the galaxy and tied it into their last known location. "Ah, that would explain things," he said.

"What's that?" Sandra asked.

"We're passing out of the galactic arm in which Earth’s solar system inhabits," Daniel said showing them on the map.

Maria looked at the map and saw the ships position. "I'll be the first to say I know nothing of distance or warp theory, but shouldn't we be at Alpha Centauri by now, even with the few planet surveys we did?" she questioned aloud.

Daniel looked at her and then the computer readouts on the drive, and discovered that the alarm was for the EM-Drive itself. Three of the four plasma injectors were damaged and needed to be repaired or replaced.

Daniel shut down the EM Drive and brought the ship to a halt in the cold void of space. With nothing close by to which he could use the solar panels to collect more power from, he started shutting down non-essentials to conserve on energy consumption, in case they had to be there for a while.

"Danny, what's going on?" Maria asked.

He sighed deeply, "I'm not sure what happened, but we've been running on one Plasma injector for some time now.” He turned to face Mathew,  “Mathew, can the duplicator."

Mathew cut him off, "No." He answered. "As a prototype, we didn't think to incorporate duplicating complex machinery or advanced elements.

Sandra spoke up concerned, "What does that mean guys?"

Daniel sighed again. "It means I need to do a spacewalk to widen the last injector to alleviate pressure on it. That would keep us at least one times the speed of light," he said.

"How much time does that add to the journey?" Maria asked.

Mathew began running the calculations. "Well, I'm not sure if we've been wrong about the size of our galaxy or if our calculations on the speed of light are wrong, but according to the computer it's going to take us around twelve years to reach Alpha Centauri," he finished in a slightly exasperated tone.

Both girls looked at each other and then back to the guys. Maria spoke first, "I take it that means we need sleep?" Maria said.

"I was hoping we wouldn't need to use those beds, Daniel." Sandra finished.

"As much as I wish we didn't, I'll be honest. I'm glad I brought'em along." He said.

He got up and went to the lower level of the ship and began preparing for his spacewalk. Maria helped him into the suit and cable harness. Once he was secured, he grabbed his tools and went to the airlock. Maria turned him around. "Be careful please," she pleaded with him as he hugged her as tightly as he could. He walked in the airlock and sealed the door. He then gave the thumbs up to Maria to start the depressurizing processing. Once completed he opened the outer door and hooked his cable to the anchor on the ship.

Maria was incredibly nervous as she watched him floating out in the void. Sandra and Mathew came over to watch with her. They watched him hit a few buttons on the suit until a loud static and pop "Hello, can anyone hear me in there?" Came Daniel's voice as Maria pushed a lit button on the console panel.

"Danny!" Maria said excitedly.

"Hey, sis. "I'm fine I just made it to the injector ports. I also wanted to hear other people's voices. You never really understand just how quiet space is until you start to hear your heart beating." Daniel commented.

Mathew leaned in to hit the button, "How do the injectors look?" He questioned just as Daniel pulled the panel off and set it off to the side.

“Well, it's not looking good that's for sure."

Sandra chimed in, "What's that supposed to mean?"

Daniel reached in and pulled out one of the injectors without any tools and showed it in front of the camera. "This does explain things. What you're looking at is a melted injector." He said.

"Those are made of tempered Iridium. They shouldn't melt like that." Mathew said.

Daniel pulled out the other two and adjusted the last one before closing it up and headed back to the airlock resealing the door, and give the thumbs up for Maria to pressurize. Once the cycle finished, he stepped out of the airlock and moved over to let Maria help him out of the suit. Once he was out of the suit, he opened the toolbox and handed the melted injectors to Mathew. "Are you positive that the duplicator can't make new ones?" Daniel asked.

"Positive, though I would love to know just what it was that melted these. Tempered Iridium has a melting point of some eight thousand degrees. What temperature does the plasma get too?" Mathew questioned Daniel.

Mathew took them to perform a metallurgical analysis on them while Daniel went to the cockpit to reprogram a new flight path into the computer.

Sandra had Maria follow her back to the medical lab to review the scans of Daniel's brain again to see if there was any new development. After an hour reviewing the information, she turned to Maria and spoke, "I'm worried about him."

"What do you mean?" Maria quietly asked.

"If this new paracortex continues to grow, it's going to put stress on his cranium as it displaces the brain fluid," Sandra answered.

Maria sighed, "Which could do any number of things. Such as a real coma, seizures, brain damage or possibly death." She sat down in a chair. "And I don't have anything here to remove and store brain fluid unless I want to return to the dark ages of medicine," Maria said in a somewhat defeated tone as Sandra came over and hugged her. "Why is it that no matter how much I want him to be happy, everything else is trying to take him away," Maria said as she softly wept.

"Well, at least for now once we get in those beds, the stasis field will stop it from growing any further until we can find a way to remove the excess fluid," Sandra said hoping to reassure Maria.

Once they got to Daniel, he showed them the new flight path. “All right here's what I've done to maximize distance and recharge time. In the hopes of cutting down our time in the stasis beds while getting us to our destination." He showed them the map, and the path as it crisscrossed or tacked between the two arms they were positioned.

"How long can the ship last before needing to be recharged?" Sandra asked.

"It's power cells can last for ten years, as long as I shut everything off, but the computer for navigation, and the controller for the stasis beds awake protocol," Daniel said.

"This way the computer can wake us when we get to these recharging locations?" Mathew asked as Daniel nodded in response. "Well, the computer came back with the analysis for the injector ports you handed me," Mathew said.

"What was the result?" Daniel asked.

“Iron," Mathew said as he plunked them down on the console.

"So, wait, they were faulty to begin with?" Sandra asked in a surprised tone.

"So, it would seem," Mathew answered her.

"What does that mean?" Maria asked in response.

"Who knows, the point is these three injector ports were cheaply made, and yet somehow lasted for some time since iron has a much lower melting point," Daniel answered her.

They went and ate a small meal before preparing for their big sleep. The computer calculated that it would take about five years to reach their first stop. Daniel reprogrammed the stasis beds unlock pattern for manual release, with the same one that Julyna had given him to contact her without even realizing it.

Once Maria and Mathew were locked in nicely Sandra pulled Daniel off to the side. "Dan, I need to talk to you about something," she said in a concerned tone.

"It's my brain, isn't it?" he asked as she nodded. "I'm dying, right?"

"For the moment? No."

"But?"

"With the paracortex growing, we will need to remove a small amount of brain fluid," she said.

"Why is that bad?" he asked.

"Because Maria doesn't have the tools to do that, at least, not without using crude tools." She said as she hung her head.

"Believe me when I say, I trust her implicitly, and I know she'll do everything in her power to save me." He said as he pulled her into a hug, as she hugged him in return.

"But I'm sensing something else that you wanted to talk about." She softly blushed, because saying that meant he was potentially starting to use his new-found ability.

"I, I've wanted. No, I can't say it." She said as she began to pull away, but he held her closer still.

"It's better to get it off your mind than to keep it bottled up. Maria taught me that recently." he quietly said.

She looked up into his eyes and just pulled him into a deep kiss. He returned it before gently breaking it off. She whispered to him, "I want you, Danny." she said.

In all the time of knowing her, this was the first time she had ever called him that. "I had a feeling you did," as he whispered softly in her ear.

He picked her up and carried her to the room, while not even bothering to close the door. They undressed each other and began their passionate love making. She had wanted him since they first met years ago. Even though having him just to herself wasn't going to happen on this trip, just having him at all made her happy.

Afterward, they cleaned up and locked themselves into their stasis beds as the computer began shutting everything down and started the countdown while initiating the EM-Drive, heading towards its first recharge destination.