Word was that all of us had tested innocent, middies down through the lowest rating. Sandy lay in his bunk, sicker than th etest of us. P and D affected some more than others.
The Board of Inquiry met one last time, issued its report.
They found no evidence of sabotage; they concluded the accident was probably caused by a deteriorating fuel valve unnoticed by a sensor that had malfunctioned.
For two more days, while we recovered, the ship floated dead in space.
Captain Malstrom conferred off and on with the Chief, Pilot Haynes, and Dr .Uburu, determining whether to return to Earthport Station. When I next had the watch he was as gruff as he’d been before, then unbent.
“I’m sorry, Nicky. I’m frantic with worry. I don’t know what to do.”
“I understand, sir.”
“I’ve pretty well decided to go on. If there’s been no sabotage we’re not at undue risk, and Miningcamp and Hope Nation desperately need our cargo. If we turned back, it would be almost a year before a replacement ship got this far.”“Yes, sir.”
“Nicky, I want to be honest with you. We have no lieutenants, and you’re senior. But I can’t appoint you, yet. You aren’t qualified.’” ‘I know, sir. What about Vax?” The words were bitter on my tongue, but I had to say them. Vax was far more ready than I.
“No, not yet. He doesn’t have the temperament. I’m still looking to you. By the time we get to Hope Nation you’ll qualify, I promise. I’ll help you. For now, you’ll both remain middies. If I can, I’ll see that you make the grade before the others.” If so, I’d have seniority over them for the rest of our days in the Navy, unless one of us finally made Captain.
“That’s not necessary, sir.” I forced down the foul taste of ambition.
“Maybe not, but it’s what I intend.” He took a deep breath.
“We’ll Fuse tomorrow, right after the memorial service.”
“Yes, sir.”
The service was a sad and formal affair. We officers wore our dress whites, our white slacks gleaming against black shoes, the red stripe down each leg sharp and bright. Our white shirts and black ties were covered by immaculate white dress jackets, a black mourning sash thrown over the right shoulder. Our length of service medals gleamed.
On a distant cruise, burial was in space, in a sealed coffin ejected from the airlock. Celestina’sdead had been so entombed, and drifted to this day on their endless way through the cosmos.
Ours wasn’t a burial service, because there was nothing to bury. A memorial service, held in the ship’s dining hall.
Every person aboard Hiberniacrowded into the mess, the crew awkward in unfamiliar officers’ country. Relatives of two passengers who had died, Mr. Rajiv Etra and Derek Carr, were mourners and stood with the officers who mourned their Captain on behalf of the ship. The other four passengers had been traveling alone. Mr. Etra stood in forlorn dignity. Derek Carr, his eyes red, spoke to no one and held himself stiffly.
Captain Malstrom led us in the traditional ritual of the Yahwehist Reunification. “We commend the spirits of our dead to your keeping, O Lord God,” he said. “As we commit their bodies to your void, until your day of judgment when you call them forth again... “
We stood a few moments in silence, and it was ended.
After the service Alexi went on watch, with Pilot Haynes.
Normally the Pilot was called only when we docked at a station or navigated a trafficked area. Now, though, he would have to stand watches with the rest of us.
Back in the wardroom Vax Holser was sullen. When Sandy got in his way, he shoved the boy aside. I ignored it, not ready to face another problem. An hour or so later we Fused.
Pilot Haynes was a dour, balding man who said hardly a word, if I didn’t count routine orders when on watch. We middies wondered why he stayed bald, when most people would have undergone simple follicle touchup. Of course, none of us dared ask.
A watch shared with the Pilot was a very quiet time. Now that we were back in Fusion I found it hard to stay awake in the lengthy silences. Not that the Pilot was offended by remarks from a middy; he just squelched them by monosyllabic answers until one tired of trying.
“Energy variations seem up a trifle, sir.” I was reading from my screen.
“Urn.”
I made another attempt. “What’s the widest normal variation, sir?”
“Ask Darla.” It was little more than a grunt.
I turned to the puter. “Darla, what’s our greatest normal energy variation?”
“For the fusion drive?” Sometimes she needed us to be very specific.
“Yes, Darla.”
“Two percent above and below mark, Mr. Seafort.” A long pause. “Are you trying to make conversation?” I don’t know how they programmed that.
After watch when I returned to my bunk, tired and irritable, Vax was ragging Alexi. I told him to stop. He did, but stared at me, a contemptuous smile on his face, until I got up and stalked out of the wardroom.
“The discovery by Cheel and Vorhees in 2046 that Nwaves travel faster than light, and their accompanying revision of the laws of physics, led to the fusion drive and superluminous travel.” Mr. Ibn Saud paused, surveying the audience of passengers, officers, and crew in Hibernia’sdining hall.
“Riding the crest of the N-wave, powered by wave emissions rather than particle emissions, our great ships glide through the galaxy, exploring, colonizing.” Absorbed, I sat, wishing Sandy wouldn’t fidget. The Passengers’ Lecture Series was a welcome diversion from ship’s routine, and he should have the sense to appreciate it.
“Fusion brought us desperately needed resources, such as metals from Miningcamp. But the real benefit of the fusion drive was as a safety hatch--it allowed those educated, intelligent, restless folk who chose to settle the distant colonies a means to flee Earth’s dwindling resources, pollution, and soaring population.”
Ibn Saud sipped from his glass of water.
“But the fusion drive embodies the dilemma of maintaining our ever more complex technology. The colonies need our best and brightest, and at the same time, the new industries spawned by Fusion demand great numbers of highly skilled workers.
“Meanwhile, society has recognized at last that compulsory education was a resounding failure. Voluntary schooling results in better education, but for fewer people. So, unfortunately, the general populace is less educated than they were two centuries past. Some, like the transpops who infest the lower levels of our cities, have no training at all, and are fit for no work.”
Ibn Saud smiled apologetically in our direction. “Nowhere is our shortage of skilled labor more apparent than in the military forces. The officer classes, selected from the educated, technological minority, are drawn to a life of honor, to the excitement of exploring the galaxy.” I nodded, without thinking.
“But for the most part the Navy, like the U.N.A.F. ground force, is manned--by necessity--from the uneducated underclass. And so we have the anomaly of a great starship, the pinnacle of technology, governed by an authoritarian system not unlike that of the eighteenth century sea navies. We’ve even returned to corporal punishment, at least for young officers. Rigid hierarchies maintain order as we travel to the stars.
“But mankind will be changed by the experience--in what way, we do not know; it will be generations before we learn.
Surely the changes are for the better. If we assume Lord God watches over us, as he always has, the rescue of civilization by the fusion drive becomes understandable. If man is marked for further greatness, if we are destined to colonize the galaxy, we have been given the tools. What we make of them, and what they make of us, is up to us.”
Ibn Saud sat to enthusiastic applause. Amanda, as education director, lauded him for his presentation, and thanked the audience for attending. As we dispersed I caught her eye, relishing her quick smile.