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  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  A NECESSARY TRIGGER

  Credits

  Want more?

  Excerpt: RIDDLED SPACE

  Dedications

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  A NECESSARY TRIGGER:

  A Riddled Space Short

  by Bill Patterson

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  A NECESSARY TRIGGER

  Copyright © 2018 by Bill Patterson

  All rights reserved.

  Cover Model © 2017 Greg Bulmer

  All rights reserved.

  Cover design © 2017 Christian Bentulan

  All rights reserved.

  “Come on, Ted, move your butt. We've got three more holds to unload!” Lisa Daniels's voice filled the work channel of the cargo crew.

  “Awww, Looie, it's shift change in twenty minutes. Let the next shift handle it.”

  Lisa floated right up to the spacehand, waved her hand across her throat, signaling radio silence, then talked to him for two of the remaining thirty minutes. She pushed away from him and back towards the docked cargo ship, knowing that Ted Reinhart followed her.

  ***

  A few billion years ago, in a galaxy out near where a constellation called Virgo would form, a star imploded—crushed by its own mass. It was so huge, and its own gravity so strong, that parts of the original surface raced towards the center at one-tenth lightspeed. They didn't have far to fall.

  ***

  The fluctuating tones of shift change sounded over all radio links and intercoms aboard the Roger B. Chaffee, UNSOC's only space station in Earth Orbit. In a remarkably short time, everyone was heading back to their bunks, counting the days remaining on their hitch as they floated four hundred kilometers above the Earth.

  “Thank you, Ted,” said Lisa, passing him in the Changeout Room, just to the side of the EVA airlock.

  Ted grunted in reply. It was just easier to work those last thirty minutes than put up with the sarcastic comments of his peers after work. “Thanks for the radio silence.”

  Lisa gave him a thumbs-up as she headed to the female section of the Changeout Room to get out of her skintights, sponge off the drying sweat, and get into a pair of coveralls. Lesson one: never chew out subordinates in front of their peers. Thanks, Colonel Howard.

  ***

  The impacting outer layers of the star hit an immovable object—the degenerate core of the star. The compacted core ignited in a furious orgy of high-order fusion that blew most of the star's mass outward towards empty space. Massive neutron bombardment during that minute of fusion formed nearly every element on the periodic table. A nucleus of iron, too recently formed to have snagged the requisite twenty-six electrons and become neutral, was seized by twisted magnetic field lines and hurled out to space. Forced to ever-faster velocities by the whipping electromagnetic field, it left its birthplace at half the speed of light.

  A cosmic ray was born.

  ***

  Sixteen hours after shift change, Lisa, Ted, and the other eight spacehands of the cargo crew were back at it, this time carefully loading the incredibly expensive products produced by the Chaffee's industrial tenants. Space-formed pharmaceuticals that would be impossible to produce in a gravity field. Perfectly round bearings. Precisely layered composites, free from the distortions induced by gravity. Defect-free cylinders of pure silicon. Single-layer films of graphene, hexagon after hexagon of carbon atoms marching away in a perfect lattice, production greatly assisted by the abundant vacuum of outer space. All of these materials were stacked in padded transport containers for their ride down from orbit.

  The cargo vessel would be returning to Earth worth ten times more than it was sitting on the launch pad.

  It also took three times as long to load the cargo going down as it took to unload the cargo carried up. The third shift finished the project towards the end of their shift. Lisa and her crew were eating breakfast when they felt the subtle shove of the hydraulic rams pushing the cargo vessel away from the port.

  Ted smiled. “An easy shift,” he muttered to his buddy across the table. They ate very carefully from plates velcroed to the table tops. Experienced spacehands would use their forks to gently flick food from the plate towards their mouths. Most everyone else would just slowly bring the food up with a spoon.

  “Don't think so,” said his friend. “Duty Daniels will keep us hopping. We can't protest, either—she'll point to some reg justifying the work. At least she's not a polisher.”

  “Huh?” grunted Ted. “What do you mean, a polisher?”

  “She doesn't give us makework—stupid crap that doesn't make a difference. We won't be polishing bulkheads. But you can be damned sure that all the lines will be coiled correctly so they don't tangle when we use them, and that all the comms gear and electrical connections to the port are checked and safed.”

  “Beats shoving around silicon cylinders worth a few million apiece,” said Ted.

  “Maybe. Better finish up, ten minutes until shift change.”

  ***

  The crew dispersed throughout the bay, performing various post-cargo cleanup tasks: rewinding cabling, chasing down packing material and recycling it, assisting the tenants in finding their promised shipments. Lisa was working down a standard checklist prior to closing down the docking port. She tried to ignore the prickly feeling under her skintights. Just one wall between me and pure vacuum.

  “Ted, we've got an intermittent in the power umbilical. Please unlatch and relatch it in the stow position,” she called over the crew radio link. Despite everyone being inside the station, it was far easier for the crew to communicate over radios than the clanging, roaring, echoing environment of a working docking port.

  “Roger, Lieutenant.”

  Lisa quirked her lips minutely. Ever since those two minutes, Spacehand Theodore M. Reinhart was much more formal to her. All she did was repeat to Ted a chewing out she had gotten from her first instructor, Colonel Howard. It was just as effective on Ted as it was on her all those months ago.

  She reached up to the bulkhead combing to steady her as she floated outside the receiving room of the airlock and scanned the next item on the list. “Ensure locking ring is in the 'receive' position.” She looked at the control panel set in the bulkhead and tapped at the proper control.

  ***

  The cosmic ray, after spending billions of years being plucked this way and that by passing magnetic fields, drilling through dust clouds, enduring the unchanging vistas of intergalactic space, was nearing the end of its brief life. For though billions of years had passed on Earth, to the partially ionized iron nucleus, only a thousand years seemed to have gone by.

  After a final shove from the magnetic fields of the Sun, the cosmic ray, embodying a fragment of the energy of that long ago supernova, buried itself in a block of crystalline silicon glued to the aluminum wall of the Roger B. Chaffee. Energetic collisions with the lattice of silicon atoms shattered both the iron nucleus and the lattice. The fragments split again and again, dispersing energy throughout the disintegrating matrix. The silicon block, hosting millions of transistors monitoring sensors throughout Cargo Port 3, lost its connection with an air pressure sensor, the vital circuitry destroyed. The microprocessor knew nothing about cosmic rays, all it knew was that the air pressure in Cargo Port 3 was zero, and sounded the alarm.

  ***

  The panel flashed an angry red, and the alarm klaxon sounded.

  “A
ir pressure zero?” said Lisa as she stared at the panel. Wait, there's no wind. She tapped at the panel. It's saying there's no air in the next room, but I know that's wrong.

  “Get out of there, Ted!” she shouted. “Pressure door's going to lock!”

  Ted slammed the umbilical back into its storage socket and relatched it, then threw himself towards the hatchway. Already, the pressure door was grinding shut. He scrambled desperately, and almost made it.

  Lisa was paging rapidly through the panel, looking for the cutoff control for the pressure door, while simultaneously calling the Bridge.

  “Bridge, this is Lieutenant Daniels, down in Cargo Port 3.”

  “Go ahead, Lieutenant,” said Commander Parlitt.

  “We have a blowout alarm down here, but there's nothing wrong. I can't deactivate it, and the pressure door's almost shut. Got a man on the other side.”

  “We're on it. Do a headcount,” he advised.

  Lisa turned as Ted Reinhart threw himself through the closing pressure door. It caught him across the thighs and kept closing.

  “Emergency, Bridge. I've got a man caught in the pressure door,” she reported. Lisa tapped urgently at the panel. “Panel is locked out.”

  “We've taken control up here,” said the commander. “We'll get the door stopped.”

  “Hurry!” she shouted, as the whine of the closing door wound upward as more power was fed into the drive mechanism.

  “Get it off me!” shouted Ted.

  “We're trying, Ted,” said Lisa. “Hang in there!”

  “It's going to break my leg,” he said, pushing futilely at the bare bulkhead. The alarms and flashing lights continued without letting up. “Ah, Loo, it hurts!”

  “Bridge! What's taking so long? I've got a man getting crushed down here!”

  “Working,” said the commander. “Give us a minute.”

  “He doesn't have a minute,” she said, as the drive motor threatened to go ultrasonic.

  A sudden sounded, Ted slumped into unconsciousness, and the pressure door lurched forward a couple of centimeters. It continued to grind forward for another two seconds, then stopped. The drive motor noise vanished, then the door reversed itself.

  “Bridge, get medical down here. Looks like Reinhart has two broken legs,” said Lisa. When the door opened enough to see inside the cargo port, Ted Reinhart's legs stuck upward at an obscene angle. Lisa maintained her composure throughout, kept the rest of her crew out of the way of the medics while they stabilized their crewmate and hustled him down to the aid station, and only gave in to the heaves when she was off duty and secure in her miniscule stateroom.

  ***

  “Cosmic ray, sir,” said the young engineering officer, as he flashed the image up on the flatscreen. “This dot is the entry point. Scorch marks means a big one. Chewed the chip up good. Gigavolt range, enough to kill it.”

  The Captain rubbed his lower lip with a fingertip. “Zero output, so the computer thinks we have a blowout, and then the emergency logic takes over.”

  The engineer nodded, silently.

  “Sensor work?” The Commander realized he was copying the engineer's clipped speech.

  “Yes.”

  “No backup microcontroller?”

  “No, sir. Backordered six months.”

  “We'll alert UNSOC, but don't hold your breath. They will send us exactly one replacement, but not an extra one.”

  “Sir.”

  “In the meantime, secure the pressure door and lock out this dock. I don't want anyone in it until I get that replacement controller. We could have a real blowout down here and never know it.”

  “Wilco.”

  “You don't say too much, do you,” said the Commander, looking at the officer. “McCrary, right?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, good job running this down. Carry on.”

  ***

  Ted woke up in a haze of pain. He was strapped on a lightweight gurney dogged to a deck in Sick Bay. He looked at the straps crossing his chest and holding him onto the gurney without comprehension. His gaze drifted down his body to his legs, which were held slightly above the sheets. Each thigh had two pins driven through them and held apart by a linkage. Oddly, they weren't the main focus of his pain. Nor was the bruising and discoloration between the pins. He looked further down to see his shins and calves a mottled angry purple, swollen to twice their normal size.

  That was when he passed out a second time, and thus, missed when the General Quarters alarm sounded for real.

  ***

  “There's got to be a better system than this!” said Lisa, after confirming all three shifts of her spacehands were crammed into the center of the station near the hydroponics bay. “This thing's a hundred years old, and they haven't figured out anything more effective for solar storms?”

  Nobody answered her, for there really was no answer. The original International Space Station was only part of what was now the Chaffee. Once UNSOC took over the station from the original owners, growth in the facility was oriented towards only one thing: whatever would produce the greatest revenue for the least launch cost. Solar shelters that produced zero revenue never made the cut.

  Lisa noticed Jeng Wo Lee nearby and wormed her way through the crowded space to float near him. “Any word from the Collins?” she asked.

  “For a solar storm? Come on, Lisa, you know your physics better than that. Collins is under three meters of Lunar dirt. Everyone inside the station is safe. It's only dangerous on the Moon's surface, and there's plenty of time to get inside after the flare blows. The Moondogs hardly notice it.”

  “I dunno, this is my first flare. I'm still jumpy, I guess.”

  “Embrace serenity,” he said, drawing his legs up in lotus and closing his eyes. “We're fine here, but even if we weren't, there's nothing we can do about it. Besides, the troops are watching us.”

  Lisa was about to throttle her friend, but stopped. Colonel Howard always spoke about the proper attitude around subordinates. If officers here started losing their cool, then panic would race through this crowded shelter in a heartbeat.

  “And the civilians are watching the spacehands,” she murmured back.

  “You are more important than you realize, Lisa Daniels. Look at the Commander and emulate him.” Jeng opened his eyes, his face composed, and calm radiated from him.

  “I will, and thank you, Lee,” she said. “I should check on Reinhart.”

  “I am sure he is in competent hands. Still, a leader should check on all her subordinates, especially the wounded.” Lee smiled. “Go. You are calm enough.”

  Lisa thanked him and moved through the three dimensional maze of clustered bodies until she came to the alcove where a makeshift aid station was in operation. After the first rush of evacuation, the place was settled down and the stream of frantic customers was gone.

  “Ah, Lieutenant Daniels. Right on time,” said Doctor Poulin. “I knew you were too smart to hassle us in the beginning. Reinhart is still out. Frankly, it's not looking good for him. What do you know about him?”

  “Not much more than his personnel jacket shows, Doctor. Typical spacehand, young, ambitious, kind of a daredevil, tries to be a ladies man.”

  “Is that a complaint?”

  “Oh, no, Doctor. I mean, he respects my authority, has never tried to put the moves on me, but I do notice he hangs around the tenants area a little too much when he's off duty, trying to make it with a civilian tech.”

  “Don't they all?”

  “Well, yes. Only place they can fraternize. Um, one parent family. His father died when Reinhart was twenty-four. Mother's in the wind somewhere. No siblings. On his own, looking to score some cash, sees the rates they pay spacehands, thought 'why not?'“

  “Lot of them like that up here, Lieutenant.”

  “So, how's he doing?”

  “Not good. I've paged Commander Parlitt, I'll brief the both of you at the same time.”

  “Can I see h
im?”

  “Can't hurt, but he's looking like hell. Go ahead.”

  She slipped inside the curtain and drifted up to the man. Doc Poulin was right—Ted looks like hell from the waist down. He had a small sheet over his genital area, but he was otherwise naked. She knew the pins and linkages kept the ends of his bones aligned for them to heal. The calves were a horror, a mixture of blue and angry red with a curiously deflated look about them.

  He was catheterized, of course, but there was something weird. She caught her breath when she looked at the cather bag. A weird brownish colored fluid was in the bag. What the hell?

  “Always knew you wanted to see me naked.”

  Her eyes jerked upward. Ted was awake, but barely.

  “Reinhart,” she said.

  “Call me Ted, ma'am. Just this once. I won't tell.”

  Lisa hesitated, then relented. “Ted.”

  “I feel like hell,” he whispered. “Got pain in my back, too. Kidneys. Tell the doc.” His hand grabbed hers. “Thanks. You're a good looie.” His hand relaxed and his face grew slack as his eyes closed.

  Lisa put his hand back, hesitated, and took both of her hands and hugged his face. She backed out of the alcove and floated over to Doctor Poulin.

  “He woke up for a few seconds and reported pain in his back, around the kidney area.”

  The doctor grimaced. “That's not good,” he said. “Here's Commander Parlitt.” The doctor nodded in the commander's direction. “Commander.”

  Lisa automatically started to salute, then remembered Parlitt's standing order against it. “Commander.”

  “Lieutenant, Doctor. Tell me about the spacehand.”

  Doctor Poulin went into reporting mode. “Spacehand Reinhart was extracted from the pressure door in Cargo Port 3 at fourteen thirty-seven hours and was transported to the aid station in an unconscious state. He had simple complete fractures of the femur in both legs at approximately the mid-thigh area. He was stabilized and underwent surgery. Pins were emplaced above and below the fractures in both legs, and spreader linkages are holding the pins securely in three dimensions to allow the bones to heal.”