Anti Life by Allen Kuzara

Author:Allen Kuzara
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

Parker gave Alvarez a thumbs up. There was a clear box hinged to the wall above them. Alvarez lifted it and mashed the yellow button inside it. A buzzer sounded, and lights blinked red. They were in the cargo bay, the Constance’s de facto airlock.

Alvarez heard the whoosh of gas escaping. Then the alarm fell silent. His helmet fogged up momentarily. He heard Parker breathing.

Despite hundreds of spacewalks, Alvarez never got used to them. There was a surreal loneliness about them. He heard his respiration, and between breaths, he heard his heartbeat. He was completely dependent on his spacesuit. Life was too fragile.

“Parker, let’s get this over with,” he said.

The two men hooked the tethering rope first to each other’s belts and then to the transport table they used to carry parts and tools. Their space suits had integrated propulsion systems. Tethering was just a precaution.

After the airlock opened, they lifted from the floor as AG disengaged. Alvarez always ate lightly on days he expected to do a spacewalk. But today’s walk was a surprise, and he was suffering the consequences of a full stomach.

“Are you okay, John?”

“Yeah, I’ll make it,” he said gripping the transport table between them. The table was a commonplace but indispensable tool. It held the new combustion chamber which was bulky, a bit too large for the table. It was pinned with tie-downs, which were only necessary sans gravity.

“These wheels aren’t doing us any good,” Alvarez said. He punched buttons on the table’s control screen. Tiny jets burned blue from various ports until it balanced itself. Both men held to handles on each end.

“Are you over there, Parker?”

“I’m here.”

Although they faced each other, the massive combustion chamber blocked their view.

“Hang on. I’m taking us out,” Alvarez said.

They exited the bay and turned a corner, rounding the belly of the ship. Alvarez looked for the probe but couldn’t locate it. He wondered what Brennen had found.

He pushed the table’s propulsion speed to the maximum, but the built-in governor kept them at a snail’s pace.

Parker said, “Here it comes.”

Alvarez peeked around the combustion chamber. He watched as they came to a small hatch at the base of what looked like rockets. These structures were an ironic reality of interstellar travel; their behemoth size belied their importance. They were thrusters used for traveling short distances at sub-IST speeds.

The much smaller warp-field generator was responsible for IST. It was powered by electricity and responded logarithmically by the square of the power delivered to it. At slow speeds and short distances, the warp-field generator was an inefficient means of transport. But with a large power source, a fusion reactor, the stars were within mankind’s reach.

Parker released the transport table and grabbed the rail on the hull’s exterior. He connected their tether to the rail. After disengaging safety locks, Parker spun the massive wheel, opening the service hatch.

Alvarez pulled himself down the rail, hand over hand, until he could see over Parker’s shoulder. Inside the hatch was the reactor core, combustion chamber, and the disengaged energy-transfer coupling.

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