The Hyperspace Trap by Christopher Nuttall

Author:Christopher Nuttall [Nuttall, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 9781503949096
Publisher: 47North
Published: 2018-02-26T22:00:00+00:00

Paul couldn’t believe what he was seeing on the display. The distortion was reaching out for them, almost as though it were a living thing. Space twisted itself into a pretzel, dragging his ship backward into the maw. This must be a black hole, part of his mind insisted, although such an eventuality was impossible. The closest black hole to Tyre was well over two thousand light-years away. No one had ever gone near it . . .

“Crash-transit,” he ordered. The move was probably suicide, but it was the only way out. Damn the pirates. He’d just have to hope that they were in the same boat. Maybe they were already running for their lives. “Now!”

“The vortex isn’t opening,” Rani shouted. On the display, the vortex flashed into existence and then vanished just as quickly. “The energy matrix is disrupted! I can’t compensate!”

The display flickered then failed. Paul felt his heart stop, just for a second, before the system rebooted. That should have been impossible. The main lighting failed too, plunging the bridge into near-complete darkness. Nearly twenty seconds passed before the dim emergency lighting came online. That too should have been impossible. The emergency systems should have taken over at once.

“Multiple power failures reported, all decks,” Tidal said, sounding as though she didn’t believe her own words. “A handful of emergency systems are offline. I . . .”

Paul swallowed. Supreme had more redundancies built into her power distribution network than anything smaller than a superdreadnought. Even if main power failed, emergency backup systems and power cells waited to jump into action. Losing power completely was damn near impossible. The entire system was designed to survive.

“The main drive field is failing,” Rani added. She looked up. Sweat poured down her face, glistening oddly under the lighting. “It . . . the power is draining.”

“Divert all power to the drives,” Paul ordered. If they were caught in a black hole, or something similar, they were dead. There was no way they could outrun its gravity pull. But they had to try. “Get us out of here!”

“The drive field has collapsed,” Rani said. She sounded as though she was starting to lose control and panic. “Compensator fields are weakening!”

Supreme shivered, then started to fall into the distortion. Or maybe the distortion was reaching for them. Paul had a sensation, just for a moment, as though they were spinning like a top. His head swam, strange prickly lights appearing at the corners of his eyes and then vanishing back into the semidarkness. Rani screamed, throwing herself back from her console an instant before it exploded. A second console followed a moment later, blowing its operator across the bridge . . .

Paul struggled to stand, to get a medical kit, to do something, anything, to stave off doom for a few more seconds. Consoles didn’t explode, not outside bad movies. What sort of idiot starship designer would cram explosive packs into a real console?

“Systems failure, Deck Seven,” Tidal yelled. Red alerts flashed up on the display.

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