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Authors: Kevin J. Anderson
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said! What was wrong with it? Wouldn’t it be best if we humans joined the Ildiran Empire, joined forces? They’ve offered us so much already.”
Stannis pinched the bridge of his nose and turned away, closing his eyes. He could feel a migraine pounding in the back of his skull. “Oh, go to bed where you can ‘rest and recuperate.’ I’m going to be up all night trying to fix this.”
Dejected, the King shuffled away. Stannis waited in the private room a long time before Liam Hector returned to announce the measures he had taken. So far there seemed to be no repercussions, but Stannis still felt nauseated. He shook his head. “Obviously, Liam, we can’t let that old fool do any more damage! I will not stand by and see our power stripped away.”
10
COREY KELLUM
Circular repairs , that was the best name for it, Corey thought.
After the Ildirans left, his technicians and engineers had rushed around like children on a birthday morning, eager to see how the huge facility really worked, despite the formal briefings. They compared the clean Ildiran blueprints with the actual configurations; they tinkered with the cloud trawler’s power trains, the reactor lines, the levitation engines, the life-support modules, the food-processing systems. They carried electronic clipboards, studied holographic diagrams, and complained about the awkward Ildiran design.
They made repairs to the main ekti reactors, while Corey inventoried the export cylinders for all the stardrive fuel they planned to harvest. If they got the cloud trawler running to his satisfaction, they were going to need a lot more containers.
His crew combed over the floating industrial facility, running diagnostics (and, more often than not, repairs) on system after system. Over the years, the piping, electrical conduits, sensor chains, power-distribution systems, and rerouted channels had grown like vines in a fractal rainforest. No one could quite figure out what half of the systems did, other than to hamper the ekti-processing efficiency. And when the teams finished working on one deck and moved on to the next, something broke down in the previous day’s modifications, and they had to go back and start all over again.
Circular repairs .
Shoulder to shoulder, Corey and Oliver bent over an open maintenance panel trying to dissect and comprehend the intricacies of the systems. “The Ildirans must have had some reason for doing all of this nonsense,” said Oliver, following a thick cable to a dead end. He held up the capped terminus, which did absolutely nothing as far as he could tell.
Corey shook his head and gave up in exasperation, extracting his fingers from the tangle of wires and connectors. In front of him, the holographic system grid showed a detailed map, and he tried to match the blueprint with what he saw with his own eyes. “Somebody must have thought it was a good idea, and then generations of Ildirans just continued the modifications without asking questions. This cloud trawler needs a full-blown overhaul. If our clans had run the Kanaka like this, we would have died twenty years out from Earth.” He forced an optimistic grin. “Then again, Oliver, if the Ildirans knew what they were doing, they’d have no need for us, and we’d be out of a job.”
In only a few weeks, however, they began to send shipments of stardrive fuel aboard Ildiran vessels. In spite of constant breakdowns and unexpected delays, the cloud trawler already produced ekti at the same rate it had under the most experienced Ildirans. After his crews installed one more round of enhancements, Corey expected the trawler to double its output within a month.
When Sara Becker announced over the intercom that an Ildiran cargo ship had arrived to pick up a load of fuel canisters, Corey told Oliver, “Keep tinkering with the reactor process monitors. I’m going to the control dome to monitor the cargo.”
“And leave me with all the work?” Oliver said.
Grinning, Corey
Stannis pinched the bridge of his nose and turned away, closing his eyes. He could feel a migraine pounding in the back of his skull. “Oh, go to bed where you can ‘rest and recuperate.’ I’m going to be up all night trying to fix this.”
Dejected, the King shuffled away. Stannis waited in the private room a long time before Liam Hector returned to announce the measures he had taken. So far there seemed to be no repercussions, but Stannis still felt nauseated. He shook his head. “Obviously, Liam, we can’t let that old fool do any more damage! I will not stand by and see our power stripped away.”
10
COREY KELLUM
Circular repairs , that was the best name for it, Corey thought.
After the Ildirans left, his technicians and engineers had rushed around like children on a birthday morning, eager to see how the huge facility really worked, despite the formal briefings. They compared the clean Ildiran blueprints with the actual configurations; they tinkered with the cloud trawler’s power trains, the reactor lines, the levitation engines, the life-support modules, the food-processing systems. They carried electronic clipboards, studied holographic diagrams, and complained about the awkward Ildiran design.
They made repairs to the main ekti reactors, while Corey inventoried the export cylinders for all the stardrive fuel they planned to harvest. If they got the cloud trawler running to his satisfaction, they were going to need a lot more containers.
His crew combed over the floating industrial facility, running diagnostics (and, more often than not, repairs) on system after system. Over the years, the piping, electrical conduits, sensor chains, power-distribution systems, and rerouted channels had grown like vines in a fractal rainforest. No one could quite figure out what half of the systems did, other than to hamper the ekti-processing efficiency. And when the teams finished working on one deck and moved on to the next, something broke down in the previous day’s modifications, and they had to go back and start all over again.
Circular repairs .
Shoulder to shoulder, Corey and Oliver bent over an open maintenance panel trying to dissect and comprehend the intricacies of the systems. “The Ildirans must have had some reason for doing all of this nonsense,” said Oliver, following a thick cable to a dead end. He held up the capped terminus, which did absolutely nothing as far as he could tell.
Corey shook his head and gave up in exasperation, extracting his fingers from the tangle of wires and connectors. In front of him, the holographic system grid showed a detailed map, and he tried to match the blueprint with what he saw with his own eyes. “Somebody must have thought it was a good idea, and then generations of Ildirans just continued the modifications without asking questions. This cloud trawler needs a full-blown overhaul. If our clans had run the Kanaka like this, we would have died twenty years out from Earth.” He forced an optimistic grin. “Then again, Oliver, if the Ildirans knew what they were doing, they’d have no need for us, and we’d be out of a job.”
In only a few weeks, however, they began to send shipments of stardrive fuel aboard Ildiran vessels. In spite of constant breakdowns and unexpected delays, the cloud trawler already produced ekti at the same rate it had under the most experienced Ildirans. After his crews installed one more round of enhancements, Corey expected the trawler to double its output within a month.
When Sara Becker announced over the intercom that an Ildiran cargo ship had arrived to pick up a load of fuel canisters, Corey told Oliver, “Keep tinkering with the reactor process monitors. I’m going to the control dome to monitor the cargo.”
“And leave me with all the work?” Oliver said.
Grinning, Corey
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