Ghost Station (The Wandering Engineer) Read Online Free PDF Page B

increment to try to keep the bottle
stable but it was barely keeping ignition temperatures now. They had planned on
doing that anyway so they could install the new parts once they were checked
out. She had been shocked and pleasantly surprised when all of them had without
a problem.
    That
however had taken a couple of hours to complete. Most of life support was now
thrown onto the jury rigged secondary systems by now. Of course most of those
systems were super conductor batteries, all well past their impedance and
projected working lifetimes. Oh there were a few solar cells on the hull, but
nowhere near enough for all the bodies on this ship.
    “O'Mallory
did you send a crew to fix this hallway?” Warner demanded, cutting off her
thoughts.
    “What
are you talking about?” she asked, slowing and then stopping.
    “Someone
did a bang up job in here. I don't know why,” the exec replied. “If you didn't
do it, who did?”
    “Jerry
said that admiral guy was fixing stuff in the hallway a while ago,” Marko said
behind O'Mallory. She turned on him with a scowl.
    “What
did you just say?” she demanded.
    “I
said that um,” he looked a little sheepish. “That Jerry saw that admiral guy
doing stuff in the hallway outside his quarters. Fixing stuff you know?”
    “And
you didn't report this why? Why the hell didn't Jerry for that matter?”
O'Mallory rounded on the hapless tech.
    “Cause
we didn't think it was a problem. The guy wasn't breaking anything hell! He was fixing it! What's wrong with that?” he demanded.
    “Apparently
this guy knows his way around a wrench,” Leia said grimacing.
    “Apparently
so,” Warner snarled. “I'm at his quarters. The guards were locked inside. He
somehow picked the lock and stunned one and then he had Hadji drag his partner
into the room.”
    “Great,
so he's on the loose?” O'Mallory demanded, rubbing her temples. Could this day
get any worse?
     
    Irons
monitored the communication from the exec to the chief, and chuckled at her
confusion. The exec entered the room and ordered the guards out, and reported
to the bridge that the admiral was loose and armed.The engineer
grimaced and ordered Defender to lock the ship down.
    “Admiral
I'm not even sure that is possible. Or advisable,” Sprite said as she felt
Defender's efforts through their joint link. Since the Admiral was out of his
room and on the move Defender was using the Fleet Launch to invade the ship's
systems remotely.
    He
heard the slamming doors and felt the gravity fall off. The lights flicker and
shut off, and he felt the panic on the communication’s channels before they too
shut down.
    Sprite
watched engineering go into panic as the bottle began to fluctuate
uncontrollably. “As I was saying admiral, it was not advisable. Cascade bottle
failure is imminent.” The AI informed him the reactor’s harmonic was beginning
to destabilize containment and he grimaced.
    “Oops,”
he said trying to think. He didn't want to kill hundreds of people. Not if he
could help it. After a minute he came to a reluctant decision. “Sprite, open a
channel to the bridge.”
    “Are
you sure admiral?” Sprite asked as he paused.
    “Just
do it before I change my mind,” he growled.
    “Okay...”
Sprite opened a channel to the bridge and waited for the captain to stop
cursing.
    “Things
not going as planned captain?” Irons asked amused.
    “Who
the hell is this?” the captain snarled, looking around his bridge.
    “Admiral
Irons. Your guest. Fleet Admiral John Henry Irons, Federation Navy. It seems
you have a serious situation. One we both have had a hand in causing. The
question is where do we go from here?” he asked.
    The
captain paused, looking around. He wasn't sure what to do. He'd heard that
Irons was some sort of jumped up officer but he'd thought it was some sort of
ploy, a con artist using it to get around the galaxy. Now he wasn't sure.
    “Sprite
course to main engineering,” Irons said.
    “Sprite?”
The