Into the Black: Odyssey One Read Online Free PDF Page B

particles that were swept away into the void of space. Weston soon found himself sitting on the edge of the void, grasping his chair for protection, as the effect encompassed his crew, one by one. When the maelstrom engulfed him and the universe went black, Weston’s last conscious thought echoed through what was left of his universe.
    If we survive this, I’m going to have a very serious talk with the techs back home about what constitutes ‘need to know’.
    *****
    Four and a half light-years from where the Odyssey vanished, an unusual disturbance began in the Alpha Centauri star system, where a cloud of particles decelerated apparently from nowhere and rapidly reformed themselves. First, the long forward spires of the Odyssey’s primary communications array and soon the rest of the vessel were reconstituted as the tachyon disruption faded and left the massive ship hurtling sunward into the system’s primary.
    Odyssey Command recovered before the rest of the ship, the transition shock rippling through them even as they turned their attention back to the status reports that began filtering in. Weston found that he had almost slipped from the command chair after they re-entered dimensional space and was quick to correct his posture, a moment later his head stopped screaming long enough for him to begin reacting.
    “Report! All stations,” he snapped, hoping his voice was steadier than his vision.
    “Ship is undamaged Sir, minor wear evident on the Tachyon reactors, The Tachyon based sensors are out of alignment, however. Two hours to repair,” The technician behind him sounded badly. Weston turned to look at him closer.
    Weston stood up and walked over to the shaking tech, “Ensign Waters, you are relieved. Go to the Med-lab and get yourself checked out.”
    Waters shook slightly and looked up at Weston in relief before heading for the back of the room. Weston glanced around the room again, looking harder for evidence of trouble. The rest seemed all right, but he would have to keep a closer eye on them until they had a chance for some rest. He returned to his seat and thumbed an intercom switch after tapping in the channel number.
    “Med Lab, how bad is it down there?”
    Doctor Stevens voice sounded pretty shaky, even over the intercom, “Pretty bad, Captain. Over thirty crewmen have reported in for varying causes…,” the pause in the doctor’s speech seemed ominous, “And we have at least one that we have to confine to the labs… Lt Tearborn snapped, Captain. Security picked her up in engineering. Apparently she witnessed the reactor vaporize and she thought it was a breech.”
    Weston’s words were uttered too quietly for anyone to hear him, but his body language transmitted the message to anyone on the bridge unfortunate enough to be watching. It had been hard enough watching the ship, apparently disintegrating into a vacuum, but to watch the reactor fall apart? Too many horror stories had been told about reactor breeches on board ships for that to be easily dismissed.
    Eric let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding, and nodded, “All right, Doctor. Do what you can. Oh, by the way, I just sent Ensign Waters down to you. He should be arriving soon.”
    “Yes sir, we’ll clear some space. Med Lab out.”
    Weston thumbed the switch back and sank into his seat. Tearborn was a good engineer, not someone he would expect to snap. When I get home, I think I’ll recommend sedatives for nonessential crew members prior to entering transitional space.
    He shook his head, compartmentalizing the thoughts and emotions, then quickly straightened and locked an iron grip on his Command Persona. “Helm, plot us a nice long hyperbolic course. Commander, tell the labs to make good use of the time, because we’ll transition out when we clear the gravity well.”
    “Aye Sir,” Both Daniels and Roberts chorused as they turned to their tasks.
    The Odyssey sailed into the system, sails almost literally unfurling