Every gasping breath is agony. The toxic outgassing of smoldering components sears my lungs and brings tears to my eyes. Only willpower keeps me from succumbing to a fit of helpless coughing from which I'll never recover. One fringe benefit of the dangerously low oxygen levels, though, is that substantially less of my bridge is on fire now than was 30 seconds ago.
Focus. Don't make pointless witticisms, and don't cough. I need air or I die. Focus. Main power is offline. Battery power hasn't kicked in, don't know why. There still should be power from the solar panel. Focus. No power means no computer, no computer means no automatic reconfiguration. Going to have to splice a cable between the feed from the panel and the life support distribution node. Heh. At least there's plenty of cable floating around! Don't do that... focus, dammit!
No gloves, but no time. Suffocation or electrocution, what a choice. Pull that wire. Open that junction. Don't touch the end, don't touch the conduit. Just jam the end in... FRAG!! That hurt! Should have closed my eyes.
Done. Maybe. If. Can't.... focus. Breathe. Just breathe. If I go to sleep, I may never know if I died. Heh. Heheheh. That's not funny.....
What's that sound? Something's rattling. Sounds like a damaged fan in the recirculation system. Hey! It sounds like a damaged fan in the recirculation system! It fragging worked! I can breathe!!! Woooohoooo!! I'm alive!!!
Hmmm. Well, I'm alive, but my ship isn't. No power from main or battery, no computer, no propulsion, no gravity, no weapons, no sensors, no communication. Scud! Where do I start? At least the hull wasn't breached.
Frag! Is he still out there? Did I get him? His shields were definitely down, but did I get him? If he were alive, he'd either have blasted or boarded me by now. So he's dead. Right? Or he's broke too, trying to fix his ship while I sit here fragging running in circles! Scud! Frag!!
Focus. Breathe. He's out there or he's not, doesn't matter. I've got more immediate problems. Where to start. Can't fight without weapons, can't move without propulsion, can't navigate without the computer, can't see without sensors, can't make anything work without power...
Focus. Focus, frag you! Start with what you have. You've got a sound hull. You've got power from the panel. How much? This system has a class K star, last reading was 117 AUs from center. Square the distance, divide it into the base luminance for a K... scud! I need a computer for this! Focus. Focus. Breathe. Think it through, round off to nice even numbers.
Ok, I've think there's enough power coming in to run 2 low consumption systems. There's life support, the computer, sensors, gravity, communications. So, any 2 of those at a time. Maybe, maybe, there's enough for maneuvering if I turn everything else off.
Focus. Prioritize. I need to know what's out there first, so I need sensors, but I can't troubleshoot sensors without the computer. Right. This time, I think I'll put on the proper protective gear. Should probably take the extra time to rig a manual switching panel so I'm not moving and soldering live wires every time I need power somewhere else. I can pull breakers from the main distribution node, cable from.....
What's it been? 7 hours?? Frag, but I want to rest. So tired. Hurt in so many places.
...and now we turn it on. Come on, baby, daddy needs a new pair of magnetic boots. Come on... come on... you can do it... that's a girl... yes! YES!!! Alright, the computer works! It's alive!!! IT IS ALIVE!!! ..... Hmmm. I didn't know it had so many red lights. Focus. Diagnostics, sensors.
I hate EVA. I didn't become a pilot to spend time floating around in space! Whose fragging brilliant fragging idea was it to put the primary fragging sensor fragging feed outside the fragging hull???
So tired. So hungry. 19 hours since the battle, and no stop. Focus. Tired. No, focus. Sensors should be on. Shut down life support. Power to sensors. I don't dare fall asleep now. Should be air for about 6 hours, no more. Focus. Scan. What's out there?
He's not dead. He's not moving, but he's not dead. There's enough thermal signature to indicate life support, but no EM emissions, so he doesn't have sensors. Either that, or he's on passive scan. I need to maneuver.
So tired.
The good news is that the maneuvering engines are in ok shape. The bad news is the batteries are toast. They must have overloaded pretty badly during that last volley. Resistance is up about 370%, and capacity is down. Way down. Ran the numbers through the computer, and at this distance from the star, it looks an hour of charging will give me about a minute of maneuvering. That is, of course, if I divert all power to charging. Scud.
Wha? Where am I? Oh, FRAG! What time... 14:00?? I've been asleep for 9 hours! SCUD! Where is he? Where is he?? Disable life support and charging, boot the computer... come on, come on, you fragging piece of scud! HURRY!! Ok, bring the sensors online... he should be right...
Oh, scud. Scud, scud, scud. He's stopped tumbling, and arrested his drift. He's got maneuvering. Probably got it while I was fragging napping! What an idiot! What am I doing out here!! Fragging worthless imbecile!!
Breathe. Focus. Think.
If he could have reached me, he would have. Wouldn't he? Look again... he's definitely stable, but still no EM emissions. Which means no sensors. Which means he's still blind. Hm. I can see, but he can move. Wait, I can move! The batteries were charging while I slept... still not much, but there's about 6 minutes in there.
6 minutes of maneuvering. Not even enough to start a fight. Fight? He's blind! I could fragging coast over, and he'd never see me coming! Wait. Focus. You just said something important. Coast. Not maneuver, coast. Of course! I'll only need about 90 seconds of power to stabilize the ship and overcome my momentum! Which leaves power to spare. Enough?
Hehehehe!! Fragging pirate! Time for you to die!! Tumble checked... 53 degrees yaw... easy... easy..now pitch up just a bit... easy... there! And main thrusters fire... 20 seconds... 10 seconds... 3....2....1... off!! Check the readings... check the math again... close enough. I'll be there in just under 3 hours. Now to get the forward cannon working...
Yes! 20 minutes to spare, and the cannon is operational. My best guess is that I'll be able to get about an 80% charge, but I'm not about to waste power on the computer to find out for sure.
Closer.... Closer.... Scud, I can actually see him out the viewport now! Never been this close to a soon-to-be-ex pirate before. Minimum distance should be in about 3 minutes... time to bring the computer and fire control up.
FRAG YOU!!!!!
Go me!! Go me! It's my birthday! It's my birthday! I am the champion, I aaaaaam the chaaaaaampion!!
Hm. I hope someone friendly comes thru here in the next few days. Gonna get pretty hungry soon...
(This message has been edited by moderator (edited 05-19-2003).)
(Just watch word overuse... I won't go into detail because you probably already know, and it's been said.) Keep writing!