CHAPTER 8

Wow" Silversten said "so you advised him to go on this dangerous mission. What if he dies?"

"That is why I'm here, to make sure you don't fail" the AI replied.

"But the possibility of finding a planet such as Earth is very low, which means we are more likely to fail than not" Silversten pointed out.

"By failing I mean dying but at least even I we can't find such a planet, we would be away long enough to make people believe that Tungsten really died, which is to the detriment of his father. And the way we have planned o getting our revenge" the AI told Silversten

"I don't understand howw you can get your revenge by tarnishing Tungsten's father's reputation " Silversten told Tungsten, but the AI was the one that replied.

"When Tungsten doesn't appear for the court hearing, it will be assumed that his father had a pre knowledge of the lawsuit filed against him and sending Tungsten away is his way of avoiding it. But when the accusation being that Tungsten's father threatened to kill him reaches the public, it will be assumed quite naturally that he had carried out his threat.And this will paint quite an image of Tungsten's father which his enemy, Lord Plank, must surely use to dethrone him. The fall from sovereignty and monarchy to a commoner's life is the worst thing that can happen to Tungsten's father,. For then the commoners he have mistreated can have their revenge on a fellTow ' commoner' and the authorities won't care"

"That's quite a nice plan, but then won't Tungsten be affected too, I mean, he is the heir to his father s power isn't he?" Silversten asked

"That the power was conferred on him by the virtue of his birth doesn't make it dependent of the consequent conditions of his family. It can only be revoked by the 'Powers that be' and of yet, they haven't a cause for that". The AI said.

"Now you guys won't believe it, but it's already a day, time to pull into the dive again" the AI informed them. Silversten and Tungsten groaned in unison but started making their way to the bridge a anyway, grabbing their suits on their way.

Once they took their suits Tungsten depressed a button and two other crew members came in. The two men took their seats in front of the controls on either side of Tungsten.

"Run the radar and find any objects or planets ".

Tungsten said to one.

"Run the diagnostics and find out if there is any fault with the ship" he said to the other then turned to Silversten. Before he could speak however, Silversten interrupts him.

"I know. I have to check the fuel enzyme rate and set the combustion rate." Silversten said before Tungsten could turn to him.

"You got it." Tungsten said grinning.

"Radar reporting. A clear way ahead." One of the men said.

'Doctor reporting. Diagnostics completed. No fault found with the ship " the other said.

"Engine reporting. Ship ready to go." Silversten said

"Pilot reporting. All set" Tungsten said.

"Permission to start combustion Chief?" Silversten asked Tungsten.

"Granted" Tungsten replied.

"AI Luna, report progress." Tungsten said.

"Required fuel quantity ready, combustion started, diving in 5 seconds, free fall anticipated." A voice spoke from a speaker. All four men immediately strapped themselves to their seats. A low hum in the the bridge told the men that the ship has pulled into a dive.

"What is the speed?" Tungsten asked.

"Four grav pull and still acceralating at the speed of a grav pull per five minutes.''

"Good" Tungsten said.

"Can we now release our straps?" Asked Silversten who always found freefalls unpleasant.

"I think..." Luna started to reply but was suddenly cut off.

"Luna?" Tungsten asked. There was in response

"Luna ate you there?" No response.

"Luna what's wrong?" Still no response.

"Luna? " thus time their was a note of panic in Tungsten's voice.

"What's wrong?" Silversten asked.

I don't know. Doctor run the diagnostics. " Tungsten barked the last sentence.

"I can't. The ship is in freefall."

" I'm going to find out what happened" Tungsten said, unstrapping himself.

"You can't, I'm the chief engineer" Silversten said almost immediately.

"You don't tell when Luna is involved".

Tungsten snarled and pushed up from his chair, shooting straight up in the zero gravity. Silversten unstrapped himself and followed suit. Using gravity nodes on their palms and feet, and one on their chest, they navigated their way out of the bridge. Tungsten in his haste started making for an elevator, but Silversten knew it will be useless in the zero gravity. They had to use the stairs.

Once in the engine room, Tungsten diverted to the communication and signals section while Silversten went on to the main engine. He thought it might just be a mechanical fault.

Silversten floated into the engine room, the silver pipes and machines dazzling him for a moment. Here and there are rows and rows and columns and columns of silver pipes and machines making a beautiful pattern. Silversten didn't let himself admire it, he knew that in the situation, any one of them can be his death. He switched on his GM tube, just in case any of the pipes are leaking. Then he turned on the alarm, he wasn't taking any chances. For safety reasons, the GM alarm doesn't depend on the GM tube alarm entirely. The alarm is made if a material that can't withstand high radiation and will burst with an audible pop sound once the radiation reaches a certain limit.

Silversten floated to an interface board and put Hus palm on it, instantly, a green glow filled the room. On each metal pipe and machine, a green board have appeared, displaying all needed information about the processes going on in them and where each pipe leads to. Silversten grabbed an over hanging metal pipe, gauged the distance to the fuel combustion section and swung his body. He glided smoothly to the far end of the room, stretching out his hands and using gravity nodes to stop himself just in time. He Checked the figures on the fuel tank, the reading showed that the carbon and hydrogen boron fuel needed to run the ship were still available. He glided to the delivery pipe leading to the combustion chamber and looked at the figure. For a moment his heart stopped, then he told himself that the ship might just be in excess activity and therefore needing a fast delivery of fuel. The same theory might have passed for the combustion rate if he haven't noticed just in time that the combustion rate was increasing exponentially. His first reaction was to shoot himself towards rye fuel tank and cut off the delivery. If he hadn't,the high combustion rate will lead to the production excess energy for the ship's use which will inevitably lead to energy overload and consequently explosion of the engine room which is just the same thing as a sentence on the ship.

But once the figure on the delivery pipe wrote zero, gravity returned and Silversten found himself falling. He fell with a loud thump and another one behind him made him look back to find Tungsten behind him.

"So what's with Luna?" He asked.

"Don't know. The problem might not be with her but the comm center. It is not receiving any power." Tungsten replied.

"Which makes one ask what all those fuel is being used for?" Silversten wondered.

"Yeah, I saw the figures too. Makes me wonder because a third of the fuel is used to provide electric power. Now if there's no electric power, where does all the fuel go to?" Tungsten asked.

"Wait let me get this straight. You mean there is no electric power in the whole ship? Because there was in the bridge before we cane here." Silversten said. There was a long and drawn out beep just then and the room was into darkness. The last if the carbon and hydrogen boron fuel pellets in the combustion chamber have been used up.

"That answers it then. Makes me wonder how fast the delivery rate was such that the last of the pellets in the combustion chamber only just burnt up now." Silversten said.

"Going really fast, which makes me wonder what all those fuel were for?"

" we can only find out by tracing it." Silversten said, unplugging his pen from his belt and plugging it into a memory board beside him. The heat of his hand activated the pen which in turn activated the memory board. He unplugged it and wrote the engineers password across the board.

"Enter command" the memory board displayed.

He wrote the instructions which looked like a bunch of random numbers and letters with symbols to Tungsten.

" I wonder how it's like to always think in equation, Engine. "Tungsten remarked ruefully, referring to the command Silversten wrote.

" I wonder what is like to always think with coordinates, Pilot." Tungsten replied then glanced at pipes. Not finding what he was looking for, he wrote the command again. Then he remembered that the fuel tank wasn't delivering the pellets yet.

He walked over to the fuel switched it on, instantly, green arrows appeared on the Silver

pipes leading to the combustion chamber. Just as I started instantly, Silversten felt a lurch in the pit of his stomach and his body became weightless.

"Hey, Tungsten,what just happened? "

"Don't know. But I remember quite well that when using the reserve power, we are supposed to be in free fall ". Tungsten replied.

"And when direct from the fuel tank, there isn't supposed to be free fall. But the exact opposite is what is happening ".

"Wonder what is wrong with our gravity turbines. Let's go and check "

"No" Silversten replied. "You go check, I'm going to check what uses all the power generated by our fuel. Our New voyager might be leaking "

"okay" Tungsten said as he glided away to the deck below. Silversten after watching his head disappear looked towards the pipes again and his heart made a second leap in an hour. The green arrows were now red and what's more? They are now moving so fast they just formed an unbroken straight line.