Dusters FIFTEEN

Norrie exited the airlock and headed to Engineering. Fagan was having trouble controlling the drone while in the environment suit. These were much less bulky than older suits, but still a bit cumbersome. He got the drone out the hatch and headed aft along the Port side of Two.

“Approaching collector 35” He said.

“Great, there is a latch plate just to the left of it.” Dinah said, “Another above it too.”

“Um, I know that.” Fagan told her. “I did prepare somewhat.”

“Fine.” Dinah said, a little perturbed.

Kelly put her hand on Dinah’s shoulder and said “Cool it Dinah, we need to all be focused on this.” She was off mic, so only Dinah heard her.

Dinah just nodded.
Fagan moved the drone just past collector 35 and turned the craft to face the forward end of the ship. He latched onto the plate behind it with the right arm and the one above with the left and pulled the craft as close to the ship as possible.

“All snug here, I’m going to open the hatch and git er’ done.” He reported.

Dinah and Norrie looked at each other, Norrie was grinning and Dinah was shaking her head.

Fagan depressurized the drone and opened the hatch. It couldn’t open quite fully because the left arm of the drone blocked it, which set off an alarm. Fagan silenced that and told the crew it was nothing.

He tethered himself to the drone and wiggled free of the small seat.

The modified controller card was attached to his waist. He had to remove 15 screws to remove a plate which exposed the controller card on the side of the collector. The screws didn’t actually come off the plate; they were still anchored to it when he pulled it open.

“Got it open.” He said. He tethered the plate to his waist and reached in to pull the controller card. There were two latches he pushed up at the same time on the sides of the card to unseat it.

“Ok, the controller out, do I need to keep this? He asked.

Norrie looked at Dinah. “Your call.” She said.

“Fagan, go ahead and bring it back in, an extra spare.” Dinah said.

“You got it.” He told her and tethered the card to his waist.

He unhooked the modified controller card and plopped it into the empty slot and felt it seat into the connector. Fagan set the latches to lock the card in place.

“All right, it’s in. Can you run a diagnostic, but please don’t activate the collector.” He reported. “I’m putting the cover back on now.”

Norrie announced the diagnostic looked good and Dinah monitored the tests on one of her monitors. She confirmed it looked good.

“Now we just have to see if it works.” Norrie said.

Norrie decided to set her controls to the remote station in the Control Room and headed up there.

Fagan tightened all the screws on the plate and crawled back into the drone. “Heading back now.”

He disconnected the two arms and gently guided the drone back to its airlock. He got the drone inside and locked into its base station. He hit button to close the outer hatch and start pressurizing the room.

At first he didn’t notice the small cracks starting to form in the hatch’s windows. The cracks quickly got bigger on the two large concave view ports.

“What the hell?” He said, then realized he had not re-pressurized the drone. “Shit!” He shouted.

The two large windows imploded at the same time, sharp shards of the polymer window shredded his suit and cut into his body. His right arm was decapitated totally and his right leg was cut badly.

After the half second it took the drone to implode, it exploded and all of the debris shot outward.