Dusters FOURTEEN

Fagan and Norrie went through hours of configurations of the test collector before they hit the one that matched up to the original scenario. Dinah had come and gone twice while they worked on it.

They had to drop magnet 35 to ½ power then wait 2 seconds and kill magnet 17 to recreate the same condition that had delivered them to their current location.

The only concern was what other random problems might interdict in their effort when they try this for real. Norrie headed off to modify the controller card for their test collector so they could remotely control the individual magnets and recreate the incident.

“This should take an hour, let Dinah and the rest know.” As she left.

Fagan went to tell Dinah.

“We think we have it down.” He told her, as he walked into the Control Room. “Norrie is making the modifications to the collector control card and we should be able to get started soon.”

“We have to do a manual modification to collector 35.” He said flatly.

“Who’s going out?” Dinah asked from her chair.

“I’ll do it.” He said.

“I would rather Norrie do it.” She said.

Kelley was in the back of the control room with the Navigator. “Me too.” She said.

Dinah looked over at Kelley, and she stepped towards the seated Copilot.

Fagan objected; “I can do it Kelley, I feel fine and with Dinah and you driving the ship, I need something to do. You need Norrie in engineering.” He pleaded. “I can do this, I’ve done dozens of space walks.”

“Your call Kelley, you’re in charge I suppose.” She turned back to her console.

Kelly walked up to Fagan, “Watch your ass; I know you can do this, but we are a long way from home and no one is coming to save us.” She planted a finger in his chest as she finished the sentence.

She went back to finish with the Navigator. Dinah chuckled next to him, “Go get-em tiger.”

Fagan smiled and gave her a quick thumbs up, spun on his heels, saluted and over animatedly marched out of the Control Room. Dinah was still laughing. Kelly and Opoku smiled for a second.


AT the portal airlock, Fagan sunk into the maintenance drone’s chair. “This was built for a smaller man.” He said as he crammed into the seat and strapped in. “Ok a child?”

“It didn’t have you in mind when they designed it Fagan.” Norrie said. “They didn’t have anyone in mind, it’s supposed to be a drone.”

She reached in and hit the button to close the hatch. The drone had two large arms and several smaller ones to handle finer tasks. She waved at Fagan as the hatch swung down and sealed itself.

She walked past the rigged controller card to the communications panel and donned a headset. “Start the preflight checks please.” She said.

“Already running, you…” He quipped. Seals are good, pressure is fine, power looks great, life support is nominal, check check check and check.” He said.

Laughing Norrie said, “Ok, test the arms please. Try to be a bit professional.”

“Me? Professional? When have I ever?” He began testing the large arms first, though he shouldn’t need them except to latch onto the ship. He took each through a “range of motion” maneuver and docked each when complete. He did the same for the three smaller arms then stowed them as well.

“Looks good Eng, let’s get the party started.” He said.

Norrie called up to the Control Room, “We are ready, all stop please.” She asked.

They felt the small burn to stop the ship in space. They had been drifting towards Saturn, but way slower than they needed to be moving.