Fatal Boarding by E. R. Mason

We have proven,
however, that we can manually initiate thruster firings. We
actually did that on an aft and a starboard thruster for 2
milliseconds each and it worked. The system still thinks it’s
supposed to be holding us at station keeping, so afterward it
automatically puts us back into our original position, but we have
proven it can be done."
    Grey sat for a moment and looked around the
room as though he expected someone else to speak. No one did. He
exhaled as though the entire affair was tedious. "Does anyone else
have any input for the general group?"
    Silence.
    "What we are going to do is set up for
another attempt tomorrow at 07:00. If necessary, we'll force the
thrusters to back us away and then set up for a hard start of the
AmpLight Drives. We'll put some distance between us and this sector
of space, and then stop and take another look at our situation.
Everyone make the necessary arrangements for that. If anyone has
any problems, I want to know, immediately. If there's nothing else,
that's it for the main group. Let's break down for the departmental
meeting."
    For a moment, it seemed as though no one was
willing to leave. Finally, the doors slid open and a slow, silent
exodus began. Gradually the line of staff dwindled down to nothing.
Grey turned and surprised me by pointing for the doors to be
closed. As I did, Tolson looked back and motioned me to one of the
two empty chairs at the center table. I took a seat next to
Erin.
    Grey leaned forward. "Exactly what are the
problems you will face with a manual thrust back away, Mr
Davis?"
    Davis replaced the pointer to its holder and
took his seat at the far end of the table. "There are several,
Captain. We need to disconnect the fiber lines from the auto
controller, but make them still think they have control of the
thrusters. Then, we can force the ship to move, without fighting
the auto controller's desire to maintain station keeping. Our back
away will at best be erratic, although Ray has indicated that Range
Safety will have no problem with that. There's nothing out here to
bump into except that ship. For a brief period, we will be drifting
free with minimal separation between ourselves and the other ship.
Of course, there will be a tendency for the two to attract each
other. Not only will we face a collision hazard, but we also have
measured a significant static potential between hulls. We could
possibly have arcing between ships, if we got close enough. No
matter how we look at this, it's a gamble, and it may not
work."
    "But I trust you will be ready to make an
attempt by 07:00, Mr. Davis?"
    "Yes sir, that is the one thing we are
certain of."
    "What about the ALs, Paul. Do you have any
other reservations you would like to add?"
    "Actually we don't, Captain. Our status is
exactly as reported at the general meeting. We are optimistic about
a hard start."
    "Alright, we are depending on you gentleman.
Who here is reporting on the Scout craft option?"
    "That's me, Captain." Terry Lee, the chief
structural engineer, raised his hand from the right hand side of
the table. "We have a prototype attachment designed for the scout
ships, and we've run enough simulations to know what the best
possible scenario would be. Two scout craft, one aft, one
starboard, at the 240 degree and the 80 degree on the Y-plane. That
gives us enough clearance from the other ship to avoid blow-back
from the scout engines. It would need to be a very slow move. Once
inertia takes over the scouts would just be following along. The
thrusters must be off-line to do it. And, we would need them later
to stop Electra. There are no desirable bumper points back by the
reactor core to use the scouts. They'll be able to come back in the
hanger bay anytime during the move, but without thrusters we'll
just keep coasting backward. Also, we have run simulations of
problems with the hanger bay doors. Technicians in spacesuits would
be able to open them manually, if that kind of problem crops up. It
will