Investments by Walter Jon Williams Page B

captain’s lips, so soft it was almost a sigh.
    “Proceed.”
    “Very good, my lord.” Severin checked the captain’s intravenous drip, then spun in the air with a flip of his hands and kicked off for the door.
    He didn’t know how much of his report the captain had understood, but Severin felt better for having delivered it. Lord Go was a good captain and deserved to know what was happening in his ship, and perhaps Lord Go himself felt better for knowing.
    The captain had been returned to his bed prior to the commencement of acceleration. Dehydration was a serious problem with radiation burns and Severin and the other six uninjured crewmen had spent the last few hours giving the surviving victims intravenous drips, an arduous process because they had to learn the technique first, practicing on each other by following the steps in a manual.
    Severin had debated with himself over whether the step should be taken at all. Prolonging the lives of the victims was only to extend their suffering without a chance of altering the outcome.
    But Severin wanted to be able to look at himself in a mirror. He wanted to be able to tell the families of the victims that he’d done everything he could for them. He didn’t want to have to say, “I let them die without trying to help them.”
    He made his way to the control room and worked his way into the command cage, then pulled the display down in front of him and locked it there. Bhagwati, Nkomo, and Chamcha were all strapped into their acceleration couches.
    “Engines,” he told Bhagwati, “sound the acceleration warning.”
    “Yes, my lord.” The warning clattered through the ship.
    “Engines,” Severin said, “prepare to maneuver with the main engine.”
    “Yes, my lord.” Bhagwati looked at her board. “Gimbal test successful, my lord. Engine on standby.”
    “Course one-five-seven by one-five-seven relative.”
    “Course laid into the computer, my lord.”
    “Begin maneuvering.”
    The thrust was gentle, and Severin heard the engine fire only as a distant rumble that seemed to come up his spine. His couch swung lightly in its cage, and a faint whisper of gravity reached Severin’s inner ear. The engine faded, then fired again. Severin’s cage rattled. His stomach gave a little lurch.
    “Come on, ” Bhagwati urged. The main engine really wasn’t intended for this kind of maneuvering.
    The engine fired again, a more sustained burst. Severin found himself waiting for the sound of something falling.
    Nothing fell. The engine fired thrice more, each minor adjustments. There was triumph in Bhagwati’s voice when she announced, “One-five-seven by one-five-seven relative.”
    “Commence acceleration at point one gravities.”
    The engine lit, a sustained distant rumble, and Severin’s cage swung again. A gentle hand pressed him into his couch.
    “Systems check,” Severin ordered, just to make certain nothing had broken.
    Nothing had. Severin had no worries for the hull, which was tough resin stiffened with polycarbon beams, but there was still enough metal in the ship to cause him concern. There were metal shelves, metal hinges, metal fittings, and the sick crew lay on mattresses placed on metal racks. Pipes and conduits were secured by metal strips. Valves with metal parts pierced the hull to bring in water or electricity from stations, or to discharge waste.
    All Severin needed right now was a hull breach.
    Severin added gravity a tenth of a gee at a time until the ship was decelerating at one full gravity. Only once did he hear a crash, when a shelf gave way in the captain’s pantry.
    “Systems check,” Severin said.
    Nothing was destroyed, nothing breached. Severin began to feel proud of Surveyor. It was a tougher craft than he’d expected.
    He would get Surveyor to Laredo, where there would have to be a complete refit. Surveyor was twenty-eight days out from Laredo, so it would take twenty-eight days to reverse the momentum that had built, plus another