Lazarus Rising

1.17 Sabotage

"Captain, hold. We've got interference to our signals to The Stopover, the source is spaceside. Platform sixty, sector Alpha154."

The corners of Shelvocke's eyes creased with puzzlement as he eased himself back into his seat. "Bring it up on the Projector."

They studied the image thrown up by the Projector. A knot of dark metal pipework covered in a blanket of shadows. Deep within them there was just the faintest hint of a circle of rotating orange light. Shelvocke blew up his cheeks and released a long ragged breadth of irritation. "I can't see anything in that jumble of pipework. Can you enhance the projection any further Khriain?"

Khriain adjusted the focus, sweeping his hands to and fro to enhance the grainy image "No, that's as good as I can get it."

"Launch a sphere an' get it over there."

"Launched."

The Projector blurred, an image flashed and tumbled before them, offering up occasional glimpses of the surfaces of the Zig and the stars beyond before it slowed, then stopped. A flood of light lit up the tangle of pipes. "What, in the Heav'ns of Mars?" Shelvocke muttered. Nesting In the dense network of tubes and columns sat a squat round sphere on four hexagonal feet. An outer collar, lit by a ring of dancing neos rotated rapidly around its axis.

"It's a fractal device, Captain. It's the sort of thing that could have brought down the Melpomene." Charisa's voice rang out.

The Captain rubbed his eyes as if he could not believe what he was seeing. "This must'a been put on at The Stopover. Are you sure you know what it is?"

"I'm sure, Captain and it's been armed but I can't say much more than that. But if it goes off soon we'll be visible in the night sky over Europa. So we must assume that's the intent, to detonate it before we are too far from Earth."

"Can it be disarmed?" Shelvocke pulled himself out of his seat and steadied himself against his weightlessness.

"Maybe or maybe it will have been booby trapped. We won't know until we get out there."

"We?" his face darkened.

"Can't we just release it and push it free." Cheyenne interrupted.

"That'll be possible, I sup'se. It looks like it's been mag locked on. You two, come with me. Khriain hold this course and let The Stopover know we've got a bomb on board and we intend jettisoning it if we can. I guess if we fail they'll know pretty soon."

Cheyenne left her seat and bounced up toward the roof. Grasping her ankle, Charisa pulled her back. "Hold on to the bars and you'll be OK. It'll take a little while to get your orientation but you should pick it up pretty quickly."

Leaving Lazarus in the main Command cabin they took a small service levi down to Platform sixty. The Captain hung deep in thought, running is fingers through his thick beard while Cheyenne and Charisa held onto the hand grips to stop themselves being lifted up and gently pinned against the padded roof of the speeding cell. As it slid to a halt they floated into a cabin fitted out with heavy service equipment held in a series of racks attached to an oily stained wall. A line of bulky spacesuits were clamped to a hanger at the far end of the room by a wide, circular lock air. A long thin viewing pane of thick plex allowed a view along one axis of the Zig's base. Glancing through it, Cheyenne could see, some three hundred meters away the hovering sphere illuminating the grid of pipes in a brilliant white arc of light.

"This is it," said Shelvocke as he climbed onto a suit and pulled it over his thickset shoulders. "The device out there is sitting between two bracing members. Here, help me on with the air supply. You're Charisa, right? Well I won't ask what you are but clearly you know more about this than I do. You are here to help talk me through defusing it, if I can't release it. I'll open a channel so you can talk t'me."