Point of Failure

by ~waran4

Point of Failure
AD 4226 – November
A faint hum sounded throughout the ship as we passed by planets and moons at speeds no man could have thought of reaching. The tests of the new ship-fitted warp drives were a success; at least so far. Pushing through the empty voids of space at 50,000 km/s, over 55 times faster than previous speed records, we were tasked with testing the warp core prototype in a simple way: a trip to the notorious, celestial object known as "Pluto", and back; all within two weeks.

Packed within the Brontes were fifteen crewmen who had never even met each other, me being one of them, everyone having one major task put for them: keep the warp core going and keep it from collapsing. Being a prototype, it was extremely unstable and needed adjustments continually to keep it from stalling or, in the worst case, collapsing. An eerie silence hung in the atmosphere, noting us of the nervousness the others had while maintaining the warp core. The fifteen crewmen to have been selected were at the top of their class. It was a must, considering we were going to go far beyond real-time communicational ranges. If something went wrong, no one would be there to help us out. Thus, the psyche in the minds of the crewmen had to be ice cold, leaving no thoughts about what could happen, and more on what is happening.

The Brontes was picked out as the best suitable ship for the task: its systems are compatible with the warp core prototype, and its design is well-regarded as one of the most durable of its kind, many predicting it will be used for thousands of years; I myself doubt it will last that long though. Some scholars even make jokes about it to be called "Taranis" in the future, seeing it is the Celtic, and more famous name of the Cyclops "Brontes" from Greek mythology.
Since we were about to venture into less-populated parts of the solar system, the Brontes was fitted with three small hybrid cannons. I only hope the occasion where we will need to use them will never come…

By the time we had passed Saturn, the hopes of whether this would work started to show relieving results; keeping the warp core stable started getting easier; fluctuations were diminishing. The cause was unknown, but the core showed no signs of being close to stalling, let alone collapsing. The faint hum deepened to the point where one could barely notice it. Minutes later, you couldn't hear the hum whatsoever, leaving a void of silence filling the surroundings, reminding us once more of how far away from civilization we were, and also the fact that we were by no chance getting closer to said civilization.

A question I kept asking myself was why the boys with the glasses back on Earth would put 15 people instead of one well-programmed computer inside this ship. It would be much more accurate about regulating the core, and previous small-scale tests had showed that it worked efficiently? Rumors have it that they didn't want a computer to do this because the possibility that a situation it didn't know of could come to light, thus dooming the whole ship and the warp core prototype. In short,"They wanted to exchange the one point of failure for fifteen new ones instead", is how I see it.

I let out a low sigh, sitting by the console regulating the flow of energy from the capacitor to the warp core. I was getting exhausted. We were all getting exhausted. While seven of us worked the core, seven others slept. That was everyone's daily schedule, and everyone did their best to stick to that schedule. Not doing so would jeopardize the whole mission; an easy reason to keep everyone working. The last crewmember was a simple janitor; a kind old man, and probably the only person over 30 years. Truly a person who enjoyed every possible bit of his line of work: never possessing anything worse than a smile at every occasion suitable. I said that everyone was at the top of their class, and I'll stay by that statement even considering that janitor.

We were closing in on the orbit of Neptune when things started getting hectic. The core had started thirsting for more energy ever before and the fluctuations had been getting heavier, almost to the point where they were uncontrollable. The hum which once had faded had picked up again, roaring through the interior of the ship louder than ever before. Considered how exhausted we all were from the long trip, these two things were not high up on our wish list of things to happen. Readings showed nothing out of the ordinary about the core, other than the fluctuations and proneness to stalling making it devour more energy to keep going. The cause was unknown, and at the current energy consumption it was estimated that we only had enough capacitor to reach Mars on the way back. A faint feel of panic started creeping up on everyone's back, planting desultory and haphazardness in most of the crewmembers.

We were only hours away from Pluto when everything went in every undesirable way any of us could think of. At some point, there had been an undetected breach in the hull, lowering the cabin pressure somewhat. Finding said breach proved to be close to impossible, and due to how small of a problem it caused, we all ignored it. As an added bit of kindness from mother nature, exhaustion had become such a severe problem people started falling asleep aside of the six hours a day we normally spent sleeping. And to top it all off: we had, at some point, altered our course enough to possibly ending up missing Pluto. After a quick meeting, we decided we had to make the core stall to stop it, correct our course, and try to start the core again. Not a simple task, considered it normally took twenty percent of the capacitor to fire it up again without the use of external capacitor suppliers like we used when orbiting Earth.

Everyone took place, and we started decreasing the energy flow to the core; the notorious hum constantly reminding us of the importance of the mission at hand lowered and suddenly halted, leaving the eerie, empty void of silence once more. Due to the way the warp core works, we were slowed down to a complete halt, only just starting drift due to the gravitational forces from the sun and the surrounding planets. We quickly corrected our course, and got ready for an attempt at firing up the core again. For every failed try, the core would drain a little of our capacitor, so ultimate precision was a must. For the first time ever, the janitor was actually watching us as we were working on the core's systems. A nervous atmosphere hung in the air as we were about to fire up the core again. We all looked at each other, and nodded towards the Hispanic man sitting by the ignition controls. A few moments later, he looked down, tipped over the translucent, box-shaped lip covering the blue ignition button, and depressed the button before him with all his might. A loud, struggling hum filled the atmosphere, giving off the impression that it had difficulties to get the core running. Seconds felt like hours, as we waited in hope for the more fluid-sounding version of the hum. It was hopeless to watch the indicators while starting the core, as the fluctuations were off the charts, making the indicators go everywhere. Seconds had passed, but the hum kept being random. He let go of the button, and stood looking at it in nervousness, sweating; actually, that applied to absolutely everyone in the room. We made some slight adjustments and were ready for the second attempt. "This better work this time" was a thought circulating through everyone's mind. The Hispanic man had probably never been as nervous as he was at that moment his entire life. He pressed the button forcefully once more, followed by the erratic hum like the last time. Once again, seconds went by. Everyone, as exhausted as we were and far away from any help whatsoever, could only wait as we listened to the warp core fluctuate heavily. After some more seconds, the hum started evening out. Indicators showed decreasing energy consumption: a sign that the core is stabilizing. No one said a word; we all just returned to our respective tasks and continued on what we had been doing for the past week.

Our course was going to take us in at only 70km to the side of Pluto, from which we would turn around and go back after dropping a probe there; it was a simple way to let the world know we had been there. We closed in on Pluto, and everyone got ready to stall the core once again. If we stalled it a little too early, we wouldn't be close enough for the probe to crash into Pluto; if we stalled it too late, we could overshot Pluto and the result would be the same. When the time came I, who was the one in charge of the energy flow to the core, and thus the only one capable of stalling it, let alone stopping the thing, smoothly pulled the sliders down, lowering the energy flow, until the core couldn't bare the scarce energy flow anymore, thus grinding to a violent halt which shook the ship forcefully. In a few minutes, we had ejected the probe and sent a report back to Earth about what had happened so far. Then the most nerve-wrecking task of them all: firing up the core once more. Our capacitor was at only a mere 42%, leaving no room for error.

After all the preparations were set, and everyone had taken their respective seats, we were ready for the first attempt once more. The sporadic hum filled the atmosphere again like before, emptying everyone's heads and filling them with dear hopes that it would work on the first try. It didn't. An alarm sounded, and we all turned our desperate eyes to the monitors again. The heavy, magnetic fluctuations in the warp core had bent the structure of the ship repeatedly while we were traversing towards Pluto, putting strain on surrounding plating like someone pounding it with a sledgehammer thousands of times per second, and had been doing so for the past week non-stop. We all abandoned the thought of firing up the core again, and turned to maintaining the imminent hull breach the alarm noted us about, but in reality, we couldn't do anything about it. It wasn't taken into account for the journey that we would experience hull breaches, and thus we didn't have anything to counter them in any way. Soon, we all accepted the situation before us, and just sat watching, as the monitors showed multiple imminent hull breaches all over the ship. Minutes passed by, and the only thing happening was more alarms popping up, noting us about damages to the structure of the ship. Troubling sounds started echoing throughout the ship as the hull gave way, bending and bulging from the vacuum of space. More time passed, and all we could do was reminisce about the life we had on Earth, our families, and the great failure this mission turned out to be. The sounds of the hull creaking grew louder, and soon a major alarm went off, indicating a hull breach had taken place. It was right next to the warp core, leading straight into a hallway. Safety screens quickly isolated the hallway, leaving us to wonder how long it will be before another one show.

An hour passed by, and our helplessness hadn't changed. The hull was creaking like an old rocking chair and the alarms were on like a disco. Minutes ticked by with only the creaking of the hull filling the air. Suddenly, the ship shook violently, and another major alarm went off. A hull breach in the sleeping cabins, where half of the crew was residing. I didn't think the atmosphere could get heavier, but after seeing where the breach had taken place, I realized that was completely wrong. "They probably didn't wake up from the creaking due to how tired they were" I thought to myself, attempting to comfort myself. More minutes passed by, and another breach made its presence, soon followed by two more. Now, a hallway, the sleeping area, the engine area, the cargo hold and the warp core itself were not pressurized, exposed directly into space.

Hours passed by, and the creaking lowered. A breach made its way once again; although not as loud as the other ones, it was surely one of the most notable ones. Seconds after the breach, we lost main power throughout the ship, leaving us helpless in the darkness. Moments passed by. A little while later, a red emergency light illuminated the room, making us remember the long-lasting tradition of energy-saving light by using red lamps in emergency situations. Every breach from now on could be anywhere, and we wouldn't know.

A day passed by faster than one would've thought. The low creaking sounded throughout the ship like a moaning beast waiting for its prey to exit its safe cavern. A hungry predator starving for an easy prey waiting nearby. The sounds dancing around me made me think of those old u-boats used thousands of years ago that I had read about, where the crew often survived long after the submarine started to sink, alive long enough to hear the creaking noises of the hull giving way to the pressure of the depths; this was us now. Multiple breaches sounded off, rocking the ship like never before, but unlike last time, we had no idea where they were. The backup batteries wouldn't last much longer. After a day of breaches, I predicted it'd be expended by the next couple of hours. If a breach occur after it's emptied, there'll be nothing to stop the rapid decompression of the control room, nor any other part of the ship.

Just like I predicted, roughly three hours later the red-glowing emergency lighting started fading, until complete darkness engulfed the room. Everyone stopped talking to each other, returning to just waiting; waiting for the impending crack of the whole ship imploding. The creaking started getting louder, and a few moments later, a violent gust blew everyone off their seats.

The little gleaming spot in the sea of stars reminded me of how far away from home we really were.