Lora was bored. Everyone had gone off leaving Daegaer for
company. She wandered about the ship, Daegaer following. "Your
great company, you know, Daegaer", she told him. "A barrell of
laughs." He stared blankly at her. "Go on, find something that
doesn't work. I will fix it." He held out a snapped stylus. "Oh,
very funny." She wandered back to engineering and pressed a few
buttons at random, then reset them. "Go on, I'll close my eyes
and you twiddle a few knobs", she shut her eyes. Daegaer turned
off the light. "Gee, that's a difficult one", she said, turning
it back on. She pulled out a reference manual. "Lets see if
everything meets its tolerance levels." She leafed through a few
pages, "Go get me a welding kit, a fire extinguisher, an
impedence tester and a milkshake." He sighed and loped off.
"Strawberry!", she yelled after him.
She turned the power pland on and began increacing the
energy flow. "Just a shade below red." Daegaer returned and
dropped the items. "Lighting system should be able to take 0.3
mega-watts", she said around the straw. She flicked a few
switches and the lights glowed a very intense white. Daegaer
gasped and covered his already shaded eyes. "Sorry!" She turned
them off. "Lets see, circulatory fans on max." Daegaer held his
head as she made the connection and flicked the switch. A gentle
wind began blowing through the ship, gradually increacing.
"Wheee!", cried Lora. She turned it off as the manual's pages
began to blow about in her hands. Daegaer sat back up in his
seat. "What next? Purefication plant? Boring. Air conditioning?
Never did like snow... Hull bonding? Hmmm... enhances molecular
bonds in crystal structure of hull, three mega-watts." Daeger
whimpered quietly. "Did you say something?" He shook his head
rapidly. "I know you can talk. Why do you play mute?" She sighed.
"Lets give it a go." She twisted a few wires together and threw
the switch. An almost subsonic throb echoed and quickly died
away. Lora raised and eyebrow and flicked the switch off and on
again. The low noise reverberated throughout the ship. "I've got
an idea."
She unwired the console and set up a small circut to the
power flow controler. She set it to one megawatt and activated
it. The monitor filled with a square curve and around them the
hull emitted a vibrant tone. She smiled. "Go to stores and get
forty mertre of six core cable", she instructed Daegaer. She
dismantled the temporary circut and began studying wiring
diagrams.
She worked rapidly most of the afternoon, Daegaer catching a
bit of her excitment. Dashing here and there, fetching and
carrying tools. In late afternoon the sun was setting. They stood
on the hot cement to one side of the ship. A thick cable drooped
out a hatch and ran to a set of many switched boxes that Daegaer
sat at. A thin wire lead to the final aparatus which Lora
carried.
"Stoke her up", she said. Daegaer gingerly turned a knob,
watching the head shimmer radiate off the engines. "Connect the
interface." He threw several large switches. "Engage filters."
Her activated these and his hand hovered shaking over a large red
button. "Activate", she whispered. He pushed it.
She savoured the moment of silence, then leaped in the air
bringing her hand down shaply on the string of her gitaur. The
sound blasted from the hull's surface area and exploded over the
whole shipyard as she sank to her knees, fingers madly plucking
their way up the nect as the sound rose hight and higher. Daegaer
clung to the console as the ship slid several inches on its madly
vibrating landing gear. At her climax he joined in with the
ship's artilery thundering.
* * *
Terry and the others returned that evening to find their lot
covered in people. Starport police surrounded the area and a few
administrators in business suits were arguing loudly with Lora.
Around her several other spacers had turned up and were chatting
at Daegaer. One had brought a howitzer, another a suitably
modified ultrasonic combat stunner and a tight knot worked around
a plasma cannon, making unguessed modifications. Lora waved them
over.
"What is going on here!", demanded Terry,
"We just thought we'd have a good old jam session!"