It was a few days prior to Jump Out, the historic first jump of mankind’s first ever colony ship. I was in the primary control room running through a formal checklist with my First Assistant Chief. Jumps aren’t normally a big deal nowadays, since spaceships have been using jump technology for the better part of 20 years. However, there has always been talk of a theoretical upper limit as far as the amount of mass one can push through a single jump.
Destiny, our colony ship’s name, was nowhere near that upper limit but it was still five times the size of the largest jump capable ship in the fleet. So I was a little nervous and wanted to make sure everything was “nom and calm”. Or checking that systems were within nominal parameters and no alarms or warning lights were on.
It was during a power up test of the main engines that something started beeping. “What’s that Grey?” I asked my FAC. She gestured with her right hand over the 3-D display and pulled up a diagnostic holo. “Coolant temperature is getting a little hot, Chief.”
“That’s weird,” I said as I looked over her shoulder. “We haven’t even spooled up the engines. There’s nothing for the coolant to cool.” Then the impossible happened. The coolant temperature continued to rise and what started as a mildly annoying “look at me” beeping turned into a symphony of more insistent “this is getting serious” alarms.
“Okay, lets abort the test. Start procedures for powering down the main energizers.” I went to a separate console as Grey set to work getting the systems powered down. It wasn’t helping. Nothing we did seemed to have any effect. Well, that’s not exactly true. Nothing we did seemed to have any positive effect. It was like all the procedures we followed just made things worse. More alarms blaring and system warnings popping up like daisies all over the holo displays. Until…
“Until?” Sheila queried again, annoyed at my long pause. I took a long look at her, standing in her impatient kindergarten pose, secure in the logic and rationality of her worldview. I was like that once, just last week. So I didn’t say anything and just brought out my hardcopy print of one of the displays and showed it to her. They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Of course this picture was summed up by her in just three.”What the hell?”