Dreams of the Stars

Jameson bent down, hands on his knees, wishing he didn’t have to shout to be heard over the whirring of pumps and humming of the Ziploc drive and the vibration of the floor. “I was just wondering if you had noticed something, well, off aboard the ship. Strange things going on.”

Garr dabbed his forehead with a cloth. “Look, I don’t really have time for this.”

“All right, all right, I’ll get to the point. I’d like the crew to get together to have a talk about what’s going on, and about Commander Boddy’s performance as commander.”

“Ooh,” Acker drawled. “Them’s fightin’ words.”

“Commander Boddy’s performance?” Garr laughed. “How about he’s a pretentious poge who doesn’t know a filter carbon cleanse dump from a fart.”

“Well, then, I take it you’re not quite satisfied.”

Garr had made a show of returning to his work. Now he made a show of pulling himself out from his panel again. “No. I am not quite satisfied.”

“Then what do you say? We gather the crew together tomorrow morning in the science lab and see if we can compile a legitimate reason to take our concerns to Felter.”

Garr had been so surly and uncooperative, Jameson was quite surprised when he said, “I’ll be there. You want to come, Acker?”

“You bet!” Acker chirped.

“All right, good.” Now that the first step had been taken, a cold dread welled up in Jameson. Boddy might forgive him for this morning’s surreal episode, but this was conspiracy to mutiny, no matter what platitudes he used. He had no choice now but to go forward with it. Now that he had recruited two members of the small crew, he was committed. He was the leader of a mutiny. He could not take that back, not without losing the respect of the entire crew.

Now what? Samuels might be in the lab by now—but he’d rather talk to Reichmann first. Better to already have as many people on his side as possible before broaching the subject to Boddy’s best friend.

As he had expected, he found Reichmann in the systems room, poring over program data. At first he didn’t seem to notice Jameson’s presence, so absorbed was he in his task. Well, that was typical of every member of this crew; not a particularly effusive bunch, each more interested in his work than his colleagues. That was probably why they had volunteered for a mission that would likely never bring them back to Earth.

Jameson cleared his throat. Reichmann, startled, looked up from what he was doing. “Oh, hello, Mr. Jameson.”

“Are you busy?” Jameson asked, trying to inject some warmth into his normally cold and neutral voice. He failed.

“Just routine stuff.” Reichmann saved his data and closed his screen. “Can I help you?”

“Oh...I was just thinking. Well, disturbed, really.” It was hard enough to open up and talk to others about his work, let alone his feelings. He wasn’t sure how to express what he was thinking in his own mind, let alone to someone else. “Have you, um, hallucinated?”

Reichmann’s forehead turned pink. He said nothing.

Jameson suspected that Reichmann’s reaction meant an affirmative, but he was poor at reading body language, so he simply continued. “The truth of the matter is I fear we’re losing touch with reality. I don’t know if I’m the only one...I mean, I don’t hallucinate. But ...” He stopped, at a loss for what to say next.

Reichmann continued to stare at him wordlessly.

“I’m thinking—just thinking, at this stage—that we need a change in leadership.” Just thinking, he chuckled to himself, after chasing the commander through the ship with a welding torch. “I think we all ought to discuss it, and if we’re in agreement, take our concerns to Felter.”

“What concerns?” Reichmann asked. “I agree with you that there have been some strange goings-on, but what do you expect Commander Boddy to do about it?”

“I don’t know, something. He’s just ignoring it. He’s affected himself, you can tell. But he doesn’t want to hear it. He just snaps at people, blames us, then goes back to sitting alone in his cabin.” Jameson sighed. He wasn’t sure he was getting anywhere. It might have been a mistake to bring this into the open at all. “Look, I’m not a mutineer, and I don’t want to start some sort of theatrical conspiracy. But if Commander Boddy doesn’t want to talk about what’s going on, I think the rest of us should. I’d just like to get the crew together and see what we’re all thinking.”

“I suppose there is no harm in just talking,” Reichmann said doubtfully.

“No, no harm at all. Garr and Acker will be there, and I’m just on my way to talk to Samuels. Just an informal discussion. There is a clause in the regulations that allows the second-in-command to take over. It’s perfectly legal. We just need to see if we all agree that the circumstances warrant it—and of course the final decision will be up to Felter.”

“Very well. Certainly this is a matter that affects the whole mission, whether I agree to go along with it or not. I had better be there.”

“Good. Tomorrow morning in the science lab.” Jameson left, dissatisfied with Reichmann’s reaction. Am I overreacting? he wondered. Well, that was the point of the meeting, to discuss the situation with the rest of the crew. No definite decisions yet. Yet.

Perhaps the phenomenon—whatever it was, if that was what it was—was localized and sporadic. Like any Florida resident, Boddy knew about hurricanes—even during a busy hurricane season, there are quiet spells, and even when two or three storms are active, there’s no telling where they’ll go, and most regions are untouched by them.

So things about the Eldorado fell more or less back to normal that evening. Boddy returned to the control room, collected reports from each crew member, finished his evening reports and entered them in the official log, and returned to his quarters for his tiresome evening meeting with Joe Felter.

All the compatibility testing had been done with Owen James as prime commander; Boddy remembered the close friendship he had observed and been told about between James and Felter in those early days. He also remembered the coldness and distance between himself and Felter when he had replaced James. And there was the infuriating and embarrassing fact that Felter simply knew the ship’s systems better than he did, had a better memory for procedures, and worst of all, never hesitated to remind Boddy of the fact.

Of course, Felter was never insubordinate; there was absolutely nothing about his job performance that Boddy could complain about, and nothing for which to discipline him. But the ruthless, pointed efficiency with which Felter performed his duties unmistakably carried a sharp edge pointed at Boddy’s throat—or, more precisely, at his command stripes. No commander should resent having a top-notch crew, but it was Felter’s showy performance that bothered him. His second-in-command did not have his back; he was instead looking to stick a knife in it.

Worst of all, Boddy knew he had only himself to blame. It wasn’t that he was unqualified for his position; obviously the Deke would never have assigned him if that were the case. It was just that he had lapses of memory, sometimes made little mistakes, occasionally spoke the wrong word when he meant something else—Jesus Christ, nothing important. For God’s sake, when Apollo 11 was returning from the Moon, Charlie Duke had looked at an image being broadcast of the Moon and had mistaken it for the Earth! Laugh-laugh, ha-ha, can’t tell the Earth from the Moon, giggle-giggle, move on!

But should Boddy make a little mistake—say, in casual conversation mention talking to Garr in the science lab when he meant Jameson, no, Felter had to harp on it. “Garr is the engineer. Jameson is the scientist.” Or recalling a maneuver or experiment during the day, fumble for the correct name for an obscure piece of equipment, “The, uh, whatever you call it, that thing in the self-repair arm.” “You mean the GAGM,” Felter would say pointedly, “the Tri-Axis Gimbal Mount. It swivels the KR-3 section of the arm along three axes for maximum field of access.” Yes, I know that, bastard, for God’s sake, on Apollo 16 John Young couldn’t remember the names of any of the experiments he set up and nobody complained when he called something a ‘doomaflicky!’

But Boddy could not complain, either officially or off-the-record, about Felter being efficient. He could only try to outclass him. He was ashamed of himself whenever he frantically studied and crammed and prepared for meetings with Felter just so he could come across as more knowledgeable—or at least as knowledgeable—as the arrogant pilot.

Although he couldn’t complain out loud, he had long ago given up any attempt at an amiable relationship with Felter. They were rivals and they both knew it; the whole ship knew it. They snapped at each other, they blatantly tried to outguess each other, they constantly interrupted each other, and each conversation—or confrontation, really—with Felter left Boddy feeling drained, in need of a drink. In need of the easy companionship of Samuels or Reichmann.

Summarizing Samuels’ preliminary thoughts on the possible cause of the day’s strange events, Boddy made the mistake of uttering the inflammatory words “I don’t know.” “He thinks it might be possible that our lack of inertia might be contradicting the tremendous amount of kinetic energy we’re carrying, and that might somehow tie in to the time dilation effects and cause these events—though I don’t know if those effects were already considered by the mission planners.”

“Well,” Felter began, the condescending tone of knowledge dripping from that one word, “I don’t know that either, but I would suggest you talk to Reichmann about that. He was intimately involved in the planning of the mission—“

“Yes, I know—”

“—and is an expert on the Ziploc drive. You could also speak to Mr. Jameson, his knowledge of the mathematics of relativity is incomparable—”

“Yes, I know—”

“—Between the two of them, I’m sure they could answer your question more accurately and completely than I could.”

I wasn’t asking you, you posturing peacock ...

“But if I were to speculate, I would think those particular effects were considered, since everyone knew the high velocities we were going to achieve would generate tremendous energy and multiply our mass, which would have to be factored into the operation of a drive system that’s directly tied in to our mass. But as to the specifics, I can’t say much more than that.”

Oh, thank thee, Great One, for bestowing thy knowledge upon thine unworthy commander. “Obviously. But none of the mission planners anticipated hallucinations or whatever has been going on today.”

“True, true,” Felter generously allowed. “Which is why the explanation for these effects undoubtedly lies in some unanticipated variable.”

Boddy was tempted to ask, “Such as?”, but knew better than to invite Felter to speculate. Surely he would have an answer, a lengthy one. If there was any real flaw in Felter’s performance, it was that his shows of knowledge and efficiency carried the air of proving his own intelligence rather than genuine devotion to his duty. Not that it mattered; you can’t fire someone for doing his job well, no matter what his reasons are.

Boddy was saved from having any further dealings with Felter by the welcome arrival of Reichmann. “Excuse, please. The door was open. May I speak to you?”

“Certainly, Reichmann. That’ll be all, Felter.”

“Okay, I have things to do anyway.” Felter rose as though he were through with Boddy rather than the other way around. “Thanks for chatting with me, bro.” As he passed Reichmann, he slapped him on the shoulder and said, “Hey, what’s goin’ on?”

There was no putting this unprofessional display down to another psychedelic episode; that was just Felter’s off-duty persona. Boddy resisted shaking his head in disgust. “What can I do for you, Reichmann?”

“Can I tell you that the drive system is functioning within predicted parameters and have that be the extent of our conversation as far as anyone else is concerned?”

“Of course.” Boddy gestured to the chair across from his desk and settled into his own chair. Reichmann sat across from him. “This conversation is strictly confidential. What can I do for you?”

Reichmann leaned over the desk, his eyes darting back and forth as though he expected spies were listening in. Softly, he said, “Jameson is trying to recruit crew members into a mutiny.”

Boddy exhaled slowly. So that part of it was for real.

“I am sorry, Commander Boddy.”

“He tried to recruit you?”

Reichmann nodded. “He is holding a meeting tomorrow with Garr, Acker, me, and I think he said Samuels too.”

Samuels?! “All right. No one will know you told me. Do you have any idea what his plan is?”

“For now, only to see if he has the crew on his side. Then, if he does, who knows what he might do?”

“Any idea how the others feel about this?”

“No, I am afraid not. He approached me an hour ago. I did not want to come to you right away, lest he put together that I am mousing on him.”

“Ratting.” Boddy would have expected Felter to orchestrate a mutiny, but why Jameson? Because he was a better mathematician than Boddy? Because he had more rhythm? Or was Jameson still under the spell of whatever had caused this morning’s hallucinations? “All right, Reichmann, I’d like you to attend that meeting and let me know what goes on.”

“I will do that. In the meantime, I thought you should know what goes on.”

“You did the right thing, Reichmann, and I thank you.”

Reichmann stood, bowed his head slightly—even clicked his heels, Boddy noted with amusement—and left.

What could Jameson’s grudge be? Samuels would be at the meeting too, and Boddy knew for sure that Samuels wouldn’t go along with this nonsense—or would he? Could he trust anyone or anything anymore?

Well, ever since the rap incident, nothing truly bizarre had happened, at least to him. And this visit from Reichmann had not had the surreal feeling of detachment and unreality, with objects appearing or disappearing or memories altered and attention wandering, that had accompanied other events. It seemed real enough. If so, he could think of only two explanations—one, Jameson somehow felt that the strange goings-on were somehow Boddy’s fault, or two, the strange happenings had affected Jameson’s mind.

Well he’d get a full report from Reichmann tomorrow after the meeting—and, hopefully, from Samuels too. For now he might as well breathe a sigh of relief that at least things seemed to be back to normal, at least as far as reality and unreality were concerned. He showered, ran down to the gym and shot some hoops with the ghost of Hamlet’s father, and turned in for the night.

Even after nearly twenty-four hours, Aldiss Jameson was still rattled from his nightmare experience with the giant rat. He could handle all the time-twistings of space travel, he could handle the contradictions in quantum theory, and he could even handle being attacked by a giant predator, so long as he escaped with his life. But when the very nature of reality itself altered—without scientific or mathematical explanation—his entire worldview was thrown into a conundrum. And it wasn’t just him; the entire crew had confronted manifestations, nightmares come to life, reality slipping its hinges. And though an explanation for these extraordinary events remained elusive (and of course he and Samuels were both working on that), and it could be argued that these events were unforeseen and therefore no one’s fault, certainly Jameson had to look at the man on top. Command presence and crisp judgment were not Ed Boddy’s strong points. The man was an excellent pilot, and no one disputed his skill in that field or that he was the most senior astronaut of those on board. But as the commander of a ship in crisis, he fell short of Jameson’s expectations.

Jameson looked into the faces gathered round the table in the engineering conference room—Samuels to his left, Acker and Garr together on the far side, Reichmann to his right. “So. Do we take this to Felter?”

“Boddy is the commander,” Samuels said. “The Deke put him in charge, I say let’s simply be open and frank with him.”

“This isn’t the time for that,” Jameson snapped. “I am not questioning NASA’s judgment in staffing, considering the requirements that were known before departure. But we’re in unfamiliar territory now. Does anyone here deny that Felter is more knowledgeable than Boddy, quicker to analyze data, more apt to make quick and correct decisions when faced with an unexpected situation?”

“Yes, I deny it,” Samuels said. “Look, I’ve known Ed Boddy for a long time and I’ve seen him react to stressful situations calmly and methodically. Now, I’m not saying Felter isn’t just as capable, but come on, people, let’s be a crew here. Let’s stand behind our commander.”

“This isn’t a question of loyalty,” Lawrence Acker said. “I’ve been seeing things. So have all of you. Yesterday I saw something horrible—right...out there.” His head jerked toward the door, out into the service bay. “I had a...a flashback of something that happened to me in high school wood shop...a girl caught her hair in a lathe and got dragged into the thing ...”

“We’ve all had these hallucinations—“

“Except that I saw it too,” Garr said.

Acker’s eyes went wide. “You didn’t tell me that!”

“Well, I’m telling you now.”

“You should have told me! I spent the whole day feeling like you didn’t take my concerns seriously. I felt totally invalidated.”

“Can we stick to the point?” Jameson boomed.

Garr and Acker shut up.

“This is not the only instance of shared hallucinations. I dread to tell you what Boddy and I both went through yesterday morning. But suffice it to say, he knows I’m thinking of...well, let’s not mince words, mutiny. So time is a factor here. Approaching him is useless, he’ll simply shoot down any concerns we have. You know he will. Any threat to his command image, he simply grouches at you and tells you to stop talking about it.”

“You seem to have made up your mind,” Samuels said. “Why are we all discussing it?”

“Because I can’t go to Felter myself and whine that I don’t like the commander. We must present a united front. Once Felter knows that we are all behind him, only then will he act.”

Reichmann spoke for the first time. “So far you have made this a rather one-sided conversation, Mr. Jameson.”

Jameson nodded. “Yes, because I’m trying to persuade you. You’re all intelligent men, you are all strong-willed men, you will make up your own minds. Suffice it to say, I have my own point of view and I believe myself to be right, therefore I am trying to convince you. But none of you will be led.” Except perhaps Acker. “Now, who is with me?”

“I am,” Garr said. “I’ve always felt Boddy was the wrong choice for commander. Felter has class. Boddy’s a little man who tries to act big. If he didn’t have those stripes on his sleeve, he’d never dare talk to me the way he does.”

“I’m with Garr,” Acker said, glancing at his superior with a boyish grin that Garr didn’t notice.

“Samuels?”

Samuels didn’t meet his gaze. He simply said, “If the whole crew is behind this, I’ll go along with it, but I’m against this and I still say we should take our concerns to Boddy.”

“I’ll accept that.” Jameson turned to Reichmann. “Reichmann?”

“If I do not agree, will you still go to Felter?”

“I feel that with three on my side, one dissenter will not matter, so yes.”

“Then my opinion does not matter either way. NASA put Boddy in command, and I support him.”

Samuels applauded.

“Who the hell’s side are you on?” Jameson shouted.

“I’m on Boddy’s side. But as I said, if most of the crew plan on going to Felter with this, then obviously this crew has lost faith in Boddy and so I’m in the wrong.”

“Then you will support us?”

“If asked, I’ll present my case to Felter as I laid it out to you just now.”

Jameson knocked on the tabletop. “Then it’s decided. We petition Felter to relieve Boddy of command.”

“Suppose Felter refuses?” Garr asked.

Jameson laughed. “He won’t. There’s no love lost between him and Boddy. I know without asking him that he’d like to assume command. But in the unlikely event that he does refuse, what can we do? We proceed under Boddy’s command, and no harm done.”

“Except stabbing a friend in the back,” Samuels said.

“We’ve got a lot more to worry about than that,” Garr said. “Are you naïve enough to think those little hallucinations yesterday were the end of it? I can’t explain what happened any more than you can, but I do know stuff like that doesn’t just happen and go away. We don’t know the explanation, but sure to God there is one, and so I’m guaranteeing right now it’ll happen again, and the line between reality and dreams is gonna become so fuzzy we won’t be able to see it anymore. You think things are tough now? We won’t even know what’s real and what’s not! In such a case, I’d much rather have Felter in command—but if he refuses, I’d rather have anybody than Ed Boddy.”

“What are you saying?” Acker asked. “You’d move against him yourself? Him and Felter?”

“Please God, it won’t come to that,” Garr said.

The group fell silent, and Jameson pondered what Garr had said. He had spoken without solid evidence, but his reasoning was sound, if not strictly logical. In any case, there was no more reason to think he was incorrect than that he was correct. It was another of those wild variables for which Jameson couldn’t find the equation. He was suddenly impatient to wrap this meeting up and get back to work on finding a scientific explanation for the hallucinations.

“All right, let us write up our petition. We know the course of action; we are asking Felter to assume command. But we need a specific list of grievances against Boddy and reasons why Felter would counter them as commander.”

There were general nods of assent; even Samuels and Reichmann couldn’t object.

As the others worked on the document, Jameson felt himself suddenly excluded. For all his boisterous and persuasive talk, he was suddenly at a loss to think of specific grievances, or specific points in Felter’s favor. He sat back and watched the group hammer things out—even Samuels and Reichmann took part. Throughout, he dreaded the emergence of another hallucination or altered reality, dreaded suddenly finding himself in a dark cavern or reliving some traumatic event from childhood, or for God’s sake, standing on a stage in front of an audience performing rap. Rap! Where the hell had that come from? He hated rap! And he certainly couldn’t compose poetry.

Of course, he often dreamed that he could.

When completed, the document read as follows:

To: Pilot Joseph P. Felter, NASA, USN, Lt. Comm., Eldorado

From: Chief Scientist Aldiss Jameson

Assistant Scientist Dennis Samuels

Chief Engineer Lester Garr

Assistant Engineer Lawrence Acker

Drive Systems Designer Hans Reichmann

Subject: Petition to relief of command Mission Commander Edgar Simms Boddy, USAF, Captain, Command Pilot, Eldorado.

Sir, it cannot have escaped your notice that recent occurrences aboard ship have been out of the ordinary. These occurrences are being researched and an explanation is expected to be forthcoming. In the meantime, however, we the undersigned request you consider the following discrepancies in the actions of Mission Commander Edgar Boddy.

1.Commander Boddy has failed to address the occurrences or discuss them in general meeting with the crew.

2.Commander Boddy has been abrupt and disagreeable with members of the crew who have sought to discuss the phenomena.

3.Commander Boddy has taken no action to discontinue these events or to research, or to order the research of, their cause.

4.Though we acknowledge Commander Boddy’s skill as a pilot and his accomplishments in his brave service to his country, we respectfully point out, despite his seniority in the astronaut corps, his lack of experience in the fields of mathematics, the physical sciences, electronics, and engineering, areas of vital importance to understanding and dealing with the aforesaid phenomena and other phenomena likely to arise during our mission, and though we acknowledge that Commander Boddy is experienced in the field of space navigation, we note that you are more so.

We further note that, although your humble self has less seniority than Commander Boddy, we hasten to point out to you your knowledge and experience in these matters relating to the navigation and engineering of our ship, and the scientific matters which almost certainly pertain to the phenomena we have been experiencing.

For these reasons, we humbly ask that you assume command of the Eldorado on the grounds of the commander’s competence, as allowed in regulation 126 paragraphs 3 through 7.

Following were the conspirators’—why should he not use that term?—signatures. The document pleased Jameson; it was professional, respectful, and above all quoted a regulation. Whether Felter would consider that regulation applicable to this situation remained to be seen; Jameson only hoped Felter’s dislike for Boddy came into play there. It was perfectly obvious that Felter was the more capable officer; that was not the critical point. The critical point was the letter of the law.

But then, another point he could raise was how pointless the law was out here, especially aboard a ship that would never return to Earth.

“Well, if you’ll excuse me,” Samuels said, “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“We’re not finished yet,” Jameson said. “We have to take this to Felter.”

“What, now? We just wrote the damn thing! Shouldn’t we shelve it for a while? Think of revisions? Other fine points? Possible objections?”

“Why, so you can sneak off and tell your friend Boddy what we’re up to?” Garr sneered.

“Yeah, why waste time?” Acker agreed.

“There’s no telling when the hallucinations may begin again,” Jameson said. “We’ve hashed out the points, now let’s act before the situation gets worse.”

Samuels huffed and slouched back in his seat. “Okay. But frankly I don’t see how Felter could do a better job handling that situation than Boddy.”

Jameson took up the petition and stood. “All right, is everyone with me?”

Not surprisingly, Reichmann remained seated. “I want no part of this.”

But everyone else rose.

“Fine. Let’s go.”

Felter was alone in the control room when the little party of mutineers arrived. Boddy was down in the navigation room taking sightings—as much to comply with the posted schedule as to avoid Felter.

It was obvious that Felter knew something was amiss when four members of the crew arrived, marching toward him like an army. Jameson, determined and angry—and frightened—as he was, was momentarily amused at the thought of how they must look at this moment, herding like a mob toward a solitary and probably nervous figure.

“Can I help you gentlemen?” Felter asked.

The confident boom in Felter’s voice reinforced Jameson’s opinion of the rightness of what they were doing. “Yes, Mr. Felter.” He held his hand up, and the others obligingly stopped behind him. “We’d like to have a little conference with you.”

“Is there a problem?”

“We have a petition for you.” Jameson held out his hand. “The petition, please?”

Someone—he couldn’t see who—placed the sheet of paper in his hand. He held it for a moment, suddenly aware of the immensity of what he was about to do. Of course, this was really nothing next to chasing Boddy through the ship with a welding torch and singing to him...But this could really do it. There were no hallucinations now, and what he did now would be put on his record. And shortly he may have his wish; Boddy might well be relieved of command. He was taking an enormous responsibility on his shoulders—and frightening though it was, it was also exhilarating. He handed Felter the petition.

Felter read it over in little more than ten seconds. Then he calmly handed it back. “You understand the implications of this?”

Samuels spoke up. “We’ve all discussed it at length.”