Tribulations - Softcover

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WHEN BILLY WEST woke up, he opened his eyes to a wondrous sight: Open space filled his entire field of view, and his mind was struggling to understand where he was. As his mind cleared from the night’s sleep, he remembered they were on board their spaceship, Genesis.
Once he was fully awake, he smiled to himself as he remembered their wedding night. He turned his head to look at his new bride, Linda Lou, whose head was resting on his shoulder as she slept. As he was enjoying watching her sleep, she began to stir. She opened her beautiful dark brown eyes to an amazing sight. The walls of their room were still transparent and allowed her to see the grandeur of space.
She lifted her head off Billy’s arm.
He said, “Hi you.”
She smiled and said, “Hi yourself, husband.”
As she replayed their first night together in her mind, she felt his mind touch hers.
“I love you so much. Last night was everything I dreamed it would be,” Billy said.
“It was neat. Wasn’t it? Space is so beautiful. I thought it was awe-inspiring when we used to lie on the grass and look up at the stars, but this is amazing. Are you ready to get up and go and eat some breakfast?”
She felt his answer in her mind and told him, That’s a much better idea. We can eat later.
*   *   *
A COUPLE OF hours later they showered and went down to the main galley for breakfast.
Richard Patterson spotted them as they entered and wished them a good morning. He asked, “How do you like married life so far? Wait, you don’t need to tell me. You’re both glowing. I just hope you’re always as happy as you are today. Why don’t you take that open table over there, and I’ll be right back with your breakfast?”
As they waited for their meals, Richard’s wife, Shirley, brought them a pot of coffee and their silverware. “Congratulations again, and you both look so happy. It almost makes me believe that we may have a chance for a decent life yet.”
“We’re very happy,” Linda said. “And we both think that we’ll all have a good life. It may not be anything like we could have imagined, but it’ll be a good life nonetheless.”
“How can you be so sure? Things definitely don’t look good right now.”
“I know they don’t, but I believe there are truly wondrous adventures ahead of us.”
“Here’s your breakfast,” Richard said as he sat their meals down.
“That was quick,” Billy said. “I meant to tell you the other day, you guys are doing a great job running the galley.”
“Thanks. I’m afraid we don’t know much, other than how to run a café, but we always try to do our part.”
“You’re definitely doing your part.”
“We’d better let these two newlyweds eat their breakfast,” Richard said. “I just saw some soldiers come in. We’d better get busy, because those kids can eat like horses.”
Billy and Linda Lou ate their breakfast in what looked like complete silence. In reality, they were conversing in their own special way. When they finished eating Billy asked, I’m going to the lab to work on finding us a destination. Would you like to come with me?
No thanks, I need to get down to the hospital and get back to work. There are over a hundred people waiting to see a doctor.
I didn’t realize that we had that many people who were injured.
They’re not all injured. Most of them just have your normal everyday health problems.
When Billy reached his lab, he reviewed the ship’s logs for any issues. When he was finished, he leaned back in his chair as he contemplated what their initial destination should be.
Since it was technically the closest one, several of the other scientists in the fleet wanted to try to reach the Canis Major dwarf galaxy. He’d strongly disagreed with them, however, because it was in the process of being pulled apart by the gravitational forces of the Milky Way.
It had taken him several hours, but he finally decided on the Sagittarius dwarf elliptical galaxy. The problem was that although it was relatively close as stellar objects go, it was still over four light years away.
As he pondered the immense distances they would need to travel, he realized that they needed to find a way to exceed the speed of light.
As he tried to think through the problem, it brought back memories of a conversation that he and Klaus Heidelberg had had on the subject. He had told Klaus that he thought faster-than-light travel was feasible, even though Albert Einstein’s theories didn’t support his thinking.
Klaus had been a close friend of Einstein’s, and he had assured Billy that Einstein had believed it was possible. Thinking of Klaus made him remember how much he missed having him around.
After he had spent a few minutes remembering Klaus, he said a quick prayer for him and resumed his work.
He called up the schematics of the ship on his computer screen so he could study them. While they were building Genesis, he had Nicholas Stavros add a set of massive magnetic projectors in the bow of the ship. At the time, he didn’t know exactly how he was going to utilize them, but he had felt that he would at some point.
He spent the day deep in thought, and when he finally looked up from his computer, it was after 6:00 PM. He had worked through lunch, and he realized he was starving. He saved his work and went to find Linda, so they could eat dinner together.
He found her in the hospital, where she had just completed an evaluation of John Tyler. John had passed out during their wedding reception the previous night, and he had to be rushed into surgery. Linda’s boss and mentor at the Mayo Clinic, William Robbins, had performed the microsurgery necessary to repair several congenital defects in his heart.
Linda greeted Billy as he entered John’s room. “I’m glad you’re here. I just finished examining John, and he’s making a good recovery from his surgery. I think he’ll be able to resume some light duties in eight weeks or so.”
She turned back to John and said, “You don’t know how lucky you are. Without the advances in microsurgery that we’ve made in the last two years, you probably wouldn’t have survived, and if you had, you would have been laid up for several months, instead of several weeks.”
“Actually, I understand more than you could ever know. The doctors at Walter Reed had told me that the surgery wasn’t even possible. In fact, it was the reason I got out of the military.”
“The last few days have been pretty exciting for you,” Billy said. “You’ve got a new baby boy, and you’re going to get your health back. How are Millie and Adam doing?”
“I only got to spend a few hours with them before I had my problem, but this is the happiest we’ve been in many years. We can’t thank both of you enough for all that you’ve done for us.”
“No thanks needed,” Linda said. “Besides, if it hadn’t been for you, our entire team might not have made it.”
“It’s great that you’re going to get your strength back, because I’m going to need your help,” Billy said.
“No problem, you can count on me. If you don’t mind, I do have a couple of questions. Do you think we’ll be able to find a new home, and how long will it take us to reach it?”
“I’ve selected our first place to search, but at our present speed, we won’t be able to reach any destination for many years.”
“That doesn’t sound very promising. I would hate to think of Adam growing up without ever being able to run and play in the sunshine.”
“It’s too early to think like that. I’m working on some things that may allow us to cut some time off of our travel, but it’s too early to talk about them yet.”
*   *   *
MOST OF THE living quarters had kitchens, but they hadn’t worked out the logistics for everyone to pick up the food they needed, so everyone was either eating in one of the ship’s galleys or they were picking up their meals and taking them back to their quarters to eat.
Billy and Linda Lou liked eating with everyone, but they had decided that they wanted some time alone. As they sat eating, they had joined their minds instead of talking out loud. Billy had turned on the virtual reality system so the scene was quite a contrast of perceptions. They were sitting at a small table in front of the fireplace in their bedroom, but they were surrounded by open space.
The stars didn’t twinkle in the vacuum of space, and the crystal-clear view was incredible. They could see the faint glow of the ships that stretched out for miles behind them, and the occasional piece of space junk that went speeding by.
They were already moving faster than any human had ever gone. The fleet had been under constant acceleration since they had left the rally point, and it wouldn’t be too much longer before it reached its maximum speed.
At maximum power, the Genesis was capable of almost 60 percent of the speed of light, but the rest of the fleet was only capable of about half that.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to the view,” Linda said.
“It is awe-inspiring,” Billy replied. “But I imagine we’re going to see a lot of things that we never thought we would. Even though I’m responsible for much of the technology, I’ve got to admit that I’m somewhat astonished by what we’ve achieved.”
“I know what you mean. I’m still struggling with our lives in gener...