A Present 3

"That so? Well, let's get to it then! Me and the boys have been waiting a while for this one."

"What is it?"

"A handful."

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

"You'll see~."

As they walked to the maintenance area, a space in the center of the hangar left empty for the sole purpose of repair, everything in the vicinity started to light up.

The surrounding area could only be described as a mess. Evidently the engineers were not too worried about the state of their tools.

"Watch your step. Engies didn't clean up their mess after polishing the paint. Left to get drunk."

"And they're just okay with leaving their tools around this way?"

"Apparently, that's exactly where they want them, only the tubes and wires are out of place. First one to collapse from drinking gets to clean it up, or so I've been told. I'm fine with it as long as it doesn't get me killed." While saying that, he kicked aside a cord that Don would have tripped over.

Even with the lights, some of the cords were the same shade of gray as the floor. While Don could enjoy finer meals, he was not eager to taste the composite metal that made up the hangar floor. More than just tasting like various metallic elements, Don was concerned there may be some undertones of various volatile chemicals based off of the general state of the maintenance tools and the distinct scent making up the room.

The fact that there was any scent at all was impressive given the intense ventilation and vapor containment protocols.

In contrast with his first impressions, Don was starting to think the crew of this particular carrier were not as professional as he had initially thought. A little bit of drinking could be excused as a way to stave off boredom and depression, but they seemed to take it a bit far.

Granted he considered it might also be that this is normal, a case of what is taught in the academy not matching up to conditions in the field. He could overlook it to a degree, the crew was still experiencing the afterglow of an absolutely devastating victory. He would be an idiot to not expect celebration.

As they continued on, that stench only go worse. "God, would it kill them to get rid of this smell? Did they piss on the floor or something?"

To that, Thompson gave only a laugh. Bending down, he grabbed a handle flush with the floor and opened a door. If the lights weren't off Don would have seen many such handles on the floor, all attached to openings in the floor. They served many different purposes, some were openings for the ammunition and parts transportation systems, others had connections to the fueling and charging systems, a few had interfaces for controling various systems like the opening of the hangar door.

However, the one function they all had in common was that they could act as an impromptu airlock in the case of a hull breach. It would not be comfortable, nor safe, but all of these utility doors could keep them alive in the worst case scenario.

A grand total of five of these hundred or so panels had nothing to do with utility and were in fact doors to vertical corridors. Unlike the rest of the ship, these corridors were not subject to artificial gravity. This was because they lead to the other hangar, where gravity is directed in the opposite direction. There was no regulation requiring these to lack gravity, however many found it off-putting to go from being pulled one way to being pulled the other.

There were also concerns of what might happen to the more delicate parts of organic matter, like the brain, were it to be put into a situation where two parts of it were being pulled in different directions simultaneously for an extended period of time.

This isn't to say tests hadn't been done, but it remained fact that both the designers and the deployed had concerns over the ramifications. The sailors in particular were a suspicious bunch, you tended to become that way after living in a metal box where one mistake might have you enjoying a swim in the sea of space.

After jumping into the corridor and rapidly acclimating to the lack of pull on his person, Don took note that this corridor was not actually empty. Certainly, there was nothing floating freely in the air, but there was a door halfway through.

He was never told that you could put other rooms in this space during his design classes, but he supposed there would be no reason not to either. This would just be empty space if it didn't go to use. Unused space wasn't strictly a bad thing, it provided some benefits in regard to weight reduction and potential structural issues, but ship designers were generally of the opinion that if there was space that was not being used then it was an unnecessary expenditure in terms of both weight and energy.

As Captain Thompson opened the door, Don immediately discovered that this was probably the most effective used of this space he could imagine.

Zero-Gravity was actually extremely difficult to work with when robotics and artificial intelligence were mostly out of the question.

It was a generally inadequate environment for large quantities of liquid, It would slosh around when the ship moved and would have little incentive to actually go through a tube into something like a fuel tank as there would be no force acting on it.

It was hard to store massive objects, such as missiles and spare ships, as when somebody would attempt to move them, they would be moved a much greater distance in turn. Even with the assistance of magnetic locking boots, shifting such large objects around would be difficult.

Similarly, large quantities of small objects would be difficult, though for completely different reasons. In this case, unless properly secured, small objects would invariably find themselves scattered and bouncing around at the slightest jostle. It would be bearable in the presence of gravity, the extent of the mess would be them piled on the floor. Without gravity this mess would be three dimensional, and likely mobile.

Experience had shown that these situations were extremely undesirable. Unfortunately, experience had also shown that these things were exactly what you would put in these empty spaces, they were left empty because everything else that was vital was already taken care of.

That made what was stored here a stroke of genius. This was a pilot's lounge. It didn't store materiel, it stored people!