”If the automatic system should malfunction, he can switch to a backup system while the other is being repaired.”
“Piloting must be easy,” a man said.
“It is. But only an experienced pilot can handle emergencies, which is why most of them are Mississippi boat veterans.”
He pointed out that the deck of the control room was ninety feet above the surface of The River. He also called to their attention that the pilothouse structure was, unlike that on the riverboats on Earth, located on the starboard side, not in the middle of the deck.
“Which makes the Not For Hire resemble an aircraft carrier even more.”
They watched the marines drilling on the flight deck and the men and women busy practicing the martial arts, sword, spear, knife, and axe fighting, and archery.
“Every member of this crew, including myself, has to become proficient with all weapons. In addition, each person has to become fully qualified to handle any post. They go to school to learn electricity, electronics, plumbing, officering, and piloting. Half of them have taken lessons on the piano or with other musical instruments. This boat contains more individuals with more varied skills and professions than any other area on this planet.”
“Does everybody take turns being the captain?” said the woman who’d angered him.
“No. That is the exception,” Sam said, his thick eyebrows forming a frown. “I wouldn’t want to put ideas into anybody’s head.”
He strode to the control panel and punched a button. Sirens began to wail, and the exec, John Byron, asked the communications officer to send the “Bridges, clearing” warning over the general intercom. Sam went to a starboard window and urged the others to gather by him. They gasped when they saw long thick metal beams slide out from the three lower decks.
“If we can’t sink the Rex,” Clemens said, “we’ll board it over those bridges.”
The woman said, “That’s fine. But the crew of the Rex can also board your vessel on your own bridges.”
Sam’s blue-green eyes glared above his falcon nose.
However, the others of the group were so awed, so astounded, that Sam’s hairy chest puffed from joy. He had always been fascinated by mechanical devices, and he liked others to share his enthusiasm. On Earth his interest in novel gadgets had been responsible for his going bankrupt. He’d put a fortune into the unworkable Paige typesetting machine.
The woman said, “But all this iron and aluminum and other metals? This planet is so mineral-poor. Where did you get these?”
‘”First,” Sam said, pleased to recount his exploits, “a giant nickel-iron meteorite fell into The Valley. Do you remember when, many years ago, the grailstones on the right bank ceased operating? That was because the falling star severed the line.
“As you know, it was back in operation twenty-four hours later. So….”
“Who repaired it?” a man said. “I’ve heard all sorts of stories, but…”
“I was in the neighborhood, in a manner of speaking,” Sam said. “In fact the tidal wave of The River and the blast almost killed me and my companions.”
He mentally winced then, not because of the near-fatality but because he remembered what he’d done later to one of his companions, the Norseman Erik Bloodaxe.
“So I can testify to the amazing but undeniable fact that not only had the line been repaired overnight, but the blasted land had also been restored. The grass and the trees and the stripped soil were all back.”
“Who did it?”
“They had to be the beings who made this Rivervalley and resurrected us. I’ve heard that they are human beings like us, in fact, Earthmen who lived ages after we did. However…”
“No, not human beings,” the man said. “Surely not. It was God who made all this for us.”
“If you’re so well acquainted with Him,” Clemens said, “give me His address. I’d like to write Him.”
He continued, “My group was the first to get to the site of the meteorite. The crater, which might have been as wide and deep as the famous one in Arizona, was buried by then. But we staked out a claim, and we began digging. Some time later, we heard that large deposits of bauxite and cryolite were under the land of a state down-River. Its citizens, however, had no means of digging it up or then using it. But my state, Parolando, could make aluminum from the ores after we’d fashioned iron tools. That state, Soul City, attacked us to get the iron. We beat them and confiscated the bauxite and cryolite. We also found that some other states relatively nearby had some copper and tin deposits. Also, some vanadium and tungsten. We traded our iron artifacts for these.”
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