“Well it would make an excellent defense against the Union soldiers.”
“Union soldiers?”
“Yes they are really more mercenaries now since the Union government has fallen. We have seen them and tried to stay out of their way.”
“And we aren't exactly hiding here are we?” said Dag. “Perhaps I should speak with the Captain about what you have told me.”
“Yes, I'm glad to be of help Dr. Mach.”
“Captain I've been speaking with Jomo Astatke, the people from Galla.”
“Yes Dr. Mach.”
“Jomo tells me that in their travels they have had to hide from Union soldiers. It occurred to me Captain that we aren't exactly hidden. Perhaps we need to think of some defensive measures in case these soldiers come across our encampment.”
“I think you are right Dr. Mach.”
“I believe you have a wormhole weapon onboard?”
“That's correct, one can be deployed if necessary.”
“Well sir, I was thinking that maybe we should get it online in case soldiers show up in the valley.”
“But that would entail getting the crew wheel rotating.”
“Yes we would have to raise the ship but I think it can be done.”
“You're right Dr. Mach, it can be done. I will get the Chief right on it. Meanwhile, we will do what we can to prepare for any eventuality.”
Preparing the ship was more than just raising the crew wheel off the ground. It was also stabilizing it sufficiently in that position to allow the wheel to spin which was necessary to create the Mach effect which was necessary to use the wormhole weapon.
A major undertaking, it would be a good exercise to see how well the crew would handle the situation they found themselves in. Maybe it was because this crew was older and more experienced than most or maybe it was loyalty to the Captain but Dag was impressed as to how well they worked together to get the job done.
It wasn't more than a couple of weeks until they had the huge ship raised and stabilized with the help of the shuttles which did the heavy lifting while the crew assembled the stabilizing scaffold. The day came with the wheel in slow rotation the wormhole operator checked the systems and fired a test shot. The results were as expected and surprising at the same time.
Used in an atmosphere, maybe for the first time, the bolt of plasma was not only thunderous but also visually impressive. Multi-colored bolts of lightning jumped from the plasma bolt to the ground and into the air all along its trajectory. People were stunned and most hid their eyes and closed their ears to what was a blinding and ear-splitting phenomenon. Some complained about temporary blindness and deafness.
“I guess we should issue sunglasses and earplugs for everyone before we do that again,” said Dag in the forward control room. Even from such a protected position the sight and sound were impressive.
“At least it works,” said the Captain.
And that was the problem.
21
The army unit formerly of the Union of Adowa was now nothing more than a band of mercenaries robbing and stealing and sometimes killing for their own benefit.
“Hear that?” said Captain Kianga.
“Yes Captain I did,” said General Kibwana.
“Sounds like a storm on the other side of the hill,” said Kianga.
“A very local storm Captain. I want you to take some men and scout it out.”
“Yes sir.”
The General had been waiting for about an hour when the Captain and his men returned.
Saluting he said, “General you will never believe it. There is a fusion spaceship on the other side of that hill.”
“Are you crazy Captain. How can anyone land a fusion ship on a planet? Preposterous.”
“Maybe so but you can question these other men if you want. We all saw it.”
“If what you say is true Captain Kianga this could be the greatest prize we've ever captured.”
“Yes sir. I believe they are generating electricity with the fusion engine. I saw some lights as well as cables strung between the fusion ship and shuttles. I believe they have quite a power plant.”
“Electricity,” said the General wistfully. “We could stop living like dogs in the mud.”
Captain Kianga grinned.
“Very well Captain take two platoons and test their defenses. I will bring up the rest of the men for a possible assault.”
“Yes sir.”
As usual, it's my skin and his glory, thought Kianga.
The Captain called for two platoons of men, some one-hundred and fifty soldiers. He explained what they were doing and they headed out.
Once the Captain and his men had advanced the General moved the rest of the men and supporting equipment forward.
An alarm sounded in the control room of the JS1.
“Captain we've got a security breach down the valley, kilometer one.”
“Okay get me a visual.”
The wallscreen focused on the Union soldiers.
“Looks like we've got some visitors. According to Jomo Astatke they may not be friendly.”
“Defar will you issue a challenge over the comm, please. And alert Dr. Mach and Walker to go at once to wormhole drive operations.”
“Attention you men, please state your identity and your purpose.”
“This is Captain Kianga of the Union Army. We are reconnoitering this area. We are under orders to provide any aid to the civilian population that we find. Is there anything we can do for you?”
“Captain?” said Defar.
“Thank them but we need no assistance.”
Defar relayed the answer.
Captain Kianga then asked if he and his men could approach the encampment. Captain Reynolds suggested that the Union men remain where they were and he would send a delegation to meet them.
“Very well,” said Kianga, “we will wait here.”
Kianga immediately called General Kibwana for further orders.
“Captain send some of your men to flank the ship. I will bring up the tanks and artillery. We will let their delegation meet our armor.”
The First Officer and six of the crew started down the valley to meet the soldiers, they were armed.
As the delegation got closer to the soldiers there appeared in the far end of the valley the General's tanks. Immediately opening fire by rail-gunning conventional explosives upon the First Officer and others they made their intentions known. The First Officer and the rest of the delegation tried to crawl out of the line of fire.
But the General had already switched to kinetic weapons which the tanks were now rail-gunning at the line of shuttles. Several shuttles were hit, one catching fire. Captain Kianga and his men started advancing again. They were still about a mile away.
Upon hearing the explosives and seeing his shuttles take hits Captain Reynolds called for Dag and Walker to return fire with the wormhole weapon.
“Dag,” said Walker. “Will we kill anyone?”
“If we use the wormhole weapon as it was intended Walker there is no doubt. But there is another way to neutralize their weapons.”
“Remember what Jomo Astatke told us about when they encountered our negative energy bubbles?”
“Yes, I see.”
“Well let's try it.”
Dag used the wormhole drive to create the bubble of negative energy. Instead of trying to find a micro-sized wormhole mouth to blow up to macro size he localized the cast of negative energy and kept streaming it into the same coordinates until a giant bubble had built. He then nudged the bubble in the direction of the Union mercenaries by creating a smaller bubble and holding it. The two bubbles repelled each other and the large bubble began to move invisibly toward the soldiers that were advancing.
The first hint to Captain Kianga that something strange was happening was when the railguns fired again. This time the projectiles struck the bubble of negative energy. The result was that the fast-moving projectiles slowed and traveled an
arcing path as they were repelled from the bubble's center where the negative energy was densest. The projectiles exited the bubble at a greatly reduced rate and changed direction. Most fell into the woods without further damage.
“General, something strange is happening up here,” called Captain Kianga over his comm-link.
“What do you mean strange Captain. That makes no sense. Are you sick or something?”
“The projectiles were deflected they ...” the reply from Kianga was interrupted by static as he and his men were felled by the bubble.
The General could see through his field glasses the men laying down in the field. He was incensed.
“Captain you and those men get up now. I'll have you and the rest tried for cowardice if you do not.”
There was no answer.
Through his field glasses, he could see some of the men trying to rise but falling to the ground again as Dag had let loose another negative energy bubble. Some of the men were actually rolling backward. The General was dumbfounded.
Then he felt a prickling of his skin and his command vehicle buck as the dissipating bubble of energy passed over him. At the distance to the General's position, the bubble had almost completely dissipated as the repulsion of negative energy for negative energy overwhelmed its density.
All the General could think about is how insulted he was that such a soft target had not already fallen. He ordered the rest of his group to the attack. The railguns were firing as they moved. It was all a mistake of strategy.
Almost at the position of Captain Kianga and his men who had risen and then decided to roll around on the grass again the forward elements of the rest of Kibwana's forces encountered a bubble. It was still coherent enough to cause panic and damage.
The men advancing in front of the General suddenly decided to act like Captain Kianga and his men, rolling around on the ground. Then the advance vehicles encountered the bubble. They seemed to abruptly stop. Some were lifted as the bubble's varying density repelled the fronts of the vehicle causing them to overturn.
The General sat there not believing what he was seeing. But not for long. The open vehicle he was sitting in suddenly lurched toward the sky and flipped. The General did not survive.
Once they were able to move and seeing that the General had been killed the men and equipment starting withdrawing back down the valley. Many were fleeing in panic.
“That's it Walker,” said Dag. “I hope no one was killed.”
It was the following day that the First Officer took a detail down the valley to inspect the scene. They found the General under his vehicle. They buried him there in the grassy valley.
Captain Reynolds set up a continuous guard, in case the soldiers came back. The whole perimeter, up to a kilometer away, had to be staked with detection equipment so that there would be no surprises. He figured that would give Dag and Walker enough time to respond to any incursion. It had been over a month since the incident and things were getting back to normal. The only loss had been one of the shuttles and a few injuries.
“I don't think the Captain completely approved of our handling of the situation,” said Dag to Ally.
“I don't know. I think he is pleased. It's just that the use of the wormhole weapon would have been a more, let's say, compelling response.”
“But many more would have died Miss.”
“Yes Dag but Captain Reynolds is only responsible for the people here in the valley. Others may come but not menacingly. And we basically aren't military and must meet force convincingly or we'll be overrun.”
“I guess so.”
“Anyway after the excitement have you returned to your new theory?”
“Well as a matter of fact. You remember me telling you about creating a 'tunnel' of nonlocal links? It turns out that mathematically a link looks exactly like a narrow wormhole.”
“Really. And we know how to manage those.”
“Exactly. But there will be some differences if we use really distant links. The amount of negative energy required to hold it open would be tremendous and while theoretically, the wormhole drive could meet the requirement it would be dangerous. So I'm still intending to create a pulse, a bubble, that will carry the ship the entire length, greatly reducing the energy requirements. In fact, it may require less energy than is now required for an equivalent distance.”
“That would be great Dag. How do you know where you will be linking to?”
“We will simply look through a link before we establish the portal. If the other side of the link is not too far away we should be able to recognize the stars and extrapolate. But for really distant links we may have to explore and map.”
“We could start that now.”
“What?”
“Peeking through the nonlocal links.”
“I guess we could if the Captain approves.”
“I'm sure he will.”
“We will have to modify and recalibrate the wormhole drive somewhat.”
“Well let's get started.”
After discussion, the Captain approved the experiment with the stipulation that the wormhole drive could be returned to normal operation at a moment's notice. He didn't want to get caught in another battle without his main defense.
Dag and Ally agreed and with the help of Walker got busy. In a couple of weeks they had the drive modified and were ready for testing.
“Okay Miss I'm going to try and find a link.”
Dag started the wormhole drive. He cast it to some coordinates located above the planet and cast it again. Several more attempts and he stopped.
“I don't understand, if there are nonlocal links in every cubic centimeter of space as I've calculated I surely should have found one by now.”
“Dag could it be the rotation of the planet causing the problem?”
Dag looked stunned.
“You're right I didn't take that into my calculations. Just a minute.”
Dag worked with his Emmie a few minutes.
“Okay I think I've got it.”
He tried the drive again and this time the cast seemed to find something.
“Okay Miss I'm going to try and open this link get the telescope ready.”
“Feed the coordinates to the scope Walker.”
“Yes Miss.”
On the wallscreen, after a blurry moment, it sharpened to display a starfield.
It was several minutes later when Dag spoke up.
“Walker anything?”
“Just a moment Dag I believe the Emmies are about to finish.”
A moment.
“Dag the Emmies have identified that bright red star as Arcturus to a confidence level of five nines.”
“Arcturus,” said Ally. “Then the link is essentially pointing back toward Earth and that end of the link must be about forty light-years from here.”
“Thirty-eight point-seven Miss.”
Dag was pleased.
“Okay Walker mark it.”
“But Dag won't it drift?”
“No Walker. You see the nonlocal link is embedded in a volume element which is held in place by all the local links from other volume elements, kind of like a scaffold.”
Both Dag and Ally chatted for the next hour as they opened links and located their ends for the database they were building. Walker was quiet and efficient.
22
Jomo and his family had been surprised by the battle. Caught off guard his great-grandfather had been one of those injured. At first it did not seem a serious injury, a broken leg, and the doctor from the ship had been able to repair it.
Recovery seemed certain but shortly he became quite ill. The doctor said it was an infection, a consequence of the earlier injury, but although he expected the old man to get better it was not to be. He died less than a month after the skirmish.
Jomo's great-grandmother blamed it on the occupants of the ship. They had brought strange infections for which the family had no immunity. She urged the men of the family to leave t
he valley before others were sickened.
At a family meeting Jomo's grandfather agreed that they should leave although his father was uncertain.
“I am certain,” said his grandfather, “they will be back.”
“But the results will be just as before,” said his father. “The ship has superior weapons. No matter how many times the soldiers return.”
“If only we could return to our old life,” said Jomo's mother.
“I am afraid mother that our old lives are gone permanently. Even should this space be restored as Dr. Mach believes it can be, Adowan society is permanently changed. The old politics is gone. We will have to start over. And while that is a daunting task I think we can have some hope of creating a better world.
“Anyway getting back to the subject of this meeting. I agree there will be another attack and that the ship will drive the soldiers away. What I don't know is how many casualties will result.
“But there are no guarantees either way great-grandmother. I'm not sure how much longer we would have lasted on our own. So I vote we stay with this settlement permanently. I believe it is our best chance of survival in the long run.”
After Jomo's speech, there was general agreement that the family would stay.
“You have decided to stay with us permanently Jomo?”
“Yes First Officer Sands. We believe that with the state of the world as it is we are better served by staying here. Do you think the Captain can use us? We want to contribute to the settlement as all of you do.”
“I'm sure the Captain can find a place for you and your family Jomo and something useful for them to do. I'll discuss it with him.”
Captain Kianga had taken over command of the remaining men and had also promoted himself to General. He had promoted his underling, Dodi Mulinge, to Captain. They were planning another assault on the JS1 settlement.
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