She spun to the closest window and looked down at the colony. Baxter pressed his helmed face to the window beside hers. They were both watching when the derelict went from a chunk of broken ship to a white-hot ball of a tiny star on the surface of the planet. Their faceplates dimmed to compensate for the light, but it was still difficult to look at. She could see a wave of the blast race across the landscape, flattening dunes and clearing the sky of clouds in an ever-expanding circle.
“Brace for impact,” the pilot said over the loudspeaker. He sounded far too calm to Sara's ears.
The ship bucked as warning lights and sirens went off. Sara was thrown to the ground, along with others who hadn’t yet strapped in. The ship tilted to the right and groaned as if it were being flexed in a giant’s unfriendly hands. They began losing altitude as the thrust vector was thrown askew. The shrill alarm cut through her helmet, making her ears ring slightly. A shaking rumble built up and rolled through the frame of the shuttle as the pilot increased the burn of the starboard thrusters and leveled out the craft.
“We’re through the blast wave. It should be smooth sailing the rest of the way, folks. I don't mind telling you that was fucking close. If you have a god, you should thank them now,” the pilot said, his voice still cool as a fall night.
25
“How are you doing?” Sara asked Cora once she was in her quarters, changing into a fresh battlesuit. Alister was still shaking out his fur after being compressed in his own.
There was a pause before Cora answered her. “The repairs are coming along, but the ship is demanding a lot from me, now that it’s down by two reactors. It’s supplementing power with Aether, and I’m the battery. I’ll be okay, but we need to get those reactors online sooner rather than later.”
She sounded tired to Sara, who was used to hearing her sister chipper and positive. It made Sara worry that Cora was not telling her everything.
“I’m about to contact command, and hopefully we can head back to the docks for repairs,” Sara said, slipping an arm into the black cloth of a fresh battlesuit.
“Honestly, I don't need the docks. I can manufacture the parts here on the ship, since we have a molecular printer. It just takes a little time to print the parts. If I could set the ship down and shut off the gravitic drives, it would give me the breathing room I need. I’m capable of running the ship physically; it’s just mentally taxing because so many things need my attention.”
“Other ships use computers to maintain the baseline of the ship. Why the sudden change to the system to have you do it?”
“I don't really know. Being integrated into the ship helps with reaction times, but I don't see how I can keep this up forever,” Cora said distractedly. She was silent for a few minutes before returning to the conversation. “Sorry, I had to adjust the power flow to the PDCs. They were pulling power even in their standby mode. I don't want to take everything offline, in case there is an attack, but leaving it all on is giving me a literal headache.”
“Are you able to warp?” Sara had a flash of fear that they might be trapped where the Teifen would know where to find them.
“Actually, going to warp would make it easier on me. I can shut down everything but environmental. It will be a relief when we finally jump.”
“Well, good, because I want us out of this system as soon as I get to the bridge. Once we’re in deep space, I’ll contact command,” she said, walking through her door and heading to the bridge.
The ambassador was on the bridge, along with Dr. Hess. They were in conference with Grimms, who didn't look happy. He ran a hand through his cropped, gray hair several times as he considered the Elif’s words. His stocky frame and serious face was a sharp contrast to the placid looks the two Elif gave him as they looked down from their greater height.
“What’s happening?” Sara asked, stepping into the command ring and powering it up.
“We need a space to continue our work with the core, Captain Sonders,” Dr. Hess said, stepping between the first officer and the ambassador.
The bubble view materialized around Sara's torso, but she turned to the doctor and looked at him through the translucent field. “This was a rescue mission, doctor, not a continuation of your research. That being said, we can provide you with a room, but not much in the way of equipment. We took some damage in the battle and need to make repairs. Until that happens, we are running at minimal power.”
“A room would be fine, and I will keep my power requirements to a minimum.” The doctor turned to go.
Sara frowned. “No, doctor. You will keep your power requirements to the lights, and that’s it. You will have plenty of time to study that core when we are back to full power. ‘Til then, you may as well just have a seat and enjoy the ride.”
She turned back to the view and pulled up a star chart to overlay it. She could see large portions of the sky snaking through the galaxy that were colored in with a red shade, indicating Teifen space. Looking at the tiny chunk of sky they inhabited, she wondered what the human leaders were thinking when they agreed to fight such a large empire. Even the Elif’s section of the galaxy was only a third the size of the Teifen territories, and if the rumors were true, what territory the Elif held was shrinking daily.
She found a relatively empty portion of space and pointed it out, dropping a navigation pin and sending it to Ensign Connors. “Plot a course for empty space in this direction. Something close, but far enough to keep us hidden in the black.”
“Aye, Ma’am. I won’t be as accurate as Cora, Ma’am,” he said, glancing Sara’s way to be sure she still wanted him to make the calculations.
“I’m aware, Ensign. We don’t need to be all that accurate to get to the middle of nowhere.”
He typed away at his console, and a few seconds later said, “Course plotted and sent to Cora, Ma’am.”
“Cora, are you ready?”
“Yes, but we should increase our speed a little to make the jump easier. Thirty percent thrust for sixty seconds should do it.”
“Helm, make it so,” Sara said, leaning back in her command ring. She could see their speed increasing through her readout.
A minute later, Cora came back, her voice a little slow, “Jumping to warp.”
Sara saw the engines go offline, along with the weapons, and then the view of space contracted and began to spread rather quickly.
“How long is the jump?” Sara asked, looking to Connors who checked his readout.
“Thirty seconds, Ma’am.”
Not long for Cora to catch a breather.
The image snapped to clarity thirty seconds later, and she noted that the stars had moved slightly, and the planet was gone.
“Cora, keep power to essentials only. I don't want you burning out before we can get you repaired.”
“Aye. Thanks, Captain,” Cora said, relief plain in her voice.
“Mezner, get the reports ready and have them sent to command. Add a note asking where to drop off these researchers. Grimms, what does our repair bill come to?”
Grimms pulled up his tablet and looked over the numbers as he spoke. “It looks like we will have the parts printed in the next three hours, but we need to flush the reactors before anyone can get in there to replace the internals, and a full flush will take twenty-four hours. The repairs should take an estimated forty-eight hours.”
Sara tapped her fingers to her lips as she leaned back in her command ring. “Are those estimates to fix both reactors? What if we put more people on it?”
“It is. More people won’t help; there is only so much space to work in the reactor. This is a case of more hands not being helpful,” Grimms said, from his command chair.
“Message packet sent, Ma’am. The mage on duty said they should receive it at Earth command in thirty-two minutes,” Mezner reported, tucking a lock of her blonde hair behind her ear.
Sara nodded her thanks and turned back to Grimms. “Have you seen the reports from the extraction? Particularly the video of
the engine room where we retrieved the core?”
He shook his head, “We were a little busy, figuring out if the explosion was the reactor on that derelict, or an attack from the Teifen. I assume there is something I should see?”
Sara nodded and stepped out of the command ring, letting the bubble dissipate in a puff of bluish smoke. She motioned for Grimms to follow her, and stepped into the commander’s ready room. She didn't like the room as a workstation, and spent the majority of her time on duty on the bridge.
The desk was small, and there were no windows, making the small ready room feel cramped. She took a seat behind her desk, and Grimms took the one facing it. He pulled up the video in question, and Sara waited patiently as he scanned through. She knew he had found the footage with the tank when his eyes went wide, then narrowed as he considered the implications.
“Is this the tech the Elif used to make the tank?” Grimms asked, working it out in his head.
“I believe so. Cora, did you get a chance to see the report?” she asked the ceiling.
“No, should I?” Cora asked, her voice sounding much calmer.
“Yeah, particularly when we get to the core.”
A few minutes later, Cora came back, her voice full of apprehension. “So, they have me in a tank they copied from a dead race? I don't like where this is going.”
Sara sighed. “It gets worse. The good Dr. Hess informed me that the Elif couldn't make the tech work for them because it drove their controllers crazy.”
Grimms’s thick eyebrows rose. “Crazy? As in it drove them insane? How long did he say it took?”
“He said they couldn't use it for more than a couple months. I have a suspicion that the Elif’s communal nature had a little something to do with it, but just over the last few days, I’ve noticed the stress in Cora's voice, and this little bit of news is making me nervous. Be honest, Cora. It this too much for you?”
There was a pause. “I don't think it’s too much. Not right now, anyway. I can't speak to what it will be like two months from now. This system is amazing. It cuts reaction time of the ship down to the speed of thought, and the Aether reserves it opens up are incredible. The drawback is that there are so many more systems under my control, or at least that I monitor. I guess I understand the thinking—the subsystems need to react faster, in reaction to the main components reacting faster—but I feel like a lot of this should be under the eye of a computer monitoring system. It’s like whoever designed this originally could either think faster, or they had help of some kind.”
Sara leaned forward and put her elbows on the small desk. “I think they did have help. That’s what the core is. It has to be. When the reactor on the derelict went critical, Dr. Hess said it was because the core was no longer manually controlling it. It came from a tank just like yours, and, if I remember right, there is a place to fit a core on your tank. It’s like they knew they needed one, but didn't have one to plug into your system.”
Grimms’s face went a little red as he frowned. “This makes sense, in a way. When the Admiral came to me and asked me to be the first officer of the Raven, he said the Elif were pushing this new ship out quicker than they liked. He implied that there was some kind of internal struggle that they were not telling humanity about. I would bet that they had this tech all along, but knew it would drive the user crazy without a core. Maybe word came down that they had found one on this colony we just evacuated, and they thought they could reverse engineer it before it became a problem for Cora.”
Sara put her face in her hands and let out a breath of frustration. “Well I don't know how they plan to reverse engineer it. They can't even touch it! When Dr. Hess tried, it zapped him so hard it knocked him out. I don't know much about engineering something from something else, but I would bet being able to touch the object would be needed in the process.”
“How did you get it, if it knocks out anyone that touches it?” Cora asked.
“I pulled it out. Evidently, my high magical potential is some kind of security measure. If you have enough power to pick up the core, you must be qualified to handle it.”
“What if we plug the core we have into my tank?”
“Are you crazy? That sounds like one of my reckless ideas, and we only need one person making suggestions like that,” Sara said, her head cocked in wonder.
“The captain is right,” Grimms nodded. “We don't know what that would do. We don't even know what systems the core controls. Obviously the Elif built this system from the aliens’ design, but who knows if they got it right, if they’ve never gotten their hands on a core? No, I wouldn't let that thing in the same room as you, let alone take part of your control away.” Grimms had a stern look on his face that was similar to one that Sara had seen on her father’s. It was the look someone gave you when they cared about you and were trying to keep you from hurting yourself.
It made Sara’s respect for Grimms go up several notches.
“Okay, I agree, that was a little reckless of me to suggest. Let’s say they do plan on reverse engineering this core…how long will that take? Am I going to go mad before they even figure out how to open it up? We just learned there is a timer on my effectiveness in this tank. It seems to me there are far too many secrets between the Elif High Command and humanity, and if this tank is any indication, they are playing fast and loose with my sanity,” Cora said, her frustration turning to anger.
Sara flopped back in her chair, drawing a look from Grimms that said, “you are a captain, and captains shouldn't flop”.
She sat up straighter and gave him a half smile. She thought about what she and Dr. Hess had talked about, and how to leverage that to Cora's advantage. Cora was right about the fact that they were on a deadline, and from the sound of it, they were going to miss it by a huge margin. The problem was that they had answers within reach, but the intentional way the Elif were keeping them in the dark about those answers made her nervous.
“Why would they keep the fact that the tank system is of alien origin secret?” she mused to the room in general.
Grimms considered the question. “Well, it could be that they thought we wouldn't use it, if we knew its origin and the history of their own testing.”
“I suppose that could be it, but if so, then why not just wait ‘til the core was done being reverse engineered? Why give us the tech now, knowing it would cause harm to its user? Why take the chance that the core wasn’t ready in time?” Sara asked, absently petting Alister after he jumped up into her lap, circled a few times, and settled down.
Cora spoke up. “Maybe they’re desperate. The war with the Teifen is happening a long way from here; a carrier attacking a distant research colony tells me that they have ships to spare. That means they don't have to concentrate their forces to take on the Elif. Maybe the Elif know they are losing and need us to step up our involvement.”
Grimms gave a frown, but nodded. “Tactically, that is sound—unless the research colony was far more important than they let on. But if so, why wouldn't they have ships in orbit to protect it? The more I think about it, the more it makes sense that they are getting desperate. The Elif fleet has been taking bigger and bigger steps away from helping us build up. They gave us the tools to build our own ships, but now it seems like they are itching to get out of the Sol system at the first chance. No one of any considerable rank has been off their ships for more than an hour for the occasional meeting over the last year or so, which tells me they don't want essential personnel far away in case they need to go somewhere quickly.”
Sara thought for a moment. “Let’s say they are in trouble. Let’s also say they are trying to set us up as an independent force. Why wouldn't they just tell us what’s happening, and help us figure out how to get this tank system working? If we ignore for a moment the fact that, without a core, the user will go mad, the system is obviously far superior to anything currently being used. If we could work together on the problem, wouldn't it solve the problem faster?” Sara asked, na
rrowing her eyes. “So why the secrecy? What are they hiding?”
26
Mezner came over the intercom. “Ma’am, we have a packet from command coming in now.”
“Thank you, Ensign,” Sara replied.
She and Grimms had been speculating for over an hour, and she felt like they were no closer to anything resembling an answer. She was worried about Cora, but Cora said she would be fine once all the systems were back online. Most everything was automated to a degree, but with the power on minimum, she had to manually monitor and adjust the systems to keep them balanced.
“Commander, let’s see what our betters have to say, shall we?” She pulled the packet up on her desk’s tablet, while Grimms pulled it up on his own, ever-present tablet.
She looked it over and was surprised that there was no mention of the fact that they had taken out a Teifen carrier. In fact, the orders seemed like they had been prepared before the Raven had reported back to command.
The packet only gave the coordinates for a second destination, Colony 788, where they were being instructed to drop off the researchers and stick around until the Elif could send transport ships to pick up their people. The report stated that the Teifen had targeted the colony but made no mention of how they knew that. It also said that the Elif should be there long before the Teifen could arrive, and the Raven was to defend the colony until backup came.
“I don't like this at all; these orders were premade. There is no mention about the Teifen carrier, or the fact that the ship is damaged and not in fighting shape,” Sara said to a frowning Grimms.
“I feel like this may be a bit of a goose chase, Ma’am. How long are we supposed to wait? What kind of timeline are we talking about? A day, a week, a year? These feel like placeholder orders. How are we supposed to defend a colony if our ship is damaged?”
Genesis: War Mage: Book One (War Mage Chronicles 1) Page 15