"Uh, roger that, Heehaw. It looks like there's a giganotosaurus, an allosaurus, a T-rex, a couple of apatosauruses, maybe a titanosaur, a handful of stegosauruses, a brachiosaur or two, and what looks like a pack of velociraptors," Jawbone said flatly.
"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Heehaw replied, almost under his breath.
"Negative, sir. You've got the entire complement of Dinoland coming your way. Shit!" Jawbone reversed the throttle and flipped her mecha in a backward pitch-over to reverse direction, just in time to miss what appeared to be a flock of pteranodons and pterodactyls.
"Holy shit, Jawbone, what the fuck is that?" her wingman cried over the net in a panic.
"Well, Lieutenant Junior Grade Wilson, that one right there . . . Fox three," one of the robotic replicas of the ancient birds burst into a ball of fire. " . . . is a pteranodon. And that one right . . . guns, guns, guns . . . there is a Pterodactyl." Delilah yawed her mecha through the flight path of the flock, firing her DEG and stirring up the winged beasts.
"How the hell do you know that?" Wilson asked.
"Not that it really fucking matters right now . . . uhn," Jawbone grunted and pushed through a high-g turn. The bladders around her legs began squeezing her like a pneumatic vise. "But, pteranodons don't have teeth, and pterodactyls do."
"If you two are quite finished, get down here and clear out Main Street for me!" Heehaw ordered.
"Roger that, sir."
Heehaw searched through the virtual battlescape in his mind for the best escape route. He had just about decided that they were going to pick up the First Family in the hands of the mecha and make a run for it when Captain Washington burst through on the net.
"Captain Elliot, it's Washington."
"Captain?"
"Negative on your moving the package. The package has arranged for other means of transportation and has warned to be ready to run cover in one minute thirty. I repeat, one minute thirty. Over," Thomas alerted him.
"Roger that, Captain. Be advised that aerial recon shows a herd of dinosaurs headed our way, and they'll be here soon. I'm transmitting the ID tags for them now." Heehaw passed along the tagged red dots in the virtual battlescape so that they would be marked as dinosaurs in all the DTM links with the right command codes.
"Acknowledged and understood. I have the data now, thanks. Get ready."
"Ready as we'll ever be."
Chapter 8
October 31, 2388 AD
Sol System
Oort Cloud
Saturday, 6:00 AM, Earth Eastern Standard Time
"Quartermaster of the Watch!" Captain Jefferson called through the urgent sounds of the background bridge conversations and the din of the continuous buzzing from the tac-net DTM mindvoices.
"Aye sir!" Quartermaster Senior Chief Patea Vanu snapped away from his viewscreen and looked at the CO sitting in his command chair.
"Chief, I want an eyeballs report every minute to corroborate the sensors. I don't want us getting caught with our pants down like we did during the Exodus." The captain rocked the seat from left to right nervously and looked through the QMSC like he wasn't there. His stare looked right through the main viewport of the bridge and over the deck of the supercarrier out into the deep black space of the Oort Cloud some ten thousand astronomical units from Sol. The Sienna Madira was battened down and preparing for a hyperspace jaunt into a battle plan, the likes of which hadn't been seen since the Martian Exodus. Jefferson assimilated data as fast as he could in an attempt to make some sense out of the mountains of premission analyses piling up in the virtual sphere around him.
"Aye, Captain! I've got eyeballs posted about the ship feeding me continuously. I'll let you know if anything sounds out of the ordinary."
"Good." Jefferson turned to his XO. "Larry, are there any last- minute operations lagging?"
"No sir. A group of AEMs decided to ride down the tubes with the Warlords, and they are strapping the last of them in as we speak. We're good to go." XO staffers passed in and out of the bridge carrying out background orders from Colonel Chekov and making certain that the thousands of operational needs of the supercarrier were met. Every department of the ship had issues for the XO, and each of those departments had to function smoothly for an operation. It literally took a massive organization structure and hundreds of assistants to keep the ship functioning properly at all levels. The added layer of the AICs spread about the ship made it even more complicated, while at the same time adding to the capabilities of the mammoth war machine. Besides, it was Uncle Timmy's job to command the AICs.
"AEMs volunteered to ride in the drop tank tubes with the tankheads?" the CO grinned wryly. "Let me guess, Ramy Roberts' Robots?"
"Yes, sir."
"Goddamned Ramy, you tough SOB." The captain shook his head and continued to smile. "You wonder why his marines love him so much."
"Guess who's riding the first tube out?" the XO remarked. He didn't have to say anything more, as Captain Jefferson knew good and well that the first drop tube out would have Army Colonel Mason "Warlord One" Warboys driving his M3A17-T, and USMC Major Ramy Roberts would be right on top of Warboys' tank in his armored e-suit hanging on for dear life, God, and probably singing the country hymn of the USMC all the way down.
"COB, anything I need to know about my ship and her complement?"
"Well, sir, this reminds me a bit of the Triton mission a few years back."
"I know I'm gonna regret asking this, but how so, Charlie?" the CO asked reluctantly. The COB was renowned for his long-winded tall tales that eventually got around to him being a superhero, along with there being some lesson to be learned or a nugget of wisdom that would be useful in some way or the other.
"The ship is in great shape, the crew is ready to go, and the mission seems all too easy, sir." Chief of the Boat Command Master Chief Charlie Green smirked and sipped at his coffee. "Remember how that turned out, sir?"
"That's it, COB? 'It seems too easy, sir'? Where the hell is the amusing anecdote about some damned space mermaid or a UFO or some such damned thing? That's just no good at all, COB. We need to check with Ensign Rivers about what they're putting in your coffee." Captain Jefferson laughed almost disappointedly.
"That damned Rivers won't make anything but decaf, sir. I've had to hide those colored water packets three times this week," the XO added. "If he does it again, I'm going to put his decaffeinated ass on report."
"At ease, EndRun," the CO replied, using the XO's mecha callsign, which he seldom used unless he was trying to keep the mood light.
"Well, now that you mention it, there was this one time," the COB started, but thought better of it when the captain waved him off with a grin. He paused, almost sulked, and then sipped his real coffee that he had made himself. Captain Jefferson, of course, realized all of that. Everybody on the bridge drank the COB's coffee, as nobody could stand that weak-ass stuff that they kept down at the mess hall. And the stuff that Ensign Rivers had insisted on, well, it didn't even qualify as Navy coffee, and an old marine mechajock like the XO sure as Hell couldn't take it. Captain Jefferson had been very pleased once the COB had decided it was his personal duty to make certain that the bridge crew members were supplied with appropriate, thick-as-mud, vile, and extremely stout-beyond-stout java with real caffeine in it.
Uncle Timmy? He sipped from his coffee mug and then snapped the magnetic base back onto his command chair's arm.
Yes, sir. We are packed, stacked, and ready to go, sir.
Hyperspace?
All systems are go and ready for the engagement.
Sound it off, Timmy.
Aye, sir. The ship's head AIC, actually Lieutenant Commander Timmy Uniform November Kilo Lima Three Seven Seven or UNKL377, the AIC officer of the U.S.S. Sienna Madira, keyed the 1MC intercom and announced the call to start the mission. There were a few short bursts of the bosun's pipe and then Timmy's voice.
"All hands. All hands. Battle stations. All hands prepare for immediate hyperspa
ce transfer to hostile engagement zone and battle deployment. Stand by for hyperspace countdown."
"Well, that's that. Comm, verify that the relay of engagement command to the Blair was successful and that mission clock has started," the CO ordered.
"Aye, sir! Message is relayed, and the clock is going. Captain Walker says, 'break a leg' sir," the communications officer Lieutenant Keith Aldridge replied. The young lieutenant held a finger down on his right ear as if he were drowning out ambient noise to listen more closely to his DTM mindvoice.
"Of course she did." Jefferson grinned briefly, recalling that Sharon had indeed broken her leg while commanding the Thatcher during the Exodus and practically saving his ass, the Madira, and the entire Mons City main dome. It had been a running joke between them since. "Take us in, XO."
"Aye, sir." Colonel Larry "EndRun" Chekov turned to face the viewport and looked sternly over the bow of the Madira. "Helm!"
"Roger, XO."
"Commence hyperspace jaunt to predetermined coordinates at your discretion."
"Aye, sir," the helm replied, and turned from the XO to the navigator's station. "Navigation Officer, confirm that hyperspace jaunt coordinates are correct, ma'am?"
"Jaunt coordinates comply, Helm!" Lieutenant Commander Penny Swain verified the jaunt tensors in her DTM and again with her AIC. "We're good to go, Captain Jefferson," Penny added with a nod to the captain. Most officers of the bridge crew historically answered to the CO through the XO, but it was common practice since wooden ships with sails that the navigation officer replied directly to the captain on major course changes.
"Hyperspace is a go, sir. Handing off to Uncle Timmy in five, four, three, two, one, mark," helmsman Lieutenant Junior Grade Macy Marks counted down.
General quarters! General quarters! All hands, all hands man your battle stations immediately! Prepare for short hyperspace jaunt in fifteen seconds. Expect multiple ground targets with incoming surface-to- air defenses and multiple unknown airborne targets. Prepare for evasive! Nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Hyperspace.
"If you don't mind my saying so sir, you sure picked a hell of a day to join the crew." Engineer's mate Petty Officer First Class Vineet Shah made idle conversation as he led Lieutenant Joseph Buckley to the Chief Engineer's staion. The CHENG's station was on the aft side of the hyperspace propulsion unit in the engine room.
"Well, I'd guess today is as good as any," Lieutenant Buckley replied. Joe looked the engine room over as they walked. He was most intrigued by the dancing of the light-pink fluorescence, swirling around the zero point, energy-field-shielding projector. Joe had studied the ship's systems ad nauseam and was knew that the pink light was caused by gamma rays at extremely high energies being generated at the event horizon of the space-time expansion, which was created by the projector. As the extremely high energy gamma rays were ripped right out of space and time itself, they traveled radially— aside from a slight rotation due to the frame dragging of the projector's vortex-like motion—away from the section of space and time that was stretched beyond normal space but were then severely red- shifted all the way to the far visible and near infrared. The red- shifting was an effect of Einstein's General Relativity, and the extreme gravitational difference at the boundary between the projector and normal space was like trying to escape the pull of a neutron star.
As a main propulsion assistant it would be his job to make certain that the projector functioned properly and continued to generate a focused swirl of expanded space-time in front of the supercarrier. Joe and EM1 Shah walked underneath the giant, swirling tube of pink light. The conduit projector hung just above head height and was more than four meters in diameter. It ran the length of three decks of the ship in both directions.
"Commander Harrison, sir, this is Lieutenant Buckley." EM1 Shah nodded back and forth between the two senior engineering officers.
"Sir." Buckley saluted the chief engineer and then shook his hand.
"You picked a hell of a day to join us, Lieutenant," chief engineer Commander Benson Harrison said with a raised eyebrow. The engineer watched the propulsion control systems closely. The instrument panels spread across the wall, and duty stations around him all were active with digital readouts blinking some piece of information in a myriad of thousands of brilliant flashes that gave Las Vegas a run for its money in artificial illumination.
The instrument panels were complicated enough, but there were also several other layers of information regarding the main propulsion system that could only be transferred DTM; otherwise, there just wouldn't be enough real estate within the ship to physically locate all the sensor readouts. The actual sensors and switches were the minimum systems required to manage an extremely rough jaunt through hyperspace with a several-AU destination-error budget per light-year. The DTM layers and AICs were required to keep the jaunts more accurate.
"That's what EM1 Shah said, sir," Buckley replied.
"Well, Vineet has a good head about him, and you'd be wise to keep him around. Look, we'll be dropping out of the hyperspace conduit in less than a minute. Are you up to speed on this ship's systems enough to take your duty station at Main Prop?" Benson asked.
"Aye, sir."
"Take it easy with that 'aye, sir' stuff, Joe, unless the command crew is around. You can call me Benny otherwise."
"Yes, sir, uh, Benny, sir." Joe just couldn't make himself break the protocols. His last command on board a frigate had a CHENG that was so by-the-book that he had even starched and pressed his coveralls. Buckley was going to have to get used to his new boss's more relaxed style.
"Right. Okay, time to get to work. Melissa, give Joe's AIC full access to all engine room protocols required for position of main propulsion assistant," the CHENG verbalized to his AIC and nodded to his new MPA.
"Yes, Benny," his AIC said over the room's coms.
"Okay, Buckley, she's all yours." The commander slapped him on the back and moved across the room to speak to a young female lieutenant at the damage control assistant's station.
"Yes, si— uh, Benny." Buckley sat down at the MPA's station and typed in his personal password data, then handed the wireless off to his AIC, Debbie.
Debbie, Three November One Uniform Zulu Juliet One logging into MPA station control protocols.
Welcome, Debbie, a subconscious or automated subroutine of Uncle Timmy's replied.
We're good to go, Joe.
Roger that, Debbie. Now DTM me the ZPE field projector status. Joe's mind filled with a virtual sphere of gravitometric tensor calculations and vacuum field probability equations. The intense whirl of space-time in front of the ship was decreasing and about to destabilize in less than a minute as matched perfectly to the flight plan of the ship. "Looks good," he mumbled to himself. However relaxed the CHENG might have been on formalities, his propulsion system control was dead on. Joe assured himself that the CHENG's ship was tight in the best way and was probably why he was the CHENG of the nation's fleet flagship.
Captain Jefferson ignored the DTM virtual sphere for a brief moment to look out the viewport of the bridge as the Sienna Madira lurched and then phased out of normal space with a reversed cascading shower of violet flashes of light.
"Hyperspace entry looks good, Captain," the ship's navigator said.
"Stay on it, nav."
"Aye, sir."
The Madira jaunted through her multidimensional vector and as far as the captain could tell would emerge into normal space just as the battle plan required. It was a short jaunt. The Madira and the Blair had been prepping for the attack on the Seppy Oort Cloud facility only a few light-minutes away, and so they would be snapping back into normal space very quickly into whatever mess the Seppies might have waiting for them. Of course, Captain Jefferson was fairly sure that the Seppy bastards weren't expecting them at all, but nothing was ever certain when it came to warfare. And the Separatists had proven to be nothing if not clever and full of misdirection and misconception. He tugged his s
eat belt a little tighter and gripped the arms of his chair nervously.
Uncle Timmy, how're we doing? Captain Jefferson asked his AIC.
All is well, Captain.
Good. Keep on top of it all.
Aye, sir.
"Everything looks right, Captain. Emerging from hyperspace in thirty seconds," the helmsman announced.
"Prepare for incoming. Air boss is a go for sorties," the CO ordered. Violet swirls of hyperspace spiraled rapidly around the supercarrier in a vortex of space-time fabric being warped into submission by the main propulsion system.
The quantum membrane of the universe was expanded beyond its normal flatness in the converging tunnel ahead of the supercarrier, violating the energy conditions of normal space. The exotic matter field generators in the giant field coils underneath the ship projected a focused beam in front of them that interacted with the vacuum energy fluctuations and through negative superposition canceled out a majority of normal space energy bands. This created the vortex region, where less energy existed than even in empty space-time itself. Navy propulsion engineers were often fond of explaining that they would create a region of nothingness that had even more nothing in it than normal.
The CO took one last, brief glance out the stern viewscreen at the twirling, blinking, and flashing light show of super-sized nothing and took a deep breath. He slowly pursed his lips and exhaled while closing his eyes. Taking one last quick assessment of the operations readiness data in his DTM, he tensed and readied himself for what waited on the other side of hyperspace.
"Aye, sir. Go for sorties!" the air boss acknowledged. Without looking up from his screen, he switched channels to the hangar bay. "All hangars, all cats, we are about to reenter normal space. Commence sortie deployment. I repeat, commence sortie deployment."
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