by Greg Mutton
Graham looked directly at JT and David, ‘You two must continue the work your father has started here.’ He stopped, thinking that maybe his passion had gone too far.
‘Have no fear, we will,’ JT answered. ‘There’s no alternative; it must be preserved.’
‘Agreed,’ David added.
That calmed Graham — the heir apparent and the head of finance committing to the project was all he wanted to hear. He looked at his watch, ‘I’ve arranged for lunch so we should head back.’ They returned to the entry foyer and went into one of the meeting rooms for their lunch. Laid out all around the room were plans, models and sketches of the site and, more importantly, impressions of what it could look like.
JT fidgeted as the food was delivered, not even looking at the plates but quickly cornering Graham instead. ‘Graham, have you heard about the Second’s collecting obsession?’
‘JT, for Pete’s sake… let it go…, David interrupted, ‘there’s no old car collection!’ All his life he had had to put up with JT’s crazy notions and he’d heard it all before.
‘Come on Dave…,’ JT sounded exasperated, ‘it could be true, and down here would be an ideal place to hide it!’
Graham shook his head. ‘Mr Abraham, I have heard such stories and believe me, I would love to solve that mystery; but there is nothing indicated on any of the plans. So far, we haven’t found anything to suggest they’re down here. Sorry.’
‘Yeah, let the poor guy alone… let it remain a myth,’ Sol chipped in as he placed a generous helping of caramel pie on his plate. ‘Come and get some of this, before I’m forced to eat it all.’ JT shrugged and went back to the table, finishing his lunch in silence.
The rest of the afternoon was spent wandering around the compound above ground, including a quick tour of the ancient power farm. While the majority of the power for the complex was generated by the MAM reactors, the ancient solar and wind generation systems had been restored and were fully operational.
The house itself was also intriguing — it was huge and was said to have over seventy bedrooms. The family only really used six of these on the upper ground floor. The other two floors above were used to house visiting executives and their families, as well as visitors from off-world operations. At any time there could be as many as one hundred people in the house or as few as two. Further to the west was another village where most of the staff resided, all provided by the company as part of employee remuneration packages.
It was just before five in the afternoon when they returned to the house, where they were met by Ajay who addressed John.
‘Sir, your father would like you to join him in his study. I’ll take Captain Radchak and your brother to the library.’ He turned and led them away. John knocked on the study door, memories of his youth flooding back. This was where his father spent most of his time and where he disciplined wayward children. John smiled as he entered.
‘You want to see me?’ His smile widened as he remembered entering his father’s study so many years ago, with the same words… the moment was not lost on Jeff, either.
‘Long time since you were sent to the study,’ Jeff chuckled, the irony of the situation not lost on him.
‘Can’t think of what I have done wrong today.’
Jeff waved his son into a chair then moved over to a sideboard and poured two good measures of scotch. He handed one to John and sat opposite his son. The chairs were ancient Chesterfields and seemed to envelope them as they sat. They both took a long sip of the liquid, savouring the flavour.
‘How was the tour today?’ he asked.
John looked at his father, not believing for a moment that this was the real reason they were in here. ‘Great… and we didn’t go anywhere you didn’t want us to.’
‘I know, and thanks. I know you don’t want to be seen as one of the Abraham family, but unfortunately son, you are. Not going past where I asked sets a good example. You must remember that we’ve nearly 300 employees down there… if we don’t obey the rules, how can we expect others to?’
John eyed his father warily. Here it comes, he thought, the time to join the company speech… well I’m ready for that. His jaw tightened, determination evident on his face.
‘It seems as if we are going to have another surprise visitor, this weekend,’ Jeff continued. ‘Probably a few… the President and some others will be here. Evidently, he has decided that the event your mother has planned would be a good time to honour your sister for all her work in the marine arena. He also expressed interest in having a look at the bunker while he’s here, but I get the feeling there is much more to this than meets the eye.’
John interrupted his father. ‘Hang on… how many has she invited?’
‘Around one hundred and fifty,’ Jeff smiled back, revelling at the effect of this news.
‘What?’ John exclaimed. ‘She told me it was just a family affair!’
‘Calm down,’ Jeff commanded, ‘you know your mother. All three of her unattached children in the house at the same time… did you honestly think she would pass up a chance for some match making?’ He paused as John squirmed in his chair.
‘Forget that,’ Jeff resumed, ‘I’m far more interested in the President’s timing. Firstly; your uncle’s coming with some mysterious old friend. Then there’s the final exercise for your ship and Wilson’s presence and now Malik invites himself to the party.’ He paused and drained his glass. ‘No John… there is something else going on… have you heard any scuttlebutt?’
JT shook his head. ‘Nothing… I thought Malik would be going on Rhapsody… at least, that’s what we were told.’
‘Well apparently not; he’s coming here directly from the launch and his security detail will be here first thing tomorrow morning.’ Jeff smiled, evidently pleased at a new thought, ‘I’ll bet Albrecht will be pissed when he finds out; his media hype will fall a bit flat.’
8
Aaron couldn’t quite make out the distant sound — was it a bell? No, someone was speaking — now the bell again! Slowly he climbed through the darkness back to consciousness.
Finally… I thought you would never wake up! The voice sounded again in his head. Four hours, as you requested. The link with the ship’s central brain was still new to him — sometimes he wished he hadn’t been compatible.
‘Thanks George,’ he said as he moved to the shower.
The needle-like drops hitting him at well below body temperature soon had his senses back on line. Aaron shut off the water and grabbed a towel — a vigorous rubdown completed the awakening process. His uniform was waiting in his wardrobe and he quickly dressed.
Although he had a full kitchen in his cabin, he headed down to the ward room where he ordered a bacon and egg roll and a coffee from the dispenser. He sat at one of the tables to eat his roll, then, with coffee in hand, headed to his ready room. There he reviewed the last watch data and noted that there had been no change in the projected course of their five mysterious companions.
Still a bit over two hours till insertion, then we’ll see if this thing works, he thought. He was interrupted by the sound of the chime, announcing that someone was at the bridge door to his ready room.
‘Come in,’ Aaron replied to the chime.
Petra entered the room. ‘Good morning, Captain.’ The door closed behind her.
‘Care for a coffee?’ he asked; his throat suddenly dry and his heart beating a little faster.
‘Sounds good.’ she turned to the dispenser. ‘Coffee, white, no sugar, fifty-five degrees,’ and a mug of steaming coffee appeared on the pad. They moved to the lounge area and sat facing each other. ‘Uneventful watch, no change and everything was quiet; next couple of hours could be interesting though.’ She smiled her mischievous, challenging smile.
‘What do you mean… interesting?’ Aaron asked.
‘Well, do you have a plan in mind for when we reinsert?’ she asked.
‘Not as such,’ he answered. ‘But I have asked Kate and Simon to m
eet me here in about fifteen minutes and then we will all work on a solution.’
‘So… we have fifteen minutes to kill do we?’ she smiled flirtatiously.
Aaron felt the strange fluttering in his stomach again, he was about to say something when the door chimed. Kate and Simon were a little early; they both ordered a cup of coffee and sat on the opposite lounge.
‘Where are we up to Simon?’ Aaron asked.
‘In just under two hours, we reinsert into normal space; then a little over seventeen minutes before we reach our next insertion point; then next stop, Earth.’
Travelling through hyperspace was not just a set-and-forget process. Very rarely did any journey happen by engaging the displacement field and travelling directly to ones’ final destination. For one thing, the energy needed for this was immense; for another, there was the fact that space, and everything in it, was in constant motion. To arrive at exactly the desired place and time usually meant a number of shorter operations, as was the case here. The trip to Earth needed two separate worm-hole insertions to arrive exactly where, and when, they had planned.
‘So,’ Aaron looked at the group. ‘We have seventeen minutes… we could have five possibly-hostile ships to contend with… options, Number One?’
Petra put her coffee mug down and spoke. ‘As this has been an uneventful watch, I have taken some time to study the engineering schematics; she really is one hell of a boat. As I see it, we have three options: one, we do nothing and reinsert as normal with only the deflector operational; two, we reinsert at full battle readiness; or three, we go in sneaky.’ She paused, inviting comment; none came, so she continued. ‘The design on this ship differs from most others I have served on; this one has a distributed power system, with each major system having its own generating capacity. At the moment, we’re running in normal cruise mode with the main reactor providing the bulk of the ship’s power requirements, so this is what I suggest; we run up all generating systems and initialise shield and weapon systems — initialise only — we don’t bring them on line. Once we reinsert, we can have everything on line within seconds, if needed. Now, I haven’t had a great deal of experience in combat but this would seem to be quite quick. If there’s nothing there, no harm done, but if we do run into hostiles, it may give us an edge.’
Kate added, ‘Basically, going to alert status amber — without the fuss — works for me.’ Aaron and Simon nodded their approval.
‘Still your watch Number One; it’s your plan so you’d better get cracking,’ Aaron urged.
The process was simple: all generating systems were slowly brought online, with the main reactor and generators adjusted to compensate. This would look like a normal power setting to any sensor scan and, with weapons and shields only initialised. They wouldn’t be a recognisable threat to any vessel in the area.
Aaron let his crew do their job and stayed in his ready room, telling himself that this would be a good test of the new first officer. He checked the time, six minutes to reinsertion. He left his desk and strode onto the bridge. Simon looked up from his console, ‘Five and a half minutes to reinsertion; do you want a count down?’ he asked.
Petra vacated the command chair and took the number one’s spot to the right of the chair, behind tactical. Kate was already at her console, left of the chair and behind comms.
Aaron looked over to Simon, ‘Sounds good… do it.’ He looked over to the sensor console toward Harper. ‘Is everything ready Cadet?’
‘Yes, sir’ Harper answered back. ‘I’ve put the theoretical tracks into the Bubble so we can have an idea where they should emerge. As soon as we pick up their signature the system will make any corrections.’
The track in the Bubble showed the five amber dots on a slightly converging course that would intersect with Condor just prior to re-insertion. The hairs on the back of Aaron’s neck stood up as he saw this — he knew what this could be the start of and he didn’t like it one bit. He moved over to the nav console.
‘Simon, if we miss this insertion point, how long to the next one?’ he almost whispered. Simon’s fingers flew over his console making calculations at lightning speed.
‘Four hours,’ he answered. Aaron nodded his thanks and returned to his chair, he beckoned Petra to join him.
‘Number One, how much do you know about Krell battle tactics?’ he asked quietly as she joined him.
She looked at the Bubble before answering. ‘Not a great deal. I studied the basics of battle theory but not much else, why?’
Aaron thought for a moment. ‘There’s an old trap they use, it’s called Katoc; loosely translated, it means fist. They place one cloaked ship in front of the target effectively blocking its path, while the others fan out around the target to form a flanking formation. If it all turns to shit, they have the advantage — they can concentrate fire and the target must divide any response. It can crush the target like a fist,’ here he clenched his fist to demonstrate, ‘hence the name. Aaron followed her gaze to the holographic scene in the Bubble. ‘If Harper is correct and they reinsert where he says, things could get very interesting.’
Petra was surprised. ‘You don’t seem too worried… they could destroy this ship!’
‘Ah, you forget!’ Aaron smiled. ‘I spent a couple of years at their academy. There is one way out of the trap; ballsy, but effective. If they carry it out, we can still get through. Probably with a bloody nose, but we can get out.’ He turned back to the nav station.
‘Simon… how long?’
‘Thirty seconds.’
Aaron looked back at the weapons officer. ‘David, get everything spun up as soon as we reinsert.’
‘Everything?’ David questioned.
‘Yes, everything.’
Simon’s voice intruded, ‘ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one… reinsertion.’ Again, that fraction of a second when everything seemed to shimmer out of phase, then they were back in normal space.
‘Harper,’ Aaron called.
‘Coming up now sir,’ Harper replied and he turned to the Bubble, ‘just a couple of seconds.’ He looked like an expectant father waiting on the birth of his first child.
The five amber dots changed to red, one by one.
‘Yes!’ Harper exclaimed and punched the air. ‘It worked!’
Aaron watched the five red tracks as they divided and moved into new courses that would allow them to initiate the fist. He swore under his breath.
‘Fuck!’ he said again out loud. ‘Sometimes it would be better to be wrong.’ He turned to Tactical.
‘Dave, those five red dots may be hostiles… don’t ask now,’ he said as he waived away the question that was forming on the Tactical Officers lips. ‘Just get everything spun up and the ship prepared for a fight.’ He turned back to the nav console.
‘Navigator, can you insert a timer into the Bubble? I need to know where we are with respect to the insertion timing.’ Simon’s fingers again flew across his console and immediately a countdown clock came up on the view screen.
‘I don’t know about the Bubble, but will this do?’ he asked, sensing that urgency was the key.
‘Excellent.’
The seconds seemed to creep by and after about five minutes the comms officer spoke.
‘Sir, there is a lot of chatter out there … can’t understand it … it’s encrypted, but there is a lot of it.’
Aaron turned to the tactical officer. ‘Dave, if these are Krell cruisers, we could have some problems.’
David could not contain himself. ‘Krell cruisers… what the hell’s going on Skipper? I thought we were all friends?’
‘To be honest, I don’t know it all myself, but this could just be a ghosting exercise, or we could be heading into a fist. If so we need everything ready and all the shields at max, ok?’
‘Sure Skipper.’ He looked a bit surprised and worried. ‘You’re thinking of hammerhead?’ Aaron nodded and both smiled. ‘Never a dull moment,’ David said, quietly.
‘What’s hammerhead?’ Petra enquired.
Dave looked up. ‘Hammerhead; the only way to break through this is to do just that… break through. We will set our shields to counter as much of the cross fire as we can but we throw everything at the front ship… crash or crash through… hammerhead!’
Petra was still confused. Aaron pointed to the Bubble.
‘What’s our objective? To go to our next worm hole insertion point… but what’s stopping us? The front ship; it’s trying to block us. We can’t go round them; that’d change our insertion angle and we’d end up who knows where. So, we hold our course and hit the front ship with everything we have and crash through. We’ll take a few licks but this old girl can handle it.’ He turned and patted his chair as if to assure the ship he knew what he was doing.
Just then the voice in his head joined in. Patting your chair won’t do much. George said, the sarcastic tone now gone, as you said, ballsy… but there is no other choice.’
Already the computer was calculating the most probable damage points and working on repair logistics. One of the huge advantages of having a ‘Brain’ ship was that all the ‘behind the scenes’ tasks just happened. Aaron watched both the counter and the Bubble while the tension on the bridge rose exponentially.
‘Sir, there was a lot of chatter as we reinserted, but it has just stopped,’ the comms officer announced. They all waited and watched the red dots, knowing; their entire future depended on the next ten minutes. Another minute ticked by, then another.
‘Sir,’ it was Harper. ‘The lead ship is slowing.’
Aaron watched as the Bubble confirmed Harper’s words. The lead ship had slowed. This is wrong… they’re too far from the insertion point he thought.
‘Chatter just started again, almost sounds like an argument.’
Aaron pressed a button on his chair and the chatter filled the bridge.