by David Nash
“Joseph and I have been discussing just such a problem, William Tell.” Oni says, laying her hand on her husband’s thigh. “Tell the General your solution.”
“Boss, I think we found a solution with the spherical space dock. Since all our ships were designed with a rail gun that lays along the keel, if we docked then with a sphere, and had them all configured bow out, like a spiky puffer fish, then the ships would always be orientated to fire their main weapons.” Joseph said excitedly. “Furthermore, we could make the docking ports similar to rail guns, and be able to ‘fire’ then ships out quickly.”
I imagine what they are describing, it would be massive. “Marvin, theoretically, would a ship large enough to dock an entire strike force, be large enough for a fusion generator? Is this feasible?”
“General Davis, a ship that size is possible, and yes, it could potentially be able to utilize the fusion technology. It would be a massive undertaking, and would take years.” Marvin said.
“I think we have a workaround already in motion, at least for a prototype.” Joseph replies.
“Oh do tell. I hope it hasn’t interfered with your primary mission of preparing the colony fleet.”
'No sir, you ordered the work around some time ago. What if we used Sedna?”
Shit, Captain Jones once again swung for the bleachers
“Marvin, is this feasible?”
“Sir, it would take a tremendous amount of power, and without calculations I cannot tell you how fast it could travel, but quick estimation says with the power available per kilogram of mass, speeds above .3 c would be difficult. However, as the planetoid has no molten core, it is feasible to hollow out the center and used the crust as a massive armored layer. The biggest problem would be time; a project of this size would take decades.”
“I like the idea of using Sedna as a movable fortress, but decades plural is too long. Does anyone have any suggestions for similar capabilities that could be done in a shorter time?”
Isoken gave her husband that look. “Joseph and I have discussed this quite a bit, while we think Sedna is the perfect choice long term, we also agreed that not would take less time and effort to retrofit the Barkun orbital fortresses.”
Never one to dither about, I see the potential. Now to bring it to life without making too many mistakes or impacting other projects….
“Isoken, how much more do you need to do to prepare from the Burrougots mission?” I asked
“Sir, My team and I are just making final checks, most of which I only manage not run.
“Joseph, how are your preparations coming?”
“General Davis, I too am almost ready, we are waiting on some final personnel to arrive, and a few procedural checks to be completed. However, my daily schedule has a lot of freedom if needed.”
“As long as we are on schedule, I want Isoken to ensure the Sedna team is fully staffed and understand the planetoids new direction. It will still remain the Legions headquarters. Hopefully, one day it will be the Legions Flagship as well. In the meantime, I’d like to see a plan in place to retrofit the forts. Jones, assist wherever needed, but your priority is still preparing your fleet for departure.”
“Renata? What do you think?” I ask afraid that once again I let business interrupt pleasure.
“Tell, I think that the legion is lucky to have you and your team. I don’t know even a potato about space warfare, but it seems like building armored super carriers would greatly reduce our dependence of Kernel replication, yes?”
She doesn’t know a potato about something? What is she talking about? I think to myself, this must be a Spanish idiom, no matter, she is right.
“Renata,” I say, “you may not be completely knowledgeable on space combat, but I still trust your opinion, it wasn’t that long ago that only science fiction authors talked about space combat.”
I notice my beer is empty. “I think the Legion is well in hand, and this will be the last dinner party for a while, let us table the work discussions and finish the beer and remember what we are fighting for.” I look toward the two toddlers trying to build blocks on top of the dog. I love having Robert, but I miss his father and try not to imagine the difference a battle planet might have made in the Second Battle for Earth.
3
Colony Fleet
Commodore Jones, all ships of the fleet report they are ready to depart.” says the communication Lieutenant in my command center.
As I sit at the command chair in the operations center of my fleet I have mixed emotions. In the seat beside and slightly below the command chair is me is my wife, Commander Isoken Jones, the science officer for this expedition. I feel pride that I now have my first real command. I am the Commodore of a space fleet; it’s quite a step up from my start as a Petty Officer with aspirations to become a Navy SEAL. I have some self-doubts, but I know enough to keep them to myself. I am also scared of fucking this up. General Davis can be an asshole, but no one wants to let him down. In the years since I first met him and he took chance on a corpsman that had just tried to drug him so the government could try to kidnap him, he has taught me a lot about leadership. In all of history, I have never heard of anyone that has done more to protect and defend humanity than he has, at least no human has. Yet, he is willing to sacrifice anyone and everything in his path in order to protect humanity. He has ordered me to do some sketchy things that neither one of us thought I would survive; however, it was always for the greater good. This is no different, yet it is. This time my wife and baby daughter are coming with me. The price of failing this mission is much more than I can take. I guess failure is not an option.
I look down at the buttons on the arm of my command chair, as Commodore, I run the fleet. The mothership my command center is on has its own bridge and Captain. I press the appropriate button and the Captain appears on my screen.
“Yes Commodore?”
“Captain McDonald, is the fleet ready to depart?”
“Yes sir, I was getting prepared to notify you.”
“Well then, take us out. Make all possible speed toward GJ 357 d”
“As you wish, Commodore Jones.”
I cut the feed and look toward my science officer and smile.
“Well, our first leg is underway; in some 31 light years we may have the makings of a new Republic colony.”
Commander Jones smiles and says, “Let us just hope the conditions on the planet match our surveys.
4
Earth
Marvin stayed in the well-appointed sitting room outside the Republic President’s officer as I met with President Eastman.
When the secretary tells me the President is available, I march in, stand at attention in front of his desk and say, “Sir, Commandant Davis Reporting as ordered”. I remain at attention staring through the President until he smiles and motions toward one of the two couches in his office.
“Please, have a seat General; we have a lot to discuss.” I wait until the President sits down and I take the seat opposite him.
“We haven’t really worked together, but I do admire all you have done to protect Earth. Not many people would have turned over power to a governmental body as you have. My advisors just don’t know what to make of you.”
“Frankly, Mr. President, I don’t care what they think of me, but I do care about the working relationship I have with my boss. I would not presume to ask what you think of me, however, I have some briefing material on the Centaurus trip, the Burrougots mission, and defensive strategy updates. How would you like to precede President Eastman?”
“As one good Georgia boy to an old Tennessee boy, I will tell you that whenever I hear ‘I won’t presume to tell you’, I always hear exactly what they presume to tell me. Tell, I admire you, what you did to protect Earth was nothing short of miraculous. Short of George Washington, I don’t know anyone who would not take this office if given the chance. I also know what you did to help me get into this office. It’s not what you did for Sabol, but I am pre
tty sure I understand your reasoning. Before we get to formal, would you like a drink, in the interest of building a working relationship with your boss…?” The President stands and walks to a cabinet that contains a well-furnished bar, I stand also. “Sir, if you have any good Tennessee Whiskey, I would be proud to have a drink with you.”
He hands me a snifter of old number 7, takes up another and toasts “May we love peace enough to fight for it”. I raise mine in salute and we both take a drink. The President returns to his seat, so I follow. When we are seated he says:
“You are the Commandant of the Legion; right now your spot is harder to fill than mine. I have read the briefs, war is coming, and unlike the Barkun battles, I don’t see this being over with in two moves. Right now, I have my hands full with all the changes the technology has brought. Our entire economic structure is in shambles. Money is worthless in a world where anyone with a build box can make anything they want. The only saving grace is that currently, only Sabol’s, scratch that… only your companies and the government have replicator technology. We are trying to figure out how to spread the technology without creating anarchy. We have panic, fighting over who leave Earth, hell we even can have cults worshiping computers. Well, anyway, all that is my problem. What I want you to know is that you have my total support. Tell me what you need to grow the legion, and I will clear away any planetary obstacles I can to help you protect us all.”
“Thank you sir, likewise, the Legion stands ready to assist wherever we are lawfully needed, as such, I am willing to carry out your orders, and believe I should brief you on the projects we had in place before your election.”
We spent the next few hours discussing the Burrougots mission, as well as my upcoming trip to the Centaurus station. The President agrees with the need to get allies, and said he would be willing to send an ambassador along. The Sedna battle planet project intrigued him, but like Marvin, he preferred to retrofit the Barkun forts. He expressed a desire to refit them covertly and gave the project a compartmentalized security classification. Many of those working the projects would not actually know the end goal of the retrofit. I concur. After meeting with President Eastman, I have a gauge of his strength of character. He won’t be a rubber stamp for the Legion, but he does share our core values and believes in the mission. I think, in this case, we got a statesman and not a politician.
Marvin spends the next week finalizing the Centaurus expedition, as Admiral Aegeus, Ambassador Kronberg and I discussed the mission.
When not engaged in preparing to meet our potential allies I also worked on Operation Blue Harvest. Commander Daniel Baumgarter Jr. led the project. He is another former Marine, his Dad actually served with mine back in the Corps. I did not know that at the time he was selected for the position, but it would not have mattered. The Commander was as squared away as they come. He had a technical education, as well as service as an enlisted Marine Grunt before he went to school and earned his commission in the Marine Corps. I expressed the President’s desires, as well as my own that the Blue Harvest mission was the highest priority of the Legion, and that the security of the Orbital Fort retrofit was to be even better guarded than the Manhattan project was. He had his choice of engineers and support staff, and priority for replication and mass distribution. He showed me some of his plans for the retrofit and I am satisfied we have the right man for the job.
When complete, the super carriers will retain their smooth spherical surface, but will gain 6 rail guns that will be placed similar to the ion cannons of our spherical fighters. These rail guns will terminate at the core of the ship and will be serviced from an auto-loading magazine. The cannons are 7 meters in diameter and carry kinetic projectiles, electronic warfare drones, and nuclear penetrators; there has been some talk of building special operations insertion pods later. Large ion cannons and point defense lasers ring each rail gun muzzle. Staged around the surface of the ship are recessed docking ports for each ship contained in a full strike force. Those docking ports are embedded inside the ship itself and contain gravity plates to eject the smaller ships at speed. In addition to the fighters contained in the strike force mothership, the super carrier has its own contingent of 100 fighters split into two hanger bays. It also houses 4 of its own busses, 4 destroyers, and 2 drop ships. Integral to the design is super-bertha replicators that are also recessed into the surface. It is sized large enough to replicate a complete mothership if feed enough mass. This class of ship is a modern day Bismarck, carrier, Death Star rolled into one. The last specific order I gave Commander Baumgarter is that besides his no Kernel or implanted personnel should be allowed on the fortresses, and that his should not be involved in the retrofit. As an orbital platform, Kernels are not needed. We cannot take the risk that our secret weapon development is noticed by the Kernel of Sentience, and they are smart enough to piece together fragments of information to discover our plan.
5
Colony Fleet
We arrive at GJ 357 d in the Hydra constellation. The exoplanet does not have an atmosphere, so it is frigid. It maintains a temperature of -53o Celsius, yet it is just inside the habitation zone of its star, so we believe with terraforming it could become habitable. Luckily the world has at least 6 times the Mass of Earth, so terraforming would just take time.
“Comms, put me on the 1MC I would like to address the crew.”
The pipe squeals the signal throughout the ship that the main circuit will be passing information.
“Commodore Jones, the 1MC is live” reports the young Petty Officer at the Communications console.
“All hands, we have transited to system containing star GJ 357, hereby known as the Elmer system. We are approaching the third planet from its star. Man all flight quarters stations and prepare for colonization operations. We will arrive at the system in 2 hours. That is all.”
My science officer looks at me with a raised eyebrow, “Elmer? Did you have to go there?”
“Its system 357, Commander, what would you have me call it, Merrifield?”
We soon arrive at the planet; scan it for life sights, transmissions on the electromagnetic spectrum, and kernel carrier systems. We find nothing. For all purposes, it is a dead planet. However, it will not be for long. While I took the liberty of naming the star, I allowed the colonists to select the name of their planet. They knew exactly what they were getting into and debated the name from the time they were selected for the mission. The hardy colonists had a sense of humor when the decided to name it Hoth.
The 1MC piped again at my command.
“Commence colony operations, Detach the assault ship and destroyer. Citizens of Hoth, We salute you and wish you success. I don’t know when we will be back this way, but when we come, I am looking forward to seeing just how much you have built. Good Luck and Godspeed”
We stayed a while longer to ensure the first set of colonists safely landed on the cold planet. We left a present of a set Electronic Warfare Satellites≥ They scan for Kernel signatures in space, act as a GPS, and as a telecommunications satellite. Right before we left to continue the Burrougots mission we used an experimental communications drone to send a message back of the successful first stage of the mission. The drone uses data from the LaGrange point gate network so that we can eventually make jumps between systems safely and without Kernels. We project only a 30% chance the drone will make it back, but if it does, it will help our researchers. Once the Colony is secure, they are tasked with creating a system of satellites around their systems main LaGrange point so that they can fully join the gate network.
“Helm, time for phase 2, bring us to the planned heading and continue the mission at .5c”
“Coming to .5c at the planned heading, Aye Aye sir.” The ensign said confidently.
6
Centaurus Habitats
I was told the Centaurs lived in a series of habitats outside of an asteroid belt on the far end of the colonized galaxy; I was not prepared for the size of the habitats.
“Admiral Aegeus, you told me the Centaurs lived in habitats, these things are planets!”
“General, I would suggest that you not say that in front of the herd, if a centaur heard those words, they would be honor bound to challenge you to a duel to the death. The loss of their planet is their greatest culture shame; they do not allow the word planet to be spoken.”
For a civilization that only has one punishment, I keep finding the Kernel enforcing alternative punishments. No wonder Marvin finds humans intriguing. It is going to be interesting trying to build an alliance with a group by offering them a chance to get a planet, when saying the word planet will result in a fight to the death. Sometimes I long for the days when my greatest challenge was keeping a private from marrying a stripper.
“Ambassador Kronberg, are you ready?” I ask.
“Yes General, I am ready whenever you are.”
“Comms, please hail the Centaurus station, put them on the screen and ask permission to dock.”
The wall shimmers and a figure appears on the screen. The speaker has the torso of a large, well-proportioned male, with long thick black hair mixed with some grey and a thick beard. His body is, as you would imagine from the name, shaped like a horse. I am not disturbed by the sight, but I am surprised that a deep green field of grassland appears behind the being communicating with us.
“Welcome to the habitat General Davis, Admiral Aegeus has described you well. Please come aboard our habitat, The Centaurus people have a lot to discuss with the Legion.”
