Unless I turned on the illusion field generator for the ship we would look like a very bright star in orbit so it is very important to let the authorities on Earth know that it as our new ship that they saw in orbit, so we were not considered as the enemy. But I was not too concerned that there might be any possibility in being targeted by a defence frigate, this was due to a system on the frigates that prevented any possibility of friendly fire. Our ship continually sent out an alliance identity beacon that would be questioned by the frigates computer and if there was any doubt the default condition was, not to fire. After landing we had almost all the military personnel at the base take a look at our new ship. They were agog by its size.
“So this is your new ship,” stated the obvious by the base commander.
I replied, “Yes and I have two frigates with me. I believe this is the final complement for the UK; the next two will be the final complement for the US.”
We had to wait for our payment to arrive from London, so it was a good time to check up on the internet website for any messages. Amongst the messages was one from NASA enquiring into the possibility of terraforming Mars. They knew by our website that Alkarr was terraforming its moon. I replied with what I knew about the subject. ‘Terraforming Mars would be mammoth and almost inconceivable task. Alkarr and it moon both have a magnetic field. Alkarr is slightly larger than Earth and its moon is slightly larger than Mars. Due to their mutual influence they curate tidal forces on each other. This has resulted in both having a liquid core and magnetic fields which have protected any atmospheres from being lost by solar winds. To add to that they are both in a favourable part of the habitable zone of their parent star. Mars on the other hand has virtually no magnetic field, just remnants of a long lost field. Most of any previous atmosphere has been lost to space and Mars also orbits fairly close to the outer edge of the habitable zone of its Sun. Some things that would be required. First Mars needs a moon large enough to create tidal forces at its core and kick start it dynamo, thus resulting in a new magnetic field. One way that this could be possibly achieved is to move Ceres from the asteroid belt and place it in orbit around Mars in the most favourable position to do this. Yes it would be on the extreme limits of possibility with Alliance knowhow, but the cost would be staggering. Next warm the planet by introducing a gas to the atmosphere that had the properties to create a greenhouse effect without destroying any ozone layer. Giant mirrors in space would also help raise the temperature. Although there is a lot of CO2 frozen at the poles this would not be enough. Anyway you need nitrogen as a buffer gas. Mars probably had a lot in the past but this has nearly all evaporated to space. To replenish it you would need to go the Oort cloud and find asteroids rich in frozen nitrogen and tow them to Mars. This has a problem in itself. As soon as you start entering the inner part of the solar system the solid nitrogen will turn to gas. To prevent this from happening you would need a shield kept between the asteroid and the sun. Finally you would need to come in on the night side of Mars, release the asteroid in a précised calculated Sharrow re-entry so that it hits the planet in way that you would skim a stone over water. This would do less damage to the surface of the planet, as hitting Mars head on would send enough debris into its atmosphere to curate a nuclear winter. You would need thousands of these asteroids. It would require a journey of around a month for each and you would need many specialist space craft for that purpose. This is just a scenario. If you want to know more details you would need to contact a terraforming specialist within the Alliance.’ Good luck on that one I thought. Terraforming Kelda would be child’s play compared to Mars.
I had a brochure of various civilian space craft available to purchase that Jenna had picked up from Relnor. I was interested to see what response we would receive. I did not acquire a brochure for ships with any military purpose or those that have intergalactic travel capabilities due to the fact they have star drive. Earth is excluded from purchasing any of these types anyway. The rest were for inter solar system travel so I could list these on our website with a guide to cost only, as I needed room to negotiate a fair price depending on who and where the prospective purchase was coming from .
The payment for the frigates had been rushed to us. I was also informed that UK had just completed a dedicated landing zone for civilian cargo transport for use by us and any others that may wish to brave any concern in trading with Earth. I was given its coordinates which turned out to be adjacent to an airport, so landing and take-off could be controlled from the airport tower. I would register these coordinates for this landing zone when we returned to Alkarr, as that would be expected of me. Jessica was given the privilege to fly to orbit this time. Soon we were on our way back to Lusiana. The children I believe were spending too much time in the hologram room outside their education periods. If I could have set the scene as a setting to display Grimda to keep them out by choice for a while, I would. They all needed some exercise in the new sports hall, which up to now, had not been an attraction at all. It was a simple choice for them, sport or beach. It was no choice really. They would choose the beach every time. Having spoken to Alenna I was to lock the hologram room as from now on. It would only be open for a specific time each day. For each hour spent in the sports hall they and the adults including myself will be able to spend two hours in the hologram room. General maintenance of the ship. I still had to change the carbon dioxide scrubber filters on a routine maintenance agenda. Although the time taken to do this was about the same as before, the time to get to each area were this maintenance was to take place had increased.
I loved my new man cave. I had taken fake windows from two of the locked cabins and installed them on opposite walls. I intended to obtain some footage of Earth then program this into them. As this room was supposed to be an observation room I had the most spectacular view of the galaxy from the large real windows. This was at its best when in deep space. As for vacant space on the walls, I mounted the two energy discharge rifles on the wall between two large observation windows. I also now had three hand guns which operated the same way so I also mounted these just below the rifles. I stood back to admire my armoury, before hiding the five power packs that I now had behind the drawer to my desk. I continued filling in spaces on the wall with not only pictures of my family but interesting things I had seen visiting other planets and moons. Finally mounting the map of all the other worlds I had the fortune to visit and some I still had not, such as that newly discovered world Tazanter. Our next two frigate delivery runs to Earth went without a hitch. It was now time to return to Alkarr for a few days before we did the last two runs, four frigates left to deliver.
The first thing Alenna said was, “I have to go to the credit and exchange centre to change our gold to credits. Jenna, Perri and Yarkeli please will you accompany me.”
“Can I see this gold please Alenna?” I asked.
“It’s only gold,” remarked Alenna, “but if you want to see it I will get a bar now.” She went to her locker and took out with a little difficulty a bar of gold and plopped it down onto my double bunk. It sank deep into my mattress.
I said, “Alenna it has almost disappeared into my bed. How much have you got in that locker?” I looked. There was a sizeable pile. I picked the one up from my bed, it was heavy. After looking at it for a while I said, “thank you,” then I teased Alenna by pretending to walk away with it.
“Where are you going with that?” screamed Alenna.
I laughed and said, “It’s mine, all mine!” before pretending to kiss it.’’
Alenna could not see the joke so I tried to explain, “It’s like this Alenna the thing about gold, it is supposed to drive some human men mad and they get what is called gold fever. I was just pretending, here.” I passed the gold back to her and remarked, “Be careful not to drop it on your foot.”
She divided the gold into four sturdy bags so that
she along with Jenna, Perri and Yarkeli could carry a bag each, they soon left the ship. The rest of us made our way to our residence, I had a busy day ahead. First I wanted to see if I had any replies on the men only forum, so I needed to be escorted to my man cave. After what had happened with Emily I had changed my tune and was now insisting that I was chaperoned. You just don’t know who might drop in to our residence. Lumi was busy with the twins and Minty, Luka and Emily had left already to go and see their mothers, and as for Lara, she was not at home, so I was almost on my own. With luck I was able to intercept Sabrina and Rachael before they left our residence.
“Before you go sisters,” I said, “could you wait a short while? I have to check on things, I need you to wait outside my man cave until I come out. You can then escort me to Lumi and the twins, and I won’t keep you both too long.”
Although Sabrina was regarded by me as a sister she still had to accept the responsibility when required of being a chaperon, though she was always to be used as last resort. I checked to see if I had any replies regarding plasma cannon. I had two, one you could obtain new cannon from the Dregg. I knew that already but the cost was way above the price to purchase a new frigate. Knowing how much the military on Earth would like the most advanced weapons available, they might consider buying these but I was sure I could get a better deal for them. Some planets must have updated their surface based plasma cannon. The second reply completely shocked me. It was right on my home turf. A male from a house that had a rival transport business informed me that they had just delivered a load of scrap to Perri’s mother’s house on the moon. Included in this delivery of scrap metal there happened to be some old plasma cannons. He could not say what condition they were in. I was going with Perri to the moon later so I might be able to shine some further light on that. I left the man cave and was escorted to Lumi. Rachael and Sabrina then hurried to leave our residence before they were asked to do anything else. I spent some time with Lumi and the twins. This was not a problem as we could have some quality time together without anyone else being around. I was able to pick up the twins and rock them in my arms, not something that Alkarren males ever do, but Lumi knows I am very passionate in the welfare of my children and have this loving and caring instinct that females have.
Lumi could not get over the way I was talking to them in baby talk, I just said, “Don’t worry Lumi I am not mad, Earth men just go soft at these times when they hold their babies, it’s nothing to get worried about. Some even cry, but don’t expect me to do that.’’
Later Lara arrived back and asked, “Where is Alenna. The owners of that shuttle that we had rescued during the pirate incident, have now contacted us and they wanted to know when they could possibly collect it.”
I just said, “Lara, she has gone to the city and will be back later so you can inform her then.’’
Sometime later Minty and Emily had returned with most of the children including Isabell and Honey. All I had to do now was await the return of Perri along with Alenna, Jenna and Yarkeli so I could leave for the moon. I was hoping that Perri’s family had not yet broken down the plasma cannon and melted them into ingots off their various base metals. It had been two weeks since they had taken delivery of these cannons and it depends on what other work they had in progress. I still had the Plenngy seeds to give to Lidier.
On Alenna’s return, Lara jumped in ahead of me and informed her about the owners of the shuttle contacting us. I butted in to her conversation and said, I’m off to the moon with Perri, bye.”
I beckoned towards Perri. At the same time I picked up Honey in my arms and took Isabell by the hand. As Perri came over to me I said to her, “We need to leave now to go and see you mother and family. Have you got everything you need?”
“You’re eager, just give me a couple of minutes,” Perri replied.
As Alenna left the room she mentioned to me, “Jake I need to talk with you. It is not urgent. It can wait until you return from the moon.’’ What is it that she wishes to discuss with me I wondered? I would find out later. It just better not be about another wife. I left with Perri and our two daughters to head towards the port, where we then boarded our new shuttle. Perri had not taken a trip in the new shuttle so did not take her seat immediately. Instead had a quick look around.
Perri was being nosy and started opening lockers. Then she noticed we had two doors leading into the back of the shuttle and asked, “Why do we have two doors? Our old shuttle had only one leading to the toilet.” She went over to one of the doors and opened it and proclaimed, “Just the toilet, but not just a toilet there is a shower as well, very nice.’’ Perri smiled in a pleased way. She now tried the other door, “Wow there are three bunks on top of each other.” Perri asked, “Why do we need bunks?” She was now expecting a reply from me.
So I did reply with what I could summarise, “We have never needed them before but someone must have requested new shuttles to be fitted with bunks, perhaps for long journeys to outer planets which can take several days.”
Perri sat in her front row seat between our two daughters. We then made our way to orbit before traveling to the Alkarren moon.
On arrival we were greeted by Lidier who said to me, “I have something that might be of interest to you, plasma cannon!”
I replied, “I have been after plasma cannon and I knew you had received some for scrapping. I just hoped you had not scrapped them before I could contact you.”
“How did you know that we had received them?” Lidier asked in a surprised way.
I simply replied, “Men only forum.”
Lidier said, “Oh that, my husband goes on that forum, but he won’t tell me anything about it. What do you do on there?”
“It nothing to worry about. We just talk mainly to find out about things, business and general politics.” I said in dismissive manner.
“Men don’t do business or politics,” Lidier replied in a puzzled way.
I explained, “Men just moan about politics. As for business I do get involved as you well know. I don’t know of any Alkarren men that go as far as getting directly involved, though they do tend to talk an awful lot about it.”
We were going to see these plasma cannon, so after leaving the children with their grandmother Lidier, Perri and I suited up to go outside. We exited the airlock and as I did, I glanced along the side of the dome to see if the Plenngy was still there. It was. We now made our way, first past piles of metals waiting to be melted down. The public transport shuttles were still where they were when last viewed. There at the end were these plasma cannon.
“Are they complete?” I asked Lidier.
Lidier replied, “As far as I know, but they have been sitting around for at least fifteen years and have not been fired for even longer than that.”
I casually asked her, “How many are there and how much are you looking to sell them for?”
Lidier answered, “There are five cannon, as for price… Lidier thought for a moment before saying, Ten thousand credits each.”
“Lidier,” I said, “you are too cheap! I can get much more than that for them. Earth will snap these up in an instant even if they don’t work. They will copy anything that is required to make them work. You want a second recycling dome don’t you? How much does that cost?”
“Lidier looked at me and said, “You are willing to negotiate business with me, I must confess I do not feel comfortable in discussing business with you.”
To that I replied, “Don’t worry Lidier, I know I am not expected to negotiate with you. I just want to find out the details before passing them to Alenna to do any contract. So how much is that new dome going to cost you then? I asked expecting a reply.
Lidier spurted out, “One million credits.’’
I no
w confessed to her, “I do indulge more directly in business, but only at the Earth end of a deal. I can tell you because you are family that you can expect if all goes well to get… Two hundred thousand credits per cannon, enough to purchase you second recycling dome.
Lidier shook her head before saying, I can’t believe that amount. Is Earth really willing to pay that for these old plasma cannon?’’
I replied excitedly, “Yes they are. Nothing will stand in their way and they will go to extremes to acquire anything that is more advanced in the field of military armaments than they have at present. You can get some idea of what other things will fetch. Look at what I have informed you that you can expect for those public transport shuttles. Earth should always be treated differently from other worlds; big profits are the norm. Earth would be paying more than two thousand alliance credits for each cannon. After all I will expect to receive our transport costs on top.”
When we had returned to the dome I informed Lidier that we would start delivery of the public transport shuttles within the month,
I handed Lidier a bag containing the Plenngy seeds saying, “That’s a present for you.”
On opening the bag she replied, “Oh Plenngy seeds, thank you.”
“My privilege,” I replied before saying, “With all that trade with Earth you will soon be able to buy an agricultural dome and have a real garden, just like my family have back on Alkarr.
Lidier smiled and excitedly whispered to me, “That’s my secret dream to afford one of those.”
Chronicles of Jake 2: The Invasion Begins Page 12
