The Great Talisman (Intersect Book 2)

by M C I Hinchliffe

  So the fact that you or I are smaller won’t make any difference as every opponent will be the size of a mountain, including their women.”

  “You will have to learn how to match their speed and better their skill if you want to survive.” As the large soldier returned to the class, Sarah approached a women of similar age and size and said, “Your next!”

  The young trooper nervously followed Sarah on to the simulator platform. “Program seven.” Sarah said out aloud. The two occupants of the simulator suddenly had energy swords appear in their hands. The blade was a bight coloured beam of energy in the form of a broadsword with a silvery coloured hilt. Sarah always chose the red blade as she found it easier to track during battle, and gave the young student the green. “Ready yourself soldier. Remember, what you considered the limit of your speed and strength is no longer. You can now move as fast as you can think, so think fast.” With that Sarah slashed at her head at a speed that defied the eyes.

  To the surprise of the class, the young soldier parried the blow, and the next and the next. Sarah paused for a moment, “Good, that is much better.” Then she picked up the pace. Several blows came at the young apprentice within a heartbeat and the first few she successfully parried. Then Sarah broke her defence and her computer generated sword passed through the apprentice’s body. A loud bleep acknowledge the fatal contact. Sarah turned to the class again, “That is how fast you have to be to match a Warrian......”

  Sarah stopped as she noticed someone approach, then solute. “Admiral Williams! Class attention!” Everyone stood erect and soluted as Ryan walked onto the simulator platform.

  “At ease.” Ryan replied. The class and Sarah adopted a more casual stance. “General Everley, can you spare a moment for a one on one?”

  “Yes Sir.” Sarah said to the class, “Class, take ten.” They dispersed from the simulator platform area leaving the two alone. “Sir it’s been a while since your last training session, hope you haven’t got rusty?”

  “That is why I’m here. Maybe today I will beat you.”

  “Sir, in your dreams.” She said with a smile.

  Her expression took him by surprise. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you do that before.”

  “Do what?”

  “Smile.”

  “Sorry sir, it won’t happen again.” She retorted sarcastically.

  “Hope none of the class saw that or else you might ruin your image of the toughest bad ass around.”

  “Especially since it’s taken me so long to create it.” Her expression became dark again.

  “Oh, I know why. You enjoyed showing that big bastard a thing or two, didn’t you?”

  “Maybe just a little.” She replied with a smirk. “Did you come here to gas bag or to fight?”

  “Let’s get to it.” He pressed a button on his wrist communicator and his A.A.E.E.V suit appeared over him. Ryan removed his helmet as he found it constrictive during a training session against Sarah.

  Sarah said, “Program twelve.” Computer generated walls appeared around edge of the simulator platform as a number of boxes of various shapes and sizes were scattered within. In their hands were the preferred close combat weapon, the energy sword. Sarah again had the red blade and Ryan held his favoured colour of blue.

  The two instantly moved into action pacing around each other and moving their swords in anticipation of the numerous angles of attack. “Have you got yourself a boyfriend yet?” Ryan asked in an attempt to distract her as they cautiously stepped about each other.

  Sarah expected Ryan’s mind games as he had used them in the past. “Why, are you back on the market?” Sarah replied.

  “No, it’s just that you don’t get out that much and I was a little concerned.”

  “That’s rich coming from you, mister recluse.” She retorted as her sarcasm returned.

  “Touché.” Ryan said with a smile, then launched into Sarah with a flash of cuts.

  The clash of speed and skill left little more than a blur for the human eye to see, as they pushed the limits of human proficiency. Ryan slashed, cut and parried Sarah’s unrelenting onslaught to defuse her masterful attack, then turned the tables on her and pushed back against an obstacle. Before he could corner her, Sarah leapt backwards and somersaulted onto the top of the box. Ryan did likewise and parried Sarah’s cut as he soared over her head. The battle continued with Sarah forcing Ryan off the edge of the box. He anticipated the narrowing space on the box and somersaulted back onto the simulator floor. Sarah leapt to the floor and continued her assault. With Ryan retreating, Sarah increased the pace to her maximum ability and pushed him off balance. With Ryan on the floor in a vulnerable position, Sarah took a moment to gloat. “I was right, you have got rusty.”

  Ryan rolled and spun back onto his feet, “Just lulling you into a false sense of security.” Ryan launched back into attack and their luminous blades recommenced the blistering fast light show. He fought more savagely to push Sarah back, instead Sarah moved faster and her face turned to a sinister sneer. This time she threw everything at him and Ryan quickly changed direction and began to retreat. The fury before him was astounding and only his conviction kept her from making a fatal hit.

  Ryan had to better her. If he could not, he would never stand a chance against Zardon. From deep within he drew upon every ounce of resolve to diffuse her impossible speed and skill. Sarah’s intense expression began to change as her mastery was being thwarted. The sinister anger in her eye turned to frustration as Ryan survived everything she threw at him. Slowly the tables turned and Ryan began to push her onto the defensive. Now what he saw was not Sarah but Zardon, and his resolve strengthened as his determination boiled up to the point of rupture. It was as if the beserker within Sarah had traversed to Ryan making him the new master.

  The speed Ryan unleashed upon Sarah was beyond the range of human senses, and beyond the perfection of Sarah’s skill. Spinning like a top he slashed several times into Sarah’s defending blade until she could resist no more. The alarm sounded.

  The loud bleep broke Ryan’s trance like state enabling his consciousness to return and realise what he had done. Beneath him was the broken figure of Sarah. He collapsed next to her exhausted.

  Through lungs that gulped for air, Sarah said, “You saw him didn’t you?”

  “Yes.” It was the only word he could muster through exhaustion.

  They both rolled onto their backs and waited for some strength to return. After some time, Ryan continued. “Who do you see?”

  “My father.”

  “Oh, I thought it might have been the gang that I rescued you from during extraction for recruitment.”

  “Sometimes it’s them but mostly it’s my father.”

  “Why your father?”

  “He was a complete asshole!” She paused for a moment as she sat up. “He used to beat my mum and I when he came back from the pub. He was an amateur kickboxer. One time he tried to molest me, but mum caught him and managed to distract him long enough for me to get away. He put her into hospital. I was only ten.” Ryan sat up next to Sarah as she continued. “When she come out, we packed our bags and left him. I never saw my father again. Some years later apparently, he got into a fight with a gang outside a pub and they beat him to death. A fitting end if you ask me.”

  Ryan couldn’t think of anything to say except, “I’m sorry.”

  Sarah wiped away the tear that trickled down her cheek. “So what is it between you and Zardon?”

  “It’s a long story, I’ll tell you about it some time.” Ryan stood up and extended his hand to her. Sarah grabbed his hand and Ryan helped her to her feet.

  “My job is done.” Sarah said. “There is nothing more that I can teach you.”

  A beeping sound came from Ryan’s wrist communicator that was now embedded in a panel on the A.A.E.E.V suit. He pressed a button on the panel and the Adam’s face appeared on the small screen. “Admiral, do you have a moment?”

  “Sure, where are
you?”

  “In the Flight Training Centre.”

  “I’ll be there in a moment.”

  Ryan turned to Sarah as he deactivated the A.A.E.E.V suit. “Maybe we can do this every now and then, just to keep in shape?”

  “It’s a date.”

  **********

  Conley sat at his desk with his head in his hands. The world that he had built about him was about to come to pieces. He jumped when his desk phone rang. Conley picked up the handset and shouted into the mouth piece. “Jane, I said no calls!”

  “Sir, he wouldn’t take no for an answer. He said it was a case of national security.” Said the female voice on the line.

  “Jane, I’m the Secretary for Defence, all of my calls are a case of national security.” He paused for a moment as he ran his hand over his face, then continued. “Who is it?”

  “Emmett Smith, sir.”

  “I could use a friendly voice right now, patch him through.”

  There was a pause and a click, then the voice of Emmett sounded in his ear. “Herb, it’s Emmett. Sorry to call you at work but something has come up, something big!”

  “Not you too, I was hoping for a call about that fishing trip you’ve been promising me. What’s up?”

  “I can’t tell you over the phone. You will have to see it for yourself.”

  “See what?”

  “I’m telling you, you have to see it for yourself!”

  “Okay, okay, where are you?”

  “England.”

  “Where! Why England.”

  “Look, just get on a plane and get your arse over here pronto.”

  “Okay, this better be as big as you say it is.”

  “It is Herb, it is.”

  **********

  Ryan entered the Flight Training Centre where he found Adam seated in one of the simulators, but the canopy was still open. The simulator was an exact replica of the Starfighter’s cockpit and nose cone, but everything from just behind the canopy was missing. It stood on a low platform and would raise and move to simulate flight. Apart from the two occupants, the Flight Training Centre was empty.

  “So what have you got for me?” Ryan asked.

  Adam had been on the simulator for hours and looked exhausted. “I’ve run over a hundred simulations and finally managed to pass through the Megaproton Energy Field.”

  “So how did you do it?”

  “At first I thought it was the angle of trajectory, but that did’nt work. Then thought about how you could pass through a wall of energy, and then I can up with the idea of passing through it at warp speed. With the warp engines active, the dense gravitational field could not only enable breaking the light barrier, but weaken the field through distortion. With MAC’s help I ran some scenarios and theorised a twenty percent success rate. After many attempts I finally did it. If you travel at just beyond light speed and decelerate within a millisecond beyond the field, then with the slightest angle of trajectory you would have enough distance to decelerate without smashing into the field on the far side.”

  “So how can we stop them from getting through?”

  “We can’t.” Adam saw the weight on Ryan’s shoulders double. “Before you jump out the nearest air lock, we may not be able to stop them from getting in but we can sure as hell make it hard for them.”

  “How?”

  “We can run a random program on the field’s range modulator.”

  Ryan stood away from the simulator as he considered Adam’s idea. “They would have to exit warp speed in sync with the range of the field.” A Smile grew on Ryan’s face.

  “Very few would get through.”

  “But can we oscillate the Field?”

  Adam looked up and said. “MAC, can we oscillate the field?”

  A voice from an invisible mouth answered him. “Yes.”

  Adam was excited with the fruition of his solution. “The best thing is its simplicity. A basic random program is the most difficult to predict, they could never crack it.”

  Ryan grabbed Adam by the shoulders and kissed his forehead. “I want to have you babies!” He said with a smile.

  Adam replied. “A hand shake would suffice.”

  “There is something still bothering me.”

  “What is it?”

  “That Warbird was one hell of a bastard to shoot down. Very few of our pilots could have got it. Its manoeuvring capabilities were exceptional. If you asked me, only you and I could have shot it down.” Adam paused to examine Ryan’s reaction. Ryan remained quiet as he considered any possible solutions to the dilemma. Adam continued. “It was like dog fighting against you.”

  Adam’s words struck a chord. “I remember some time ago a friend of my father’s Doctor Chen, a fellow scientist on Carillia, had some idea of computerising the brain functions of a top fighter pilot, and install them into the flight computer of a Starfighter. He asked me if I would be his host subject. I said yes.”

  “Could it be that the Warrians have captured the data and applied it to that Warbird’s fight computer?” Adam enquired.

  “Impossible. I had my concerns about its misuse, so Doctor Chen kept the data on a minidisk that he wore on a chain around his neck. The data was never copied into the archive database or kept on any machine to ensure security. Only Doctor Chen and myself knew what it contained. Also there was number of programming issues that he had to overcome to make it work, and from memory it was never successful. So it’s not a possibility.”

  “You know as well as I do computers don’t have any instinct. That is why we still have human pilots, because an instinctive pilot could always out fly even the most advanced flight computer. Whatever piloted that Warbird knew what I was going to next. It had instinct. So you tell me how that’s possible?” Adam retorted.

  “I don’t know. How could they get access to such technology?”

  “What about that strange ship that came through the white hole? Let’s face it, the Warrians somehow got access!” Adam’s stare attempted to enforce his words.

  A soft feminine voice cut through the ether to break the momentary silence. “Ryan, its Katie. I think I’ve found something, do you have a moment?”

  “I’ll be right there.” He turned to Adam. “You should come too.”

  A few moments later they strode down a long tube that was virtually all transparent. Outside was a spherical chamber that contained another that had no other access except the one that travelled down. When they reached the end of the tube they were confronted by an unusual door with a number of bazaar impressions on its surface. Ryan placed his hands on two of them and pushed. The circular impressions moved into the door until all of his forearms were engulfed in the door. He removed his hands and waited. The door separated down the middle to reveal another door behind it, and it separated horizontally to reveal another door which in turn separated diagonally to reveal a small, dimly lit room. They walked into the room and stopped as the opposite door remained closed. A beam of light passed from the roof to the floor then disappeared returning the room to its former darkness.

  A booming male voice violated the silence. “Access approved, you may proceed to the Neuro Centre."

  The door on the opposite side opened and Ryan led Adam into the Neuro Centre, the brain of the Master Access Computer. A fabulous light display filled the football field size room. The energy surges passed from node to node in a seemingly random choice of the thousands that lined the Neuro Centre. They walked down to the central control station where Katie was seated. She spoke the moment they arrived. “What do you know about a Doctor James Lian Chen?”

  The two looked at each other with surprise. Ryan turned back to Katie. “He was a good friend of my father’s, I knew him quite well. Why, what have you found?”

  “Doctor Chen had a number of ongoing experiments, among others were Integrity experiments on the Megaproton Energy Field, research into the advancement of fight computer systems through the input of human thought patterns, and the developmen
t of the Manta Ship. A vessel utilising intense gravitational fields to cloak the ship from visual and sensor detection. All were ongoing experiments yet to yield results.”

  “Looks like the impossible has become probable.” Adam announced.

  Katie continued. “But how did they get the incomplete experiments to work? These experiments were cutting edge technology. I can believe the Warrians could apply completed experiments that were well documented, but incomplete experiments, I think not!”

  Ryan’s attention appeared to be at the fare side of the Neuro Centre when he said. “What if he was still alive?” Adam and Katie looked at him with complete surprise, but Ryan was not deterred. He continued, “Where was he when the Warrians attacked?”

  Katie spoke to the console before her. “Display the last known location of Doctor Chen?”

  The ether before them shaped three dimensional text that formed a sentence. Katie read the sentence out aloud. “Last known location, installation on Artainia’s third moon.”

  “Artainia was just beyond Carillia.” Clarified Ryan. “A planet similar to Saturn with rings and a number of moons. A small base was built on the third moon to perform potentially dangerous experiments such as gravity distortion. What if the resistance from Carillia left the Warrians a little wiser and didn’t automatically obliterate the base. Doctor Chen may have survived.”

  Katie added. “So the Warrians may have captured Doctor Chen and made him finish his experiments for their own use.”

  “That would explain their new found technology.” Adam concluded.

  “Unfortunately there is little data on the experiments and finding loopholes would be virtually impossible.” Katie concluded.

  “But what if we could ask him?”

  Adam looked at Ryan as if he had lost his mind. “How do you propose we do that? We don’t know if he is alive or if he is even in our century.”