by Francis, Ron
“SAMMI, thank God you’re back online.”
“Of course I’m back online, Colonel, I would not be having this conversation with you if I were not online.”
“Yes, thank you, SAMMI,” he briefly smiled. When he installed the AI, he knew it would always take things very literally. He and Serge had been working for quite some time to give SAMMI a little more personality, and it seemed as though she were developing a bit of a sarcastic streak. Just then, the door to the bridge slid open and in walked Dr. Susanne Baker.
“Suzy, thank God you’re alright,” Jesse called over the klaxons. “Collin is hurt. Can you see to him?”
“Right away, Colonel,” she replied as she made her way across the bridge. “You don’t look so good either. Let me have a look at you.”
He waved her off as he replied, “Collin first. He’s the only one that hasn’t woken up yet. I promise you can have a look at me when things have calmed down a bit.”
“I’m going to hold you to that. I know all about your aversion to doctors,” she replied, as she crossed the bridge towards Josiah and Collin.
“SAMMI, status report,” he called out.
“All primary systems except life support and several auxiliary systems are down, Colonel Marcos. It appears that there was an explosion at approximately the same time we were entering the event.”
“Do you know where we are?”
“Negative, Colonel; if we traveled through the matter conduit, according to Dr. Hightower's research we should be in the Kaldorian system of the Kalephi galaxy but until my sensors are online, I cannot be certain. As soon as my sensors are back on line, I will attempt to ascertain our exact location.”
“So systems are coming back on line?” He asked a glimmer of hope creeping into his voice.
“Yes, Colonel,” SAMMI replied. “We only experienced systems failure because our power distribution systems were taxed by the explosion combined with the strain of entering the phenomenon. I enacted a hard shut down to protect my more critical systems; the only systems that remain online during a hard shut down are emergency life support and artificial gravity. We have actually experienced very little damage, but the system reboot will take some time.”
"Finally some good news," he replied.
“Collin is awake,” Suzy called out.
More good news, he thought, if we can only keep it going. “SAMMI, what systems are actually damaged?”
“Primary shields and cloaking system, Colonel,” SAMMI replied in her usual melodious manner.
He could feel the air leave his body. Perfect, I knew our luck was too good to last. Without the shields and the cloaking technology available, he felt naked, and being vulnerable in an unknown environment was unacceptable.
“What is the problem with the cloak and the shields?” He asked with a sense of urgency.
“Unknown, internal sensors are not yet online. Once they return, I will have to run a systems diagnostic.”
“Let me know the second the information becomes available.” He ordered. “What systems are operational?” He asked anxiously. The reply was slow in coming,
“Life support, internal power, sub light engines, cooling systems and secondary shields.” SAMMI listed in a matter-of-fact tone.
“That's just great,” he yelled. “No weapons no shields and no cloak, we're in trouble. And can you please shut off those klaxons." He sighed in frustration as he continued pacing about trying to figure the problem out.
At least we have sub light and secondary shields, he thought as the noise level died down. Hopefully no one will find us out here until after our systems are back online. While waiting for the next update, he began to think about Endeavor.
Endeavor was larger than a gunship but not as big as a frigate. She could crew up to twenty-six comfortably and she could hold a wing of four Viper starfighters and one Eagle assault shuttle in her landing bay. For this mission, Jesse opted to carry only the shuttle. Endeavor measured one seventy-six meters long and thirty-eight meters wide. She was wider in the back than she was in the front because of the casings for the sublight engines. She had six sublight engines in all, two attached to each side of the ship and two affixed to the top. Each one exceeded Coalition standards by a considerable margin. Standing almost nineteen meters high, she contained three decks. The bottom of the ship was almost rectangular with wings containing the sublight engines protruding from each side. The lower deck contained engineering and the landing bay. The upper two decks of the ship were more narrow and contained the bridge, common areas, med-bay, galley, weapons locker and crew quarters. Her hull was made of Gralium, the hardest metal known to man. The light drive was mounted at the rear of the ship and four heavy landing struts allowed her to gently sit a meter off the ground.
Being Sea Side Enterprises' latest ship meant having the coolest toys. Serge and he had designed her for deep space exploration, which included many unknowns, and to this point, the only unknowns humanity had encountered had tried to kill them. So they made sure she had the strongest shields, most powerful plasma beams and most advanced light drive which would normally be too expensive to put on a private vessel - unless you own the company.
Endeavor’s AI - Secure Artificial Man-Made Intelligence or SAMMI for short, is the first interactive AI designed for a ship, and had actually saved their lives with the hard shut down. All of the systems could have been severely damaged or destroyed in the accident, had it not been for SAMMI’s quick action. SAMMI is one of three systems aboard Endeavor the military would kill to get their hands on, if they knew the technology existed. The other technologies that set her apart are the anti-fighter technology and the cloaking technology.
The anti-fighter technology uses a massive stored up electrical charge to shoot out an eight kilometer laser net that disables or destroys any small ship in its path. The only downside to the tech is the power drain; it takes almost eight minutes to build up a large enough charge to fire again. She is also equipped with a dozen lasers, outfitted with motion activated guidance, to keep any fighters brave enough to approach at bay until the next charge can be fired.
The cloaking technology, though, was the coup de grace. Most military ships had stealth systems that made them difficult to see against the back drop of space, as well as sensor masking tech to keep ships that weren’t looking too closely from picking up their trail. Endeavor’s cloak was far more advanced; total invisibility in space, or even more impressively, on land. Sensors couldn’t pick her up when cloaked, and eyes couldn’t see her when cloaked. The only downside was that due to the power requirements, she couldn’t use her shield or fire her weapons when cloaked.
She was the latest ship to be created by Sea Side Enterprises, the corporation owned by Jesse and his older sister Nina, a one of a kind technological marvel. SSE had been the chief supplier of the military’s Leviathan Battle Carriers, War Hawk Frigates, Eagle Assault Shuttles, and Viper Fighter Squadrons, as well as most of its planetary defense technology since the beginning of the Jarlevian war. The Jarlevian came into Earth’s sector seemingly out of nowhere. They were pale blue humanoids, large and powerfully built. The average Jarlevian soldier stood about six foot-seven inches tall. Their bottom teeth were razor sharp and they all seemed to have angry demeanors. Earth had been fortunate Jesse's gambit to stop them had succeeded and brought a quick end to the war.
SAMMI’s next announcement broke into Jesse’s thoughts. “Navigation and internal sensors are now online. I have begun running a diagnostic of the ship, and have discovered that the main power coupling that runs to both the shield and cloak has been damaged. According to inventory, a replacement coupling can be found in storage compartment A-thirteen.”
“That’s not too bad,” Collin called out. It was the first time Jesse had heard him speak since he woke up. “It’s a twenty minute fix, max, once the rest of the systems are back online.”
Collin was one of four remaining members of the Rocket Riders, one of Earth’s elite
Special Forces units. Jesse was team leader, and Josiah was his second. Collin Torrensede and Manny Hernandez were the only other surviving members from their suicide mission on Polisia, which, although successful in ending Earth's first interstellar war against the Pack, came at a heavy price. Jesse lost six members of his team that day, but Josiah, Collin and Manny have been part of his inner circle ever since.
“That’s good to know, Collin,” he called back. “And how long until the rest of the systems are online, SAMMI?”
“External sensors, maneuvering thrusts, and anti-fighter lasers are back online.” SAMMI replied.
“What about the anti-fighter net?” He inquired.
“Not yet, Colonel. It will take approximately seven minutes. Fourteen minutes for primary and secondary weapons and sixteen minutes until the FTL engine will be operational. After that, you may begin repairs to the power coupling controlling the shield and cloaking systems.”
“So about thirty-five minutes before we are fully operational again, Colonel,” Collin interjected.
“If we are in the middle of nowhere, and no one passes by, we might get through this.” Josiah’s comment was cut off as a loud crash rocked the ship followed by the words,
“Warning, we are under attack,” through the ship speaker.
“Battle stations!” Jesse yelled. Within moments, Collin had the yoke, Josiah was at the sensor array and Kimiko was at weapons. “Secondary shields to maximum and AF lasers on line. Begin evasive maneuvers, Lieutenant Torrensede.”
“Yes, Sir,” Collin replied.
Jesse had almost forgotten how easy it was to slip into military protocol, even though these were his friends and Endeavor enjoyed a more relaxed atmosphere than most vessels, they still easily jumped back into protocol when the situation required it.
“I’m not sure how much good it will do, Sir; we don’t know what’s out there, and I’m not sure our lasers will make much of a difference.” Collin called out in frustration.
“I’m on it,” Josiah replied. “Sensors are showing one ship to our four o’clock and six fighters of unknown origin.”
“Beginning evasive maneuvers,” Collin informed.
Unknown origin meant that we were not in Pack space or Jarlevian space, which increased their odds of being in the Kalephi galaxy. “Kimi, can you handle the fighters?"
“I'm not sure yet, Colonel. I’m still a little dizzy and I haven’t seen the fighters yet”.
“No worries, Kimi. Okay people, we have to figure out a way to hold them off for fourteen minutes until our main weapons are back on line, any ideas?”
“SAMMI,” Collin called out. “Is there any way to get power to the shield by bypassing the main power coupling? Maybe we can use one of our extra power supplies to feed directly into the shield reactor.”
“Negative, Lieutenant Torrensede. The effort would fail; without a power coupling, the power supply is not compatible.”
"What about the portable shield generator?" He asked with a glimmer of hope in his voice. "We could easily last until weapons are back online with that.
"It has been powered down for travel and would need to be initialized, which would take several minutes," Jesse responded, "but let's do it."
“Colonel, we’re being hailed,” Josiah broke in.
“Onscreen,” he replied crisply.
______
When the image came on screen, it took the crew of Endeavor by surprise. They were staring at a bridge with several different sentient species on it. Up until this point, the only species any of them had ever encountered were the Pack and the Jarlevian, both of whom wanted to wipe out humanity. Jesse was beginning to wonder if all alien species hated humanity, and what humanity had ever done to deserve their hatred. He also began to think Dr. Hightower had been right about everything.
“Attention, unknown vessel,” called a reptilian creature. “You are trespassing in Garrinorassss' territory. Power down your ship and prepare to be boarded. Failure to comply will result in your destruction.”
They all looked at each other in amazement as Jesse replied. “This is Colonel Jesse Marcos of the Earth ship Endeavor. We are currently lost due to a problem with our navigational computer. We will be out of your territory within a half-hour.” Twelve minutes until weapons are on line, he thought as Josiah ran to the storage area containing the portable shield generator.
The reptilian creature was humanoid. It had no tail, but its sharp claws and its facial features reminded Jesse of an iguana. Beside him stood Bigfoot, or at least a creature that looked like Bigfoot. To his left, he saw what appeared to be a purple and yellow blob, with eye stalks sticking out of the top and tentacles coming from several directions. There were other species, too, but he didn’t get a good look at them. He did notice that they all seemed to be wearing black and red.
“Negative, humansss, you are all prisionerssss of Garrinorasss now. Prepare to be boarded or prepare to die.” The lizard man replied.
“What is a Garrinoras?” Jesse responded.
“Colonel,” Suzy called. “Do you really think antagonizing the creature is the way to go here?”
“I’m only trying to buy us a little more time. I’m fairly certain the secondary shields can take another two, maybe three hits. I know the hull is good for a few more judging from the size of their armaments, which means, all we have to do is keep from getting hit more than five times until the portable fires up. After that we start taking damage.”
“Humanssss, it strikesssss me as odd that you have never heard of the mighty Garrinorassss. He is the master of a fleet of privateer vesselssss that patrol this sector of space, and provide protection to those wise enough to pay for it. Everyone in the galaxy knowssss of Garrinorasss. This is your last warning, we know your ship isss damaged and your weaponsss are down. Surrender or die.”
“Pirates, really?” Collin yelled in frustration. “A half-hour more and we’d be home free, but we have to run into pirates! What are the odds?”
“Calculating the odds would not be possible at this time, Lieutenant Torrensede. There are too many unknown variables to give an accurate reply.”
“Thank you for that, SAMMI, but I wasn’t actually asking.”
Jesse returned his attention to the lizard man. “Like I said, we are lost, and Garrinoras can’t possibly be that mighty if we’ve never heard of him. Maybe you should start referring to him as the regionally known Garrinoras, or the not-as-famous-as-he-wants-to-be Garrinoras. I’m just sayin.”
The result of that last comment was six alien starfighters hitting their thrusters and vying to be the first to destroy Endeavor.
“Well done, Colonel. It's nice to see you can still make friends,” came Suzy's sarcastic reply.
“I just bought us another minute and a half, Suzy. Collin, continue evasive maneuvers to port on my mark. Lieutenant, hold the dive a little longer than usual so Kimi can get a couple good shots.”
“Yes, Colonel.”
“Everyone ready? Three… Two…. One…. Mark!” As Jesse yelled mark, the ship began an unexpected ninety degree dive with the port side facing the alien fighters. Kimi fired two shots at fighters not expecting functioning weaponry, vaporizing the first two fighters. The remaining four fighters peeled off to group into a new attack formation as another shot from the pirate ship rocked the secondary shields.
The alien fighters were of interesting design. It was like looking at an oblong disc with small cannons mounted along the bottom and no indication of a canopy that would allow the pilots to see out into space.
As Endeavor pulled out of its dive, an idea hit Jesse, and he wanted to kick himself for not thinking about it sooner. “SAMMI, what is the status of our shuttle?” Kimi stole a look at the Colonel, thinking she knew where he was going with this.
SAMMI replied quickly, “The Assault Shuttle is fully operational, Colonel Marcos.”
“Including the cloak?”He hoped even as he asked.
“That would fall under t
he category of fully operational, Colonel.”
Wow, he thought, SAMMI was certainly getting the hang of sarcasm. Soon he was going to be having a talk with her about the proper way to address the ship’s commanding officer. For now, though, he simply said “Thank you, SAMMI, have her powered up and ready to go when I reach the landing bay.”
“Sir, powering up the shuttle will take a couple minutes.” Kimi grunted as she took out a third alien fighter. At the very least, the pirates were going to leave here bruised.
“I’m not going directly to the landing bay. It should work out just right.” With that, he was out the door.
As Collin continued to juke and jink, trying to keep from getting hit by the pirate’s cannons, he looked over at her and asked, “Do you know what he’s doing?”
“I cannot be sure, but I think he is planning on taking the shuttle out in stealth mode and launching one of our space mines to destroy the pirates.” She answered as her fingers flew deftly over the firing array controlling the lasers.
“It’s pretty desperate, but it might work.” Collin admitted, wishing he’d thought of it.
“Let us pray that it does,” she grunted, as she watched the fourth alien fighter explode into a cloud of super-heated particles.
______
As Jesse reached the first container carrying space mines, he felt the ship rock again. SAMMI was alerting the crew that secondary shielding had failed, and he knew that Endeavor could only withstand a couple more hits before she started taking serious damage. His crew had been stellar to survive this long. This team was a well-oiled machine. A machine he vowed not to let down.
He loaded one of the mines onto a hover-cart, then turned and started at a limp/run towards the landing bay. He was pleased to hear SAMMI’s update that the net had begun its power up sequence as he was entering the shuttle. They had survived seven minutes. Now if we can only last two or three more until the shield generator fired up. The net would take eight minutes to power up, but he was certain that Kimi would have destroyed the last two fighters by then. That wasn’t the problem though; the problem was taking out the pirate ship before it could hit Endeavor two more times.
