by SF Edwards
The chief looked at the craft with appreciation when he approached Blazer. “You did a fine job! Much better than any cadet I’ve had through here in a long while.”
“Thank you, sir,” he replied, his smile wide. “Should I take it to the paint barn though?”
The chief looked at the mismatched wing and shook his head. “No, leave it. Now go get yourself cleaned up. You’re released for the rest of the cycle.”
Blazer checked the chrono. He still had several hects until lights out. “Are you sure, sir?”
The chief nodded. “I’m sure but I could always find some more work for you if you really want.”
Blazer needed no more convincing and hustled off to the lift pads out of the hangar.
UCSBA-13, Dorm Room 305
Blazer took his time heading back to the locker room and getting cleaned up. It felt good not to have to rush back and forth. After he’d finished his shower, Blazer headed straight back to his room though. To his pleasant surprise, Gokhead sat at a desk working with Bichard on a homework assignment. Blazer walked up to Gokhead and tapped his shoulder with his macomm.
“What’s this?” Gokhead asked looking Blazer up and down. “And why do you smell like you’ve just come from the locker room?”
“You seriously have to ask?” Blazer replied with a smile.
Gokhead’s eyes went wide and he snapped the macomm out of Blazer’s hands. Everyone else in the room took notice too and set aside their work. Gokhead linked the macomm into his portable console and flipped through the layers of menus and encryption to pull up the flight data. “So you flew it? How did it handle?” he asked with the eagerness of a kid opening presents when the data filled a window.
Blazer nodded, appreciative. “Can you see if the sensor data is on there?”
Gokhead looked through the data log for a moment as he compiled the flight recorder data and plugged it into a visualization program. “Yes, it’s here.”
“Good. Can you alter that?”
“How so?”
“I was supposed to be out there taking sensor data out in Optimus Teg’s mass shadow. If an analyst digs into that data, they’ll see the performance changes and…”
“I understand. I can dump the data and weave it to look like you were still performing as normal,” Gokhead replied before the first bits of data scrolled across the screen and the visualization commenced. “Oh! That is wonderful,” he said watching the playback.
Everyone else crowded in close to watch and read the data on the performance improvements.
Gavit rested a hand on Blazer’s shoulder and watched the trainer pirouette across the sky of Optimus Teg. “So, when are we fixing mine?”
Blazer looked up at Gavit, a smile on his face; watched the fighter dive into the clouds. “I don’t…”
“Oh, that was gorgeous!” Gavit interrupted him during the stall maneuver.
“I don’t think it would be wise to try and do this to everyone’s fighters,” Blazer finished.
Everyone stopped and gave him incredulous looks.
“No. Seriously. You all saw how difficult it was installing all this in my own fighter. Plus, Seri has been against this from the start. The more we try to modify the better our chances of getting caught are.”
“But look at how nicely it maneuvers,” Deniv moaned.
Gokhead bit his left lower lip in thought. “There is something we could do.”
“What?” Gavit asked, giving him a friendly push.
“Well other than the physical modifications a lot of this was really software based.”
Blazer implored him to go on.
“The maintenance dongle has been what has allowed us to use these modifications so far. If we could get a few more, I could write software into the dongles that will override the primary software control systems instead of having to upload it directly to the fighter’s own computers.”
“It would work on any fighter we plug it into. But won’t the performance suffer by comparison?” Gavit asked.
Gokhead shrugged his shoulders. “It won’t be as good as what we’re getting in Blazer’s fighter but I will have to run the numbers. Oh, wow!” he exclaimed and recycled the playback a few centipulses to watch the maneuver again.
The bunkmates watched with loving attention, as the fighter barrel rolled around the helium river in the sky, the shields sparking in response.
“As I was saying we wouldn’t get the same performance gains as this craft but the software integration would result in some noticeable improvements.”
“But are the normal data busses able to handle the load?” Arion asked.
Gokhead cocked his head to think about it. “Maybe. I’ll have to check the specifications to be sure. Even if they can’t I might be able to work something out to use the secondary and tertiary busses.”
“Good,” Gavit replied, looking at the fighter dance with an eagerness Blazer didn’t recognize.
Blazer stood looking over their shoulders and smiled. “I think we may have started something here.”
“Oh, indeed we have,” Gokhead replied, pulling out his own macomm and showing Blazer a schematic of a Splicer 2000 Cutter High Speed Interceptor. “I’ve already started working out how to make similar modifications to other fighters.”
“Very nice,” Blazer replied looking at the schematics.
UCSB DATE: 1000.308
Xoth System, Alpha Station, Probe Control Bay
Captain Delgado strode into the bay with a purpose. Data flowed in from CAD-1-3-53462, filling the myriad screens. “Report!” he called out, masking his enthusiasm.
His aide pulled up a screen, showing their connection status to the probe. “We have a solid connection and good data flow.”
“Latency?” he asked before a hail of data dropouts filled the scene, the white blocks in the image pained him before they cleared.
“Five minutes, fifteen seconds, sir. Any less than that and we suffer severe packet degradation.”
Captain Delgado gave a silent curse. Why couldn’t our budget have included funds for Quantum Entanglement Communicators? Those would have given him true real time data and control. Each QEC cost twelve times what the probes themselves had and their high casualty rate mandated that he make do with the Probe’s original tachyon communication systems. He saw the result of that here, the low energy signal giving them decent data, but the lag was intolerable, and a higher energy signal would be even slower thanks to relativity.
“It will have to do, now what can you tell me?” he asked and searched the screen for clues.
“Sir, we have acquired a visual of the gravitational anomaly,” the aide replied and zoomed in the view from the forward camera onto the object ahead of the probe.
“Can you clean up that image?” Captain Delgado asked of the blurred image.
“Image processors are working on it now, but we’re waiting on the next high resolution still to come through first. Shall I change the wavelength on the cameras?”
“No, we’ll wait for the next data burst for better visuals, but what are we looking at here?”
The aide looked at the sensor analysts as they did their best to avoid eye contact with him. “Well, sir, it is definitely an anomaly and the closer we get the more it baffles us. The mass of the object is on the order of one quarter Terra, but it is barely 200 feet across.”
Captain Delgado raised an eyebrow at the spheroid on the screen, the image cleaning up with each passing second. “What in the worlds of men are you?”
“We’re getting limited spectrographic data back now. The composition is consistent with that of Drashig hull plating. A few of the minor elements are in different ratios, but that’s what the database indicates.”
“Interesting… any further analysis?”
“The probe’s processors are coming back with their initial analyses.”
Captain Delgado pulled the assessments up on his datapad. The reports were incomplete with missing words thanks to the
data dropouts, but he was able to get the gist of it.
“The spectrographic analysis concurs with our results but the radiation readings indicate that the object has been orbiting at this distance for, a thousand years. Am I reading that correctly?”
His aide looked over the data himself before the analysts transmitted their findings. They corroborated the probe’s findings.
“Yes, sir. That looks to be correct.”
“What is that second object? It looks to be in a close orbit.” Captain Delgado asked, pointing to what now appeared to be a separate body orbiting the anomaly. “And check your figures again, the primary object is actually smaller than whatever it is that’s orbiting it.”
His aide nodded and a new set of figures appeared on Captain Delgado’s datapad. The primary object still displayed a mass of one quarter Terra but now had a radius of 47 feet. The other object appeared oblong with a length of 100 feet, but no mass reading yet. “Command the probe to scan the second object.”
The sensor operator tapped a few keys at her station, redirecting the probe’s array of data-gathering instruments. “Command sent, sir.”
Captain Delgado nodded and pored over the incoming data while he waited. The data left him with nothing but questions at first. How could such a small object have a mass that significant? Why do the radiation readings indicate it has been out there for a little over a millennium? Was this all some wild goose chase? This object had to be artificial. Nothing else could explain it, but what in the Confed arsenal, especially so long ago, could produce this?
“Sir, we’re getting a clear image of the primary object, and I have what appears to be writing visible on it.”
Captain Delgado pushed aside his datapad and stared at the screen. Will this answer my questions? Sure enough, writing appeared there. While he wasn’t familiar with the script, the computer soon churned out an answer. The writing was in Vedekian, and displayed an alphanumeric code, possibly a hull number.
“Vedekian?” he wondered aloud, the pieces starting to fall into place. He noticed his aide staring at him and straightened, tugging on his tunic. “Do you know much of Confed history lieutenant?”
His aide shook his head.
“The Vedekian were a mighty empire that the seven races forming the early Confederation wiped out to the last.” He scratched at his chin, the picture in his head creating an image of his glory to come. “Now we’ve found the remains of one of their ships.”
“Are you sure, sir?”
“The hull markings confirm the ship is Vedekian. If I’m right, I know what happened to it, and this system.”
The chief sensor operator held up a hand. “Sir, we’re getting our first data burst on the second object.”
“On screen.”
The main screen shifted and Captain Delgado saw the recognition in all their faces.
“That’s a Confed Feral bomber,” he blurted out.
“Yes, sir, stellar radiation readings indicate it’s been here less than fifteen years. All indications point to it being an older E model too,” his aide replied, his forehead scrunched up.
Captain Delgado scratched at his chin again. “Good, good. Then the fusion cells might still have power. Instruct the probe to…”
“Sir, the probe has already accessed the bomber’s communications systems and its main computer.”
Captain Delgado smiled. The expense to install Synthetic Intelligence Processors in these probes was proving itself more and more.
“Sir, the first data packet is coming in. We have a partial dump of the bomber’s navigational data, including its course.”
“Show me,” Captain Delgado ordered
The data appeared on the main viewer and his datapad. Once again there were numerous dropouts, but there was enough.
“I want a full high-powered data burst sent to us right away.”
The course on the screen gave them enough information to plan their next move. The bomber’s origin lay within the asteroid belt, from the proto-planetary mass.
“Looks like the crew ejected after leaving the protoplanet. Maybe we should have gone their first,” his aide commented.
“No, we were right to come here first. The information we’ve gathered here is as valuable as the data on the bomber’s home.”
“How so, sir?”
“Think about it, Lieutenant. This craft has been orbiting here for a thousand years, probably blasted this way by whatever destroyed it. But more important is the mass of it. There’s a detonated singularity warhead at the heart of that object. How it escaped complete destruction, we’ll never know. The important thing is this. The early Confederation used singularity weapons on the Vedekian. They said they’d got rid of them all, but I’m willing to wager that they still have a stockpile of them somewhere. That proto-planetary mass might contain just such a hoard.”
The lieutenant stared at the screen. “If that’s true then wouldn’t those weapons be capable of…”
“Razing a planet, yes. Look what it did that to that ship.” He looked up at the screen again. “Command the probe to orbit the object for two days, get as much data as it can and send us a data burst. Then have it make for the proto-planetary mass at best speed for stealth.”
“Yes, sir,” his aide replied and sent the command. “Sir, allowing for maneuvering the probe should arrive at its next destination in forty-six days, thrust drift mode.”
“Good, we’ll need that time to analyze this data. Instruct it that I want a passive sensor log every week until arrival, ceasing transmissions two weeks prior to avoid detection.”
UCSB DATE: 1000.319
Star System: Classified, UCSBA-13, Main Hanger
Blazer grunted, crawling around inside the engine nacelle of a Feral Bomber with a replacement fuel pump in his hands.
“Explain, in your own words, the general structure of hyperspace,” Marda called to him, poking her head into the access duct, reading off the next question on his homework.
“What?” he asked. He was glad to have Marda there helping him with his homework while he worked. Prior to finishing the repairs to his fighter, he kept falling behind. He’d just caught up with his classes now that Chief Flind allowed Marda to accompany him more on the maintenance decks. Blazer chuckled when he thought about that. Marda’s the only one that grumpy old Rimdook allows on the deck now that my fighter’s back in service.
“Explain in your own words the general structure of hyperspace,” she repeated.
Blazer crawled backwards back out of the access chute until he could sit on the maintenance platform to look up at Marda, grease smearing his face. “You have to be kidding me. I answered that question dozens of times before the academy and they’re asking me that question here?”
Marda turned his macomm around to let him see the extended screen and the question.
He read it and with a sigh continued. “OK. Dictation mode.”
“It’s not going to pick you up in there,” Marda stated.
Blazer grumbled under his breath.
“I’ll take the dictation from here. You get back to work.”
“You are a freaking blessing to me,” Blazer said as he popped up to give her a kiss before crawling back down the shaft. He had the replacement fuel pump next to the old one but the old one was giving him trouble coming out.
“OK. Explain general hyperspace structure.” I hate vague questions like that. Depending on the instructor; that could mean anything from sitting down and showing all the math to explaining it in a way that a first annura student can understand.
“All right. Uh, at its most basic, hyperspace is a parallel universe to our own. Prior to the formation of the universe as we now know it, theory states that the universe was a perfect omni-dimensional singularity existing in all universes, spaces, times and dimensions at once. Then the great expansion occurred and in The Grand Flash the singularity fragmented into multiple universes. Some had higher dimensions than ours while some were lower. We exi
st in N-space because scientists can’t agree on how many dimensions we live in. Now come out of there, you stupid piece of junk!” Blazer groaned, trying to work the old fuel pump loose.
“Do you want me to leave that last bit in?” Marda asked jokingly.
“No,” Blazer sighed. “As I said, we live in an N-dimensional universe with an unknown infinite number of universes, above, below and parallel to ours. The number of dimensions is unknown and up for debate. So far, we have no hard evidence of the existence of any N minus one dimensions, but they are theoretically possible. The closest example we have of an N minus one dimension is a flat plane but if that plane has any thickness then it is N dimensions.
“Hyperspace is N plus. It is at least N plus one dimensions but is usually referred to only as N plus as we do not know, nor can we measure, exactly how many dimensions It’s made up of. All scientists at least agree that the only reason we can transit hyperspace is because, while it is a higher N number than our dimension, it is not significantly higher. So there is a constant… come on! I got you!” he exclaimed as he pulled the fuel pump free.
“So there is constant debate on whether it is N plus one, plus two, and so on up to N plus N because it is believed that transitioning any dimension beyond N plus N would be impossible for us,” Blazer continued with a series of grunts.
“Now, during universal expansion and formation, space-time was weaker than we experience it now. As protostars and protoplanets formed, they created weak points in the fabric of N-space. These weak points became the gateways to N-plus space. Scientists have yet to explain why they only opened jump points to N-plus and not N-minus or N-parallel or even N-power space.”
“What’s N power space?” Marda asked.
Blazer hadn’t considered Marda’s limited experience in this area of physics. “Uh, N-power space is the name used for the super high-dimensional universes. Anyway, jump points were formed. While a great number of them closed during universal expansion, theory states that some N-plus, N-minus and N-parallel universes remained open for us to use. Jump points require entropy to exist. Any exchange of energy passing through jump points causes them to close. So the more energy and matter that passes through them, the more unstable they become until they collapse.
