by SF Edwards
“I know. So do I,” he said and leaned in to kiss her.
She allowed him the liberty and then pushed him away. “No, Blazer, I want this to be special.”
“It will be.”
“No, not if it’s like this. Not if it’s in the bomb bay of a Feral. Our first time shouldn’t be a matter of convenience. It should be romantic and someplace special.”
Frag it all, that’s what I want too, but… Staring at Marda in the seat next to him, naked and glowing with passion, Blazer had a hard time calming himself down. He wanted nothing more than to just take her right there. She even wanted him and had said as much. Her whole body practically screamed that she wanted him inside her. But he held back and leaned in slowly to give her a kiss.
“I love you Marda Sciminder and I am willing to wait for you.”
She pulled him in to kiss again. “I love you too and I don’t want to have to wait much longer, Blazer Vaughnt.”
They both nodded and touched their foreheads together. They floated there for a moment, just staring at one another. She looked up into his eyes and he looked back a moment later, still panting with repressed tension.
“Capben is only a hect away from Midduwn so let’s get together during the break. I can come down to Capben or you can come up to Midduwn,” she offered with a smile.
“You got it.” Blazer smiled back at her and the perfect place came to mind. “We’ll go someplace special while we’re there.”
She kissed him hard on the mouth. It wasn’t too much longer until they would go home, then they would be truly one.
“I can wait that long,” he panted.
“We better get dressed, or…”
Blazer nodded. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could hold back if he had to keep staring at her beautiful naked form. They launched themselves back to the bomb bay to retrieve their clothes and started slipping back into them. He couldn’t help but stare at her the entire time and from the way she kept looking his way he could tell neither could she. At first Marda attempted some modesty by covering herself but she stopped when she saw his eyes caress her lovingly. He intended to memorize every curve and detail of her so that he could hold that memory forever. She slipped leisurely back into her clothes for him and let him watch every movement. After he pulled back on his underwear, however, he still stood at rigid attention.
“Do you need to take care of that?” she asked with a sly smile.
He looked down and blushed. “I should be OK,” he said and slipped back into his flight suit. When he attempted to zip the form-adjusting garment back up, he realized it left his condition even more evident. “On second thought, I might have to,” he replied looking back over at her.
He sighed longingly when she slipped the top half of her flight suit back on, covering her breasts. I wonder what she’d say if I asked to her stay topless the rest of the flight? She smiled back at him and pushed off from the wall before she flew into his arms. They kissed again and it was all Blazer could do to not tear her flight suit back off. “This isn’t helping.”
“I know,” she replied with a grin and continued to kiss him. “But this might.”
UCSBA-13, Main Hangar
When they landed a little over a hect later, Blazer felt emotionally spent. From the way she’d handled the bomber into landing, Blazer could tell Marda felt the same. For the rest of the flight they’d continued to kiss and explore each other’s bodies. They had kept their pact not to make love in the bomber, but that didn’t stop them from doing other things. After they’d landed, they did the best they could to get themselves cleaned up. Only a shower or trip to the cleaners could remove the sticky sweat and essence of one another. So Blazer prepared himself to protect his and Marda’s honor.
Blazer grimaced as he and Marda flitted down from the hatch to find Chief Flind waiting for them. He must know what we did. I bet he can smell it on us.
The ridge over his artificial eye confirmed Blazer’s suspicion. “You two didn’t do anything that wouldn’t be right in my bomber did you?”
The two of them exchanged sheepish glances with one another then back at the chief. Both of them replied with a slightly disappointed sigh, “No, chief.”
He looked back at the pair curiously, but shrugged in understanding. “Most cadets do when I send them out like that.”
“And you would have made me work it off,” Blazer replied.
The chief smiled a toothy grin back at him. “Now that really wouldn’t be right.”
UCSB DATE: 1000.356
Xoth System, Alpha Station, Probe Control Bay
Anticipation filled Captain Delgado. The day he had waited months for was upon him, the day when his theories would be proven right. He watched the main viewer in the probe control center with the eagerness of a child staring at his birthday presents. Soon real-time data from the probe would flow into the room, filling every console, and the objective he sought for so long would appear.
His heart soared when static filled the screen for a moment followed shortly by a gray scale image. His spirit plummeted at the sheer number of data dropouts blotting out portions of the screen.
“Can we clean this up at all?”
The primary sensor operator adjusted several settings and shook his head. “No, sir, this is as good as we can get in real-time. As it is, all we’re getting is visuals; no data feed or color even.”
Captain Delgado scowled and looked upon the asteroid shell. For weeks now, the probe had sent them passive data from the target. Radiation from multiple active scanners, the distinctive trail of plasma rockets, and the telltale gravitational fluctuations that followed the use of dark matter drives seeped into the sensors. Each piece gave Captain Delgado and his analysts hints of what they would find. That alone was enough to prove that the confederation had a major facility hidden within the asteroid shell. Still, he wanted more, needed to know what lay within so that he might plan its destruction.
“All right,” he called. “Command the probe to record all data and make an immediate data burst on our order.”
The sensor operator nodded, sending the command.
Captain Delgado watched the screen with an intensity few could muster, and traced the orbits of the various asteroids within the shell. A movement caught his eye, an unnatural movement even for anything in the impossibly tight orbits these asteroids followed.
“Sir, I’ve detected a Confed targeting decoy,” his aide called out.
He looked down at his aide’s screen. The visuals seemed to corroborate his findings.
“Good, set a course to follow it into the asteroid field.”
He felt the eyes of his technicians turn towards him.
“It’ll give us our best chance to slip in undetected – just try and keep us in its wake.”
“Yes, sir,” the controlling technician called. “Command sent.”
The transmission filled with static for a moment.
“What’s wrong?”
“Sorry, sir, firing the engine disrupts the low-powered signal, no way to avoid it.”
“Try closing down the field of view, that should help,” Captain Delgado called.
The image at the center of the screen widened, filling the whole with a much cleaner image than they’d had before. That brought a smile to Captain Delgado’s lips. I love it when I’m right. Within moments, the probe slipped into the asteroid shell, the technician visibly straining to keep it in the decoy’s wake.
“Keep it steady, we don’t want one of the rocks damaging the probe.”
“I’m doing the best I can, sir, recommend that we put the SIPs in command,” the technician commented before static and dropouts filled the screen.
“What’s going on?”
“Sir, we’re getting a massive amount of interference,” his aide replied, pounding away at his desk to try and clean up the signal.
“What’s the source?”
“I’m not sure, sir, but the passive sensors detected a large amoun
t of dark matter on approach. It might be what’s holding this asteroid field in place.”
Captain Delgado bit back a curse. “I should have realized that. Alright, command the probe to proceed into the asteroid field at SIP discretion. I want it to make two orbits then exit and make a high-powered data burst. Order it to exit immediately if detected. That data is vital.”
“Yes, sir,” his aide replied. “I’ve set the data burst to a five-day latency. That should give us a clean signal.”
“Good work,” Captain Delgado replied.
A moment later snow filled the screen before it went black. He could only hope that the command had made it through, and barring that, that the SIPs would act according to their programming. The delivery of the data was their top priority.
He did his best to occupy himself while he waited for signal reacquisition. The imagery they received thus far hadn’t been ideal, but the image processors were creating a nice map of the asteroid field for him to examine. The spherical grouping of asteroids was almost a bigger anomaly than the ship they’d discovered the month before. What limited data he could find, told him that the asteroid field was hollow. It’s what’s inside I need to know for certain.
Every few minutes he looked up at the screen, hoping to see something. He had no idea how long it would take the probe to orbit the interior of the shell and the wait drove him mad. He couldn’t give up though, couldn’t admit defeat, not when he was so close.
A yawn caught him by surprise. He hadn’t realized how late it was. In response, he got up to get a cup of coffee. The screen filled with static before he left his seat and he froze.
“Ping the probe. See if it’s trying to make contact.”
Before the technician could react, a grainy image of the stars outside the asteroid shell filled the screen. Captain Delgado let out a breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding and sat back down. “Status?”
“The probe has completed its orbits and is preparing to send a data burst, signal is showing a five-day latency,” his aide replied, giddiness in his voice.
Captain Delgado smiled at that, this was almost as much his lieutenant’s victory as his own. He did after all design the Synthetic Intelligence Processors.
“Main antenna is opened and sending transmission.”
“I want a low-powered burst as well, show me what it saw,” Captain Delgado ordered, he couldn’t wait five days, he wanted to see inside that shell.
Three minutes later the video began to cycle backwards, the probe seeming to retreat into the asteroid shell. The camera slewed about as the probe prepared to exit the shell, and sensor data poured in. Dropped data packets still permeated the transmission, but it gave Captain Delgado his first view of the interior. All the images told him, however, was that the shell was, in fact, hollow, and that multiple craft and larger asteroids filled it. Then the signal cut out.
“Status report, what’s going on?”
His aide wound the video forward to the last few images the camera had captured. A blurry object filled the last two frames and everyone groaned. A stray asteroid outside the shell had collided with the probe.
Disheartened Captain Delgado turned to the sensor technician. “Tell me that it got the main burst off before it was destroyed.”
The sensor tech shook his head. “The last indicator I got said it was transmitting. There’s no indication of whether it completed the transmission before it was destroyed. I’m sorry, sir.”
Captain Delgado put on his bravest face and turned to his crew. “We’ll see in five days, and even if the data isn’t complete, what we’ve gathered so far has vindicated this project. You’ve all done extremely well.” He stood and looked down at his aide. “Forward all data we’ve received so far to my office, and get the analysts on it as well. I want a preliminary report ready before the data burst reaches us.”
Star System: Classified, UCSBA-13, Command Center
Deep in the main command center, Gokhead sat at his duty station and noticed what appeared to be a fusion core breach just outside the asteroid shell. He couldn’t explain its source and waved over his superior. “Sir, you might want to take a look at this.”
The sensor officer on duty made her way over for a look. “That’s odd. Was that a fusion burst?”
“That’s what my analysis shows, ma’am. It might even be an intentional fusion core overload.”
Gokhead suppressed a smile when the officer shot up in response. Anyone desperate enough to self-destruct via a fusion core breach had to be up to no good.
“Order a cleanup crew to retrieve any wreckage. I want them in full radiation gear.”
“Yes, ma’am!” Gokhead replied and punched in the order.
***
Two hects later, Admiral Sares looked over the data with the deck officer, Misa Ijochi. He did not like what he was seeing. The debris and remaining markings were consistent with the old Galactic Federation CAD-1 probe. What was that thing doing in my system and why had it just self-destructed? “How long do we estimate that it had been in-system?”
The sensor chief looked over the data again. “Unknown, sir. The Geffers decommissioned those probes decades ago. Figure that and the preliminary analysis of the casing and the partial serial number we were able to find, its well over a century old.”
“Still, some of this debris isn’t consistent with the majority of CAD-1 probes that I’ve seen. It might have been modified.”
“It’s possible. A pirate group could have picked it up and sent it in. This one sensor module looks Confed in design.”
The admiral shook his head. Pirates weren’t known for using probes, captured or otherwise. The hyperspace booster required to launch probes into a system were too expensive for most pirate groups. “I doubt it. I want a full analysis done on this debris. See if you can get any computer or data cores for analysis.”
“We’ve already checked, sir. The computer systems were completely disintegrated. There’s nothing left.”
“Was there anything else unusual about this probe?”
Officer Ijochi thought about it for a moment. “It’s possible that it might be a model of CAD-1 that we’re not used to. We’ve only collected a few over the annura for study. The things have been drifting through Confed space for over a century, though the incidence of their discovery has increased recently.”
That was news to the admiral and he looked up, curious. “Explain.”
“Well, we’ve been finding CAD-1 probes all over Confed space lately. All of them thus far appear to be old. Therefore, the general assumption is that they have just gone undetected this long. Though there are a few people who think that the Geffers may have gathered them up and relaunched them.”
The admiral didn’t like the sound of that. “I want all the data we have on those recently discovered CAD-1 probes. I don’t like the idea of the Galactic Federation having any presence in my system.”
“Understood, sir,” Misa replied before she headed back to her station.
The admiral waited at his command console. Before Misa could even begin on her briefings, he pulled up other reports and data on the CAD-1 probes turning up throughout the Confederation. Sure enough, they all appeared to be standard CAD-1 probes but some of them had newer hardware and systems installed. It looks like the Galactic Federation has been retrofitting the old probes and pressing them back into service.
The admiral scratched his chin in thought. He had difficulty wrapping his mind around it. Why are they reusing old hardware this? Is it their age? Does the Galactic Federation assume that most Confederates will pass them by for being outdated? Several captains had recovered intact probes in recent tridecs, disabling their communications systems first as a matter of protocol. However, one thing was certain. Anytime someone attempted to access the probe’s interiors it would use whatever means it could to send out a data burst before melting down its computer systems and data cores.
Admiral Sares considered the implications of the rep
orts. Did the Geffers just discover our secret base? Could a transmission have gone out before the probe’s destruction? Jammers orbited around the exterior of the system but every jamming net had holes. Moreover, this probe had to have come through the jump point. He ordered an analysis of all jump point traffic for the last annura. This was starting to worry him.
UCSB DATE: 1000.366
Sapin System, Planet Sagis-2, Maglid Valley
Bichard sighed, lying in his field observation point high above the valley. Surrounded by the tall grasses of the overlook, chameleon paint coated Bichard’s exoskeleton. The paint shifted colors to match the savanna and made him all but disappear in the dry underbrush. He panned his scope across the valley, scanning the passive end of the EM spectrum for any sign of enemy activity, while the rest of the Blade Force stalked towards their objective. If they kept their current course, they would avoid the enemy patrols around the valley. It was his job to make sure of that.
The other half of their sniper observer team, Deniv crouched beside Bichard, his rifle alone poking out of his enhanced guile suit. Bichard loved to work with Deniv while the rest completed their mission.
Those enemy troop movements look like insect swarms. At that thought a voice called to Bichard from out of nowhere. No, not her, not now. The voice had lured him as long as he could remember and he feared it more than death itself. The voice belonged to a Coretherian Queen. She was calling him back to his rightful place as her mate. He had escaped his natural drone fate for far too many annura and his own instincts fought to push him towards it. Despite his efforts to ignore her, he couldn’t block out the melodious voice completely. His own instinctual desires drew him to look out into the heavens to find her. Fighting his own neck muscles, Bichard looked away from the battlefield towards his home world an unknown number of light-annura away. But the primordial drive to mate drew him.
Bichard rose and reached his hand out towards Corether. His body was no longer his own but the mindless marionette of the queen. Deniv twisted about and tried to pull him back down. His hand slid off Bichard’s paint slicked exoskeleton while Bichard ignored his friend’s pleas to get down. Unable to hear anything else, Bichard walked towards the siren's call resonating through his brain.
