by David Smith
He killed the video link but left the audio connection open, hoping this might reduce the obvious confusion. ‘Is that better?’
There was another silence and Dave cursed himself again, remembering now, that when he’d sat at the other end of the link he been stupid enough to nod dumbly in agreement.
He also remembered listening as the conversation had continued, so he knew he had to carry on regardless.
‘Soooo . . . to recap, there’s a group of Imperial warships due here in about six hours. The fleet centres around an old heavy cruiser. There are also three light cruisers and a scout ship. We’re out-gunned, so we need to have a plan. Here’s what we’re going to do . . . ‘
He ran through the plan as he remembered it, trying to sound confident and calm even though he knew that he’d been near catatonic with shock on the other end of this conversation.
Once he’d finished, he at least got a response from ASBeau, who, as always, was more than happy to shoot at things. His other self eventually joined in too, clarifying things he didn’t understand and running through options and alternatives to make sure the plan was as solid as they could make it.
To Dave’s surprise, it was actually quite hard work dealing with himself. He’d assumed everything would fall into place as they were the same person, but he discovered five days can make a lot of difference to a person, and after twenty minutes of talking to himself, he wasn’t sure if he was schizoid, paranoid or just a gibbering wreck.
Chapter 15
Dave waited patiently for ASBeau to signal the opening of the battle-plan. Like the other Tiger, they were shut down, hanging silently in space and waiting for the enemy to come to them, like a pair of gigantic black widow spiders.
They watched as Rhino executed a hard turn and the approaching enemy force split in two halves, looking to catch the ex-Tana battle-ship in a cross-fire.
On the Bridge of Tiger, Dave watched the tactical display and as the wing of three light cruisers passed the other Tiger, Janus switched to a camera view.
They watched silently as their younger selves rained destruction on the Imperial ships, but as she chased down the third cruiser, Janus brought them back to reality. ‘Hornet has changed course, sir. Heading our way . . . ‘
He changed the camera angle to show the Imperial heavy cruiser coming straight towards them. Anxiously they waited until she reached her closest point, and Dave shouted ‘Fire!!’
Bolts of orange phaser fire arced across the view-screen, smashing into the Imperial heavy cruiser. The Bridge crew winced as with clinical precision, Janus targeted the stanchions that supported her warp-engine nacelles.
Striking at their narrowest point just outside the secondary hull, Tiger’s phasers blasted into the tritanium skin of the stanchions. The tough metal absorbed so much energy that it vaporised in spectacular plumes of white hot metal, before the stream of phaser energy burrowed through the stanchion and found the plasma conduits that transferred energy from the warp-core to the engines.
They exploded in a ball of white hot fury, spewing billowing clouds of hyper-energetic plasma into the icy-cold of space.
For good measure, Janus targeted the impulse engines at the rear of the main hull, a few well-placed shots destroying the coils that accelerated ionized gases to propel the ship. Hornet was dead in the water.
In her engine room, Hornet’s engineers fought to control the warp-core that had been damaged by the loss of the main plasma manifolds. They lost the battle and in desperation were forced to eject the warp core before it exploded and took the ship with it.
‘They’ve ejected their warp core, sir!’ yelled Chief Benoit.
‘OH CRAP!! Lyle hard away! Maximum Delta!!’ shouted Dave. ‘Janus, shields to maximum! Shearer, general broadcast, warn everyone!’
Lyle threw Tiger into a hard turn to port, bearing away from the stricken warp-core. She accelerated as hard as the ship’s control systems would allow, straining the structure and integrity fields to the limit.
Everyone on the Bridge felt the unnerving yawing sensation as the inertia dampers struggled to cope with frightening g-forces that would turn them into a red smear if the dampers failed.
Shearer, was still broad-casting, warning the other ships that Hornet had ejected her warp-core, but the other version of Tiger was now heading directly towards Hornet as she chased after the Victory.
There was a blinding flash on screen and a visible shock wave raced away from what had been the warp-core, smashing the Imperial cruisers aside like toys. Seconds later it caught the Tiger and they had the briefest of glimpses of her black shape silhouetted starkly against the primordial fury of the warp-core detonation before it enveloped her too.
‘BRACE FOR IMPACT!!’ Dave screamed across ship-wide intercom just a fraction of a second before they too were enveloped by the tidal wave of the explosion.
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Dave faced a nervous wait for the other Tiger to respond to his calls. He knew exactly what shape he was in, and who’d been injured and who hadn’t, but there was still a nagging doubt in the back of his mind that somehow something else had gone wrong. This was USS Tiger, and it was a miracle if anything ever went according to plan.
He breathed a deep sigh of relief as he accepted a call from his other self. His own image appeared on the main view-screen looking relatively intact and asked ‘How are the three light cruisers looking?’
Dave shook his head ‘Not as good as we’d hoped. Essex and Swiftsure are viable but can’t move and they have a load of impact casualties from being hit by the shock-wave of the warp-core explosion. At least they survived, only a dozen fatalities between the two of them. Poor Victory is a mess. We only managed to rescue fifty-three survivors.’
Dave could see his other self was horrified by this revelation and he immediately offered what support he could. ‘I’ll bring this Tiger in closer to give more support . . . ‘
Dave paused. He hated to have to do this, but it had to be done. ‘You can’t, you’ve got other things to be doing.’
He could see his other self’s confusion and knew exactly the counter-arguments he was about to face. Trying to retain some professional detachment, he interrupted again ‘That’s not what I meant. There are another half dozen ships attached to the fleet we’ve just beaten . . . ‘
It was odd to see himself so obviously panic. ‘WHAT?!? Why the hell didn’t you say? How far off are they? How many . . . ‘
Dave realised he could’ve broached this revelation more carefully and more discretely, but by now he’d remembered that they were fighting the clock as much as the enemy ships. ‘Woaah!! Hold on, we’ve already disabled the Flag-ship of the group, another cruiser, a group of three frigates and a scout.’
His other self looked less worried, but no less confused. ‘So if you’ve disabled them why are you bringing this up now? Deal with what’s in front of us, not what’s gone before’ he grumbled.
Dave couldn’t help but smile. ‘I remember saying that! I’m you, remember? Five days in my past . . . and that’s about one hour in your future . . . I took Tiger out of orbit and used the warped-drive to go back along the flight path of the Imperial fleet and intercept them a day before they arrived, and then took Tiger back from that point to intercept them a day before that . . . Are you with me?’
The Dave on screen pulled himself upright in his chair and looked incredibly uncertain, but still answered positively. ‘Uh . . . yes?’
Dave could remember how uncertain he’d felt, but by this stage of the conversation was weirdly happy that everything was falling into place. He had absolute confidence in his other self, as he’d already witnessed his success. ‘Attaboy! Well off you go then, no sense in hanging about’ he smiled.
His other self still didn’t look entirely convinced. ‘How do we stop the other ships? I mean, we’re stealthy and all, but we’re only one vessel . . . ‘
‘You’ll work it out. After all, I did.’
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Dave watched the other USS Tiger disappear in a relativistic flash and sighed as his thoughts turned to the next task in hand. They’d defeated the enemy on their doorstep, but the Empire’s Third Fleet were now free after crushing the rebellion in Sector 193, and Dave couldn’t imagine that the loss of an entire Task-force in the disputed zone would go unanswered.
The Sha T’Al couldn’t stay here, but didn’t currently have anywhere to go. Dave asked his Science Officer to meet him in the Chart Room on Deck 3 to discuss their options.
Lieutenant-Commander O’Mara arrived just as he did and they entered the room to find Ensign David already at work on the problem.
Colloquially known as the Chart Room, the Stellar Cartography Suite was actually quite small, but Ensign David had started up the main display system, which took a lot of getting used to.
The vastness of space isn’t easily described in a small room and larger ships such as Tiger were equipped with the latest technology to support exploration.
A holographic display covered all the surfaces in the room except the main control console in its very centre. As they stepped into the room, space yawned before them like a bottomless abyss.
They stepped uneasily onto an invisible floor and all around the depths of space unfolded before them, black and unending. The door closed behind them, completing the illusion and they took a moment to orient themselves as their brains told them they were floating in the vacuum of space with nothing tangible within a million miles.
As they steadied themselves, they saw the control console with Ensign David stood in front of it, floating in space as they were, and behind it stood Crewman Cassie Long.
Dave had been warned about Cassie, and like most people remained wary of her. Cassie was a slender, blonde woman who wore the saddened, distant expression of a person who’d seen terrible things far too often. Another of Tiger’s ‘permanent shift’ personnel, Cassie was afflicted with the greatest stigma of all. She was a telepath.
Born to completely average parents in a non-descript community on a back-water world, Cassie was a bright child whose future promised great things, until she reached puberty.
That was when her ‘gift’ had become apparent, and after the initial excitement, it had soon become an inescapable curse. Cassie couldn’t tell the difference between speech and thought, and heard what people thought, just as the ordinary people around her heard what others said.
Within weeks she was a wreck, unable to shut out the constant chatter of dozens of voices, and even by then the most common words that she heard were things like ‘freak’ and ‘weirdo’. Thoughts carry even more emotional weight than words, and Cassie found herself swamped by fear, loathing and disgust.
She’d been shipped out for her own sake (and everyone else’s) and had spent her formative years in a variety of ‘Special Institutes’ where she was little more than a lab rat. Her abilities were exceptional, and caused even more excitement when it was discovered that in addition to her rampant telepathy, she had pre-cognitive abilities too.
Even Starfleet had taken notice, and had experimented with her talents as an alternative to such technologies as universal translators and strategy-analysis software.
Sadly for Cassie most people lost interest when they found that her talents were largely uncontrollable. Her brain struggled to filter out particular thoughts in any but the most controlled environment, and her pre-cognitive abilities were spectacularly random.
Even Chief Money had abandoned her and shipped her off his team when she correctly predicted a string of Ice-hockey results, but failed to predict in which week they occurred.
Her time working with scientists and other, less-gifted, telepaths had taught her some useful self-control techniques, but Cassie still preferred the solitude of night-shifts in the Stellar Cartography Suite.
In her oasis of peace and tranquillity she whiled away the small hours, unfettered by the judgement of others. Just occasionally, however, her other talents were required and were much more useful. Cassie was really, really good at her job.
‘Good afternoon team, do we all understand why we’re here?’ Dave opened.
Long nodded silently, but Ensign David couldn’t say anything concisely. ‘Yeah, we’re looking for a hidey-hole for the Sha T’Al. Roll me in sugar and call me a dough-nut; How weird is that!! I can tell you it’s bloody lucky that I’d already been for a pee when Ashy baby told me, or it would’ve been change of knickers time.’
Dave sighed mentally; ‘Yes’ would have sufficed. He was slightly disconcerted to see Long nod in apparent agreement. ‘Ok, we have details of Sha T’Al physiological requirements, and I believe Lieutenant-Commander O’Mara has already furnished you with details of geological preferences that would facilitate the extraction of chemicals that might help the Sha T’Al create drugs to control their affliction?’
‘Too right! Ashy baby was on the ball as she always is. Got enough data to fill a hole the size of the Captain’s libido. We’ve got . . . ‘
Dave was a patient person, but if anyone would ever test that, it would be Ensign David. ‘Yes. Got that. Thank you’ Dave interrupted, ‘so what are your initial thoughts?’
The Ensign puffed his chest out in indignation ‘Well, how rude!’
Dave and O’Mara both glared at him and he grudgingly continued. ‘We’ve made an initial search for stars in classes G to M, with small rocky planets with oxygen atmospheres. We’ve cross referenced this with data provided by the Sha T’Al and files taken from the computer cores we recovered from Hole. Unfortunately there’s a limited number within the disputed zone, and none of them meet the specific requirements laid out by Ashy babe.’
Cassie Long didn’t need to be telepathic to sense their disappointment and quickly added ‘But not much further afield there’s what we would describe as treaty exploration space, which has a much larger sample of such worlds. Many of these are entirely unexplored, but obviously we lack substantive data about these and will have to investigate further.’
Dave thought about this. Although Treaty exploration space was politically viewed as the property of the Empire, there were so many systems and worlds to explore that it might be decades before anyone considered visiting any world the Sha T’Al settled on. In terms of the Empire’s point of view, it would be no different if the Sha T’Al settled there than it would be if they settled within the disputed zone, as the Empire had laid claim to both. And as long as the war with the Tana and Sha T’Al dragged on, there was no possibility at all that the Empire would consider exploring the area: it would be far too remote to defend effectively.
‘An interesting idea Long . . . ‘ Dave began. He was about to ask for her preliminary thoughts, but Long was ahead of him.
‘I’ve selected twelve suitable systems, each with at least one habitable planet. I would suggest we prioritise by likelihood of success and send probes for more detailed analysis before committing to an evacuation.’ She pressed a few buttons and Dave felt a sudden sense of vertigo as the Universe apparently span around them. Long had adjusted the view point, taking them from their current position, hovering around Todot Hahn, to a view point deep in the Empire’s treaty exploration space.
As she did, twelve solar systems were high-lighted and each suddenly had a stream of astronomical data appear beside it.
Dave gauged the map as best he could and pressed a few buttons on the control console to add their current position, the boundaries of the Terran and Tana Empires, and Sha T’Al space. These appeared as a glowing blue dot and three translucent, barely visible bubble structures in red, blue and green. Treaty exploration space hovered next to the blue Tana and red Terran Empire bubbles and Dave immediately noticed that some of the systems Long had suggested were quite close to the Terran Empire.
‘Ok, Long thanks for that. I suggest we prioritise the worlds furthest from the border of the existing Terran Empire . . . ‘
She interrupted him, and Dave noti
ced a wistful, distant look in her eyes. ‘Oh, we don’t have to worry about that. The Terran Empire won’t be a factor in two years time.’
There was a very definite and very prolonged silence.
Cautiously, Dave asked ‘Sorry. Could you just run that by me again?’
Long didn’t even look at him as she continued peering at the data on the twelve systems she’d selected. She spoke casually, as if everybody present knew what she was talking about. ‘The Terran Empire won’t exist in two years time. The loss of most of their fleet at Todot Hahn will leave them open to an invasion by a combined force of the other major races in the Alpha and Beta quadrants. The treaty space we’re looking at will be left unexplored for hundreds of years.’
‘I find that . . . a little hard to believe’ Dave said, quietly.
She sighed. ‘Everyone always does. But there you go, that’s life. My life, anyway’ she stated flatly, but with just the slightest hint of bitterness.
Dave was horrified by the prospect of a fleet being destroyed and started to ask if she could give more detail. ‘Can you . . . ‘
‘Nope.’
‘But you’re . . . ‘
‘Yes.’
‘Should we . . . ‘
‘Look,’ said Cassie, suddenly looking very tired, and very sad. ‘I’ve seen it happen. A huge fleet arrives here, the whole lot are destroyed in a single explosion. The Empire loses over half of its ships in a single disaster, and the other powers surrounding the Empire take advantage. They unite and crush the Empire completely in a matter of months. It’ll be hundreds of years before humanity even gains its freedom, let-alone threatens the Sha T’Al again.’
She paused. ‘It doesn’t matter if you believe me or not. That’s how it is . . . how it will be. There’s nothing you, or I, or the Sha T’Al, or even the Terran Empire itself can do about it. I don’t see dates and times, I see images of terrible happenings. I don’t get detail, only a big, scary picture, three-dimensions, hyper-resolution and surround-sound. I don’t know what happens to you, or me, or the Sha T’Al down below. All I know is that a huge Terran fleet arrives here, and that fleet is completely and utterly destroyed. All you need to do is get the Sha T’Al and us out of here before that happens.’
