Running With Argentine

by William Lee Gordon

  He also wasn't particularly surprised to see that Gossip was wearing his own circlet interface.

  After his conversation with Paula that morning, he'd let everyone know what was going on and ordered them to spend the day testing out their interface. He'd switched the emphasis from controlling the ship to learning everything they could about her.

  That's what tonight's meeting was about, to share what everyone had learned.

  In addition, he'd gone to the doctor and, between them, figured out a way to relax himself back into a prolonged dream state without drugging himself into oblivion.

  Although it was a little hit or miss they'd managed to succeed for hour-long stretches at a time.

  What he'd learned from Paula was… Disturbing.

  "Let's start by hearing from each of you. Chief? Do you want to go first?"

  The chief, never one to shy away from an audience, was visibly enthusiastic as he started describing the engines and technical design of the ships power plant structure.

  Rory would jump in from time to time and they both had to be constantly reminded to keep it less technical and more about the practical abilities.…

  "We haven't had your experience, Captain," he summed up. "I never actually met this Commander Entebbe that you told us about, but there are things about the ship – especially the power plant – that I just seem to know. Rory's experiencing it too, although I don't think it's quite as strong with him."

  The chief went on to describe the first two types of engines the ship carried: sub light and surf motors.

  Everyone had been waiting for him to talk about the Temporal Drive…

  "I think it must be what we're all thinking it is, Captain. You generate some kind of field that somehow manipulates the space-time equation. But whether it's actually some kind of, uh… Time Machine… I have no idea."

  Argentine understood the chief's reluctance to say the words. No one really believed it; no one wanted to believe it was true. Most of them were still waiting for some other rational explanation to be put forth.

  Unfortunately, what Argentine had to share was going to dispel all those notions…

  "So, I take it you've also had no contact with this Officer Samuelson?"

  "No," the chief said shaking his head. "And I don't seem to have the same intuition about the temporal machinery as I do with the other engines."

  "Well, I've learned some things that might help fill in the blanks," Argentine said for all to hear. "But I'll share my story last."

  "What about the rest of the ship, Chief?" Lieutenant Stark asked.

  "Yeah, I've had better luck there. In this Terran League of theirs, apparently the lead engineer had responsibilities for the ship structurally as well. I keep realizing I know things… For example, the long structures that run laterally down the sides of the ship help generate the field for the Temporal Drive.

  "I can also confirm that this ship carries a heavy industrial manufacturing ability along with a really advanced robotics workshop."

  "What about the upper section?" Argentine asked.

  "We've had less success with that," he admitted.

  "As you probably remember from when we first approached, that top section is made up by a large cylindrical hull that attaches to a huge latticed-worked section that contains three gigantic and almost spherical structures.

  "My best guess is that the spherical structures represent massive cargo bays, but we don't know for sure because we can't get to them."

  "What do you mean by that?" the lieutenant asked.

  "I mean that all the passages we found to the upper section of the ship are closed off by locked hatches. And Captain, these aren't like the door locks on your cabin door… These are heavy hatches."

  This isn't what Argentine had wanted to hear. That upper section of the ship was the one area he'd been able to learn absolutely nothing about.

  He turned to Lieutenant Stark…

  "What about weapons and defense?"

  "Well, I don't seem to find any intuition like the chief is talking about so I have no idea how the weapons work, but I do seem to have a dry knowledge of how to use them. Or at least how to turn them on or off… To learn more, I think I'm going to have to play around with them."

  "And defenses?"

  "Yes."

  "Yes and…"

  "Yes, and I'll be damned if I know what they do. We've already seen that the ship has some kind of automated defensive mode, and I think we carry some kind of defensive shielding. But again, any knowledge I'm getting from the interface is limited to turning it on or off."

  This was much less than what Argentine had hoped for. If they were to have any hope of operating this ship his people needed to be more than trained monkeys flipping switches. Apparently though, the lower the rank the less actual capacity the interfaces carried.

  Barry was duly impressed with the piloting computer; something about being chuffed and smashing…

  He'd had to curb both his and Sami's enthusiasm but had learned that, according to them, the ship's real technological advancement was in its sensor capability.

  "We’re still exploring it," Sami explained. "But I've never dreamed of having this kind of range!"

  "It's not just the range," Barry added. "The quality of the input is extraordinary. I daresay that if we can figure out how to use them no one will ever be sneaking up on us!"

  Doctor Amaya added her report and seemed particularly impressed by the ship's ability to compound pharmaceuticals.

  Just when Argentine thought he'd taken everyone's report, Marco raised his hand…

  "I'm sorry Marco, were you able to discover anything?"

  "I know that myself and my family, we are not officers," he started. "And I'm sure our interfacing with the ship's computer is much less than all of yours… But I think I could direct the lieutenant on where to find all the specifications about his weapons. And you remember my third cousin, Nina? She can show you where to find all the data on the sensor suites… And I'm pretty sure Nicu and his friends found all kinds of info on the Temporal Drives – but it didn't make any sense to me when I saw it."

  The entire room was silent.

  "How did you find all these things?" the chief finally asked.

  "My family, we want to be good crewmen… So we thought it best to act like students. We've spent the day on the new crewmen tutorials."

  Eventually Argentine said, "Marco, if I ever exclude your family again from the ship meetings you have my permission to correct me."

  Marco stood a little taller and smiled with pride.

  ΔΔΔ

  They were all gathered on the bridge – including most of Marco's family.

  Argentine briefly wondered if he'd ever get used to a bridge this size… Yeah, in a heartbeat, he realized.

  He was in the Captain's Chair on the raised platform and at consoles immediately in front of him were Barry and Sami. Mandi had the communications console to his left and Lieutenant Stark had the weapons console to his right.

  Behind him, in the theater seating, set Doctor Amaya and a few of the others.

  Rory and much of the Petulengro family were manning the many consoles on the main floor of the bridge.

  The main console of that lower section was immediately in front of the captain's command deck and was manned by the chief. Presumably he had authority over all of the stations on that level, which consisted of everything from additional sensor support stations, to environmental control monitoring, to internal ship communications, to just about everything else you could think of and a whole bunch more they hadn't figured out yet.

  Everyone had spent two days undergoing crew tutorials. Now, they would put that newly learned information to use.

  Or not.

  It was one thing to study something, it was totally another to put it into practice…

  "All bridge stations on standby," Argentine gave the pre-memorized command.

  Someone behind him gasped…

  A
ll of the consoles on both levels of the bridge immediately lit up.

  "Prepare the ship for transit," he continued.

  This time they all paused to stare… The immense dome above them once again lit up with the unbelievable star scape of their surroundings.

  "All stations, report status."

  The lower level stations quietly reported their readiness to the chief, while the upper level stations did the same for him.

  Once that was complete he realized the moment was at hand…

  "Pilot, give us some sub light acceleration."

  "Yes sir, Captain. Where would you like to go?"

  "For now, just take us that away," he said, pointing at a general direction on the dome.

  "Yes sir!" Barry responded… And then, "Ship is responding; we are underway."

  Argentine smiled. He had command of the most powerful ship he’d ever known.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX

  Farewell

  Earth 2349 A.D.

  "Captain Ramires you have a message," announced the computer.

  He was sitting at his cabin's dining table eating breakfast.

  He swallowed and said aloud, "Play the message."

  "It is a text-only message," came the response.

  "Who's it from?" he asked, curious who on the ship would want to communicate in such an unorthodox fashion.

  "Admiral Sanchez."

  "What! When?"

  "The Admiral logged a message that was to be delivered to you immediately upon entering the void between the spiral arms. Will you take it now?"

  "Of course… Where…"

  "You can access it from your desk terminal."

  Captain Ramires left the rest of his breakfast on the table. He moved to his office desk and immediately opened up the message…

  Captain Ramires,

  You are now approaching the point of No Return and I want to personally wish you and your crew good fortune and good sailing.

  Major Jacoby and I have been dealing with this situation for some years now and, if it hasn't started to already, I will warn you that it can tie you up in mental knots trying to think through the repercussions of your actions.

  Know this… Even after all this time our best minds still have no idea how this is going to work…

  They tell me that our very universe could cease to exist once you make your temporal jump, that the very act of you disturbing the timeline could erase this future.

  You may be surprised to learn that I am a scientist, but I will readily admit that I can't keep up with what they're calling Temporal Physics. At any rate, I choose to believe that we’ll still be here tomorrow.

  My advice to you is to trust your instincts. Don’t let the unknown freeze you into inaction; Do The Right Thing in every situation and let the chips fall where they may.

  I do need to honor, however, some of their cautions. There are things I would like to tell you but have been advised not to. So if this message seems in some ways incomplete, I trust you'll understand the necessity…

  I do want to take the risk of letting you know that we have received some of your messages. I suspect that some of them have also been lost, although I am under strong advisement not to identify to you which are which.

  I will say, though, that redundancy is a virtue. Perhaps each report should contain copies of all previous reports? I'll leave that to your discretion, but you know what the stakes are.

  One thing that needs to be said…

  As you know, the consensus is that these extinction events are not natural. We believe we are facing an intelligent enemy.

  In regards to that, there are two schools of thought here. One is that if you can get the appropriate intelligence to us about our enemy, his strengths, his weaknesses… Everything we've discussed…

  If you can find a way to gather that Intel and get it to us, we can devote all of humanity's resources to stopping them.

  There is a second school of thought that believes if you can find the origin… If you can identify the very first extinction event and address it… That might be humanity's very best opportunity to stop it.

  I know that places a tremendous burden on you and your crew. Please know that all of us here have faith in you.

  I could wish that traveling into the past wasn’t a one-way trip. I could wish that there was a way I could someday shake your hand and congratulate you on a mission well done…

  Anyway, good hunting Captain. May the wind be at your back and God at your side…

  Admiral Sanchez, out.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN

  The Reins Of Power

  Aboard the Roosevelt

  A man could do an awful lot of good with a ship like the Roosevelt, she'd said.

  At the time, Argentine thought she was talking about righting social injustices…

  Like the growing dominance of the military in the Asperian sphere; or more starkly, the cruel injustices practiced by the Lords of Trinity.

  With a ship like this they probably could make a difference; but the truth of the matter was that the allure of Argentine's mountain cabin dream was still vivid in his mind.

  More so than ever.

  Perhaps it takes closing in on a dream for a man to realize just how truly important it is to him – especially if that same man is faced with the prospect of losing it.

  As tempting as it was to command a ship like the Roosevelt, he knew he could give it up…

  But now…

  Now the stakes were larger than anyone could imagine.

  He'd gone back and forth in his mind, toying with the idea that what he'd learned wasn't true. That it was some crazy hidden agenda enacted by madmen that really didn't know what they were talking about.

  If the situation had only been explained to him verbally he probably could've convinced himself of that. But with the circlet interface… He knew that the memories were real… He knew that Paula believed it to be true.

  She had helped him find the recorded ship's briefing that Captain Ramirez had given to the ship's crew upon entering the void between the spiral arms.

  One line in that briefing stood out for him. One line kept replaying itself over and over in his mind…

  But whether our mission comes down to a ship battle, or if it comes down to a single individual from our ship that has the determination to defend our race, we need to be ready.

  Everyone that heard this speech was gone. Everyone, except for one individual.

  And that individual was trying to do exactly what her Captain had asked of her…

  Whether Paula was actually alive or not wasn't an issue, he realized.

  These were a group of people that had given everything for something that was bigger than just themselves. The odds were immeasurable that they could've lived out their lives without ever experiencing an extinction event.

  They might have originally bought into a cover story, but to the best he could tell they had unanimously embraced the magnitude of the new mission. Yeah, there might be a few examples here or there of some of the technology leaking out, but with that many people and that many secrets to keep… There was no question in Argentine's mind that to a person they put the greater good above themselves.

  Especially when you consider that many of the survivors would have inevitably been subjected to torture, and worse.

  Now, the last real crew member of the Roosevelt was asking him to carry on the mission…

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT

  The Message Never Sent

  Approximately 9 Million B.C.

  Captain Ramires paused in thought…

  He was trying to put the finishing touches on a new message that would hopefully be found by his people in the future.

  He reread it for the twentieth time and realized it was fine. Which was good, considering he needed to get ready. His senior officers had been invited for dinner by the government of Paladin III, the planet that in 8 million years everyone would know as Earth.