Chapter 23: Hosting a Party

Indeed, everyone at SBE had been busy. Starbase Earth had been transformed from a hole in the Alberta ground to a fully functional base with enough room to house Blazing Star along with a few hundred other smaller ships. Everything was still underground, hidden and entirely on Simon’s property. George had, with the very capable assistance of Dawn, enlarged the underground base to include some shuttle and fighter construction. Storage of those vehicles, although limited, was available to assist the fleet, but available resources to build such vehicles were still at a minimum. The ones completed, however, had been very busy!

With many shuttles now available, resources could be obtained from further afield, in places outside of North America, although a proper longer distance vehicle had not been yet produced. That vehicle, the Corvette, was just going into early production in SBM. The Corvette was designed to be a truly mid-sized, small crew, multi-role craft capable of defending itself, some attack capability, shielded, cloaked, FTL capable and with a good sized cargo hold.

George had arranged, through some of his earlier contacts, financial transactions, that now allowed the sale of several excess raw materials, such as gold, as well as the purchase of additional required materials. One such example was petroleum products. Obscurity, still being the requirement, limited the scope of the purchases to those of the expanding base. With all the new foodstuffs coming in from all over North America, Shawna was a lot happier. She could finally prepare food for a true party.

Personnel requirements were being resolved at a much improved rate. With the additional shuttles, and Dawn’s capability regarding truth sense, it all came together. Dawn, like all the advanced AIs, created from Blaze, posessed almost all of her functionality and capability. Her devotion to her duty and the smooth functioning of SBE were her primary concerns. Secondarily, her devotion to George, as Base Commander, became readily apparent. Nobody messed with George or SBE with Dawn around.

Dawn had overseen and constructed many defensive improvements to the base. Some of these were in the form of weapon emplacements below ground that could rapidly surface and engage any encroaching hostile forces, both air and ground. These, combined with Grants expanding security forces provided sufficient response to almost any offensive threat.

Threats from space were still a potential problem. Protecting the bases from space born threats was the role of the SFG Space Fleet.

One major problem George had resolved involved the movement of personnel from the base quarters and facilities. With this in mind, George and Dawn devised a pair of adjustable enclosed ‘personnel loading tunnels’ that would connect the two sides of the base to the two entrances to Blazing Stars’ Command bay. This bay was forward of central and quite high from the floor of the bay, on top of Blazing Star, so was no ‘piece of cake’ to devise and construct, but complete it they did, just in time for the party. Previously, all entries or exits had to be by shuttle craft or by using ramps from the four large Launch Bays to the base floor. That was still preferable for cargo, but personnel could now use the two new ‘tunnels’.

The most noticeable improvements to the base were all underground and involved personnel requirements and housing. SBE was now a sort of ‘jumping off’ place. New recruits were initially housed in a huge series of structures surrounding the hangar that normally housed one only Aurora Class Battle Cruiser. George and Dawn had designed and had constructed the equivalent of two full featured high class hotels that would rival those anywhere on Earth, however, avoiding the extraneous ‘glitz’, associated with some. These facilities were on either side of the cavern and offered visual viewing of all spacecraft currently in dock. They also housed many families. They had been named the “North Face Hotel” and the “South Face Hotel”, although in reality, they were facing somewhat different directions, but, underground, what does it matter.

There were additional residences for specific individuals as well as expanded base personnel facilities, all underground and fully equipped.

These families were usually part of the base support staff, although some were destined for other locations as well as a few that would be going to the various ships in the fleet. Some military families were slated to be stationed on various ships of the expanding fleet as positions became available.

With the ever increasing presence of hunanity, and other visitors, improvements to the medical facilities was a given. A fully equipped and staffed hospital was constructed, modelled on an expanded version of Blazing Stars Medical Ward. George’s good friend, Doctor Hank White, was currently in charge of all medical facilities in the base and was glad to be in perfect health and enjoying the new situation. Additional young Doctors and Nurses had been found and recruited to fill out the requirements there, as well as to begin training for the future positions.

One concern Simon had about all of this was that there was now very advanced Daandrusian technology in residence in SBE. It had to be protected and defended.

Simon noted with satisfaction that the concept of ‘delegation’ had worked like a charm in this case. The new ‘Personnel Tunnels’ extended from the base and locked onto the Command Bay doors. He noted that he would have to add the requirement to check that they had been released from Blazing Star, and retracted into the base, before moving the big ship. More problems, he didn’t need.

Command bay doors opened up revealing the new ‘personnel tunnels’. Simon was once again in Command bay with all the party goers, except Vladislav, who was still in Medical with Dr. Helen Barker, as he began explaining the next few activities.

“Okay everyone, attention please.” began Simon.

He continued. “For the next part of our party, we have reached our first destination. This is a newly created facility that I hope will meet with your approval. There will be many things you will see and encounter in the next few hours, so please enjoy the accommodations that have been prepared for you. Please follow the exit arrows to the North Face Hotel through the personnel tunnel where you may present your Identification Badges and you will be directed to your accommodations in the hotel. Once you are settled in, you may notice, out the main window of your suite, the transport you have been on to bring you to this location. This transport is named Blazing Star and more will be explained to you about this amazing ship later today.”

Simon continued. “For the next few hours, relax, visit some of the facilities in the hotel, especially the fine dining establishments. For your security, please, until further notice, do not leave the hotel. There will be tours of this facility as part of the events over the next few days, so, enjoy yourself and relax. All your expenses will be covered simply by using your personel Identification Badges, should you need any basic needs like food, clothing etc. I hear the pools are nice! For those of you who feel the need to be in communication with your home countries, there are telephone services in each suite. Please note that ALL communication will be monitored as it is directed to its destination. This facility operates under what is known as GST or Galactic Standard Time and it is currently arbitrarily set at 12:45 using the 24 hour military format, so that would put it in the early afternoon. The current GST does not necessarily indicate a local timezone, since as you will observe, we are underground and there is no visible sun to indicate an actual local time. At approximately 18:00 hours GST, a formal dinner and reception will begin in the North Face Hotel Ballroom B. Please be prompt as you don’t want to miss anything! We will see you all again at that time.”

After ensuring everyone left for the hotel with two security personnel following behind to ensure everyone made it safely, Simon left the Command bay and proceded back to Medical to check with Helen on Anya’s condition. The two security personnel took up station at the entrance to the tunnel to ensure there was no unauthorized entry back to Blazing Star.

Arriving in Medical, Simon noted the two security personnel at the door. Grant and Vladislav were seated on chairs near the door. It seemed they had been talking. Helen and two nurses were carefully examining Anya.

Simon spoke to Helen. “How is our patient doing Helen?”

“Simon, way too early to tell much. She is going to take a long time to recover and the outlook for a full recovery improves by the hour. We still have no indication of any intra cranial damage, so that looks promising. For some reason, the bones surrounding the brain or some other situation seems to have helped protect her brain. I wish we knew what caused all this damage.”

“Have you asked Vladislav? asked Simon.

“He claims he does not know. Apparently, no one knows exactly what happened except Anya and, she obviously is not talking.” replied Helen.

“Would she be better here or in the base Hospital?” asked Simon.

“I would think that she should be moved as little as possible for the time being. Also Dr. White is not as experienced with severe trauma cases as I am, so I am perhaps slightly better suited.” Helen replied.

“All good points!” stated Simon, noting that Vladislav and Grant were both listening intently to the conversation.

Simon walked over and spoke to Grant and Vladislav.

“It looks like she will be here for quite a while. She is under good care and there is nothing either of you can do to assist in the treatment, so, I suggest that you two stick together for the forseeable future.” said Simon. “Grant, why don’t you take Vladislav through Command bay and over to the North Face Hotel to get him registered, then show him around over there. Maybe relax in one of the bars. Perhaps I may join you there. I have a staff meeting in a few minutes in my quarters so will be a bit tied up till about 17:00 hrs. If I hear anything of significance regarding Anya, I will let you know Vladislav.”

“Thank you Simon!” replied Vladislav. “I believe you are correct. Improvements are going to be gradual. I am also getting hungry and there is my official job responsibilities to consider also. I had better talk to Viktor. Please lead on Grant.”

Grant and Vladislav departed. Simon headed to his quarters.

“Blaze.” called Simon.

Blaze had remained in the Command bay tidying up and ensuring that the shuttles were all secured and prepared for future use. She then proceeded to Simon’s quarters, where she knew he would be. She walked in just as he called.

“Yes Captain?”, said Blaze.

“Can you contact all Command Staff on board and ask them to come to Command Conference for a brief meeting in about one hour. Also include George and Dawn. Exclude Grant and Helen as they are both busy with important tasks. If anyone from SBM Command is here, invite them as well. Thanks Blaze.” said Simon. “You are to be there as well.”