Chapter 5: Power and Perimeter

The next eighteen hours saw Bill fully immersed with the crew in ensuring that all the fuel from the cargo aircraft was in the Blazing Star shuttle bay and being utilized. Bill had been able to bring another 400 gallons. It was all he could scrounge up on short notice. Another 200 Gallons of diesel fuel was extracted from the storage tank at the cabin and added to the supply in the shuttle bay. The second, larger shuttle was now online and helping the fuel digestion process. The entire crew ate and refreshed themselves each time they made a trip to the cabin. Some caught up on needed sleep in shifts at the cabin as required. Everyone’s sleep cycles were messed up by the Medical procedures but they were adapting quite well. Bill had received the ‘story’ from Blaze and was now brought up to speed. He was still grinning like a Cheshire cat all the time. He was just so glad to be here. Simon held a quick meeting in Command of all the crew.

“Just so we are all on the same page here, a quick review of our status might be in order.” said Simon. “We have passed the imminent danger threshold for memory core failure. We have also passed the 5% power level and can now activate additional resources. Maintenance Droids are being deployed by Blaze as necessary to ensure repairs are completed on systems required. Diagnostics are also running on equipment and systems prior to activation. I am told that these Droids are about the size of a large dog, but have eight appendages, four oriented up and four oriented down. The body sizes and shapes vary but are usually like a large box. Don’t be startled if you see them scurrying around. Just get out of their way! I think we need another fuel run to Calgary so maybe Bill could handle that soon. We just might be able to start on the core reactors soon. So far, we have conserved energy very well, but we are going to have to open up access to more systems all the time. That will draw down power again briefly until we get those reactors online. Then it should be smooth sailing.”

Simon continued, “Additionally, very soon we expect to have invited visitors prowling our perimeter. Starting now we should not discuss anything verbally about our project outside of Blazing Star or the shuttles. Hopefully that may be only temporary.”

“Blaze, do the shuttles or the fighters have any ‘stealth’ technology?” asked Simon.

“Yes Captain, we call it a cloaking field. It can be applied on our shuttles or our fighters while they have at least 50% power.” replied Blaze.

“Good, I want a couple of fighters prepped as we power up just in case. Also I think Bill and James need to get checked out on the fighters and shuttles. From now on, all flights out of here have to be fully cloaked! We’ll need to find out how effective the cloak is, though.” said Simon.

“Captain, we do have flight simulator trainers that could be brought online.” replied Blaze.

“Do that and schedule all of us for the Shuttles and Bill and James for the fighters initially.” said Simon.

“Acknowledged” replied Blaze.

“Captain!” said Blaze. “Passive Scans have picked up fifteen humans total, exiting out of the north canyon, East and West sides.”

“What are they doing?” asked Simon. “They appear to be spreading out and dividing up, moving mainly around the edge of your property.” replied Blaze.

“Continue to monitor. Maintain passive scanning and alert me if any of them approach the cabin or this location.” said Simon. “It appears our perimeter defense has arrived earlier than expected. Now might be a good time to make your fuel run to Calgary, Bill. See if you can spot them from the air on the way out and back. They are due to report in about seven hours from now at dusk. You should be back by then.”

“Good plan, I’ll call ahead and see if I can get another 1000 gallons dropped at our hangar before I arrive.” said Bill.

“Nate did you bring anything with you to enable communications between here and the cabin?” asked Simon.

“No, I didn’t realize we might need that.” replied Nate.

“Captain, we do have Remote Audio/Video Probes available now that our power levels are coming up.” commented Blaze. “We only need to locate the probe in the cabin and it should pick up everything going on near there.”

“Take one with you and set it up when you shuttle Bill to his plane.” said Simon. “I recall that there are personal wrist communicators available. What is their range and do we have sufficient power to activate them?”

“Yes Captain we have enough power to start utilizing them. They have a range of about 100 miles in atmosphere, I’ll distribute the communicators to each of you and set the communications channel to Officer. I’ll take a Remote Audio/Video Probe (RAVP) to the cabin.” replied Blaze.

“I’ll go with them and come back with Blaze.” stated Nate.

“Okay people, it looks like our plans are coming together! Let’s get back to work.” said Simon with a smile.

Several hours later all was in readiness when the call from Grant came in. Nate and Blaze had rigged up direct communication to the cabin and allowed Nate’s connectivity and the satellite phone at the cabin to be monitored by Blaze and forwarded directly to whoever or wherever it was for. Bill was still in Calgary, but everyone else was back on board Blazing Star.

James answered the incoming call. “James here, what have you got for me?”

Grant reported “We arrived on-site several hours ago, a little quicker than I had anticipated. I sensed some urgency and we were able to pick up a friendly transport to a drop zone several miles away from your perimeter. Don’t ask who. We walked in from there. So far we have observed one pilot and aircraft leave the area. No arrivals. The aircraft was a small transport and seemed to have just dropped off fuel for the cabin tank. The pilot was Bill Sharpe, your partner in ASA. Another light aircraft, a Cessna, also owned by ASA, is tied down near the cabin as well. We haven’t seen anyone else yet, though. The cabin and airstrip are inside the perimeter. Nothing is happening outside the perimeter with a single exception. The place is pretty remote, however, we did have to gently persuade one visitor to move on! A brown bear got a little too close to one of my men. I don’t believe we have been observed, my men are pretty good at this.”

“Good work, Grant.” replied James. “I’ll await your next check-in.”

Everyone had been privy to the whole conversation as it was relayed to Command by Blaze.

“That was interesting!” commented Simon. “It seems our cloak works pretty well. They must have some hardware to communicate and check up on what they found as well, since they were able to identify Bill. I hope the bear didn’t get hurt!” he said smiling. “Let’s all pile in TS-1 and wait for Bill to return at the cabin. We can freshen up and fill up.”

Bill returned several hours later, just before dusk. He taxied close to the cabin, shut down the engines and made his way to the cabin. He found he was just in time to partake of an old fashioned pot luck dinner. Everyone made something of their own and shared it. Blaze was also present and sat quietly and watched them eat, occasionally appearing to go into a ‘standby’ mode.

Bill mentioned that on his return approach he had done a bit of a circle around and could not detect anything from the air. He could see the area that Blazing Star was under and confirmed that it was well concealed and entirely on Simon’s property, now surrounded by Grant’s men. It was agreed that Blaze could monitor Blazing Star’s status from here just as well as from the ship itself. There wasn’t much else they could do till the power levels approached 15%.

Simon glanced over at Blaze and thought he detected a slight smile at the corner of her mouth.

He said “It looks like we can probably attempt a re-start on Reactor 3 in the morning. As soon as we get Grant’s 11:00 PM check-in, we should get some rest.”

At 11:00 sharp the phone rang. Blaze activated the intercom system through the probe, so everyone could hear the conversation and James spoke, saying “Hello Grant, go ahead.”

“A quick report James. Bill Sharpe returned several hours ago and left the plane on the airstrip. He is in the cabin now. Unable to determine how many others are in the cabin. External of the perimeter is all quiet, nothing moving. No apparent activity anywhere near here.” reported Grant.

“No more Bears?” asked James grinning.

“None to report!” said Grant.

“Next check-in changed to 8:00 AM. Understood?” said James.

“Confirmed.” replied Grant.

“Catch some sleep, talk to you in the morning.” said James.

Simon could almost imagine Grant’s men spelling each other all night long to maintain the surveillance. It could get to be mighty uncomfortable work out here. Especially come the bad weather this region was noted for.

Everyone was up at first light eager to start the day. Tonya volunteered to serve up a breakfast of bacon, eggs and toast much to everyone’s surprise. All the beds and couches seemed to have been occupied over night, so a quick tidy up was required after breakfast. They all exited the cabin and entered TS-1, which had remained cloaked all night. Since TS-1 was parked in the depression near the rear cabin door, it was highly unlikely that they would be seen getting to the open shuttle door. They flew to and into Blazing Star where they all assumed their stations in Command.