Chapter 702

Ship

At warp 4, Ship was making up for the time lost during the battle with the Graex. In the Captain’s ready room, Jeff and the General had just finished discussing the happenings and were relaxing with coffee and snacks.

“Have you finalized your plans about your crew when you finally leave on your vacation trip or whatever you’re currently calling it?” Whitworth asked.

Jeff took a sip of coffee and a bite from a sweet roll while he thought. “As you know, I want my family to be the Primary Crew, but I don’t want them working all the time. Nor do I want the Miadax crew to feel picked on. Since Ship is intelligent, she doesn’t need someone monitoring everything minute by minute, but she has designed herself to have a crew, although she continues to oversee everything.

“I imagine that we will wind up with a standing watch of a few members, unless we are nearing a system, or there are problems such as the one we just encountered. Eventually, the remainder of the Miadax Engineering Crew will be up to speed — I hope — and will be able to stand watches in the engine room, thus relieving some of the work load of the Miadax Chief Engineer as well as Helen, who, as you know, is in overall charge of the engines. According to the Miadax Engineer, Ship’s engine room is many times larger than even the one on that monstrous ship the Miadax came in, but many of Ship’s engine components are sealed systems. Should something malfunction — and she thinks that will be highly unlikely — it will require Ship’s mechanicals to do the dangerous work of opening and repairing those modules. When everything settles out, there will be far less stress and work on each of the stations than the Miadax were accustomed to on their ship.

“Again, as you know, Ship doesn’t use nuclear energy for her drives, but channels energy from another ‘energy’ plane. The magnitude of energies unleashed is truly mind-boggling, but she claims her closed systems make them ultra-safe. That said, I still shudder to think what would happen if one of those boarders had managed to get a shaped charge through the engine room’s shields. Ship, however, says that, at worst, the charge would only have furnished her primary energy source with yet more power.

“And speaking of shields, I know little about how Ship’s work, but I understand that she has Primary and Secondary shields. When the Primary shields overload, the Secondary shields take over, and they operate on an entirely different principle. Instead of deflecting or absorbing the beam, they channel the power to another dimension that absorbs any amount of power channeled to it — in theory. But — there seems always to be a ‘but’ — that second set of shields has never been tested. Oh, she has channeled power to them, and they worked the way she thought they would, but they have never been tested in combat.

“Another of my worries is that some of Ship’s systems haven’t been thoroughly tested. She tells me that in her studies, she came up with some theories that she has proven — at least to herself — and she has tested those theories repeatedly. When her testing was complete, she built her warp engines using those totally new principles that, as far as she can determine, have never been considered before — a system that produces and uses far more power than anything our top physicists can even speculate about. And... it should produce speeds many times greater than anything even visualized before. Speeds that might even allow us to bridge the unimaginable gulf of nothingness between galaxies.” (The next nearest comparatively sized galaxy to our Milky Way is the Andromeda Galaxy, which is roughly 2.5 million light-years away. Stars in our galaxy, on the other hand, tend to be approximately 5 light-years apart on average. Alpha Centauri, our nearest neighbor, is approximately 4 light-years distant.) “Ship claims that her math is impeccable, and she has spent literally eons proving it as she waited for her Prime to arrive. If she’s wrong...

“When she rescued my team, none of us actually knew where we were, or more importantly, where Earth was. We didn’t communicate mentally, and that was the only way Ship could communicate. Over weeks, she managed to obtain enough images of the stars from our minds to eventually match those mental pictures that we didn’t even know we had, to find her way to our dimension and its correct star system. Oh, there was more to it than that, but she still loses me when she tries to go into the details of that search. Apparently, our minds tend to keep near-perfect images without us realizing it or being able to recall all the details ourselves. With that, combined with the help of the scientists that were with us, we finally managed to stumble our way home.

“As you know, the quality of our communication has increased over time, and now incorporates much more than mere spoken words. In addition to physically speaking to Ship, she can converse with several of us mentally. Arlene, Diana and Kayla in the beginning, and me, of course, but Ship can now do the same with Ann, and a couple others are learning. Now, we can truly feel each other’s emotions. Hell, I think my wives realized it even before I would admit it to myself, but I’ve fallen in love with that fabulous mind that is Ship.”

Jeff felt his face flush as phantom lips touched his neck and a pair of soft breasts pushed against his back to the accompaniment of a quiet mental sigh. With a deep breath, he went on. “As I’ve mentioned previously, we all need to become intimate with her systems — until we become a true team. We know that she could have won that little skirmish without our help and done it in far less time. She didn’t even fire her big guns, and wound up destroying the Graex the way she did the last of the Miadax by using her diversion field, which wasn’t even designed to be a weapon.

“We could have ended the fight in a matter of moments — even before the Graex ships released their boarders, but I don’t want to be the bully that instantly kills when challenged. And with Ship’s power, it would be easy to fall into the bully category. I want this to be a family ship to explore as we search for the race that built Ship’s brain, but I don’t want us to screw up and bite off more than we can chew.

“The Miadax ship was designed to take the plunder stolen from the planets they overcame back to the Miadax’s home planet, and it was armed sufficiently to take any planet they had ever encountered, easily. Besides, it doesn’t take much to subdue any planet that doesn’t have space travel. Even hurling rocks down could be highly destructive, and there is no way a non-space-faring planet could defend itself. According to the First Officer, the Miadax also have true battle cruisers with far more firepower than the ship we fought.

“We need to learn everything about Ship and have her teach us, in detail, all the theory that went into building this marvelous machine. Maybe we will never meet a true battle cruiser, but then again, we need to be prepared. Who knows? With a couple of geniuses aboard, they might even find ways to improve Ship’s systems, or come up with new systems that no one has even thought of before. All that will take time, but reference what I just said about our lives.”

Ship announced the First Officer, and Jeff told her to send him in. After she provided him with a cup of stim, and he had sat with the other two men, Jeff turned to the alien officer while barely noticing the physical differences. “We’re coming up on a half light-year out from the planet. Any thoughts, First?”

The First Officer was reluctant with the General sitting there, and Whitworth picked up on it. “I’m just along for the ride. The show belongs to you and the Captain here.”

After a second’s hesitation, the First turned to Jeff. “Sir, as the Navigator suggested, we can skip in and out of warp as we near the planet. Maybe even take time between micro-jumps to avail ourselves of what our instruments are showing as far as any ships in the area or any abnormalities, all before we arrive at orbital distance. I would assume that the science team’s equipment should broadcast to orbit...”

“Easily,” the General offered.

“Excellent. Once the research team answers our transmission, they can apprise us of their situation, which will allow us to make further and more detailed plans. Assuming they are in good health, and the only thing wrong is their lack of equipment and supplies destroyed by the cave-in, quake or whatever, we can resupply them, and move the team to another location, should it be appropriate. That decision should involve the General and the research team’s superiors, of course, and we will give support as needed. That is my assessment of the situation as I know it. Of course, all that may change the instant we contact the science team and are appraised of the current situation.”

“And what if they are coming under fire?” Jeff asked.

The First Officer hesitated. “Perhaps we should have brought a fire team with us, just in case.”

Or I should have trusted the Miadax and hence given my bridge crew more than just a minimum of weapons training, Jeff thought.

A second later, Jeff and the General passed a glance before Whitworth grinned. “Well, Colonel, it’s been a while since we’ve taken up arms together. Perhaps that day has come again. I think I can still remember which end of a pulse rifle to point toward the enemy. How about you?” he joked.

The Waterfall Campsite

...”Oh, yes,” Dessie agreed. “I’m sure that Mia, her sister and brother-in-law, as well as Karl and Glenda, are all frantic to know what happened. We’ve become quite close, particularly with Mia. We had planned to spend more time with them — much more time — but we want to spend time with our daughter, too. We owe her apologies for the things that have happened...

“No. You owe me nothing; it is I who owe so much to you two,” Selina said as tears suddenly appeared in her eyes.

Arlene walked over. “We need to get started.”

After cleaning up from the meal and ensuring that the fire was permanently out, Dessie and Phillip quickly finalized packing their equipment into their backpacks as well as the packs on the two-wheel cart. As Dessie made sure all the fishing equipment was packed, Phillip noticed the look on her face and came over.

“What’s the matter, Baby?”

Dessie stood looking at their equipment. “This kept us alive, and I never want to get rid of any of it,” she said as she motioned to the tiny rods and reels that folded into something that a true fisherman would be embarrassed to use. But we are never going camping again with straight hooks. There is no telling how many big ones got away because of those damned barbless hooks of yours.”

“Some places require them,” he reasoned.

“Then we won’t go there,” Dessie griped. “But, barbless hooks or not, I caught enough fish to keep us alive before I found the potatoes. Oh, Phil, we could have died — starved to death. You could have died in the fall — oh, just everything.”

Phillip pulled his wife into his arms. “It’s hard for me to get my mind off what has been happening. It ... almost feels odd to be able to move when I want to. I keep expecting my arms and hands to flop at my sides when I start to use them, not to mention not being able to talk. We take for granted so much, but trust me, being able to walk and talk are gifts that we should never forget.

“But my girl always found a way to feed and take care of me, even if she did have to wipe my ass almost every day, not to mention changing my diaper and washing it. And yeah, I knew enough about what was going on to realize most of what you were doing for me, and I will always remember.”

“There was a time or two when I might have wished for disposable diapers,” Dessie returned with a grin. “But I have my husband back...”

“And he owes you his life,” he said before tenderly kissing her.

“I don’t want to forget my stringer,” she said as she unclipped it from a bush at the water’s edge and slung most of the water off.