Cade looked at Anita and said, “If our Queen will give me the 200 manufacturing facilities, then we should be ready in a year with the short range penetrator.”
Tag said, “The Plants are close to completing the harvesting of the first planet. I suspect that they will finish within 7 months. What if I gave you eight hundred facilities, then how long?”
“Sten’s facilities are huge. If you include those then we could be ready in five to six months. The bulk of the time will be spent building the new fabricating machines; once those are done we will be able to produce more than 300,000 a month.”
Tag was energized. This is what he had been waiting for five years. “Cade, begin making your plans; the facilities will be yours beginning two days from now.”
Cade and Anita smiled and said, “Thank you Your Majesty.”
Tag sighed again and then sent a thought to Danielle telling her what he needed. “Please let us be ready in time,” he thought.
Suddenly Cade ran back in and said quickly, “A Plant Scout has just entered the Dremels system and has broadcast its location before we could destroy it.”
Tag looked at Cade and said, “We have to have the new penetrators ready before the Plants complete harvesting activities. I’m certain that the Dremel will be the first thing they will address after they’re through. We will make this a Realm emergency project, Cade, so don’t let us down.”
Cade bowed and ran from the room. Tag’s display lit up and Admiral Dorg was on the screen. Tag immediately said, “Cade just informed me about the scout. I need you and your command team to come here to meet with me about our plans to handle this issue. Plan to be here in eight drags.”
Dorg nodded and said, “Yes Your Majesty.”
Tag said, “Not you too.”
Dorg actually laughed, “Oh yes, me too. Besides, we’ve been idle too long; it’s time to get back into some real action.”
Tag looked at Dorg and said, “You miss it, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do. Besides, there are some human colonists to whom I owe a blood debt and a close friend that should still be here that calls for us to act.”
Tag smiled and said, “Wait until you see the new toys we have to play with. I think our playmates will not like them at all.”
“I look forward to seeing you in eight drags.”
Rose was sitting in her room listening to her father start making plans for a major assault against the plants. She stood with a frown on her face and appeared to be concentrating. She got up and went to the map room at Castle Gardner and started looking at the wall maps that showed all of the known universe and the millions of galaxies that had been discovered. She sat and thought for a long time neither moving nor showing any expression. Finally she gave a heavy sigh and looked up at the map that had the Milky Way on it. Suddenly, all of the galaxies around the Milky Way started changing positions relative to each other and then came to a stop. Rose looked at the closest galaxy to the Milky Way. “I hope I’m wrong but I have to make sure.” She thought. “Please, let me be wrong.” She remained in the map room for most of the day for the next four months.
The Fleet Leader sat in his command chair on board the Algean Fleets command vessel pondering the soon to be completed harvesting of the planet that had taken six cycles to complete. There was only two thirds of a cycle left until harvesting operations were totally over and he was curious about why the Strangers had not interfered on any massive scale. The previous five cycles had only seen minor appearances by the strangers and it just didn’t sit right with him. Why were they waiting to attack? Had they just given up? They had discovered a way to get around their frequency ships, he had a recording of that ship jumping into the system, but then they had effectively just disappeared. It was a huge waste of resources to keep the three whole fleets in this system but they could not afford to lose the harvest. Something was going to happen; he could just feel it, even though he had no proof, and if the Strangers were consistent with their past actions, it was going to be dramatic. There was still the other planet to harvest and the scouts had found three more during the previous five years waiting for attention. One disturbing discovery was of an advanced technological world surrounded by those small rocks that had destroyed so many of their ships in the early conflicts with the strangers. The Elders think that the system might be the Strangers home system. Before any other harvesting was begun, that system was going to be visited, unless the Strangers came here first. The Fleet Leader was not sure which scenario he preferred. He felt certain of one thing; the next contact was going to be brutal. He hoped he was wrong, but somehow he knew he wasn’t.”
Chapter 20
The Stars Realm Command Team along with Tgon-Gee, Terl, Misty Nicole, Sten, Headman Dgzh, Cade McAllister, Danielle, Rose, Sten, and Tag sat around a large conference table in Castle Gardner’s meeting room. The room had displays that covered most of the walls along with an active universal map. The room was circular so any display could be seen by all. Tag pulled a photo the two new penetrators that had been developed and then said, “Cade, explain how these two new weapons actually perform.”
Cade stood and used a laser pointer to indicate the first display, “This penetrator is designed for ship to ship conflict. It has an armored skin of Coronado Power Cells that are charged to the maximum. It can accelerate faster than anything we’ve ever created or seen and it will also penetrate any screen we’ve ever observed, even ours.” Everyone immediately sat straighter in their chairs; this was an important development. “Once its sensors detect immediate impact, the entire screen around the penetrator will focus directly in front and burn a hole thru any screen it impacts. Once the penetrator hits anything solid, then it will release all of its stored energy into a single blast. We have measured the diameter of that blast to be five miles.” Cade faced the group, “Nothing can out run it, no screen can stop it, and anything it hits will be destroyed. Even the ships that are twenty miles long will not work if a five mile wide hole is blown into it. This is the ultimate ship killing weapon.”
“Is there anything that can stop it?” Dorg asked.
“An anti-matter hit will stop it, however, it is programmed to avoid their missiles and it will blow past anything in its path faster than they can react. Theoretically, if you can surround your ship with antimatter missiles so that there are no gaps smaller than the width of this penetrator, then you might be safe. However, if you do that, then the blast will then lead to a chain reaction of explosions of all the other missiles which will probably destroy the ship in the middle.”
Tag stood and said, “The second penetrator is just like this one except we can jump it to any coordinates programmed in using the null star drive.” Everyone gave a start at this statement. “We have learned that if you use the null drive to jump into a system, it will only read the coordinates of the place it arrived and not the null coordinates. However, if you use it to jump out of the system, then the null coordinates will be read running the risk of letting the Plants learn of the null star drive system. These penetrators, however, will only be jumping in, not out.”
Terl said, “Why do we even need to risk a ship; just jump enough of these in system to destroy their ships.”
Tag looked at Cade and nodded; Cade stood and said, “Picture in your mind what would happen if we jumped these penetrators into the Plant fleet. The fleet would scatter and we don’t have a system big enough to target millions of ships rushing out of a system on different trajectories and get their coordinates into a single missile for each escaping ship. These penetrators have a 1,200 mile limit. Even with their acceleration, ships would block the penetrator’s sensors if they were bunched and a large number would be able to escape. The Megaships could use their systems to target ships that were escaping.”