“Urk,” Bill replied, grimacing. “That’s a very good question. And, no, nobody has. It’s going to have to be cycled up to fire while we’re still in warp. I have no idea if there are secondary effects from that.”
“Just an interesting thought,” Miriam said.
“We’re definitely going to have to test this thing.”
“Come,” the CO said, looking up from his paperwork.
Deep space mission or no deep space mission, in the middle of a situation or not, there was always paperwork. Some of it could probably wait for the trip home, but he hated to see it build up. Hell, there was going to be more paperwork from the new installation.
“I’ve got Hexosehr crawling all over the hull but I’ve brought up a, I think, valid point,” the engineering officer said. “This generator isn’t designed to go under water. We install it on the hull and we’ll have to land in Dreamland to have it deinstalled.”
“I’m sure they’re going to want to get their hands on it, anyway,” Spectre said. Dreamland was a part of a sprawling military reservation, an area referred to by some, incorrectly, as Area 51. Since it was a highly secure area, once you got away from the fringe areas where the nutballs hung out looking for, well, the Blade, it was where the main R D facility for Space Command had been installed and their secondary base after Norfolk.
“All well and good, sir, but we’ve got to land with it. But I’ve been looking at the thing, sir. It’s not all that big, actually. Nor is the fusion generator they’re installing with it. I think it would fit in one of the tubes.”
“So you want to jettison one of the missiles and put it in there?” the CO asked. “Fine by me.”
“I’ll see if we can,” the engineer said. “Thank you, sir.”
“Just get me an operational weapon, Eng. I don’t care if it’s installed in the wardroom.”
“So that’s the new super weapon,” Himes said. “Doesn’t look like much.”
The chaos ball generator was a squat cylinder, less than two meters high, with a bulbous end that made it look vaguely obscene. A group of Hexosehr were fussing around it and the similarly shaped generator it had arrived with.
“What’s it do again?” Smith asked.
“Shoots chaos balls,” Berg said. “I have no clue what that means.”
“So we’ve got something that looks like a gongoran that shoots flaming balls?” Himes said. “And we’re named the ASS. This is just getting worse and worse.”
“And why are we out here?” Smith asked. “I mean, it’s not like we’re going to be turning a wrench or anything.”
“Because we’re about to pop a missile out,” Berg said. “At which point, somebody has to secure the warhead. Who secures nuclear warheads, Lance Corporal Smith?”
“Marines,” Smith said glumly. “I’m just getting tired of standing around on the hull all the time.”
“Would you rather be in your bunk?”
“Come to think of it, yes!”
“Here we go.”
The missile was not being fired out but carefully lifted by a team of missile techs. It was only possible because the ship had gone to microgravity and they still had to do it slowly.
Once free of the tube the missile was slowly rotated onto its side and secured to the hull. Then the missile techs removed the warhead itself from the terminal stage. Last, the missile was unceremoniously pushed off the hull and into space.
“Seems like a hell of a waste,” Himes said. “One of those things runs a few million I’m sure.”
“Fifty-three,” Berg said. “But what are we going to do? Strap it to the hull to take home?”
“We’ve got all this other junk,” Himes pointed out. “Why not?”
“The junk isn’t explosive?”
“The warhead is,” Smith said as the missile techs approached. “And we’ve got to get it down to the armory. Does anyone else get a pucker factor from that?”
“The warhead is filled with quarkium,” Berg said. “Which pound for pound is more expensive than diamonds and can also be used to fuel the ship. And we might find a use for it. The missile… don’t think it will be much use. Last but not least, those are our orders.”
“You know, Two-Gun, sometimes you’re just too gung-ho for your own good,” Himes said as he took one handle of the carrier the warhead was secured to.
“Be careful with that thing,” Berg said. “And there is no such thing as too gung-ho.”
“Any word from the Caurorgorngoth,” the CO asked as he entered the conn.
“Negative, sir,” the XO replied. “At least nothing we’ve gotten from the Hexosehr.”
“Unless my eyes deceive me, the Dreen are overdue,” Spectre said, sitting down in his chair and accepting a cup of coffee from the COB.
“Yes, sir,” the XO replied.
“Status on our installation?”
“Doing the final fitting of the system, sir,” the XO said. “I went down to watch. It’s really rather fascinating.”
“That is so cool,” Miriam said.
She was in armor, floating just off the hull and looking down into the missile tube.
The team of four Hexosehr doing the installation of the chaos generator were attaching it to the side of the tube. The ceramic sheath on the interior had been removed and they were welding the weapon to the bare metal sides of the tube. Welding, though, wasn’t the right term. Melding was the term. A circular fitting had first been melded to the exterior of the generator and it was that which was blending, seamlessly, to the steel of the launch tube. The device they were using looked something like an oversized soldering iron. How it was making the two metals blend was, to Miriam, a mystery. And she had more than a casual understanding of metallurgy, having worked in the steel industry for a couple of years.
“How does it work?” she asked.
“I truly do not know,” Baelak replied. “You’d have to ask Rimmild.”
“I will,” Miriam said. “I will. That, right there, is a really important advancement we could use. There are thousands of applications.”
“That I realize,” Baelak replied. “Are you going to remain on the ship when they go to battle?”
“Of course,” Miriam said.
“You realize that…”
“I’ve been in a couple of battles before,” Miriam replied. “I know that they’re no fun. But where else would I go? Your ships are full and don’t have any of my needs. Besides, I’ve learned enough of the ship’s systems that I might be able to help if there is damage.”
“May the others stay as well?” Baelak asked. “Rimmild and Dugilant? They may be of use.”
“I don’t see why not,” Miriam replied. “What about you?”
“If you fail in this battle,” Baelak replied, “if the Caurorgorngoth is lost as well, then the Dreen will finally take us. I would much prefer to be in sleep and never know our fates.”
“You know, just when I think we’re similar as a species, I realize we’re not,” Miriam said. “That is a decidedly unhuman approach. We always want to know what is happening, right up to the point of death. In part, I’d guess, because we are so good at denial. Right up to the point of death we believe it can’t really be happening.”
“The Hexosehr are not that way,” Baelak said. “We see reality very clearly and do not deny it. We may disagree on certain points, but we still see reality. It is only how to deal with it about which we disagree.”