“Yes, Colonel Teller.” The AI’s voice was professional and respectful. Teller had heard Cain complain about Hector before, but he himself had nothing but praise for the semi-sentient computer. Erik would have been pleased - and a little pissed - to know how well Hector had behaved in his absence. “Major Brinn on your com, colonel.”
“Good evening, major.” Teller glanced at the chronometer. “Actually, I suppose good morning is more appropriate. Barely.”
“Good morning, sir.” Brinn was trying not to sound half asleep, with limited success. The troops of 1 st Division were mostly veterans, especially the officers. But none of them had been expecting an alert. The Powers were all at peace, and there had been no indication of imminent hostilities. “What can I do for you, sir?”
Teller took a short breath, feeling mildly guilty about the job he was about to dump on 1 st Division’s chief armorer. “The division is on full alert, major. I need you to do a full diagnostic check on the ordnance.”
There was a brief silence. Hand-checking almost 10,000 suits of powered armor was a massive undertaking, and Brinn’s team was understrength just like the rest of the division. “Yes, sir.” Brinn paused for a few seconds, and Teller could hear the officer’s breathing over the com. “Sir, I am very short of manpower. Is it possible to loan me some technicians?”
“Sorry, major.” Teller wished he had the personnel. “We just don’t have the bodies. The whole division is getting ready to bug out. There’s just no one to spare.”
“I understand, sir.” Brinn was silent for a moment, but when Teller didn’t say anything, he continued. “With your permission, sir, I will get started. We have a lot of work to do down here.”
“By all means, major. Get to it.” Teller cut the connection and glanced down at the screen on his workstation. The combat prep checklist was displayed. The first several items were highlighted in blue, indicating they were completed or underway. The rest of the list, which ran all the way to the bottom of the screen and scrolled off, was still red. “Hector, get me Captain Masters.” It was going to be a long night, he thought. He scrolled down the list, all the way to the end. A very long night.
Cain was exhausted. They’d been there for six hours, and they had watched all of the transmissions three times. He kept hoping it would show something different if they ran it again, but it was the same every time. The colony fleet had been attacked with weapons far more devastating than anything the Powers had deployed before. The implications were sobering. Whatever Superpower possessed that technology could probably take on and defeat all the others. The entire balance of power on Earth was at stake, not to mention the newly won semi-independence of the Alliance colonies.
“I’ve never heard of anything with thrust capacity like that.” Cain’s voice was hoarse, and he practically had to shout to force out something audible. “Bigger reactors?”
“I’m afraid it’s more complicated than that, General Cain.” Colonel Thomas Sparks was the Corps’ chief science officer. Head of the R&D team that produced the newest model fighting suits, Sparks was one of the most brilliant weapons designers who had ever lived. “The maximum yield of a fusion reactor cannot generate the thrust levels we see on these transmissions.” Sparks looked extremely uncomfortable, as if considering something he couldn’t quite figure out. “There has to be another power source at work here.”
“More powerful than a fusion reactor?” General Holm had been silent for a while, preferring to let his command team discuss the situation while he sat and listened. But now he spoke up. “What could that be?”
Sparks looked at the Commandant. “There’s only one thing known to our science that could theoretically generate that much thrust.” His voice was timid, as if he was suggesting something insane. “Antimatter.”
“They’d been producing antimatter for 200 years now.” Cain had started with a silent thought, but somehow he ended up blurting it out.
Sparks shifted in his chair and turned to face Cain. “Yes, general, that is true. However, there is a difference from the production of small quantities for research and…”
The door slid open, and Augustus Garret walked purposefully into the room, his boots clicking loudly on the hard metal floor. “Good morning, all.” He looked harried, but of course they were all edgy and tired, and Garret was no worse than anyone else. He nodded appreciatively as Holm motioned toward an empty seat, and he walked over and sat down, dropping with considerable force into the chair. “I got here as quickly as I could. Perhaps you’d be good enough to catch me up.” He paused, but just for an instant. “I’ve seen the transmissions.”
Sparks leaned forward slightly, but he wasn’t sure he should address the admiral’s question himself. There was a lot of rank sitting at this table, including the commanders in chief of both the navy and the Marines.
“Colonel Sparks was just addressing the likely power source for the missiles we see in the transmissions.” Holm had seen Sparks’ discomfort, and he jumped in to make it easier for the colonel. “Please Tom, continue.” He thought a little informality might ease the tension. There was a lot of stress in the room, and the last thing they needed was more, especially over something foolish like rank. Sparks’ hesitancy was understandable, but not particularly helpful.
“Yes, sir.” He glanced over at Garret. “I was just saying, admiral, that my only hypothesis for the power source is antimatter. I know of no other way to generate the thrust levels we see in the transmissions.”
“Could that also explain the yield of the warheads?” Garret was matter-of-fact, accepting the scientist’s premise and moving on from there.
Sparks nervously cleared his throat. “Yes sir. That is a possibility.” His eyes wandered to Cain then back to Garret. “We have only been able to make very rough estimates on the mass of those missiles. We could build fusion warheads with yields that high, but they would be too big to be feasibly deployed. An anti-matter warhead would be able to achieve the same yield with a much lower mass.” Sparks’ mind was racing as he spoke, going over every detail he’d seen on the transmission. He was still thinking this all through, and he didn’t want to make a mistake. Not now. Not in front of those assembled here. “Nevertheless, while it is theoretically possible to achieve a six gigaton explosion through different means, there is no other method known or hypothesized that could achieve those thrust levels.”
Garret nodded, his expression grim. “So we are dealing with one of the Superpowers that has developed the capability to weaponize antimatter?”
Sparks’ started to shake his head, but he decided that wasn’t the way to disagree with a five star admiral. “Well sir, that would seem to be the case, but…” He paused, not sure if he should continue.
“Please go on, colonel.” Garret’s voice was friendly and informal. “We’re all here to work on this together. Speak your mind.”
Sparks still looked uncomfortable, but he nodded and continued. “Well, sir…ah…as General Cain noted just before you arrived, we have been producing antimatter for 200 years.” He shifted his gaze around the room as he spoke. “However, the energy requirement for creating even small quantities is prohibitive. Early 21 st century methods were able to generate only nanograms, and the storage methods were crude and insufficient to preserve even such minuscule quantities for more than a few minutes.” He took a breath and continued. “Two centuries of ongoing research have brought us to the point where we can generate a few hundred grams at a time and store them for a period ranging from hours to days.” He paused for a few seconds, panning his eyes across the table. “A six gigaton detonation would require almost 100 kilograms of antimatter.” He let that sink in before continuing. “If one of the Powers has developed the ability to produce and store that quantity, they have made a quantum leap…probably a thousand years ahead of where we are today.”