He Who Dares: Book Two (The Gray Chronicals 2) (55 page)

“And then?”

“The hull plating wouldn’t last very long.”

“Massive damage to a Capital ship?”

“Yes,  even a dreadnought or super dreadnought would not be able to stand up long under a continuous pounding from these.”  The three of them looked at each other with the same question in their eyes.

“And can we mount a couple of them on my ship?”  Mike asked.

“I’m afraid not, Captain.  You don’t have sufficient power for more than one small unit.”

“But you do have one that would fit?”

“Yes, indeed, that was one of the reason you were asked to come here, so you could see for yourself."

“Good lord, even with one of the units we could stay way out of knife fight range.”

“As I said, a small unit, and you could only fire it a few times per minute, the power consumption is very high.”

“But as a first strike weapon...”  Mike mused.

“If the enemy wasn’t expecting it, sir, we could seriously degrade his shields at long range.  Couple that with long range torpedo strikes...”  Conner left the rest unsaid.  He could see the wheels turning in his Captain mind, looking for permutation and possibilities.

“That’s another thing, Leftenant Gray.  On your way back out to the fleet, please stop here and reload your torpedo bay, instead of going to Gosport.  We have a few new units for you.”

“And the cannon, or whatever you call it?”

“I’ll have a team arrive at your ship within three days and have the new auxiliary weapon in place within two days.  Our design team made sure that it fits into the same space as the current turret.  There is one proviso, however.”

“And that is?”

“If your ship is disabled, and in danger of capture, you must destroy this unit and the new torpedoes.”

“I have no problem with that.  I wouldn’t want either of them to fall into enemy hands.”  Mr. Houseman held his hand out and they shook.

“Please feel free to look around the facility and ask any question you may have.”

“I have a couple!”  Adam jumped up and almost ran across the room to the tactical consult.

Mr. Houseman excused himself and left them to it, with a promise he be back in half an hour.  Mike and Conner strolled around the rest of the huge lab, looking at the different consoles.  Mike main interest was the observation control.

“How did you manage to see the target at that distance?  In place cameras?”  The man sitting at the consult smiled and shook his head.

“I’m professor Ingles, and this is my contribution.”

“And what exactly is that?”

“How’s your history?”

“Um, a little rusty concerning Dark Side.”

“Oh, I meant in general about early twenty first century astronomy?”

“You have me there, little to none.”

“Not surprising.  Most people have forgotten about this.”

“This being?”

“You’ve probably heard of the Hubbell space telescope, right?”

“Yes, I’ve heard of it.”

“For its time, it was very good, after they fixed it that is.  But it didn’t really ‘see’ far enough.  Then a rather eccentric astrophysicist name Clark noticed that objects on the other side of black hole appeared closer than they really were.”

“I’ve read about that.”

“This puzzled him until he realized that what the black hole was doing was distorting space, creating a lens if you will.”  That raised Mike’s eyebrow.

“Go on.”

“Once Enright came up with his Ag plates, Clark played around with them and created a gravity lens.”

“You’re serious?”

“Oh yes, very.  That what this unit is all about.  It’s an updated version of his original design."

“So why isn’t it still in use.”  Conner asked, then it struck him, as both the professor and Mike looked at him.  “Oh yes, I see, why sit here and look at it when you can go there and see it.”

“Right,” the professor smiled, “so his invention sat in some lab as just a curiosity.”

“Until?”

“We needed a way to optically ‘see’ clearly at long range, rather than advertising our presents with tachyon pulses.”

“Yes, that would be noticed in short order.”

“Complicated setup?”

“No, not really, just the superconducting elements and the projector, why?”

“Just thinking, it would be nice if I could ‘see’ further than anyone else.”

“Oh, I see what you mean, yes, that would be an advantage, not having to ‘ping’ for the enemy.”

“Right.  Any chance of getting some specification on this?”

“I’ll have to talk with the Director, Mr. Houseman, but I don’t see any problem.

“I think between Adam and Gable Bushman, they might just be able to rig something up.”

“If the Director agrees, I could probably let you have the working model, of course, it will only see out to about one light hour.”  He sighed.  Conner blinked and looked at Mike.

‘One light hour!’ he mouthed.

As it turned out, the Director had instruction from someone to give Mike all the assistance he wanted.  The Director ordered it delivered at the same time as the new weapon.  Little was said on the way back, as each was occupied with thoughts of his own, Conner’s was on beer and a certain woman, unlike the others, but as he said.  He’d leave all that engineering stuff to them that understood it.

At the appointed time, the transport arrived with the new drive units, and everyone went outside to see them unloaded.  Cynthia looked skeptically at the bare stern, hoping Adam was right about not needing extensive modifications.  She’d heard that before.  Instead of the usual four, round flat disc unit, these were slightly cone shaped and segmented, and as Adam said, would fit into the existing hold down points without difficulty.  It was the two large tubes that turned out more of a headache.  Cynthia eye the recesses where the plate fitted with a critical eye, then nodded.

“They should fit without too much of a hammering.”  She said jokingly.  “But what’s so special about these units Mr. Adam?”  For a moment, he looked around, but other than the six of them, the others were out of earshot.

“Yes, what’s so different about them, other than they are slightly coned shaped?”  Mike added.

“It's all in the angle of impedance, Skipper.  Normally, the drive plates push against the lines of gravely in a tear shape form.  It’s inherent with the flat plates, and one of the reasons we have to shut down the drive when we land auxiliary ships over the stern.”  Gable put in.  The turbulence is too great for small ships, like a shuttle, or scout ship to handle.”

“OK, I’m with you so far, and...”

“That’s what got me thinking, these are cone shaped as you see, and reduce the angle of thrust.”  He kept grinning with some secret joke, waiting to deliver the punch line.

“These are segmented, so we can control the thrust vector.  The higher the speed the more cone shape they become, thereby, reduce the angle of impedance even more.”  He chuckled.  It took a moment for Mike and the others, except Gable to get it.  Then Mike clicked his fingers.

“Damn!  It’s like a variable pitch prop on an old wet Navy ship.  When you increase or decrease the angle it change the amount of thrust.”

“Yes... yes, that’s it, Skipper.”

“But what about those tubes?”  Mike asked, pointing to the two black tubes the fitters were unloading.  These were ten feet across and twelve feet long.  The obviously fitted into the opening in each drive plate, but for the life of him, Mike could think what purpose they served.

“They serve two purposes, sir, first they help decrease the initial graviton drive flare, and when polarized they will hopefully will give us a completely straight line push at top speed.  In other words, straighten out the magnetic lines behind us into a smooth profile.”

“How does that help us reduce the drive signature, Adam?”  Mike asked.

“Oh that, well, by straightening out the drive flare it won’t cause so much disturbance behind us, and with luck be less detectable.”

“The gravitational flux in our wake should return to normal that much quicker, Skipper, if what Adam and I calculated is correct.”  Gable added.

“Hummm.”  He muttered darkly.  “I see.  Not seeing at all.

“Usually, drive signatures can still be picked up four hours after a ship has passed, depending on the size of the ship.”  Adam explained.  “If what Gable and I calculated is right, these units should cut down the time fame considerable.”

“If we are right, they shouldn’t be able to pick us up after an hour.”

“Good God, we’d be out of sensor range by that time.”  Pete muttered.  “Adam - Gable, you are both geniuses!”

“If it all works the way I think it will.”

“How did you manage to get Gravatronics to produce the units so fast?”

“That was the easy part, they saw what I was talking about right away, it was making the molds that took time.”

“Cynthia, how soon can we sail?”  Mike asked, turning towards her.

“I’d say in about two to three days, give or take a day, it all depends on how quickly we can get the new brackets for those tube thing-a-gigs installed and tested.”

“Pete, send out the recall order to the rest of the crew and have them back here by 08:00 the day after tomorrow.”

“Aye-aye, sir.”

“Hopefully, our second crew of fitters should be here by tomorrow to install the... um, new stove.”  He laughed.  He left Conner to explain.

As they were about to return to the ship, a dark blue Navy turbine truck came down the road and stopped at the foot of the gangway.  Three people got out of the cab, two of them immediately walking over to the group.

“Ensigns Wheeler and Cooper reporting as ordered, sirs.”

“One, sir will do Ensign,” Pete said, returning the salute, “where are your orders?”

“Here, sir.”

Mike stood back and let Pete handle it, but shook his head slightly.  Then he turned to Conner and whispered.

“God, did I look that young when I arrived, Conner?”

“No, sir, not quite.”  He lied straight-faced.  Neither of them looked over eighteen, one male and one female, looking like they’d been freshly scrubbed and polished by their mother.

“Just in case, Conner, run a complete background check on both of them, I don’t want to suddenly find out they’re ringers.”

“Aye, Skipper.”  Mike knew that if they weren’t who they said they were, the ever-suspicious Conner Blake would find out in a hurry.

Pete took his time, carefully reading the orders, leaving both of them at attention.  The orders looked good, as far as he could tell, with all the correct signatures.

“All right, get your gear aboard and report to the Captain ready room at 11:00 hours,”  he keyed his comm unit, “Sergeant Rice!”

“Rice, aye!”

“I have two newbie’s down on the dock, Sergeant, and I need an escort to show them the way to their berth.”