Between the Altar And the Mercy Seat
Outside the Republican Union Ship Blind Man's Zoo
Landing Pad 3225, HQTRS,Freeman Lang, Terranova
9/14/2101, 0015.14 American Time
"We can't wait too much longer," Chief Warrant Officer Royce "Finn" Huckabee whispers, the howl of sirens and the sweep of searchlights competing with the rising suns.
"We lift now, Padre," he says to the old black preacher standing beside him,"or we're just screwed, with no Vaseline, when-"
"We wait on Smitty," Robert Cheney replies, before coughing up his damn frickin' lungs again, the twenty-year veteran of the Terranova Republican Spacefleet's Pathfinder Service wondering for only the millionth time in the past five minutes, just why in the hell had he chosen to go over the damn wall, at the same time, his right hand goes to the M2049 250-gigajoule laser pistol resting in its holster, his left hovering over the hilt of his laser lance, his stomach doing flipflops, as he resumes pacing underneath the tail of his SR-142B-class pathfinder, blowing cold smoke out of his mouth with every step he takes.
The preacher man just stands there, looking in the direction of First Street, leading from Gate 1 to the flightline, occasionally hacking up more bloody blue-green mucus...that unpleasantly reminds Huckabee of his own mama, coughing up her damn frickin' lungs from Lindsey's disease, being told by the quacks that it was all her effing fault she was sick, just before the greedy goddamn bastards slapped her in an automedic for the last eighteen months of her life.
He sighs, blowing more cold smoke into the second dawn Terranova will see in a twenty-four hour day.
Ten years ago, and, still-
"Sunnuvabitch!" he interjects, drawing his laser pistol with one hand, using the other to shield himself from the roar of white light blinding him, Smitty's voice cutting through the light, shouting for Huckabee to "get that effing goddamn cargo ramp down, do it now!"
Outside the Republican Union Ship Blind Man's Zoo
Landing Pad 3225, HQTRS,Freeman Lang, Terranova
9/14/2101, 0018.00 AMT
Just as he says that, Micheal Smith, late Adjutant-General of the Terranovan National Police, has to duck down, turn round and start shooting into the light with his drawn Colt Double Eagle massdriver pistol, the Choctaw's autolaser turret spitting blue fire at the massdriven rounds and laser pulses coming back at him and the three others running like hell for the cargo ramp that Finn managed to drop to the ground, Finn and Robert Cheney standing with him, laying down fire with their laser pistols, the two Gnats what brought Robert and Precious Syms here clomping their way down the ramp, volleying bursts of .502 slugs from their M16A4s, Freddie Barker barking for Smitty to get his ass aboard the bird, now, he and Vining'll hold them off, Freddie then shoving the older man up the ramp, Finn and Robert both following him up, the autolaser quad turret in the pathfinder's belly opening up on the Marines advancing by squads towards them.
Rush and improvise ain't no frickin' plan of action, his old squadron leader's words echo through his skull as a sort of rebuke for the mess the hajjies in general, and Smitty, in particular, has found himself in.
He was stupid to think he could never fall under suspicion, not with the whole damn planet wired into the friggin' InterWeb and Zellner only getting more paranoid in the years since he burned E.J. Busbee at the start of 9YW...even in keeping a low profile in regards his extracirricular activities, he couldn't help but attract attention, especially with that flying frickin' monkey Baraka in charge of the TSID.
Why he didn't realize that, until after the jarheads running the roadblock on 75 had told him Baraka had given them special orders concerning him, he had no answer, except he'd gotten as safe-as soft-as the rest of the movement.
Cryin' over spilled milk don't change the fact it's spilt, Lieutenant Farabee's ghost is quick to remind Smitty, as a Haziri, quick as shit, swoops down on Freddie and Mark Vining, ripping them both to shreds with the pair of chainblades in his hands, the flying monkey howling, as he starts to charge up the ramp, Finn melting him down like candle wax with a pulse from his laser pistol, just before the ramp closes back up into the ship's cargo bay.
Aboard the Commonwealth Forces Ship Unbroken
Landing Pad 150, Commonwealth Forces Base New Seattle, Big Sky
9/14/2101, 0522.10 Zulu
The workstation terminal bleeps for her attention, Commander Jamilinne Sipe stroking one of the keys on the holodisplay, Chief Warrant Officer Ariel Dixon's holo lighting up her quarters.
"Sorry to bother you, ma'am," Unbroken's flight engineer says,"but I have an incoming communication for you from Admiral Grey, aboard the Commonwealth Forces Ship New York."
Crap.
Her daughter had commanded the first Vinnie, part of the triang of cruisers then-Vice Admiral Kaplan had made the mistake of putting Jami in charge of sixteen years ago.
During what most everyone else called the Liberation of Avalon.
"Put her through, Chief," the captain of the Unbroken manages to say in a normal voice, Ariel's holo instantly replaced with a holoprojection of a striking woman, short, greying red hair, piercing green eyes, an admiral's four black stars superimposed on top of the seal of the Free State of New York on her dove-grey uniform beret.
"Commander," Melinda Grey, commanding officer of the battlecruiser New York and the Commonwealth Forces' Third Fleet, says. "Good morning."
"Morning, Admiral," Jami, checking to make sure she's sending audio info only, replies.
"Just wanted to see if you would join me for breakfast this morning, Jami," the Third Fleet commander says, after a pause.
"With respect, ma'am," Jami replies,"but it's a long way from here to Mars."
"Third, Fifth, Sixteenth and Nineteenth Fleets are descending on orbital approach for New Seattle even as we speak, Commander," Admiral Grey replies, adding,"we got our orders couple days ago, extremely short notice on the part of Mars Command, but given the situation with the neighbors, they've little time to waste on the usual pleasantries."
"Understood," Unbroken's skipper replied, Stevie mumurring as she turns over in bed, spilling waves of auburn hair all over the place, Jami smiling in spite of everything.
"I'll see you for breakfast then, Commander?" Admiral Grey asks.
"I'll be there, ma'am," Jami replies, the Third Fleet commander nodding her head, telling her,"I'll see you then, Commander," before her holo switches off.
"Whawuzzat bou' Thir'Fleet being 'ere?" her wife and second in commander wonders sleepily.
"News to me too, babe," Jami replies, reaching in the dresser drawers above the bed, pulling out a pair of white cotton boxers, a white t-shirt and a pair of white socks, putting them on at the same time she's rummaging in the wardrobe for her dress greys.
"That's what I was afraid of," Stevie, now a little more awake, says, the covers falling away from the top half of her as she sits up in bed.
"Not good, I agree," Jami, pulling on her dress uniform slacks, remarks, before slipping her dress uniform tunic on and buttoning it up, as she's trying to fasten, zip and buckle the belt around her pants.
She bends down and kisses her wife gently on the lips, the two of them rubbing noses, before hugging.
"Mmmmm," Jami whispers,"you make me want to sleep in, y'know that."
Chuckling thoratily, Stevie whispers," Me too, luv."
"But...." she adds.
"I know, baby," Jami replies, sighing.
She kisses her wife one last time, before she finishes dressing up.
Sipe House
374 Sullivan Drive, Owensboro, Terranova
09/14/2101, 0036.65 AMT
"In other news," YouTube's Rachelle English says to National Policeman 1st Class Garrison Lee Sipe and his eldest son Jacob, as they sit in the living room of his house, " Bibb County Delegate Cyndi McKinley addressed the Bibb County chapter of the IAACP, asking minority voters to oppose the fifteen and one half billion dollars in aid which the proposed school bond will bring to Bibb County's beleaguered public education system."
"Zeds is always," nine-year old Jake says," 'ginst the public schools, Daddy; that's what my friend Matt said, and Matt's real smart."
"She claims," the You Tube anchor adds, as Sipe "uh, huhs," his son," that the bond proposal, which the Bibb County Comission heartily approves, is discriminatory against minorities, which is a rather odd claim to make, considering eight of the city's and county's ten public high schools are in majority Haziri neighborhoods...it is interesting, though, that she had chosen to take the same position on this as Terranova Education Minister Gilda Schrenko, who has openly pursued a racist and homophobic agenda, in regards to the Union's public-education system, since her taking office eight years ago, even going as far as to lobby for the dismantling of the public school systems in all 159 counties before both houses of the Common Legislature.
Governor Zellner had this to say on the subject:"
The HV dissolves, refoccussing on the tall, hypermasculine, greying at the temples, proudly homosexual Governor of the Union, as he addresses the General Assembly, the former Chairman of the Union Security Council and head of the TSID clutching his mace of authority in his hands like a second...well, no need to explain that particular simile:
"It is obvious what motivates Ms. McKinley, Minister Schrenko and all the other shrill, barking, foaming at the mouth zeds in their opposition to the Bibb County Board of Education's perfectly-reasonable request for more money...they have refused to reinstitute the misguided program of social promotion which only serves to benefit the academically-challenged amongst the students of Bibb County, a programme which tells all the zeds, ‘it's all right, you don't have to try hard in school, we'll give you a diploma, and you won't even have to break a fingernail.' "
"Just," Zellner adds, after a brief pause to take in the cheering of the Assemblymen and those watching him on the InterWeb ," as the all too powerful, ultra-millitant army of racist zeds, with their cries of ‘rape,' and their witchhunts, conducted with false accusations of sexual harassment against Terranovan citizens and hysterical charges of sexual abuse against the fathers who break their backs ninety-six hours a week for twenty years providing their spoiled, ungrateful brats with the necessities of life, have made it so that their kind do not have to succeed in the workplace...all they have to do is show up, and their fellow travelers will give them jobs, even if they have to steal them from honest taxpaying citizens of this Union, and if any one of us dares speak out, he will be hounded and destroyed by the by the same breed of cold-blooded snake what persecutes us with cries of, ‘murder,' ‘rape' and ‘sexual harassment' while forcing others of its kind to pay for its beneficence with-"
"Damn skippy, monkeybone!" hollers Jacob at the HV in the living room, the speakers built into the walls deafening Sipe with more of same.
"Shouldn't you," Sipe asks him,"be in bed by now, boy?"
"Shouldn't you," Jacob sasses him back,"be putting the boots to your fat-assed poo-"
"That's your mama you're talking about, Jake," Sipe snaps.
"It's a zed," Jacob retorts, before taking a pull from a bottle of Bud he's gotten out of the fridge," I'm talkin' about, Daddy, a good-for-nothin' goddamn zed."
"Ain't like," he adds,"it's a human being or anythin', now is it, Daddy?"
Sipe opens his mouth, not knowing how to reply to that, when a pounding on the door saves him from having to respond.
"Hold on, hold on," he says, getting up off the couch, telling the house's intranet to unlock and open the front door."
"Halfacre," he says to to his partner, National Policeman 1st Class Geoff Halfacre standing at the front door,"what's-"
It's then Sipe's notices the two TSID Special Victims Unit agents on either side of him, one of them holding a verifier unit in his hands.
"The frickin' Adjutant General's been a goddamn hajjie the whole effing time," Halfacre declares, disgust in his voice.
All the explanation Sipe needs.
"C'mon in," he tells the three of them. "Let's get this over with."
Sipe House
374 Sullivan Drive, Owensboro, Terranova
09/14/2101, 0040.26 AMT
"In a prepared statement," Rachelle English says, shifting her short skirt enough to show her audience a flash of her white thong,"Twice-Born Assemblywoman Sally Kern defended the homophobic comments she made before a gathering of local Republicans in Zellnersboro Monday, at the same time Terranova Governor Guy Zellner and Terranova Prime Minister Micheal Bauer both added their voices to the chorus demanding her resignation from and/or impeachment by the Twice-Born Congress."
"Hateful goddamn zed," grouses National Policeman 1st Class Geoff Halfacre, devoting his whole attention to the HV in his partner's living room.
"They're all like that," Garry's oldest boy comments, as he takes another pull from his bottle of Bud, a chorus of "damn right they is"es booming over the speakers, as Micheal Bauer stands on the steps of the Capitol, saying:
"-hate speech, pure and simple, by a spiteful, narrow-minded zed who simply cannot tolerate anything or anyone different from her, and a point of view which simply has no place in twenty-second century society."
Now a whole bunch of "oh, hail naw!"s screamed over the speakers, Halfacre glancing over at the TSID op interrogating Garry, his Human partner holding the verifier close to his head like he was holding a gun on him, nodding from time to time at the monkeyboy asking Garry questions.
He ain't in the back of the car, Halfacre muses, so Garry hasn't effed up.
Yet, he adds to himself...it's obvious to anyone with half a brain that Garry's been off his game lately, staring off into space at odd moments, hesitating to do what he should know by now needs be done, things like that.
It's probably nothing.
He's known Garry since they both graduated from Forsythe eighteen years ago, well enough to know he ain't like that.
It's probably just a mid-life crisis or something, he thinks to himself, but they ain't gonna see it like that, buddy, not with ol' Smitty switchin' teams and Baraka taking command of the National Police as well as the TSID.
And, he adds, making the only decision he can, I ain't backing you up if they have any reason to suspect you, bud, ain't tryin' to be mean, but a man's gotta look out for number one, 'fore they do a number two on him.
Know what I mean? he asks himself, turning his attention back to HV and all the voices calling Sally Kern a bigoted, hateful, mean-spirited, Nazified goddamn zed.
Aboard the Commonwealth Forces Ship New York
Landing Pad 464, Commonwealth Forces Base New Seattle, Big Sky
9/14/2101, 0602.14 Zulu
A master chief in the Legionnaires leads Jami into the wardroom of the 300,000+ ton Albion-class battlecruiser which is the Third Fleet's flagship, Admiral Grey, still in her fatigue greys, seated at one of the tables, a bot putting the last of several dishes' worth of food down in front of her.
"You didn't have to be quite so formal, Jami," the Third Fleet commander remarks, smiling, motioning the captain of the Unbroken to a chair directly across from her.
"Ma'am," Jami replies curtly, her stomach in knots, as she removes her long grey dress uniform greatcoat, the bot taking it from her....
"...than this," Jami says to the assembled mourners, Unbroken's spaceframe covered in repair bots,"that a man lay down his life for his friends."
Fat frickin' lot of good those words will do Sarah's mom, standing with the rest of the senior Admiralty, wind and cold rain whipping at her grey dress uniform greatcoat, neither coming close to wiping away the tears in her piercing green eyes....
"...sit, Jami," Admiral Grey says to her, adding,"I don't bite."
"Ma'am," Jami replies, taking a seat, Admiral Grey adding,"if you're waiting to be served, you're gonna end up starving."
The captain of the Unbroken uncovers a pot at the center of the table, pleasantly surprised that it holds cheese grits, with just the right amount of cheese and butter making them an orangey color...even Stevie's not acquired the taste for them, and she can cook them up perfect.
"Coffee and juice," Admiral Grey adds,"are on the sideboard to your left."
"Thank you, ma'am," Jami says, ladling some grits into a bowl sitting on the plate in front of her, uncovering another dish to discover it piled high with bacon and link sausage, Jami shovelling a generous helping of both onto her plate, along with a couple of chicken-fried steaks on the plate next to it, a covered bowl next to it holding Keenan Valley home fries(from the admiral's native Summer Rain)pungent with yellowflower and pepper and smothered in sausage gravy.
Jami scoops some of that onto her plate as well, Admiral Grey commenting,"good lord, girl, you can go back for seconds, you know."
"Ma'am," Jami replies, the admiral chuckling, smiling, as she adds,"it's Melinda, kay?"
"I..." Jami says, trailing off, forgetting until just now what's happened.
Admiral Grey nods her head, swallowing back the tears in her eyes, smiling again, as she takes Jami's hand in hers and says:
"For a long while, I did blame you, Commander, even after reading the after-action report and looking at the footage from the Vinnie's black boxes...believe me, I watched that over and over, it...."
"It replays in your dreams, doesn't it?" Jami found herself asking, sighing, her face wet.
"Only," Admiral Grey whispers heavily,"every frickin' night, Jami."
"Only," she repeats softly,"every night."
Sipe House
374 Sullivan Drive, Owensboro, Terranova
09/14/2101, 0104.26 AMT
They seem satisfied with his answers.
At least he's not in the back of the car on his way to execution or reassignment.
With Halfacre staying in the living room to cover Sipe, the two TSID agents begin what they call an "enviromental inspection," a fancy term for rifling through the house, raiding the icebox and maybe, checking to see whether he had anything on hand that might be considered damaging to Union security.
The doorbell rings, Sipe telling the house to unlock and open the front door, before he realizes the TSID might not want him to entertain company right now.
Halfacre turns toward the door, hand on his massdriver pistol, the words,"I'm sorry, but-" coming out of his mouth, before he realizes just who is at his door.
"Anything the matter, Garry?" Dad's chief of staff, Vice-Admiral James Bentley Spinks, asks, after nodding a greeting to his partner.
"Adjutant General's gone over the wall, sir," Sipe replies, a sound of whimpering, shouts and flesh striking flesh coming from the master bedroom at the same time.
"I heard," Ben replies, nodding his head, the monkeyboy coming back into the living room, barking out,"I don't think now is the time to be receiving gues-" before he snaps to attention and salutes Ben.
"Begging the Admiral's pardon," the Haziri quickly adds.
"As you were, Master Chief," old Ben replies. "You're just doing your job, though I doubt you'll find anything out of the ordinary; Garry's a good boy, known him all my life."
"Yes, sir, we are aware of the Admiral's association with National Policeman Sipe's family," the monkeyboy says quickly, pulling out his best bowing and scraping just for the chief of staff of the Union's Chief of Military Operations.
"Grrreat Scott," Ben then says to Sipe, ignoring the TSID op altogether,"Garry, you hear 'bout Sally Kern?"
"Watching it on the news just now, sir," Sipe replies, Ben snorting his contempt at BoobTube, as he remarks:
"Liberal Republican media don't never wanna tell you nothing...TSID and Twice-Born National Security found out she's been taking trips to the Oklahoma City Prison Zone, Commies have been letting her have her pick of the inmates, and she helps 'em out with the AFEGs on TB."
"And," he adds, the monkeyboy keeping his mouth shut about Union security,"now those damn AFEGs are bringing their terrorism here, they were behind the assault on the Capitol three days ago, and 'em zeds at Terranova Wesleyan were in on it."
"They were?" Jacob asks, Ben replies,"sure was, Jake. They found about ten meg TSC in the MoneyCenter account of one of 'em soccer players, money that came straight from a numbered account in Fort Gibson that the Commies' State Security Buerau uses for black ops."
The Human TSID op comes into the living room, saying,"I think we're pretty done with the enviromental inspection-"
He abruptly shuts up and salutes the instant his eyes fall on Ben.
"What did you find, Ensign?" Ben asks, the ensign replying,"nothin' out of the ordinary, Admiral."
"I didn't figure you'd find anything, son," Ben remarks, the two TSID operatives saluting him one last time, before motioning for Halfacre to accompany them out the front door.
"Sorry 'bout this, buddy," Halfacre remarks, Sipe telling him it was all good, as he follows the Special Victims Unit ops out the front door.
"Guess," Ben says,"I'll be getting on back to the house myself; Esther'll be worried sick 'bout me being out and about in the middle of the night."
"Yes, sir, good night, sir," Sipe replies, the HV now showing some virally-blonded Sally standing with the man commanding the Terranovan peacekeeping forces on TB.
I know her, I think, a part of him observes, Sally telling everyone on line:
Office of the Special Provost Marshal for Twice-Born
Twice-Born Government Complex
511 Benjamin Zellner Parkway, Zellnersboro, Twice-Born
9/14/2101, 0107.35 AMT
"In a sweep of seven housing projects in the city of Fort Hawkins, just fifteen miles west of the Twice-Born capital of Zellnersboro, Terranovan Republican Marines from the Special Operations Ready Regiment of the 27th Shock Army, assisted by members of the Twice-Born Republican Interstellar Navy's FALCON Team 18 and the Terranovan Republican Special Forces Command's elite Task Force 21, uncovered an extensive cache of Commonwealth-manufactured weapons and munitions, including nearly thirty kilotons of plutonium oxide gas, four hundred tons of VXD nerve gas, 150 tons of various biological agents, twenty thousand laser pistols, laser rifles and autolasers, two thousand man-portable rocket launchers and artillery lasers, thirty self-propelled artillery platforms and at least fifty intact Lynx armored fighting vehicles, these weapons and munitions being earmarked for use by zed terrorists on Terranova, as part of a civil uprising planned by the Conspiracy's leaders in the wake of their attack against the Capitol in New Whitehorse three days ago, according to Terranova Republican Spacefleet Admiral Paul Meyer, commanding the Union's peacekeeping efforts on Twice-Born, the Admiral having personally led last night's raid, which also netted nearly 100,000 people with ties to organizations directly linked to the Conspiracy."
Meyer smiles as he watches the 'cast...he cuts quite the figure in his dress whites and his gold shoulderboards, the Special Provost Marshal for Twice-Born regretting the fact they gave out pay raises instead of medals anymore, 'cause a few of them sure as hell would've looked good on that manly chest of his.
No matter, Meyer thinks to himself, watching himself talk with the virally-blonded little piece of poot, dressed like all its subhuman kind, right down to the short blue skirt which doesn't even come close to covering her lavender G-string panties, the Special Provost Marshal loving the sound his voice makes when he talks:
"-use ‘em on us, sure as hell, Asleigh...worse, they used some of your own kind as shields, forcing them to throw themselves at us by the thousands, expending our firepower, while their dominants hung back and took shots at our boys with virtual impunity...all you limp-wristed right-wing Vargas liberal elites can whine all you want about killing innocent civilians, but you just don't effing want to know...none of you, none of you, is exactly what any of us can call innocent, or civilians, for that matter, you're all out to destroy every decent, God-fearing, good and honest thing we have built with our blood, our sweat, our labor, because you are all jealous of what you can never hope to achieve in a hundred lifetimes. I have no problem with ordering our boys to go in and kill every thieving, whoring, lowlife goddamn one of you, simply because that is the duty of every God-fearing Christian."
"Yes, sir," Ashleigh O'Connell replies, nodding her head slightly.
"Are these zeds," she then asks, doing lines like a good little girl," then, part of the fedayeen we've been hearing so much about?"
"They are indeed ," Meyer hears himself say. "The Commies and their fellow travellers have been turning ‘em out for years, Ashleigh, doing things to ‘em that simply aren't fit for broadcasting...mutilation-especially of the breasts and genitals-torture, electroshock, beatings, starvation, whippings, drugs, gang rape, things that make 'em as hardcore and brutal as their dominants, make them hate themselves and their fellow soldiers even more than before, so they are more than willing to fight to the death and trade their lives for ours."
"'For years,' Admiral," the spoiled little Vargas Sally repeats. "Does that mean-"
"That some in the Twice-Born government and ours knew about what was going on?" Meyer's alter ego finishes her assigned question for her.
"I'm afraid the answer to that's a matter of Union security," he adds,"and I can't discuss it on the IW; what I can tell you , however, is we now have indisputable evidence that the traitor Micheal Bauer-the older brother of notorious terrorist, sexual predator and serial murderer Jamilinne Sipe-is , in fact, a sleeper agent of the Commonwealth's State Security Buerau, who, for years, acted and lived as if he was a loyal servant of our Union, not only because he was ordered to do so, but also, like all your kind, he despised himself and everything he was supposed to have stood-"
The door to his office buzzes.
"Who's at my hatch?" Meyer demands, the second class acting as his receptionist lighting up the holospace above his terminal, replying,"Admiral, Fleet Captain Rabwin is here, on your orders."
"Enter," Meyer replies, the door buzzing open, letting in a tall, natch-blond Human male with piercing blue eyes and features carved from the Tin Gods themselves.
He is the star of the reality series Pax Rabwin; Terranovan Spaceman, commanding officer of CruRon 625, ace cruiser squadron of the Union's Sixth Fleet, and, perhaps the finest man Meyer has ever had the privilege of commanding.
And, for Meyer and the folks back home, he will perform one final mission before Sixth Fleet returns to Nasty Hank for the start of season ten.
"Sir, Fleet Captain Rabwin reporting as ordered," Rabwin says, snapping to recruiting-holo perfect attention, executing a crisp salute which is Meyer's pleasure to return.
"At ease, Fleet Captain," Meyer replies, Rabwin relaxing, but not sitting down.
The Special Provost Marshal calls up a map of Human-colonized space into being over his workstation terminal, immediately coming to the point:
"CruRons 625 and 628 are to proceed to interstellar space along the warpdrive corridor between Sol and Tau Ceti, where they are to deploy mines to deny that route to enemy shipping."
"Aye, sir," Rabwin replies, asking,"is there anything else, Admiral?"
"Nothing I can think of, Fleet Captain," Meyer says regretfully."You're to lift ship in an hour; link up with YouTube's servers the instant you emerge from warpdrive. Dismissed."
"Aye, sir," this Adonis says to him, before turning smartly on his heel and walking out of the Special Provost Marshal's office.
Aboard the Republican Union Ship Blind Man's Zoo
TArch57512 Tony Hawk, 2.2 AU from Terranova
9/14/2101, 0110.26 AMT
"How much frickin' longer do we have to sit here, Master Chief?"an understandably testy Huckabee asks Master Chief Petty Officer Marlin Coates.
"Another hour," the pathfinder's flight engineer snaps, his hands furiously working the engineering holodisplay, sending commands to the bots actually working on the sealed-off McDonnell-Boeing WE5200 warp engine's drivefield generator...the bots have already patched the hole in the spaceframe a 160-terajoule laser beam burned through it, flooding the warp engine housing with more cryogenic helium supercoolant.
The jennie's another matter entirely, 160 TJ lasers having that unfortunate tendency to turn nearly anything they touch into bubbling slag...the bots had to scrape that off the deck, before they could even think to hoist the replacement generator from the cargo bay, through the cubbyhole of a machine shop and into the housing itself...from there, Marlin has to logically reconnect the warp engine to the engine computer and recalibrate the drivefield generator so that it does its magic, instead of making the ship go poof!
That's what's taking so goddamn long, recalibrating the drivefield generator; it has to be right, or they would all die, that simple, but every minute Marlin spends fiddling with the damn thing is another minute the cruisers and warpfighters they left behind in the New Whitehorse corridor have to get entirely too close to this icy-black pebble at the fringe of the Terranovan Archipelago.
If those zeds crammed in his cargo were lucky, all they'd know-for less than a second at least-was the effect 160-terajoule lasers had on half-mile wide glorified charcoal briquette.
Huckabee doesn't believe in any kind of luck which isn't bad.
"It takes as long as it takes, Smitty," he tells his old friend, furiously pacing the ship's tiny bridge, just barely avoiding bumping into any of the four stations,"there's no rushing these things."
"Yeah," Smitty spits out, asking, as he reaches the hatch directly opposite Huckabee's piloting station and Warrant Officer 1st Class Lee Crenshaw's nav station at the nose end of the bridge," got anything to eat on this bucket that didn't come in a foil pouch?"
"Only a pack of bologna and a half jar of peanut butter," Huckabee replies,"and I ain't giving any gurantees as to how both of those been in there."
Truth be told, he's just as frustrated as Smitty, but, right now, it'll do about as much good to vent it, as it would to vote for Governor in the next election.
"If we can at least get some decent programming," Smitty bitches, trying to turn it into a joke...only the passive sensors are online, including the radio telescopes, and they're picking up all the BoobTube an online audience could want.
And, we can't even shout it down, he muses, not that we ever really could, without the TSID Special Victims Unit paying a visit.
"All the BoobTube a man could want, Smitty," Huckabee remarks out loud.
"Like I wanna frickin' see another 'cast about how Sally Kern supposedly said bad things about fudge pirates," Smitty says.
"But, they caught it on YouTube," Huckabee says, with a straight face,"and YouTube's by you for you, not like those lying Commie propaganda broadcasts."
"And, Terranova really is the homeworld of the human race," Smitty remarks sarcastically, before he begins pacing again.
Aboard the Commonwealth Forces Ship New York
Landing Pad 464, Commonwealth Forces Base New Seattle, Big Sky
9/14/2101, 0612.49 Zulu
After a long silence, Admiral Melinda Grey smiles bravely, as Unbroken's captain, Sarah's friend and commander, gently holds her hand.
"It wasn't because it was your fault, Sarah went along with what happened, any of us would've, that's part and parcel of what this uniform entails," the commander of the Third Fleet says, giving Jami's hand a gentle squeeze.
"But," she adds," blaming you was easier for a while, 'cause you were here, and that bastard Guy Zellner was on Terranova."
"If-" Jami starts to say, Melinda giving her hand a gentle squeeze, whispering,"I know you would've, in an instant."
She sighs.
"'Fraid it's not all social, Jami," she remarks, barely regaining her composure. "Mars Command's ordered me to take charge here, we're using Big Sky as a staging area, as well as beefing up the planet to withstand the inevitable Yanker invasion."
The look in Jami's eyes betrays no surprise at this news.
"So Intel's sure?" she asks.
"Dead cert," the Third Fleet commander replies, adding:
"According to Commonwealth Intelligence, Zellner's ordered two squadrons of cruisers to mine the warpdrive corridor between Tau Ceti and Earth's Solar System, part of an all-out effort to deny us free passage in our own home soil."
"True to form," Jami observed, Melinda nodding her head.
"One of the cruiser squadrons detailled to denying us the corridor between Big Sky and the homeworlds is CruRon 625-" she starts to say, Jami filling in the rest:
"Pax Rabwin's squadron."
"The same," Melinda replies.
"CruWrong 8113," she adds, referring to the three cruisers under Jami's nominal command,"will execute a deep-space intercept; the ground crews are loading your ships with additional Smashmouths for this mission, you can lift ship, as soon-"
Unbroken's skipper is already on her feet, bolting the last of her breakfast, nodding her head slightly, before saying:
"With your permission, Admiral."
Spinks House
387 Sullivan Drive, Owensboro, Terranova
09/14/2101, 0118.80 AMT
He's staring over coffee as he sits at the dining room table, HV in the corner telling everyone on line the latest in the Miley Spiers sex scandal, BoobTube being sure to go into excruicating detail about the sixteen-year old "PopTart's" escapades in her mansion's "fantasy room," everyone on line cheering and condemning at the same time....
Vice-Admiral James Bentley Spinks sighs...Esther's asleep in the downstairs bedroom, and both grandkids(Teresa's kids)are sleeping upstairs.
Ben, on the other hand, hasn't been able to sleep good, not for a while, too much he should've done different on his mind.
He thinks about Jami when he thinks about his own grandkids...he should've come forward with the truth when she'd tried to, not just sit there in silence while Zellner helped Ken put her in the damn Phoenix Center.
Or when Ken ran Cyndi down and Jami was the one who ended up going to prison over it....
He nods his head absently, tears blinding his eyes, the seventy-year old man swallowing, as he dwells on what should've been done.
On what he knows he has to keep doing now to try make up for it.
-endit-
