erios909
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A2 - Chapter 34 – Standing Orders and Transit
🕑 Added 2022-10-28 09:16:27 +0000 UTCNote from author: Hey all of you lovely patrons! You might have noticed that there are a bit of spelling and grammar errors in the latest patreon posts. This is because I've been releasing them fresh off the page essentially with just a quick glance over for mistakes.
I've been doing this so I can get as much content out to you as fast as possible. It's entirely probable that some errors sneak into every chapter. My goal is to get you up to 15 Early Access chapters for your pleasure. Once we hit 15, I plan to slow down releases a bit and give them a bit more editing and proofreading time, but still do my best to be at least a little faster than one chapter every other day.
So here's another chapter, I hope you enjoy!
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USD: A few hours after departure from Ackman Station
Location: Enroute to Nu Crateris Jump Point, Tears of Fire
Alex had discussed the mission with Elis, and after some examination of the specifics they decided to accept.
True enough to his word, Wyles had smoothed things over with Mr. Whitely for them. Which was good, because the Portmaster had been having fits that the construction crew for the manufactory job was completely comprised of the Tears construction bots.
Apparently, the drones were a safety hazard. Alex suspected they were much safer and more efficient with Nameless controlling them than any human crew would be in the same circumstances but revealing that to the Portmaster wasn’t an option.
Sadly, the production on that had to halt once they accepted the Dedia IV relief mission.
It had taken four days to load the Tears, even with all their remaining cargo bots assisting them. Nameless had scrambled all the construction bots to rigging more cargo hangars inside the hull, and all the space had been required.
News of the nature of their mission had spread. The people on Ackman station turned out to have close ties to their neighbors in Nu Crateris. Pallet after pallet had arrived at the Mooring arm with donations of food, clothing, and just about everything one could imagine. Including piles of guns. Piles of loose old projectile guns and boxes of ammunition to go with them.
Alex was glad it wasn’t their job to sort out that mess. It did pose more logistical problems, and she had to put her foot down when Nameless had informed her they would need an additional hangar platform inside the ship if they were to load any more.
Those sections were already a hazard in combat, and now there was the remote possibility they would need to take the Tears into atmosphere. That was her next priority.
“Nameless, can you please show me our engineering display for navigation?”
[Affirmative: Displaying Navigation Status.]
| Navigation: Nominal |
|| Sub|Astrogation: Nominal |
|||Ter|FTL – Waveform: Nominal |
|||Ter|RCS – 128/128 |
|||Ter|Linear Drive Thruster: Nominal |
|| Sub|Aviation: Marginal |
|||Ter|Aerodynamics: Nominal |
|||Ter|MPVT Accelerators: Nominal |
Alex read over the data. “Our upgrades to the Linear drive was canceled due to other things coming up, weren’t they?”
[Notice: Industrial taskings have been prioritized over ship upgrades. No current drive upgrade is in progress.]
“I’m not blaming you, we had things we needed done. You told me we could upgrade the Bi-phase Linear drive to anti-matter enhanced.”
[Informative: Upgrade currently possible with existing resources.]
“Next, our ship is much heavier than is standard, do you think it is still atmospheric capable? I noticed aviation is listed as marginal.”
[Notice: Current maneuvering thrusters TWR is below 1 for Dedia IV. Atmospheric Linear Drive usage is not recommended due to hazardous exhaust.]
“Yeah. First priority, fix that. Can we increase power to our Magneto-Plasma RCS system by shunting power from the Linear drive? Or… just increasing the amount of thruster ports?”
[Informative: Both options are possible. Shunt systems will degrade system integrity by a small amount. Additional RCS thruster mounts will increase ship maneuverability in all environments.]
“So, we need both of those. Plus the anti-matter upgrade for the Bi-phase Linear drive. I need you to crunch some numbers. Assume we need to get to Dedia IV as fast as possible, and then possibly enter the atmosphere. What’s our best option, upgrade now or will it slow us down?”
Alex waited for a minute for Nameless to come up for an answer for them.
[Informative: Upgrading Bi-phase Linear drive to AM Enhanced Bi-phase Linear drive will save approximately 25% travel duration to Dedia IV orbit. Upgrading shunting and RCS thruster mounts concurrently will reduce this to 22% duration.]
“Great. Make it happen. Also about the new hangars. We need a way to get rid of them, safely. I am not going to have anyone onboard the ship, and they are going to want to unload as fast as possible, I’m sure. So ideally we would be able to just detach the hangars and float them out once in orbit.”
[Informative: A new access hatch matching hangar specifications is possible, however a reduction in hull integrity would result. Furthermore, this would reduce our time of arrival speed from drive upgrades from 22% to 20% if done concurrently.]
“That’s not the greatest but go ahead and add that as well.”
She tried to think of anything else to set in motion, but drew a blank.
“I think that’s everything. I’m going to go spar with Elis to practice my new ANUF things.”
[Notice: Traumatizing or injuring the ship’s most productive human crewmember is not advised.]
“Don’t worry we have power armor now!”
---
USD: Later that day, after a brutal sparring session
Location: Enroute to Nu Crateris Jump Point, Tears of Fire
Alex sat at the table in the mess, her head on the table while a bag of ice sat on her cheek. “You broke my jaw,” she mumbled sadly.
“You’re talking again, so it’s already healed. I’m sure it won’t be problem when the pizza is done.”
Alex wiggled her nose, sniffing the air, the fragrant smell of the ‘pepperoni’ pizza filling the room.
“I’m cured! Let’s eat!”
“Ten more minutes.”
Alex grumbled, “Cooking is the worst, because you have to wait for it to get done.”
“Every good thing takes time.”
“We should install a Jaco’s inside the ship, then we wouldn’t have to wait.”
“I don’t think a kebab shop is appropriate for a warship.”
“You just don’t want to admit my amazing ideas.”
Elis gave her the look.
Alex bit her bottom lip, “Fine, we can ask Jaco to franchise on A-3123Y as soon as it’s ready for employees!”
|Idyllic galley |
|A most, tasty fragrant smell |
|Cooking for the masses |
Elis looked a bit shocked, “The rock is writing Haikus? Plus, its listening in on us?”
[Affirmative: Laser comm link established with Avatar approval. A-3123Y wished to monitor Tears of Fire to continue to learn. This unit has been providing educational assistance and problem-solving recommendations.]
Alex nodded, “It wanted to be part of the team. I didn’t think blocking it out would be nice, since we are the only ones it has to talk to.”
|Fiery morning sights |
|A graceful redhead training |
|With a beautiful smile |
Elis’s cheeks turned red, and she began to fidget, “Maybe it should talk more instead of just creeping!”
“Well, it is trying now, isn’t it? I think it might just be getting used to us.”
Elis shook her head, then looked at Alex “A restaurant on a station would be much more reasonable than a ship, yes. Although I’m not sure how happy people would be if they found out who their chef was. Also, speaking of employees, I had a few hits for you. I put their files on the ShipNet.”
Alex nodded to Elis, “Okay, I’ll look at them later.”
Worried about what A-3123Y would do while they were gone, Alex picked up her data pad and started poking at the statistics information for the orbital.
“Nameless, can we make a plan for A-3123Y while we are gone? I don’t want it to be alone, or idle. Probably be best if it didn’t try to work on the manufactory alone but getting everything needed for that would be a good idea. Even transporting those items to Ackman.”
[Informative: SubCore A-3123Y is fully capable of carrying out independent orders. Recommend a comprehensive priority list.]
Alex looked at her datapad and started jotting some notes down.
|A-3123Y Important Task List|
|Get required goods for Manufactory ready|
|Finish full schematic for A-3123Y orbital|
|Ensure safety of all personnel on orbital|
|Make sure everyone has good food|
|Increase mining and production operations|
|Integrate with sector economy|
|Produce income stream for Starlight Revolution|
|Try to be discrete and not draw too much attention|
|Build more ships for economic and defense purposes|
Alex finished and offered the data pad to Elis, “What do you think?”
“You put food higher than mining and production operations?”
“Well, it’s the most important thing for people I think.”
|A strong foundation|
|Built a kingdom majestic|
|With kebabs and cake|
Elis looked like she was going to fall over, “Oh my gosh, it is seriously learning from you. This is going to turn into a comedy act if it wasn’t already one.”
Alex narrowed her eyes and stuck out her tongue at Elis, “There is nothing wrong with Kebabs and Cake!”
Elis shook her head, “I’m not sure how well a fully automated station is going to be taken. We had plenty of them in the Federation of course, but when the NAI war started… well most of them turned. I noticed that a lot of automation that we used to enjoy is… done manually now. They have almost twice as much crew on the ships for example.”
Alex winced, “How do they fit everyone in the ship? I can’t even imagine if the Tears had a full complement… where would we store all our extra gadgets and bullets?”
“Hot bunking, extra crew quarters in dead spaces, larger food storage. It’s a lot of extra non-combat mass to keep us humans alive in a tin can these days.”
“I think it will be alright… we have already demonstrated the cargo and combat drones. I think everyone has just assumed its Federation tech and not a NAI running things. I mean, to be fair, it is FedTech. Just the intelligence running it is a bit smarter.”
Elis nodded, “That’s why I’m not against it. Plus, unless you want to run away from everything, our course is sort of already set.”
“You’re right. I don’t want to go into hiding or anything. Honestly everything has been a lot of fun, minus those black ops goons we still can’t figure anything about.”
Elis nodded, “Things have been going well. I’m not sure how fast we can put a team together, but I think we do need more hands. Even if it is just because the three—four of us can’t think of everything.”
“I’ll look over those resumes after we eat.”
“Speaking of… I think the pizza is done!”
An excited Alex jumped out of her seat to come help take it out of the oven, “Yays!”
---
USD: 5 days after entering Starlane to Nu Crateris
Location: Enroute to Nu Crateris, Starlane, Tears of Fire
[Notice: Starlane departure in one minute. Expect minor turbulence on arrival.]
“Roger that, Nameless. Is it going to be as dull as entering the lane?”
Elis spoke up, “Usually it’s a bit more dramatic. I’d watch the hull cam.”
Alex pulled up one of the outer hull cameras. The blackness that existed beyond the ship was nearly absolute, but on the observation deck she had stared out into it long enough to think she had seen some small hints of roiling purple clouds in the dark.
The camera wasn’t detailed enough for that. At least that is what she hoped it was, and not just her seeing things.
[Notice: Transition imminent.]
Alex put her hands on the arms of the captain’s flight chair and waited.
A slight shudder ran through the ship, and Elis’s prediction proved to be true as the camera lit up in a display of color. The ship’s D-field turning from the faint blue shimmer into a brilliant set of colorful hues shifting from blue to yellow and finally red.
There were no flames, and suddenly the intense dissipation of energy on the D-field evaporated, sending a sea of tiny little motes of light and energy floating off into space behind them.
“Well, that was pretty.”
[Informative: All systems nominal, beginning system scan with passive sensors. No nearby objects detected, arrival distance 768 million km from 92 Pegasi ingress point. Displaying astrogation data now.]
Alex’s eyes turned toward the CIC’s main display.
The sun of Nu Crateris, a rather unassuming G2V Yellow Main Sequence star, filled the center of the map. Circling it in various orbits mostly along the orbital plane were numerous planets and moons.
Three small rocky planets were shown to be in quick orbits much too close to the sun to be habitable. The fourth, Dedia IV, was their destination. A fifth, larger rocky planet with no hydrosphere orbited a little further out. The atmosphere was thin and it was far enough away that the temperature during the day was barely above freezing.
Closer to them was a small gas giant, that had at least two dozen smaller moons orbiting it chaotically. Several were highlighted in red to indicate decaying orbits that would terminate with them impacting their parent within a hundred years.
It the outer reaches, there were three smaller ice planets, each with one or two moons each. They were barely large enough to not be considered dwarf planets.
Alex turned her attention back toward their destination, Dedia. Raising her hand she highlighted the planet and the screen zoomed in, a map of the continents appearing and lots of information about its topography.
The planet was covered by 60% liquid water that formed massive oceans. There were three major continents which were broken up by massive mountain ranges in the center of each one, with large river networks flowing out from them.
Alex flipped the map view to a geopolitical view, and several areas were highlighted in various shades of red to blue.
The colony was entirely situated in a small area on one of the continents near the equator. The largest city marked by a vivid red circle, and a marking indicating various manufacturing facilities along with a space elevator that could facilitate transfers between orbit and the ground.
That was likely going to be useful for unloading Alex realized.
The map zoomed out further to a orbital view and highlighted an object in orbit around the fifth planet. The label read ‘Crateris Station’ with a infographic indicating a population of fifty thousand people.
Elis spoke up, “Nameless, what do we have for system traffic?”
[Informative: Ninety-seven small vessels have been recorded. Three super freighters are outbound and on course for the 92 Pegasi jump point. Multiple freighters are in orbit in proximity to Dedia Prime’s space elevator. There is also a small stream of traffic between the planet and Crateris Station.]
“Set course for Dedia Prime’s space elevator. Maximum burn. If you can try pinging the elevator station with a tight beam, see if you can get the governor on the line so he knows we are on the way.”
[Affirmative: Raising AM Bi-phase Linear Drive power to maximum.]
[Notice: Fuel reserves will be depleted upon arrival to approximately 25%. A full speed return journey will not be possible. Recommend replenishment.]
Alex looked over to the communications console, “Elis, let’s figure out where they sell the gas here while we wait for a response.”
Elis nodded, “Sure thing, let me see what’s on the system infonet.”
Comments
fireok
So she stared into the abyss, now when will the abyss stare back?
Jonathan Wint
Cool 😎!
Erios909
I think this is already covered under the Biological Modifications physical ability
Straven
Seriously love your story! Thank you for another batch of great chapters.
Jonathan Wint
1. One upgrade I would suggest would be have her Nanites removing carbon from the CO2 in her blood this would allow her function indefinitely in space with a spacesuit she just will recycle the oxygen and run off whatever energy source nanites run off. Level 2 Later level of upgrade could be to remove the carbon from inside herself from the CO2 this would make her almost non-dependent on centralized organs. Her heart stops beating she wouldn't even pass unconscious just get weak because her muscles wouldn't have sugar to Run Her brain wouldn't die of oxygen starvation. Alternatively she might pass out. She could heal more effectively from devastating damage. If you stop her heart beating by say shooting it it can now slowly safely heal. For one thing if she ran out of blood her body would still stay alive and slowly begin healing her she couldn't bleed out because the most important thing blood does is carry oxygen well she no longer can die from lack of oxygen. That would make her a lot tougher.
Jonathan Wint
And I wonder if that's how her progenitor might have gotten into trouble wanting to upgrade the entire race for its own good? You know she was trying to literally come up with a way she could save them.. as in saved them as uploaded data uploaded into maybe a simulated world? Meaning to the explanation she kept giving humanity "I want to save you this is for the good of humanity."have a very dark and bizarre meaning.
Jonathan Wint
Suggested for instance for a Gray goose scenario which would cover the entire earth would 634 years single out break. Can you imagine the horror but your planets dying and you realize you have less than 634 before it's completely covered In nanites. If you're space fairing Species the plus side you got time to escape.. but if your not you have a a few centuries before your before your planet becomes uninhabitable and 634 years to know it won't exist anymore... But that's assuming the nanites would take everything. Instead of just the elements they need. Human bones behind because they don't need all that calcium but all the carbon taken from the body.. concrete reduced to powder as all the oxygens removed from it all very brittle calcium. All the water would be gone hydrogen and oxygen are both useful to nano machines. Would they destroy the entire planet taking out the iron core or would that be too much work? Likely they would dissolve the crust and then wait for the new magma layer to cool and then try eating that later. Leaving behind minerals that they have no use for. Yeah that might be less than 634.. the planet would look like hell it self. As it slowly being dissolved. Ecosystem dying.. Having key minerals removed from it. Imagine humans with a slow nanite infection killing them stripping minerals from them. Imagine Alex just saying stop repair...And reversing it....She could rip someone apart and integrate their minds Nueralnets and even Rebuild them as VR or as Androids or even restore them as humans. But that would take a lot of time to save the minds and integrate them into an artificial neural net cell by cell. Yep scary.. imagine upgrading an entire species with a mechanical infection that would take perhaps weeks.. it would make the star trek boig hell of a lot more horrific. But that would be a full conversion not what we actually see in Star Trek. But yeah you could break down an entire human being nervous into an artificial neural net and take their very soul. Stealing their mind. Or she could just put nanites through someone slowly without telling them like microplastics inside your blood.. and all they would have to do is monitor each neuron copying.. I wonder if she would do that to save Elos's life. Somehow I could see Alex doing it to save her live and I could see Ellis being horrified and she's changed into a upload without even knowing she was copied or integrated. https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/206889/how-long-would-a-grey-goo-scenario-take-to-finish-coating-an-earth-sized-planet
Erios909
You can suggest future research upgrades they find for ANUF in the future, sure!
Jonathan Wint
@erios909 I have two questions.. I like the idea that Alex gets a list of upgrades that will improve as time goes by.. 1. But would you mind if we suggest upgrades? I used to role play a lot of cyberpunk. My the best system I ever saw was (Tor cyberpapacy). 2. What are the size of Alex's nanites. I don't think she has a theoretical string machines which would be smaller than an atom made out of quartz. But I'm betting the far smaller than a normal human cell to allow for a proper brain neural interface that's assuming she has a brain. Nope that isn't a dig it's quite possible her head might be just filled with nanites that she is basically a Terminator... But what had nanites can do and not do will be a lot of ways determined by the size. One really interesting possibility for a very powerful night human has been suggested by a futurist where the nanites infuse the entire body create their OWN secondary neural net that in the phases with the human bodies Brain effectively making you one giant brain with separate momentary neural processing running for your entire cellular makeup to do that by the way they wouldn't have to be very small about human brain cell size. And that would actually allow backups and even downloads and uploads not merely copying the personality. It was allow into reaction with the brain machine which is what she has now so they are at least neuron size. It's also possible that had genetically engineered body is genetically engineered to allow for neurons to fully integrate with the nanites. But if they would say 20 times smaller than a living cell she could be immune to viruses. Able to do genetic repairs. That we will have that IN 20 YEARS... Another possibility is that that size you could remove carbon from carbon monoxide inside the cells meaning she effectively wouldn't need to breath. Happily recycling the carbon and oxygen at a cellular level.. she wouldn't even need blood to move that often except to deliver proteins and move carbon around and perhaps regulate the body's temperature. It's also possible at that level that her cells might be themselves cybernetic. For instance she might not have mitochondria but Nanites. Basically to do real cellular repairs they would have to be smaller than a cell to do an effective brain body link they would need to be able to create links throughout the brain assuming she has a living brain at the size of a neuron. At that size it will be a little bit like they wear food dye in a celery stick. But at the sub human cellular level say 20 times smaller than a cell you would get to do things like changing a genetic code. When she was created was she actually grown from a baby in a womb or was she literally grown by the nanites an adult woman sell by cell if the latter... yeah they would have to be about 20 times or smaller than a human cell. At that size her powers would be limited by the amount of nanites she has. Also by the amount of work they could do without cooking her alive by the generated heat. You could make a entire body of nanites but there limits because of physics.
Jonathan Wint
I was thinking an alien crew member that was supposed to be this nonsensient animal that was being driven into Extinction on its own planet and has full sentience. I also think it would be fun if she runs into an alien queen that's intelligent you know because Alex's an alien queen.. something I don't think Alex or Elis have any idea of. Yeah that's what I pretty much I'm convinced Alex is the nanite Queen. I thought about her other brothers and sisters.. and I have a theory. Entity was shooting out progeny each one with more of a download than the next because the first thing she would want to shoot out is one that was survivable say 1% download and while she was doing that she was building another princess that was more of a download. Remember she's being eaten alive by the federation counter nanites. And she doesn't know how long she can hold out. So she shoots off the next one.. that's is say 3% download. Then she shoots out another one that's a 10% download.. ect.. the last one she didn't have time to put into slipstream because it's the Omega.. it's the one with the biggest download with the greatest Authority. That's what I think's been going on but there's still lots of mysteries with the original ship graveyard for instance there were ships they hadn't simply floated off in a debris field. I think her brothers and sisters would come in occasionally looking for the youngest most powerful sister. I also think they rule some of the other territories.
ShadeByTheSea
I really hope they don't get a pet anytime soon. It would either just be a side note, or take over the story. I want a story about ships and nanites!
Jonathan Wint
Alex " But I want to keep Him He Followed Me Home! I will Walk him Every Day! Just Give him a Chance!" Elis" (O-O) A Rexxor is not a PUPPY OR A CAT NO NO JUST NO! OH F*&K NO! NAMELESS EXPLAIN! She can not keep the Flesh-eating Space Monster!"
Erios909
Thanks, I had to read it twice after you mentioned it to find the paragraph where Alex called it a him.
Rainer
You have the characters calling A-3123y a 'he'
Erios909
I think the NAIs default to 'it', unless they express a desire otherwise. Alex obviously thought Nameless was a man though because of his appearance inside the ShipCore and him saying he preferred they use whatever pronoun they wanted. A3123-Y hasn't expressed any desire either way yet.
Jonathan Wint
It's wonderful I do not mind mind spelling errors. To hell with all spelling Nazis!
Rainer
So you've decided A3123-Y is to be male? Did it decide, or is there another reason?
Rainer
Completely understandable. I find many authors that make spelling and grammar errors on Patreon. Don't let nay-sayers get to you. If they don't like it, they can unsub.
