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Only the Admiral, two of her advisors, and the Human contingent had stayed past the introductory portion of the meeting.
Apparently the information was so extraordinary as to require secrecy beyond even the top clearance.
At least until The Admiral and her friends decided how best to disseminate it through the ranks, and who exactly got into the need-to-know category.
Apparently I wasn’t yet in that category, I wondered if I’d ever be.
In the meantime the Fleet salvaged what they could from the rubble that was once their comrades. The return Jump home had been delayed while the science teams figured out what exactly they were dealing with on the captured ships.
Although, once aboard, they made quick progress. Even though it had been over five thousand Cycles since the last Hegemony ship had been captured intact—and the tech had changed drastically since then—the reverse engineering was completed remarkably fast.
In mere tens of MilliCycles, the weak points in Hegemony ships were identified and incorporated into engagement strategy. The armament of the Cruisers was simple enough to replicate, with the exception of the Gravity Torsion Cannons. Those, while understood in principle, would require the fabrication capabilities of a full scale orbital construction yard, and we’d have to wait til we were back in Collective controlled space before that was an option.
The HyperTransit Drive was a different story however. While the teams were confident that they could be activated—that the ships could be utilized—it was still a mystery as to how the Drives worked. Understanding those, I was told, would take quite some time.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
But the advantage of at least being able to use the captured Hegemony Cruisers was that our Fleet could Jump into Hyper on their coat-tails. We could make the trip back home in a fraction of a fraction of the time it would have taken otherwise.
And this was a great boon, especially because getting back home to warn High Command of… well… of whatever it was that they needed to be warned about, seemed to be a rather major concern of The Admiral and those-in-the-know.
And so, it was in short time that the Fleet was readying for HyperTransit back home in the wake of the two requisitioned Hegemony ships. Rechristianed Crippling Blunder Of Thyne Enemy and Folly Of Those Destined To Fall.
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“Attention Fleet.” The Admiral announced from the bridge of Blunder, where we sat in the hastily reconfigured crash seats.
“This is Admiral Preyl, prepare for HyperTransit on my mark. How are we looking, Lieutenant Colonel?”
“This is Lieutenant Colonel Kelby, reporting from the bridge of Folly. A week and a half spent prepping this Heg Cruiser hitting my head in doorways and choking down the printed mush from these repurposed fabricators, and I couldn’t be more ready to get back home and eat something grown in real dirt. But I digress, Captain Yribia is at the helm and we are ready on your mark, Admiral.”
“Excellent.” She said, turning to Goolie. “Captain, initiate countdown.”
“Yes, Admiral.” Captain Goolie replied. “Preparing for jump. Initiating countdown. Ten, nine—“
I thought about the recent events that our great society, all our great races, had experienced. The things that had brought us together and strengthened our resolve.
“—seven—“
So much had happened, so much had changed.
“—six—“
I found myself wondering what the future had in store for us. A Cycle from now, ten Cycles from now, a hundred Cycles from now, would we look back and and count this another milestone in our society’s list of achievements?
“—three—“
Would we look back and count it among the failures? The catastrophes? The disasters?
“—one—“
Would there even be any of us left to look back at all?
“—jumping!”