Riven grimaced as another torpedo exploded far too close to the tiny vessel, she was aiding what was left of the Alandran crew through the retreat from the Oort Cloud. Three chaff torpedoes left, after that, they would be defenseless. “Shields down to twenty five percent Captain. I don’t think we’re going to make it to the planetary defenses.”
Captain Jan’Inar gritted her teeth and tapped on the arm controls of her command chair, “Engineering, tell me we have the ripple drive back up?” There was no response from her request.
“Captain, the chief engineer is dead, and the ship is so riddled with holes and fires I doubt communications are reaching engineering.” Riven said with a sigh. Then was forced to launch two chaff missiles towards the four enemy missiles that were bearing down on the Rivendell with monstrous acceleration.
The torpedoes attempted to corkscrew around their interceptor, but their dim AI’s were no match for Riven, who detonated the bomb pumped masers through the defractors with millimeter precision over three kilometers away, reducing them to slag. “We have one chaff torpedo left Captain, no ripple drive, half the crew is out of the fight.”
She watched as Captain Jan’Inar looked down through the floor monitors, the hulk of the Isengard was three hundred kilometers in the Z axis. “Riven, get us to the Isengard, use whatever maneuvering is necessary.”
Riven shrugged internally, she didn’t see how getting to the wreck would help, they were still ahead of the last two Trinar scout vessels, but hiding amongst the wreckage wouldn’t help. “Aye Captain, making for the wreck.”
A giant explosion appeared in one of the starboard monitors, one of the ones that wasn’t flickering off and on that is. “What the hell was that?” Jan’Inar asked Riven.
It took her a mil to process the incoming data, half her external sensors were either gone or malfunctioning. “That was the Trinar cruiser’s reactor exploding from nearly five light minutes away, the Missive managed to take her out, but she’s heavily damaged.”
Looking in the forward view screen the wreckage that was once Isengard was coming up fast, “Captain, we will arrive at the wreckage in twelve seconds, what do you want to do?”
The Captain sat back in her chair and answered, “Take us under the wreckage and put it between us our pursuers. Force them to go around the wreckage, and when they do, use the last chaff torpedo to hit one of the four fusion reactors of the Isengard.”
Riven smiled, that was Alex level deviousness. Also, quite a problem, three ships on different vectors, one near stationary wreck, and then the torpedo itself, which isn’t designed for precision, more like a shotgun blast. She cranked her frame-rate to maximum and her ship VR faded to just raw windows. Even at her maximum processing speed the calculations took agonizing milliseconds.
“Firing chaff torpedo three now!” The heavily damaged ship shuddered a bit as the last torpedo roared from its launch tube. It took nearly three seconds to reach the wreckage and detonate, an eternity to Riven. She watched as the bomb pumped masers sliced through the containment bottle, releasing the hellish energy and pressure at the heart of a star.
The explosion turned the wreckage into atoms, then lanced out in a sphere engulfing both Trinar ships in white hot plasma, obliterating them in the maelstrom. Then the shockwave from the explosion lashed out into space in every direction at the speed of light. The Rivendell was struck from behind, the ship staggered, her torch drives melted, and the lights went out.
_________________________________
Kara ended the simulation, both Alandran ships returned to normal operating duty. She opened up a channel to both Captains, letting Izzy and Riven broadcast her report to the crews. “First the good news, the enemy fleet was destroyed and the Missive and Rivendell survived to fight another day. Now the bad news, the Isengard was lost with all hands, which could have been avoided if you both stuck together and allowed your point defenses to overlap. All this means we’re going to be running another simulation tomorrow.”
She could hear both crews groan at the announcement before she continued, “I will be providing Riven and Izzy with the battlefield data, I expect you all to spend the next few hours going over where you could do better.”
Then Alex’s face appeared on all monitors in both ships, “We beat them this time, but I won’t be satisfied until we beat them every time. Go over the after action reports, come up with some new ideas, and get some rest before we tackle this again tomorrow. Also, I want to congratulate the crew of the Rivendell for lateral thinking.” Then the monitors all reverted back to their normal duty.
Alex looked over to Kara, “They’re getting better.”
Kara nibbled at a chip, “They’re not getting better fast enough. We know what we’re dealing with when it comes to the Howron ships, but the Trinar as you’ve taken to calling them are still a complete mystery. They may be even more dangerous than we’ve extrapolated them to be.”
Alex rubbed the back of his neck, “And they may be far weaker than we think, look, we can only do the best we can. We can’t really fault the Isengard crew, they’re even greener than the Rivendell.”
Kara nodded walking around the buffet table, “I’m really worried Alex, we have three ships at the moment, two of them with new crews and new AI’s. The forth will be online in a week, and I need to start focusing on producing and training a new AI.”
Alex held her lightly around the waist, “Getting the forth ship and it’s AI up is more important than these simulations, I’ll deal with them, you do what you do best?”
“Play Mother to everyone?” She asked?
Alex grinned down to her, “Well someone has to be the adult around here, and it ain’t gonna be me.”
She looked up to him, “They listen to you more than you know.”
“Poor kids.” He said as he leaned down to kiss her.
Kara spun away from his embrace and went back to the holo-tank, “Speaking of adults, it looks like we finally received an error free scan of Kel’Taraan’s mind.”
Alex came up beside her to look into the holo, it showed the docking area where the ships repair crew would normally be housed during refits. In the common area sat the Stasis pods with Kel’Taraan and Mon’Kelron, the former of which had received the medical nanobots that would repair her internal damage while she stayed in stasis, they were nearly done repairing the damage.
He turned to Kara, “Have we finished constructing the matrix yet?”
Kara shook her head, “Four failed attempts, today will be attempt number five, I’ve slowed down the print head on the auto factory to it’s lowest rate, in a few hours it will be done, then I have to put it through pass/fail checks and cross my fingers.”
Alex sighed, “Yeah, they told me about the hardest thing for an auto factory to make was the print heads for another auto factory, something biological, or a replicant matrix. Makes sense that we’d have difficulty now, as we build in space, not a sterile lab environment.”
Kara swiped at the holo, showing a video of the construction process of the matrix. “If this one doesn’t work I may have to build a lab around an auto factory and provide the gravity and sterile environment, these things take forever to construct.”
Alex studied the table for a snack, “Oh, you think we may have more matrix’s to build in the future?”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Kara looked over to Alex a little exasperated, “Once the genie is out of the bottle, I expect we may find we need to make quite a few of these.”
He rubbed his chin in thought, “We’ve asked Kel’Taraan to keep the knowledge of replication secret, I’m pretty sure she’ll do so.”
She looked back at him shaking her head, “You know as well as I do that something like this won’t stay secret forever.”
Alex nodded and sighed as he looked down, “Yeah, you’re right. Something will slip, intentionally or unintentionally. Best plan for it in the future.”
“And that brings up the next question, what do we do with Mon’Kelron?” Kara asked.
Alex looked at Kara a bit confused, “We let the medical nannites finish working on her and we keep her on ice until we can drop her back off on the planet.”
Kara shook her head, “No, that will stir up even more suspension in the Alandrans, who already think we are mysterious. She needs to be let out for observation or something before we put her back into stasis.”
“Well, you’re busy getting the new AI up and running and getting the matrix built, I’m busy with the simulations, Riven and Izzy are running ships and working with crews, that leaves Monty. Where is she anyways?”
“Personal project, she’s been working on a particle accelerator model that will be easier to build around the first planet, using material from the first planet.” Kara answered.
Alex frowned, “How would that work? We need an accelerator large enough to circle the star to make the exotic materials we need.”
Kara grinned, knowingly, “Remember that this universe is more energetic than our original universe? Monty figures that she can get by with one that encircles the first planet at twenty thousand kilometers and with about fifty loops around the accelerator we can get the necessary velocities to create the required materials.”
“Okay, so a smaller accelerator, we figured what, a century out to get one built around the star, how long will this take?” He asked.
Kara shrugged, “We had to make an estimated guess, but since the supply line would be vastly shortened by harvesting the planet with mining drones we figure two to three years before it would be operational, assuming we move one quarter of all mining drones to the first planet.”
Alex nodded, “Much more feasible. However, you haven’t mentioned probable yield.”
Kara sighed, “Yeah, less than a tenth what a proper accelerator would produce, but if we use most of the production for manufacturing nannites and substitute other materials for armor or hull we could still build some of the heavy cruisers you have the prints for.”
Alex looked down to the table and found some boneless buffalo wings, snatching the small bowl and cradling it he commented. “Well, three and a half years to build the first heavy cruiser isn’t too bad. Granted we have to build a full sized shipyard in that time frame as well. We aren’t going to churn one out in the scaled down models you two came up with.”
Kara nodded, “Already on the production schedule as well.”
Taking a big bite out of the buffalo wing, Alex sent Monty a message. “Would you be so kind as to join us at the buffet table?”
Monty faded in beside Kara, “What’s up with the big guy using all formal messaging?” She asked.
Alex swallowed, “What? I can be elegant and shit too you know.”
Monty rolled her eyes, “There’s the Alex I know. I’m assuming you need me to do something boring?”
Kara answered before Alex could make another quip. “We need you to baby sit Mon’Kelron for a bit. She needs to think that she is inside the ship so she doesn’t think anything strange is going on, particularly with Kel’Taraan.”
Monty tapped her chin, “Um, the hanger bay where they are being stored is separate from the rest of the ship. Only our two androids are located there in pods, how do I explain that she can’t go beyond that point?”
Alex spoke up while Kara was trying to come up with an answer, “Simple, you tell her she is in quarantine on board our vessel, let her know you have been decontaminated but it’s a long process and I’m too busy to go through it right now.”
Monty nodded, than smiled, “Can I wear a cute nurses outfit?”
Alex shook his head, “Fine, just sell her on the story and keep her occupied while she is under ‘observation’, then get her back into the stasis pod.”
Monty did a salute that was fairly close to an insult and faded out.
________________________________
Kel’Taraan awoke suddenly, there was no slowly drifting into consciousness, it was as if she had been startled awake. Looking around she saw only darkness, where was she? Was she dead? Were the humans unsuccessful in turning her into a replicant? Then she saw light, just two glowing blue eyes at first, then the silhouette of a petite woman brown hair down to her shoulders.
Then the rest of her faded into view, she wore a uniform similar to what all Humans wore, more practical than formal. Then she spoke, “Hello Kel’Taraan, I am Kara, it is nice to finally meet you.”
“It is nice to finally meet the legendary Kara. This must mean the process worked, what will happen to my old body?” She asked
Kara brought up what looked like a cylindrical hologram and was touching icons, the world around her faded in to what appeared to be a comfortable house. “It was destroyed before you were activated, otherwise you would not be the closest continuer, but a mere copy of yourself.”
Kel’Taraan was a little taken aback, “Closest continuer? Why destroy my old body?” She wasn’t sure why she should care if her old body was gone, but for some reason she did.
Kara finished fiddling with her hologram and it faded away, now they were sitting in a quite nice cottage, complete with a fireplace and bookshelves full of leather bound books. “Short answer, the No-Hiding theorem states that like matter or energy, information can neither be created nor destroyed, simply moved or transmuted. The information that made up ‘you’ cannot exist at the same time that your replicant was activated or you would be two different people with the same memories.”
Kel’Taraan nodded, “So to ensure it would really be ‘me’ who awoke, the original vessel had to be destroyed to ensure only one copy of the information was available?”
Kara nodded, “Correct, although it is much more complex than that, and still under some debate, that is the reigning theory of closest continuer.”
“So what do I do now?” Kel’Taraan asked.
Kara smiled, “Now we start training you on how to be a replicant. I have given you a private virtual reality environment, it should be close to the little cottage in the picture frames in your room.”
Kel’Taraan looked around and found that it was very similar. This was the cottage that she and her Emmet had looked at purchasing so long ago. She reached down and rubbed the ornate leather chair she was standing behind. It was only at this moment did she notice she was not hunched over, her back did not hurt, and she needed no cane.
Looking down at her hands they were without wrinkle or age spot, the skin was soft and taunt. She looked around and found a mirror by the front door, and in it she barely recognized the face, it was her, nearly four centuries ago.
“How?” She asked as she turned back around to Kara.
Kara summoned some keldaran hot tea and two small cups on the coffee table before sitting in the other leather bound chair by the fireplace. “Our spy devices in the palace found pictures of you when you were young, we extrapolated a three dimensional form for you to inhabit here.”
Kel’Taraan nodded as she walked back to the empty leather armchair, she noticed her hair was blonde once more, no longer silver. Sitting down she looked at the beverage choice, “Fair warning, that stuff tastes like battery acid, I have no idea how the Empress drinks it, could I try your coffee once more? It has been so long!”
Kara grinned, and waved away the Alandran style crockery and replaced it with a coffee pot and two coffee mugs, along with cream and sugar. Pouring a cup for Kel’Taraan and offering cream and sugar, which she accepted and raised it to her face to inhaled the aroma. “This brings back memories.” She stated, tearing up a bit.
After taking a sip of the Human brew she sat it back down on the coffee table. “I suppose since I am in the company of Humans once more you find our naming schemes a bit aggravating?”
Kara shrugged, “It doesn’t bother me, although Alex wishes he could shorten your names from time to time.”
Kel’Taraan nodded, “The first Human crew called me Kelly, I think I would like to go by that again.”
“Kelly it is then, I’m sure Alex will be pleased.” Kara stated while taking her own sip from her coffee.
They both sat there for a moment, just enjoying the silence and the beverage, before Kara spoke up. “I want you to get comfortable here in your cottage, if you want I can help you change your VR environment at any time. You probably don’t realize it yet but you and I are operating at millisecond resolution at the moment.”
Waving her hand a small menu appeared before Kelly, showing her how the frame-jacking system worked. Kara continued, “I’ve given you access to this menu, and more will follow in the next day, which can be as short or as long as you choose.”
Kelly thought for a moment, “So at our default frame-rate, a single millisecond lasts..” (11.57 days) A slider appeared above the frame-jack menu.
Kara nodded, “We all experience time differently than biological creatures, we can experience lifetimes in days, or we can stretch a single day into milliseconds.”
Kelly nodded, “Seems like I have a lot to learn.”
Kara put down her coffee cup, “That you do, and for that reason you have this library, inside these volumes are the culmination of Human knowledge and culture.”
Surprised, she raised an eyebrow, “Doesn’t seem like a lot of books compared to the Imperial library on Alandra.”
Pulling the first tome off the top shelf she handed it to Kelly, “Open this.”
Taking the amazingly immaculate leather bound tome she opened it and her mind was awash in chaos. Words, symbols, numbers, letters, ideas, constructs, abstractions and so much more flooded her very essence. Then it was gone, replaced only by a floating bar above the now closed book. It stated, “IMPRINTING INFORMATION 2%”.
Looking up at a Kara she whispered, “What just happened?”
Kara sat back down and crossed her long legs, “You just downloaded the contents of that tome, several yottabytes of data, now your matrix has to make sense of it, hence the imprinting information bar. I will leave you now to consume the contents of this library, after that you should have the basics of everything you need to know about Humans and our technology.”
And with that Kara faded out of Kelly’s VR space. She looked down at her book, 6% complete, this was going to take a while… or was it? She smiled and reached for her frame-jack slider.