Marengo Station,
Sector 7-F.
The Station’s docking bay was full to bursting with the arriving refugees from Hemera. The Nelson was the sixth arrival since the evacuation, every bay was now taken up with ships now queuing—some for days—waiting for available berths.
Chase had his duffel bag over one shoulder as he walked through the crowds, looking for Docking Bay 47 where he would find the Mary Rose and his new assignment. His thoughts on being removed from the Nelson were brushed aside. He was furious, of course. While he hadn’t assumed that the captaincy was in the bag, he was also willing to accept serving under another CO were Wessex to stand down. He enjoyed the camaraderie with the crew and was sorry to have to do Stepaside. However, he knew that his new CO was not responsible and was not about to let his feelings out on whoever they may turn out to be.
They were standing by the airlock at Docking Bay forty-seven, a woman in her late forty’s with long curly blonde hair and an unimpressed look on her face. Celia Harding was waiting for him. She wore a civilian jumpsuit with various colourful patches sewn on the upper chest and right arm sleeve.
The mission was technically under the command of the civilian Archaeological Oversight Committee, with Chase being the ranking naval officer on board and Harding in command of the overall operation. It was an unusual setup, but not entirely unheard of.
A more paranoid officer would have taken this assignment as adding insult to injury. Not only was he not getting his command, he wasn’t even getting a military commander. Chase did his best, as usual, to brush it off.
“Lieutenant Commander Nathan Chase,” the woman shouted over the din of the crowds in a clipped English accent of the upper classes. “You’re late,” she said. Chase had orders to report to the ship at 1400 hours. It was currently thirteen-fifty station time.
“No, Ma’am,” Chase replied formally.
“You are supposed to be here at 1330 hours,” she told him, immediately turning and heading through the airlock, not leaving any doubt that she was expecting him to follow.
The Mary Rose was newer than the Nelson by a decade, which wasn’t saying much. While the latest ships off the assembly line were in the Sol system, and the majority of the fleet assigned to the cluster was from a previous generation, there were still a few of the nicer ships for those with the top pick of assignments.
Chase felt like a schoolboy sent to the principal’s office. Although it had been upgraded with some military hardware, Mary Rose was a civilian craft. The corridors were even narrower than what he had been used to, with barely room for two people to pass.
As Harding walked through the cramped interior, a crewman stepped out of a cabin, only to retreat back in to allow her to pass. Chase hoped they would never have to deal with boarding actions; the options would be severely limited. Following Harding through the door at the end of the corridor, he found himself in the ship’s mess hall, in the centre of the vessel.
“You made it then?” someone asked. Chase turned to see Wokoma sitting grinning at him.
“I made it,” he confirmed with a smile.
“I see you two have already met,” Harding commented, clearly unimpressed. “Elizabeth Wokoma is our pilot,” she indicated to the other two men sitting around the large round table. “This is Specialist Daniel Martinez,” indicating the younger of the two men in naval uniforms. He was mid-twenties with a neatly trimmed beard. “Martinez is the science expert on this job,”
Martinez took the opportunity.
“The ship we are looking for, the Trafalgar, had an experimental jump drive. Where a conventional hyperspace flight takes the ship out of our usual dimension, allowing it to sidestep that pesky law of the speed of light being the fastest anything can travel.” He picked up a salt shaker to demonstrate. “The jump drive was an attempt to simply remove a ship from one location and replace it instantly at another,” he added, sending a pepper pot to the other side of the large central table where it came precariously close to falling to the deck.
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“That sounds far-fetched,” replied Chase.
“No, but it wasn’t,” Martinez said with a look of excitement. Everyone else let out an exasperated sigh or rolled their eyes at the idiot allowing Martinez to go off on one about this again.
“It works,” said Martinez. “The Trafalgar’s engine had several successful flights before it vanished”
“But it did vanish,” said Chase.
“But if we can find it, we can see what happens and get this technology to work successfully.”
“And why is that good?” asked Chase.
“You’re the one that found aliens that want to attack us,” said Harding cynically. “Why do you think?”
“No, that’s not what happened…” Chase tried to defend himself.
“Well, anyway, the Navy is suddenly much more motivated for us to track this thing down,” said Harding.,” And that’s just what I intend to do.”
A young man in his early thirties walked into the mess. Chase turned and caught his eye. He was also in Naval uniform.
Harding now pointed to the newcomer. “This is Scott Dryden, our engineer,”
The man gave Chase a friendly nod.
“She’s been trying to raise funds for this mission for the best part of the decade. You will have to forgive her cynicism,” Martinez said. The conversation paused and Chase looked down at his bag hanging from his right shoulder.
“Shall I stow my bag somewhere?” he asked.
“I’d say you better. We are due to disembark in…” Harding checked the ship’s clock. “Ten minutes. If we don’t start clearing our moorings in the next five, the dock master is going to lose his temper with me again. Have you any idea how many ships are waiting for our berth, Mr Chase?”
“Again, I apologise; my orders said...” began Chase.
“I understand you had it quite easy on the Wellington,” said Harding.
“The Nelson,” Chase corrected her and immediately regretted it.
“I understand you had an easy ride on the Nelson,” she emphasised the name. A chime sounded. She didn’t react. “But you’re here now in the private sector, where everyone is expected to pull their weight.” Harding tapped a panel by the mess hall’s door.
“This is Harding. Speak to me.”
“Captain, we’ve got a lead on Trafalgar’s location.”
***
The Mary Rose dropped out of hyperspace at the edge of the system. Chase had joined Harding on the ship’s cramped command deck. It was laid out with ambitions of a much larger vessel. Wokoma was up the front at the pilot station, a small but comfortable-looking command chair for Harding, with Dryden in the engine room, and Martinez sat to one side of Harding, with a second chair for Chase. However, he thought it better to stand, given Harding’s earlier assessment of him. He held his hands behind his back at ease and looked at the forward viewport.
The front of the bridge was composed of a transparent alloy rated for deep space that ran the entire length of the forward wall, giving a panoramic view of the system they had just entered. A large planet, mostly white, took up much of that view. Chase could make out snow-covered peaks on the surface in the breaks between cloud cover.
“We’ve got a lead,” Harding informed him without looking around. “But don’t get excited. This is our twelfth. It’s safe to say I’ll believe it when I see it.”
“Understood,” Chase replied non-committally.
“One of our probes detected elements of titanium ore in this system,” said Wokoma from the helm, turning and meeting Chase’s gaze. “It was the primary material used in starship hulls until about fifty years ago,” she added.
“That’s the smart way of doing it,” said Chase.
This time, Harding did turn to look at him.
“I’m glad you approve, Mr Chase,” she said bluntly. “Now, I want you to prepare a landing party.”
“Very good,” said Chase. He was about to say captain, but realised she never clarified her exact rank. He settled with “Sir.”
Chase indicated for Martinez to follow him.
The large double door at the rear bridge dragged itself open as Chase turned to walk out, the bulkhead creaking as it did so. He wondered if he should ask Dryden about getting it oiled.