First Contact (Galactic Axia Adventure) (11 page)

As a test of the equipment, they were going to transmit the signals from the original disc to gauge the ability of the set to receive the faster-than-light signals. Then they planned to test the transmitter itself by sending a test signal back to the receiver. Later the signals received would be compared to the original disc to make sure the frequencies and harmonics matched. All of these tests would be conducted with minimum power necessary.

The equipment hummed evenly as it powered to full stabilization. This was quite a leap of technology for the team. None had any experience working with faster-than-light signal vectors. An electrical engineer monitored the power supply as it struggled to provide the necessary voltages and frequencies far beyond what they had ever been designed for. This was uncharted territory and everyone here knew it.

“We’re ready over here,” announced the man at the recorder.

“Ready on the receiver,” called another over a land-line connecting the two locations.

“Transmitter ready,” echoed a third.

At a nod from Dr. Garret, the original disc of the alien signals was played. The receiver immediately sprang to life and produced the signals it received in normal time. The scientist on the receiver activated the small computer they’d rigged for the translation work and fed the new signal into it. Out of its speaker came the translated words from the alien broadcast. There were many hopeful smiles around the room.

“Running it through for comparisons,” Spenser said from his monitoring location. In seconds, he had both the original sequence and their attempt paired on his scope. He looked up and nodded. It was an acceptable match to the original recording.

“All right, test the transmitter,” Garret ordered.

Oren activated it and keyed in the test signals, a pattern of tone frequencies that would allow them to test for modulation and harmonics.

“Looks great!” reported the receiver location. “Let’s try voice transmission.”

The transmitter operator switched over to voice and recited the standard audio test phrases. “Receiving five by five.”

“Run it through the translator program,” Garret instructed. “Then run it back through the system and see if it makes any sense.”

Soon they heard the voice of a man emit from the receiver in the strange alien language. A disc was recorded and run back through the translation equipment. Although the machine produced the translation in flat mechanical tones, it was easily recognizable. It was human!

“Okay, shut it all down,” Garret ordered. In succession, each piece of equipment was powered down. After all was quiet, he spoke again. “Now that we know the equipment will work, we need to get a proper antenna set up.”

“Why not just use the radio telescope again?” Oren asked. “We’ve got a tap into their system now.”

“Too big of a risk,” Garret said. “Besides, since they tweaked the grid, it may not work with the signal we’re sending.”

“But we can adjust for that.”

“True,” Garret answered. “But the political aspects are much more difficult. We need our own directional antenna aimed to where we received these signals from.” The others nodded in agreement. “When that’s completed, we’ll be ready to transmit. Let me know when it’s ready. I’ll be in the office trying to figure out what to say.”

∞∞∞

Morning broke over the spacefield to find four newly minted captains waiting anxiously in one of the ready rooms. The officer in charge of their orientation had directed them to be there and flight ready at first light. With a mixture of both fear and eager anticipation they awaited his arrival.

The orientation on their new FAR ships was going faster than the four new captains had initially expected. Building on their knowledge and experience with the bedsprings drive aided the process of giving them a good foundation to build on. Not only did the new, faster Albert drive give them speed and maneuverability far beyond their simple trainers, but its side-effects improved both the defensive and offensive capabilities of the new scout ships.

And now the day had come that the orientation officer felt his students were ready to fly. He appeared and strode into the room.

“Well, I see someone knows what I mean by first light,” he said off-handedly as they jumped to their feet. He stepped confidently to the front of the room and set a stack of folders on the podium and motioned the four new captains to a row of seats at the front of the room. Scores of empty seats stretched behind them that were normally filled for a large operation.

“As you probably already suspect, we’re flying today,” the officer began with a grin. “Each of you will have a qualified officer on your ship to aid in the training. Here are your flight plans for today,” he added as he handed Eaton the pile of folders.

While these were distributed, the orientation officer continued, “Generally speaking, we’ll lift together and proceed to our designated practice zone. I will be aboard the AR-236 and direct operations from there. Any questions?”

“Will we be doing any live fire practice?” Waldon asked as he looked up from his notes.

“Yes,” the officer answered. He noticed a gleam in the eyes of these eager young flyers. “Your ships are fully stocked with torps and are to remain that way unless your ship is in dry-dock for a refit. An unarmed ship is worse than useless to the Galactic Axia and the people we protect.”

“What about speed trials?” Leatha asked. “I want to see what my ship can do!”

“You’ll find that on the sixth page for today’s operations,” the officer answered. Just then the other three orientation officers walked into the room.

“OK people,” the lead officer said to the four captains. “Shake the dust off your feet. It’s time to fly!”

All four new captains were nervous as they strapped into their control chairs for their first official flight. Although they’d sat in their chairs during dry runs and orientation, this would be the first time they actually got to fully power up their ships and head up into space. The training officers aboard each new scout strapped into one of the extra control stations and prepared for lift-off. Delmar heard the lead officer call for clearance over the comm. “Rodar Control, this is AR-236 requesting permission for the training group to lift and proceed to the designated training area.”

“AR-236, Rodar Control,” came back the voice of the controller. “Permission granted to lift and proceed as requested.”

“Thank you, control. We’re lifting now.”

“Acknowledged. Have a good flight and we’ll expect you this evening.”

The officer aboard gave a double click in reply. The realization that they’d be out all day was news to all of the new captains. They’d expected it to be only the usual hour flight like in the simple trainers.

At a nod from his officer, Delmar carefully advanced the throttle and rotated the axis ball for lift-off. He’d been warned that these ships were very sensitive and accelerated much faster than the trainers, so he took extra care. Even at that, the ship shot upward many times faster than he expected. The officer smiled while he watched Delmar recover from the unexpected acceleration. Nearby, the other three ships were going through similar motions and it took a few moments for them to reform for the trip out to the training area.

“All right,” the officer on AR-236, Leatha’s ship, said over the comm, “set your heading for the range minus two points. Accelerate to the bottom of the yellow arc and reform one-quarter parsec outside the range station. You’ll then proceed individually in numerical order. AR-234, proceed on my mark in minus three,” he said. “Three, two, one, mark!”

Delmar watched Waldon’s ship accelerate away faster than he would have believed possible. In turn, the other ships followed, leaving only the
Cabbage Patch
waiting for its turn to depart.

“Prepare to accelerate, AR-237,” the lead officer’s voice countdown came over the comm. “Mark!”

Delmar advanced the throttle to the bottom of the yellow arc and the ship immediately shot forward. From the visual effect through the front windows, Delmar could tell they were traveling several times past the top speed of the trainers. In a matter of minutes, the navigational console indicated they’d arrived and Delmar cut the throttle.

A trip that normally took a trainer half an hour only took the new ships seven minutes. Delmar was stunned at the speed and wondered what this new ship could do if the throttle was ever pushed higher into its power arc. The bottom of the yellow arc would only be considered very low gear on a ground vehicle. His mind reeled at what this ship might be capable of!

Delmar’s musings were interrupted by a call from the lead orientation officer. “What took you so long, Eagleman? Getting slow in your old age?” He tried to look serious while his on-board orientation officer grinned at him. But Delmar’s discomfiture was all too soon forgotten.

What followed were several hours of intense flight drill. They flew the ships singly and in combination through maneuvers that until now would have seemed impossible. The Spiraling Scissor was among the most challenging because it required the ships to be in motion in all three axis while varying their speed. It had been bad enough in the slow trainers but with these speed-demons, it was another thing altogether!

 All four captains were exhausted by the time the lead officer decided they’d had enough formation work for one day. Next he had them work the firing range. Not only were the new captains challenged individually, they were put through it again in pairs. This made the timing and firing more critical, but would stand them in good stead later. Although survey ships usually worked alone, being able to function as a team would help in large operations.

After the firing range, they were ordered to a particularly clear area for speed trials. In turn each ship was taken from a standstill to the bottom of the red zone on the power arc, not quite half of full throttle. As lead, Leatha took the first run. Delmar watched as in the blink of an eye her ship zipped off his own detector screen. When she stopped it was much farther out that they’d ever been in the trainers. Finally, his turn came and Delmar was openly astonished at the speed of his new ship.

Sensor trials were next, both at minimal speed and flat out. Maneuvering at high speed became trickier because the ships were in danger of over-flying the range of their current sensors. It required constant vigilance on the part of each new captain to adjust to the almost instantaneous course changes required. Fortunately, such speed was rarely required and better sensors were already being developed. This final exercise placed them far away from the base on Rodar.

“That’s enough for today,” the lead officer said from his place on the
Aurora
. The four young captains felt a wave of relief.

Finishing the day’s trials, the lead officer ordered the group to return to Rodar. Since they were quite far out (it would take a trainer at least two days to reach their position) he allowed the new captains to run the ships home in the low red zone. In less than two hours they found themselves in orbit around Rodar. Not only was it a record run for the new captains and their ships, but the ships seemed to be ready for more. Much more. Normally a high speed run of that distance in a regular drive ship left it exhausted and overheated. But the Albert drive didn’t have such limitations. Delmar noted that even with all their fast running, the temp sensors on their cooling tanks barely registered any change.

Upon landing, the lead officer instructed them to gather in the
Cabbage Patch
while he conferred with the other examiners. The new captains were tired and nervous while they waited. Delmar activated the food synthesizer so they could at least have something to sip on while they waited. He was glad this unit performed better than the one he suffered with at computer school.

Thirty minutes later they were all called to Leatha’s ship. As the four entered the hatch they were nervous and must have shown it.

“Please sit down,” the lead officer said, “and don’t look so worried.” They relaxed somewhat and waited for the results of their efforts.

“You all did extremely well,” the lead officer began. The other three officers nodded their agreement. “You’ve all improved on flight maneuvers and on the firing range, especially Leatha.”

Leatha blushed at the compliment. Her check ride score had been eighty-seven on K-66. Today’s score was a seventy-three on level N-22.

“As far as we’re concerned,” the lead officer continued, “you all qualify for local solo flights in your new ships.”

He went on to explain that they’d done well and the best way for them to learn now would be to practice on their own.

“Arrangements will be made for you to use the advanced ranges. Range Control will post coordinates and times available.”

Finally one of the four young captains spoke. “What about long-range navigation?” Eaton asked. “Our ships can easily over-fly our sensors.”

“That and some final navigational runs will happen soon enough,” the orientation officer answered. “In the meantime, learn to work with the limitations. It’ll do you good someday when you’ll need it.”

∞∞∞

The group of scientists was again gathered around the transceiver equipment. Both the transmitter and receiver had been combined back at their main hidden laboratory. Equipment and breadboard wiring were spread out on the main work table while they double-checked everything prior to operation. In the background they could hear the video news report that the science probe and its booster had achieved stable orbit around Maranar’s largest moon. This news was exciting in itself, but what they hoped to accomplish tonight would far outweigh it.

The message had been prepared and recorded in a continuous loop for automatic transmission. The plan was to run the disc several times an hour for three hours that evening. By spreading out the transmission, the scientists left frequent and predictable gaps through which whoever was out there could send their reply.

“Any comments or objections before we proceed?” Dr. Garret asked while he studied the faces of his comrades. The mood was electric while they pondered the implications of sending out a signal.