The Lost Prince (23 page)

“I’m on the bridge. Follow the corridor at the front end of the landing bay forward.”

Abigail went through the door and walked two hundred yards forward. She entered the bridge and a young man stood at attention and saluted, “Welcome aboard, Sir.”

“I believe I’m not a Sir.”

“All officers regardless of gender are called Sir, Sir.”

She saw the young man continue to salute and she said, “You can stop that.”

“Sir, I am required to hold my salute until you return it.”

Abigail put her hand next to her forehead and dropped it. The young man took his place in the command chair. Abigail looked at him and said, “Is that the command chair?”

“It is.”

“Am I not in command?”

“You are.”

“Then get out of my chair.”

Gary stood and moved to the second chair. Abigail looked at the huge banks of controls and said, “We’re supposed to go out and familiarize ourselves with this ship.”

“Then take us out, Sir.”

Abigail snapped her head around at Gary and said, “Don’t be sarcastic with your commanding officer.”

“I’m not. You’re in the chair that flies the ship. So by all means take us out.”

• • •

Abigail stared at Gary and said, “I looked at your records and asked that you be replaced.”

“I didn’t need to look at yours and requested that you also be sent back, Sir.”

“Why!”

“Because you’re too egotistical to admit that you don’t know everything about everything and that can get me killed in a fight with alien ships. You also refuse to accept anyone else’s opinion but your own. I was told my request was denied so I’ll just wait until you put us in a situation that destroys this ship and I’ll jump in an escape pod if given the opportunity. Perhaps the next time I’ll draw someone that’s not so self-centered. So take us out, Captain.”

Abigail was furious but looked at the controls and knew she knew nothing about flying a space ship. Gary watched her and after a moment she said, “I don’t know why you and I were forced to go on this mission, but we need to establish our working relationship.”

“I wasn’t forced to go, Captain. I wanted this mission.”

“For God’s sake why!?!”

Gary looked her in the eyes and said, “Ships like these are going to be on the very cutting edge of all scientific breakthroughs for the near future. This is where the excitement of new discoveries and bumping up against new alien civilizations are going to happen. I wouldn’t miss this for anything.” Abigail just stared at him like he had three eyes.

Gary stood and looked at her and after a moment she stood and Gary took the command chair and began pushing buttons and switches on the console. Abigail sat in the second chair and heard a deep hum start and move into a higher pitch until it moved above her hearing range. The ship lifted off the hanger floor and slowly moved forward. Gary said, “G, take us out to the main blast shield.”

“Arrival in two minutes.”

Gary said, “Fleet Control, request permission to lift off planet.”

“Send your transponder frequency to the Obelisk.”

“Frequency has been sent, Fleet.”

“You may exit in four minutes.”

“Thank you Control.”

Abigail watched the huge ship move forward until it was directly over a dark grey section of concrete.

“What are you doing?”

“We’ve been ordered to take the ship out and put him through his paces. We are going to have to learn to deal with the rapid changes of direction that this ship is capable of doing. I would highly recommend that you buckle in your harness.”

Abigail watched Gary buckle his harness and she began struggling with getting hers on. Gary unbuckled and came over and said, “May I assist you, Sir.”

Abigail looked at him and said, “Yes.”

Gary pulled her harness out from under her and pulled her arms through the straps. He pulled it over her head and buckled it. He showed her a strap and said, “Pull this and make it as tight as possible.” Abigail pulled it snug and Gary sighed, “Sir, you want that harness as tight as you can stand. You’ll not be able to walk tomorrow if you don’t really pull it tight.”

Abigail looked at him and said, “Pull it as tight as you think it should be.”

Gary pulled the strap and Abigail thought the harness went through her into her back bone. She couldn’t take a deep breath. Gary went back to his chair, buckled in, and said into the communicator, “Lift off in fifteen seconds.”

“The pattern has been cleared, ship three.”

Abigail looked at the display in front of her and saw it showing the area around the ship and a countdown in the upper right corner. The counter hit zero and the display showed the planet grow smaller below them at an incredible pace. Her stomach passed her heart on the way up to her throat. Her heart had arrived, first because it was closer than the stomach and she knew it had bounced off her throat and rebounded toward the place her stomach would have normally been. It was impossible to say anything. Then she heard, Gary say, “I’m going to FTL; hang on.”

She wanted to scream, “Hang on!?! I fell off when we left Euclid,” but her voice wouldn’t work and the planet below them disappeared completely. She closed her eyes and was thankful she had not had anything to eat.

• • •

Drey and Ian sat on Doc and watched the ship leave Euclid at an incredible velocity. “I think he’s picking on her.”

Drey laughed, “You think!”

“Drey, we’ve never lifted that fast and gone to FTL that close to a planet.”

“It takes a certain personality type to really get the most out of a warship.”

“Well, it appears he has it.”

“And we’ll need her there to keep it under control.”

Ian looked at Drey, “Do you really think this will work?”

“It will or they’ll die.”

“What are you planning to use them to do?”

“They will be the point of our spear.”

Ian shook his head, “I don’t know if I’d wish that on anyone; including Abigail.”

Drey shrugged, “We’ll see.”

A
fter ten minutes Abigail opened her eyes and saw small objects passing the ship. “What are those?”

“Stars, Sir.”

“How fast are we going!?”

“About ten thousand LYM.”

“LYM?”

“Light years a minute.”

“I thought the upper limit was a thousand.”

“It was before the fusion reactor. I need to determine our upper limit.”

Abigail shook her head, “Do I have to be here to do that?”

Gary took a deep breath, “We are going to be sharing this ship and if we’re forced to run to survive, I need to know what this ship can do. You must develop a tolerance to the forces used in escape maneuvers. We can do this the easy way and slowly work our way up to the limits, but we’re leaving for the alien’s domain in a few days and I need you ready in the event I have to pull out all the stops.”

Abigail moaned and said, “Cole tells me that one of our ships was attacked.”

“It was.”

“Do what you have to do. I’ll let you know if I get to where I can’t bear it.”

Gary nodded and quickly changed direction. Abigail moaned with the gravity suppressors but didn’t call for a halt. Gary felt the stress on his body and, though he didn’t want to, admired the woman’s resolve. After another thirty minutes of heavy maneuvers he saw her staring at her display taking deep breaths. “Are you ok?”

“Perhaps I should learn to fly this ship.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I think this would be easier if I knew in advance what you were going to do.”

“You’re right and you should link with G and have him give you the tutorial on the ship’s controls.”

“I’ll do that when my brain catches up to the rest of my body. I think you left it on that pad on Euclid. I’m having trouble thinking.”

“You need to get over that quickly.”

“Why is that?”

“I don’t like you, Captain, and I’m aware you have no respect for me, but no one argues that you have one of the best analytical minds in the Union. I need you at your best to see the things we need to survive. I’m going to be too busy flying this thing to be able to do anything other than react to what I see.”

Abigail closed her eyes and started thinking. After another hour she began anticipating the ship’s movements. She kept her eyes closed and said, “Call me Abby. When we’re in full flight maneuvers, you will command our ship. I will contribute anything I sense but you will make the command decisions. If we’re not in the middle of an attack, I will be in command of all other situations. Do you understand?”

Gary shrugged, “I do.”

“When communicating with the other two ships we will follow the structure of command. However, when it’s just us we will use our first names.”

“Abby it is.”

“Tell me why you’ve been twisting the ship as violently as you’ve been doing.”

“You know the basic shape of this ship?”

“I do.”

“What offers the enemy the largest target?”

“A shot at the top or bottom of the ship; the front and rear edges of the ship are the narrowest views.”

“So if I can turn the ship head on or sideways to an attacker, the beams they fire at us will have the smallest target to hit. It will also give us the maximum weapon coverage of any other position. This ship is vulnerable from above or below. I’ve got to learn how fast to twist him to prevent a top or bottom target to an enemy vessel.”

Abby thought a moment and said, “You could turn the ship ninety degrees and fire the missiles on the wing tips and only offer a side view to a ship above or below us. You wouldn’t need to twist the ship to a head on attitude.” Gary was surprised by the observation. “And since the missiles are FTL, you could spin the ship like a propeller to keep that attitude with any ships you haven’t fired on.”

“G, did you hear that?”

“I did.”

“How fast can you spin and can you fire while doing it?”

“I can rotate at eleven hundred rpms and firing would be easy.”

“Let’s give it a go and see how well you can do that and change course.”

Abby shook her head, “Me and my big mouth.” The ship turned and Abby closed her eyes. Gary decided that he would listen to the Captain and any suggestion she made. This process made the ship even more difficult to hit and didn’t stress the frame nearly as much as trying to turn head on into an attacker.

An hour later Gary said, “Sir, we have completed our trials and we’ll be headed back to get the ship armed. You are now in command.”

“Lieutenant, how far are we from Euclid?”

“The ship is fifty thousand light years above the galactic plane, Sir.”

“See how long it takes us to return at maximum speed. I think I can handle it now.”

“G, take us home.” The giant ship accelerated at an unbelievable velocity and Abby felt her stomach rebel but after a moment it settled. Once they were on Euclid, Abby returned Gary’s salute and said, “Good job, Lieutenant. If you’ll handle arming the ship, I need to look at the ship’s diagrams.”

“Yes, Sir, and thank you for your suggestions.” Abby nodded and went straight to her quarters and discovered Gary was right. She was barely able to move for two days.

• • •

Four days later Abby took the ship out and flew it through escape maneuvers. She knew that she wasn’t close to Gary’s skills, but she could fly the ship if the situation arose. The next day the three ships lifted and gathered above Euclid. Ian said, “I made a change in the original plan. The three ships we have in our landing bays will not have the main ships personality. The one on each ship that hasn’t linked with the main ship will link with the vessel in the landing bay.”

Andi said, “Why are you doing that? We’ll lose the ability our ships developed during our first voyage.”

Doc said, “No you won’t; the ships have all the protocols and software downloaded. They’ll perform perfectly.”

“What do we call the ships?”

Ian said, “Violet, yours will be V. Andi’s will be A.”

Drey said, “What about Captain Abigail?”

Abby didn’t like that Andi had taken A. Gary said, “I think B would be appropriate for Captain Montgomery. After all, she has two of them in her name.”

Andi said, “Abigail only has one B.”

Gary said, “Yes, Sir, but Abby has two.”

Abby said, “That is a good recommendation, Lieutenant. That’s what I’ll use.”

Violet and Andi looked at each other on their display. Drey could read their expressions, “ABBY? A good recommendation?” Drey said, “The three of you need to go and link with the small ships and we’ll start moving out of the Union. Let us know when the links are done.”

The three females left the bridge of their ships and Drey looked at Gary, “How’s the learning curve so far?”

“Captain Montgomery suggested that if we’re caught in a battle with numerous enemy vessels to spin the ship and use the wing tips to fire while spinning. I tried the maneuver and it really is more effective than trying to turn the ship head on or sideways to enemy vessels.”

“Doc, you need to work on that maneuver.”

Gary said, “Sir, I would highly recommend having your crew buckled in before doing that.”

“Belay that, Doc.”

Ian looked at Drey and lowered his eyebrows. What was happening on G? Drey shrugged.

Abby looked at her display and said, “What are they doing?”

Gary looked at her and said, “I told them about rolling the ship to avoid being targeted. It appears they’re trialing the maneuver.” Abby stared at the display and after a moment Gary said, “What are you thinking?”

“I don’t think they’ve done any aggressive maneuvering before; at least, the records they downloaded didn’t have any except Drey when he attacked the giant ship.”

“So?”

“I suspect Violet and Andi are suffering at this moment.”

Gary smiled, “I suspect they are.”

• • •

“Alright, I’m just about over this!”

Ian shook his head, “Grin and bear it. We’ve got to get up to speed on what E can do.” Andi closed her eyes and hoped she wouldn’t lose her lunch. After an hour Abby saw Drey on her display, “We think it might be a good idea to have a training maneuver to see where we stand.”