Chronicles of Sol: The Fall

Sali hopped off the bed and sighed, “time to go back to my boring cell?”

The guard chuckled, “Well I’m sure the medical staff would love to have you around a little longer.”

She blinked, “Yeah on second thought, let’s go.”

The guard led the way out of her little room in the medical ward where she had spent the last few days since her incident with the nanite bath. An experience she didn’t care to repeat. That had not been fun.

The man commented, “I don’t blame you. Being a patient sucks. As I see it, as long as you don’t need a nanite bath you are good.”

She shuddered.

“Sorry forgot about your being dropped in an industrial one.”

“It’s okay.”

“I’m glad. On a different note, you will have a few hours to relax before you need to report to the industrial bay. I think you will be happy to know that the crystals are almost done.”

She smiled, “That sounds good. Just one question, why didn’t anyone install rails?”

“Around the nanite pool? Well, most people don’t fall in and its not dangerous. There is a neutralization field around the pools that will disable any nanite that leaves the bath. Keeps them from doing something they aren’t supposed to.”

“But that doesn’t help anyone who falls in!”

“To be fair, it doesn’t happen that often. In fact, unless I am mistaken you are the only person since we left port to fall in.”

“And how long has that been?”

“Nearly two years now.”

She blinked, “I see, that sounds good but I still think there should have been a railing.”

“Well you could always put in a petition.”

She laughed, “Yeah like anyone would take it seriously coming from me.”

The guard didn’t react.

After a moment she gave him a look, “Wait!? You were serious?”

“Well, yes. I was.”

“But, I’m a prisoner. An alien prisoner with no rights! Why would...”

“Why would anyone listen to you? You still have a voice, use it. Someone just might listen.”

She nodded but really didn’t think it would matter. A moment later they reached the exit to the hospital sector and in silence they stepped into the busy corridors. She watched the traffic as they made for the lift and as they drew close the people walking around thinned but when they turned a corner she encountered a face most unexpected. A Valorian face.

Countryman shifted a bit on his feet as Ruri nodded, “Yes I can think of a few things we might be able to do. The obvious route would be to try looking into adding a type five armor penetrator instead of the type two. I have no idea how to solve the issues with that though.”

Countryman sighed. He knew exactly what she meant and what those issues were. The type-five penetrator was a torpedo module specifically designed to penetrate modern armor. It was extremely effective at punching holes in reinforced plate thereby allowing the main warhead to bypass a ship’s armored belt and explode inside the hull where it would do more damage. They had been quite common with the old mark II fusion warheads back when they were in common use. Seven years had passed since then and torpedoes had improved a bit. Unfortunately armor penetration was an area in which standard warheads had regressed. This was mainly due to operational issues between the shield penetrator and the more advanced armor penetrators. They didn’t play nice with each other. Torpedoes tested with a type five and a shield penetrator tended to detonate prematurely, rendering them ineffective at best.

“I know, I’ve been looking into that as well. Unfortunately, the only solution I could come up with is sub-optimal. It works in simulation but takes up a lot of extra space on the torpedo. Effective yields are cut almost in half.”

Ruri blinked, “hmm, i guess that is an option if we don’t find a better alternative.”

Countryman leaned over a console and tapped in a few commands, “About that, I have a few ideas for improving our warheads.”

Ruri leaned in and looked over the file being projected. For a moment or so she simply stared and the silence seemed to drag on before finally she spoke, “Um how long have you been working on this?”

“Since I first saw your design for photon warheads.”

Ruri looked back, “Uh, Jac. If I’m understanding what you did here, this will result in a five-fold increase in the destructive yield.”

“Greater. My simulations show an increase in the maximum yield of nearly seven times. Just shy of five gigatons, which is right in line for some of the most destructive warheads ever devised.”

“Five!? That would make it the most destructive torpedo ever devised, and the first...

“Multi-gigaton warhead?” Countryman shook his head, “I’m afraid not.”

Ruri gave him a look, “I haven’t heard of any torpedoes like that.”

“I’m sure you recall the experiments with antimatter weaponry?”

Ruri nodded, “I do.” she blinked, “Wait! Are you talking about some kind of antimatter warhead?”

Countryman nodded, “We experimented with several different types of warhead, using small amounts of antimatter. The most destructive utilized a compressed anti-hydrogen charge to ignite a compressed protoplasma casing. The prototypes had a yield of nearly seven gigatons.”

Ruri frowned, “If they are that powerful, why are you refining a photon and not giving me those to work with?”

Countryman sighed, “Well for one the prototypes weren’t that reliable. Issues with the antimatter containment bubble that were never resolved. I’m sure you could fix them but there is also the bigger problem. The protoplasma needed for the warheads is difficult to synthesize and hard to comeby and that isn’t the only complication materials-wise. Suffice to say the prototypes were expensive. For the price of a hundred photons, you could have one of these antimatter-plasma warheads. And with our current resources? I’m afraid its even harder.”

Looking over the diagram, she nodded, “I think I can fix the reliability issues easily enough. Can’t do anything about the cost though.”

“Consider it a side project, then, but I want you to focus on the photons.”

Ruri smiled, “I don’t think those would take me too long. Your work is pretty though. Give me the resources and a couple of weeks and I can have the prototypes out for you. That antimatter-triggered plasma fusion warhead on the other hand? Might take longer. I have an idea for what to do about the reliablity, but its going to take a lot of testing.”

Suddenly the intercom beeped. Countryman tapped it and Greyman’s voice spoke, “Sir, the first probes are returning from the system.”

“Excellent. I’ll be on the bridge soon. In the meantime, start recovering them as they arrive.”

“Aye, sir! Will do.”

As Greyman signed off. Countryman prepared to leave. The probes Greyman had mentioned had been launched not long after the Enterprise reached the edge of the Zah system. They weren’t much to talk about either. Simple class three probes, which had been designed decades ago. Not much had changed since they were first tested, as there wasn’t much point to it The Class III probe was designed as a short range interstellar probe and commissioned as part of a project geared towards interstellar exploration. The idea for the class III was to create a cheap, expendable device to allow a single ship to more effectively scout an entire star system. What they created was basically a flying sensor array, secured in a hardened titanium casing, powered by a couple of high density energy cells and propelled by a simple laser pulse wave engine. In fact class three probes were so simple and cheap that he could build them onboard easily. Even better the materials needed for them were largely easy to comeby. The only hard one was the small amount of Rydium needed for the engine, but given the size of the engine it was easy to produce the needed crystals.

As such, it only took about 30 minutes to build a single probe if the materials needed were on hand. The Enterprise didn’t have a dedicated probe launcher, but it didn’t need one. It was possible to fit up to five probes inside a modified torpedo casing. The probes didn’t have much range, and were rather fragile, but he could deploy a fair number at a low cost. Making them quite useful to the current problem. They needed to study the system radiation to determine how safe it would be to enter the system to mine. There was no need to be stealthy about their presence, nor were they trying to scout a military installation.

Thinking about it, he made a note into looking into improving the design of the old class IV probes, those were intended for long range and were actually big enough to carry a small reactor module. A fact that improved their operational time from mere hours to days. A class III could operate for about thirty hours before it simply ran out of steam. The class IV could carry enough fuel to function for over a week before needing to refuel. The difference was that it was more expensive and neither type was a substitute for a proper scout ship. Neither probe had any kind of protection either, not even a stealth coating. Of course they were designed as scientific units not military recon devices. Hmm something to think about there.

Countryman stepped onto the bridge. His balcony was rather empty. Greyman had been left in command, so if he wasn’t up here, he must be down on the lower level. A glance over the railing confirmed that, as he spotted Greyman leaning over the strategic display in the middle of the bridge.

Countryman made his way down the stairs and approached the display. “So what are you looking at?”

Greyman looked up, “I was looking over the first batches of probe data. Preliminary readings are quite promising. The system is extremely rich in valuable minerals, including exotic materials. The probes even found a gas giant not too far into the system. Its magnetic field could help shield us from the radiation in the system, and its atmosphere is very rich in deuterium. Not only that we have already found sources of gold and titanium as well. The system also had erudite in it. We can build up a supply of that valuable stuff as well.”

“Speaking of the radiation, what is the verdict?”

“Our radiation shields should be able to protect us, but it will drain the shields rather severely. I would not recommend staying in the system for more than a few hours. The star’s output is rather intense.”

Countryman nodded and then recalled the young shield expert they had recently recruited. By now she was already getting to work in her own lab, but she might be useful right now. “Get Vera up here, we could use her opinion.”

He nodded and glanced to Misaki. Who spoke up, “Already on it!”