Ryk Brown - Aurora CV-01

“No, smaller ones, she thinks…”

“…Anything on sensors?” Cameron interrupted, turning towards Ensign Yosef.

“No Sir.”

“I don’t understand?” Cameron asked Jessica. “How does she know they’re coming?”

“Their ships reported it. They picked up the incoming vessels on their sensors a few minutes ago. I brought Jalea up here so she could translate between you and their ships.”

“Good thinking.” Nathan commended.

“Actually, it was Marak’s idea,” she admitted. “He thought it would be better for her to remain with you, as your translator, for now.”

“But how are Marak and the others going to communicate with our people in engineering?”

“Vladimir figured out that their language is a mixture of Slavic and Germanic languages, with a little Arabic thrown in.”

“Odd combination,” Cameron observed.

“Yeah, well, Vladimir speaks German as well as Russian, and with Jalea’s help he managed to fill in a few of the blanks, at least enough for now. He’s pretty smart, I’ll give him that.”

“Captain!” Ensign Yosef interrupted. “I’ve got them now! Transferring to tactical.”

Cameron looked down at the tactical display. “Two of them, much smaller than the first one. They’re moving fast, maybe twice light, so we can’t out run them.”

“We can’t outrun anything in our current state,” Nathan added, the frustration obvious in his voice.

“How long until they reach weapons range?” he asked Cameron.

“Well, they’ll reach us in about twenty minutes. Assuming their weapons range is about the same as ours, maybe fifteen?”

Nathan thought some more. No propulsion, no maneuvering, no weapons. To him it all equaled one thing-no options. He looked around the bridge. There were marines guarding both exits once more, and two more ensigns had come in and taken the ship’s systems station behind Ensign Yosef, and the Port Auxiliary Station located just in front of the port exit was being reconfigured to manage both Communications and Electronic Countermeasures.

“Can your ships stop them?” he asked Jalea.

“No, Takaran ships big, very strong.”

“Can you call for help?” Jessica interjected.

“No, help too far, no time.”

Nathan noticed that Doctor Sorenson was sitting quietly at her station, running systems checks to keep her mind off of her father’s untimely demise. “Doctor Sorenson?” he asked. “Can we jump again?”

She stared at him coldly for a moment, finally answering. “I do not think you understand the complexity of this system, Captain,” she warned. In her mind, she blamed the reckless manner in which Captain Roberts had used the system for the death of her father. The first transition algorithms had taken days to calculate, and even longer to verify. And these people thought using it was like jumping over a puddle. “You can’t just jump, jump, jump, whenever you like…”

“…Doctor,” he interrupted, trying to take a more gentle tact. “I understand what you’re saying, and under normal circumstances I wouldn’t dream of using it in such a haphazard manner. But these are not normal circumstances. We’ve got more enemy ships on the way, we’ve got no weapons and we’re adrift. I don’t see any other options.”

She looked at him again, realizing he was right. “Maybe. We just got power back minutes ago, and I haven’t finished running diagnostics on the transition sequencer yet. But the field generators are okay, and there is still enough energy in the storage banks for a short jump, maybe two or three light years at the most. But I do not know the state of all the field emitters on the outside of the hull. We took a lot of weapons fire, and if too many of the emitters are damaged, the fields may not initiate properly.”

“What happens if they don’t” Cameron asked.

“I’m not sure.”

Cameron could see in the Doctor’s eyes that she at least had a suspicion of what might happen. “What do you think could happen?”

“Part of the ship might not jump.”

“Part of the ship? I don’t think I like the sound of that,” she insisted.

“Neither do I. Doctor, can’t you check the emitters from here?”

“No. We did not have time to add hard-wired sensor leads to all the emitters, so we used wireless ones on more than half. But the external comm array is damaged, so I am missing status information on at least half of the emitters.

“Well,” Nathan said, “I guess the next question is, how do the Takarans treat prisoners?”

“No prisoners. Takar execute all rebels.” Jalea answered solemnly.

“I don’t like the sound of that either,” Cameron added.

“Rebels?” Nathan asked.

“Yeah, I was getting to that,” Jessica explained. “Seems these people are part of a rebellion against an oppressive regime. Nasty people, from what she tells me. They’ve been fighting them for decades, and have nearly lost everything. I’m not sure, but it sounds to me like we arrived just in time to save their butts. They had lost twenty ships before we jumped into the middle of it and took out that warship.”

“When did you…” Nathan began to ask.

“…We talked on the way up,” she interrupted.

“Well, that explains why they want to help us,” Nathan realized.

“Yeah, they want our ship for their little war,” Cameron said under her breath. She wasn’t sure how well Jalea understood English and didn’t want her to be aware of her suspicions.

“Or maybe they’re just looking for an ally?” Nathan offered.

“To be honest, Sir,” Jessica interrupted. I don’t think they knew what to expect when they came aboard. They tried to hail us first, but got no answer.”

“Comms were down,” Cameron reminded him.

“Is there enough room in the hangar bay for the rest of the rebel ships?” he asked Cameron, an idea brewing in his head.

“Yeah, I think so, If we park them tight, they’re a bit bigger than a fleet tactical shuttle, but they should fit.”

“Doctor, will the additional mass of those ships affect your jump calculations?”

“Not at all. The transition system uses the same mass canceling technology as the FTL system.”

“Jalea, have all your ships land in our hangar bay,” Nathan told her.

“This is not a good idea,” Cameron warned him. “You heard what she said-part of the ship might jump?”

“Better than all of us being executed,” he argued.

“I’m with her, Sir,” Jessica agreed. “Besides, I don’t like the idea of taking on who knows how many more rebels.”

“How many people on your ships,” Nathan asked Jalea.

“Twenty, I think. But I not understand,” she added.

“Twenty? I can’t watch twenty of them,” I’ve only got six guys right now, and four of them aren’t even combat trained.”

“Keep them in the hangar bay for now. I doubt they’re going to want to keep all their ships bottled up for long after we jump anyway. I know I wouldn’t,” Cameron explained.

Nathan looked at Jessica, who finally resigned to the inevitable. “You’re the boss.”

“You can have my two marines, if it makes you feel better?” Nathan offered.

“Naw, better you keep’em, in case something goes horribly wrong,” she advised.

“Why you want ships here?” Jalea asked again, confused.

“If you bring the ships here, I can get us all far away from the Takaran ships,” Nathan explained.

“I must speak with Marak,” she told him, pulling a small communication device from her pocket. Nathan indicated to her that it was alright, and she began explaining the situation as best she understood it to Marak. Although they could not understand what was being said, it was obvious that Marak was not enthusiastic about the idea.