“Wow. This thing sure is huge. You did pull the numbers, right?”
“Yes. She’s supposedly strong enough to level a small galaxy or something- and do you see those two big missiles on the back?”
“Wait. Those are missiles?”
“Yes, actually. They’re supposedly so powerful a single one can exterminate an entire starsystem- and, of course, there’s supposed to be four.”
“What? Where are the other two?”
“Fired in deep space during an automated systems test, I understand, for harmless detonation in the intergalactic expanse.”
“What else does this thing have?”
“Bigger or smaller?”
“It has bigger?”
Nod. “Both physically and in destructive power.”
He stops the shuttle, floating just off the side of the ponderous subject of their discussion. “What is it?”
“They called it the singularity cannon.”
“Singularity cannon? Really?”
A few button presses, and a video plays. “Yep. Some coordination with all six spinal weapons, a couple shields, and at least three different engines, allows her to create a temporary singularity off her forward bow- and avoid falling in.”
“How… How long can she maintain that?”
“For as long as she has power. They have even hypothesized- untested, of course- the capability to create a singularity that will sustain itself for a few years unattended.”
“And he gave her command.”
Blink. “Yes. Probably because she’s so good at her job… even though so many hate her for it.”
“Alright. When are we due back by?”
He looks at the clock. “Uhh… We have to be back to the station to pick her up in about two hours.”
“Roger that.”
Sigh. “I still wish she’d let us go aboard first. As it is, there’s going to be a scramble to get the crew settled in and everything set up before the first training mission comes along.”
She watches eagerly out the window of her shuttle. She’s hiding her eagerness, of course; it would never do for an officer like herself to exhibit that kind of behavior.
The thing is, this will be her very first FTL-capable command. She’s commanded other craft before- multiple, as a matter of fact. Many of Earth’s spacecraft are in-system craft, and many of those aren’t capable of FTL. Some of them can get close- her last command, an asteroid belt police cruiser, could make almost point six cee- but it takes the far more mass and power intensive Distortion Drive to go any faster.
This ship is equipped with one.
Most warships aren’t. The Distortion Drive works by heating up the particles of space to truly astounding temperatures as the ship passes. She doesn’t understand exactly how creating a trail of fusion behind the ship propels it faster than light, but it apparently does. Either that or the techs are bluffing and it instead runs on some phlebotinum-based doohickey Command would be opposed to.
In any case, as much as the fields are angled to direct these superheated particles away from the ship, it’s impossible to deflect them all- and the ship always feels the brunt of at least some of them. The ceramic shielding necessary to protect the ship from these enormous temperatures- and the massive, rear-mounted radiators necessary to vent the heat that does get through- are simply too massive for a warship.
For most warships, at least. Most of them just dock with an auxiliary component to perform the jump, often its own ship; just a few, the very biggest warships, have their own Distortion Drives.
This one is different. This thing’s forward hull is definitely made of metal, not ceramics.
Besides- according to the briefing, this ship has no ceramic shielding. Instead, apparently, it makes do with an energy barrier- and has reportedly attained speeds almost a hundred times faster than the fastest Distortion Drive vessel she knows… without overheating, at all.
What’s more, she gets to be the first to step aboard after her commissioning. The first of the ship’s crew to set foot on the deck plates.
Almost no starship captain gets to do that. She’d asked for the privilege when she learned of its current, unmanned state- and it had been granted. Then of course, they had sprung all sorts of surprises on her- for example, the first training mission will occur no more than two weeks after the Captain’s scheduled boarding time- no matter that most even new vessels’ crews have two weeks before that to prep the ship. She’d asked to revert to the normal order, but been denied.
That reminds her. Her briefing had been interestingly terse about what kind of computer support the ship has; she hopes it’s got enough to help make up for some of that time.
And for the distinctive lack of engineering personnel on the roster. True, the Navy is starved for engineers- but they still try to put at least a couple on every ship. Especially new ships.
Maybe they decided she wouldn’t need that with a ship this large? She almost snorts. With a ship this large, she’ll be liable to need a hundred times as many.
She watches as the shuttle approaches the side of the ship. It’s a small craft, with an open flight deck; judging by the muttering she hears between the pilot and co-pilot, they’re not sure where they’re supposed to dock.
She spots it almost before they do. A ring of lights just came on on the side of the ship. A tiny ring, compared to the size of this face of the ship- but the color pattern matches the approach pattern for an external airlock. She feels the shuttle shudder as the pilots apply power to the engines again, pulling closer for a proper airlock-to-airlock mating.
It seems to take forever. Maybe her pilots are dreading their new assignment already? Funny- they won’t be involved in the first training exercise, as small craft pilots. No; instead, they will be sitting out the target practice session. The small craft won’t have a mandatory training exercise for almost two months- and she’s planning on giving them as much time as they need to get settled in before pushing one on them. Unless they take all of those two months, of course.
The locks meet, eventually- and the green light glows, indicating a good seal and pressure. The copilot checks all the indicators on his control panel, before pushing the button to indicate to her that it’s safe to unstrap; they’re properly docked to the bigger ship.
She unbuckles herself from the seat swiftly, launching herself into a drift to the handle next to the lock. She grips the handle, using it to swing herself inside the tiny airlock- the tiny, wide-open airlock. As she does so, she catches her first glimpse of the inside of her new ship.
And the first thing she sees, of course, is the well-lit warning signs on the inside of the ship’s larger airlock. Like all warning signs, the word WARNING is written across the top in bold letters. Most of the rest of these signs are taken up by large arrows, both pointing down, towards the same surface- the floor, presumably. It’s a little askew from her shuttle’s ‘down’, but that happens with airlock-to-airlock dockings; the portal is round.
Underneath the arrows is printed ‘1.0 G’ in similarly bold letters.
She tilts her head. Does this ship have gravity or something? She orients herself to the arrows just in case, before crossing the threshold- and sinking directly to the floor, under the effects of gravity. She blinks a few times, staving off the fog trying to invade her mind. That would make this the first vessel Earth has ever produced to be equipped with a genuine gravity generator.
Then a voice floats out of the walls to greet her. A calm, female voice. “Welcome aboard the Starship Athena, Captain.”
She lets out a huff of breath. Not a visible one, no- that would be unbecoming of an officer. They’d promised she’d be the first person aboard, then they’d had the gall to put someone on the intercom? She glances back into the shuttle. “All clear,” she states; Command had stipulated that, because she wanted to be first aboard, she had to be first by at least an hour- and that the rest of the crew weren’t allowed to even start getting ready until she was aboard. During that time, she’ll be completely alone… with no guide.
They probably did that, along with their refusal of her request to revert, as an insult. For some reason, noone seems to like her. It’s not like she chose to be the Space Lord’s daughter! Or that she asked for all those promotions! For that matter, her father has been very careful to keep his hands out of her career, at her request!
She’d even considered refusing one of the promotions. She’d been smart enough to ask her dad about it first, of course. According to him, not only would he be disappointed by such an action, but they would never offer her another promotion… unless he pushed for it.
So she had accepted it. And- the Personnel department’s decision, not her father’s- been assigned to the biggest ship in the fleet. Even though a ship this large is most certainly worthy of an Admiral or something- not a lowly Commander like herself.
The outer airlock door closes behind her, sealing itself shut. She hears the shuttle’s airlock door doing the same at the same time- just slower.
Then, suddenly, the sound is gone. Probably because it formed the seal. She turns her head to watch the telltales on the control panel change colors, indicating the disconnection of the shuttle.
Then she turns back to the passage and starts walking.
As she goes, she glances up at the walls. Are they listening, whoever’s got the intercom? She still feels incredibly tired, for some reason. “So, what exactly does Command expect me to do before my crew arrives?”
The answer is instant. “Unknown.”
“Do they care what I do?”
“Unknown.”
She lets out a small sigh. “Are they watching me?”
“Negative.”
“Are they listening?”
“Negative.”
“Will they watch the recording?”
“Release of internal sensor data requires the Captain’s specific authorization. No recording is in progress at this time.”
She raises an eyebrow. “You mean they can’t listen?”
“Command will be denied access, if requested, to any internal sensor data, whether recorded or live, without your explicit permission.”
“What about you?”
“This vessel may use any records on file during the consideration of any order, request, or situation. No disclosure will be made of the use or presence of closed records, including internal sensor logs, without your explicit permission.”
She scowls. “Well, what about you?”
“This vessel is operated by an internal Artificial Intelligence system capable of advanced heuristic modeling. While considering a situation in such a manner, this vessel may use any and all information available to assist in the final decision, including private logs. When such decisions are logged, no disclosure will be made of the decision process nor what sources may have been involved. Only the final decision is logged and, if applicable, the time taken by the total process.”
“If applicable?”
“Most decisions made in such manner are performed in a negligible timeframe; some may complete within a single processor cycle.”
She squints her eyes. “Oh? How fast is that?”
“This vessel’s primary computer core is currently operating at seventy three point nine one seven terahertz.”
Blink. “How fast is that?”
“Approximately seventy four trillion processor cycles per second. This is approximately equal to seventy four thousand processor cycles per system clock cycle, at one nanosecond in duration.”
Sigh, and she shakes her head. “Sorry, I’m not a computer nerd.”
“Very, very fast.”
“Like how fast?”
“Fast enough to model the biological mind to allow for the anticipation of future requests.”
“Uh…”
“Processor speed cannot be measured in miles per hour.”
“Oh.”