Progress of the mutiny, “grab fields” used to contain people while heavy weapons kill them, Dahak has only a single hypercom (it’s a massive installation) and the Fourth Imperium has been a spacefaring civilization for 7000 years.But Captain Druaga's face was grim as he stood beside his command chair and data flowed through his neural feeds. He felt the whickering lightning of energy weapons like heated irons, Engineering no longer responded—not surprisingly—and he'd lost both Bio-Control One and Three. The hangar decks belonged to no one; he'd sealed them against the mutineers, but Anu's butchers had blocked the transit shafts with grab fields covered by heavy weapons. He still held Fire Control and most of the external systems, but Communications had been the mutineers' primary target. The first explosion had taken it out, and even an Utu-class ship mounted only a single hypercom. He could neither move the ship nor report what had happened, and his loyalists were losing.
Druaga deliberately relaxed his jaw before his teeth could grind together. In the seven thousand years since the Fourth Imperium crawled back into space from the last surviving world of the Third, there had never been a mutiny aboard a capital ship of Battle Fleet.
Red 2 Internal, accept no substitutes when boarded or a mutiny is ongoing.It was a draconian solution . . . if it could be called a "solution" at all. Red Two, Internal, was the next-to-final defense against hostile incursion. It opened every ventilation trunk—something which could be done only on the express, authenticated order of the ship's commander—to flood the entire volume of the stupendous starship with chemical and radioactive agents. By its very nature, Red Two exempted no compartment . . . including this one. The ship would become uninhabitable, a literal death trap, and only the central computer, which he controlled, could decontaminate.
This book takes place approximately 30 years into our future, hence why geopolitics and technology are a bit different, and there are multiple moon-bases, and a couple of habitat stations.Lieutenant Commander Colin MacIntyre's radar pinged softly as the Copernicus mass driver hurled another few tons of lunar rock towards the catcher ships of the Eden Three habitat, and he watched its out-going trace on the scope as he waited, reveling in the joy of solo flight, for secondary mission control at Tereshkova to respond.
Extent of moonbases.MacIntyre ran down his final check list with extra care. It had been surprisingly hard for the test mission's planners to pick an orbit that would keep him clear of Nearside's traffic and cover a totally unexplored portion of the moon's surface. But Farside was populated only by a handful of observatories and deep-system radio arrays, and the routing required to find virgin territory combined with the close orbit the survey instruments needed would put him out of touch with the rest of the human race for the next little bit, which was a novel experience even for an astronaut these days.
This is just a tender, an automated or remote-piloted ship for hull matinence and repairs, but it’s the first we see of Imperial grav-drive."That" was a blip less than a hundred kilometers astern and closing fast. How had something that big gotten this close before his radar caught it? According to his instruments, it was at least the size of one of the old Saturn V boosters!
His jaw dropped as the bogie made a crisp, clean, instantaneous ninety-degree turn. Apparently the laws of motion had been repealed on behalf of whatever it was! But whatever else it was doing, it was also maneuvering to match his orbit. Even as he watched, the stranger was slowing to pace him.
The shuttle Colin is flying is armed, apparently because of terrorist targeting of the aerospace industry. Lot of firepower though. Missiles vanish before impact.Three small, powerful missiles blasted away from the Beagle. They weren't nukes, but each carried a three-hundred-kilo warhead, and they had a perfect targeting setup. He tracked them all the way in on radar.
The tender up close, Imperial ships are made of “battle-steel” which is colored like fresh and shiny copper.Yes, there they were. And mighty disappointing they were, too. He didn't really know what he'd expected, but that flattened, featureless, round-tipped, double-ended cylinder certainly wasn't it. They were barely a kilometer clear, now, but aside from the fact that the thing was obviously artificial, it seemed disappointingly undramatic. There was no sign of engines, hatches, ports, communication arrays . . . nothing at all but smooth, mirror-bright metal. Or, at least, he assumed it was metal.
Instant accel/decel, a staple of the genre.They stopped. Just like that, with no apparent sense of deceleration, no reaction exhaust from the cylinder, no . . . anything.
Tender slows to several hundred kph, implying higher velocities, Dahak hangar bays.The cylinder slowed to a few hundred kilometers per hour, and MacIntyre felt the comfort of catatonia beckoning to him, but something made him fight it as obstinately as he had fought his panic. Whatever had him wasn't going to find him curled up and drooling when they finally stopped, by God!
A mighty tunnel enveloped them, a good two hundred meters across and lit by brilliant strip lights. Stone walls glittered with an odd sheen, as if the rock had been fused glass-slick, but that didn't last long. They slid through a multi-ply hatch big enough for a pair of carriers, and the tunnel walls were suddenly metallic. A bronze-like metal, gleaming in the light, stretching so far ahead of him even its mighty bore dwindled to a gleaming dot with distance.
Their speed dropped still further, and more hatches slid past. Dozens of hatches, most as large as the one that had admitted them to this impossible metal gullet. His mind reeled at the structure's sheer size, but he retained enough mental balance to apologize silently to the proctoscope's designers.
One huge hatch flicked open with the suddenness of a striking snake. Whoever was directing their flight curved away from the tunnel, slipping neatly through the open hatch, and his Beagle settled without a jar to a floor of the same bronze-like alloy.
They were in a dimly-lit metal cavern at least a kilometer across, its floor dotted with neatly parked duplicates of the cylinder that had captured him.
Tenders have stealth fields effective against radar, but disallow radio since, y’know, they both use radio waves."It was not possible. The tender's stealth systems enclosed both you and itself in a field impervious to radio transmissions. It was possible for me to communicate with the tender using my own communication systems, but there was no on-board capability to relay my words to you. Once more, I apologize for any inconvenience you may have suffered."
A car for getting around Dahak (hey, it’s a big ship) not actually needed with the drop tubes, but comforting to people who haven’t grown up on a ship, or want to sit and read a book or something.MacIntyre craned his neck and caught a glimpse of movement as a double-ended bullet-shape about the size of a compact car slid rapidly closer, gliding a foot or so above the floor. It came to a halt under the leading edge of his port wing, exactly opposite his forward hatch, and a door slid open. Light spilled from the opening, bright and welcoming in the dim metal cavern.
Artificial gravity. When he reviewed the Farscape pilot, Chuck said something about how a moment that surprises him on every viewing, when Chrichton first realizes he’s on an alien world. This is like that. Colin is seeing things that we, as sci-fi fans have seen a hundred times before, like tractor beams and artificial gravity, but there’s a real sense of wonder and discovery, much as I imagine I’d feel on finding that nay of those things are real.His eyes widened. He couldn't be certain, but his weight felt about right for a standard gee, which meant these bozos could generate gravity to order!
The car again, conforming seats, one-way cockpit, room for two. I guess privacy might be an extra benefit to the cars. Oh, and no controls, because Dahak controls them.It seemed innocuous enough. There were two comfortable-looking chairs proportioned for something the same size and shape as a human, but no visible control panel. The most interesting thing, though, was that the upper half of the vehicle's hull was transparent—from the inside. From the outside, it looked exactly the same as the bronze-colored floor under his feet.
He shrugged and climbed aboard, noticing that the silently suspended vehicle didn't even quiver under his weight. He chose the right-hand seat, then made himself sit motionless as the padded surface squirmed under him. A moment later, it had reconfigured itself exactly to the contours of his body and the hatch licked shut.
At least 2 g acceleration for internal transit cars, then again they have to get around a hollow moon. Dahak times hatches to open and close just as the car goes through. Internal transit shaft 2-3 car-widths, as opposed to the 200 meter shafts for fighters, tenders, and possibly other parasites.At least there was a sense of movement this time. He sank firmly back into the seat under at least two gees' acceleration. No wonder the thing was bullet-shaped! The little vehicle rocketed across the cavern, straight at a featureless metal wall, and he flinched involuntarily. But a hatch popped open an instant before they hit, and they darted straight into another brightly-lit bore, this one no wider than two or three of the vehicles in which he rode.
Car decel (it’s just cool, ok!) and bouncing guide light to show people around.His first warning was the movement of the vehicle's interior. The entire cockpit swiveled smoothly, until he was facing back the way he'd come, and then the drag of deceleration hit him. It went on and on, and the blurred walls beyond the transparent canopy slowed. He could make out details once more, including the maws of other tunnels, and then they slowed virtually to a walk. They swerved gently down one of those intersecting tunnels, little wider than the vehicle itself, then slid alongside a side opening and stopped. The hatch flicked soundlessly open.
"If you will debark, Commander?" the mellow voice invited, and MacIntyre shrugged and stepped down onto what looked for all the world like shag carpeting. The vehicle closed its hatch behind him and slid silently backwards, vanishing the way it had come.
"Follow the guide, please, Commander."
He looked about blankly for a moment, then saw a flashing light globe hanging in mid-air. It bobbed twice, as if to attract his attention, then headed down a side corridor at a comfortable pace.
Command One, otherwise known as the main bridge. Unspeakably cool.MacIntyre shook himself and followed with a wry half-smile, and the bronze portal slid open as he approached. It was at least fifteen centimeters thick, yet it was but the first of a dozen equally thick hatches, forming a close-spaced, immensely strong barrier, and he felt small and fragile as he followed the globe down the silently opening passage. The multi-ply panels licked shut behind him, equally silently, and he tried to suppress a feeling of imprisonment. But then his destination appeared before him at last and he stopped, all other considerations forgotten.
The spherical chamber was larger than the old war room under Cheyenne Mountain, larger even than main mission control at Shepard, and the stark perfection of its form, the featureless sweep of its colossal walls, pressed down upon him as if to impress his tininess upon him. He stood on a platform thrust out from one curving wall—a transparent platform, dotted with a score of comfortable, couch-like chairs before what could only be control consoles, though there seemed to be remarkably few read-outs and in-puts—and the far side of the chamber was dominated by a tremendous view screen. The blue-white globe of Earth floated in its center, and the cloud-swirled loveliness caught at MacIntyre's throat. He was back in his first shuttle cockpit, seeing that azure and argent beauty for the first time, as if the mind-battering incidents of the past hour had made him freshly aware of his bond with all that planet was and meant.
"Please be seated, Commander." The soft, mellow voice broke into his thoughts almost gently, yet it seemed to fill the vast space. "Here." The light globe danced briefly above one padded chair—the one with the largest console, at the very lip of the unrailed platform—and he approached it gingerly. He had never suffered from agoraphobia or vertigo, but it was a long, long way down, and the platform was so transparent he seemed to be striding on air itself as he crossed it.
Dahak’s size."A spacecraft? As big as the moon?" MacIntyre said faintly.
"Correct. A vessel some three thousand-three-two-oh-two-point-seven-nine-five, to be precise—of your kilometers in diameter."
Dahak camouflage, and length of time in Earth orbit."It's not possible," MacIntyre said stubbornly. "If this thing is the size you say, what happened to the real moon?"
"It was destroyed," his informant said calmly. "With the exception of sufficient of its original material to make up the negligible difference in diameter, it was dropped into your sun. It is standard Fleet procedure to camouflage picket units or any capital ship that may be required to spend extended periods in systems not claimed by the Imperium."
"You camouflaged your ship as our moon? That's insane!"
"On the contrary, Commander. A planetoid-class starship is not an easy object to hide. Replacing an existing moon of appropriate size is by far the simplest means of concealment, particularly when, as in this case, the original surface contours are faithfully recreated as part of the procedure."
"Preposterous! Somebody on Earth would have noticed something going on!"
"No, Commander, they would not. In point of fact, your species was not on Earth to observe it."
"What?!"
"The events I have just described took place approximately fifty-one thousand of your years ago," his informant said gently.
Dahak appearance, crew size (250 thousand, with room for families to grow) and service times.Earth vanished, and another image replaced it. It was a sphere, as bronze-bright as the cylinder that had captured his Beagle, but despite the lack of any reference scale, he knew it was far, far larger.
The image turned and grew, and details became visible, swelling rapidly into vast blisters and domes. There were no visible ports, and he saw no sign of any means of propulsion. The hull was completely featureless but for those smoothly rounded protrusions . . . until its turning motion brought him face-to-face with a tremendous replica of the dragon that had adorned the hatch. It sprawled over one face of the sphere like a vast ensign, arrogant and proud, and he swallowed. It covered a relatively small area of the hull, but if that sphere was what he thought it was, this dragon was about the size of Montana.
"This is Dahak," the voice told him, "Hull Number One-Seven-Two-Two-Nine-One, an Utu-class planetoid of Battle Fleet, built fifty-two thousand Terran years ago in the Anhur System by the Fourth Imperium."
MacIntyre stared at the screen, too entranced to disbelieve. The image of the ship filled it entirely, seeming as if it must fall from the display and crush him, and then it dissolved into a computer-generated schematic of the monster vessel. It was too stupendous for him to register much, and the schematic changed even as he watched, rolling to present him with an exploded polar view of deck after inconceivable deck as the voice continued.
"The Utu-class were designed both for the line of battle and for independent, long-term survey and picket deployment, with core crews of two hundred and fifty thousand. Intended optimum deployment time is twenty-five Terran years, with provision for a sixty percent increase in personnel during that period. Maximum deployment time is virtually unlimited, assuming crew expansion is contained.
Dahak parasites and armament. This will be expanded on in the second book, but I may as well explain now. Fully half of Dahak’s internal volume is taken up by drives (mostly the FTL) and the generators needed to run them. Basically, the Fourth Imperium, whatever their other technical wonders, were incapable of miniaturizing an FTL drive enough to use on ships smaller than celestial bodies. So Dahak serves as an FTL carrier for thousands of fighters and 200 sublight warships: destroyers, cruisers, all the way up to battleships a bit smaller than an aircraft carrier."In addition to small, two-seat fighters that may be employed in either attack or defense, Dahak deploys sublight parasite warships massing up to eighty thousand tons. Shipboard weaponry centers around hyper-capable missile batteries backed up by direct-fire energy weapons. Weapon payloads range from chemical warheads through fusion, anti-matter, and gravitonic warheads. Essentially, Commander, this ship could vaporize your planet."
In space battles, the first line of attack and defense are hyper-missiles which have a range covering much of a star system. There are limitations, like needing large airtight silos, and needing to carefully calculate exit ranges and vectors, but the missiles cross systems very quickly and if you’re very good at aiming, they can materialize inside an enemy’s shields or even inside the enemy ship itself. Worth noting that shields can cover some or all hyperspace bands, but grow consecutively weaker as the same power is spread over a greater and greater area. After that you have sublight missiles that carry similar warheads and are subject to ECM and point-defence, then energy weapons at close ranges.
You should be familiar with how nuclear warheads work. Antimatter gives you a bigger bang. Chemical warheads are really only useful for attacking planets. Gravitonic warheads create miniature black holes where they detonate. There’s some question as to how powerful they are, at this point in time, a single gravitonic bomb will not one-shot Dahak or destroy a planet, but will certainly kill any of Dahak’s parasites. Later, they do break 200 km warships in half with a single hit. They’re decidedly the upper limit on Imperial firepower, and Dahak has many missile batteries.
Dahak also has gravitic drive with instance accel/decel, and a max sublight speed of 52.4% c. Less than HH or Andromeda, more than double that of Starfleet. There are two kinds of FTL drive known to the Fourth Imperium but they can only build a ship with one. Hyperdrive is objectively faster, but Enchanach Drive, like Dahak has, allows you to view the universe, stop, change course etc. Once you jump into hypserspace you’re committed to the coordinates you programmed in or bust. Enchanach Drive works like a series of rapid teleports, and Dahak’s has an effective velocity of 720 c."Sublight propulsion," Dahak went on, ignoring the interruption, "relies upon phased gravitonic progression. Your present terminology lacks the referents for an accurate description, but for purposes of visualization, you may consider it a reactionless drive with a maximum attainable velocity of fifty-two-point-four percent that of light. Above that velocity, a vessel of this size would lose phase lock, and be destroyed.
"Unlike previous designs, the Utu-class do not rely upon multi-dimensional drives—what your science fiction writers have dubbed 'hyper drives,' Commander—for faster-than-light travel. Instead, this ship employs the Enchanach Drive. You may envision it as the creation of converging artificially-generated 'black holes,' which force the vessel out of phase with normal space in a series of instantaneous transpositions between coordinates in normal space. Under Enchanach Drive, dwell time in normal space between transpositions is approximately point-seven-five Terran femtoseconds.
"The Enchanach Drive's maximum effective velocity is approximately Cee-six factorial. While this is lower than that of the latest hyper drives, Enchanach Drive vessels have several tactical advantages. Most importantly, they may enter, maneuver in, and leave a supralight state at will, whereas hyper drive vessels may enter and leave supralight only at pre-selected coordinates."
History of the Fourth Imperium, so-called for being the Fourth human interstellar civilization. Of course, archeologists are fairly sure there were 9 more. There’s been a cycle for a hilw of the alien Achuultani wiping out an Impeirum, but leaving some survivors on some backwater world that survive and eventually reclaim the stars only to be slaughtered all over. The Fourth has been very miltary and research oriented to try and escape this fate, but know their ancient enemy only through mythology."Briefly, the Fourth Imperium is a political unit, originating upon the Planet Birhat in the Bia System some seven thousand years prior to Dahak's entry into your solar system. As of that time, the Imperium consisted of some fifteen hundred star systems. It is called the Fourth Imperium because it is the third such interstellar entity to exist within recorded history. The existence of at least one prehistoric imperium, designated the 'First Imperium' by Imperial historians, has been conclusively demonstrated, although archaeological evidence suggests that, in fact, a minimum of nine additional prehistoric imperia intervened between the First and Second Imperium. All, however, were destroyed in part or in whole by the Achuultani."
A formless chill tingled down MacIntyre's spine.
"And just what were the Achuultani?" he asked, trying to keep his strange, shadowy emotions out of his voice.
"Available data are insufficient for conclusive determinations," Dahak replied. "Fragmentary evidence suggests that the Achuultani are a single species, possibly of extra-galactic origin. Even the name is a transliteration of a transliteration from an unattested myth of the Second Imperium. More data may have been amassed during actual incursions, but most such information was lost in the general destruction attendant upon such incursions or during the reconstruction that followed them. What has been retained pertains more directly to tactics and apparent objectives. On the basis of that data, historians of the Fourth Imperium conclude that the first such incursion occurred on the close order of seventy million Terran years ago."
The asteroid belt as remains of a First Imperium stronghold. The Achuultani like throwing big rocks (and sometimes small moons) at people they don’t like. They’re also what did in the dinosaurs."The Achuultani objective," Dahak said precisely, "appears to be the obliteration of all competing species, wherever situated. While it is unlikely that terrestrial dinosaurs, who were essentially a satisfied life form, might have competed with them, that would not prevent them from striking the planet as a long-term precaution against the emergence of a competitor. Their attention was probably drawn to Earth by the presence of a First Imperium colony, however. I base this conclusion on data that indicate the existence of a First Imperium military installation on your fifth planet."
"Fifth planet?" MacIntyre parroted, overloaded by what he was hearing. "You mean . . . ?"
"Precisely, Commander: the asteroid belt. It would appear they struck your fifth planet a bit harder than Earth, and it was much smaller and less geologically stable to begin with."
What the Fourth Imperium has puzzled out about the Achuultani motives. Also, roughly how screwed humanity is. Don’t worry, it gets worse."Thank you. Imperial analysts speculate that the periodic Achuultani incursions into this arm of the galaxy represent sweeps in search of potential competitors—what your own military might term 'search and destroy' missions—rather than attempts to expand their imperial sphere. The Achuultani culture would appear to be extremely stable, one might almost say static, for very few technological advances have been observed since the Second Imperium. The precise reasons for this apparent cultural stasis and for the widely varying intervals between such sweeps are unknown, as is the precise locus from which they originate. While some evidence does suggest an extra-galactic origin for the species, pattern analysis suggests that the Achuultani currently occupy a region far to the galactic east. This, unfortunately, places Sol in an extremely exposed position, as your solar system lies on the eastern fringe of the Imperium. In short, the Achuultani must pass Sol to reach the Imperium.
"This has not mattered to your planet of late, as there has been nothing to attract Achuultani attention to this system since the end of the First Incursion. That protection no longer obtains, however. Your civilization's technical base is now sufficiently advanced to produce an electronic and neutrino signature that their instruments cannot fail to detect."
Dahak is self-suffcient, as long as the crew doesn’t become too numerous, and carries easily enough people to colonize some world with a sustainable population. Which was the mutineer’s plan all along."It was. Dahak's cruising radius is effectively unlimited, Commander, with technical capabilities sufficient to inaugurate a sound technology base on any habitable world, and the crew would provide ample genetic material for a viable planetary population.”
Dahak’s power is provided most of the time in-system by 312 fusion plants (anybody have a clue how to calc?) Dahak also has a “core tap” which tears open a rift into hyperspace and wrestles almost limitless power from the screaming void. Certainly, it dwarfs the combined output of all the fusion plants. However, the core tap cannot be run indefinitely, so it’s mostly only used during FTL flight and battle. It does take some considerable power to start the core tap and properly contain the energies, more than 2 fusion generators can provide. After the destruction of all but 2 fusion plants, it took Dahak 110 years to self-repair to the point of becoming aware again.Before Comp Cent became aware of and deactivated them, three hundred and ten of Dahak's three hundred and twelve fusion power plants had been destroyed, dropping Dahak's internal power net below minimal operational density. Sufficient power remained to implement a defensive fire plan as per Senior Fleet Captain Druaga's orders, but not to simultaneously decontaminate the interior and effect emergency repairs, as well. As a result, Comp Cent was unable to immediately and fully execute its orders. It was necessary to repair the damage before Comp Cent could decontaminate, yet repairs amounted to virtual rebuilding and required more power than remained. Indeed, power levels were so low that it was impossible even to operate Dahak's core tap. This, in turn, meant that emergency power reserves were quickly drained and that it was necessary to spend extended periods rebuilding those reserves between piecemeal repair activities.
"Because of these extreme conditions, Comp Cent was dysfunctional for erratic but extended periods, though automatic defensive programs remained operational. Scanner recordings indicate that seven mutinous parasites were destroyed during the repair period, but each defensive action drained power levels still further, which, in turn, extended Comp Cent's dysfunctional periods and further slowed repairs by extending the intervals required to rebuild reserve power to permit reactivation of sufficient of Comp Cent to direct each new stage of work.
"Because of this, approximately eleven Terran decades elapsed before Comp Cent once more became fully functional, albeit at marginal levels, and so was able to begin decontamination. During that time, the lifeboats manned by loyal personnel had become inoperable, as had all communication equipment aboard them. As a result, it was not possible for any loyalist to return to Dahak."
Dahak was never designed to be a fully sentient AI, it just sort of happened over the millennia. Which is why Dahak refers to his old self as Comp Cent."You must understand that Comp Cent had never been intended by its designers to function independently. While self-aware in the crudest sense, Comp Cent then possessed only very primitive and limited versions of those qualities which humans term 'imagination' and 'initiative.' In addition, strict obedience to the commands of lawful superiors is thoroughly—and quite properly—embedded in Comp Cent's core programs. Without an order to send tenders to retrieve loyal officers, Comp Cent could not initiate the action; without communication, no loyal officer could order Comp Cent to do so. Assuming, of course, that any such loyal officers had reason to believe that Dahak remained functional to retrieve them."
Explanation for interrelations between man and his enviroment, massive campaign by previous Imperiums to spread life again."Wait," he said hoarsely. "Wait a minute! What about evolution? Damn it, Dahak, homo sapiens is related to every other mammal on the planet!"
"Correct," Dahak said unemotionally. "Following the First Imperium's fall, one of its unidentified non-human successor imperia re-seeded many worlds the Achuultani struck. Earth was one such planet. So also was Mycos, the true homeworld of the human race and the capital of the Second Imperium until its destruction some seventy-one thousand years ago. The same ancestral fauna were used to re-seed all Earth-type planets. Earth's Neanderthals were thus not ancestors of your own race but rather very distant cousins. They did not, I regret to say, fare well against Dahak's crew and its descendants."
Dahak has only one hypercom, and lacks materials needed to repair it. You’d think that would be on the list of mission critical spares. Explanation of fold-space comms."Supralight communication is maintained via the multi-dimensional communicator, commonly referred to as the 'hypercom,' a highly refined derivative of the much shorter-ranged 'fold-space' communicator used by Fleet personnel. Both combine elements of hyperspace and gravitonic technology to distort normal space and create a point-to-point congruence between distant foci, but in the case of the hypercom these distortions or 'folds' may span as many as several thousand light-years. A hypercom transmitter is a massive installation, and certain of its essential components contain Mycosan, a synthetic element that cannot be produced out of shipboard resources. As all spare components are currently aboard Fleet Captain Anu's parasites, repairs are impossible. Dahak can receive hypercom transmissions, but cannot initiate a signal."
Dahak knows where the mutineers make their base, in a stronghold under the Antarctic. But Dahak cannot penetrate their shields without using enough firepower to devastate the enviroment and kill off most of the world."It does. Such action, however, would conflict with Alpha Priority core programs. This vessel has the capacity to penetrate the defenses Fleet Captain Anu has established to protect his enclave, but only by using weaponry that would destroy seventy percent of the human race upon the planet. Destruction of non-Achuultani sentients except in direct self-defense is prohibited."
A bit of future history, Dahak and Colin are speculating why the mutineer’s manipulation of societies have shifted from suppressing science and technological development to encouraging it in the last few centuries. They eventually figure Anu and his mutinners have given up on Dahak and are trying to build their own interstellar craft that will not contain Fourth Imperium technology and thus not get shot down like all their attempts to board Dahak."Agreed. Yet that, too, is consistent with the theory I have offered. Consider, Commander: the superpowers of the last century have been drawn together in cooperation against the growing militancy of your so-called Third World, particularly the religio-political blocs centered on radical Islam and the Asian Alliance. This has permitted the merger of the First World technical base—ConEuropean, Russian, North American, and Australian—Japanese alike—while maintaining the pressure of military need. In addition, certain aspects of Imperial technology have begun to appear in your civilization. Your gravitonic survey instruments are a prime example of this process, for they are several centuries in advance of any other portion of your technology."
The Achuultani are coming, and Dahak cannot deal with all the conflicting equal-value orders. He needs a captain, and names Colin thus.I have received hypercom transmissions from unmanned surveillance stations along the traditional Achuultani incursion routes. A new incursion has been detected, and a Fleet alert has been transmitted."
MacIntyre's face went white as a far more terrible horror suddenly dwarfed the shock and fury of hearing himself "die."
"Yet I have monitored no response, Commander," the computer said even more softly. "Fleet Central is silent. No defensive measures have been initiated."
"No," MacIntyre breathed.
"Yes, Commander. And that has activated yet another Alpha Priority command. Dahak is a Fleet unit, aware of a threat to the existence of the Imperium, and I must respond to it . . . but I can not respond until the mutiny is suppressed. It is a situation that cannot be resolved by Comp Cent, yet it must be resolved. Which is why I need you."
"What can I do?" MacIntyre whispered hoarsely.
"It is quite simple, Commander MacIntyre. Under Fleet Regulation Five-Three-Three, Subsection Nine-One, Article Ten, acting command of any Fleet unit devolves upon the senior surviving crewman. Under Fleet Regulation Three-Seven, Subsection One-Three, any descendant of any core crewman assigned to a vessel for a given deployment becomes a crew member for the duration of that deployment, and Senior Fleet Captain Druaga's deployment has not been terminated by orders from Fleet Central."
MacIntyre gurgled a horrified denial, but Dahak continued mercilessly.
"You, Commander, are directly descended from loyal members of Senior Fleet Captain Druaga's core crew. You are on board Dahak. By definition, therefore, you become the senior member of Dahak's crew, and thus—"
MacIntyre's gurgling noises took on a note of dreadful supplication.
"—command devolves upon you."
All Fleet personnel back in the day got biotechnic enhancement surgery like this. It was the favored carrot for recruitment, as a matter of fact. Well, not everyone got the bridge officer packet, but you could definitely expect a neural interface, some strength and speed enhancement, and the medical implants leading to the almost 6 century life-expectancy."And just what," MacIntyre demanded warily, "might biotechnic treatments be?"
"Nothing harmful, Captain. The bridge officer program includes sensory boosters, neural feeds for computer interface, command authority authentication patterns, Fleet communicator and bio-sensor implants, skeletal reinforcement, muscle and tissue enhancement, and standard hygienic, immunization, and tissue renewal treatments."
"Now wait a minute, Dahak! I like myself just the way I am, thank you!"
"Captain, I make all due allowance for inexperience and parochialism, but that statement cannot be true. In your present condition, you could lift barely a hundred and fifty kilos, and I would estimate your probable life span at no more than one Terran century under optimal conditions."
"I could—" MacIntyre paused, an arrested light in his eyes. "Dahak," he said after a moment, "what was the life expectancy for your crewmen?"
"The average life expectancy of Fleet personnel is five-point-seven-nine-three Terran centuries," Dahak said calmly.
Extent of biotechnic combat enhancements, and I am impressed. I’m not quite sure what he means by taking 11x damage, this isn’t a videogame and there are complex and myriad ways for a person to be hurt."Of course, Captain, if you insist, I will have no choice but to forgo the biotechnic portion of your training. I must respectfully point out, however, that should you thereafter confront one of the mutineers, your opponent will have approximately eight times your strength, three times your reaction speed, and a skeletal muscular structure and circulatory system capable of absorbing on the order of eleven times the damage your own body will accept."
