Crusade chapter 3 (standard:science fiction, 2245 words) [3/11] show all parts
Author: St George	Added: Mar 11 2003	Views/Reads: 2604/1907	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Crusade continued

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

systems in reference to the films), but like everyone in those days he 
had helped out on every project at sometime or another. Cyberdyne's 
first operational computer had only used one two gallon bio-cell and 
had been timed at only 400 megahertz, Alecto made it look like an 
abacus. 

With the arrival of mail and news from home there was a definite upturn
in morale on board and with promise of the same next week the last part 
of the voyage home seemed likely to pass quickly, and indeed it seemed 
only a few days later that Alecto and the chief navigation officer 
guided the titanic starship into Mars orbit. The navigator had told 
Carver that they had to be careful in designing their orbital path in 
order to keep from causing an eclipse every time they orbited. 

Carver had been expecting a lot of attention from naval command at
Hellas station but what he hadn't been prepared for was the press 
coverage; although when he thought about it he realised that the 
arrival of Crusader was bound to be pretty big and he should have 
prepared something for the press. As it was, as soon as his shuttle 
touched down inside the shielded and pressurised spaceport the 
reporters gathered around, they must all be here at naval invitation, 
he thought, there's no other way onto this planet. As he stepped onto 
the tarmac the reporters crowded around asking for something on the 
Crusader. “Just be glad we're good guys, otherwise you'd be in 
trouble!'' he called to them as he strode through the security check, 
determined to enjoy his fifteen minutes of fame. “You'll regret that,” 
said Logan, walking a pace behind. “No,” answered Carver, “it's not me 
their interested in, its her,” he continued, pointing upwards in the 
general direction of Crusader. The pair walked through the glass doors 
into the main foyer of the port, noticing briefly the words etched on 
the glass, ‘Let's treat this planet better than the last one', they had 
been Bogdanov's first words as he set foot on Mars. 

“Are you taking care of my baby?” a voice said behind them. “Nagumo,
Great to see....” suddenly Carver stopped short, “... I mean ... Yes 
Sir.” He had stopped because he saw that Takahama was wearing a shiny 
new Vice Admiral insignia on his collar. “At ease Captain.” “When did 
you get that,” asked Carver indicating the insignia. “Ah, well they 
offered me a command like you, but I turned it down so they made me 
Director of Starship Design. It might not be as dashing as Captain of 
the Crusader but it is a bit safer, besides I was always the better 
designer so it makes sense.” “The better designer? If it wasn't for me 
Envoy 1 would still be on the drawing board,... with respect Sir,” 
responded Carver in a falsely hurt tone. “Never mind that, I've got 
something to show you,” said Takahama, “Remember what we said when we 
sat down to draw up the plans for the Lucifer class?” “That we would 
know the stellar navy was a reality when we could hold....” Carver was 
cut off mid sentence when Takahama handed him a blue hardback book, on 
the cover it said ‘Jane's Fighting Starships'. “I thought you would 
want to see that,” said Takahama. 

Not long afterwards Takahama took Carver to one side and said “Listen
Richard, news hot of the presses, the Anduril have almost completed 
construction of BS002, but don't tell anyone, it's supposed to be a 
secret.” This was interesting news; Crusader's pennant number was BS001 
so it wasn't too hard to work out that BS002 must be a sister ship. 
This was a big shock to Carver, he had never heard even a rumour of 
this second battleship. “Who's up for command?” he asked. “Can't tell 
you, they haven't decided yet, I only know because they asked me, they 
haven't even decided a name yet.” 

For five days Carver played what he called the ‘proud father role' in
front of the press and high command, and in a sense he felt it was 
true, having designed Crusader (with Takahama). 

As well as crew, Crusader also received 600 VMDs, or vessel maintenance
droids. These spider like machines would be Alecto's Physical presence 
and perform routine maintenance plus anything that couldn't be done by 
a human, they were equipped with a variety of tools including a laser 
torch and in theory could even fight if the ship were boarded, ...in 
theory. 

With crew and supplies now on board both Carver and Captain Tennit were
eager to start on final shakedown and training, so five days after 
arrival Crusader and Kerray-win left Mars orbit bound for Bernard's 
star, a little over two days away at top speed of 0.35 parsecs per hour 
(a parsec being 3.26 light years or almost 1.84 trillion miles). The 
first 400 crew members were all taken from other ships and so had some 
first hand experience (though not of combat obviously), but the rest of 
the crew, who had just come aboard, were fresh out of the academy at 
Cydonia and it was because there was such a large group of green 
recruits that the Kerray-win was accompanying them; it was in the 
Anduril's interest to aid the stellar navy as much as they could so 
that when the time came they were strong enough to aid the Andurils. 

Once clear of Mars there came an important point in Crusader's history,
the first time her hyperdrive was brought on-line to generate an entry 
portal. Deep within the ship the reactors were pushed to their limit, 
the hyperdrive needed over three terra-watts of power to open a portal 
large enough for Crusader to pass through, and even with the reactors 
at maximum the portal was only 100 metres larger than Crusader at her 
widest. There was dead quiet on the bridge as the two helmsman guided 
her in; as they moved their yokes, in the depths of the ship enormous 
Etheric masses moved and shifted changing Crusader's course. Most 
starship helmsmen were drawn from the ranks of submarine helmsmen on 
earth because despite the different situation the jobs were very 
similar. Although Alecto could take over in an emergency it was felt 
that the ships computer was better employed at other tasks, in this 
case performing the billions of calculations a second needed to 
maintain the portal. The holographic display showed Crusader, a long 
octagonal cylinder, and ahead the blue-grey sphere of the portal. At 
the press of a button Carver zoomed out the point of view to show 1800 
metres away, the Kerray-win just beginning to form her own portal; the 
picture was extrapolated from conventional radar and visual sensors, 
but for ranges greater than around 15 light seconds or at speeds 
greater than C these were useless and they had to rely on epdar. Again 
epdar operators were often recruited from submarine officers because 
the system was almost identical in use and operation to sonar. Once in 
hyperspace the ion drives of both ships found it easier and top speed 
was soon attained, (in fact, Kerray-win could have gone a little faster 
but Crusader needed to keep up). Crusader could carry enough hydrogen, 
super cooled and compressed into its metallic state, for 55 days' 
hyper-flight and it replenished its supply as long as it was moving in 
real-space. 

Crusader was octagonal in cross section, and in each of the diagonal
walls were two cut away sections each housing a massive twin EP canon 
turret, there were eight turrets in all each covering an arc of 90 
degrees fore and aft and 101 degrees elevation, although directly in 
front and directly behind were out of the turrets line of sight. There 
were eight torpedo tubes in the bow, six port and six starboard and six 
tubes in the stern. 

In addition to these primary weapons there were 600 starstreak launchers
covering all directions, but clustered around vulnerable or important 
areas, each starstreak turret had a pair of high speed, high 
manoeuvrability, starstreak defensive missiles capable of destroying a 
torpedo or damaging a fighter. There were also 600 computer controlled 
rapid-fire EP blasters capable of 750 bolts a minute, designed to ward 
off fighters. Taken altogether there was (almost) no angle which was 
not covered by both offensive and defensive weapons. All weapons 
systems had to be put through their paces. 


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