Astra Pt. 06

He sighed, "The last 2 got away?"

Jack shook his head, "The Drakor. When one of these groups jumped in caught a stealthed Drakor ship in the field. We ended up slamming into it with my battleship. They both took heavy damage. We will travel back at 6x speed but we have a lot of repairs to make now on our own ships. I helped to rescue the Drakor ship from another timeline.

The Drakor now has the new arrivals as I contacted Justice immediately. When I saw why my pilot missed a scout sized ship in the middle of all of that. We took the nose right off it. We were in FTL mode.

We are currently chewing our way through the debris and asteroid field to reopen this route after we turned it into an asteroid shooting gallery. King Arthur is on its way back with the FTL drive damaged. Overall pretty good shape for the number of ships we encountered. The Drakor killed the last battleship before departing this location."

The President sighed, "I heard from Grace about the losses at the other 2 battle sites. She said you lost 13 children in the battle between the 2 locations."

Jack sighed, "It is a rough life out here and they know it. This is the first time Sprits has lost a child; one of my Wing Commanders who flew the Death Valley course. He and his twin tied both beat the record before Sprits claimed it and I took it from her."

He nodded, "Grace kept my wife quietly aboard one of the shuttles resting. I think she would like to tour the damage when you get back."

Jack nodded, "I agree you should."

He laughed and shook his head, "I am still picking up all the pieces from your news conference. 'Convict Gonzales' went into a hissy fit and her lawyer showed her the deal did not allow her to choose who all went.

All her co-conspirators are going. Those from Terra-1 still in prison you bet. 'A bunch of rapists and murders' she said. I reminded her she was a murder who plead guilty to it in open court. That shut her up and ended that call. I told the switchboard to not put her through again.

Until I send her a code to gain access for a call I want to have. You played hot potato with the religion question. Your answer on Messiah being too broad a term as it is defined. I was asked to comment on your answer toward some Christians who see you as a Messiah!"

Jack groaned, "Jesus was a Jew who made a new religion, Christianity. I did not lie about my knowledge of Christianity. To be honest I just wanted to end those questions."

He nodded, "I did answer, I told them 'By the definition many world leaders could claim to be a messiah. I also told them your refusal to rule over humanity and be involved in politics. Finding and stomping on corruption sure.

It is a sign to me that he wished to be outside of political and religious discussions because they all are political hot potatoes.' I was then asked about you being a Home Guard Admiral. I explained to them, 'They have no political system and ranks were based on knowledge and your skills.

It is a co-op. Because of that you had more military experience than others in the group and ended up picking up that role along with your crafting and inventions. You do not have to go out and beg for a better gun or materials to build another ship. You just use your ship and refine what you need.

What we need. We hope to have that first formal colony agreement together in a few days. Grace put together a great first draft on that."

Jack nodded. "I did not know she submitted a brief on me being human. That was a pleasant response."

The door opened and it was his son, "We cleared the field and processed all of the wreckage we got a couple of new elements that showed up.

I wanted you to know at 6x we should be there in 18 hours." Jack nodded. The President smiled, "We will be looking at the footage."

Jack nodded, "We set up a couple of camera satellites up there to watch over our activity from behind so we got a looking down view. We left them because if this cycle of time travel events occurs with others then those satellites will see them in the new corridor. We have all of the ship camera footage at all three battle sites."

The President nodded, "How many ships total did we face?"

Jack sighed, "The first 40 in Tau Ceti and they had another 80. Jupiter had 80. The outer belt had 200. 400 ships. Around 7,000 Tau Ceti lives lost would be my best guess and you lost the TRD Victus and their crew. All because we came back."

He nodded, "I know. Your demonstration on those rogue scouts with your fighter showed just how badly we would have got trounced without the innovations."

Jack nodded, "We need to decide on what you are going to do with ship designs. The fighter is easy. You do not need FTL drives in your fighters. I will spend a few hours in the lab running some modeling numbers. I will see you tomorrow."

He nodded and ended the call. He sent a call to Grace and she took it and sighed, "Thank god. I heard you were doing crazy shit with traveling in FTL in system?"

He nodded, "Only way to get to them while they were going through the corridor.

We did an 'Admiral' fly by on them. We came in with FTL with 3 ships and shot through the middle of the groups. Jonni 'missed a Scout' and it took the nose off the scout and fucked the nose on the battleship.

We are traveling at 6x while docked. The hull will likely breach up there but we have all the emergency bulkheads down. The reason she missed the scout was that it was in stealth. It was Drakor."

She looked shocked, "Oh gods what did they say?"

Jack smiled, "The ship design was unknown to them. It got jumped in with the Brelan. They were from an alternate reality. We chatted while I got their ship out of the field and returned to the Drakor using my shuttle while the base chewed through the field to reopen the corridor and clean up the debris. I was told we have a couple of new elements that were isolated. I will have Astra look at them later. How is Sprits holding up?"

She sighed, "She was a wreck for the first few hours. Her other son Steve said Martin died doing what he loved. They had to do something tactically stupid in shooting each other to get to him. He was fucking up their day. She laughed as she could see him doing that. She is still hurting but so is everyone. All the mothers got hit with this one. Our twins understood when we told them what was going on in 3 locations. How many ships did you take on?"

Jack looked a bit sheepish because she was going to be pissed. "200 ships." Her eyes went wide, "With 3 fucking ships!"

He nodded, "We got all but one. The Drakor killed that ship. They are likely going to pass judgment on the Brelan in this timeline as well."

She nodded, "Well you get some rest. I am sure it is going to be bedlam here. The first of the others started arriving and they can see the damage done to the ships. The commander reported in the numbers to me and the Terra station. That you went off to face a larger force with only 3 ships he left out. Figured he would leave it to you."

Jack nodded as he got to his lab. Grace was there on the screen. She sighed, "Let Astra in."

He nodded, "She is free to come in if she wishes. I am not summoning her."

She nodded and ended the call. He got to his keyboard as she walked in and slammed the door. 'Summon me?"

He nodded, "I leaned on you a lot today. I am hurting like I have never truly been hurt before."

She sat in his lap and hugged him, "The children?"

He nodded, "2,900+ of my children or unborn have died. Over 2,800 of them simply because I sired them and someone hated me."

He pulled the file for the two new elements and displayed them on the screen. Astra's eyes went wide, "Where did you get this one?"

Jack opened the image to a barrel of it. "Found in what we mined."

She groaned, "You know what that is?"

Jack shook his head? She smiled, "You have not looked yet." She sighed. "That is the missing element to create my cybernetic brain. The explosive one."

He nodded, "I can make you a new backup body."

She nodded, "Yes, you could be the father of AI."

Jack shook his head. "That is a part of you for you. Someone else will create AI's in time. For now, you are one of a kind, indispensable, and in a way the mother who lost the most."

She looked at him, "You mean because I gather all the samples and work to see your seed spread. If I looked at it like you're stating it, you would be right. I never looked at it like that. It is the closest I could come to be your wife and I helped you to create thousands."

He nodded. He helped her off his lap and got undressed. "I think you know I am not in the right frame of mind for sex." She nodded, "You sit in your chair and work on what you want to work on. I will just suck it all out of you for those mothers who lost children to that butcher. I overheard about her hissy fit. I think she got her eyes opened."

Jack asked, "The other one?"

She looked at it, "That one I have never seen before. Jack smiled, Travinum."

She smiled, "You do have the right to name it. It is an ore?" He looked at the barrel and it was encrusted in the rock, " He looked at it, "Model its properties while you're working and tell me what you think it might be good for."

He started up the fabricators on 200 terawatts power cores and an 8x multiplexer. He looked at his katana design and created up a new model. One that incorporated his design for a Wormhole Drive. He went through 8 variations until he got what he wanted. He went back to his machine and created a new device for the ship. One he would wait to test with the Wormhole Drive.

He reconfigured his engine room power core section to add a second level. Something he would need to do as he added a set of internal hard shields around the cores. He moved them into a mid-tier platform that was held up by an anti-gravity field so it had four 150 terawatts cores to power it and the two sets of hard shields on those power cores.

He reworked it and put in the support beams to make it modular instead of gravity fields. He added 8 more power cores per section. He worked at his formula for the Titanium-H and he looked at what he could add to make it harder. He tried each of the two elements in the design and they failed. Ever together.

He relooked as his shield generators and ran a few different models before Astra came up for air. She looked at his design. "A new shield." He nodded, "Yes, using metallic hydrogen alloy I could quadruple the stack height on the shields. He brought the new design up quickly and smile, "A five stack.! He then added in hard shield components into it.

Astra was back and looking at what he was doing. She gasped as she read the modeling results. He had a new shield. It was not just a new power increase or magnification. He created a new shield design. She looked at it, "That cannot be fired through though."

Jack smiled and ran the model for her. She shook her head, "How is that possible? He looked at her, "Hydrogen is a gas. Transparent. Metallic hydrogen is a liquid black or silver in color. Black is a lower pressure variant. Vironidite is a crystalline structure. Transparent but a very pale blue hue to it."

She nodded, "I get that and when combined with Metallic hydrogen you make it stable at room temperature."

He nodded, "Name something you can see through but the person on the other side cannot?"

She looked at Jack, "You are talking a one-way mirror but that only works if one side has bright light."

He smiled. "A multi-layer shields. A clear metallic-like surface that makes it hard and reflects light when show into it from that side. That reflects light away from it when 'bright light' hits it. Like bright laser fire."

She looked at Jack, "That keeps this inner shield safer longer from being taken down because it is technically hardened to drop the inner shield with projectiles. The outer one does not add any protection. Just a reflective surface from bright light. Low power consumption. Now we added a layer in between the two. We generate a thin layer of gas between the two." She asked, "Where does this gas come from?"

He smiled, "Naturally."

She looked at him, "What?"

He laughed, "When you bond two unlike items together with epoxy is does not do well. When you do it at a molecular level like building an alloy. Applied the same principle but with the two shield layers. That trapped gas, if you will, be charged with a current to run at a random frequency for a period of time.

Let us say for the sake of argument we did it for an hour. All projectile weapons would have the ammo in chamber reflect that frequency and pass right through it. She looked at me, "Then you would have to make modifications to the rail guns in your design."

He nodded, "Only projectile weapon we use. Machine guns they would have to turn that charge to the middle field off. All incoming attacks.

Light, not all but most are reflected away. Hard ammo like railguns comes in it hits the charged field. Takes some energy away from all three. Laser fire comes in the small amount that gets through is light energy and is absorbed. Strengthen the middle field back a little at a time. Now our big rail guns would likely drain about 30 to 40% of the energy on this shield.

Because it is draining the power from all three equally, mostly. She nodded, "In theory." He pointed at the model and she pointed at the title theoretical model. He smiled, "How many times has it worked here but not out there when I settle in on a design?"

She nodded, "Keep going."

He sighed, "Three shots from a rail gun would bring the shields down."

But the armor would not have been hit. You are talking a dedicate 200 Terawatts power core for the shields. On a scout, cruiser, or destroyer. At least 2 150terawatts multiplexed on a battleship. On a dreadnought. You are talking an 8 multiplexed 150terawatts or six-plex of 200terawatts.

Then I also designed this box."

She looked at it, "Lots of liquid hydrogen. What does it do?"

He nodded, "Recharge rate on shields. A Power Transfer Regulator that will draw from unused power to recharge them faster. It can also be used on this."

He pulled up his design for the Wormhole Drive. He threw up the design for the ship." She looked. You're adding almost 50% more width to the stern section adding a second tier in the engine room for all of these power cores." He animated it."

She looked at it, "WOW. That is almost 4 times the width and the height on the ship." She looked at it, eight cores, and eight pylons. "With your power regulator to draw additional power from the rest of the ship cores in engineering."

He pointed. She looked at what he pointed at, "What are those eight cores for?"

He looked around his lab. "These 6 will get moved down, 2 more will get added and then an 8x multiplexer. It will give me room to add a few more things in the lab. I will tie the new shields into that set of 8 and another shield generator with controls to surround all of these power cores."

She looked, "That is why you are adding 10cm of armor on the engineering section. Because you have so many cores that could get hit. It will still fit inside our dry docks because our dreadnaught docking system will handle four battleships side by side.

Talking of the fat Terra fleet side-by-side. They are designed like a fucking cock with no balls to me. Ours is longer with no real bottom except in the rear. We have hard mounted lasers turrets, point defense streaming lasers. And the 3rd rail gun along the bottom to go with the two on top. You will have to adjust the Dreadnought section to allow for the base increase. You built the ship like an actual Katana blade toward the front."

He nodded and threw up the design change, "Added to all base stations designs. Including this one. Send this one to Paul. Tell him to build this as soon as possible."

She looked, "Colossus Dreadnought Colony Base. You took out half the factories and added more interior room for colony ships. You built-in the walls! Moveable walls and giant doors. You adding more length to it!

That is why you took out the factories and relocated the other two inward more. You are making the Colony mover with a Wormhole Drive here. It has the new mount so it can handle both Battleship designs. When the battleship is mounted you cannot use the Wormhole Drive."

He nodded, "Correct which is why. He rotated the design and threw up the aft section changes on the colony transport and the 16 massive pylons that would be up all the time. "These do not retract like the others.

They are mounted to the ship and attached outside of the dry dock. Each one is the size of a cruiser! She looked at the engine room, "8 Cores per pylon!"

He nodded, "When that is not engaged the extra power will go into shields and heavier defensive weapons. This is a defensive guarding platform. Not a forward charging carrier.

It will have 4,000 drones operated from it when in orbit or in transit at 5x or 6x speeds. It depends on the cargo of the colony ships. With 200 fighters. I left the room to relocate your core compartment into this base design. This will become my flagship base. I have too many children to protect. This new design battleship will be my command ship.

I will move a series of your non-protected core servers into my lab. That is what I am making room for. To bring you with me instead of leaving you on the base. If you are gone too long your alternate body will have your last update and active in the core of the Super-Dreadnought base.

When you come aboard and we separate you shut down the restricted servers until you are back. The core defenses we built will protect it and if they make it through the first three layers when they open the fourth, they are in for one hell of a surprise."

She smiled and nodded, "How long before the secondary comes online?"

Jack smiled, "Up to you to decide that. With the satellites and relays, you can monitor and keep tabs on it. When you do return you can sync the changes that occurred and directions given at the base with what was given on the battleship.

What you do now with the monitoring you would do with the core and as the 'elder' of the two units, you could get that one back into 'hibernate and wait' mode. Or keep it up and performing other tasks. The choice is yours.'"

He walked over and switched two of the fabricators to build his new shield generator. He wrote the software update for the shield controls and sent it to the terminal. He got contacted by the bridge, "Admiral something tells me you already know the shields software is changed and is saying the two 'other shields' are offline?"

He nodded, "I get a couple of able bodies in about an hour and we will see what that software is saying."

He laughed, "You got something new on the shield side for us. Been working that problem."

Jack smiled, "How very astute of you XO. Arrival time is 2 hours?"

He responded, "Just under."

Jack smiled, "Yes I do. Arrival time in 3 hours. We will come to a stop shortly to move some cores to engineering. Then run the cabling back to my lab for those cores."

He heard his son chuckling, "You got something else to go with it."

Jack smiled, "Don't I always have something else to go with it?"

He heard him laughed, "System stopped. I will be there with 12 others."

Jack nodded, "Time to put my pants on then."

He heard the crew laughing on the bridge over the open comms.

They came down to engineering with all the new power cables from the lab running through the auxiliary duct to engineering. Chief Engineer Daniele Sotto looked at the hardware, "You are making it hard to walk in here Admiral!"

He nodded, "When we get into dry docked all of the power cores will be moved up there." He pointed. She looked, "You are putting in a second-tier just for all of these power cores?" He smiled, "Also eight more coming!"