Astra Pt. 07

I am bringing you in as lieutenants to gauge how you compare with your peers. Katlyn will likely move up one or two ranks as she is the only botanist, we have onboard. She will be our liaison with the colony ships; particularly the farm ships and needs to get familiar with the technology. I want the materials for a botany lab brought aboard if it is not already here if I know Grace."

She smiled, "They are boxed up and, on the ship, as you already know and requested. Along with the 3rd-5th breweries you requested. His new base ship has, what was a factory section, set aside for an onboard greenhouse on one side of the ship and one for growing crops. One of those breweries is for Katlyn's Irish Rose refined Irish Mills mead.

You also own the name to Katlyn's Irish Rose for your whiskey and vodka lines you talked about or wines. It has room in that compartment to add more now. He wants to see how you do with the first one. Yes, he bought the license through your Mother to manufacture it on his new command base.

It will be a heavily fortified colony ship, yet never meant to stay at a colony but to keep moving. If you bring it back to Terra for 'sale' it is required to get board approval and then sold through their distributors for a percentage of course."

Katlyn jumped across his desk and straight into his lap and hugged him, "Why are ya doin this for me?"

She kissed him several times. He smiled, "Because I realized you had work to do at the colonies at Tau Ceti but little to do aboard ship unless you expand your degrees more. Finish your studies. We got a few months to go before you can work with that fifth one.

You get your shuttle license and you can set up 3 and 4 where you think they would do the best. Draw some of the workers into new settlements to spread out the population. Then move the first one on Geos to a more appropriate location. When we go there, I want you to finish your course work and get a feel for those colonies until the first children are born. I will be back often with this new drive."

She nodded, "Softening the blow of taking me off yer ship?"

He shook his head, "We all have our jobs. You got six months to a year's work in just getting these operations going. It also gives you time to add that other degree you talked about in chemistry."

She nodded, "A lot of overlap with my Brewery classes but I figured it would be more useful when I am on a ship or looking at some of these other spirits."

He nodded, "Exactly. I snatched you up out of your life before you had a chance to finish them."

She nodded, "Alright, we will do it yer way this time ya big Ox."

He smiled and kissed her. Then he looked at the others. "Every few months they assess the skill sets of those in each department to find out where they should be. Vess's position will remain open officially until I get an agreement across the departments.

As to which person in the medical and science department is the best one to represent all of their interests. Grace would be talking with the heads of each of the 6 or 7 departments they set up down there. At least as they are today. Vess was there from the beginning after the Excalibur incident because she knew it would get her back to Terra.

She helped to pull the rest of the team together. Some might switch out when we get back and switch crew rotations. That also means you all should be in uniforms tomorrow. They are in your quarters. The bridge will be crowded but I expect you all to be here and you can watch from my ready room which has a lovely view if you feel too crowded."

---

He spent the night with the ladies, though they could feel his mind was still elsewhere. He still took care of every one of their needs. He could not bring himself to sleep. After a couple of hours, he left them in the room. We went to his lab.

He was in turmoil over the increase of his weapons activity he had other designs floating in his head and he finally drew them all out. Another eight types of weapons including torpedoes that had 8x miniaturized hydrogen-warheads, 500 and 750 terawatts power cores and system drive enhancements.

He then drew out the personal defense systems including miniaturized 20 terawatts powered shield belts and his own units combat armor having these functions built into them within. Advance sensor sweeping computer that could do life signs and metallurgical scans inside the arm of the armor. Using a new vid 3D projector to give better ground threat assessments.

He had all of this on his screen with his private offline server when he felt Astra's hands on his shoulders. "I could not seem to get ahold of you so I came to check on you. Our night prowlers are still going at it."

He nodded while She looked at each design. She shook her head, "All new designs, another 12,235 patents. I brought you food, you are not eating enough again. Here are two of your meads and your morning coffee. Now eat while I eat. Tell me what is troubling you."

He ate but did not talk about what was on his mind. He needed to talk but it was not Astra he needed to talk to. He finished his food and set back and thought, *Justice, you have been watching what I am doing. What do you make of all of these technology upgrades and new weapons, defenses, and engines? This is not normal and I am trying to figure out if I need to get away from humanity to protect them from the level of defenses and weapons I have been building *

Justice replied, * You got them out of your head. It does not mean you have to put them all into the hands of humanity yet. The choice is yours. You are building designs of weapons and defenses for an unknown enemy from the future. You want to protect and defend your species but also worry about conflicts you know are coming from the previous timeline.

You cannot change them from happening completely. You could work to minimize the damage that is done during those times. The choice is yours. Your concept for your forces to protect humanity is interesting. Most have met resistance from this approach where it was tried.

Your people are divisive amongst themselves it might be the only solution to put forth. Your thoughts are not misguided you just have to decide which pieces to hold back. In the coming days continue to do what you do. You have the plan in hand, this might be the time to present it.

The choice is yours. You are correct, as an individual, you have advanced in power in years what should have taken centuries. Build project file 764125zmi. It could come in handy sooner rather than later. The choice, again as always, is yours. *

Jack came out of it and Astra looked at him, "That was 6 blow jobs and not so much as a grunt and you did not talk with me or them."

He looked behind to see all his wives. He stored all his project files an pulled up the one file and started transferring parts to different to the machines still without saying a word until he finished.

He smiled, "Was getting answers from Justice. Grace I am going to need that Home Guard Agreement today. Astra, activate Bastra and queue up Castra. You are going with us today."

She smiled, "A trial run of how this would work. Thank you for including me in this."

He nodded, "Right now you are the leader of your kind. Like I am."

She looked at Jack, "You plan to keep Bastra online?"

He nodded, "Yes, with an instruction order for Castra to activate all the way through Faxtra if a serious threat to the repository is detected. You are the only one to share my bed."

She looked, "Unless I am irretrievably destroyed."

Jack nodded, "At which point Bastra becomes Astra."

Grace asked, "How many backups did you make for her?"

He looked at Grace, "Not enough probably. Nastra is the last one in this series; 14. They have slight appearance modifications to incorporate my new wives into the designs. Astra is unique in she is with the first wives. All the others are based upon the current wives. That was from all the material I had to create up her cybernetic brains.

She talked to me about becoming the Father of AI. I want that to come back naturally. She cannot have more than 4 active and they can only be activated by my direction, directive, or emergency contingency which could bring them all online. If Faxtra comes online and it gets down to one it will destroy the archives and all other models which are explosive; base on the material their minds are made from.

They all receive periodic updates from the units that are online. I can also order the destruction of the archives. Built into the backup server it would trigger all alarms and the archives would blow. Connected into my implant. Astra knows this as do the others. They are barred from tampering with those fail-safes. Each of them has a tattoo on the arm with a sword and shield with the letter of their designation on the shield."

Jack stood and got his pants up. Grace asked Jack, "More weapon designs?!"

He nodded, "Stored for a rainy day. The new battle armor and personal shield belts will come into play as soon as we do the mockups. They will stack with the telekinetic shield. Hitting the belt one first I believe."

Jack was saved by the Bridge, "Admiral this is the XO. Income comms from Security Services."

He thought, * Patch them through. *

He got a familiar image, "We are here to do the pre-visit inspection."

Jack asked, "What does that consist of?"

He laughed, "In your case, I am not sure. Normally that the first family has a safe room and no obvious signs of insurrection."

Jack laughed, "Nothing hostile but a few surprises he knows are coming. You normally bring the President in on his shuttle and escort it up. We will allow 4 of your guards to accompany the family we have so much going on that having room for more on the bridge with the other guests.

Some defense contractors and their families as well. It will be secure for the President. Also, one reporter and camera operator you are familiar with already. Unless your guys can strip weapons and put up telekinetic barriers to protect the first family, I do not see a need for more than that."

He nodded, "The President said you would have 2 hybrids with them at all times. Also, two of us including myself. Two destroyers off to the side."

Jack nodded, "I am going to ask that those two destroyers be docked on the forward airlocks of the ship. Some of the items we will be testing will mess with your ships if they are not under proper shielding.

You will get that docked to the ship. You can remain powered up and weapons hot they get in through our shields it would be a miracle." The agent laughed, "I heard you got a new shield contractor."

Jack smiled, "They are still ramping up to get the new ones. Shields drop shield 2 so they can get through the shield."

The guy laughed, "For real?"

Jack nodded, "The second shield is electrically charged and carries a random frequency which is synced with a module on physical weapons so they can penetrate when being fired. Else it would be like ramming a ship. But it does no physical damage to us unless you hit it hard enough. Your beam weapons will work fine through them."

He nodded, "Anything else we need to know?"

Jack smiled, "You will see a lot of weird technology today and a few things you have never seen before. No itchy trigger fingers and no reason to panic so please remember the shields when charged will keep your ships inside with us. You want to disembark the President will have to authorize before I lower that secondary shield."

He smiled, "Lots of rules with you."

Jack smiled, "I have had my shuttle bombed how many times? Tampered with? I keep my guard up aboard my own ships."

He laughed, "We are docked on the forward nose."

Jack went down and met them in the corridor where two of his own security people in full body armor stood. The guy shook his head, "I feel stupid saying this but your internal security cannot carry sidearms or rifles."

Jack smiled, "Just swords. We have saved him from assassination attempts, treason, and invisible assassins. It was in the best interest of humanity. He is a stable progressive figure who can affect change to a changing universe."

He laughed, "Some say the same about you but stable is not in their statements."

Jack nodded, "How many groups have launched violent attacks against me for no other reason than I am a hybrid or I destroyed corruption? People or businesses?

Our people needed a wakeup call on the larger universe and the threats we do not know about. We need those who want to look after the interests of the people as a whole. Leading the people; not hybrids. We cannot compromise."

He nodded his understanding as Jack walked him to the quarters' section, "Those rooms beyond that door belong to myself and my wives. All hybrids. Even the new ones." He nodded, "Nine protectors behind that door." Jack smiled, "Astra has a room in that section as well and she can active all the internal security defensives, is well versed in martial arts and swords.

We are the only ones who should be traveling this section of the hall. This door down here has a separate security code. My wives know it as does Astra. That brings down the bulkhead. There are rooms across the way for your people as well."

He nodded, "You got them right next to the big guns. Got it."

He then chuckled, Jack asked, "I can show you my bridge, my office, and the briefing room which will get used a lot on this trip."

He shook his head, "Engine room first please."

Jack smiled, "This way."

He took them to the lower level, "Right and down to the left." He pointed, "Right through that doorway." He opened the door and they bounced off the shield. Jack smirked, "Master Chief lower engine room shields."

She called, "Lowered Admiral."

The guy shook his head, "Shields on an engine room?"

Jack nodded as Astra stood There, "NDA agreements concerning the design, technical, and security configuration are required. Also, if he shows you his lab."

He smiled as he signed. As did the quiet man behind him. "How did she know we were coming here?"

Jack smiled, "I have a com chip that she can communicate with me quietly, I modified one and added in the technology that allows my telepathy to interface with it."

He nodded as did his buddy, "Like the ones we have but we have to talk."

Jack nodded, "Exactly."

He walked them in on the third-floor gantry way. They looked out and the quiet man's mouth fell open. He asked, "How much power are you running there?" Jack smiled, "Just there, 200 terawatts by 40 power cores."

He shook his head, "8,000 TERAWATTS?!" Jack nodded, "Yes but the back two are interconnected. That is 3,200 terawatts dedicated to all the auxiliary systems and the engineering shields.

My lab shields, my living quarters shield—the whole section including the President's room, and the core exterior shields augmentation. The rest is for external shields, weapons, my lab, and all propulsion systems." This whole section also had 10cm thick interior armor. As does the other three sections I mentioned.

Not counting the external plating, shields, and massive amounts of firepower. Built to fight the future of the unknown enemies. Is our engine room secure enough for you? Remember your NDA's."

The head agent looked at Jack, "This place is more secure than the Presidential compound. Setting up internal shields and thicker armor would be too much to talk about?"

Jack shook his head, "Where those are on this vessel, the number and size of our power cores are classified, at least for now. Each set of 8 has a multiplexer.

The 1 set of 2 in the back share 1 power regulator to share across multiplexes. The middle set has 2. They are controlled from the station on the bridge as well as here in engineering. Shields running low? We can funnel energy from the other cores to speed up shield recharge rates.

I upgrade my lab like crazy then they can funnel more power to it. My lab is tied into the middle set. Engines are split across the 2 outer ones. As we are down here, we can stop by my lab for a second."

They nodded and they went up 2 levels and then they watched him go through 4 layers of security. He went to the fabricators and pulled the three bracelets. He walked over and grabbed a bar of stable metallic hydrogen. He took and made it a liquid blob. Then he designed an open pendant on an ultra-thin triple rope chain with no clasp. He placed the 3 crystals inside and sealed the edges.

He hung it around his neck. The guard looked at the design of the shiny square shield in the center of the oval pendant. It had a darker sword partially hidden sword behind the shield. The heraldry had three worlds on it and the fourth spot blank. Around the outer edges were written the words. 'Nos clypeum donec opus sunt gladii destricti' in a scripted font.'

The guard asked, "What does it say?"

He smiled, "Wait until the President asks that question."

He smiled and the quiet one of them pointed, "That is your workstation?"

Jack nodded, "Now that I have more room I can expand it and use bigger displays."

He looked, "12 display and 3 keyboards?"

Jack nodded, "I thought about 4 for the upgrade on the keyboard and 6 monitors per keyboard. Yes, I wrote over 2,000 patents last night in things I invented."

He looked at Jack, "Seriously?"

Jack nodded, "Ideas start flying at me and I have to get them out of my head and into a computer. I will have a separate project going on each display. I like what I got and I can kick it to the fabricators in here to create the items. Store it for the future, it all depends."

He put what was left of the bar and made a globe on a small but wide pedestal. He looked over, "I need to create more little things, I can merge some of the trinkets in the room. The necklace is not a trinket."

He walked them out and took them to the bridge, "Astra, please inform the wives, the other hybrids, and our guests to come to the bridge. Please meet me down by the shuttle dock and get chairs for our President and his now 4 ladies in front of mine. XO you can get everyone situated. "Lower the 2nd shield, let me know when he lands and the dock is secure."

He took the guards who mumbled into their comms as he approached the dock he got the message, "Dock secured, President has arrived Call sign DF-1 Presidential in use."

He shook hands with everyone and even saluted the President, "Welcome aboard."

He nodded, "I brought my new Admiral along."

She nodded, "Impressive ship."

He smiled, "This is just the docks."

She laughed at that," Set a course for dummy ship and raise shield 2."

She shook her head, "We cannot wait to get our hands on the shields."

He nodded, "They are working on getting tooled up for it. Nobody was ready for that big of a change in shields."

She nodded, "True and Ms. Helgen is in so much hot water. Your patent lawyers are like sharks, shutting down production of other products she had out."

He nodded, "I know. I told them if she declares bankruptcy to go after the items that needed those components and send them over to the shield people and they can add that into the contract of things to build and innovate upon."

She shook her head, "I heard what she did to you. You kept it together even with 18 shooting at you."

He nodded, "There was no jumping in my shuttle to get away which is what they would expect. I knew with that many that it had been rigged to blow. The police were very slow on the uptake to get what they needed there; especially for a courthouse."

They went straight to the bridge and he was shown to his seat as soon as everyone was there. He looked over, "Keep the still on the crowd, widened out and everyone can watch what is going on. Tactical take 'oh my' 1, aim at 6m in at the bow 1m above the midline. Take 'oh my' 2 6m in from stern, 1m below the midline. Fire simultaneously when ready. They had two balls of green lights cross and hit on the marks.