Eric Olafson, Midshipman 73b

Part 73b: CELTEST

Continuation...

I acknowledged and said: “Mao full shields. Krabbel set a course. Shaka get us there but slowly and drop out of Quasi at least 30 light minutes away. Mao and Wetmouth you keep your eyes on those sensors. Hans stand by for Damage control.”

The Paracelsus hung dead in space. It was a new Uni design ship, wedge shaped but white instead of the regular navy gray. The Wanderer turned out to be a rugged shaped chunk of rock and ice of roughly 2000 kilometers diameter.

I leaned forward. “Energy or life form readings?”

“I am reading Neuro-electric impulses of an estimated 85 life forms aboard the Paracelsus. The ship is on emergency battery power only. The antimatter cores are gone. They ejected their containment coil and all the AM.”

“Any battle damage?” I asked.

Mao adjusted the visual sensors of his weapon sights. “We’re still too far out for the visual sensor to pick out details. But I am not detecting any debris.”

I didn’t like the situation one bit. There was something that stopped a state of the art starship, forty times bigger than our Barracuda Destroyer. True the Hospital ship had no offensive weaponry, but its shields where equal to a battle ship. As far as I knew there was nothing so deep in Union space that could attack and overwhelm such a ship.

Hospital ships where designed with strong shields and engines so they could survive an attack and flee. The Paracelsus should have survived any initial attack and then high tail away from any aggressor and use GalNet to call for help. It also bothered me that it happened in deep space. According to Captain K’Tngnk it was very unlikely to run into trouble in deep space. Yet this was the second time I responded to a distress call aboard a relative small space craft approaching a Union ship near a rock in space. The Seneca had been attacked by a disguised Kermac Raider, but that was much closer to Kermac space. We were far from any potential hostile civilization, but then huge animals migrated through a cave tunnel from one planet to another, thousands of light years apart without anyone inside Union space detecting it. While I was musing and contemplating our next steps I was looking over the technical readouts of that Hospital ship.

“Hold our position, Shaka. Don’t let us drift any closer. Wetmouth please launch a probe and have it scan that rock and the ship closer up. Mao activate all weapons and load the sniper cannon with 5k loads.”

“Probe launched.” Wetmouth said.

“Weapons active, Sniper cannon loaded.” Came the response from Mao. Otherwise it was very quiet on the bridge.

I was on the edge of my seat now watching like the others the telemetry of the probe came in and displayed on our mains screen.

Then a sudden flash from the Asteroid surface and the probe no longer transmitted.

Wetmouth reported with calm voice:”There is now a detectable Energy source on the surface of the Wanderer. Energy signature is clearly alien, multi dimensional and strong.

“Mao target that source and fire!”

The Barracuda had two Translocator sniper cannons. Small load Translocator cannons designed for long range precision shots.

Our long range visuals where at maximum and we saw the bright energy bubble expanding where the 5 kilo Antimatter bomb exploded.

Mao reported. “Captain I am now detecting a small vessel detaching from the surface. Mass and size calculation makes it just a little bigger than a Wolfcraft, but the energy signature is 100 times that of a Wolfcraft. Energy signatures are transdim in character and alien.”

Wetmouth immediately added. “Object is shielded and shields are similar to our Transdim shields as our sensors are unable to penetrate past them and our Translocator bombs cannot penetrate those shields.”

Mao followed again. “Whatever it is, it is on an intercept course and it is making a run for us.”

The Barracuda shuddered just as Mao completed his sentence. I was almost lifted out of my seat, but the emergency restraints activated and pulled me back.

Har Hi’s said:”Direct hit of unknown Energy weapon. Primary shields at 50 percent. Another hit like this and we are down to secondary shields.”

I switched my chair to battle mode and said while the dome shaped Omni-sight helmet lowered around me. “Alright, whoever this is wants’ to play rough. Let’s show them what a Barracuda can do.”

“Shaka go into full Virtu Helm, evasive action. Elfi report our situation to Fleet Command. Mao switch to Graviton bombs and place dual loads to each side, as soon as you sense their shield weakening fire Translocator bombs at their drive section! Simultaneous launch Loki torpedoes in proximity fuse mode.”

The Barracuda shuddered again.

Lights flickered, but did not go out. Circuit had left the bridge and went to engineering. His symbol blinked and I activated his channel with an eye-blink. He said. “Primary shield projectors are completely destroyed. Secondary Shields holding at 40 percent for now.”

Har Hi reported:”Alien ship intercepted Loki Torpedoes with counter measures of sort, they went dead and did no damage.”

We were hit again, this time the lights didn’t come back on, but the consoles still worked.

Circuit reported. “Secondary shields at 15 percent”

I acknowledged and said as calm as I could. “Shaka, micro jump behind that alien ship, overwrite jump safety. Mao stand by on FTL projectors and Loki Torpedoes as soon as we come out of Quasi I want you to fire point blank. Circuit put all energy you got in our forward shields as soon as Mao fires!.”

The Barracuda was designed to take a pounding and all systems where at least triple redundant, my damage board showed me that this was the reason we were still alive.

Shaka proved he was one hell of a helmsman. He executed a micro jump with computronic precision, Mao fired as we saw our attacker for the first time close up. It was a small ship, disc shaped, almost looking like a miniature version of the Devastator. The similarities where so great that one could think they came from the same designer.

Our FTL projectors fired, at the same time Mao laid two Grav bombs on each side of the vessel and two Loki torpedoes with Exo loads launched and connected!.

Shaka executed the second part of the micro jump but not before our secondary shields collapsed from the energy overload of two Exoload explosions. The last layer of shields was all we had left and it was no longer at 100 percent.

We re-entered Planck space and witnessed the alien ship emerging from the energy cloud apparently undamaged, but this time its shields flickered and were clearly damaged.

“Mao now, Microloads salvo tact, into their drive section, FIRE!”

Mao fired manually as the fire control automatics were down. The aft section of the alien ship was ripped apart and the rest drifted in space.

“Wetmouth reported. “Captain, sensors indicate the alien ship is without shields and maneuver power and there is one life form aboard. I also detect repair activity!.”

What did it take to defeat that thing? It was clearly more advanced than anything the Union had, and it was only Wolfcraft sized. What if there was something much bigger?

“Shaka get us close enough for Main Translocator. Mao Place a full load in that drive section.”

Mao’s shot exploded a micro second before the shields of the alien came back on. This time everything but the cockpit section of the alien ship was completely destroyed.

With one eye on our own damage control read out I blinked a fire order to Mao. “Micro loads into secondary energy sources.”

Four more explosions crippled the alien ship and reduced it to a burning wreck.

“Captain I am still reading the life form.”

“Tech stop and Paralysator full intensity.”

Wetmouth didn’t take the eyes of her scanners. “Captain this is incredible. The ship over there is destroyed and disabled to over 80 percent and I can detect molecular manipulation and energy to matter replication. The ship is repairing itself. Whatever this is Captain it is at least Techlevel 11.”

“Can you localize the energy sources?””Yes Captain. There are 200 of them.”

“Mao fire till that thing is destroyed completely and utterly destroyed.”

The Cockpit section of the Alien ship detached itself as Mao kept firing, but Mao was on the ball and he send a Gravo bomb into the path of the cockpit. It was shielded but unable to evade and the Gravitation bomb pulled it into its Grav center and depleted its shields.

I felt as if I was fighting a mythical dragon that kept re-growing heads, a smaller object emerged from the cockpit. It was a humanoid shape in a space suit. It approached our ship! I didn’t want to fire on a being in a space suit, but it could perhaps re-grow an entire ship. “Mao target that being and fire.”

The Alien ship was gone; Mao’s gravitation and anti matter bombs had reduced it to atomic dust and dissipating energy.

We were hit once again with a powerful weapon beam and it came from the suited being, just before Mao could place a Gravo bomb close enough to the small target.

The suited beings last shot had penetrated our shields and hit portside, but as effective its weapon was against our shields it did only superficial damage to the molecular compacted Ultronit armor. Shaka’s evasive flying was the main reason we were still in one piece.

Wetmouth looked over her readouts. “Alien Suit is damaged, shields down. I can read humanoid life signs.” Wetmouth reported.

“Hit it with Paralysator and Tech Stop. Maybe we can capture that alien and see what they are and find out if there are any more of them.”

“Hans and Har Hi, I hate to ask, but you need to get into Quasimodos and out there as fast as you can and cut whoever it is out of what is left of that suit and place it in Stasis.”

“Aye Captain.”

I said. “Wetmouth launch another probe and see if there are any more surprises around that Asteroid.”

“I am on it.”

“Circuit, Damage report please.”

Wetmouth’s detailed scan of the asteroid revealed no other energy signatures. Circuit was busy fixing our shield projectors. The Barracuda was still space worthy, but we had depleted of much of our ammunition. Several systems were damaged but Circuit was confident he could repair it within two or three days, Mao went to assist him.

Har Hi and Hans had recovered the alien being and they had to completely destroy the suit completely as it too began to repair itself.

The alien being, to our surprise was a human looking female.

Wetmouth had her in sickbay and examined our prisoner.

I ordered Shaka to approach the Paracelsus and now we could see that the hospital ship did sustain damage, all four ISAH pods were gone and there was a hole in the engineering section where the energy producing antimatter reactors had been located. Our scans confirmed all six of the energy reactors were missing. I asked Har Hi to take the Conn and keep watch over both the Paracelsus and the planetoid and then made my way to Sickbay to inspect the Alien. Hans had activated two Cerberus robots to stand guard, just in case.

Our sickbay was small but state of the art and Wetmouth, even though she wasn’t a designated Medic, had the knowledge of a MD and was a Xeno biology expert. She stood next to a diagnostic table on which the restrained naked woman was lying. She looked human, had short black hair and appeared to be in overall good condition, she was very thin and her skin had an unhealthy ashen shade.

Wetmouth said to me as she saw me approaching. “We almost took a Trojan Horse aboard.”

“A Trojan Horse?”

“An ancient legend of Earth, where the Greek, a Terran native tribe overcame another Terran tribe, the Trojans by giving them wooden Horse as a present; inside the Horse were soldiers and the Trojans pulled the trophy inside their city unaware of its hidden cargo, the Soldiers hidden inside the horse then opened the gates of the City and thus caused the doom of that city.”

She pointed at the Alien. “She was loaded with very advanced nanites ready to spread out throughout our ship and transform it into whatever she needs.”

I felt suddenly sick and swallowed. “Where are those Nanites now?”

“Thanks to Circuit we were able to contain and destroy them. He can see nanites and released his brand of battle nanites and destroyed the alien ones.”

“Any chance that there are more inside her or that you missed any?”

“Circuit says no and I did a details molecular scan. She is full of Medic Nanites of ours now, trying to repair her cells and save her life.”

“She doesn’t appear to be sick or wounded.” I said.

Wetmouth looked at me. “Eric, that woman is human, while her DNA isn’t Terran, Saran or Pan Saran. It is similar to all. Like all Humanoid species we encountered so far, she shares many of our traits. If my analysis and diagnostics are correct, that lady is over 1 million years old and her cells are failing. My guess is she was in some sort of stasis or suspended animation and way longer than anticipated. The reanimation process was either interrupted or unable to restore her.”

Just then the woman blinked and opened her eyes. She tried to move but the physical restraints and the contour force field made that impossible.

Then she said something and it sounded angry and demanding, but whatever she said was in a language I did not understand.

The Computronic beeped and said: Language not on file. Translation sequence started.”

The Computronic spoke directly to the Alien in single phrases and the Alien woman responded. After about eight minutes, Wetmouth spoke in the same alien language to the Woman and listened to her response. The Computronic beeped again and said:”Translation process sufficiently progressed for conversation. Verbal communication filters in place.”

The woman said. “I am Commander Cateria. I carry important information for the Empress. You are inferior and you are herby ordered to release me at once and supply me with all I need to complete my mission, otherwise I will destroy you.”

“Hold it right there, Commander.” I said. “You attacked an unarmed Hospital ship and caused casualties and damage. You are inside Union space and you are in no position to make any demands.”

She closed her eyes and opened them with an even angrier look.” It matters not if you destroyed my ship or my suit. My Nanites have infiltrated your systems as we speak and you will be at my mercy in mere moments.”

“Sorry to burst your hopes, Commander but we detected your Nanites and destroyed them. On the other hand our Nanites are in you repairing your cell structure. I have a good mind and order my medical officer to cease all restoration procedures and simply recover your brain and complete a memory dump on it. We don’t really need your entire body to find out who or what you are.”

She blinked again and tried to swallow.

I said. Commander if you do not want to find out just how primitive and barbaric I can be. Now you better tell me what you have done to the hospital ship. Are there Nanites of yours aboard that ship?”

She didn’t answer my question.

Circuit came in and held a tiny metal sphere between his fingers. “I have never seen anything like that. This Alien Nanite control center is very advanced. Luckily however her nanites are work units only. My Battle nanites where able to infiltrate it and completely shut it down. Wetmouth removed it from her brain.

She starred at Circuit with hate in her eyes but then sudden despair replaced her anger and she pleaded with me. “Is it not better to be under our rule than face utter destruction from the Dark Ones? Aide me to reach the Throne World and I will make sure your species will be rewarded.” She ended her plea and begun to stare at me in a strange intense fashion. I felt as if something was pushing into my very mind, just like on Quagmire I suddenly became aware of my ring and always when that happened I wondered why I kept forgetting about it and at the same I saw Narth in a dreamlike vision before my eyes and I was certain he was saying.”Push back.”

Somehow I did exactly that. I saw Wetmouth slumping over and Hans holding his head with both hands, I knew she attacked us with something Psionic and even Wetmouth wig that usually shielded her from such attacks appeared not effective. I hated Psionics and managed to put my anger at these invisible powers into a single thought and said loud. “Enough.”

The Alien woman screamed and blood ran out of her eyes and nose. Whatever affected me was gone. Hans lowered his hands and then aimed his blaster at the alien woman. “That Witch has Psionic powers too. I had it with those Psi freaks.”

“Hold your fire.” I said.

Wetmouth pulled herself up and took a deep breath. “I am alright.” She went to her console and scanned the now unconscious woman.” She is alive but barely. Something caused a massive cerebral hemorrhage and it appears she had some sort of bio tech device attached to her medulla oblongata. It is completely destroyed and crushed.”

I wiped my mouth and realized I was bleeding too. I had bitten on my tongue. “Keep her sedated and scan and examine her cell for cell I am almost certain she has other surprises hidden.”

Hans snorted. “She is too dangerous to be kept alive, Eric. She almost killed us twice now. Her technology is too far beyond ours.”

“I tend to agree with you Hans, but we must take the risk. We need to know where she came from and if there are more like her. Can you imagine what a fleet of those little ships could do? We are not in unknown space but deep in our own territory we deem safe. There are hundreds of inhabited worlds in this sector. It is our duty to find out as much as we can until help arrives.”

He grunted. “You’re right. I just hate being attacked that way. It makes me feel so helpless.”

Wetmouth looked at me. “How did you defend yourself against that anyway? Even the Psi Shield in my wig failed.”

“I am not sure, Wetmouth. But I carried the Huhgavh of my friend Narth once and I think it has done something to me that made me less vulnerable to such attacks.”

She blinked. “A Narth? You know a Narth?”

“Yes he is one of my best friends.”

“I don’t know what a Huhgavh is.” She said.” But that could explain why the Psi Snake couldn’t control you. Whatever the Narth did might have raised your Psionic abilities.”

“I love this Narth like a brother but I am like Hans, I don’t like Psionics one bit.”

I assembled my little crew in the small conference room behind the bridge. Elfi started the meeting by saying’ “I send all our findings and your report to Fleet Command and they say help is still days out. The situation on Planet Gregory is getting worse by the moment. They need the medical supplies aboard the Paracelsus badly.”

I nodded to Wetmouth so she could speak. “Our guest is in Zero Stasis. I established an original DNA pattern of hers and removed fourteen artificial enhancements most of them I have no idea what they do. She should be harmless now, and I repaired her enough so she will not deteriorate if we take her out of stasis, but she needs new organs the ones she has are failing. Our sickbay is not equipped with the necessary equipment to help her on that.”

I said. “But I bet the Paracelsus has equipment to do that, right?”

Wetmouth nodded. “Yes, it is a Hospital ship after all.”

Circuit was next:”As I said before, her technology is far advanced to ours; she is at least Tech 11. Her Nanites are able to manipulate matter on the atomic level and reproduce quickly. Unlike ours, hers are more intelligent and adaptive. I am sure with her Nanite control device intact; she could reproduce enough units to rebuild her ship within a few weeks from scratch.”

“Circuit, can you detect her nanites?”

“Yes, that was and is my original design. I was born to be a Nanite engineer and can see them and my nanites can find hers and neutralize them.”

“Can you launch some and get them over to the other ship and if she infested the Paracelsus?”

“Yes I get right on it.”

“We need to secure the Paracelsus. Render first aid to those who are still alive help and repair it enough so we can get her Gregory as fast as possible.”

I begun to know Circuit well enough to detect his mood by the slight pitch adjustments he made to his voice.” Sorry Eric, there is nothing left to repair. The engines are gone.”

Har Hi said:”I think it is possible we could tow the Paracelsus. Once we overcome the drag of her large mass we should be able to go superluminal just like container tugs do, not very fast of course but possible.”

Circuit nodded. “That would be our best option if no help arrives.”

I nodded. “Well I still hope there is help on its way, but let us keep that option in mind. Before we go ourselves I think we should send a Cerberus first if you think she’s Nanite free.”

After our meeting I went back to Sick bay and said to Wetmouth. “How is she?”

“As long as she is in stasis she will be alright, but as I said she needs new organs soon.”

“Get her out of Stasis. I want to talk to her.”

I waited till Wetmouth pulled her out of the Stasis tube and deactivated the zero field.

I waited till the alien woman opened her eyes. “Commander Cateria, I don’t know who you are but let me give you some facts to consider. Our instruments say that you have been in stasis or suspended animation for a very long time, longer perhaps than you intended to be. My science officer thinks the reanimation process was interrupted or the machinery damaged, but your cell structure is failing on a massive scale.

We cannot do much about that here on my ship and it appears we need to make you new organs. The big ship you attacked is a Hospital ship. An unarmed vessel but equipped with our most advanced medical technology and a host of medical specialists, able to do just that and save your life, so I am asking you and I am asking only once, do you have any of your Nanite technology on that ship?”

She listened to me and Wetmouth activated a field screen over her head so she could see the scans of her own body. Wetmouth pointed at the image and said to the woman. “I am not sure how well you are trained in medical terms but on the right hand side you see a simulation of a healthy cell and on the left you see an actual picture of yours.”

The alien woman stared at the screen, pressed her lips together and then said:”I was attacked and my ship was damaged by the Dark Ones. I managed to land on a moon of a planetary system and engage the repair nanites. My body was also damaged so I placed myself in deep stasis for regeneration. Can your screen show me the system we are in?”

Wetmouth answered her. “We are in no system, we are in deep space and that moon of yours is a wanderer an unattached celestial object drifting in deep space.”

Wetmouth fingers flew over the input screen.” I am now calculating the path of the wanderer, factor its drifting speed and we can see from where it might have originated.

The screen over the Alien woman’s head changed and showed the asteroid then moved out to show the entire sector. A dotted line appeared and traced across the screen to an area well known to me, the Vanderstraat Nebula.

Wetmouth explained. “It appears your moon could have come from the Vanderstraat Nebula, which has been created by a sun that went supernova and exploded approximately 1 Million Years ago. That timeframe correlates with my carbon dating data of your cells. It appears you have been in suspended animation for about that time span.”

Cateria’s chin quivered as she stared at the screen.” This was my home system. There were nine occupied worlds.”

I said. “We know of a force or species called the Dark Ones only from legends. Two of our oldest member species, the Saresii and the Narth remember that time and in their stories and legends the Dark Ones fought a Galaxy spanning culture we call the Celtest, as their true name is lost in time.”

A tear pearled across the alien woman’s cheek.” I know of the Narth and the Saresii. I also know you speak the truth. I am a Seenian, or what you call Celtest.”

She still stared at the screen. “Can you enhance that lower sector?”

Wetmouth did and said:”This region of the Galaxy is called the Downward Sector and is still mostly unexplored.”

Cateria tried to raise her hand but the field restrained her.” Can you zoom in on the left side and highlight all sequence sender stars there?”

I wondered what she meant but Wetmouth nodded. “I am sure she means Quasars”

The Alien woman said:”The Ancient ones that seeded human life in our Galaxy left these Beacon stars. The Throne world should be right there, but all I see is another Nebula. “Her voice became a whisper.” There are no Seenians left then? We lost the war?”

I nodded. “Saresii history records tell us that they joined the Celtest in that fight against the Dark Ones. The Saresii paid dearly for their involvement and had been punished by those Dark Ones. The Saresii fell back into primitive pre space flight conditions and gave up all FTL technology for more than 100,000 years. When they finally resumed space exploration both the Dark Ones and the Celtest were gone. There are no accessible reports about what the Narth know about that time.”

Wetmouth called up a selection of GalNet articles on Celtest subjects and said. “There are a few known Celtest artifacts and rumors about Celtest ruins, but no one ever claimed to have found anything belonging to the Dark Ones.”

Wetmouth switched to another article and said. “This is an article about the Celtest Terra legend. Some scholars believe it to be true, that Terrans have developed out of a forgotten or overlooked Celtest colony. Eric’s ancestors are from Terra and our Helmsman is a true Terran.”

Her eyes lit up. “Maybe that is why you could capture me so easily.”

I grunted.”It wasn’t exactly easy.”

She sighed. “I think my ship automatically attacked your hospital ship to gain the necessary energy and materials to repair and restore it; I was woken shortly after the initial attack on that ship of yours. My repair capabilities were severely hampered by the lack of energy and the battle damage my intelligence systems received.”

She trembled and then sighed.” I will no longer resist and try to help.”

Two days later.

“This is Midshipman Olafson currently in command of the Devastator Auxiliary Ship 45-12, Barracuda Class Destroyer.” I said after Elfi got me connected to Fleet Command. “We waited as long as possible for assistance but without any fleet units arriving in time and without further instructions or response to our reports I decided to continue with our efforts. We are now in orbit around planet Gregory. We managed to partially repair the hospital ship revive the crew that was in emergency stasis and tow the Paracelsus to Gregory.

Captain Perma is currently in surgery but expected to recover fully from his wounds received during the attack on his ship. My science Officer Midshipman Wetmouth is currently planet side assisting the medical research team of the Paracelsus and she isolated the cause of the epidemic. My engineer Midshipman Circuit is working on modifying a Loki torpedo to seed a counter agent into the atmosphere of planet Gregory. We believe this to be the fastest way to combat the disease causing microbes. We have a live Celtest commandant aboard, who was in suspended animation for about a Million years and was the cause for the Paracelsus damage.”

The Commodore laughed harshly. “Mister Olafson, I had about enough with your jokes and your fantastic stories. I indulged your games for a while now and I am sure you are having fun in whatever simulation the Academy put you in, but now stay away from official fleet channels and connect me with your commanding officer. Your fantasies are getting out of control.”

“Sir I am the commanding officer of this ship, but I can connect you to the XO of the Paracelsus in a short while, their Comm. systems are still under repair.”

“I had enough of this, Midshipman. Your adventure stories where fun and imaginative. I am contacting the Devastator for real and tell your Captain, you are in trouble now.”

The Commodore cut of the transmission before I could say another word.

I looked at Elfi. “I am getting the distinct feeling he never really contacted anyone, no wonder no ever showed up”

She blinked at me. “I did transmit our ID codes and everything.”

“Maybe he never looked at them.”

“We are being hailed, Eric. From the Devastator.”

Captain Harris and Stahl appeared on our screen and both had stern unreadable faces. Stahl spoke first. “I just got a complaint by the Commandant of Cygnus Sector. He tells me a bunch of Midshipmen keep contacting him with outrageous stories of alive Celtest, Hospital ships in distress and all this happening deep in Union space. He liked your games at first but he thinks you are misusing official communication channels. What is this all about? Didn’t Captain Harris send you to the Dover system?”

“Yes Sir we were on our way to Dover when we encountered a distress call on our way and contacted Fleet Command for advice.” I looked away from the screen and gave Elfi a sign. “Transmit our Comm. Logs and transcripts to them.”

I saw both Harris and Stahl watch and listen to our initial contact with Fleet Command.

Stahl then looked up and said. “The Commodore believed it was a training scenario, and never checked or called on the Paracelsus. He never called us or anyone either. Now tell me the rest.”

I repeated my report and when I came to the end I said. “We overstrained our engines towing the Paracelsus. We could use some spare parts and fuel. The Colony doesn’t have much and the Paracelsus is still without an engineering section.”

There was silence; both Officers looked at me with open mouths. Stahl then swallowed. “You are under Red-Red-Blue right now. Do not call anyone and mention the Celtest Officer. We will be there shortly.”

We all stood in line and in attention on one of the Devastators Flight decks. Harris and Stahl walked slowly down up and down the short line we had formed; finally the Captain stopped and turned to me. “Teaches me to give the Olafson gang a ship, anyone else would have made it to Dover without any problems or incidents. There are ship crews spending their entire career flying all across this galaxy of ours and nothing ever happens to them, but the Olafson gang has to pick a fight with a tech-level 11 space ship, capture a real live Celtest Officer, tow a battle ship sized ship across 103 light years and find time to save 200,000 settlers by identifying the cause of a planet wide disease and even finding a way to effect a cure.”

He threw his hands into the air. “If we want to make this Galaxy a truly safe place, I guess we have to stick the nine of you into suspended animation for the next ten thousand years. It certainly would make my life a whole lot more predictable.”

I lowered my head. “I am sorry Sir. I know you gave us orders to go to Dover. I apologize if I disappointed you. I was in command and it was my fault alone. My friends only followed my orders. I accept all blame and any punishment you see fit.”

“I see. What do you have to say for your defense?”

“Sir I believed I acted according to regulations especially after Fleet Command gave me green light to proceed. I was not aware he thought this was an exercise. Lives were at stake, Sir. Truth to be told I would have acted the same way if I had no orders from Fleet Command. Before you punish me, Sir I want to recommend my fellow Midshipmen who acted gallantly and professionally.I also recommend a re-evaluation of communication protocols. I am certain we acted exactly as regulations required us to act in case of a distress call. That the receiving party, decided to evaluate the situation without verifying the facts could cause serious harm. What if other distress calls are dismissed the same way?”

Harris put his hand on my shoulder and sighed. “Olafson you are not in any trouble. The Admiral and I watched some of your recordings and we are deeply impressed by your alls conduct action and professionalism. It was my fault for not giving the Barracuda official recognizable codes, the Commodore could check and verify. The ship now has a name and that might help too. It is properly registered now at Fleet Central as the USS Porter. The section commandant is currently facing serious charges and his performance evaluated.”

He shook his head. “The only thing I still can’t explain why those things always happen to you. Do you have some sort of magnet for trouble implanted or perhaps a gypsy cursed you in your crib?”

Stahl’s stern face didn’t chance. “The discovery of a living member of the Celtest race is perhaps the most significant find in recent history. Because of that significance it must remain secret. You are not allowed to speak to anyone about this incident. However the events showed clearly that you are no mere Midshipmen, but talented and resourceful officers. I am making you all acting Ensigns and we intend to make your ranks permanent after you completed your Challenge at Dover Planet. It seems almost trivial to send you now to a Midshipman challenge, but we already committed you to that. Since Captain Harris is already getting used to decorating you, I will do it myself.”

Harris opened a box and Stahl tagged a Distinguished Space Star on my ribbon display. “Mr. Olafson once more you displayed courage and resourcefulness in a difficult situation and while I am not superstitious I begin to ask myself the same questions Captain Harris has raised.”

He then decorated everyone the same way and added a golden Mercy Cross to Wetmouth’s decorations. “This is for identifying a disease and saving an entire planet by finding a cure.”

She answered. “Thank you Sir, but it is Circuit who deserves it. It was his idea to seed the atmosphere with a genetic designed virus that killed the fever causing bacteria.”

He sighed just like Harris. “That’s why I am giving him one too.”

Part 74 »