The Black

Professor Quintius stepped into the research station’s mess. Mac sat in solemn silence, picking at his food with Lyrian not doing much better. Mac looked up from his plate, smiling ruefully at the thick bearded scientist. “Well Doctor Grem, what’s the reapers bill.” Mac said with a dark chuckle that was far from settling. Mac must have noticed. He took a breath and visibly calmed himself, “My apologies, Humans use dark humor as a coping mechanism sometimes.”

“I…see, well I believe I have the report on the exercise you were referencing.” The professor responded as he took a seat with them, passing over a data pad. Mac looked over the information.

“I don’t see any signs of corruption in the transmission. We might be ok. Doctor Grem, I never got to ask this, but why does data travel so much faster than solid matter in subspace?” Mac out the slate down and took another bite of food.

“Well, it’s a combination of a couple of factors. First, is the fact that it has no mass. In subspace, we cannot accelerate or decelerate. Only jump in and out. The power used in the jump, compared to the mass and velocity of the object jumping determines speed in subspace. The deeper you go into subspace, the faster you go… except for data. With Data, we transfer it in the transient border between real and subspace. The rules of power to mass are greatly exaggerated, but because data has no mass, we can simply overpower those rules for transmission, and distance becomes the issue. In the border between subspace and real space, an object of any mass slows over time. So, because of our current technology being unable to provide velocity, post jump, in subspace; the transient border is of little use to us for shipping, but invaluable for information exchange throughout Unity. Lyri took a quick glance at him. Mac’s face has not changed, but their bond flashed with an ‘ah ha’ style of emotional excitement. Mac had put something together, but he wasn’t going to tell the Professor.

“That sounds like a lot of math, and none of it the kind I am good at.” he finally said with a smile. Lyrian pointedly looked back to her food as Mac gave her a little reassuring squeeze on the forearm. “What’s the status on disconnecting Concord?” Mac changed the subject, “I’d like to depart soon. I promised Lyri some more seat time in orbit before we head home.”

“Your ship should be ready for you inside the next two hours. The techs are having a much easier time of it than expected. The overflow banks took on enough power that we won’t need to tax our reactor for another 2 or 3 days. She is a truly remarkable vessel.” Professor Grem obviously wanted to see how Concord ticked.

“In time Professor Quin. In time. However, Human Kinetic Small arms have never been classified. They were developed in the private sector. Tell you what, tell me where to meet you next week, and I’ll Bring some… toys… for us to play with.” Mac gave the bearded scientist a smirk as he set the hook.

Professor Grem’s eyes widened slightly, “considering what happened to the Gri’Kra that attacked you, I look forward to it.” he said, “Now if you will excuse me, we may have gotten off with relatively light damage, but damaged we are. I must oversee the repairs.” He gave a nod and departed.

——————————————————————

The almost imagined sounds of recycled air were sporadically drowned out by the puff from the emergency thrusters in Lyri’s G-suit. It was just a touch less snug, and she cursed herself for it. There was very little room for exercise aboard the cramped research station. Mac had compensated some by getting authority to modify the gravity of their quarters. He had set it to 1.4 DG, which had been hard on her the first week. The problem was, they had been limited to an only partial Calisthenic work out without their vests. She felt ridiculous. She was in the best shape of her life, possibly the strongest Delmar in existence right now… She still cut a striking woman’s figure, but she was still pissed that she had lost ground. This mission could not have waited, however; and she refused to skip out on a single flight in concord if she could help it..

Mac had increased her food, particularly protein and animal fats, intake as she increased her strength. When they met, she was eating maybe a quarter of what he did. She was now approaching one third of his calorie intake. Luckily, according to Mac, Delmar females differed from human females in that human female bodies tended to scavenge the body of all fat, causing them to deflate some under extreme strength training. Delmar biology did not. Lyri was happy that her body had kept her womanlier proportions, even as chords of thickened muscle were showing their first signs of ripples beneath her skin. Her focus re-centered as they approached Concord’s open cockpit as she lay to her thrusters. Her thrusters had been in station keeping ever since their arrival. One of the problems they had to overcome was the incompatibility of Terran Docking clamps, vs GU standard docking formats. The solution had been found in Concords strength. They had only needed about 90 percent of her twin reactors’ total output for the transmission. This left enough power to keep Jarvis and the maneuvering jets online after shutting down the rest of her systems. They had fabricated and adapted umbilical to access Concord’s shore power connections. This was the trickiest part since Concord could easily fry every system on the station instantly, but only on the station side of things.

Concord was built to Terran Navy ‘best practices’ standards. As such, all terran navy ships capable of producing their own power, had and umbilical connection that was capable of transmitting power as well as receiving it. This had been used more than once to limp a wounded ship home from a firefight. Mac and Clint had personally used it to save his flight lead early in his career during his first mission. The sorte had not gone to plan, and the three-ship of TALONS had found themselves in a running dogfight back to their parent fleet after a Martian cruiser got lucky and spotted them on their optical array.

All of this had forced a spacewalk between concord and the station. The standard emergency thrusters had done the job nicely. The distance was minimal, less than 40 meters from the airlock to Concord’s cockpit. She ran through her checklist as Mac floated around Concord once, doing a quick external inspection before settling into his own seat. This was their 9th void walk of the trip. Some to prepare for their transmission shot, but several to continue Lyri’s training. She had spent hours inside her cockpit seat using the HUDS motionless simulation training modules. She had not practiced any combat maneuvers, but she HAD completed multiple simulated takeoffs, landings, and re-entries. She had passed the modules finally, and Mac had promised her something special. She looked up from her checklist to see mac floating next to her holding on to the lip of the canopy from the outside.

“You’re in the wrong seat” he said through their intercom, “you’re pilot in command today... I’ve checked your scores. You are ready. Take us home.” he smiled at her as she looked back at him in shock, then he laughed as she scrambled to unstrap herself before floating out of the back seat, pulling herself into the front seat. She had done a couple of simulations from Mac’s seat, mostly to get her some experience at his controls. The most notable difference between their controls was that Macs stick and throttle were reversed from hers. He flew with his right hand on the stick, and his left on the throttles. She settled in and tightened down the straps as Mac did the same. The canopy lowered and sealed as they double checked each other’s preflight.

“Boards geeen,” she called in the traditional Terran call.

“Same, reactors online. We are green back here” came Max’s ‘airline pilot voice’. He was playing his part for this test. It was time for her to do as well.

“Main drive starts up, now.” she called as she personally awoke Concord for the first time. She monitored the engine data as Concord began to speak.

“Drives online, navigation online, optical online.” she reported.

“Weapons online, targeting online, sensors online, “wizzo” go, scopes clear.” Mack reported back.

“Pilot go, launching” Lyri reported. They were being more formal than was their want, but this was a test after all. Lyri plied her will to Concord, and the vessel’s low howl of idle blossomed into her customary roaring bellow with the bare hint in upper frequencies of hearing. Concord leapt for the planet under Lyrians touch as she made for the upper atmosphere. Lyri bore her fangs in a very human smile as she read 4 human G’s internal on the HUD, she was barely exerting herself under a weight that would have crushed her not so long ago.

“Retro Initial Point in 45 seconds.” came the call behind her as she double-checked their flight profile status.

“On profile, retro in 30…” she called. Pulling back on Concord’s main drives to keep from overspeeding her reentry initial velocity.

“10 seconds” she heard the report, as a bubble of nerves and anticipation rose on her chest.

‘Holy shit I’m doing this’ she thought as the timer reached zero. “Initiating retro burn!” She accidentally shouted i excitement as she hauled back on the stick and goaded Concord once more to speak her rage into the void. Her HUD showed her trajectory as she looked up, but simultaneously looked down at her home planet. The HUD projected an artificial curve that she maneuvered Concord’s attitude to match with the actual horizon of her planet. she held Concord there with the barest thought and pressure on the controls as velocity numbers bled away. A couple of minutes passed as they pierced Delmar’s atmosphere with Meteoric intent. Lyri smiled as Mac started singing softly. She recognized the song he had shared with her while on passage, and joined in.

“Four, three, two, one

Earth below us

Drifting, falling

Floating weightless,

Calling calling ho-o-oo-ome”

“Retro complete” Mac interrupted their harmony as Concord reached the correct altitude and speed ensuring she would no longer be in danger of kipping off of Delmar’s Atmosphere. Lyri executed the recovery, pressing the nose back down and activating the air brakes as Concord buffeted slightly at Delmars token resistance.

“Activating Aero, SCRAM active, controls responding green.” Lyrian called as she reconfigured Concord for aerodynamic flight.

“One contact 020/001 it’s an orbital shuttle, negative intercept. Our course is clear” came Mac’s report as Lyri punched HS1 into the nav bringing up the permanent waypoint to their home. An hour later, Concord once again roared up Hylisti straight toward their lodge at just below 900kph as Lyri’s visual scan found the runway. She opted for a long straight in approach to give her plenty of time to go through the landing progression. Non vtol landing just wasn’t a thing anymore in the greater galaxy, so this would be her first one. From the front seat, Lyrian could see so much more, and it made all the difference. Soon enough, the main tires chirped as she touched down 150 meters after the threshold numbers. A moderate burst of reverse thrust and it was time to shut the main drives down and close the SCRAM intakes.

“Well done.” Mac called as Concord came to a stop facing the door inside her hanger; and Lyri let out a massive sigh of relief. She flashed a victorious grin as she dropped down the ladders last wrung to be envelopes in Macs embrace.

“Go call some friends, let’s go out and celebrate, you earned it...” he said.

——————————————————————

The Celebration dinner was an upscale jungle side cafe, Martin arrived with the woman who Mac had seen passed out with him during the homecoming party, his wife Mavira. Tristen and his wife Juelana; Brayton, Icario, and Tili were there of course. Lyri also invited her siblings, but they couldn’t break away from their plans. Frieya, and Pamaris came. Mac learned that they were childhood friends and that they had ended up on different freighters when they graduated. Apparently Lyri was the first of them to claim someone. “Frie (Fray) and Pam” got there first and pummeled the two of them with questions before the rest arrived. Silu and his bride had swung by with twins in tow to congratulate her but didn’t stay, as they were on their own special outing with the grand babies. Mac decided he liked this side of ‘Grandpa Silu’. The Dinner lasted well into the night, with very drunk Frie and Pam going home with Mac and Lyri. They had carpooled in an air car here but decided to sleep off the night’s festivities in a guest room rather than risk a trip home.

The rest of the week went uneventfully. Pam and Frie both demanded rides in Concord. Mac decided to let Lyri do a quick traditional solo. Three takeoffs and three landings in succession. This earned her her her full ‘civilian wings’ as Mac called it. She was allowed to take her friends up on the condition she stay under 2 human G’s. She had nodded when Mac reminded her that her friends were not taking the intensive physical training she was doing and would likely get hurt if she pushed to hard. In the end, she stayed close. Choosing to roar up and down the beach with one in the cockpit and the other on the beach watching. Lyri then did the same with her mother and father. Mac decided it was only fare and talked Tristen and Martin into quick flights. Martin, the poor man, lost his lunch after his hop.

Mac took some time to use the house’s auto fab to rig up a quick Gun Safe, where he deposited all the small arms that had been on concord for testing. It had long been decided that nothing would change molecularly through the knowledge the greater galaxy had on the subject. The lasts day of the week, he received an email from Professor Grem setting up a time for the meeting.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Clint walked into the meeting room at 0755 and sat down. It had been about 14 days since they had flashed Light-House. In fact, in about 10 minutes, it would be two weeks exactly. Clint settled into his seat to wait for the daily briefing. It was going to be another boring “we are yet to receive anything” briefing followed by power consumption numbers and various other smaller experiments his department was responsible for, ‘I wonder if Johannson is going to request another quantum computing session. It will be his 3rd one this month.’ He had relented twice, but Cint couldn’t do it this ti..

The door was nearly ripped out of its slots as the man behind it refused to let it open fully before entering. “Sir! Contact!! We have an incoming signal!” it was Johannson.

“No need to shout Corporal, we knew we would get…” the Swedish Scientist actually interrupted him.

“Sir, it has Sol encryption… It has Lt Mackenzie’s LEAP codes... It’s in our program langu….” The Swede never finished, the steel coffee cup pinged off the ground, but the two of them were already sprinting down the halls.

2 minutes later Clint and the Corporal arrived at the lab, “REPORT!” Clint bellowed, more forceful than his want.

“Sir, we have it... all of it… Sir, it’s over a Peta-Byte of data, including an entire Internal Log from ESS-Concord that includes several months of operations. It has Sensor and Gun camera footage.

“Jesus Christ, I want everything. Notify the Admiral. I want to kno…” It was just Clint’s day to be interrupted today.

“Sir, you need to see this. There is a Cover Message… Its Lt Mackenzie” one of the newer techs spoke up.

“Put it up.” Clint ordered. And the main view screen of the internally situated laboratory had its customary startfield image replaced with the Image of his best friend and adoptive brother staring back at him. His face had a formal set to it, and he was wearing his Terran Navy Dress Uniform. It was almost a black deep blue collor with silver strips down the outside of the legs, His Tunic was pressed, and he wore his wings without his official combat medals only the fruit salad. ‘Definitely Mac, he hated his medals’. He was sitting in a very strange cabin. It was reminisced of a northwestern American Rocky Mountain Hunting Lodge crossed with an Old Norwegian traditional accents.

“This is Lt James Mackenzie Authorization Code: Three two niner niner. This message and its contents are to be delivered immediately to Sol united Command. Cease all Test of the Slips-pace drive. I repeat, cease all test of LEAP slips-pace jumps. Inside this data packet is detailed information on what we are missing. I have included my entire recording from my flight data recorder. And separate messages with further detail. Mackenzie out.” The image of his brother froze as the message ended.

Clint stood frozen, staring at the man closer to him than any blood relative. He was alive, he was ok. He was in a position to send a message... could that mea…

“Captain, we have found two messages marked private. One for you, one for the admiral.” Johannson reported. “We received a message from the Admiral, she will be here within 2 Hours.”

“Send everything as instructed. Lt Mackenzie most likely has a better idea of what happened than we do. Contact LEAP and recommend they cancel the upcoming drone test. Send them anything that appears pertinent. Knowing Mac, he will be unimaginative with his file names.”

“Sir” it was a very young Tech, barely 17 years old. “You sound familiar with this man.”

Nitro smiled out from behind Clint’s eyes, “He is my brother.” he smirked, “LET’S GO PEOPLE!”

2 Hours later Clint’s office door slid open and Admiral Gwen Trenton rushed in. There were no salutes, Clint stood and the two hugged, both fighting back tears.

“Have you seen it?” she asked, finally breaking away from him. He pulled a seat around behind the desk and gave her his.

“No, Just the Cover Message. The one everyone has seen. He Sent two personal messages. One for each of us. I wanted to wait for you” His shock bled through his tone as His Adoptive Aunt nodded.

“Together” she said, wiping her eyes. “Show me”

Clint pulled up the first one, “ladies first” he said as he clicked play on the one addressed to Gwen.

“Auntie, tha mi an dòchas gun lorg an teachdaireachd seo gu math thu. Seadh, is mise (Auntie, I hope this message finds you well. Yes, it’s me)” Mac started in Gaelic as his Aunt stiffened, frozen in place as irrefutable proof that it was indeed her Mac slammed into her like one of those accursed Rods from God fired during the war. “Aunt Gwen” he continued in Gaelic, “Tha an turas air an robh mi air a bhith air a dhol seachad air mo mhac-meanmna as fiadhaich (The journey I have been set on has been one beyond my wildest imagination)”, ‘he was always one to speak the old tongue with a fourish’ she thought as he continued, “Feumaidh mi fios a bhith agad gu bheil mi sàbhailte, nam bodhaig cho math ris an anam. Gu dearbh, tha mi nas sàbhailte ann an anam na bha mi o chionn iomadh bliadhna, agus bu mhath leam gun coinnich thu rithe. (I need you to know that I am safe, in body as well as in soul. Indeed, I am safer in soul than I have been in many a year’s gone, and I would like you to meet her)” he said. Turning to look off camera and switching to a language no other human had ever heard before.

“Holy Shit…” Clint swore as an absolutely Gorgeous, and not quite Human, woman walked up and pulled mac’s forehead to hers before kissing him on the lips and wrapping her tale around him and turning to the camera. She was slightly taller than Mac, maybe 6ft1 at most with the figure of a Supermodel mixed with an Amazon from fairy tale. She was wearing a short blue poncho with Auburn and silver trim crested on one corner with a code of arms of some kind. It layed atop one shoulder exposing the other. Underneath it was a black high necked halter top that exposed just a bit of her midriff above skintight black pants. Her skin was ornately Silver and Auburn patterned in an almost tribal spiraling mosaic that somehow evokes a cross between culture and camouflage. She had shoulder length silver hair with a razorback of shorter hair running down the back of her neck to disappear into her poncho, only to return along the back of her tail ending in a little tuft. Deep silver grey eyes peered into the camera as she took a deep breath.

“Tha mi an dòchas coinneachadh riut a dh’ aithghearr (I hope to meet you soon).” she said in almost perfect Scottish Gaelic. Gwen let out a little gasp.

“you’ve been practicing” Mac said in English.

“A little. I wanted special, to be special, yes?” She said in somewhat halted English.

Mac responded in that unknown language, and it made her smile and lean into him while looking back at the camera.

“Auntie, I know you worried about me. What the war did to me. You know I believed I had lost my soul...” he said in English,

“Ma' chan eil mi air chall tuilleadh (Ma’ I’m not lost anymore).” He whispered in Gaelic, then spoke in more normal tones, still in the ancient language, “Na innis dha clint, tha mi airson gun innis thu dhomh cò ris a bha aodann coltach (Don’t tell clint, I want you to tell me what his face looked like).”

He returned to English, “I don’t know if or when we will see each other again. There is much for Sol to learn before they reach for the stars. It’s all in my official report. For now, I love you Ma’. I hope to hear from you soon.” and with that the woman walked over behind the camera and the message ended.

Clint closed the file. They both sat there in shock, until it was Gwen who broke the silence with a deep cleansing chuckle that turned into a laugh as Clint looked over at her.

“He’s right on one thing, your face was priceless.” she got out between gasps of laughter. She finally calmed herself once more, “He’s alive… our Mac is alive…and thriving from the looks of it.”

“He is” Clint reached around the shoulders of his aunt, giving her a small squeeze, “What of his warning?”

“In due time. First, your message.” She said, and Clint opened the next file…

Clint’s message que’d up. The Camera had started recording and the striking alien woman was sitting on the couch speaking to someone off camera.

“This one’s for Nitro?” The subtitles read as the same stunning Alien sat on the couch staring incredulously off camera.

“How’d you guess” Came subtitles accompanying Mac’s voice, speaking the alien tongue, appeared as he stepped into view and sat on the couch next to her in the same room as before… only he was wearing one of his obnoxiously loud Hawaiian Shirts and blue jeans with sandals. ‘Classic Mac’ he thought as the woman made a show of looking him up and down.

“Oh, right” the subtitles scrolled as Mac spoke in what apparently was the women’s native language. He turned to the camera and spoke English, “What’s up Nitro! Has artificial Lightning killed you yet?” Mac said with a smile, “Surprise!!” he finished before laughing at himself. Then he sobered, “Brother, I think you know it’s me. Im ok… Clint, I’m ….” His eyes grew distant. The woman next to him grew concerned and drew close to him, lowering her head below his before giving him a little nip on the neck right below his jaw. ‘Ok, she has fangs’ Clint thought.

“I’m ok, love” the strangely musical language sang as the captions scrolled. He looked back to the camera and continued in English, “Clint, Brother, I don’t know where you are, or if you are even still in the USN, but I fear they will need you. I have asked them to reach out to you in the official data stream that includes this message. Sol must tread with deadly care. The reigning power out here is likely to provoke Humanity if we stumble into them with closed eyes. That is what I hope to accomplish with this message, prevent bloodshed. The Unity, as they call themselves, have a history of…. Experimenting… on individuals of new races until they can defend their own… Most just end up being swallowed up by this leviathan. I know Humanity better. We need strength. And we need strength in enough numbers to pressure peace. We have neither. Brother, I know you. I’ve been inside your mind, and you inside mine. You know the gravity of my words...” Mac paused as a hand touched his arm. He turned and nodded to the woman.

“Enough doom, death, and destruction!” he slapped his leg with the other hand. “Those are tomorrow’s problems. I want you to meet someone.” He turned slightly to put his arm around the woman who leaned into him as if pulled by gravity. Or rather, as if they orbited each other.

“I would like to introduce, Lyrian Mackenzie Grarzia. Your sister-in-law, and my bride.” Macs smile was predictive as Clint snarfed into the mug he was sipping from, spraying coffee all over the desk. “While you clean up the coffee, we met while her father was putting me back together after our little superluminal experiment. Her Species is called the Delmaracian, we mostly just use “Delmar” in common conversation.” Mac’s face straightened, and he switched to Gaelic, “I want them as allies to Sol.” He smiled, then switched back to English, “I guess you could say that I am a dual citizen. I am of Sol, but now… I am also James Mackenzie Grarzia, Tribe Helyon of the Delmaracian Confederation. She is the senior Con of the Freighter that found me when I washed out of slip-space. I don’t live without these people, Clint. I had some ‘fun’ and scored some more victories, solo this time. Concord is her old self. I swear that ship has the soul, maybe from bits of us.” Mac paused in thought.

“Mac speaks… greatly of you” Lyrian spoke in somewhat halted English. “In time... “We meet… no.. will meet.” she gave up and the subtitles flowed as she finished in her own language, “Mac has shared so much of his life with me. You are his family, and so you shall be my family as well.”

Mac spoke after she finished, “What she is saying is, the Delmar have extremely strong family bonds. Its why I bear her last name, and She bares mine. The order Signifies the binding of two houses but recognizes who is joining the tribe from the outside. I joined Helyon through Lyri, she joined Clan Mackenzie through me in marriage, but is not leaving Helyon. So, she bares the Mackenzie name in the middle. I’m sure you have a million questions but know this one thing. I have found peace, at least in here *he tapped his chest*. Know that it is possible…. for men like us.” Mac paused.

“Gun èirich an rathad gus coinneachadh riut (May the road rise to meet you.)” he said finally. Lyri stood and walked over and turned off the camera. The message blacked out and Clint closed the file.

Clints mind whirred, ‘Holy shit, I have a sister-in-law… an alien sister-in-law… and a galaxy waiting to play high school biology if we don’t come with a strong enough hand to protect our people….’

_____________________________________________________________________________________________________

The Sol Federation Council was in emergency session. Chancellor Franklin Marovanski raised his hand, commanding silence. The entire chamber, and the entirety of both Terra and mars had watched both the Introduction, and the Official report of the wayward Lt Mackenzie. It took much to break the composure of the Council, but this had done it as sporadic conversation turned into a low din of chaos.

The Sol federation council was fairly simple, one representative of each country/dome of both Terra and Mars. Each representative was limited to one 5 year term and could not run again for another 10 years. There was an allowance made for the first counsel. To spread out the roll over cycle of elections, lots were drawn, and you could either draw a 3, 5, 7, or 9 year term. The 3 candidates were chosen from the representatives, by the representatives and then the entirety of both Terra and Mars picked one of them. It wasn’t a perfect system, but it was the best idea at the time when everyone needed to have a voice NOW to preserve the tenuous peace after the Second Battle of CenterPoint. It appeared to be working so far as there was a relatively new batch of representatives and Franklin himself was in his 5th year, having drawn a 7-year lot. Silence did not come, and Franklin was forced to use his gavel.

13 hours later, the debate was tabled for the morning. Some wanted to send an emergency Force. Others wanted to cut all communication and fortify earth. A growing majority had taken Mac’s suggestion to heart. Give the man on the ground the authority to share technology and secrets and build a power base for which Humanity can begin to trade with and Ally to. If this “subspace data” was correct, information might be the only commodity available for quite some time.

The aid Coalition inside the Sol Counsel slowly grew over the next 4 days until it was voted on. Sol would be naming Lt Mackenzie as Acting Liaison/ambassador to the Delmar Confederation. He had authorization to share power production and engine technology and basic MAC technology. The highly advanced guidance systems aboard Concord had been veto’d by counsel vote. The hang-up was in science. The Head of LEAP and Admiral Gwen Trenton had put a hold request on the execution order stating that her scientists needed to fully digest the data sent to them before they were to give a recommendation or input.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________

It had been 3 weeks since they had received Mac’s Transmission. Clint pinched the bridge of his nose. He was not a scientist, but he was a dam good analyst. It’s what made him so good as Mac’s back seater. Something in the back end of the code had caught his eye as familiar, and he had turned some of his Techs onto it. He had received a message from the night crew marked urgent. He had stumbled awake at 0245, and it was currently 0306 as he finally made his way into the Night crews lab... The smell of Coffee drew him to his command chair, and he found a fresh cup steaming in its cup holder and a positively migraine inducing radiant smile plastered on the Night crew chief. Clint held up one finger as the clearly excited man opened that smiling mug of his. To make a point Clint took a long pull from the coffee, then set it down and nodded to the scientist... The chief was practically danced from foot to foot.

“It was in the beacon, our engines did nothing wrong.” the man blurted out

“Calm down Harrison, what was in the beacon, and why did our engines do nothing wrong.” grumbled Clint slowly feeling the Caffeine begin to rouse him. He took another pull of coffee as the young Lt Harrison composed himself.

“Captain, We finished our data analysis on what you pointed out…. It’s the beacons... this subspace needs two sets of coordinates to travel accurately at any distance. Pure test runs using power won’t work because of how you enter and exit subspace.. BUT..” he waved a singular finger, then handed Clint a data pad, “We weren’t trying to get into subspace, we didn’t know it existed… we were trying to get into the boundary between subspace and real space, the space that you have to slip through to get to their version of FTL. And we can still do it. We analyzed the quantum data involved in getting the data packet here from such a long distance. We also studied their power outputs and reactor readings from the engagements that Lt Mackenzie was a part of after his arrival. They don’t have the power to generate the quantum waveforms needed to ride slip space… we do… Sir…. Your brother... he just gave us FTL…. And an FTL that will be orders of magnitude faster than anything they will have on their end.” The man was practically bouncing.

The last of Clints brain fog burned away at that last statement, “How fast”

“we don’t have exact numbers yet.. but if we installed a Higgs Bosun mass regulator on the Drone… we might be able to make the trip in 4 months one way.” Harrison said.

“Holy shit... Do we have the ability to retransmit yet?” Clint asked, tapping out as email as he waited for the response.

“We do, we have just been waiting on a message.” Harrison said after a moment.

Clint nodded, “I just notified the Admiral; we need to get on this yesterday. Prep a Packet and get the pandora array a full inspection. We are going to need to push its limits a little to get this sent.”

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

Lyri was nervous as they descended towards Helyon’s city center. She was in the passenger seat this time as the teacher. Mac was a terrifyingly good pilot, but he spent most of his life in craft that did not have vertical take-off or hovering capabilities for one reason or another. It had been an interesting experience teaching the veteran aerospace fighter pilot the finer point of not dying in a hover. This, however, was not the reason for her nerves. This was going to be her first full physical since she starting her regimen designed to give her the ability to follow Mac to his home world should he go there. There was more she wanted to ask her father, and now was the opportunity. Her first checkup happened to be on the day that Mac was meeting Professor Grem at their ad hock weapons testing facility. He would not be able to join her during her examination. She lightly touched her right skirt pocket, feeling the lump of the small glass vial.

“You’re goin’ to do great, love.” Mac’s soothing voice interrupted her mope as they gently setting them down in front of her father’s planet side clinic. He was more the owner of the medical facility but made a point to see patients when Traveler was on refit. Her appointment was in 5 ‘minutes’ or so.

“You’re getting good at that. I barely felt us touch down.” She said smiling at him bravely before giving he gave her a peck.

“I had a good teacher, now go! Don’t want to be late for your weigh in” he chuckled, using the term he knew teased her.

It was an unaffordable side effect of building herself up to withstand higher gravity. When Lyrian had met Mac, she had weighed a slight 25 ‘kg’. Now… she could feel it. Her body wasn’t getting that much bigger physically, but she was heavier, her legs were beginning to ripple with muscle as she walked, and her core/abdominals were the same, if a tiny bit bigger long hourglass. The difference was that now that long hourglass rippled with what Mac called a ‘six pack’ she glanced down at the small, exposed portion of her midriff and flexed as she headed for the door, smiling as she saw her abs crease her stomach. She opened the door and stepped through.

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“Oh!” The receptionist squeaked as an intense Delmar woman with the body of a female warrior of the old tales stepped into the waiting room. The receptionist finally recognized the face of Icario’s Daughter after a frozen moment.

“Lyrian! oh! wow! hi! Doctor Icario is expecting you. Please this way.” the receptionist stammered as she led Lyri to the back.

——————————————————————

Mac settled the air car he had dubbed “Vito”, much to Lyrians confusion, down on the sands of a rather large beach further to the south of his own property as a group of Delmar approached with a wave. He stepped out of the paradox of an air car and was greeted by Doctor Grem and an almost identical male Delmar, minus the beard, stepped up next to him.

“Ah, Mac! Good of you to join us, this is my brother Professor Bartrus Grem. He and I joint head ‘aerospace and weapons’ development for Tribe Helyon.” Professors Grem smiled at him.

“Wait, twins?” Mac asked back in shock ‘you have to be shitting me’

“A rarity for us, but yes Bart is my twin brother.” Doctor Quin responded.

Mac struggled down a laugh with a cough. “Well then, my gear is in the trunk, sorry, cargo compartment. Give me a moment and I’ll meet you at the benches.” Mac finished with a nod over to where some tables had been set up facing a shallow sloping dug bout berm that Mac had insisted that they build. There were three large tables made of a white composite of some kind. They had laid out some weapons of their own. There were some handheld, some possibly designed to be fired from the shoulder, and a few even larger, possibly squad level or crew served weapons on various mounts next to the tables.

Mac pulled a 1.5 meter long crate out of the back of ‘Vito’, he had had to drop the left side rear seat to make it fit, and calmly walked it over to the tables. He noticed the gaggle of eggheads stop tapping on their data pads and just stare as he solo hefted the crate on one shoulder and walked it to the tables. ‘Right, heavy gravity bro stuff.’ Mac remembered as he set the crate down next to the tables. He opened it to reveal two neatly stacked Gauss rifles, one made by Knights Armament, one made by Steyr.

The two resembled and were in fact further iterations of the original designs from the mid-20th century. When Humanity had moved away from propellant, they had discovered just how future-proof the venerable designs from the 20th century truly were. The weapons mimicked their ancestors in their exterior ergonomics and controls. They still fed from a 30-round box magazine of self-contained brass cartridges, ejecting the spent case after every round fired; and even used basically the same bolt and bolt carrier systems respectively. The difference came in the operating system.

Mac finished setting up in the open table area, ensuring that the weapons were empty and safe to handle, “alright. Professor, this is your show... where would you like to start. All of my weapons have been rendered safe, but not inert.” He stated.

“May I” Bart, the professors twin asked, indicating to one of the rifles.

“Feel free.” Mac picked up the Steyr and handed it to the Delmar whose eyes immediately widened in shock. He looked at the rest of the group then hefted it, muzzle up, in on hand. The shock spread before he put it back in both hands and examining it, keeping the muzzle pointed toward the berm. ‘Right, they have ranged weapons. Of course, they would know where to point the spicy end.’ Mac chided himself as he relaxed a little. The weapon was unloaded, but bad weapons handling had always irked him.

“It’s so light…. How do you get the power pack to hold any shots?” He asked.

“There is no power pack, humanity calls them batteries, in it. What you are holding is mechanically triggered.” Mac responded. “The rifle is unloaded, you can test the trigger if you like, the small lever just below where you are holding your index finger along the receiver, sorry, main housing.“ Mac indicated to the trigger of the weapon. The beardless professor Grem squeezed the trigger as his bearded twin and group watched on. A prominent *CLICK* resounded from inside of the weapon.

“If you have no power pack, how is it fired? If I remember the reports, human small arms use magnetic acceleration not unlike our shipboard Flak weapons.” The bearded Doctor Quin asked.

Mac turned to him and pulled out a cartridge and projectile he had in his pocket. He had discharged the capacitor in the case completely, and had carefully removed the bullet, keeping the sabots intact. He handed the disassembled components to the man. “Humanity figured out how to make very high powered Capacitors, the same type of thing in your power banks, very very small... the cartridge case,“ he indicated to the brass “is a capacitor. The projectile,” he indicated to the dart still wrapped in its sabot “is pressed into the front. And on firing the case provides all the electrical energy needed to power the GAUSS components for one shot. The outer rim of the flat part of the back of the case is negative half of the electrical connection. The small circle in the middle is the first half of positive conductor. That small circle is spring loaded to not allow accidental completion of the circuit. The mechanical firing pen depresses it on firing, completing the circuit and the power from the case’s capacitor to the system.” Mac finished. Everyone was paying attention now… Even Bart had stopped fidgeting with the Steyr and was listening.

“How powerful are these ‘capacitors’” he asked slowly.

“This is a 4.8 gram dart wrapped on a .1 gram Sabot with a total diameter of 7mm out of the weapon you are holding. This ‘bullet’ will exit the barrel at just under 1400 ‘meters’ per ‘second’” Max responded.

“How can you be producing over 3 times our fastest hand held Kenetics…” Bart asked somewhat incredulously, “without melting your weapon almost after the first shot...”

Mac had a hunch, “may I see one of your kinetics?” He asked.

“Certainly” Quin said and walked away, returning with a very blocky yet bulgy, obviously, shoulder fired thing. He hefted it into Macs hands.

Max held it in his hands a moment, it was easily twice or three times as heavy as either of the rifles he brought today. It obviously had a power pack on board and looked like a combination of a war-hammer Bolter and an old G-11 from Heckler and Koch’s failed caseless ammunition experiment. It too, fed from the bottom from a detachable magazine. Mac was happy to see that safety was universal, and that he had been handed a cleared weapon. “May I see what it fires?” He asked and was handed a long rod of metal with a rounded tip.

“Ah, I believe I see the difference.” He laid the weapon back down holding their projectile in on hand. He walked over to his crate and picked up a full magazine and removed one of the cartridges from it. “We tried to do what you have in the beginning and had the same heating issues. Human weapons can go several hundred to several thousand rounds before overheating to failure. And this is why.” he held up the intact cartridge, “let me ask you this. Where does all the heat go. After you fire”

“Well, into the system” Bart responded.

“Why?” Mac asked.

“Because that’s all that is available.” Bart reacted, somewhat incredulously.

“What if it wasn’t?” Mac asked. Bart just gave him a pointed look, so Mac continued, “We’ve used chemical propellants to fire our weapons for centuries. In point of fact, some civilian enthusiast weapons still do. During that time period, we learned that this brass bit, we call the cartridge case, acts as a heat sink, and removes a significant amount of heat from the weapon as it is ejected to clear the way for the next firing. When we went to Gauss weapons. We tried, and quickly ditched, designs such as yours. It turned out, getting rid of the case was a great way to make a weapon that overheats quickly. So, we ditched putting energy into the guns, and returned to energizing the ammunition, only this time with capacitors and electricity instead of with controlled explosions.”

Doctor Quin blurted out in awe, “and kept your guns from overheating! It’s brilliant!”

The conversation dissolved as the Delmar scientists all now wanted to shoot Human kinetics. An hour and 200rounds of spent ammunition, Mac’s supply was understandably scarce, and Professor Bart finally asked, “why are you showing us this. These weapons are incredibly advanced. Superior even to energy weapons because of their energy output on target at distance… Why are you showing us these secrets before your human government gives you permission”?

“Because they aren’t secrets. Humanity has been perfecting the art of throwing chunks of rock and metal at very high speeds for over 1000 of our years. These weapons were not created by our government. They were invented by private citizens, then sold to our government. In some places of my planet, it is considered a Human being’s birthright to own, possess, even wear for protection on one’s person, any of these weapons, even this”. Mac produced the pistol he killed the Gri’kra from his waistband, quickly unloaded it, and handed it to Bart. “This birthright is why you have a dead Gri’kra in your lab.. It was slain using this very weapon. Had I not worn it that night, as is my want, we would not be having this conversation.”

“I see.” Bart waved Quin over and showed him the weapon. The bearded professors’ eyes went wide as he was told that this was the weapon responsible for the damage to the Gri’kra.

Mac dug in the crate for a moment and found a few loaded pistol magazines, and they went for one last shooting session.