Maaku

Captain Kôté had said the Agonoid shields were the biggest problems, and admittedly their own shields were the biggest defensive and offensive advantage they had, well that and their cloaking. Cricket said there was no evidence to suggest that the Agonoids had cloaking capability.

Mark asked, “So knowing what we know about our shields, how do you defeat ships with shields?“

Cricket said, “There is a few ways around our shields, one is to bombard them with enough weaponry that the shield generators can’t keep up with the damage and eventually fail. Second is with patience and slowly drift through the shields, often something slow moving can float through a shield, think of your personal shield it’ll stop anything travelling above a certain speed from reaching you. Lastly, the engines aren’t covered by the shields when the ship is moving, the sides probably are, but the actual thrusters shouldn’t be protected, it would drain too much power from the shield generators while moving, as you would literally be burning your shields.“

Mark said, “Well that’s something to think about then. What ships are closest to the Empire home world?“

“The ships at Athos would be the closest as they could reach the planet in about 2 days with the new FTL drives. Marnot would be the next closest and it would take them just 8 hours longer than the ones at Athos.“

“Do we have another Sentinel ready for deployment?“

“Yes, there is one Sentinel ready and another will be ready in two days.“

Just then Mark clued in to what Cricket had said, “Wait! Marnot? Is that Sentinel even staffed?“

“It’s staffed by the 25 personnel from the original Destroyer there. There is no one in the training facility.“

“OK, contact the Sentinel at Marnot, tell them to transfer the Destroyers, fighters, shuttles and their quarters to the Orbital Hub, then send that Sentinel to the new planet and send the waiting Sentinel to Marnot. I’m not sure why I didn’t think about this earlier, but we should have made the Orbital Hubs the training facility and give them a thousand drones or so and we really should give them sub-light engines, it would make them way more effective in any combat scenario!”

“That is easy enough to do, we can use the asteroid harvesters to transfer the matter and if we’re just growing the ship, we don’t have to vacate it to do the upgrade. It’ll be referred to as the planet spaceport, but with engines it will be classed as a ship, so what would you like to call the new ship class?”

“Let’s call it a Guardian, since it will have the training facility in addition to the prison and it will be always be standing on guard around a planet. We might as well keep the Sentinel as an autonomous ship, that way we have major firepower and ship building facilities that we can deploy in a heartbeat, without disrupting thousands of potential trainees.”

“The new ship won’t quite be as big as a Sentinel, at a little over 3 kilometres long, but it will have sub-light engines, so it’ll have more maneuverability, it just won’t be capable of faster than light travel.”

Cricket then popped up a design for the new Guardian. It was pretty much just a single large landing bay, big enough for a couple of destroyers and a couple dozen manned fighters, and numerous small external landing bays for the emergency shuttles. This was all beneath the quarters, cafeteria and training facility and added to the one end of the Orbital Hub, the engines were being added to the other end of the facility and the thousand drones just attached to the underside of the exterior.

“I like it, let’s do that at all the planets, then once the upgrades are complete, have everyone transfer the Destroyers, fighters and shuttles from the Sentinel to the Guardian and then modify the Sentinel and strip away all but maybe 50 living quarters and the small cafeteria in the section under the Battlestar dock, but leave the walkway around the factory since it connects to the landing bays, although we really only need a couple of those.“

“I’ll start transforming all the Space Stations into Guardians immediately. It’ll take a couple of days, but they won’t need to be vacated to make the changes.“

“I should probably contact Kaleb.“

“Actually it’s in the middle of the night for him.“

“OK lets send him a message informing him of what I’m doing, he’ll get it when he wakes up. He can then notify all the Sentinels and explain the changes. Also message Captain Kôté and tell him the shield weaknesses, maybe he can exploit those and give him an advantage until the Sentinel can reach them in about 2 days. Have him call me immediately if the Agonoids show up again!“

Mark contemplated calling Adam, then asked Cricket, “Which Battlestar is closer, the Poseidon or the Cleito?”

“The Cleito could be there in about 4 days, it would take the Poseidon about 7 days.”

Mark thought about it for only a minute, then called Commander Northrop on the Cleito. Within a few seconds the Commander answered, “It is nice to hear from you again, my King. How can I be of assistance?”

“Commander Northrop, we have located the Empire home world, unfortunately they are under attack by a new enemy called the Agonoids. Captain Kôté is there already and has revealed himself and is actually helping the Empire defend their planet, I’ve already dispatched the Sentinel from Marnot so it’ll arrive in 2 days, if you could head that way, I’m hoping the war will be over by then and you can be our diplomat to talk to the Empire!”

As the call was ending the Commander saluted, “We will leave immediately, my King!”

Annabelle walked into his office wearing a bright yellow sundress, just as the call was ending.

She expressed her shock, “Seriously? You’re actually going to let other people do some of the work? Who are you? Where is my husband?”

Mark laughed, “I decided to try something new ... besides I’m too far away to get there in a timely manner.”

The call notification sound went off and Mark quickly glanced at the Atlanterra clock on the wall, as he answered the call from General Marsbe.

“Good morning Kaleb, you’re up awfully early,” Mark said.

“My King, you’re certainly keeping things interesting! I go to sleep, dreaming of peaceful things and I wake up, we’re at war with a new enemy, we’re now helping our previous enemy and Orbital Hubs are now Guardians! You just can’t sit still can you?”

Mark laughed, “I’d hate for you to die of boredom!”

Kaleb also laughed, “There’s no chance of that with you around, that’s for sure! So, is there anything you need from me at this point in time?”

Mark said, “Nope, I don’t think so. Have you had a chance to look at the changes I am making to the Guardians and the Sentinels?”

“I didn’t look at the Sentinel changes that much, they look almost the same as it was before. I did look at the Guardians though, I like them. What was your original thinking of why you didn’t build them that way before?”

“In all honesty, I was thinking that it would be nice to have an entire training class whisked off and thrown into the fray of a conflict. You can’t beat the experience gained from a real situation, not something that’s staged. Then today I realized, yes we train them basic fighting and combat tactics, but it’s just a part time job for them, now that we’re trying to keep the security forces local to their planets. If they want to get the elite training, maybe we should have some super elite training program to take the best of the best to the next level?

Then, since the Sentinels are so formidable on their own without any human intervention, I figured we should just leave them autonomous and we can move them around however we need without impacting anyone’s training or rotation schedules, but by having personnel, drones, fighters and Destroyers on a Guardian. The planet is always protected and, most of the time, there will still be a Sentinel nearby.”

The General nodded his head, “Actually I can see why you originally went that way, like you, I do think this makes better use of the Sentinel’s capabilities, plus if there’s any issues with passengers or prisoners at the spaceport, there’s lot of security nearby. We can work real security into their training regiment, we’ll just have them supervised, and I really like the idea of creating an elite training program for the best of the best!”

Then Kaleb asked, “Is there any other ships you are thinking of making soon that we’ll need to staff?”

Mark then had a thought, but said, “Nope, no other ships that I can think of, well I was thinking of one, but I just decided against it, I have a better idea.”

Kaleb laughed, “It’s fun to watch you think up shit on the fly like this. Want to tell me what it is?”

Mark laughed, “Sure! Solara created this little camping kit that Annabelle and I took for a test drive and it absolutely revolutionizes camping!”

Kaleb said, “I love camping, so how does this camping kit work?”

Mark explained, “Her camping kit is just a tool case full of different coloured disk-shaped construx, each disk is a different type of building and then you just point the arrow on the disk toward the centre of camp and push the button, it then creates a building for you and builds a path in the direction of the arrow towards a central building. The nice thing, is when you want to pack up camp, you go to the central case and issue the command to pack up the camp, then just walk around and pick up the disks and put them in the case. They’re re-usable construx and you get to camp with real beds in solid buildings, with kitchens, washrooms and a fire pit!”

Kaleb raised his eyes, “That is revolutionary! I don’t get out camping as much as I’d like, but I’d like to try it sometime. So how does this camping kit work into your ship idea?”

“I’m thinking of creating emergency camps, we’d have disks for meal pavilions, residences, medical facilities, and maybe a central command building and who knows what else might be required. Obviously much bigger than what’s in the camping kit, but still portable. So that way if a disaster breaks out anywhere, a rescuvac or maybe some sort of supply ship can show up with the kit and quickly resurrect a small town to help with the disaster relief. Then once it’s not needed anymore, the ship issues the command and all the buildings return to disks and get packed away.”

“That sounds like another winner! You’re very innovative, I like having you as the King! I need to get going though, I saw your message and just wanted to let you know that I got it.”

“Thanks Kaleb, talk to you soon!”

Rayven and Annabelle had collected themselves and had been listening to the call from the couches.

Annabelle said, “I like the emergency camp idea, I take it we’re going to go talk to Solara about it now?”

Mark said, “Yeah I should probably let her know what I’m thinking, she’ll make changes of course, but whatever she comes up with likely be better than what I think up anyway.”

They left Mark’s office and went downstairs to the common room, then went over to knock on Solara’s door, but just as they were about to ring the door (that’s what happens when you put your hand on the dot and it’s not your room), when the door opened and Solara said, “Come in!”

Solara was sitting at her desk, with her back to them, “Emergency Camps, huh?”

Annabelle said aloud, “Way to spoil the surprise Cricket, you suck at keeping secrets!”

Cricket popped into a hologram projector similar to the one on Mark’s desk, “What can I say? These are a great idea and I just had to tell her! Us techies gotta stick together!”

As everyone laughed, Mark just smiled at the thought that the two smartest people he knew were still working together to develop new technologies.

Mark said, “Since miss blabbermouth here told you everything, do you have any ideas or questions?”

Solara said, “Yes, depending on the number of people involved in the relief effort, it may require a significant amount of extra matter to create food and clothing for everyone. Matter will be collected as they defecate and items go into the recycling system, but a larger ship could also carry a stockpile of extra matter to get the camp up and running faster.

Water is never an issue as it can be extracted out of the atmosphere rather than using stock matter, but the more stuff we can build directly into a ship, the less matter we need to use to construct the camp. It saves a lot of time and matter if we don’t need to build medibeds, kitchens, food synths, clothing synths, etc.”

Mark said, “So, maybe the ship should be the camp centre and it’s more or less just shelters that are constructed? But if things like the medibeds are built into the ship, we will have a limited number of them. I guess we could always supplement by calling in medivacs or another camp ship?”

Annabelle then said, “Maybe the ship just has 6 or 10 medibeds, staff quarters, the command centre, the kitchen, a supply depot and maybe a washroom or shower facility?”

Solara suggested, “Maybe just showers. Washrooms are pretty basic and easy to build right into the residences. As for the supply depot ... what types of stuff should we be supplying?”

Mark said, “I think just clothing, I don’t want clothing synths in the residences. I’d like the matter use more controlled.”

Solara said, “It is controlled! You only get one set of clothes for free. You can’t get a new shirt until the previous shirt is recycled.”

“Hmmm, I never realized that! I’ve just always put my old clothes in the recycler when I get new ones. Well, then make the rooms more complete, give them a washroom with shower, a bed and a clothing synth.”

Solara then said, “A cargo sized ship similar to the Pegasus could function like central command. The cargo hold becomes the medical centre, the quarters remain in the central corridor, we could just add more of them as we wouldn’t need the kitchen area. Then the sides of the ship could swing up and provide a roof for the kitchen, a small public washroom, and the command centre and we could just build the walls, prep and serving counters, etc. All the technology aspects would be part of the ship, which saves a lot of matter and a lot of construction time.”

Mark said, “I like it! Another option, since quarters are easy to construct, is we could add more medibeds and remove the quarters and just build staff quarters directly off the ship.”

Solara said, “Actually that would save a lot of space, plus it’d be more comfortable.”

Cricket then said, “How about this?”

She popped up a hologram of a ship that was about 30 metres long, 9 metres wide and 5 metres tall. It looked pretty slick with the smooth blue exterior and the slightly angled sides that made the ship wider at the bottom. The ship had low profile landing struts to level the ship on uneven ground and it put the floor of the ship about a half metre off the ground.

The interior looked like it had twenty medibeds like the one’s at Cleito’s Temple, each in it’s own room that was about 3 metres deep and 2 metres wide, with the medical desk towards the front, blocking off access to the cockpit, with doors on each side of the desk that exited the ship.

She then animated the hologram, showing the two sides of the ship swinging up from the base, creating an angled roof that actually angled towards the ship rather than away so any rainwater could be captured, cleaned and recycled rather than extracting it from the atmosphere and it also formed a landing zone that would fit two shuttles with a big white number on it.

The left side of the ship had an exposed kitchen as the floor, walls, and then prep counters with sinks formed, complete with concession windows on the side and back. The right side of the ship had a wall with the rear one-third forming a public washroom, then the forward two-thirds forming the command centre, with tables and chairs in the corners and a large round table, similar to the display table in the control tower of the port terminal in the very centre. The entrance to the command centre and the medical centre would be close to each other.

Then off to the other side of the front of the ship, and enclosing the cockpit, was a row of residences for the staff, which also conveniently formed a border for the camp and protection from the wind for the kitchen and eating area. Behind the medical desk was the control panel for the camp and also a variety of disks for the residences, some fire disks and several stabilizer disks for transporting the wounded.

Mark smiled as he saw the mobile headquarters and said, “That should help with pretty much any kind of disaster. Maybe what we need now is a website to show organizations how we can help and how to contact us for help. We should probably also introduce ourselves to the Red Cross, UNICEF and the Salvation Army. I think they’re the primary disaster relief organizations around the world.”

Annabelle then spoke up, “While this is all fine and dandy, you know how else we can help?”

Solara and Mark both simultaneously said, “How?”

Annabelle then said, “We studied a few disasters and their relief efforts in school. The biggest challenges during a natural disaster are communications ... check, although we might need radios or something for non-citizens! Temporary shelter ... check! Food, water and clothing ... check, check and check! Electricity ... check! Security and lawlessness ... check! Our world peace system will help with that, although maybe we can do more? We haven’t addressed infrastructure and construction ... we are in a better position than anyone on the planet to help with rebuilding infrastructure! Mainly because we don’t need equipment and have demonstrated that we can build things faster than anyone else!”

Mark thought about it and nodded his head, “Yeah we can do a lot more than just the emergency camps! We could send construx and designers to rebuild bridges, roads, railways, dams, dykes and all sorts of things.”

Annabelle then said, “In places that get hit by tornados, hurricanes, tidal waves and the like, many people lose their homes, especially in regions where the construction is questionable to begin with. So instead of just temporary shelters at the camp, what if we had a stockpile of construx, like the camping disks, except they’re one-time use and build a house using normal building materials, maybe we have one, two, and three bedroom homes ready to go?”

Solara said, “That idea has merit, although the foundations of a building are sometimes still intact, so possibly I could make a construx disk that rebuilds a single level house on top of the current foundation, but using better construction techniques. Since we have the power outlets for sale now, maybe just leave one power bar per room? I’m not sure we should give them waste recycling and synths, and I don’t think we should make them out of Mazjik material!”

Cricket then said, “Actually would giving them waste recycling, water and power be a bad thing? You are trying to help the world aren’t you?”

Mark said, “Yes, we are, but if we’re building them out of normal building materials, wouldn’t that compromise our technology?”

Cricket said, “Not really! Just because you create a building out of common building materials, as long as the construx is never disabled, I’m still in control of it. So even if you build a house out of normal building material, if there’s a future natural disaster, I can protect the house so that it will withstand the disaster and then return to it’s original design once the disaster passes?”

Mark said, “Well if you’re still in control, then I can’t see why we shouldn’t give them basic houses with power, water and recycling! Then we will just need to provide additional personnel to help with construction.”

Mark told Cricket, “Construct a camp ship as a prototype, then we can actually set it up and maybe make some modifications after we see it!”

With the new emergency camp ship in development, Mark suggested he and Annabelle take a walk over to see the breakfast club and get a site started for the emergency services.

The usual quick 10 minute walk to the breakfast club’s office, turned into a nice leisurely walk along the waters’s edge, as they talked about all sorts of things. Annabelle was thinking she could use her newfound fame to help build up her mom and dad’s trail riding business by helping out with the trail rides, just like she used to.

Mark liked that idea, as he also wouldn’t mind slowing things down and helping out with a trail ride at either of the ranches, especially with Solara’s camping kit!

As they conversed about the future and their hopefully forthcoming child, they soon found themselves standing outside the office as Amelia waved at them through the office windows.

Mark and Annabelle entered the office and talked to Amelia for a bit, asking if they were fully settled in yet and how was she liking living on Atlantis?

Amelia said she liked the laid back casual lifestyle that came with the Atlantean way of life and that Henry had persuaded her to take up golf and she was actually enjoying it, as they had been golfing almost every day. Eventually they just walked into the office and went to where Beth, Cass and Zack were. When the kids saw them, they dropped what they were doing as Cass and Beth gave them both hugs. Zack just shook Mark’s hand, but Annabelle gave him a hug.

Afterwards they dropped by Henry’s office on the way to a boardroom, where Mark outlined the new Disaster Relief Services and what they would try to provide. Cricket, of course, showed everyone the mobile camp ships, including the animated camp setup and sent the images and animation to the girls for the website. It was going to be a very simple website, more or less here’s what we can provide and here’s how to ask for help.

They said they were just finishing up another site at the moment, but they could probably work on that site in the next day or two, which Mark said would be fine, since the prototype camp ship wouldn’t even be ready for 3 days.

They then let them get back to the site they were working on, as Henry escorted them back to Amelia, who suggested that someday soon they book a tee time for all four of them to go golfing and maybe have a barbecue after. They agreed and Annabelle said she would make the arrangements with Amelia.

During the walk back to the palace, Mark’s received a message from Captain Kôté saying he had news and to call when it was convenient.

As ominous as that sounded, Mark decided it was probably better if he took that call at his desk.

When they got back to the palace, they immediately went up to Mark’s office and called Captain Kôté. Annabelle now had her own chair near Mark’s desk, so she moved next to him to get in on the call.

The call was connected almost immediately as the Captain appeared in the display.

Mark started, “Captain Kôté, you requested that I call. Has there been a new development?”

“We’re still cloaked and have just been monitoring their ship to ship communications. It sounds like they have an outsider named, ‘Mark’, oddly enough, that has been helping them develop ships.

If ‘Mark’ is Sebastian that would explain how the Empire has gotten so many ships so fast, because they must be using construx.”

“That would also mean they have a limited number of ships they can build! Hmmm, it sounds like the bastard has found some new friends?”