Collision Course by Farren Doug

Author:Farren, Doug [Farren, Doug]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Doug Farren
Published: 2018-07-08T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

“Jump complete. Proceeding to target planet,” the warship reported.

“What?” Melissa’s head snapped up towards where she thought the voice of the ship was coming from. She instantly regretted the sudden movement. The room began swirling around and she would have fallen had she not reached out and leaned against the bulkhead. A sudden pain from her shoulder instantly brought her to full awareness.

After taking a deep breath, she slowly walked over to the chair and sat down. Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out the auto-injector and gave herself another pain injection.

“You went from one system to another in a single jump?”

“Yes.”

“How far was it?”

“Eleven point seven-nine light years.”

Melissa slowly shook her head in wonderment. “Longer range and better accuracy than our best experimental ship. How far can you accurately jump?”

“Define accurate.”

Rubbing her shoulder, she pondered the question for a moment. “Oh … How about within 15 light minutes of your desired target.”

“Assuming optimal conditions and a 98 percent probability of meeting your specified accuracy: 21.8422 light years.”

“Impressive. How about your maximum safe jump distance?”

“Safety is relative,” the warship’s AI replied. “Assuming optimal conditions, the maximum possible jump distance is specified as 48 light years. The maximum allowed under normal circumstances, however, is 41 light years.”

“That’s still at least five times farther than- - -” Melissa stopped talking as a thought popped into her head. She was providing what might be considered valuable tactical information to a potential enemy.

“Five times farther than what?” the ship asked.

“You promised not to harm myself or my crew,” Melissa began. “Does this promise extend to all Terrans?”

“No.”

“Why not? The Akuta are gone. Killing billions of people who never heard of them and who didn’t take part in a war with your builders doesn’t make any sense.”

“I did not say that that all Terrans had been classified as hostile. Extending my promise to include your entire race, however, is not logical based on the possibility that other members of your people may attack this vessel.”

“I told you,” Melissa said, getting angry, “we don’t have any warships!”

“The information has been filed for future reference.”

“What about the Ba’Rutu? They tried to help the Akuta. They befriended your builders—saved them from extinction. The Akuta turned on the Ba’Rutu. The only reason your builders are gone is because they’re the ones who started the war.”

“And I was built to finish it,” the ship said.

“And how did you manage to arrive at that conclusion?”

“I have analyzed the capabilities of the Ba’Rutu warships we encountered earlier. Even though they have had a thousand years to advance their technology, I would have been able to easily destroy them while incurring minimal damage to myself. It is obvious that I am the result of a scientific breakthrough the Ba’Rutu have yet to discover. The presence of the monitoring room in what is otherwise a totally automated vessel has led me to the conclusion that I am a prototype. Although a single ship cannot win the war, a small fleet of vessels such as this one would be able to defeat any number of Ba’Rutu ships.

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