Stargate Rebellion

Author:McCay, Bill [McCay, Bill]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

EVEN THE GODS ARE MORTAL

To an exterior observer, the battleship Ra’s Eye made the transition from stardrive to normal space in a soundless blaze of glory. Vacuum, of course, does not transmit sound. But it does convey light, and at the moment of its appearance, incandescent sheets of luminescence emanated from each face of the starship’s pyramidal structure. On the bridge, Hathor felt the familiar queasy sensation of shifting from the unreal hyper-realm back to reality. Starship jumps were different from transiting the StarGates-they seemed curiously unfocused. One had a sense of rushing through the void with no destination. One of Ptah’s technicians ran her hands over the lit panels that made up the navigation controls. A holographic screen flashed in front of her face.

“We have arrived in the star system Amentet,” she announced, “precisely as calculated.” Ptah himself roved the bridge, checking readouts at all stations. At Engineering, he activated the communications system.

“Engines! I’m reading a power fluctuation from the drive. Modulate!”

Hathor beckoned the engineer god over. “If you keep doing their jobs, they’re never going to learn,” she said in a whisper. His own voice was rough. “They’re only trainees, with a surface indoctrination in shipboard systems. A skeleton crew able to move Ra’s flying palace in small jumps-that’s very different from handling this behemoth.” Hathor knew all too well. Ra’s ship, for all its apparent size and majesty, was a mere yacht, a toy, next to the grim bulk of the warship. In addition, most of the royal starcraft ran on automatic systems. That wasn’t possible on a ship going into combat. Ra’s ship had power in abundance. But even with the quartz wonder stone, power was precious, being juggled between the stardrive and the weapons systems. It didn’t help that in spite of months of refurbishing, most of the power connections were millennia old. Hathor felt a sense of edginess as she paced. Feeling the bridge under her feet awoke uncomfortable memories-mere months old for her, but dating to the age of legend for almost everyone else aboard. She turned to Ptah, “How do you deal with it?” she asked. “With what?” her erstwhile husband returned. “How do you manage your status as legend? The reactions of today’s ones to the fact that you lived in the First Time?” “Simple,” he replied with a shrug. “I don’t let them know.” Ptah’s solution wouldn’t work for her, she thought. And it certainly wouldn’t help her fit into what she considered a degenerate age. The engineering crew was not the only skeleton complement aboard Ra’s Eye. Resources and manpower were being hoarded on godlings’ distant fiefs. Even some of Ptah’s technicians were being kept against their god commander’s orders. Worst of all, however, was the shortage of warriors. The ground force attached to Ra’s Eye was seriously under-strength. Far more than on Ombos, Hathor would have to depend on slashing attacks by the udajeets to project firepower. There simply weren’t enough dependable warriors to use as foot soldiers, except as a tiny reserve.

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