starship.”
“That’s right, Captain” Sherman replied. “In any case, we will probably need an edge, as the Varlon might also be looking for a nonaggression treaty. The Talcon could sign a nonaggression treaty without knowing the sneaky way the Varlon operate and find themselves attacked when the Varlon are ready. The Talcon emissary we will transport can inform the other Talcon about the Varlon and their Accadian allies.”
“The Phoenix can cross the galaxy in just under a year,” said York. “Or it used to until we underwent that ‘alteration’ at QB7.” York paused, thinking back on how things had changed after the strange events that resulted in restoring everything in and around QB7. “Now, if all the velocity and maneuvering tests we have been doing are correct, Phoenix can cross the galaxy in six months.”
“That means we should have no problem with the mission,” Lieutenant Commander Lee Sterling stated. He was working at his station. He was a blond-haired fellow with a Terran background and had traveled to or lived on several of Earth’s colonies.
“Sir, we still don’t have a precise subsector location as to where the Talcon will exit hyperspace,” said senior security officer Lieutenant Commander Diana Ares, as she glanced up from her security systems checks. Diana Ares was a very attractive woman. She was athletically built, with short blonde hair, lightly tanned skin, and piercing blue eyes. In addition, she was a transhuman originally genetically engineered by a consortium of human and Tyrian scientists.
“As long as you can get us to this Talcon ‘world ship’ safely and in time, you have done as much as a crew can,” Sherman said, as he turned to go back to the feet operations section, which was essentially a very large alcove with fleet operations interface work stations partially partitioned off to the side of the main bridge. “The rest is not as easily planned.”
Wilder nodded and smiled. “Once we obtain more precise information regarding where we believe we can find the Talcon,” he said, “astrogation and science sections can work together to give us even more accurate course data.” He looked over at Commander Andor and Commander Taylor. Andor was the task force’s coordinating science officer as well as a member of Class 3000 series artificial intelligence. Andor had silvery skin and appeared generally human. Commodore Sheppard had personally selected him as part of the crew. Sharon Taylor had more recently joined the crew. Alliance forces under Commodore Sheppard had rescued her from QB7, where she was working with a research team before the Varlon arrived. She was blue-eyed with long, sandy blonde hair that she wore up during duty hours, and she just happened to be very pretty as well as brilliant. She looked back at Captain Wilder and smiled. Wilder nodded back in his formal captain’s demeanor.
Although Fleet Captain Sherman had arranged her transfer, Wilder knew, because he had learned to read people, that she and Commodore Sheppard liked each other. Because of her people skills, she was Task Force One’s scientific liaison officer. Technically, her scientific supervisor was Vice Admiral Garfield, who was the sixth fleet’s science officer, and he had more degrees than Wilder wanted to think about; however, Garfield was presently on Karratin Hegemony business.
***
Returning to his office, Sheppard looked at the encrypted data that Admiral Pendragon had provided about the hyperspace locations and decided it was time to forward the data to Sherman and copy it to Commander Zachary, the senior helm officer, and to facilitate course calculations. Sheppard had an advanced degree in astrophysics and knew how to navigate, so he was curious to have a brief look at the data.
Sheppard left his office to go out onto the bridge, something he still liked to do when heading out on a new mission. Previously, he had ordered that his presence not be announced when entering the bridge, since unnecessary announcements disrupted the flow of things on an active bridge. He liked to observe the crew at work. Watching a busy bridge with different species interacting in an orderly manner instilled confidence in him. The bridge was a large, oval structure, with its largest diameter at sixty meters. There were three access points: one was a turbo-lift directly to the bridge from the lower decks, and the other two were from areas of deck one.
Commodore Sheppard entered the bridge from his command office, walking through the area that had been set up as the task force’s command alcove, where task force or fleet operations and communications with other ships would be organized. There were three stations in the alcove: one for operations and logistics, one for intra-task force and fleet communication, and one for a tactical command station at which he or Fleet Captain Sherman occasionally took a duty turn but which was normally operated by one of the senior task force tactical officers.
Thinking about his own recent duty, he realized this would be a command for which he would not be responsible for day-to-day operations of the ship as he was previously on the Endeavor as a fleet captain. Sheppard still had an occasional desire to more actively command, but he suppressed his urge to ask status questions of the bridge officers. The bridge of the Phoenix had several occupied stations situated across an arc of the forward part of the main bridge facing the main operational view screen. The bridge was split-level, with an upper deck that occupied about three-quarters of the circumference of the bridge. That upper area consisted of ancillary stations, such as life support, environmental, and weapons control. The ancillary stations all had officers operating them, checking systems, or verifying control status.
The lower and more central section of the bridge had the navigators’ array, which consisted of a circular, three-dimensional display area where the on-duty navigators worked; there was a helm and astro-navigation control station to the port side of the bridge. There were two command stations—one for the captain, close to the aft portion of the lower deck of the bridge, and the other for the first officer. Each senior officer had duties as well as information to check, crew to oversee, and reports to process.
There was also a station for the task force liaison officer on the starboard side of the captain’s station and command area. Near the navigation control station was the starfighter command section; this was situated to the starboard side of the captain’s area and behind the main navigation display area. Engineering, security, science, and medical also had data and operations stations on the upper bridge section. As he walked part of the bridge, Sheppard smiled and nodded a hello to Commander Taylor, who was at the science operations station coordinating scientific information between task force starships and helping update the navigators on meteors and solar winds or, presently, on hyperspace conditions.
Sheppard decided to make an announcement. “May I have your attention?” Sheppard requested. The bridge quieted down. “As you may have heard, we have been diverted by orders from Star One to locate and make further contact with a civilization called the Talcon. They are headed toward the Milky Way, and even now one of their immense colony ships that has been designated a Star City has probably crossed over the edge of our galaxy, heading to some point within. The Talcon that the Alliance explorer Commodore St. John encountered in the nearby Magellanic galaxy are also colonists from the Talcon home galaxy. The Talcon emissaries that came in two ships with St. John evidently left their home region long before this recent group. The Talcon we have talked with called the ships that are coming here Star Cites.” Sheppard paused and looked around. “I have looked at the information, and they are similar to ‘world ships.’ They are even larger than the Varlon’s space installations but much smaller than the Betellian’s multiworld or ‘Dyson spheres.’
“Headquarters believes the Accad and the Varlon will mobilize to strike the Talcon Star City as it comes out of hyperspace, before their shields and defense fields fully activate and they are most vulnerable. We will be rendezvousing with Commodore St. John onboard the Indefatigable in a few days. One of the Talcon who returned with St. John’s mission to the Magellanic Cloud galaxy will be coming onboard the Phoenix to join us as an officer and a legate or ambassador for his people.” Sheppard paused and looked around the bridge.
“Sir, we will make whoever that officer is feel welcome aboard the Phoenix,” Wilder said.
“Sir, I verified that we have staff working on the hyperspace to coordinate the information that the Star One astrogation section collected,” Sherman added.
“Good,