Bob rubbed his sweaty hands on his pants as he watched the countdown for the FTL shutdown. Jacob had given him time to pilot the ship in between transitions, but now he would have to maneuver around an actual planet.
He was glad that he didn’t have to program any of the transition coordinates. He would have to learn how to do that at some point, but he wanted more experience before that duty was lumped onto his shoulders.
“You all good?” Jacob asked as he strode onto the bridge.
“Uh-huh,” Bob nodded.
“And your checklist?” Jacob reminded him.
Bob cursed internally and pulled out the tablet. He had been so nervous that he completely forgot. He quickly went through the list, checking off items. He got to the last one, which was informing any crew or passengers of the end of their transition.
He waited for the counter to hit five minutes before activating the ship’s comm system. “Uh, this is Bob speaking. We’re five minutes out from transitioning back into normal space. Please secure any loose items and yourself while the ship maneuvers.”
Bob turned the comm off and turned to Jacob. “How was that?”
“Works for me,” Jacob chuckled. “The Astryx doesn’t have any guidelines for checklists or notifying passengers. They leave that up to the individual captains. I’m honestly surprised such organized chaos works as well as it does.”
“If that’s the case, where did you get this list?” Bob asked, shaking the tablet.
“I pulled it together from a combination of US military doctrine and airlines, while adding a few items they aren’t familiar with. I figure if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for us. It’ll also give the powers on Earth an idea of just how complicated it is to maintain a starship.”
“I think they know,” Bob replied before turning back to the countdown. “They’ve been launching ships into space for decades.”
***
“True enough,” Jacob admitted. The checklist was mostly for the technologies Earth was not yet familiar with.
The video screen popped to life, signifying that they had emerged into normal space. Jupiter greeted them in the distance.
“Holy shit!” Bob said in surprise.
“Holy shit indeed,” Jacob parroted. The gas giant was far more majestic than the pictures showed.
He gave the man a minute to appreciate the view before interrupting the moment. “I sent you an orbit trajectory. Let me know over comm when we’re there.”
Jacob left that drone on the bridge and popped into the drone in the cargo hold.
He inspected his arms and did a little twirl in the newer model maintenance drone. “Wow, that’s nice. Way better than the tracked drones. Speaking of, when was the last time I piloted one of the maintenance drones?”
When he thought about it for a minute, he realized the last time he used one of the older drones was before he left to retrieve Franky. That was nearly half a year ago. It felt like just yesterday for him.
“We’re in position,” Bob said over the comm, shaking Jacob out of his thoughts.
“Okay, keep us steady.” The comm satellite had its own gravitics, but they were tiny units meant for deep space station keeping, and Jacob didn’t want to stress them too much by having them counteract the planet’s gravity, which is why he wanted to establish an orbital velocity before he deployed the large device.
He gave a few quick mental commands to the ship, and the air in the cargo hold was quickly pumped out. Jacob then moved to unstrap the satellite. Once that was done, he sent it a command, and the unit started hovering on its own.
After the self-test came back green, Jacob opened the cargo hold door, and the satellite floated out of the ship.
I wish it were that easy when I deployed my repeaters.
Once the satellite was clear, Jacob closed the door and repressurized the ship. With that done, it was time to head to Earth and see what had changed.
***
Abyss Pearl appeared outside of Earth’s orbit, far enough to avoid any satellites, but close enough that the approach would only take an hour or so with the gravity drive. It was farther out than his first visit.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
Jacob would have liked to appear closer, but this gave him time to get a lay of the land, so to speak. He popped into the ship’s sensors and cataloged all the space debris, satellites, and space stations in orbit, comparing them to his last visit.
There were quite a few more satellites, which wasn’t much of a surprise. Earth launched dozens every year. What surprised him was the fact that more than a few faced outward. They looked like regular telescopes, but he figured they were probably lasers or something.
Jacob pulled up a quick virtual room, complete with old Victorian-era furniture and a phone that wouldn’t have looked out of place in Alexander Graham Bell’s time. With amusement, he dialed the president, and his face appeared on an old CRT television in front of the couch. The president would just see a normal image on his end, but Jacob saw him in black and white, looking like one of those actors from the silent film era.
He chuckled at that comparison.
“Jacob, you’re back. What’s so amusing?” President McConnell asked with his own wry grin.
“Sorry, just a joke someone told me. I see Earth hasn’t blown itself up, that’s good.”
The president turned a bit defensive at the comment. “We’re not savages, Jacob. We can control ourselves when the situation calls for it.” He sighed, then continued. “I would like to say that knowledge of aliens who can come here and do whatever they want with impunity has driven us to a singular purpose, but I would be lying. Some people have their own agendas and their own goals and will continue along their path despite the truth staring them in the face.”
“Don’t feel so bad,” Jacob replied. “I’m pretty sure humanity isn’t unique in that regard.”
“Knowing that aliens are a lot like humans is less reassuring than you might think, but let’s discuss other matters. Would you be open to talking in person?”
Jacob sat up in his chair. “Is there a problem?”
If it was a problem that might affect him, he wanted to know.
“Not as such. We need you to test something for us. I can’t discuss it over this video call, though.”
That was a relief. The president’s words were pretty vague, but Jacob wasn’t worried.
“Afraid someone on Earth will intercept this call?” Jacob asked in amusement.
He was using Concord encryption. It wasn’t as good as the Astryx stuff, but it had the added benefit that nobody in the Astryx was actively using it.
“Not from Earth, no. Please, come as soon as possible so we can discuss in person.” With that, the president hung up.
“What the hell?” he said to the blank monitor.
With his fun ruined, Jacob swiped his arm, and the virtual environment vanished, replaced by the ship’s sensors once again.
He plotted a quick FTL transition off the east coast of the United States. He might be curious as to what the president wanted to discuss, but he wasn’t about to trust the man implicitly.
Jacob alerted the passengers to another transition, and the ship vanished from normal space. It appeared a moment later, well short of his destination. In fact, they were still in orbit.
“What the fuck!”
His first thought was that it was some sort of trap. The new satellites he spotted during his survey weren’t targeting the ship, however. Then he assumed the phase coil burned out, but when he hopped into the drone in the maintenance section, they were humming along without issue.
He tried another transition, but the ship started to groan audibly, so he quickly canceled that.
Jacob narrowed his eyes. Somehow, this had to do with the test the President wanted him to run. He sent a comm to Bob. “Change of plans. You’ll get to fly in from here. Ever been to the White House?”
“Um…no.”
“Great. I’ll order you one of those shirts that look like a suit.”
If Bob voiced any sort of protest, it was cut off when Jacob ended the call. He pulled in a scan of one of the satellites while Bob maneuvered the ship to the surface.
He needed to know what these new devices did and how they did it, so he could leave whenever he pleased.
It was pretty obvious why they had been built. He had been pretty blatant with his transitions around Earth the last time he was here. He didn’t believe that the powers to be designed it to stop him, at least not entirely.
He wondered how the other alien races handled the problem. He was sure they had solutions to stop people from transitioning close to the surface, if just to stop a tragedy like what happened with Franky. An invasion would be a more likely reason to prevent ships from transitioning past orbital defenses.
Jacob wasn’t going to admit it to the scientists who built the satellites, but he kind of wanted some for the station. The shield sort of already filled that role, and for all he knew, planets had planetary shields, but he couldn’t even imagine how much power would be required for that. That was only if the shield was active, however. If he could prevent ships from coming and going even if the shield was down, that would be huge.
“Um, Jacob?” Bob asked, interrupting his musings. “The FAA wants our flight plan and aircraft ID.”
Jacob groaned and popped back into the bridge. “FAA, this is Captain Jacob. I’m sending you our flight plan. This vessel is designated Abyss Pearl. We don’t have any numerical designation; feel free to assign us one.”
The man on the other end didn’t know how to respond.
A few minutes later, they were flanked by two F22 Raptors. Jacob snorted when he saw the wide-eyed looks of the pilots as they flew alongside the Abyss Pearl. He’d be surprised, too, if he saw the equivalent of a slightly aerodynamic brick plowing through the air at over four hundred kilometers an hour without the assistance of any sort of lifting surfaces.
He wasn’t worried about an attack; the shield had been up since the moment they arrived, and would remain so until they departed. They were directed to land at a nearby airport, because the landing pad on the White House lawn was far too small to let the Abyss Pearl land.
The airport wasn’t much better, since the ship was larger than even the largest passenger aircraft. Despite that, Bob guided the vessel down without issue, proving that he knew what he was doing.
“Are you ready to meet the President?” Jacob smiled.
“Not particularly,” Bob admitted. “Isn’t he the one who ordered my detainment?”
“I couldn’t find any evidence of that, and believe me, I looked. He did provide me with your location to rescue you, though.”
“Oh,” his friend replied. “Then I guess it’s okay. I always wanted to be knighted or something.”
“I think that only happens in the UK,” Jacob replied as the pair walked to the back of the ship, “but it can’t hurt to ask. The president owes me.”