The Quantum Connection (18 page)

Steven, where are you!
Tatiana's voice cut through my head.

I'm in the bridge, gorgeous. Where are you?

I'm in our suite and I think you need to get down here.

Is something wrong?

I don't know, just get down here!

Mike, what's going on?

There is nothing wrong that I can perceive, Steven.

Tatiana, I'll be right there.

I rushed to our suite. I pushed through the wall and plopped into the room with expectations of something horrible taking place. The room was dark and quiet and all I could see were faint outlines of the furniture against the star fields on the wallscreens in the background.

"Tatiana?" I called out and then kicked my shin against a chair or something. "Youch, shit! Why is it so dark in here?"
Mike, turn the lights on!

Okay, Steven.

The lights came up and Tatiana jumped up in front of me and yelled, "Happy birthday!" I nearly jumped out of my skin. I looked around the room and there were decorations on the walls and there was a birthday cake with twenty-nine candles burning sitting in the middle of our table.

"Uh, how did you know it was my birthday?" I asked Tatiana; I was a bit confused--and surprised of course.

"Simple. I figured it out nearly two months ago. I was looking for my bracelet that I always wear, even in bed. My mother gave it to me when I was little. I finally realized I needed to ask Mikhail where it was and he told me it was stored with all of our belongings. Then I thought that you must have had stuff too. Of course you did. Your wallet was one of those things and your driver's license was in there. I found something else pretty neat also." She put her arms on my shoulders and smiled up at me.

"Yeah, what is that?"

"I found your SUV. It's in a big room down in the belly of the spaceship. There is a little red sports car down there also. I asked and it was apparently owned by a third guy that was here. I haven't found any sign of him."

"Yeah, you won't either. The Grays dismembered him before you woke up. There was nothing left of him when they were done. It was gruesome and I had nearly put that sight out of my mind, thanks for bringing it up." I nudged her a bit humorously and a bit seriously. It had been a horrid sight.

"Oh. I didn't know, sorry."

"Forget it. So you found my truck, huh? I had figured they left it on the side of the road."

"Go figure." She smiled and hugged me. "Happy birthday. I didn't realize how old you were until I saw your license."

"Old! I'm not old!"

"Compared to me you're ancient." She laughed.

"How old are you, then?" I asked, smirking. "What, fourteen, fifteen . . ."

"Smartass! I will be twenty-three in December. Keep it up and I won't show you the other present I made you."

"What other present?" I shrugged my shoulders.

"This one . . ." Mikhail, turn the bathroom wall into the viewscreen showing the alternate engine room.

Okay, Tatiana.
She had been teaching Mikhail personality it appeared.

The bathroom wall resolved into the screen we usually used for navigation and an image of one of the rooms in the belly of the alien ship appeared in the field of view.

What's this, Tatiana?

It's a warp drive!
She grinned back at me.

"A warp drive! Does it work?" I verbalized.

"Why of course it does, Steven! Well, we think it will. It hasn't been tested yet."

"How does it work?" I was astounded.

"It uses the Alcubierre warp theory with a van den Broeck bubble and some Clemons field modifications," she said knowingly.

How did she know about Clemons?
I accidentally thought on the top layer of my mind and it was communicated.

How did I know about Clemons? Mikhail told me. He is apparently some American physicist and is responsible for inventing the propulsion system for the U.S. Air Force vessel that shot us out here. The Grays know all about him for some reason.

On a deeper level of my mind I immediately thought of Senator Grayson from the SSCI. During his abductions they must have learned all of our National Defense secrets. This was no good, but there was nothing I could do about it right this second though.

"So, the Grays knew how to make a human-designed warp engine?" I asked Tatiana.

"Sure they do. They don't need one since their engines are thousands of times faster and more energy efficient. But they are easier to build than it is to repair the alien space drive."

Mike! Why didn't we think of this?
We should've thought of it--after all, I had all that knowledge downloaded into me. I was beginning to realize that having knowledge and being smart were two different things. I would have to get Mike to work on improving my cleverness, wit, and general problem-solving abilities.

Sorry, Steven. It never occurred to me. Perhaps you were sidetracked with the other problem we have been working on.

"How long have you been working on this?"

"Only about a week or so. It was hard doing it when you weren't around, since you are always around. I got chances here and there when you would go off to the bridge by yourself. What are you doing up there anyway? Oh well, doesn't matter. I would've asked for help but I wanted to surprise you with it. You're surprised, right?" She looked concerned only about the surprise.

Tatiana had a knack for saying a lot in one breath. A lot of times she would only seem interested in the last thing she would say. Until later, of course, when she would ask why I never answered her question. Women!

"Surprised! I had no idea! This is great. How fast does it go?"

"Well, why don't we sit down and eat some cake and then we'll try it out. But my initial calculations suggest that it will go about thirty-seven hundred times the speed of light. We should be able to get home in a few hours. Mikhail and I made some modifications to the field coil design that made it about ten times faster than the Clemons design. But enough of that, blow out your candles before they melt the cake!"

"Uh, okay." I bent down and blew on the candles. They wouldn't go out.

"Ha, ha, ha." Tatiana giggled like a schoolgirl.

Mike, make sure they go out this time when I blow.

Okay, Steven.

"I must be getting old," I put on a show for Tatiana and then blew the candles right out.

Tatiana frowned. "Aww! You cheated. Cheater." She punched me on the arm and frogged it pretty good.

"Shit!" I cursed and punched her back, but not nearly as hard.

CHAPTER 15

We decided that we would warp back directly to the Moon and contact the people who we'd learned lived there. It made sense that if they were the ones trying to defend the Earth from the Grays then the Moon was where we should take our ship and all the knowledge we had discovered. The Grays apparently knew almost everything about the human race that there was to know. Neither of us liked that. If they ever decided to conduct a final invasion, they would have more than enough information--not to mention technological advancement--to totally wipe us out. That brought up another point. Why hadn't they wiped us out already instead of playing with us for thousands of years? Nothing made any sense. What was the Gray motivation? Why were they toying with us and abducting us and killing some of us? It didn't matter. Tatiana and I didn't like it, and it had to be stopped.

We dropped out of warp on the far side of the Moon and I'll be damned if there wasn't a huge lunar base there. Three warp ships with U.S. Air Force markings met us with full force. Fortunately, Tatiana had the foresight to suggest we sit in our safety chairs and had them materialize before we warped. We had to take evasive maneuvers to keep from being blasted back out into deep space again. There were no g-forces this time since we were inside a warp bubble and the spacetime inside the bubble was simple one-gravity space. The alien's quantum string spacedrive would allow a ship to travel much faster but it required some type of inertial damping system. I think I like the warp drive better.

So we didn't really need the chairs. One of the vessels fired several warp missiles at us. We warped past Mars and up out of the ecliptic plane and were still being pursued by the missiles. Mike flew the ship and I had a communications system set up and began hailing the Earth ships. Tatiana found the weapons and blasted one of the warp missiles off our tail. We finally went to maximum warp speed and left the other missiles in our space dust!

We warped out a few minutes and then went back to the Moon. This time I continuously hailed the Earth ships. The bathroom wall navigation map showed that the Earth ships were still out at Mars looking for us. So, I sent a hail toward Mars and waited for the slow, normal speed of light microwave signal to get to them. This time of year Mars was about seven minutes away by lightspeed. Seven minutes and thirty seconds later the ships warped from Mars back to the Moon.

"Please do not shoot! I repeat please do not shoot! I am broadcasting a standard digital video signal at two point three one gigahertz along with this radio signal. There are two humans, one American and one Russian aboard this vessel. We have liberated the vessel from the aliens and discovered your lunar facility. We need to communicate with you please! I repeat . . .

Steven, there is a video signal being received. Do you want to see it?

Yes, Mike.

A video image of a young red-haired Air Force lieutenant appeared in front of us. "This is Lieutenant Ames of the United States Air Force Space Wing. You will stand down and prepare to be boarded or we will fire upon you."

"What a small universe," I muttered.

"Hunh?" Tatiana looked over at me.

"Never mind. So, do we let them board us or what?"

"Doesn't matter to me," Tatiana replied.

"Okay." Mike, will one of those ships fit through the bay doors?

All of them will, just barely, Steven.

Can we cycle the external bay doors safely?

Of course. I am doing it now.

"Lieutenant Ames, this is Steven Montana, captain of the . . ."
Tatiana?

How about the Phoenix since it is where we were reborn and reinvented?

You don't think that's too cliche?

NO I DO NOT!

Uh, you don't have to scream.
" . . . uh, the
Phoenix
. We are opening the external bay doors on the lunar-facing side of the vessel. One of your ships should be able to land there and then we can close the bay doors."

"Roger that," Lieutenant Ames replied. "Uh, did you say Steven Montana?" she asked.

"That is correct, Lieutenant. It is good to see you again."

"How in the hell? No, I'm sure this will take a while. We will see you in the bay of your vessel."

You know her?
Tatiana's thought sounded a bit jealous.

Not really. I met her in a meeting once about nine months ago. I told you I worked for the Air Force Research Labs. Well, she and her mother, a general and an astronaut, were both involved somehow or other and I never knew how. Now I do.

Hmm.

Think we should be armed or anything?

You know her; why should we be?

Well, think about it. They are soldiers fighting aliens. How do they know we aren't aliens in disguise or being controlled by parasites or something?

Good point. But we don't want to provoke them either.

Well, how about this: We can have Mike or Mikhail build us any firearms we want in a matter of a second or two. Let's just be prepared for that.

Sounds good.
Tatiana stood up and all of her clothes vanished and then she was wearing a skintight long-sleeve black bodysuit and I noticed that I was also wearing one.

What's this?

It's armor. I've been thinking about this for a while. Mikhail and I designed it. It should resist damn near anything from fire to bullets.

I looked at her and thought that the material must be amazingly strong because she basically looked naked in the thing. So did I. I made me a pair of loose-fit jeans and hiking boots that fit just right. I topped it off with a light red short-sleeve button up.

You know you look naked. Not that I don't like it but . . .

Prude, ha ha.

She was suddenly wearing multi-pocketed baggy low-rise jeans and a pair of white aerobics cross-trainer shoes. She didn't add anything on top. Images of JackieZZ's computer persona popped in my head. Tatiana also had a three-section chain for a belt and I guessed that there were knives and other various weapons in her pockets, and her hair was pulled into a ponytail with metallic six-inch-long pins--each of which could be a nasty weapon.

I wasn't worried. Anything we needed in a hurry, the nanomachines could provide. And unless the humans had figured out how to prevent the nanomachines like the Grays had, we could just use them to stop any human attackers. My hope was that there would be no need for self-defense. After all, the U.S. Air Force should be on our side.

Tatiana and I reached the external bay of the
Phoenix
.

Mike, are they in yet?

Yes, Steven. I have closed the doors and the room is at one atmosphere.

Good.

You ready, Tatiana?

Yes.
She said something else to Mikhail but I didn't pay close attention.

Okay, Mike. Open the door.

The door dissolved away and Tatiana and I walked up to the impressive little spaceship. Tatiana started to touch it.

"Don't do that!" I tried to stop her but I was too late and her hand freeze-dried and stuck to the ship's skin. It must have been on the dark side of the ship.