Jump Chain Gothic 4 - Atlantis - Part 10
Aurora-class warship. Pegasus Galaxy.
"That's wonderful news Supreme Commander" I said to the hologram the high ranking Asgard was currently projecting on to the bridge of my ship "Hopefully with all the Vanir in custody you'll be able to use their knowledge to save your race".
As it turned out the evil Asgard hadn't been very many in number, only a few hundred, and their technology was no match for the Asgard of the Ida galaxy, as such the Vanir had all been arrested, their ships either destroyed or confiscated, and their weapons taken away.
Given their advanced technology, and total disregard for human life, it was a good thing they were no longer free to act as they wished. While I understood their desire to destroy the Wraith, I didn't think that they would have simply gone and settled down on some nice world once the space vampires were gone. They might have enslaved the humans of the Pegasus galaxy, or at the very least have kept experimenting on them.
As for the material gains from defeating the Vanir, that didn't concern me much, I'd gotten what I wanted. Mostly that had been their fancy armour, which we'd not only had enough sets of for our uses, but we already modified.
"For now the rebuilding of our race must take priority" Thor let me know "however a few of my people will be remaining behind in Atlantis in order to aid the Ancients with their restoration efforts. Should you ever require our aid, you can contact me from Atlantis".
I nodded to signal that I understood what had just been said. And I also understood why the little grey guys were leaving. With the Vanir locked up and the Wraith pinned down the Ancients should be able to handle affairs in the this galaxy. They'd done so for a couple of million years before the Wraith took over.
No doubt there were other threats out there, such as the Asurans, but it was best to let sleeping dogs lie. The Asurans hadn't bothered anyone for ten thousand years, and while the Asgard had an effective anti-replicator weapon, which was technology they'd shared, there was really no justification for a first strike on the replicators.
Besides the Asgard had problems of their own, even if they were able to save their race from their genetic problems, it was only a short term solution, they needed to stop cloning themselves and maybe start having kids again. Also their empire had to be shambles after spending so long fighting the replicators.
"I forwarded your request to the High Council concerning your request for more technology in exchange for information you took from the Wraith concerning biological experiments" Thor said next "I have been authorised to install long range communctions on your ship that should allow you to remain in contact with your allies. This technology will be installed the next time you visit Atlantis".
Alas no shield upgrades, assuming I even needed them, but long range communctions could come in handy.
"There is one thing" I told Thor "I took possession of a few darts. I thought you might like one for study, consider it a gift to your people, and if you wouldn't mind could you drop one for the Tauri, we're heading that way ourselves, but you can make the trip much faster".
Thor tilted his head, and then closed the channel, a moment later Miranda informed me that two Wraith darts had been beam off the ship. This pleased me as they'd been cluttering up the docking bay.
(Line Break)
Stargate Command. Earth.
Given what had happened to last time I'd gone on a diplomatic mission I was lucky that Cameron had even let me beam down to the SGC, but in reality there wasn't much she could do to stop me from doing whatever the hell I wanted.
Touring the SGC was one of things I'd always wanted to do. It didn't give me the same level of nerd happiness that I would have liked, those IOA bureaucrats kept spoiling things by trying to make me attend pointless meetings, but it was still somewhat of a thrill to see this base in person.
I'd actually been here before, but during my first visit I'd not been able to see much, again because of the IOA, whose existence seemed totally pointless since all they did was get in people's way. However this time I was getting to see it all.
That had included a trip to Area 51, which sadly had been lacking in any crashed flying saucers, but I had seen the Tau'ri attempt at making spacecraft. I'd not been very impressed. They could handle R&D, but their shipyard was rather substandard, building space ships in underground hangers wasn't a very good idea.
The main reason why I'd been taken there was because the IOA were eager for technology exchange, but they didn't really have anything I wanted.
Sure they had some captured Gou'ald tech that Seven might want to study, once she was done going over the data we'd gathered about Ancient city-ships and everything else we'd gathered so far. But that would take a while as not only did we have many samples of Ancient and Asgard tech to go over, but also Traveller technology, and there was still much about Wraith biotech that needed to be understood.
"The Death Glider was really interesting" I said.
I didn't have much use for fighters as I had no one to fly them, but still they were cool to look at.
"What about the 302s?" he asked.
The X-302 was the pre-production designation of the F-302, Earth's second attempt at constructing a combat-capable spacecraft. It was developed using recovered alien technology at Area 51. Unlike the X-301 Interceptor the X-302 was constructed entirely from technology designed and built here on Earth.
Its form and wing orientation were based on those of Goa'uld Death Gliders like the one the X-301 was built from. It was powered by a pair of jet engines modified with aerospike boosters for high altitude maneuvers. It also possess a rocket booster for additional thrust in outer space.
Unlike other Earth jet fighters the X-302 was designed with inertial dampeners, allowing the pilot to accelerate and maneuver much more quickly than would ordinarily be possible. The X-302 also incorporated a Naquadria-based hyperspace window generator, intended to make it Earth's first interstellar vehicle. However the hyperspace engine didn't really work.
"It was okay" I told him.
Jack put his hands in his pockets and then raised his eyebrows.
"I'm guessing that something's bothering you?" he said.
With some effort I resisted the urge to sigh.
"Oh, don't get me wrong, General" I was now saying "The X-302 is an amazing piece of reverse-engineered technology and is a quantum leap above anything else on this planet"
O'Neill was rather good at reading people. I tried to hide my concern, but he could clearly sense it.
"And?" he asked.
I'd tried to be diplomatic. When that failed I went for honesty.
"How many of these things do you have?" I asked back.
I doubted it was enough.
"A few squadrons" he admitted "Here on Earth, the Daedalus carries a squadron too, and so will the new ships".
I gave this some thought.
"So should you lose the Ancient outpost in Antarctica then all that stands between the people of Earth and alien invaders is a couple of Daedalus class ships, and a few squadrons of fighters".
That wasn't good enough, and I could tell that O'Neil understood what I was saying.
"How much does each 302 cost to build?" I wondered.
The General gave it some thought.
"Oh, I don't know. I'd say… a lot" he said.
I'd could find out the exact cost of materials and labour later on, for now I needed other details.
"Are they are match for enemy fighters?" was my next question.
I did have a memory of the battle when the Tau'ri and the forces of Anubis, but that wasn't much help.
"You'd have to talk to Carter for the details, but I do know that the missiles the F-302s carry have been enhanced with naquadah, and can take down a Death Glider" the General said "And if the reports I'm getting on that dart thing you sent us are right, our fighters outclass Wraith fighters too".
While it was unlikely that the Wraith Hive Ship would ever reach Earth, if by some cruel twist of fate one did, such a craft could deploy hundreds of darts.
"But how many missiles can each F-302 carry and what are chances of each one hitting a Death Glider? Realistically hitting I mean, in combat conditions, when there's weapon's fire everywhere and it's all as confusing as hell?. And why do F-302s only have missiles as weapon systems? What happens when they run out of missiles? Death Gliders have energy weapons?".
Since we had now reached his office the General sat behind his desk.
"They do have twin mounted railguns" he told me.
Railguns were good, but they weren't a match for energy weapons. Now that the Replicator invasion was over it was unlikely that the Goa'uld would attack Earth, but before long it would the Free Jaffa Nation in charge of those ships, and not all of them were friendly with Earth. Plus Baal was still out there, and he might have enough military might to invade the planet. And of course there was the Lucian Alliance, which again had plenty of Goa'uld hardware.
"Somehow I don't think it's going to be enough" I said.
"So… what do you suggest?" he asked.
I gave the matter some thought.
"Get me the blueprints for your fighter, an inventory of parts, a list of expenses and a workshop" I requested.
O'Neil looked confused.
"Trust me you'll like the results" I assured the base's commanding officer.
(Line Break)
Stargate Command. Earth.
Despite the IOA's objections and their desire to limit what influence a certain ship's captain had over this, and other galaxies, O'Neill had decided to introduce a leader of the Jaffa to Gothic. To this end he'd sent Teal'c offworld to pick up his old mentor.
"So this Gothic wishes to speak with leaders of the Free Jaffa" Bra'tac asked.
The Jumper had attempted to set up this meeting some time ago, but as always the damn bureaucrats had gotten in the way.
"He does," the General confirmed "At the moment he's assisting us with our space fighter program, him and some woman called Tali'Zorah, whose apparently a member of an alien race called the Quarians. Gothic pointed out a few problems with the existing setup, and is attempting to fix it. I take it that you two would like to meet him after he's done replacing what used to be Earth's most advanced fighter?"
Bra'tac exchanged looks with his fellow Jaffa, and then look at O'Neill.
"And what does this have do with the Jaffa?" he asked.
Nothing really, that wasn't why there were here.
"Gothic leds a small group of people, but they have a lot of technology and resources, he wants to use them to aid the Jaffa. He knows you guys want your own nation, but you're still fight Goa'uld holdouts. Maybe he can help with that".
To Bra'tac this seemed promising.
"We would be honoured to meet him" the Jaffa master was now saying "I imagine there is much for us to discuss".
O'Neill could agree with that.
"In the meantime let's get you settled in the guest quarters" said the General.
(Line Break)
Area 51. Earth.
Creating a new fighter, of any kind, was not an easy process, and while I was an engeerier of sorts, who had invented and improved upon a lot of existing technology, designing a new fighter for Earth was going to be a real challenge.
We had many limitations, we could only use technology that the humans of Earth had ready access to, and the finished product had to be cheaper than the current model of fighter that was being produced.
As it turned out I'd underestimated just how good the 302 actually was. It was much advanced that it first seemed, and with a skilled pilot between the controls, it could indeed outfly a Death Glider or a Wraith Dart. But that didn't change the real problem, which was that Earth needed a cheap space fighter that it could mass produce. After all why the ship might have quality on its side what Earth needed was quantity.
Lucky for me I had the aid of one Tali'Zorah, as a quarian she was used to building things on a budget, and she was a total genius when it came to using any kind of technology. She'd become a built spoilt due to replicators, access to advanced tools, and technology from different universes, but she was still a child of the Migrant Fleet, as such when she needed to, she could build on a budget.
Seven of Nine, who on board the ship investigating the science behind Earth's space fighters, might be smarter than Tali, but there wasn't much different and Tali was much better with the practical stuff. Also Star Trek Voyager was a TV show her so if I brought her down to work on this people here would why Jeri Ryan was at Area 51 while in costume.
"Okay so you want a fighter that surpasses this X-302 at a fraction of the cost to build, while only using technology we can find here on this planet" summarized the engineer.
That was more or less the case.
"Well it doesn't have to actual surpass the 302, just compare enough to be worth building" I said "But we do need something that can be easily built. Earth needs enough fighters to match those carried by the larger ships of the other powers, and that means they need hundreds of fighters, and they can't to be too expensive to build because most of the population don't even know there any aliens to fight".
At least recruiting pilots wouldn't be too much trouble. The good side to having the IOA around was that it meant the SGC could recruit from many air forces across the world, and get the best of the best. At some point I'd have to ensure that my own native country's air force the RAF had a squadron of my new fighters.
"Well we can keep the same frame as the 302" Tali'Zorah was currently saying "As for weapons how about a couple of small yield phase cannons?".
A phase cannon was a phase-modulated directed energy cannon weapon, a type of particle weapon which served as a successor to plasma cannons and as a precursor to the phaser of the 23rd and 24th centuries used in the Trek verse.
The prototypes of ship-mounted phase cannons were first introduced by Starfleet in the mid-22nd century, designed as the primary defense of NX-class starships and serving as a supplement for the lacking spatial torpedoes of the time. The first NX-class vessel to test and actively use phase cannons in battle was Enterprise NX-01.
"Nice idea" I said "But remember they'll need to be able to repair and reproduce all parts of the fighter by themselves".
I gave the matter some thought.
"My thinking is that twin laser cannons would be better, less powerful, but this fighter is meant to counter death gliders and darts, it doesn't need such powerful weapons, besides if they do they have naquadah enhanced missiles for shielded targets, perhaps we can prove upon them as well".
Earth had laser technology already so it was just a matter of making cannons with the right materials, and making sure the locals had a proper understanding of the technology.
"We can always give them the design for phase-cannons" suggested Tali "Perhaps once their technology has advanced a bit further they'll be able to produce their own".
That sounded like a good idea.
"What about shields?" Tali wondered.
I considered this.
"Energy shields would be too costly and all their enemies use energy weapons" I said "Well not their domestic enemies, but we're not designing a fighter to be used against people with projectile weapons so no kinetic barriers either".
Perhap we could look to Enterprise again and see how effective polarised hull plating could be as armour for the new fighter.
"This could take a while" said Tali.
Indeed it could.
(Line Break)
Stargate Command. Earth.
It had been a relatively quiet day at the SGC, at least in the mind of a man called General Jack O'Neill. He sat at his desk and sipped at his coffee as he mentally went over what happened this day. There had been four incoming wormholes, all due to scheduled SGC parties coming and going, and that was about it.
Nothing had malfunctioned, nothing had exploded in any way, and SG-1 had not had been needed to foil some alien plot, it had been that rarest of things, a quiet day at the office. Which was a good thing, as he was currently facing the red tape mountain from hell. It wasn't that the forms were that massive. It wasn't that he didn't know how to fill them in. It wasn't that he couldn't fill them in. It was just that part of him kept rebelling against the idea of him being the guy in the office who did the paperwork.
He stared at the paperwork again and then smiled wryly. He could no doubt stuff the entire lot in a shredder and then talk his way out of it. Or maybe he'd hand it over to someone of lesser rank who wouldn't refuse the order.
Jack looked down at the desk and then leant back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. He longed to be up their, well not exactly up there, Area 51 was some distance away, but he had half a mind to have the Prometheus beam him out of the mountain and to the base.
There was a new fighter being produce and O'Neill longed to see when it was first sent out for a test flight. This was when he remembered that he was a general now and could order someone to beam him to Area 51. Which was a realisation that made him smile.
(Line Break)
Area 51. Earth.
The helmet was a nice touch. It was so going to be decorating my quarters on my ship. I'd normally store such things somewhere more secure, alas I was rapidly filling my Cosmic Warehouse with junk despite my efforts to keep it all organised.
At some point I was either going to have add more shelving or find ways to further expand the space. Perhaps my reward for successfully filling this jump would aid me in that endeavor. That or I was finally going to have to go some sort of magical verse just so I could get containers that were bigger on the inside.
Harry Potter's world had those if I recalled correctly, but bigger on the inside stuff wasn't uncommon in fiction. For example Time Lords could do it, just with technology, however in the Potter verse you could just by bigger on the inside containers in Diagon Alley. But that was something to think about later.
As for the helmet, it was the standard helmet that the F-302 pilots wore, with the latest in polarising glass for the eye shield that dropped down, primitive, but I liked it. They'd even put my name on it.
I walked over to where General O'Neill was waiting, along with a nervous looking Air Force sergeant who was carrying a clipboard, and some other high ranking military people.
"General!" I called out as I approached, "Am I cleared for this test flight?"
The man next to O'Neill, who seemed to be doing some sort of paperwork, looked over at his superior office and nodded his head.
"According to Sergeant Siler you're good to go" I was told.
General Hammond, who had turned up for this test, held out his hand for me to shake. Which I took.
"Good luck, son" he said.
I headed over to the new fighter, she'd taken weeks to design and build even with all the technology I had my command, and while she didn't look much different that a 302, it was actually rather different, and more importantly cheaper to make.
She, for some reason everyone on the base thought my fighter was a girl, had twin laser cannons, computer aided targeting system, 4 wing-mounted long range air-to-air missiles that had been enhanced with naquadah and upgraded guidance systems, as well as inertial dampeners.
The original F-302 fighter-interceptor had four different sets of engines: air breathing jets, modified aerospikes for high altitude, a rocket booster, and a hyperspace window generator. The Goa'uld Death Gliders are not capable of entering hyperspace because the engine to create a hyperspace window would be much too large. But, because the F-302 used Naquadria to power the hyperdrive window generator, the F-302 has a more compact hyperdrive engine and thus became the first human-built spacecraft thought to be capable of interstellar travel. Because of the instability of the Naquadria, however, the hyperspace window can only be generated for a very brief moment, thus greatly limiting the F-302's interstellar travel capabilities.
This new fighter, which had no one had been able to agree on a name for, didn't use jet engines, rather I'd built, with considerable help, a rather crude drive pod, like that used by Puddle Jumper, which was a much fast craft than it might seem. This means of propulsion also saved a lot on fuel.
Once inside the fighter I pulled on his helmet, connected it to the radio, and then strapped the safety harness on. While most advanced civilizations didn't see seat belts or safety harnesses as being necessary I did.
A soft whine filled the air, gently rising in pitch as the new fighter lifted from the ground, its superior method of propulsion meant that the small craft took off smoothly and accelerated with ease. However because the propulsion pod had been built using Earth based materials and parts it was noisy when compared to a Puddle Jumper.
I was no fighter pilot. I'd flown many things, air cars, shuttles, tanks, and even a few spaced ships, but this was something else, I could feel the sheer power of the engines as I took off into the sky. It was quite the rush.
"Okay" I said to whoever was listening to my radio frequency "I'm going to take his baby to max speed and show you all what she can do".
(Line Break)
Stargate Command. Earth.
Jack ambled down the corridor as he enjoyed spending time out of the office, and while he would deny it, he was in deep thought. He had a lot to think about. For one thing he wanted a go on the fighter prototype before the geeks got a chance to get their hands on it and to try to take it apart. Plus the guys from whatever firm was chosen to manufacture them would also get their claws into them.
He turned a corner and then slowed to a halt in front of the door to Carter's lab. Wonder of wonders, it was open and the sign warning people from entering had gone. Which meant whatever experiment she'd been up to was over, and he didn't have to worry about being exposed to some weird type of radiation.
"Knock knock," he said as walked in.
Carter was tapping away on her computer, and she looked happy.
"Hell? Carter? What's up?" Jack asked.
She looked up with a start.
"Oh. Good morning sir. I was just going the design for the phase cannons. I don't think we can use them on the 302s, but we might able to build them for the Daedalus class ships, and they should have the kind of power we need to penetrate energy shields.
O'Neill would have preferred phasers, but according to Teal'c an upcoming Star Trek series would have a ship that made use of weapons called phase cannons. Which was cool.
"That's it?" Jack asked "No aliens gaining a foothold, nothing wrong with gate, you're just going over design plans?".
Carter nodded.
"Yes, sir" she then said.
Jack had to sigh, he was sure things had been a lot more interesting around here when Hammond was in charge.
(Line Break)
Aurora-class Warship. Earth Orbit.
"I spend way too much time in meetings" I complained as I walked onto the bridge of my ship and sat in my special chair "I need to blow something up".
Miranda, who'd been keeping an eye on things for me while I was otherwise occupied, turned to face away from her station, and smiled at me.
"Did your meeting with those Jaffa people go well?" she asked.
Indeed it had. The Jaffa didn't want for much, but they had agreed to sell me examples of Goa'uld tech in exchange for supplies and weapons. Earth was generous with both, but unlike me the Tauri didn't have a Matter Furnace and replicators.
Because of them I could easily supply the Jaffa with metric tons of food, medical supplies, guns, naquadah, and pretty much anything else they wanted, and in exchange they'd get me Goa'uld tech such as staff weapons, zats, communication devices, and those hand held weapons some Goa'uld used to blast people with. Any rarer bits of technology I'd also trade for.
"The Jaffa were fine" I replied "Its the US government that's giving me headaches. They have some technology I want, but apparently making them a nice new fighter isn't enough, they want more tech. But it's not like they even use the stuff they have now".
One of the things that interested me were small devices some aliens had used to disguise themselves as members of the SGC during a foothold situation. I wanted some in case my group ever needed to disguise themselves, but the IOA wouldn't let me have them because of security concerns. At least not without handing over technology I didn't want to share, or more naquah than I was willing to part with. Sure the Matter Furnace could make the stuff, but to supply Earth's needs I'd need to spend many long, boring hours feeding the furnace. Frankly I had better things to do.
"They even melted down that Quantum Mirror I told you all about" I complained.
The Quantum Mirror was a device, which I was sure had been built by the Ancient known as Janus, that allowed a person, or even a group of people, access to alternate universes. The device had most likely been limited to alternate versions of the Stargate reality, but still it would have been fun to check them out. Plus in one of those realities Atlantis might unoccupied allowing me the chance to raid a version of that city-ship for its rarest tech.
At least that wasn't the only means of accessing alternate realities
"You're being called by the SGC again" Miranda told me.
I got up out of my chair, and headed for the transporter room while wondering what else they could want.
(Line Break)
Aurora-class Warship. Earth Orbit.
Doctor Jennifer Keller appeared in the transporter room of the Ancient battleship and soon as she could she got off the platform. Having her body taken apart, in a process that involved being teleported into orbit, had been not a pleasant experience for her.
"Welcome on board the..." Miranda Lawson started by saying "Oh bugger he still hasn't named the bloody ship".
This wasn't the welcome Keller had expected, and the former Cerberus Operative soon realised that she needed to get on with things.
"Sorry about that doctor" she said next "If you'll follow me I'll take you directly the sickbay. Its not been used much, and none of us have much interest in medicine, so feel free to make the space your own".
Two members of the robot crew took Keller's bags. When it came to personal effects she'd packed light, having been informed that her needs would be met while serving Captain Gothic, as most of the bags were full of specialised equipment as well as recording equipment for the discoveries she made.
"I've arranged quarters for you close to where your working" Miranda let Keller no as they began walking "And we don't have a mess hall, or a recreation area, if you don't want something to entertain you just ask the ship's computer".
The ship now had a verbal interface thanks to one of the improvements made by Seven of Nine and Tali'Zorah. This made accessing information much easier.
"Now we don't have much in the way of medical needs here" Miranda was now saying "So mostly you'll be doing research. We've gathered a lot of data on biology, but until now we've just been sending copies of what we've gathered to the Asgard. Your job while on board will be to go through the information and see if anything is useful".
Keller nodded in understanding.
"Is that all?" she asked.
Miranda led to ship's new Chief Medical Officer into sickbay.
"Pretty much" the biotic replied "Just get settled in, and I'll make sure you get access to all our information on biology. In exchange for your services you can share data with the SGC, and of course we'll pay you in naquadah, which your bosses can give the cash value for when you get home".
Miranda instructed the robots to begin setting up equipment.
"I suggest you start with our medical database and look up treatments for cancer" the genetically engineered woman said as she made to leave "Or maybe the cure for AIDS takes your fancy".
Jennifer Keller couldn't believe what she was hearing. She just stood there for a few moments while her brain attempted to accept this new reality.