Quast 1
Roughly 1-1/2 years ago:
Admiral Quast had, had nothing but trouble for the last almost three years. It all started when he got that coded flash (Climbing Spark) and had raced for the middle of the Pacific.
The crews had done a tremendous job in the 15 minutes he had given them. No sooner had the cap landed then the 18's were pushed over the side along with the single helicopter that was sitting on the deck waiting to start search and rescue.
The 18's that had been sitting in the catapults had also gone over the side.
He had lost almost a third of his air wing in those 15 minutes.
His first problem was he had lost contact with command just hours later and had never been able to permanently re-establish communication.
He had lost contact with Pearl a few days later. Contact with Tokyo had ended roughly 3 or 4 days later. They were still close enough for everyone to see the mushroom clouds rise up from Japan.
His fears had gotten him to send helicopter teams to Guam to get as much food and supplies onboard his carriers as he could. Another team had been sent to the Philippines to do the same. He had ordered every US Naval ship, and any other ship to answer his call to leave port and form up with him. He had also picked up as many people he could before what he feared where rain clouds filled with radiation got him to stop.
Now he had quiet the fleet around him going nowhere. He had been trying to save all the fuel he could, and get it from anywhere he could.
Access to the satellites was still operational and he was using them to follow the radiation clouds as they made their way around the planet. Moving his fleet as best he could to avoid them.
He had a pair of 18's with in-flight refueling doing recon of the south of Alaska. He was hoping that a place like Dutch Harbor was still unaffected and he could get food, fuel and maybe people.
He already knew the Philippines was no longer an option as was Australia. It was the little places like the Marshall Islands or Gilbert Islands that he still had hopes for.
A seaman approached his chair with a pad. After Quast had read it he deflated. Nothing! At least not in Alaska. He still had nothing from the 18's to the south. He was using aviation fuel for little to no gain. He decided to step outside and get some air.
So many ships, so many people with nowhere to go. They all had families and they all wanted answers. However there were no Radio messages. No TV broadcasts. His secure communications with anyone had ended over a year ago.
He had Cheyenne Mountain for the first year. But they had run out of fresh water and food, however the mountain itself had taken a few hits and the area around them was one of the hotter places on the planet. It was no way to die.
He looked out over the ships.
3 Aircraft Carriers, 3 Guided Missile Cruisers (for Air Defense), 6 LAMPS (Light Airborne Multi-Purpose System) Capable Warships (focusing on Anti-Submarine and Surface Warfare), and 6 Anti Submarine Destroyers or Frigates.
6 USNS supply ships that each have two MH-60S Seahawk helicopters on board.
1 Medical ship, 1 Amphibious Assault Ship (LHA), 2 Amphibious Assault Ships (LHD), 2 Attack transports (APA), the Pegasus and even 1 cruise line ship that had been launched from Hawaii before the radiation cloud reached it and then rained on it. The Pride of America to be precise. 3 Los Angeles class submarines, 4 Ohio class submarines, 2 cruise missile submarines.
The outside door opened behind him. "Jerry." Quast greets him.
"Phil" Is the response he gets.
"The 18's will be on the deck in an hour. The refueling aircraft will be right behind them." Jerry tells him.
"Anything on communications?" Quast still had hope, but it was fading when he got tired, like he was now.
"They're listening to everything. From secure satellite to old fashioned ham radio. Still nothing. Even that guy in Alaska has gone silent." Jerry was losing hope too. "We don't have much longer."
Quast looked at him. It was defeatist thinking, but he didn't blame him. They were almost drifting to save fuel. Everyone was on rations to save on food. If he didn't find someplace to go to find more they were going to run out in 6 to 8 months.
The flight decks had turned into places to play and exercise instead of flight operations.
"We may need to go North to do our own fishing soon." Quast was thinking of the Bearing sea area.
"I'd rather have a beach in Tahiti if I had a choice." Jerry would prefer but knows that whole area was too hot to go anywhere near.
"The flight deck is our beach now." Quast had to laugh, since crying was out.
The door behind them opened. "Sir we have something on radar headed this way. Supersonic."
Quast steps thru the door. "Officer of the deck, sound general quarters." Then Quast picks up a phone. "Bring the fleet to general quarters." Hanging up his phone.
"Where did it come from?" Quast has questions. This was just the first.
"It's position would suggest Hawaii." Is the answer Quast gets.
"There's no one in Hawaii." Jerry whispers. Telling Quast something he already knew.
"Sir, the target is now sub-sonic and still on approach." Quast is told while Jerry, the Captain of the ship moves over to the radar display.
"It's headed right for us." Jerry tells him.
"Who would have resources to send a supersonic flight?" Quast didn't understand.
Hawaii was barren and glowing. Even with refueling the States was a long ways away. The old Blackbirds were all in museums somewhere. The old U2's had the range just not the speed.
Quast decides to gamble and picks up his phone. "No firing, I want observation only. I want eyes and cameras running." Quast hangs up the phone.
"You're leaving us open." Jerry reminds him.
"Call it a prayer." Quast replies.
Jerry trusted him and he had gotten them this far and went back to watching the radar screen. "Here it comes."
Quast and others on the bridge moved to the windows to look.
What they saw was a sleek white almost wingless craft. It wasn't very tall, it had short stubbly winglets on each side and it was rather broad. As he flew over the deck almost even with the bridge of the island.
After it flew past they could see it had a flat rear end. "Where are the engines?" Jerry whispers out.
After it went past his carrier they watched it almost spin on a dime and travel back over the deck and continue on back towards Hawaii.
"It's gone supersonic sir." Everyone is told.
"I didn't see any insignia. No American, Russian or Chinese. Nothing." Jerry comments.
Quast was shaking his head. He didn't see anything either. "Communications, … anything?"
"No signals from anyone sir." Is his answer.
"Put it up on the monitor as playback. Let's get another look at it." Quast orders.
They watch it over and over. "It has a glass front. I can't see anyone though and I still don't see any insignia. No country emblems and no names. And where are the engines? How is it flying?" Jerry was lost in who it was.
"I haven't seen anything like it. Prototype of something maybe?" Jerry speculates.
"Get intelligence on it, see if they can make something out of it." Quast wanted more eyes looking at it. He wanted answers. "I didn't see any weapons either."
"They could be internal like the Raptor or Nighthawk." Jerry offers an explanation for that. Getting Quast to nod his head.
"But why and who?" Quast still didn't know who. "I'll be in communications, you have the bridge."
"I have the bridge aye." Jerry yells out.
"Admiral off the bridge."
"Secure from general quarters. Looks like the fun is over for now." Jerry orders.
Quast has made it to communications. "I want you to go back thru every signal you did or think you got in the last hour. That over flight was talking to someone and I want to know who."
"Aye sir." And the pair of them start going over every recording they have of every channel known.
Quast hangs around waiting. He has a guess who it was but was going to have to wait.
They were still listening to their recording when one of them answers the phone. "Communications."
Then he hangs up. "That was the bridge, they have a bogie on radar, supersonic headed for the fleet." Quast is informed.
Quast picks up the phone. "Same as last time?" His is told. Maybe Quast's theory may about to be tested.
"Switch to live listening, all channels." Quast orders.
Quast answers the phone when it rings this time. "Communications. …. Got it, keep watching. Bring the fleet to general quarters and no firing, just like last time." Quast hangs up the phone.
Quast goes back to waiting. "I'm getting something on a high band, in the clear."
"Let's hear it." Quast orders.
And over the speaker. "This is Captain Roy Montgomery of the Explorer ship Sun Rises, please respond."
Quast grabs the headset from one of the operators. "This is Vice Admiral Philip M. Quast. I'm in overall command of this fleet. Please clarify your intent?"
"We request to land on your ship. Our craft is unarmed. We need to talk Admiral." Roy tells him.
"You are from Tellus." Quast wasn't questioning since he is pretty certain of the answer.
"That is correct Admiral. Request permission to come aboard for planetary discussion." Roy wasn't sure how they were going to take this. This planet was dangerous the last time he was here, what were they like now?
"Permission granted. We will display red smoke to designate which ship to land on." Quast wanted him on his ship, not one of the other carriers.
"That will not be required Admiral. Signal triangulation tells me which ship you are on. ETA 5 minutes." And Roy ends communication.
Quast grabs the phone. "Bridge, have the captain and an armed 3 man marine detachment meet me on the flight deck. 5 minutes." Quast heads for the flight deck. This should be interesting.
Quast was already on the flight deck when Jerry and 3 armed marines join him.
"We're about to have company. Keep your weapons down and no shooting unless fired upon. No exceptions." Quast orders his marines.
"Sir." One answers back.
Then they watch as the shuttle slowly makes its way landing VTOL on his flight deck. "Sir?" Jerry questions.
"We are about to make history, and maybe, just maybe save all our lives." Quast answers.
After it has landed almost totally quiet, the back ramp opens and out walk two men a moment later.
Quast meets the two half way with Jerry next to him and the 3 marines right behind them. Quast gives a crisp salute worthy of a lowly private. "Admiral Quast, welcome aboard. This is the ship's captain Jerry Marks. The three Marines are Robertson, Linn and Suzuki." Quast ends his salute.
Roy extends his hand like he has learned from Rick . "Captain Montgomery, this is Detective Cain. You have someplace we can talk Admiral?"
"Of course right this way." Quast leads them to a conference room and clears everyone out and orders the Marines to guard the entrances and keep everyone out.
"You're a long way from home Captain." Quast offers for them to sit as he does.
"Several light years in fact, yes." Roy smiles. Pleased that someone knew about them at least a little.
"You've been here before?" Quast is wondering just which ship his was.
"I've only been here twice before. My ship was the one that picked up one of the survivors of the explorer ship Horizon." Roy tells him.
"That was you that picked up a Katherine Beckett and I'm guessing one Richard Castle but left behind Bracken." Quast still remembered his secure conference calls.
"Detective Beckett, Rick, his daughter Alexis and his mother Martha, yes." Roy was only a little surprised.
"You're man Bracken caused a lot of damage, and helped create the mess we are in now." Quast was a little mad at these people.
"So we learned from detective Beckett. She had attempted to prevent his escape off the Horizon. There were 4 total that destroyed our ship and the 115 people that were onboard at the time. Detective Beckett managed to stop 2 of them, however 2 of them escaped in a shuttle much like the one we came here in." Roy clarifies for him.
"Bracken ended up in Egypt while your detective ended up in New York." Quast fills him in if he didn't already know.
"Bracken was already wanted for murder on Tellus. We had no idea he was onboard the Horizon. We were told he landed on your planet where the primary location for what you call terrorists." Rick had briefed Roy on events of the day.
"We have our own home grown Bracken's, it was just bad luck he manages to find them and make himself a part of them." Quast now didn't blame him now. Earth was screwed up before Bracken ever got here.
"So what brings you here Captain?" They had never talked before except for that recorded message.
"The council ordered my ship to observe your planet and determine if you were recovering from Bracken and your own terrorist actions." Roy tells him why his ship is here, just not why he is down here.
"Things have changed since you left that recording." And it was all bad.
"We had hoped that knowing you were not alone would help you change. So what happened?" His scans showed the planet was mostly radioactive.
"As best we can tell, Putin of Russia, decided to bluff to force the planet to be under one ruler by threatening to blow the planet to hell and gone." Quast starts with and watches Roy wince. It told Quast it was not the reaction his people were hoping for when they sent that message.
"Someone in Russia, launched 6 ICBM's that thankfully only had one war head each. We lost Washington, New York, Norfolk naval base, Philadelphia, NASA and Chicago in minimum of 10 mega ton blasts." Quast starts his sad tale. Watching Roy cringe at all the destruction. His friend detective Cain however had an excellent poker face.
"After that we retaliated with 20, 1 mega ton tactical nukes on cruise missiles, striking a variety of targets.
This was followed a few days later by 6 more ICBM's that struck Washington and New York again. The others struck various places in Kansas, Nebraska and Missouri. The bread basket of the United States.
This was followed by 6 or our own. This time from a single boomer off the coast of France." Quast pauses thinking about what came next.
"Boomer?" Roy didn't know the term.
"Nuclear powered submarines that house up to 24 ICBM's that travel the oceans below the surface where is is harder to see them or trace their movement." Quast explains. Roy knew about the submarines, just not that they were called boomers.
"Then the Chinese got involved and finished off Japan with a number of nukes that were part cruise missiles and part bombs from air force bombers.
Then India launched theirs at Pakistan, who managed a small retaliation on India.
Best we can figure out a terrorist set one off inside Israel, who retaliated against Egypt and Iran.
This was followed by a massive launch from Russia that hit almost everyone. Mostly the United States. It was speculated at the time that Putin was already dead, so we don't know who pushed the button.
We naturally retaliated with a massive launch on China and Russia and here we are. We've been using satellites to follow what are probably radiation filled clouds ever since in order to avoid them" Quast explains his last actions.
They had blown their planet into almost a radioactive ball of dust.
Roy was surprised, maybe he shouldn't be based on what he thought of Earth when he first got here and Rick told him about the hundreds of ICBM's this planet had.
"So what's next?" Roy asks.
"It's been almost 3 years since then. We've gone around the pacific looking for food, people and fuel. Since the carriers are nuclear powered I thought of sending one to the Bering Sea to do some fishing, hoping the radiation is less there." It was Quast's next plan.
"You're almost out of food and fuel I take it." Roy could guess.
"6 maybe 8 months left at most unless we find more." Quast really was reaching the end.
It really was as bad as Roy guessed. Now it was time for why Roy came down here knowing his guess is correct.
"I have an offer for you if you're interested. …. I want to take you and one or two others of your choosing back to Tellus. You can request support or perhaps relocation. … Support is possible if the council is willing. Relocation will be difficult, I'm not sure how we would relocate the number of people I suspect you have on board your ships." Roy really did have no idea how to move that many people.
This was something Quast hadn't really considered. Now what does he do? At best he was hoping they could take some of the children, drop of a few supplies, take their history and learn from it so they didn't blow themselves to hell and gone also.
Now what? "Giving what little supplies you likely have on board will only delay the inevitable. Relocation is likely out. I doubt your ship can hold many people." Quast was thinking 115 since that was the size of the Horizon. "We don't have a year to take me to Tellus followed by a year back. Let alone the time needed to talk to whomever." Quast was grateful for the offer, but everyone he left behind would all be dead before he even made it to Tellus.
"You're correct, I have no supplies to give you. My ship is fully crewed but we can find space for you and two others. As for a year's travel. … It took the Horizon a year to get here, yes. However we do it in a month now. One month to Tellus, one month back. As too how long you are on Tellus negotiating," Roy shrugs his shoulders.
"And this is my idea. The council doesn't know you will be coming." Roy's offer was him stretching his neck out. Something Quast picked up on instantly.
"A month?" Quast was shocked. The brass was convinced they had some kind of base near here. "A month." Quast had an idea. Maybe this was going to work after all.