Star Force: Ambrosia (SF6) Read online

  Deciding to leave caution behind he suddenly stepped forward and swung forward with an overhead stroke, then cut it short and redirected into an upright block anticipating a return swing from his opponent.

  He guessed right, but the blow came so fast and hard that his sword got bounced to the side and he almost lost his grip…but to his surprise the Black Knight didn’t press his advance. Instead he held his ground and waited for Jason to try again.

  So that’s how it is…

  Up for the challenge, Jason jumped back towards him and exchanged three quick blows, but had his sword knocked down and out of his hands, landing at his feet as the silent giant waited for him to pick it up again.

  By now all the other adepts in sight had gathered around the circular ring, watching intently as Jason tried a third time, lasting five blade crossings before his sword got knocked aside and flew towards Mark, who deftly caught it by the hilt and tossed it back to Jason, who instantly began walking a circle around his opponent, looking for a weakness to exploit.

  Vermaire slowly rotated to face him, exposing the back side of his pure white trainer’s uniform to the others, who had to reign in their urge to strike at the opening. He’d gotten in their heads so much over the past two years that they had instantly gone into combat mode the moment he walked into the training area.

  Jason stepped forward, slashed once, then went on defense, backing up quickly and not trying to strike the larger man. He focused solely on blocking or diverting the return strikes, finding that he could successfully block a few, whereas in the past his strength had never been up to the task.

  What horrified him, though, was the speed at which the man was moving his blade. Jason had expected the speed gap to have decreased with the ambrosia-enhanced training he’d done, but the reverse was happening. He could barely see the man’s sword move, let alone get his guard up in time. Even playing hard to get, backing up and moving around the ring defensively, Jason only lasted 20 seconds at best, trying multiple times before the Black Knight had had enough and held up his hand, palm first, indicating that they were done, then he walked back over to his duffel and opened it.

  He pulled out another sword, identical in size and coloration, then replaced the other into the rack, then took up a guard position and motioned for Jason to try again.

  Jason rubbed his tongue against the inside of his teeth distractedly, unsure what he was up to, then tentatively struck at him again, backing up instantly to cover himself…but the return strike came slower, enough to be clearly visible, and Jason deflected the powerful blow to his left successfully.

  The next few blows came quickly, but Jason was able to keep up…barely. The round lasted a good 45 seconds before an intricate wrist flip knocked the hilt out of Jason’s hand and the Black Knight won again, flipping his new sword around in a flourish and reversing his grip on the hilt so that he held it blade down, then readied himself again as Lens tossed Jason’s sword back to him.

  Fighting an inverted blade was different, but not something that Jason was completely unaccustomed with. His experience lasted him 20, 15, and 25 seconds in the next three truncated sparring matches before the Black Knight raised his hand again, signaling him to stop.

  Then, unexpectedly, Vermaire twisted the sword in his hand until it was level with his midsection and grabbed the end of the blade with his other hand and offered it to Jason, bowing forward a bit in the process as he stared the adept in the eye.

  “Train with these if you want to increase your speed,” he said, handing Jason the sword and walking away.

  Jason nearly dropped the thing, surprised by both him speaking and by the mass of the sword. It was more than twice the weight of the originals and put an uncomfortable amount of pressure on his wrist when he took it in a one handed grip, watching the Black Knight leave them be…this time without rendering them unconscious.

  “That…was odd,” Andy said, stepping up beside Jason as he watched the giant leave, not taking his eyes off him until he was out the doors.

  “His sword is heavy…and he was still faster than me,” Jason said, handing him the sword.

  “Wow,” Andy exclaimed, verifying his assessment.

  “And here I thought we might stand a chance against him,” Erin said, having joined the spectators late.

  “He left his bag,” Lens noted, opening it wide to reveal several other swords.

  “Pull them out,” Jason ordered, wondering what else he’d left them.

  “Eight swords, two stun sticks,” Lens counted, “and four…what are these?”

  “I think they screw together,” Erin said, seeing the subtle corkscrew ridges on the end of two of the long handled swords.

  “Double-bladed,” Jason said even before Lens got the first two assembled into one very long rod with the hilts combining at the center.

  “These’ll definitely make the arms burn,” Andy said, swinging one of the singles around experimentally.

  “I think that’s the point,” Jason said, glancing at the door where he had left through. “Has he been watching us?”

  “Well, he knew you were the best one here,” Erin pointed out.

  “Yeah,” Jason agreed sheepishly. “Means we’ve still got a lot of work to do.”

  “That,” Lens said slowly, “was painfully obvious.”

  8

  July 14, 2045

  When Paul got to the last lap of his 3rd 10k of the day he didn’t speed up, but merely followed the green 7:10 pace marker to the completion of his run, happy to finish off his long day of workouts but still peeved about his inability to solve the naval riddle. The drone schematics that they’d sent on to Davis would keep the engineers and shipyards busy for a long time, so the perceived time crunch was gone, but he didn’t appreciate the ongoing failure…especially when the answer seemed to be hovering just out of reach in the recesses of his mind.

  It gnawed on him, and took the fun out of his training. He’d accepted holding back his workouts so he could spend time on the naval problem, but as he watched his fellow runners starting to move past his ability level he couldn’t help but feel that he was wasting his time, despite the drastic increasing in his running mileage and the gradual pace enhancements he’d been making. He was now running 20 seconds faster than his pre-ambrosia normal, which he could have accepted, but in his primary task he had accomplished absolutely nothing the last 2 months.

  He didn’t let the frustration consume him but it was ever present, and even another successful workout couldn’t completely rid Paul of his bad mood. Most of the laps he’d just run had been spent trying to brainstorm ways of stopping a rail gun shell from blasting through the hull armor on the first shot, and finished just as disillusioned as he began, walking off the track and heading to the nearby equipment room where he caught a quick shower and tried to push all thoughts naval out of his mind, otherwise he’d linger under the warm water indefinitely.

  Dressed in a fresh casual uniform, Paul walked to the nearby secure transit terminal and climbed into one of four waiting pod-cars, taking a seat facing backward and tapping in his destination on the control board situated like a coffee table on the floor in between two pairs of bench-like seats. The vertical door dropped down and sealed, then Paul felt the gradual acceleration around the loop track followed by the abrupt turn into the wall when all the external lighting went out, save for tiny running lights spaced as visual markers on the tunnel walls.

  Several interior orange lights provided faint illumination, as did the glowing touch screen navigational board, but otherwise the car was dark and Paul leaned back on the cushioned bench and closed his eyes for a moment, feeling the weariness of the day lightly burning in his legs. It was a good feeling, meaning that he was pressing his body forward into new exertion levels that it wasn’t used to, but it also left him fatigued and sleepy on a constant basis…and he hadn’t eaten anything in 5 hours, leaving him hungry and mildly dehydrated.

  Suddenly a bright light got his attenti
on and he realized that he was already back to the station in their quarters block. As the car’s door automatically opened Paul realized he must have dozed off without realizing it.

  He stepped out and headed down to the third level exit into the rest of the city, the only entrance into their restricted block. When he passed through the plain double doors he walked down a short walkway that opened up into a main ‘street’ through the interior of the city and blended in with the crowd, heading towards the nearest cafeteria where he met up with a few of the other adepts at one of over 200 tables, filled exclusively with Star Force personnel.

  The tourist areas of the city were far from here, allowing the adepts some measure of privacy as they carted two trays of food each over to their table with only a few casual glances in their direction. The presence of the red striped uniforms had become almost a round the clock fixture in this particular cafeteria, and enough curious questions had been previously answered or not answered that the crowds had learned to leave them be.

  Paul sat down next to Wes and began eating his various carb- and sugar-heavy foods, starting with a bowl of noodles and half finishing it before pulling the top off of one of the 3 reusable water bottles he’d grabbed and downed it in one long tilt of his head.

  “Long day?” Sara asked, taking the seat across the table from him.

  “Manageable,” Paul said, sucking down another forkful of the plain noodles. “Congrats on finally catching up,” he said half sarcastically, referring to her running speed which was now on par with his.

  “Not quite,” she amended. “You’re doing more mileage than me. Bet if we raced you’d still win.”

  “Raced?” Paul repeated, half laughing. “I’m tired enough, thanks.”

  Sara frowned. “Aren’t you getting enough?” she asked, not mentioning the ambrosia by name in the unsecured cafeteria.

  “I am,” Paul said, glancing down at the table as he tore off a bit of a roll with his fork and skewered it with the prongs. “It’s taking me a while to adapt to the mileage.”

  “You having trouble holding pace?”

  “No, it’s just the overall load. I’m fine, it’s just part of the adjustment process.”

  The blonde bob on the back of her head belied Sara’s all knowing eyes. “You’re bummed out.”

  Paul rolled his eyes. How did she always know what he was thinking?

  “I’m stuck in a rut and can’t seem to work my way out,” he admitted. “I’m no further along than when I started.”

  “Nobody said trailblazing was going to be predictable,” she reminded him. “You’ve had it so easy up till now you were bound to run into the bad luck monkey sooner or later.”

  Paul raised a humorous eyebrow. “Bad luck monkey?”

  Sara smiled. “It’s a 1s thing. He likes to sneak up behind you and beat your brains in when you’re not looking, which is why you can never take victory for granted. He comes in multiple forms…Ditty Kong, Donkey Kong, and King Kong.”

  Paul humphed. “Guess I’ve got King Kong on my back then.”

  “So shake him off,” Sara said, sticking a bite of white cake into her mouth. “Vary your routine and see if you can get your head clear. If you want we can take a walk around the city?”

  Paul thought about that for a moment. “Actually, that sounds like a good idea. It feels like I’ve plowed the same mental field so many times the soil has broken down into lifeless sand.”

  “King Kong will do that to you,” she said, sucking down half a bottle of water as the two continued to inhale their food and have their conversation simultaneously.

  After they finished eating about 10 minutes later they left the supper crowd in the cafeteria and grabbed the nearest elevator and zipped off through the city to one of the public areas and lost themselves in the tourist crowd, walking down through the parks and commons areas, then swinging through the maze of shopping centers.

  They passed many vacationing couples on the inside streets, with Sara eventually mimicking them and looping her arm through Paul’s and grabbing his hand, trying to gently shake him out of his stupor. “Looks like you finally ended up with that date after all.”

  Paul blew out a breath and laughed, then glanced over at her. “Am I really that out of it?”

  She nodded, then squeezed his hand. “Been in your place before. Hard to shake yourself loose if someone else doesn’t come along and do it for you.”

  Paul returned the squeeze, gratefully. “Don’t know if it’ll work, but thanks.”

  “No problem,” she said as they continued to walk down the streets masquerading as a couple…which ironically acted as a bit of social camouflage where their trim uniforms and ultra fit bodies otherwise made them stand out, but as soon as they ‘coupled up’ they lost most of the stares, given that people could accept that behavior and measure them up in a quick glance. Ambrosia-enhanced superhumans training to fight an army of Dinosaurs wasn’t exactly in the standard social lexicon.

  They wandered the expansive ‘E’ complex, barely making it through half of it before they hit the apex of their long loop and lazily headed back towards the edge of the tourist commercial zone. Most of the walk they said nothing, merely observing the insane corporate giant that Davis had created and the hoards of ‘normal people’ infesting it. It had been so long since either of them had been around any non-professionals that the everyday moms, dads, and kids on vacation seemed disgustingly alien and overwhelmingly chaotic. Both of the adepts found themselves immensely glad their quarters had been kept segregated from the rest of the city.

  Several of the space-themed stores along the streets had protrusions out into the walkways, displaying key items to attract the customers further inside, with one model shop in particular having various spaceships set up on pedestals with their unassembled box forms on racks below, ready for quick purchase at a register a few steps away.

  Sara and Paul walked through the maze of display cases rather than fight the flow of traffic by going around, noticing dozens of movie-inspired models. Halfway through Paul’s eyes fell on one model in particular, prompting him to stop suddenly, which yanked Sara back by the arm.

  “What?” she whispered, suddenly alert for trouble…until she noticed his distracted eye line on one of the models. It was a replica of the Trade Federation Battleship from the 1st Star Wars movie, looking like a giant, meter-wide donut. The model was huge and by far the largest available for sale, but otherwise unremarkable.

  Paul stared at it for a long moment, oblivious to everything else, then his facial expression changed slightly, with his head twisting microscopically.

  Sara watched him, patiently waiting for an answer until a smirk crossed his face.

  “George, you just redeemed yourself,” he whispered, mentally releasing his death grip on the model and turning to look at Sara.

  She smiled. “King Kong fall off?”

  He answered her with a full kiss on the lips.

  “Thank you,” he said emphatically after releasing her blonde head. “I owe you one.”

  “Yes you do,” she said pleased, pulling him by the arm out of the model maze. “Ready to get back to work?”

  “Already started,” Paul noted as they increased the speed of their walk, with Sara’s arm-lock guiding him towards the nearest elevator station.

  9

  When they got back to their quarters block Sara input the code to open the double doors then watched Paul hurry off down the stairs to the design center as she headed over to 3rd level ‘panty’ to grab a snack before she headed on down to the lounge, her mission accomplished.

  As soon as Paul got to the mostly empty design center he grabbed a table and used the touch screen interface to pull up the scifi ship designs file…one that contained 3d blueprints for every spaceship to ever hit the TV or movie screen. The Star Wars subfolder was easy enough to find and he pulled up a wireframe diagram of the TF battleship and set it slowly spinning in display mode, then used his index finger to
move the giant donut off to the left.

  Next he dug into the same subfolder and found the design for the Republic Cruiser, aka ‘Jedi Cruiser,’ that was the precursor for the Star Destroyer, which he also pulled up, along with a Super Star Destroyer, then set them each to different corners of the tabletop while leaving the center workspace empty. As they all rotated there silently he stared down at them and thought for a moment, working out a few details that he’d been mulling over on the walk back.

  What had originally struck Paul when looking at the physical model of the TF Battleship was the sheer bulk of the ship. The model to his left was tagged at 3,170 meters wide, which was approximately 2 miles. The biggest starship that Star Force currently used was the Jaguar, which measured just over 800 meters long and barely hit 200 at its widest. The TF Battleship, on the other hand, was circular, so length and width were the same, making it a giant 2 mile wide donut whose internal volume dwarfed any ship, or even space station, that Star Force would even think of building.

  But it wasn’t just the size, it was the double design. The donut had a hole in the center, even with a piece bit out of the outside ring, but that wasn’t the point. Inside the hole was a smaller sphere attached by a short ‘neck’ at the back of the outer ring. The sphere, Paul knew from the movies, could detach and land on a planet, making it a ship in and of itself while leaving the docking ring in orbit.

  The sphere contained the crew, while the ring contained the droids and equipment…not to mention blocking fire aimed at the sphere.

  The whole ship had shields, yes, and not all angles of attack were blocked by the ring, but the donut-shaped designed did provide a massive physical barricade around the command sphere, which would take the hits of any direct line lateral attacks…including rail guns.

  Not that Star Wars operated with such weapons, but Paul’s mind wasn’t limited to canon. No armor Star Force currently produced could stop a medium rail gun round without meters of material on the hull, and even that wasn’t enough if the round was sped up prior to firing by the momentum of a ship, meaning that any warship Paul designed would essentially be offense only, with a ‘one hit kill’ defense profile, which really meant the lack of one. If one round could penetrate the hull, then one round could kill a member of the crew, meaning Paul or one of the others...and that was unacceptable.