"So, what does happen during the trip through the portal, specialist?" Tara smiled, and didn't give any indication that her lack of a proper title bothered her. She was the operative whose very existence would preserve theirs. If she had questions, or doubts, everything would stop until those were cleared away. She knew her value, even if those with titles didn't like to admit it.
"A couple of possibilities are that we are traversing a bridge. A short bridge through space that allows us to travel from one point to another without going the astronomically insane speeds we would need to travel to get there. It could be a catapult, moving us at those speeds, or there is a final option that I don't want it to be." He frowned.
"And what is that option?"
"A time displacement. We don't actually go that speed, but are locked on that trajectory, and seem to travel there instantaneously, but in reality we are time frozen for the length of time to get there. We could be physically active, and even age, but appear to travel from here to there in only a few seconds." He grunted.
"I don't care for that option." She nodded.
"Its unlikely, as the probe still has power, and the trip to that other system would take hundreds of years, if not more. It is a possibility, but a remote one." She cleared her throat. "The most likely scenarios are still dangerous on their own. A bridge. Or a catapult. I don't know about you, but the catapult doesn't sound appetizing to me." He grinned a bit.
"This ship wasn't made for those speeds, and we have no way of testing our materials at those speeds either. We don't know if it could take the strain." Tara smiled.
"The probe survived, and the new probe is almost to its target, so we should be able to make a fairly good guess on the stress factors of our materials." The captain nodded his assent, but wanted to wait for the results from the probe.
"Okay, so we won't do that again." The captain closed his eyes. "How long will it take to come back online?" Tara was already hard at work on the information she had to work with. Once the probe was on the other side, it was programmed to send a low powered beacon signal through the portal, which would allow them to lock on. That caused the portal to collapse.
"If I'm reading this correctly, the portal is already reestablishing itself, but is nowhere near as strong as it used to be. If my calculations are correct, it should be fully operational within ten days." She pursed her lips. "The lower powered signal might be similar to the original builders signals that sent it into a shut down mode, or reboot mode. We can not use that signal in proximity to the portal ever again. We'll need to come up with different methods of communication. The higher frequency bands don't seem to effect it, but the AM bands are trouble." The captain cleared his throat.
"How can we be sure its fully active again before we use it?"
"The probe. We'll send it a signal to come back through, collect it, check its logs, then send it back through. It will need to take sensor readings, to verify the size, length of journey, and location its at." She closed her eyes, and hit the console in frustration. "Two years! We nearly fucked up two damned years of effort with a simple choice!" The captain turned towards the specialist quickly.
"Six years. Two years to design and build the ship, along with training, two years travel to, and two more travel back. We invested a lot of our lives in this, right along with you. The teams assigned to build those probes had no idea what would happen with low powered frequencies, as we use them extensively back on Earth." He turned back to the screen. "Don't allow other people's mistakes to overshadow what we have accomplished so far. We are at Jupiter. No one else has ever done that before. We've found proof of intelligent life besides ourselves, and we've found a way into another star system. Ask yourself how much of this was possible because you made it that way, Specialist." Tara lifted her eyes, and saw the eyes of the entire crew on her. There was no pity, or disgust in their features.
She was a part of the crew now, and they were proud of that fact.
"You were quite angry today." Daria said softly, her arm possessively and firmly planted on her hip. "You surprised us all. We didn't think you knew how to be angry." Tara turned towards her.
"I was more angry at myself. I thought I should have known, or been able to plan for all contingencies." Daria gripped her tighter.
"And how could you have foreseen that outcome? This is new to everyone. Isn't it better to find out now then when we try to cross over?" Tara thought for a moment, and sighed softly.
"I'm glad you're here." Daria smiled softly.
"On the trip, or 'here' here?" Tara rolled towards her, pressed her back against the mattress, and kissed her how she liked to be kissed. Warm, passionately, and making her the center of her attention.
Daria had her answer. Both.
"Everything is ready, sir. Hatches are closed. Cargo is stored, and locked down. Everything that can be nailed down, is." The captain nodded.
"Thank you, Thompson. Sampson? Everything clear on your end?"
"Affirmative, sir. Engineering is as ready as we're going to be." He looked at Tara.
"Anything unusual to report? Out of the ordinary readings that weren't there before?" Tara had poured over the information from the probe for the last ten hours, and the portal was just as strong as it had once been.
"No, sir. From a theoretical point of view, and from the data analysis, we are ready, sir." He nodded, and pressed a button.
"Then its time to green light this operation. Thompson, its a go." Tara, and the rest of the staff, were in their flight suits, and ready for the worst, but hoped for the best.
It would take five hours to get up to speed, but during this part of the acceleration, they would need to be strapped in. Even though the crew liked to be in the gravitational part of the ship, it was also locked down for the acceleration, and for the trip through the portal. A ship with a moving outer hull could create untold problems, so it was designed with that in mind.
Five hours was more then enough time to create an atmosphere of tension that ate at everyone's nerves. Even the captain's.
"Tell me when we pass the point of no return, Thompson." She turned towards him and frowned.
"Sir, as soon as we started to accelerate again, that was the point of no return. This is a gas giant. This trajectory is impossible to abort. We are locked in." He turned towards her with a snap.
"Why didn't you tell me that!" He snapped out. She kept her calm, though right now, all Daria wanted to do was to smack that look off his face. With a lead pipe.
"Captain, you were already aware of this." Tara spoke up, calmly and precisely. "When we had to stop short to wait, we were stationed at the zero mark. Once we passed it, we entered its sphere of influence. The only way to negate that is to do a one hundred and eighty degree turn, and fire our engines at full." He lowered his eyes.
"Which this ship is not capable of. Then why does it feel like we are not being drawn in hard?"
"The portal, sir. Its warping the surface of that field. We are in the eye of the storm." He closed his eyes, took a slow breath, and opened them again.
"Recommendations?" He asked. He looked right at Thompson.
"We go full steam ahead, sir. Specialist?" She looked at Tara, who nodded her assent.
"We don't want to be stuck in the middle of that thing, sir. If we do not have enough thrust to exit out the other side, we won't exit. We could be crushed in the gravity well, or get stuck and pushed out, right into the gas giant." He grunted.
"Any readings from the probe that tells us what a good speed to attain is?"
"Negative, sir. The lower mass will throw every reading off. Lets just go all out, and plan for the same on the other side. We can adjust the parameters in future trips." He took a long slow breath, then smiled wide. That was something they didn't expect.
"A new star system, and without fictional warp engines, or hyperspace! If this is real, we can roam about in the galaxy, and not have to worry about straining our home world's resources!" He smiled wide at Daria. "Thompson, don't spare the pedal!"
"That was unbelievably smooth." Daria said in a low voice. The trip to the portal was faster then expected, as the gravity well of Jupiter still drew them in, but as soon as the ship entered the portal, everything was smoothed out. The ship stopped its vibrations, and all the gravity was in the center of the ship. They felt drawn down, but not oppressively so.
"Don't let down your guard!" The captain called out. "Just like the trip in, the trip out will not be smooth!"
He was correct. It wasn't a catapult, but a true portal. It was like a car on a new bridge. Smooth as glass, but the entrances were the rough transition points. On the other side, the gravitational forces were extreme, but not unendurable. It took nearly half an hour for the ship to enter the portal, and half an hour to exit the gravity well of the gas giant on the other side.
"We're out!" Tara said loudly over the noise the engines transmitted through the ship. It wasn't the cone, or the burn of thrusters they heard. It was the force that it exerted on the ship itself they heard. The creaking of the superstructure, and flex of the deck plates, as the ship pulled itself out of the sphere of gravity of the gas giant.
"Report! Any damages?" Thompson and Sampson quickly ran some computer programs, and shook their head.
"Ship's navigational systems are responding as normal, sir." Daria called out.
"Affirmative, sir. All ship's systems are responding as designed. We've safely traversed the portal!" The captain allowed himself another uncharacteristic smile before he set about to the business at hand.
"Alright, take us to a safe distance away from the gas giant, then lets identify the monster in the rear view mirror, and if there are any other portals in this system. Also, start to identify the planets that are visible, and send out probes to these planets. We need information, and a lot of it!" Tara smiled.
"Sir, we should send a probe back through the portal, and send a data package back to earth. It will get there before us, and we'll be able to send a few more packages as soon as we go back, but a preliminary report could make them start to salivate, and plan." He smiled.
"Good idea. We need to grease the wheels of this runaway train, and that information is going to be more then they need to keep moving forward." He thought for a moment. "Any further information on what makes that portal work?" Tara smiled.
"No, sir, but that ship dead ahead might have some clues."
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