PRI Snippet 3

 Sitrep:

Last one. I got the manuscript back yesterday afternoon so I will be publishing it later this morning!

 

 

Chapter 3

A page rushing into the room alerted Diedra and Eugene that something was amiss. The young girl bobbed a nod. "If it pleases your majesties, there is a radio call from a craft in the air." she pointed straight up.

"Trouble?" Eugene asked. The storm system that had been over New Willinham had found them.

"That is for you to judge. Please," the girl said beaconing to them.

"Another crash? I thought Max grounded the aircraft," Diedra said as she got up and followed them.

"Ah, tisn't an aircraft from here your majesty," the girl reported.

"A pirate aircraft? Able to radio so far inland?"

"No. Not from this world," the young girl said.

The adults glanced at each other in surprise and then stepped up the pace.

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Diedra and Eugene cleared their schedules and were on hand to meet the Bootstrap visitors. Glowing Memes hovered overhead.

"Guess we should have checked the weather first," Jacklyn Smith quipped as she got out of the bird. The rain was making hissing sounds as it hit the hot shuttle. There were heat waves radiating off of it.

When she got to the base of the stairs she smiled in gratitude to a young man who held an umbrella over her head. "Thanks," she said.

"Let's get out of the rain," Eugene said as he waved to the trucks.

"Yeah, since I'm not a duck that's probably a good idea. Oh, I do have some cargo to unload."

"Gotcha. Do you want to stay and oversee that or...?"

Jacklynn shook her head and waved for her copilot to look and then pointed to the engineers and techs with forklifts. She got a thumbs up in reply.

Once in the truck they sighed in relief.

"So...?" Eugene asked.

"I'm not delaying I promise. Just getting my legs," Jacklynn said. "Good news bad news routine I'm afraid."

He blinked and then his eyes narrowed in speculation.

"You know that we had to get permissions for the craft right?"

He grimaced but nodded.

"Mitch got the permission from Lockheed because they thought he was nuts and he was offering money. But now they are sticky. And there are government permissions too," she warned.

Eugene sighed. "Figures."

He had run a multi-billion dollar company. He knew beaurcacy was not fun to navigate.

"We thought about the A400M Atlas but it too is tied up in red tape. And it takes twice as long to build. Better craft except for a few things."

"Ah?"

"Twice the range and altitude, twice the weight lifting ability, but... well, anyway, it is a nonstarter too."

"Damn," Eugene grimaced.

"Then there is the tail," Jacklynn said. She shook her head. "It is chicken little there," she warned.

Eugene frowned. "Tail?"

"The asteroid was stopped from hitting earth but it had a massive trail of debris. A tail like a comet," she stated.

Eugene stiffened.

She nodded, cold sober. "They think that most of it will burn up in the atmosphere. They are wrong."

Diedra sensed Eugene's distress. She put a hand on his arm.

"Nothing that can be done?" Eugene asked.

Jacklynn shook her head. "It will be bad. Oh, Earth will survive but..." she made a hopeless gesture.

"When?"

"In two months. We are launching another shuttle around that time. If it gets too bad we'll focus on you folks for the time being."

"You can't..." He frowned and shook his head angrily. "Sorry. Stupid to think a shuttle with what, a hundred ton capacity could bring in enough to help people. Drop in the bucket."

"Oh we will try," Jacklynn said. He blinked. "We'd appreciate help too." He nodded. "There is an old saying. To paraphrase, an old man was walking along a beach after a bad storm. He saw a child picking up and tossing starfish and animals back into the sea."

"The old man looked at he child and asked why, it wouldn't make any difference."

The child replied that it would make a difference for that one, as he tossed a starfish back into the sea."

Eugene nodded. Don't get overwhelmed by the scope of the disaster that you give up, help those that you can help. "Makes sense," he murmured.

"The Memes won't let us build you weapons so... we came up with a compromise," Jacklynn said as they headed to the hangar.

"And that is?" Diedra asked mildly as they pulled into a hangar.

"We provide you with the engines, avionics, and critical parts you can't make yourself. I brought along enough for one bird actually," the pilot stated.

Eugene blinked.

Jacklynn smirked. "There was nothing said about resale. Besides, we've gone through the design and reworked it a couple of times. The engines are almost totally different than the Rolls Royce originals."

"Ah."

"The same for the frame design. We used an organic structural engineering CAD program to redesign a lot of the parts. The thing is stronger, faster, lighter, and better."

Eugene nodded thoughtfully. "Good to know."

Jacklynn handed over a flash chip.

He smiled and pocketed it.

"To answer some of your other requests, we also brought some of our medical technology and the latest in advances on Bootstrap and on Earth."

Eugene smiled. Diedra did as well.

"The Memes won't let us bring people to our world but we can bring a medical team here to train your people and help with some sticky cases," Jacklynn stated. "Besides, from what I understand transporting them would be dicy. I don't want to loose a patient."

Eugene nodded. That made sense given that the shuttle took off like a jet and probably hit a few G's on the way up and down.

"How is Mitch?" Diedra asked.

Jacklynn's face fell. She looked down at her hands for a moment. "He'll never be the same as he was. He's quiet. But he's there. He can talk a little. I think we hover over him too much. I'm pretty sure he chafes but knows it is for his own good."

Eugene nodded. The poisoning that had happened to Mitch Chambers had acted like a stroke. He had limited speech ability. The memes had saved him but he had been changed.

Jacklynn dashed a tear. Sorry, I just hate to see a great guy brought low like that."

"No need to apologize. "We feel the same way," Diedra said as she rested her hand on her husband's. He smiled and used his thumb to stroke her hand gently.

Jacklynn saw the move and smiled.

"So, to recap, we can't get birds or the design from Earth but we can get you parts we redesigned and made. And we can help with other things. Sorry..."

"It is a step in the right direction," Eugene said. He glanced at his wife. She nodded.

"I was hoping you'd say that. We can bring over one shuttle a month to six weeks with a load," Jacklynn stated. "Sorry, but I want to keep at least 4 engines on hand in reserve for our fleet. We have a production line going though."

"Nothing to be sorry about," Eugene stated as they got out of the truck. "That makes perfect sense."

"Thanks."

"Anything else we can do?"

"Well, we need intel. I know the memes won't help but can you deploy satellites? For... communication, weather, and terrain mapping?" Eugene asked ingeneously.

Jacklynn looked up to the rainy sky outside to a Meme and then back to him. "I think we can arrange that," she said with a cheeky grin.

He smiled back.

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