Read Online Theogony 3: Terra Stands Alone by Chris Kennedy - Free Book Online Page A

the lieutenant , Captain Sheppard called for the rest of his staff and seated everyone present at the conference table. While they were waiting for the rest of the officers to get there, they made small talk, and Lieutenant Finn explained his walk. He had been born with a tibial torsion, or twisted shin, and had dealt with it all of his life. Although the doctors thought they corrected it as a child, the twisted shin had been a recurring problem throughout his life. The doctors had no idea why.
    When all of his officers were present, Captain Sheppard asked the newcomer, “Now, who are you, and who do you work for?” The lieutenant took a deep breath. “Slowly,” Captain Sheppard added.
    “My name is Lieutenant Peter Finn,” he said, “and I am a systems engineer with the Development Section of the Office of Planning & Development (OPD).” As he looked around the table, he saw nothing but blank stares. “You haven’t ever heard of OPD?” he asked.
    Everyone shook their heads. “We’ve been kind of busy,” said Captain Sheppard. “You know, fighting aliens and such. Trying to save the world.”
    “Oh! Yeah, I forgot,” the lieutenant said. “It’s hard to keep up with fleet developments when you’re out of the system. Right.” He paused. “You know what Department X is, though, right?”
    More blank stares. “Keep trying,” Captain Sheppard urged.
    “Maybe I should start at the beginning?” the lieutenant asked.
    Everyone nodded. “That would probably be helpful,” Captain Sheppard agreed.
    “When the fleet was formed,” explained Lieutenant Finn, “ Admiral Wright realized that we were going to need a unit that looked at the new alien technology and tried to figure out how it could be made to work for us, so he created Department X. Its main mission is to exploit all of the alien technology that we acquire.” He smiled. “On behalf of Department X, I would like to thank you for bringing back so many new toys for us to play with.” More blank stares.
    “Do n’t you know what you’ve done for Terra?” Lieutenant Finn asked, disbelief in his voice.
    “Well, let’s see,” said Calvin. “We’ve brought back a couple of ships and a couple of replicators. I guess the ships have new weapons and systems, stuff like that ?”
    “No,” said Lieutenant Finn. “No, no, no, no, no. That’s not it at all. Let’s take the replicator on the moon. What does it do?”
    “It makes our space fighters and shuttles,” said Calvin. “I know Replicator Command also uses it to make some of our stuff if it’s too big to be made in the replicator onboard. But it’s only good for making things that it has a blueprint for in its data banks; you can’t just think of things and get it to make them.”
    Lieutenant Finn was aghast. “ Oh! Has no one ever told you...” he wondered. Finally, he slapped his forehead with his palm. “Sorry, I forgot, military security again. I’m still new to all of this military stuff. I only completed MIT a couple of months ago.” He paused and pursed his lips. “Do any of you know how many blueprints the Class 2 replicator has in its data banks? Anyone?”
    “A couple hundred?” Calvin asked.
    Lieutenant Finn shook his head. “A couple of hundred million , maybe. We’re still counting and categorizing. It may be a billion. It may be more. The bigger replicator, the one that can make a battleship, has billions of blueprints inside, and they are all state-of-the-art. It has the blueprints for all of the pieces to make a super dreadnought, if you wanted to take the time to assemble something three miles long. It would probably be easier to make the pieces for a Class 8 replicator, put the replicator together, and then have it make the super dreadnought. At least that way, you could make more super dreadnoughts if you wanted...and if you had all of the materials required. The Planning Section of OPD is working on how to do that; you’d have to ask them about it.” He