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Three-way Race to Stars (dead by bug)

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Garfunkel:
PROLOGUE

On 4th of January, 2015, the Near-Earth Object Wide-field Survey Explorer (NEOWISE) sent its monthly update to Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Among the hundreds of IR shots that the spacecraft had taken, few were ruined by a bright streak. While initially dismissed as a glitch, its presence in multiple shots intrigued the Deputy Principal Investigator James Bauer, who placed a call to Washington. The head of the Science Division, John Grunsfeld, was just about to ride his beloved bicycle when his phone vibrated.

"Hey John, James here. I think NEOWISE might have caught something interesting but we need to retask it for confirmation and I wanted to run that by you first", Bauer explained. Two and half thousand miles away, Grunsfeld sighed as he dumped his bike and headed back to his office.

"Let me double check things but it should be fine. What do you think you got?" He asked while walking to the elevators. Bauer waited a moment, pondering whether he should share his suspicion or not. In the end, he decided to go for it:
"A new comet, never before seen one, that is coming in hot as hell", he said.

"Hot damn, that's exactly the kind of stuff that the director can take to the Hill to justify our budget. I'll give you my permission right now and will clear it with the rest of the Division right away", Grunsfeld responded. He hadn't felt this excited since 2012, when he rode to Low Earth Orbit aboard Space Shuttle Columbia.

"Gotcha boss, we'll get to work", Bauer acknowledged and terminated the call. He had a team to whip to action.

Two weeks later, NASA held a press conference to announce the tentative discovery of a new comet, one moving at a quadruple velocity compared to Hayley's Comet and with a trajectory bringing it relatively close to Earth. In scant hours, every telescope on Earth was aimed at the fresh visitor to the inner system.

***

Susan Mullally was going through her usual work - analyzing Kepler data to find binary systems - when her colleague and boss, Jeffrey Smith, called.

"Get your ass down here right now", he said, out-of-breath, before cutting the line. Intrigued, Susan rushed to the main conference room of the SETI Institute in California. By the time she got there, a handful of other night owls had been roused by Smith, who held a manic grin on his pudgy face.

"Argentina just sent this in, listen", he said and pressed a button with a flourish. The speakers came alive with the familiar sound of interstellar background noise that their radio telescopes constantly listened to - yet there was a beep that she didn't recognize. And there it was again. And again. And again. Despite not being a 'radio guy', she did understand the significance.

"Has this been confirmed?" She asked.

"No, Argentina has trouble tracking the source for some reason, they claim it is moving. They are adjusting but now that you've heard it too, ensuring that I didn't just go crazy five minutes ago, I'm going to call every radio telescope on the planet and get them in on the search". Smith was babbling but nobody cared - this could very well be the signal that the Institute had worked for.

***

General John Hyten, Commander USAF Space Command, stared at his desk. For variety, he briefly glanced out of his window but for once the beautiful view of Colorado did not soothe his mind. He had just gotten a call from NORAD that he never expected to receive.

"If this is some kind of a prank, it is not very funny. Are you absolutely certain?"

"Yes sir, we have double, triple and quadruple checked. The facts are as solid as humanely possible", the voice on the other end answered.

"And the network boys are certain that it's not some hotshot hacker playing with us?"

"Yes sir, we thought the same thing at first but it is genuine", the voice responded.

"Very well. Thank you, I will take it from here", Hyten said and ended the call. He always thought that he would never need to call the President - if WW3 started with a nuclear strike, others would take care of that end. But this! Sighing, he picked up the phone and dialled the White House, dreading the conversation to come.

"This is General Hyten, Space Command. I am calling to inform the President that we have confirmation of a message from a non-human intelligence, outside the Earth. Yes, I'll hold"

***

Comet 2015/P/Neowise-Bauer turned out to be something else altogether. A massive probe, continuously transmitting an electronic signal. Unfortunately humanity had no method of rendezvousing with it. Thousands of images of it were taken, on every part of the EM-spectrum available, as the artificial "comet" sailed through the Solar System. The scientific community worked as one to decipher the message and, once certain mathematical regularities were discovered, the rest was easy enough, with plentiful access to super computers and the best brains on the planet. Unlike our Voyager probes, its message was not of peace and harmony. It was a warning of impending doom - but also of possible salvation.

The message clearly stated that some sort of collective intelligence, possibly of extragalactic origin, that is methodically wiping out life in our galaxy, the Milky Way. Unknown number of species had already been wiped out by them and the creators of the probe were currently fighting them - and losing. The news sent most of humanity reeling. Here was definite proof of life outside planet Earth but the worst fears of the pessimists seemed to be coming true - space was truly hostile.

Yet the probe included a glimmer of hope: knowledge of exotic materials, quickly dubbed the Trans-Newtonian minerals for their near-magical properties, that seemed to offer possibilities flying directly in opposition to the Laws of Physics as currently understood. These materials could be find on planets, moons, asteroids and comets, and when subjected to an carefully modulated electric current, could be harvested from the 'regular' minerals. With them and the information that the probe transmitted, space exploration would not only be possible but affordable and vastly more efficient than before. Even faster than light travel between the stars could be possible!

Yet humans are nothing if not set in their ways. Large portion of the population soon moved on, concerned more with their daily survival than with a possible existential crisis, and some nations preferred to go at it alone - but not all. By the end of 2015, the leading politicians of NATO, EU and the former SEATO members had gathered to announce the formation of a new supra-national organization to spearhead humanity's efforts to safeguard the planet and to spread mankind to the stars. Since both Russia and China refused to join, and none of the African, South-American or Middle-Eastern countries were interested, and out of Asia, only Japan, South-Korea, and Singapore joined, this new organization was named the Pan Oceanic Treaty Organization or PATO for short. Despite protests from both Russia and China that this new organization was a militaristic one directly aimed at them, the international reaction was subdued and, for once, the diplomatic wrangling was completed surprisingly quickly. Technocrats, taking advantage of frightened politicians and the public support, managed to iron out the startup issues in short order by the end of 2015.

In short, while the countries making up PATO retained full control of their domestic, economical and foreign policies (inside the framework of their respective other groupings and alliances, like NATO or the European Union), they all pledged to work together and to devote significant portion of their industrial, economical, scientific and military capability to further the aims of PATO. Similar to how NATO was governed, each member state appointed a delegate to the PATO council, the executive chair rotating between members (by quirk of the alphabet, Albania was the first) and all decisions having to be accepted unanimously. However, the technocrats responsible for drafting the actual treaty were clever enough to shift most responsibility below the actual council, which would only be required to decide on the most grave matters. Day-to-day business would be administered by a join executive administration that combined both civilian and military leadership.

Joe Hanson, a veteran American diplomat, was tapped to become the first PATO Administrator. Experienced at overseeing massive projects in both the US Federal government and in the UN, he had solid contacts and knowledge of both industrial and economic sectors and this experience propelled him past the Canadian-born Isaac Knowles and British-born Gemma Mitchell, who were appointed as his vice administrators and potential successors.

Admiral John Richardson, the current Chief of Naval Operations for US Navy, snatched the appointment to be the top military commander of PATO. Despite heavy competition from the air forces of several PATO countries, the navy side managed to convince the politicians and the civil servants that they had the proper experience, know-how and mind set to wage war in deep space. The crucial difference was that, despite the flyboys having monopoly for aerospace operations, the miracle of TN-assets implied that future space operations would far more likely resemble naval operations of 17th to 20th centuries - not the easily micro-managed air strikes lasting few hours of the 21st century. Despite having no existing assets under him, Richardson wisely saw the writing on the wall and left his beloved wet Navy behind.

The mission of PATO was simple - to eXplore space, to eXpand humanity's hold of the galaxy, to eXploit the resources thus found and to eXterminate any threats to the human race and planet Earth.

***

Despite their refusal to join PATO, neither the Russian Federation nor the People's Republic of China were going to turn a blind eye to what was going to happen. Quietly, both countries took steps to start their own TN-programs. Russia was keen to regain her lost glory, while China was merely being pragmatic. They had no lofty ideals to safeguard.

Rest of the planet would thereafter be know as the neutral UN, playing no significant part.

Garfunkel:
2016-2017



The workmen had barely left the conference room when the gaggle of officers marched in. Its walls had not even been painted yet but Admiral Richardson felt it necessary to get the ball rolling by meeting with his staff, in person, as soon as possible. Everyone in the group wore an uniform but not even two were exactly the same - PATO Military had no uniform of its own and everyone wore their national ones for the foreseeable future.

"Please be seated if we have enough chairs", Richardson said. It quickly became obvious that there indeed were not enough chairs and all the junior officers had to remain standing. This didn't faze the admiral, hardboiled as he was in the Pentagon infighting.

"I hereby declare the first PATO Military leadership meeting open. We will start with the most urgent thing, laying out the command structure for our future space force. Then we'll proceed with the Mission Statement. Once we're happy with those, I will divide you into groups and let you get on with the details. Any questions at this point?" Richardson spoke with a clear baritone, not expecting any.

"Good. I've spent few evenings hashing out a basic command structure. To begin with, PATO will have four operational commands", he started and nodded to his Operations Officer, Lieutenant Commander Madison May, who handed out briefing notes.

"As you can see from the papers, these will be the Orbital Defense Command, the Planetary Defense Command, the Survey Command and the Logistics Command. The formal appointments will happen later, once we have the headquarters and other mundane requirements under control. Their missions will be self-explanatory but I will go through them in any case", Admiral Richardson explained.

"First, ORDCOM under Rear Admiral Tomohisa Takei. I'm sorry for this 'demotion' but otherwise we'd have nothing but admirals in here", Richardson explained. The wiry, black-haired Japanese officer merely nodded so Richardson continued:
"ORDCOM will responsibility over all of our space assets, none which exist at this moment", several officers chuckled at this "but will hopefully soon consist of both military shipyards and orbital weapon platforms designed for anti-asteroid and anti-missile duty. Yes, I said anti-missile. We all know that there are a number of rogue states here on Earth, some of which might might not look kindly on us. Note that ORDCOM will not be nuclear-armed, as we will honour the international treaties that prevent nuclear weapons in space... for now", Richardson explained. Few officers frowned.

"Secondly, PADCOM under Lieutenant-General Michael Hood", the tall Canadian nodded as well, "will have responsibility of our ground assets. Currently these are four major training areas, being refitted for Trans-Newtonian standards. Once they are up and running and all the prototypes are ready for mass production, we will start re-training NATO units and PADCOM will take control of them. The other PADCOM area of responsibility will be surveillance of local space. We are currently entirely reliant on civilian telescopes and other sensors, augmented by few satellites. Most of the military surveillance gear is only capable of watching the planet and that is not good enough now. Eventually PADCOM will also have missile silos capable of hitting targets millions of kilometers away from Earth", few skeptical looks but most of the officers merely acknowledged his words. While they were all political appointees, most countries had been savvy enough to send forward-looking officers, not hide-bound traditionalists.

"Thirdly, SURCOM under Vice-Admiral Jonathan Woodcock", at which point the jolly looking Brit waved one hand, "will be our tip of the spear. Admiral Woodcock will have the unenviable task of putting together a multi-national force of space explorers, both military officers and civilian experts, then conjure up plans for surveying the system though I leave the exact methodology to him. The various space agencies have pledged their support in this task but I'm sure you'll have your hands full soothing wounded egos and settling turf wars", Richardson grinned at Woodcock, who laughed.

"Last but not least, LOGCOM under Lieutenant-General Martin Schelleis," the sharp-nosed German nodded, "will perhaps have the most daunting task - to create the infrastructure to support the other three commands. We are going to need shipyards and missile factories and maintenance facilities and design teams and what else. I'm leaving it fairly vague on purpose as nobody can see the future. The scientists are just starting to make heads and tails out of this TN stuff and so much is still up in the air", Richardson admitted. The senior officers seemed to agree.

"Okay good. Next, our mission statement..."

***

On the other end of the building, administrator Hanson was going through his computer. He hadn't bothered to organize a face-to-face meeting, thinking it too cumbersome and slow. Instead, he relied on video conferences and emails. The Japanese were looking into a method of using TN-minerals to create large fuel storage units while the combined scientific prowess of the West was tasked to form a cohesive, general Trans-Newtonian Technology theory. Hanson had one massive problem - he only had four leading scientists that were capable of running large multi-national projects like these. He hoped that the academia would quickly produce more. Other than that, he was content on letting the industry focus on mining TN-minerals as best as they could for now, though he had already shot off improvement proposals here and there, trying to eliminate waste of both time and money.

***

"Congratulations admirals", Admiral Richardson said as he shook hands with freshly-minted Vice-Admiral Hood and Rear-Admiral Schelleis. Admirals Takei and Woodcock had already departed to their command posts.

"Thank you sir. I have to say, I'm still amazed that we got them up and running in mere four months", Hood responded. The silent German nodded his agreement, as did Richardson.

"Well, it is pretty amazing what we are capable of when we put our differences and, most importantly, budgets aside!" the overall military commander of PATO acknowledged, smiling widely.

"But I won't keep you any further. My own staff awaits as does yours. Have a safe journey gentlemen", he said and shook hands again. The two men saluted him and walked off to their cars. As soon as Richardson was back inside, Lieutenant-Commander May was upon him with more paperwork.

***

Administrator Hanson was focusing on the plethora of proposals in front of him. Now that TN-theory had been cracked, there seemed to be no end to emails demanding PATO laboratories, most of which naturally were marked URGENT and CRITICAL. He moved most of them aside - he had no intention of breaking up the current division of labs that was working so well. The Japanese would concentrate on various Logistical and Ground Combat issues while everyone else - under the watchful eye of Henry Black - would jump from field to field, laying the necessary ground work. Hanson did agree with his military counterpart in that their first priority must be sensors. Hanson shot off the necessary emails and leaned back in his chair, enjoying the view from his penthouse slash office.

***

"So these are the blueprints for the Oracle?" Admiral Richardson asked. The architect nodded. "I'm no expert but they look strange to me", the admiral continued. The architect nodded again, looking excited.

"That's because this is no regular construction. We were first going to build something like NORAD but then came to the conclusion that that would be stupid. Humanity is going to space and the Oracle should be deployable!" The man could barely contain himself.

"Wait, deployable? Am I understanding you correctly?" Richardson looked around.

"Yes admiral, yes indeed! We can and will construct one Oracle, probably in Alaska with supporting station in Australia, but the station itself can be pre-built in few pieces by our industry. These elements can then be transported elsewhere, like say Mars, and assembled by your engineers! Imagine the possibilities!" The architect was babbling, his team nodding in approval.

"Well, that is certainly forward thinking. But let's not put the cart in front of the horse. Commander May, please issue a construction request to Hanson for one Oracle to be constructed immediately", Richardson ordered.

***

The sun was extraordinary warm for May, so the ceremony was held outside the Oracle. Hanson made a short speech, followed by an equally short one by Vice Admiral Hood, commander of Planetary Defence Command. Hood and Hanson then shook hands with Lieutenant Commander David Francis, who took control of the PDC itself.

Hanson intercepted the four admirals before they managed to leave:

"You won't get any other pet projects through for a while. We're fully committed to the transformation of the industry to TN-standards now. Mere ten percent of industrial output is allocated to other projects and that is booked full with constructing the necessary infrastructure to get us an orbital presence for good", Hanson said tightly while smiling at the reporters taking pictures.

All four admirals nodded at him and smiled as well.

"No arguments from us Hanson, now that we can see what the Chinese and Russians are up to", Rear Admiral Takei answered, "especially as my command will not even exist until you get all that orbital production stuff sorted out!"

Hanson seemed satisfied and departed.



The activation of Oracle caused a storm of protest from both Moscow and Beijing. PATO ignored the complaints, citing that being able to monitor the inner system space more accurately was more important than other nations being able to hide their missile silos. Russia had 10 Missile Complexes, while China had 38. PATO had 32.

***

Major-General Charlene Taylor stood on the podium at Fort Bragg, observing the hundreds of training officers and NCOs forming into squares. Once they were all in formation, she started speaking on the microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen. Today we start on the first step towards the creation of unified PATO ground element. Taking a step from the playbook of the old Wehrmacht, you people will be in charge of forming the Replacement Battalions. Yes, I hear you wondering, what? Well, allow me to enlighten you. As you well know, normally a unit is formed and trained together. When it suffers losses, there are made good by a trickle of recruits that have finished basic training and are then sent to the combat unit alone or in small groups. The combat unit is then responsible for their further training. This causes issues with cohesion and performance. Something we cannot afford in the future."

Taylor paused for effect.

"Whatever you personally think about the ####s, their army was one of the finest in human history. Thus we emulate their training and replacement system. Each future combat brigade will have a replacement battalion of its own, ensuring that unit cohesion remains high and training is kept at high and consistent levels! In the first phase, here in Fort Bragg and simultaneously at England, at Germany and at Japan, we will train forty Replacement Battalions. Yes, we do not yet have the actual forces they would act as the replenishment for, but does that prevent good training? No! Now get to work!"

Garfunkel:
2018-2019



Hanson clapped alongside all the other dignitaries as Earth's first mass driver powered up and shot a test plane through the atmosphere. It was a balmy April afternoon in Utah, perfect conditions for a launch. The mass driver extended for kilometers over the flat plains. Hanson congratulated the contractors for finishing construction in time.

***

"A fresh announcement from the PATO has sent the stocks of four companies soaring. IAI, Saab and Pratt & Whittney have been awarded contracts for manufacturing new types of engines for use in various space projects. Dubbed nuclear thermal engines, they are the first clear breakthrough in Trans-Newtonian propulsion tech. In addition, Diamond secured a contract for pressurized water reactors. While actual construction projects are yet to be announced, analysts predict a very strong future for these companies..." Hanson muted the TV report. He had made sure to use his dummy corporations to buy stock in all four companies well before the official announcement. As long as nobody bothered to look too closely, he was going to make a nice bonus over his meagre civil servant pay.

***

September 2018, Russia announced that it has now joined the Trans-Newtonian club. China already made a similar statement last spring.

***

"Alright, let's start this meeting", Admiral Richardson announced and the discussions died away. "The floor is yours", he said to the scientists present. All four senior scientists were present - Kate Sheppard, Shinozaki Munetaka, Henry Black and Joe Sinclair. Sheppard, the most enthusiastic of them, stood up and took over the podium, starting the presentation. Their audience were the four admirals and the senior officers of PATO Military.

"Good morning", she started and clicked her laser pointer on. "You need to decide the primary armament of the future PATO fleet and we are here to explain the advantages and disadvantages of each."

"The TN-theory has forced some changes on the thinking of physics. There are some limitations and some advantages. I won't bother you with the details but the cold fact is that all beam weaponry will be of very limited ranges. We're talking about tens of thousands of kilometers, possibly a hundred thousand kilometers eventually but that's about it"

The admirals looked at each other.

"That sounds more than enough", Vice Admiral Hood stated. The scientists chuckled but Sheppard just nodded.
"Of course Admiral, it does sound that way", Sheppard acknowledged. "But just our own moon is anywhere from three-fifty to four hundred thousand kilometers from Earth. Every meaningful distance in our Solar system is counted in millions of kilometers. It takes billions of kilometers to reach the outer planets. So for long range, the only option is the trusty old missile", Sheppard explained and showed them a picture of one.
"With Sorium-based fuel and nuclear thermal engines, we can build missiles you would not believe, gentlemen. With thousands of kilometers per second of velocity, and ranges of millions of kilometers and destructive capability equalling those of pre-TN nukes. Naturally, the missiles need to be built and sufficient fire controls and sensors must be designed", Sheppard continued.
"Then to the beam weaponry. Here there are multiple possibilities. We have meson, maser, laser, plasma, particle, gauss and rail. They are all limited in their ranges and some of them have very peculiar properties, which might warrant further study. The details are in the briefing package, but I'll go over them briefly - mesons have very exotic capability of phasing through wavelengths in a manner that allows targeting at a exact location, regardless of any obstruction, basically meaning that it can ignore armour. It's useless against ground forces for the same reason. Maser or microwave amplification, is only good for disabling electronics. Lasers are just what your imagination tells you - a focused beam of light that burns anything that it hits but losing its focus as the range grows. Plasma is shorthand for a violent matter transformation at short ranges and particle beam is a coherent lance of excited particles. Gauss and rail guns actually use ammunition, not just energy, though their size is so small that we do not need to worry about reloads like with missiles. Both are fairly short ranged, at least for now, but offer the possibility of very rapid rates of fire. Due to their construction, we cannot turret rail guns but we can turret gauss guns", Sheppard droned on. She noticed that the admirals were losing their concentration.
"Basically, laser is a rifle, a plasma carronade is a shotgun, particle beam is a sniper rifle, gauss and rail guns are machineguns and masers and mesons are special-purpose weapons, though these are only crude comparisons, only for the purpose of illustrating their differences", she explained.

"I am most worried about these new missiles. What is to stop the Chinese from shooting few of them at our capitals?" Richardson asked.
"Nothing sir, and that's the way it is", Sinclair said from the side before Sheppard could answer.
"The missiles are too fast, way too fast for even computers to react", he continued.

The admirals looked at each other.

"So looks like MAD is back and with a vengeance", Hood muttered.

"Yes, I believe so", Sheppard answered and then continued: "We do not have any experts in the energy weapon field, so I would recommend that we focus on either rail or gauss guns, and missiles of course"

"Make it so", Richardson announced. "Make prototypes of both and we'll evaluate them for future use. Let's move to the next topic, the fleet doctrine"

Garfunkel:
2020-2021



"A-teen-HUT!" A scuffle of feet as the gathered officers snapped to their feet. Major General Charlene Taylor entered the auditorium and walked briskly to the front.

"Please be seated", the diminutive general said as she surveyed her audience. It was a significantly smaller crowd, if only because it included only the future commanding officers of the first wave of future PATO ground forces units. Seven Brigadiers and 28 colonels were keenly staring at her.

"Thank you for attending this meeting", Taylor started her presentation as an aide operated a computer.

"As you all know, the Pan-Oceanic Treaty Organization is going through a painful, if necessary, process of transformation and integration. Combined with the the radical changes in the civilian sector, this presents a challenging scenario for us ground pounders!" That brought her some grins.

"Now that the formation of our training and replacement units is nearing completion, it is time to move forward. The council has agreed that only former NATO countries were to be considered for the first wave of Trans-Newtonian upgrades. I am here now to tell you the details as the choices have been made and the decision is final. You are here because all of you are earmarked for command duty in the first wave of units to be formed. As the conventional US military is the backbone of the treaty organization, Pentagon has agreed that it does not take part in the first wave, to allow maintaining a believable and effective deterrent to potentially hostiles. For the same reason, the Eastern European countries are not participating." Many were nodding at this.

"The armies of Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece are busy enough handling the mess in North-Africa and Turkey is still fully committed to Syria, so they were delayed to later waves as well. Which shortened the list of options quite significantly. On the wall now you should see the full list of units to be re-trained and -equipped. Yes, we are indeed going back to divisional formations, though at first the brigade will be the largest operational one."



Taylor gave her audience few moments to observe the sheet in peace before she continued:

"The equipment for us is still being researched and designed, though some if has already entered progression. But basically we will have infantry brigades and armoured brigades. The boffins haven't made their minds up whether the tracked tank will be the mainstay or we're going for something more exotic, like hover tanks. Apparently that is indeed a possibility. In any case, a brigade will consist of four battalions. In the infantry brigades, these will be a mix of assault and mobile infantry battalions - think of them as the difference between mechanized and motorized infantry from back in the Cold War days. In contrast, the armoured brigades will have what is currently called the heavy assault battalions supported by combat engineers and infantry. Don't worry about the names too much, they were chosen more for the sake of tradition and esprit de corps than actual meaning", Taylor explained.

"The first wave will consist of three British divisions, two Canadian, two Dutch, two German and one Belgian division. We will start with the infantry battalions first, training them on our fancy new proving grounds. So brigadiers, do not expect your brigades to actually be fully formed any time soon. Now that we have gotten my introduction out of the way, the supply office will provide us with coffee and tea, after which personnel from my office will go over the organization of each type of battalion in more detail. Any questions?" Charlene did not expect any and she was correct.

***

The snowfall was light enough that it did not hinder visibility. Which was certainly a rare occasion in Alberta. CFB Suffield and especially the Suffield branch of Defence Research and Development Canada bureau had done their best to ensure that everything went smoothly in this all-important first weapons test for PATO. Engineers and technicians from both Patria and Dynetics were swarming around and, in some cases, literally over their respective platforms. The observation deck - a grandiose name for a raised wooden platform with only a tarpaulin walls and roof to give semblance of shelter from the elements - was packed with officers and bureaucrats.

Admiral Richardson listened to the lively discussion around him. The fact that the Patria weapon was twice as large as the Dynetic one had already caused many officers to side with the latter one. Being able to have an effective range of ten thousand kilometers, against the seven-and-a-half-thousand of Dynetic, had not turned the tide for Patria's favor. But the actual firing was about to commence. The debates died down as the managers of each team confirmed ready for the sustained firing test. A kilometer downrange, two massive canvas sheets had been erected. It was not supposed to be a competition but, as usual, it had turned into one.

The test director radioed the safety wardens to confirm that the hazard zone was clear and having received a satisfactory answer, announced the commencing of the demonstration. Both weapons fired. While the Patria weapon caused one tear to appear in its target sheet, the Dynetic one created four. Five seconds later, the Patria weapon barked again. And again. As it fired a fourth time, the Dynetic weapon joined it. 'A significant difference in the rate of fire', Richardson noted down. The weapons continued shooting at a steady rate, with no apparent degradation in accuracy. Eventually, the test director signaled the cease firing message and silence returned.

"Well, this was certainly informative, would you not say", Richardson asked the other admirals as he stood up. Late February in Canada was too cold for his tastes. "Let's move further discussion to somewhere warm, shall we?"

***

"So a gauss cannon can shoot every five seconds, while the rail gun shoots every fifteen seconds. The former can be turreted while the latter, due to its design requiring a long-enough straight platform for acceleration, cannot. Have I understood correctly?" Richard asked. Kate Sheppard nodded.

"But the rail gun fires four pellets, we call them that, but they are actually fairly large kinetic impactors, at the same time while gauss cannon fires just one projectile. If all four hit, they will cause significantly higher damage to the target", she explained.

"Then it seems clear to me", Rear-Admiral Takei interjected, "that the gauss cannons would be the ideal weapon for my command. Shooting down missiles requires high tracking speeds, for which turrets are ideal, whereas the damage potential of the rail gun would be less important".

"Whoever ends up captaining our future warships will likely take the opposite view", Vice-Admiral Woodcock said.

"So let's go with the gauss cannon first and take up this issue again when the design of warships becomes more urgent. PATO is still far from that stage", Admiral Richardson decided.

"Kate, any news relevant to my command?" Vice-Admiral Hood, commander of PADECO asked. The scientist nodded.

"We're working on a number of launcher systems at the moment, then we'll focus on engines, after which I'll get on with making you an actual missile, Admiral", she answered, to which Hood smiled. "Sounds good!"

"Bah, the only one of us with an actual, operational command and he's still hungry for more!" Rear-Admiral Schelleis complained good-naturedly.

***

The summer wind was balmy and Hanson was glad he had worn the light cotton suit. Watching Miss Colorado 2020 cut the ceremonial ribbon together with some local clown who made it big in Hollywood, the administrator fanned himself. The stress of the last few years had taken its toll on him, causing him to gain weight and he didn't want any paparazzi pictures where he was sweating, red faced. Luckily for him, the ceremony continued inside with drinks. The North Baxter Basin had been transformed into a modern complex, something between an airport and a railway station. This sleepy corner of Wyoming was about to become one of the busiest places on the planet. Sure, heavy cargo would go to orbit through the Mass Driver in Utah, but all personnel traffic would pass through here. Extension plans were ready but the council wanted to see how the initial Space Port fared before authorizing the funding for them. Hanson wasn't worried, as he sipped the champagne, through his dummy corporations he had invested into two separate US construction firms, which were likely to get a lions share of the contracts improving the I-80 and to transform the dusty little path of State road 43 into a multi-laned, properly paved artery feeding the port. The Rock Springs airport was already under extension, so that it could accept the big 747's and A380s that the Bureau of Colonization was expecting in few years. Rock Springs itself was already booming just from the amount of money the construction workers had poured in, and the town would never be the same - the Space Port would eventually employ as many people as lived in the town currently, around twenty-thousand, if Hanson's plans came to fruition. The governor of Wyoming, alongside the mayor of Rock Springs demanded his attention, wanting to shake hands for the press. He grimaced but managed to conjure a smile for the photographers.

***

The phone buzzed on Vice-Admiral Hood's desk. He answered it and immediately smiled when he recognized the voice of Kate Sheppard.

"I have good news for you, Admiral Hood"
"Please, just call me Michael"
"Uh, okay. Michael, we've finished testing the prototypes. Hellstone and Skybolt are both ready for mass production. BAE Systems is also ready with both the magazine and the launcher for Skybolt. I figured you would want to hear this personally", the scientist explained.
"Thank you Kate, I appreciate. In fact, as a show of my appreciation, how about I treat you for dinner tonight?"

Sheppard took a long time answering and Hood was getting apprehensive by the moment. Finally she responded:
"I guess that would be fine, thank you. I will see you later tonight then", she cut the line after saying that.

Hood stood up and walked outside of his office. His aide was going through paperwork, which he ceased immediately.
"Alert the design team, we have work to do. Oh and send my car to collect Miss Sheppard at eight tonight, will you?"

Garfunkel:
2022 - 2023



Hanson went over the projection again, hoping that he might have misread them before. Regardless of how many times he did so, the outcome was the same: converting all PATO industrial assets into TN-standards would not be completed before early 2024. He had ridden his managers and engineers hard, but there was only so much he could do. Annoyed, he was about to close his computer when a musical note informed him that an email had arrived.

"That son of a bitch", Hanson muttered as he read it. Pursing his lips, he quickly typed an answer. Vice-Admiral Hood wouldn't like it, but Hanson didn't feel like sugarcoating the message. There was no way in Hell he was going to divert industrial capability to building missiles for PADCOM at this stage of the largest industrial project the planet had ever seen.

***

"Okay, run me through our options", Rear-Admiral Takei told the group of engineers and managers from Patria. The pesky Finnish company had stunned the business world by managing to secure the contract for building gauss turrets, that would equip the first-generation orbital weapons platforms, designed to protect PATO from rogue missile attacks. China and Russia were both strongly condemning the project, but PATO was sticking to its plan.

"We can built a turret with a number of gauss guns in it, from one to four. Based on the requirements of your office, of a tracking speed above four thousand kliks per seconds, a single turret would weigh in at 400 tons, double turret at 800 tons, triple turret at 1.175 tons and a quad turret at 1.550 tons", the one wearing stereotypical engineer glasses explained.

"And is the number of guns just there for backup or can they target separate missiles?" Takei asked. The presenters glanced at each other.
"We, well, we are not certain, because we haven't been able to test this under real enough situations. It should be possible, if the missiles are very close to each other", another man put it.
"So if they are part of the same salvo, so to speak, a quad turret could possibly take out four missiles every five seconds", Takei clarified. All of them nodded. The admiral turned back to the brochure.
"What about armour?"
"We would have to use Neutronium for that and, as you know, it is very heavy. It would increase the weight significantly", the original speaker answered.

Takei pretended to take his time, but in reality he had made his decision already before the meeting - he had just wanted to see the Patria team face-to-face.

"Well then. PATO will purchase prototypes of the single and quad turrets. My design team will put the prototypes through their paces. I cannot say which one, or both", the Finns got a greedy look at that, "or even neither one, we'll end up going with. There are still a number of variables in the air", Takei said as he got up and shook hands with them.

***

Major-General Charlene Taylor stood on the raised podium, hand stiffly raised into a salute as men of the four battalions marched past her. Queen's Own Yeomanry, 1st and 2nd Battalions of Yorkshire Volunteers and 15th Battalion of the Parachute Regiment were the first four re-activated PATO battalions, equipped with the first version of powered armour and high-power kinetic rifles, firing 2mm teardrop-shaped slugs at super-sonic speeds. The British were obscenely proud that all four first battalions were technically theirs, so there had been no question of having the parade held in secret. Instead, the march took place in central Birmingham and thousands of curious onlookers had turned out. Taylor wondered how many foreign agents were hidden in the crowd, busy taking pictures and videos. Someone had already leaked some technical details of the equipment her troops were using, though luckily not enough of them, so for now PATO maintained its technical superiority over its two primary geopolitical rivals.

Finally the parade was over and Taylor retired to a sumptuous restaurant, together with the British and PATO officials and a number of politicians and diplomats for lunch. She managed to avoid answering most questions, keeping mum. But one thing she couldn't hide - the re-activation process was going strong and the next four battalions were to be Canadian, one actually French-speaking.

***

The shuttles launched mere minutes apart from Rock Springs, their destination the naval shipyard. Leaving the cool August winds of Colorado behind, the dignitaries enjoyed a surprisingly smooth ride to Low-Earth Orbit, where the immense structure awaited them - though some did feel the need to grab their sick bags as the effects of microgravity hit home. It already massed more than twice as much as the International Space Station, and it would grow far more rapidly. A lattice of thin structural beams snaked around the single slipyard, allowing workers to operate on a real 360 degree freedom, working at all angles simultaneously.

Many chuckled at the unimaginative nature of the military mind, when the name NAVAL-1 was announced. Hanson took the opportunity to point out that construction on a commercial yard was started as soon as NAVAL-1 had been finished, and how over a million new jobs had been created thanks to the cooperation of all PATO countries and his leadership. That fact alone was sufficient to silence all but the most hardened naysayers.

After several circles around the constructs, most guests were shuttled back to Earth, though a small number of VIPs grabbed the chance to don one of the new spacesuits and have a little "walk", marveling at the sight of their home planet, looming right below them. The new suits were a marvel of TN-engineering. Straight out of the pages of some old pulp sci-fi book, they were skintight, flexible, and the helmet was literally a "glass" bubble, allowing clear vision. In reality, the helmet was a composite alloy of several materials, both TN and mundane, and allowed wireless communications on multiple channels, while automatically dimming to protect the wearer from direct sunlight.

***

Navy Design Committee was a boring name for a group as groundbreaking and visionary as what it actually was, Richardson mused to himself. All senior commanders had made sure to be present when NDC unveiled the blueprints for the Orbital Weapon Platform 2024. That meant not only Admiral Richardson, but Vice-Admirals Hood and Woodcock, Rear-Admirals Takei and Schelleis, and Commodores Sophia Gibson and Samuel Ali. Gibson had two hats, leading both PADCOM Earth Corps and 1st Missile Division (MisDiv 1), while Ali led 2nd Missile Division (MisDiv 2). Both were ambitious and eager to move to space.

"It is very unfortunate that our colleague Patrick Spencer perished as he did. Not only did it delay our progress, we lost a truly brilliant mind when it came to sensors", Kate Sheppard opened the meeting. "But, life goes on. So without further ado, I'll pass the microphone to the good people of the Committee, so that they can dazzle us all with their brilliance!" A smattering of applause.

"We have two quite different designs for the Admiral to choose from. Preliminary, we're using the OWP24-designation for both. OWP24-A and -B, respectively for the light and heavy versions. Here is the specs for the A version:


--- Code: ---OWP24A class Orbital Weapon Platform 900 tons 35 Crew 90.8 BP TCS 18 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s Armour 2-8 Shields 0-0 Sensors 2/2/0/0 Damage Control Rating 1 PPV 8
Maint Life 11.85 Years MSP 63 AFR 6% IFR 0.1% 1YR 1 5YR 12 Max Repair 22 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Spare Berths 0


Single Patria Gauss Cannon R1-100 Turret (1x1) Range 10 000km TS: 4176 km/s Power 0-0 RM 1 ROF 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Aegis SPG-102 (1) Max Range: 30 000 km TS: 5000 km/s 67 33 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Raytheon SPD-103 (1) GPS 20 Range 1 000k km MCR 109k km Resolution 1
Honeywell SQR-105 (1) Sensitivity 2 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 2m km
Teledyne SAR-104 (1) Sensitivity 2.5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 2.5m km

This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
--- End code ---
At 900 tons, NAVAL-1 could start construction immediately. The crew of thirty-five is self-sufficient for about a month. It is not reliant on the big Oracle sensor, rather using its own SPD-103 to track missiles. Both the fire controls and the turret itself are future-proof, in that they can track missiles twice as fast as anything we currently have. Unfortunately we have no idea of the actual capabilities of Russia and China, but it's unlikely that they could be that much ahead of us. Now, the drawback is that this version is barely armoured at all, and it only has one gun. But it's cheap and should be fairly fast to construct. Moving on - "


--- Code: ---OWP24B class Orbital Weapon Platform 2 500 tons 81 Crew 229.6 BP TCS 50 TH 0 EM 0
1 km/s Armour 3-16 Shields 0-0 Sensors 2/2/0/0 Damage Control Rating 11 PPV 31
Maint Life 1.5 Years MSP 57 AFR 50% IFR 0.7% 1YR 28 5YR 427 Max Repair 83 MSP
Intended Deployment Time: 1 months Spare Berths 4


Quad Patria Gauss Cannon R1-100 Turret (1x4) Range 10 000km TS: 4053 km/s Power 0-0 RM 1 ROF 5 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Aegis SPG-102 (1) Max Range: 30 000 km TS: 5000 km/s 67 33 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Raytheon SPD-103 (1) GPS 20 Range 1 000k km MCR 109k km Resolution 1
Honeywell SQR-105 (1) Sensitivity 2 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 2m km
Teledyne SAR-104 (1) Sensitivity 2.5 Detect Sig Strength 1000: 2.5m km

--- End code ---
This design is classed as a Military Vessel for maintenance purposes
"Since the quad turret makes the B version so much heavier, we decided to increase the armour and design an actual damage control center. It's nothing amazing but this version could fix damaged system in minutes instead of hours. With four guns in a single turret, this one is theoretically four times as dangerous, when compared to the A version but it's also more than double in price and will take longer to construct. Worst thing is that due to its mass, NAVAL-1 will not be able construct them for at least a year, though could be as long as three years. Otherwise it's the same. Obviously we had to increase life support, so that the eighty-one crew members could be sustained for a month in the case of a shooting war."

Takei perked up at that point:
"What if you reduce that duration to, say, ten days and drop the armour level from three layers to two?"

"Not much of a help. It would go down to... let me calculate it... yeah, we'd save maybe two hundred tons. It's the turret sir, everything else is designed to support it. Well, the turret and the radar. Those are the big tickets, no way around them"

Richardson called the meeting to end:
"Thank you for this presentation. To get NAVAL-1 running, we'll go with the A model for now and switch to the B model once possible. We need the experience of both building these and training in them. Remember that we are literally stumbling in the dark here, people"

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