THREE

 

 

Over the next five years, the Rescue One went from a military-based rescue operation to a full-fledged science ship. West had remained as Chairman on request, a request that Chairman Ward had gladly granted.

And Chairman Ward had put West in charge of the overall mission. All ship’s chairmen reported to him.

Entire parts of Rescue One were being reconfigured into research labs to study the empty space bubble holding the Dreaming Large mother ship.

Admiral Cline had taken all his military ships and headed back to help out at the last seeded galaxy with upcoming wars between developing human planets.

The fleet of scout ships they had brought with them all scattered out to do what they do, scout ahead, map galaxies and spot trouble galaxies that had the occasional growing alien race.

Almost every day another science ship arrived at Rescue One and took a location either in space near Rescue One or on one of the large decks where the military ships and scout ships had once been housed.

Almost fifty smaller science ships had now surrounded the small bubble of empty space, studying it, trying to see inside it.

Every Seeder’s ship now had the scanning ability to see and avoid empty space bubbles, something that West had no doubt would save ships from losing thousands and thousands of years.

Now they just had to figure out a way to get the Dreaming Large out of there in under a few thousand years.

Every day Chairman West had a meeting with the four top science advisors to get reports on any progress. They usually met for breakfast in his own kitchen in his apartment, taking turns cooking and cleaning and talking about the problem.

All four were Chairman of their own major science ships.

It was right before one meeting, about six months after they had figured out where Dreaming Large was, that West came up with an idea. He had been sitting at his kitchen counter, staring at a surface rendering of the patterns on the border of the empty space and he suddenly saw it a different way.

They had been working to find a way to shield themselves from the effects of the empty space, go in and shield Dreaming Large as well. What would happen if they just drained the empty space out into normal space?

Or better yet, filled empty space with normal space.

In essence, they needed to pop the bubble, leaving the Dreaming Large surprised at all the company it suddenly had around it.

The four scientists loved that idea and after the meeting, West contacted Chairman Ward and told him about it to get scientists in numbers of galaxies working on the problem as well.

It took seven more years to find the solution.

Seven very long and frustrating years.

Now West stood on the bridge of the Rescue One yet again, sixteen years after he had agreed to join this project, ready to try to finally release Dreaming Large.

As everyone had been warned, no one on Dreaming Large would even realize they had been in trouble. As far as those on board the giant mother ship knew, only a few seconds had transpired since they entered empty space and their trans-warp drives had suddenly shut down.

If what Rescue One and all the other ships were about to do worked, the hundreds and hundreds of ships that now swarmed the area would suddenly just appear to those on Dreaming Large.

If it worked.

And if the forces didn’t pull Dreaming Large apart.

Chairman Ward and others had said that the giant mother ships were designed to withstand plowing into planets and going right on through. Ward wasn’t worried about that at all.

But West was.

They had calculated the trajectory where Dreaming Large had entered the empty space bubble and cleared every ship out of the way where it would be headed.

What they were going to try to do was in essence take the pressure of empty space away by opening not just one, but thousands of holes in it all at once. Just as firefighters did to a burning structure under pressure. They opened many outlets instead of just one.

The scientists a few years back had determined exactly what strange gravitational force was holding empty space together like a bubble, allowing a ship to enter and leave, yet holding the space together.

And once they had determined that force, they knew how to puncture the force to not so much let empty space out, but to let regular space and time flood in.

The entire bubble should, the scientists had told West, just vanish as if it had never existed.

West could only hope.

“Report status,” West said to all the ships around the bubble ready to send a hundred probes each to open up holes.

A moment later Korgan looked up at him and nodded. “All eighty ships report green, Chairman.”

West nodded, staring at the big screen in front of him showing nothing but empty space.

“Mission go,” West said.

West knew that once he said that, a computer program from Rescue One would launch all probes at the exact same moment from all ships. West had been told that the probes would have a small charge when they hit the membrane, so it would look like eight thousand tiny lights flashing at the same time in a sphere shape in open space.

“Five seconds,” Korgan said.

Intense, heavy silence filled the bridge of the ship.

West had no doubt not one word was being said anywhere in the large fleet of ships surrounding the empty space bubble.

West could not take his gaze for a second away from the massive screen in front of him.

Suddenly, there was a white flash of light from what looked like the surface of a sphere.

Then a moment later, the massive mother ship Dreaming Large appeared.

Cheering erupted around the bridge.

West just stood there grinning, staring at the screen, knowing that finally, after sixteen years, he would get to see his wife’s face again. And maybe a little later actually hug her and kiss her.

After a moment, Korgan, a smile almost splitting his face, turned to West. “I have two chairmen of the Dreaming Large asking just what the hell is going on?”

West just smiled right back at Korgan. “Tell them to contact Chairman Ward and let him explain.”

Then, for seemingly the first time in sixteen years, he went and sat down in his Chairman’s chair.

And then on a private channel he said to Rescue One, “Please contact my wife on Dreaming Large and put her through to my personal screen here.”

“I will be glad to, Chairman,” Rescue One said.

“Thank you,” he said.

And then, for the first time in sixteen years, he took a deep breath and relaxed.