Chapter No.9 Home Coming

Home is where the heart is.

I arrived on the command deck and found Molly already at the navigational station, and Judy at the helmsman station.

"We dropped out of warp," Molly said.

"Yeah, I know. I could feel it. How far out are we?"

"Approximately a billion kilometers, but we're moving at half the speed of light."

"I am decelerating, Jason," Judy said.

"How long till we're in Earth orbit?" I asked.

"Seven hours, fourteen minutes, and twenty two seconds."

I didn't expect that precise of an estimate.

I sat down near Molly. "Can you see anything yet?"

"At this distance, Earth is just a pale blue dot. Magnification shows the Earth pretty much the same as it was, but I'm sure it's been altered."

She displayed the image on her screen. The round blue sphere was coated with swirling white clouds. Image blur prevented making out anything on the land masses.

"We'll have to get closer to see anything." I turned to Judy. "When we get there, put us in a minimal safe orbit."

"Yes, Jason."

"I'm going down to engineering to check on how well our warp engines survived."

Molly gave me a cursory nod before going back to her scans of Earth.

When I arrived at the engineering deck, I found Queen at the main control station.

"Where are you partners?" I asked her.

"They're upgrading the antimatter production assembly, Jason."

I sat down near her. "I have a question. Why did Ellen suffer a continuous loop error?"

"She developed an inclusion of her positronic transmitters. It's a rare event but predicted by quantum entanglement."

"I wasn't aware of that possibility."

"Yet, you were able to reverse the effect."

"I could see the loop's effect and was able to reboot the affected circuit."

"That is the most efficient correction method."

I didn't know that. I just did it without thinking about it.

Vanessa and Lori appeared from an inner chamber.

"Hi, Jason," Lori said.

"Hello," I replied with a slight grin. "What were you two gals up to?"

"We made improvements to the antimatter production unit, Jason," Lori replied. "We will be able to convert protons to anti-protons at a twenty six percent quicker rate than before."

"How are we coming with Molly's conversion?" I asked.

"We have constructed the new rotating antimatter mix chamber," Vanessa said. "We are still working on the micro-sphere coupling units."

"Wouldn't it be more efficient if you had more help down here?"

"We will do whatever you ask, Jason," Queen said without batting an eye.

"I wasn't making a request. I was simply asking for your opinion," I said.

"We would be more efficient if we had two additional members," Queen said.

"Make it so," I said, gesturing with my hand.

I left them to their work and joined Molly on the Command deck.

She pointed at an image of Earth on her screen. "I'm not seeing any lights on the night side of Earth."

"That's not a good sign."

"I've also begun scans of all radio frequencies and quantum channels. So far, they are silent."

I shook my head. "Well, I suppose we had better not jump to any conclusions this soon. Maybe power is not readily available on Earth. We'll soon find the truth."

That didn't sound too encouraging, but it was probably the reality of this situation.

I went to my quarters to relax. As soon as I sat down in an easy chair of my living area, Alice and Ellen brought me a beer and pretzels.

I took a bite of a pretzel and smiled. "These are good. I didn't realize that we had anything like this."

"We made them just for you, Jason," Ellen said. "We are pleased that you were able to revive me."

"I'm sure that Alice could have helped you."

"We are unable to repair ourselves, Jason," Ellen said.

"Are you telling me that if you have a failure like you did, you are unable to repair the fault?"

"Yes, Jason."

I rubbed my face. That was mind boggling.

"Well, I'm happy that I could help you."

They smiled.

I didn't quite know how to take this. Was this the reason they kept me alive? Why am I the only one able to do this trick? It didn't make sense.