Ep.#15 - "That Which Other Men Cannot Do" (The Frontiers Saga) by Ryk Brown

admiral turned back to Ensign Tillardi. “Good work, Ensign. What about the jump missile project?”
    “That one is a bit trickier,” Ensign Tillardi said. “The Jung missiles are smaller than ours, so there is less room for the jump drive. Our plan is to reduce the size of the propellant tank enough to house the mini-jump drive and energy storage. However, because of the space limitations, we can only fit a single energy cell. Unfortunately, they will only have a jump range of about three million kilometers. That means the attacking ship will have about ten seconds after jumping in to get those missiles locked on target, launched, and jumping toward their target, before the target detects the attacking ship’s presence and goes to general quarters and raises her shields.”
    “Will shields stop those missiles?” Cameron asked.
    “A few of them, even the nukes, yes. The battleships, definitely. It would take at least eight simultaneous nukes hitting the same shield segment at once to bring one of their shields down. Even more for a battle platform. A lot more.”
    “What if you reduce the propellant storage even more?” the admiral asked.
    “There’s barely enough left over to make final course corrections between arrival and impact as it is,” Tilly explained. “The Jung missiles are smaller because a lot of their acceleration is provided by their launchers. They only burn for about fifteen seconds after launch. The remaining propellant is used for course corrections.”
    “Can you strap the energy cells on the outside of the missiles?” Nathan wondered.
    “Yes, but then we’d have to completely revamp the launchers, as they’re made to launch the missiles as designed. And we were planning on pulling stock launchers to outfit the Aurora and the Celestia. Two from the Jar-Benakh and one from each frigate.”
    “Can they spare them?” Cameron asked.
    “We’ve got eight of them,” Captain Roselle said. “I think we can spare a couple, especially if the impact percentage will be higher. We won’t need to fire as many at a time.”
    Admiral Dumar sighed impatiently. “Is this a viable concept or not, Ensign?”
    “Yes, sir, I believe it is.”
    “How soon will you know?”
    “We’re using components left over from the jump KKV prototypes, so it shouldn’t take us more than a couple of weeks to get the prototypes ready for testing. Three weeks at the most.”
    “I prefer the least,” Dumar replied flatly, one eyebrow raised.
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Miss Ta’Akar?” the admiral said, looking to Deliza next, seated next to Ensign Tillardi.
    “The final modifications to Falcon One have been completed, and yesterday’s initial test flights were a success. We did uncover some minor modifications that need to be made, but nothing that will put us behind schedule. We’ll be doing more test flights over the next few days, but in the meantime, we will be proceeding with the modifications of the remaining Falcons. We believe that we will be able to get a total of eight Super Falcons operational. The last two will require the acquisition of additional engines. Captain Navarro has his people working on that back in the Pentaurus cluster.”
    “Perhaps he can find some more on Palee?” Dumar suggested.
    Deliza shook her head. “Doubtful, between your first buying spree and the follow-up ones my father’s people made, Palee has been picked clean. We’ll probably have to head further out.”
    “I’m sure Navarro will find something,” Admiral Dumar said. “What about the Super Eagle program?”
    “The first prototype should be ready in a little over a week.”
    Admiral Dumar looked at President Scott, silently requesting an answer.
    “The Eagle plant will be operational in three weeks,” the president said.
    Deliza looked at President Scott, then at Admiral Dumar at the opposite end of the table, her eyes wide with shock. “Admiral, we haven’t finished the computer simulations yet.”
    “It