SFSTORY: HMS Golden Lance #18 - Velocity

Two beings, one cybernetic and the other flesh and blood, paced the corridors of the HMS Golden Lance, one figuratively and the other literally, as they pondered the fates of their lost comrades. The two beings were, by the way, the VAL 9000 computer and Doctor Bing Von Spleen, inventor of the Automatic Beet-Peeler and Sub-Atomic Re- Integrator and, coincidentally, the designer of said computer.

The adventurers Time Agent 357, Diana Dark, Ralph, and Omegas were lost in time, space, and pretty much every other way imaginable. Video playback had shown Omegas and Ralph constructing some sort of device which 357 then activated (though probably accidentally). Sensor logs showed that the device just might just have indeed successfully returned their four minds to their own bodies (reversing an earlier switch) before the device exploded. The explosion just might have blown them, singly or as a group, into another dimension or reality altogether. They were literally nowhere to be found. Not even Diana's Student Loan Officer had been able to track her down. That was, in Spleen's mind, the very definition of the word "lost."

=What are we going to do?= wailed the VAL 9000 computer. =I just don't know how I can go on without 357. We've been together forever!=

"Calm down!" hissed Spleen testily. "We'll find them eventually, or they'll find their way back here. These things just happen from time to time. For the nonce, however, we've got to continue our random walk through the cosmos to keep ahead of Greez Hyperiok. We've wasted too much time in this reality already, what with contacted Diana's Student Loan Officer and ordering pizza and all. Get moving."

=Sniff,= sniffed VAL. =All right. Random walk continues.=

No sooner had the ship bounced into the next reality before alarms started to sound. "Dare I ask for a status report?" Spleen asked.

=Sensors indicate an alien device attached to the hull near the ventral plasma vents,= VAL announced. =Say, why do I have ventral plasma vents when the plasma inducer is on the dorsal side?=

"Because 'dorsal plasma vent' just doesn't have a ring to it. What type of alien device?"

=Some type of sensor package, a lot of decision circuitry, and a whole lot of PU-238 explosives!=

"Well, get some more readings! We have to figure out how to get rid of it. Jettison that section of hull plating or something..."

=The device is reacting to the scans! It's sending some kind of video signal. On screen...=

On screen, the visage of renegade Time Agent Greez Hyperiok appeared. In the background was the control room of the S.S. You Are About To Die, which looked to be made of modeling clay and pipe cleaners and designed by a small child, as did the rest of the ship. This belied the fact that the ship was possibly the most powerful destructive force ever known to sentient life, created for Greez Hyperiok by Doctor Spleen's ABPSARII, or Automatic Beet-Peeler and Sub-Atomic Re- integrator Mark II, which sat in the corner beeping and buzzing and contentedly and generally looking nothing at all like a food or sub- atomic processing device.

Farther in the background, just behind a waste disposal cannister with an Interstellar Huddle of Waffles logo on it, was Dijon Mu'tard, former SAAL, or Satanic Agent At Large, and current toady to Greez Hyperiok. Despite the fact that he appeared to be strapped to a large torture rack, Mu'tard still took the time to make several rude hand gestures towards the camera. Doctor Spleen could not decide if they were directed at the crew of the HMS Golden Lance or at Greez Hyperiok's back. Not, Spleen supposed, that it mattered.

"Time Agent 357!" shouted the recorded image of Greez Hyperiok. "If you are receiving this message, it means that you've paused in one alterverse long enough for one of my limpet mines to find you and bond with your ship's hull. Do not try to jettison that section of hull plating or any of the other ideas you've no doubt come up with by now! Any attempt to get rid of or defuse the mine will result in your ship being immediately destroyed!"

Greez paused to gloat, then continued. "This mine is very special. Very special indeed. For you see, it measures the velocity of the ship to which is attached. If you vary from your present course or speed by more than 5%, it will explode. And don't think you can escape by going interdimensional. If you try to make more than one dimensional hop an hour, the mine will explode. The payload is ten gallons of New Coke and another ten of 7up. When they mix, the resulting cola/uncola reaction will produce an explosion large enough to destroy a small planet."

Greez paused again, this time to cackle maniacally. "You'd better choose those little course corrections carefully, 357! You're going to have to stay in each universe for at least an hour before you can hop out! Eventually, you'll have to choose between flying into something or hopping too soon. And don't try to abandon ship, because the mine will detect anybody trying to leave. In any case, ka-boom!"

Greez paused yet again, this time to indicate the bound form of Dijon Mu'tard behind him. Dijon stopped making with the hand gestures when he saw Greez pointing his way. "My associate here feels that this plan is entirely too complex and needlessly dramatic. He thinks that I should just have the ABPSARII blow you up and be done with it! He has no imagination. That's why I'm a supervillian and he's just a toady. Bwahahahahaha!"

Greez stared straight out of the screen. "You're dead, Time Agent 357! And with you gone, there's nothing to stop me from ruling the entire multiverse! Game over!"

The signal cut off.

"The man is utterly mad," announced Doctor Spleen.

=We're fighting a lunatic,= the VAL 9000 computer agreed.

"That limpet mine can't possibly be all he says it is, can it?"

=I'm afraid my scans confirm that it is, Doctor. I wish 357 were here. He'd know what to do.=

"Hmm," hmmed Spleen. "Let me think..."

Spleen thought. He figured. He considered. He consulted. He calculated. He cyphered. He even briefly conjugated.

In the mean while, the VAL 9000 did her very best to maintain a constant course and speed, using the ABPSARI drive to make dimensional hops only when absolutely necessary. So far, she had managed to avoid hitting anything. Twice, she had been forced to use the Golden Lance's energy beam, also called the Golden Lance, to blast small asteroids. Once, she had steered right through a planet. However, this was in an alterverse where all planets were made out of whipped cream, so there was no damage other than to the paint job. Whipped cream turns out to be rather corrosive in a vacuum.

=Doctor, I hope you've got an idea!= VAL 9000 announced with just a minor hint of panic in her voice.

"Um, maybe," he lied. "Just need a few more minutes to work out some minor details. Why?"

=Because this alterverse we've just randomly bounced into is only a few hundred light-years in diameter. At our current velocity, we'll actually run into the edge of the universe in less than 10 minutes!=

Doctor Spleen's response was, unfortunately, unprintable.

=I will not!= cried Val. =Besides, that's physically impossible.=

"Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit drinking," Spleen mumbled to himself as he entered the control room.

=You never quit drinking!=

Spleen raised his hand to make an obscene gesture at the nearest internal security camera, but the quick motion almost caused him to spill his beer, so he let the matter drop.

"Okay, I have a plan," he announced, punching buttons on a control panel with a confidence faked almost to the point of believeability. "Transit to this alterverse immediately!"

=But, Doctor!= Val protested. =If we transit now, the mine will explode and we'll all be killed!=

"You won't be killed. You're not even alive. Now transit already! I can see the end of the universe from here!"

With the electronic equivalent of a gulp, the VAL 9000 complied.

In an alterverse not all that far away when you consider just how many alterverses there are in the multiverse, but pretty darn far away if you had to walk barefoot, a medium-sized, human-looking male being wearing impossibly expensive but utterly ridiculous-looking clothes, taupe sports jacket over mauve trousers, sat at a control panel. His name was Dijon Mu'tard, former agent of darkness and currently toady for a power-mad dictator, one Greez Hyperiok. He hoped to change that shortly, as Greez Hyperiok was pretty sucky as far as power-mad dictators go, and power-mad dictators go pretty far in that direction.

Dijon's job was to monitor the monitor panel which was monitoring the limpet mines that Greez had seeded through the multiverse. Like all other sentient beings who had ever been assigned to monitor duty, Dijon was certain that he was wasting his time, comfortable in the knowledge that he was monitoring this monitor panel for no good reason. There was absolutely no chance that Time Agent 357 would stay in one alterverse long enough for any of the limpet mines to find him.

Due to this, Dijon was sound asleep when the monitor panel started beeping, buzzing, and generally trying to get his attention. After several minutes, the monitoring panel gave up the beeping and buzzing and simply sent a cybernetic signal to Dijon's chair that simply dumped him onto the deckplates.

Dijon staggered to his feet and signalled Greez.

"This had better be good, Dijon!" Greez bellowed as he stalked into the control room. "I was just gaining the trust of my Anterean killer marmosets. They'll make perfect pets once I've taken over."

Dijon, noticing the many bite and claw marks on Greez's hands and face, declined to comment. Instead, he simply indicated the monitor panel that he had been monitoring.

+---------------------------------------------------+
|                                                   |
|   Limpet Mine #326 ceased transmitting at 0235    |
|   local time.  Last recorded message indicated    |
|   that it was priming to detonate.  Therefore,    |
|   the target has most likely been destroyed.      |
|                                                   |
|                   HAVE A NICE DAY!                |
|                                                   |
+---------------------------------------------------+

"Excellent!" exclaimed Greez. "This simplifies everything!"

Doctor Bing Von Spleen opened his eyes and let out a breath he hadn't realized that he'd been holding. He looked around, half-expecting to see fluffy clouds, large Pearly Gates, and a grumpy angel named Peter. He didn't. He was instead still aboard the HMS Golden Lance, which had decidedly not exploded into little bitty pieces. This, he decided, was a good thing.

"Val? You still there?" he asked tentatively.

There was no answer. In fact, a glance at the nearest control panel showed that the question hadn't even started processing yet. In fact, the computer function monitor lights, which normally blinked so rapidly that they were an invisible blur, were instead moving in a stately waltz. Spleen counted out the seconds as a set of lights moved across the panel, did some calculations, and decided that electrical impulses were moving at approximately one trillionth their normal rate. Organic beings appeared to be unaffected.

Doctor Spleen quietly congratulated himself on calculating the exact particular alterverse (alternate universe) that he needed today. He celebrated by grabbing himself a beer from the nearest cooling unit. He chuckled quietly when he noticed that the light in the cooling unit hadn't even come on in the time he had the door held open. He walked down the corridor whistling a happy tune.

By the time he reached the airlock, Spleen was no longer whistling a happy tune. He was instead cursing steadily with every breath. Every door had to be cycled open manually. Several rooms and corridors were completely dark, the automatic sensors not even beginning to detect his presense before he had bumped, tripped, and staggered his way through them. Cranking open the airlock took several subjective hours, though of course the clock on the wall never moved.

Moving in slow motion, because building up any type of momentum in zero gravity was generally a bad idea, Spleen made his way along the hull of the HMS Golden Lance. He eventually made his way to the limpet mine. He unhooked a sophisticated and very fragile portable scanning device.

Spleen then used the scanning device to bash open the cover of the mine. He carefully unscrewed the two ten gallon containers and shoved them away from the ship, New Coke one way, 7up the other. After that, it was only a matter of time before he unmelded the device from the hull and sent it spinning off in yet another direction. By his calculations, the three would not meet up again for thousands of years. He hoped to be gone by then.

Reversing his direction, Spleen carefully made his way back inside the ship. He reached the engine room and punched in a series of commands which would bypass the central computer and initiate an immediate ABPSARI burn which would transport the ship into another alterverse. Spleen popped open another beer and waited for the control signals to reach the ABPSARI.

"7... 6... 5... 4... 3..."

The ABPSARI kicked in and the ship was transported.

"2... Why do we even bother with countdowns?"

=Doctor Spleen!= came the voice over the ship's speakers. =What happened? My sensors show that the limpet mine is gone!=

"It's a long story. You see, organic and inorganic electrical impulses travel at different rates. I calculated that..."

=Oops! No time for that now! The temporal teleporter terminal just came online. We're receiving a transmission!=

What kind of transmission?
What alterverse are they in now?
Will Doctor Spleen ever be able to finish his explaination?

When life hands you lemons, make cornbread. And tune in next week for another exciting episode of... SFSTORY!

Copyright 2006 by Troy H. Cheek. Free to read, but please reprint only with permission.