Long-time reader Prunella Farquar suggests, and not for the first time, the topic of ‘Airplane food’. Her continued interest in this topic suggests that there may be cosmic significance to this topic. And I am highly suggestible.
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Captain Qirm strode into his staff room holding a sealed envelope emblazoned with a deep red “Most Secret” label. His hastily-assembled executive officers immediately ceased their conversations and turned their attention to him.
“At ease. I just returned from an emergency meeting with Admiral Drymn,” Qirm began. “I can’t tell you all the details yet, but here is what you need to know right now. Two hours ago long-range EM sensors detected what appears to be the orbital bombardment of a small planet four hundred light years from here, in sector 5530. From the signature of the weapons, it looks like an attack by the Bigbellies.”
“As you know, sector 5530 is far beyond our frontier in that quadrant. It’s completely unexplored space. We have no idea why the Bigbellies would attack this planet. We’re being sent to sector 5530 to find out. We’re the closest unit. I want the ship battle-ready and prepared for a jump to megahypersupertrans warp in two hours.”
“If this was detected from beyond the frontier, via EM, then that must mean that the attack took place nearly four hundred years ago. So why the rush? Would it be more prudent to wait for reinforcements before jumping that far into an uncharted sector where there might be Bigbellies?” asked the tactical officer.
“I can’t tell you the reason, but headquarters believes that there is something very important about this attack. That’s why we leave immediately. But we won’t be alone for long. Five battle groups from the Glorb system, commanded by Admiral Drymn himself, will join us as soon as possible,” the Captain answered.
“The Glorbians will be able to reach 5530 in just a little over three weeks,” remarked the navigation officer, performing a quick bit of arithmetic in her head. “Their ships are very fast, and their refractory period between jumps is minimal. They’ll only be a few days behind us.”
“No,” the Captain responded. “That’s the bad news. They’ll be at least three weeks behind us.” Puzzled looks were exchanged around the table. “This mission has top priority, and I know it’s going to be hard on everyone, but we’re making this trip in one jump. The Admiral was clear on this. We need the answers with utmost speed. At 17:00 I want a jump plotted that will take us within three parsecs of the planet, assuming there’s anything left of it. The orbital calculations are already downloaded to your nav systems. Put us on the other side of its star. At 17:15 we’ll jump.”
“We’ll be in warp for at least thirty-six consecutive hours, sir,” commented the navigator.
“Then we better make sure everyone has a good meal before we leave,” growled the XO. “We’re damn sure not going to eat in warp. You know what happens to food during warp.”
The Captain nodded. “You all know what to do. Tell the crew this is important. This is one of the longest jumps ever made, but it could save a lot of lives. I’ll brief you on the details of the mission during the trip. Dismissed.”
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Captain Qirm breathed a sigh of relief when Admiral Drymn’s battle groups winked into existence in formation around his ship. In a matter of minutes, Qirm was standing in front of the Admiral to give his report.
“Captain, I expect that your crew deserves commendations for their brave and arduous journey. The paperwork can wait, but for now, they can get some sleep and let the Glorbians take over. Now, tell me what you’ve learned.”
“As we surmised, the planet was inhabited before the attack. The inhabitants were unusual–a species we haven’t seen anywhere else. We haven’t been able to learn much about them, and what we have learned just raises more questions.”
“Tell me what you know. What happened here?”
“The planet was attacked by orbital bombardment. Almost certainly by Bigbelly weapons–even though the impact craters are four hundred years old, they’re an exact match for what we’ve seen from more recent attacks. The planet was wiped clean, virtually sterilized. There was no ground invasion, from what we can tell. No Bigbelly technology left behind on the surface, in any case. They bombarded the planet and then left. Why don’t know why. There is little of strategic or economic value here.”
“Did the inhabitants put up a fight?”
“That’s less certain. There are traces of unnatural background radioactivity, and the ozone layer has been removed from most of the atmosphere. We also found traces of chlorofluorocarbons, benzene, and complex aromatic polymers. Lots of them, actually. This suggests that they had some sort of poison-based ground defense. But they probably never had a chance to use it.”
“Good lord. Not even the Bigbellies are savage enough to use hydrocarbon-based or fission weapons. Not even them.”
“There’s something more. And you need to understand that this is much less certain. We’re piecing together data from a planet that was reduced to little more than a cinder hundreds of years ago. We have restored some of their data archives, but the information seems too strange to be true.”
“Noted. Now tell me what you’ve found.”
“Admiral, most of the inhabitants of this planet were peaceful species similar to those found on our own worlds. But not all of them. The dominant species–which we have not identified–genetically engineered a giant bipedal fighting creature that they used to fight their wars. These creatures were extremely belligerent and stood, in some cases, nearly two meters tall.”
“Two meters? Did I hear you correctly?”
“Yes. It would take our largest freighter just to carry the fossilized remains of one of them back to Eqir for study. And there were billions of them on this planet. Literally billions.”
“It boggles the mind.”
“And there’s more, Admiral. They were preparing some sort of transportation vessel for these creatures. I’ve seen the schematics, and the scale is hard to believe. They were capable of transporting hundreds of these monsters, along with their equipment. Hundreds. And they had unmistakable wings and fins. These weren’t just space ships. These were designed to travel within an atmosphere.”
“Landing craft.”
“That’s our guess. They called them ‘airplanes’. These vessels could transport hundreds of these creatures and then land, almost without warning, on the surface of a planet.”
“I can see why the Bigbellies might have considered them a threat.”
“There’s one other thing, and this is the strangest yet. But the evidence, even though it’s difficult to believe, is hard to refute. These vessels were equipped with mechanisms that allowed their passengers to consume food while traveling at top speed.”
“Hard to believe, indeed. How did they do it?”
“We don’t understand the technology. But we believe it’s true. They didn’t have to stop to eat. That’s the important thing. They had food on the airplanes. They could feed without stopping.”
“So they could enter warp, stay there as long as it took to reach any location in the galaxy, or perhaps beyond, pop out just above the atmosphere of an inhabited planet, and their monstrous shock troops could be on the ground moments later.”
The Admiral shook his head and paused.
“Just between the two of us, I think the Bigbellies did us a favor here. Airplane food. The ultimate tactical advantage. Ingenious, but inhuman.”
