Praetonia
28-07-2006, 21:09
The Commonwealth Realm of New Uxbridge
Sir Gregory Thatcher shivered. It was always bloody cold on this godforsaken scrap of rock. He breathed into his cupped black-gloved hands in attempt to jumpstart the blood flow. The exhaled breath rose like a mist before him, partially obscuring the huge construct that loomed up above him him. In the distance, he could see soldiers patrolling in pairs. Their bayonets were fixed but their eyes were far from keen. Instead, they were huddling into their greatcoats and rubbing their thickly-gloved hands together in some vein attempt to keep warm. Beyond them he could see a Sovereign-class battleship breaking her way slowly through the ice-capped seas. Her deck was bejewelled with ice and her guns glittered in the fading sunlight. The sight was quite beautiful, but Sir Gregory did not dwell on it. Instead, he lit a cigarette.
Held up by dozens of steel-strutted supports, the cylindrical craft loomed over him. He had once, on his first visit to the Quartz site, walked into its shadow. The cloaking darkness that suddenly enveloped him was something he would never forget as long as he lived. He had visited the site more than a dozen times now, and yet he still did not understand how the vehicle was kept from falling over. The thing weighed more than 5,000 tonnes, and was propelled by nuclear pulse detonation. Thermonuclear bombs would be ejected from the spacecraft and explode beneath a pushing plate which he saw before him a disc of solid titanium carbide a metre thick and fifty wide. It would be the largest single launch into space ever conducted by Praetonia. If it worked.
If it worked, it would be a national marvel. On Industry Day each year children would make papier-mâché models to be displayed alongside Iron Duke kits and model factories and dockyards in assembly. It would be a testament to Praetonian technological and industrial expertise.
He inhaled another puff of smouldering nicotine. He didn't want to contemplate what would happen if it didn't. It could bring down the government. He shivered again, even though he was now quite warm. Whatever the risks, the navy needed it. The nation needed it. And he must do his duty before his King and his Country above all else, transcending politics. At least, that's what the Prime Minister insisted upon barking at the Cabinet at every opportunity.
"Bloody fool," he muttered to himself, shaking his head. Sir Gregory shivered again, and decided to turn his attention back to the assorted military personnel wandering around. Most of these people, he thought to himself, had no idea what was going on, no idea why their task was important, or even if it was important, and yet they stood out here in the freezing cold patrolling against a threat that would never materialise day-in, day-out, not allowed to even write a letter home until the project was over, at which point they would be scattered across the Commonwealth in a thousand different regiments they had never heard of before. And at the end of every day they would al gather round and sing 'God Save the King' or 'Onward marches Liberty' or 'Oh Glorious Commonwealth' with genuine joy on their faces. He knew he couldn't do it.
"Sir Gregory?" A voice inquired behind him.
The Knight quickly threw his cigarette to the ground and crushed it underfoot. "Yes what?" He snapped, his voice as icy as his surroundings.
"The, err, launch is imminent, Sir." He was always annoyed when people caught him smoking - it 'showed weakness', he said, although never where anyone could hear him. His anger soon melted when he saw the ever-jolly Captain Samuel Darlington cautiously indicating his staff car.
"I'll be along in just a minute." Darlington nodded, adjusting his pistol holster and crossbelt nervously. His khaki uniform jarred with the surroundings, and he was beginning to regret not wearing his greatcoat.
Quartz Programme Subterranean Control Centre
"Welcome to our humble home, Sir Gregory!" The base commander, Admiral Sir Thomas Arlington, took the Secretary of State's hand. He was met with an icy stare from Sir Gregory.
"This facility alone cost His Majesty's Exchequer more than a billion Praefelis. One should be forced to conclude that your home is anything but humble, Sir Thomas."
The Admiral ignored this remark. "Are you pleased with our progress, Secretary of State? As you know construction has been completed on schedule and we shall be ready for launch imminently. Just a few last minute checks and..." He tailed off. Sir Gregory did not appear interested in the slightest. Instead, he had sat down in Sir Thomas's chair and begun to consume a mug of tea. He was also looking with mild interest at the large LCD screens dotted around the room that were currently displaying camera feeds of the craft from various different angles.
"What kind of response do you anticipate from the Greenies?" Sir Gregory grunted in question.
"Well... we expect some repercussions at least. Launching a spacecraft with an atomic bomb is bound to cause some, ahem, mutterings, but I doubt the enviro-loons have any real ability to gain access to this base, as I believe has been shown..."
"Yes. Yes I think we can all agree on that." During Sir Gregory's last visit, a boat full of environmental protestors turned up and attempted to ram the PWS Lord Chancellor, a Royal Sovereign-class ship and flagship of the New Uxbridge Fleet Group. The Captain of the Lord Chancellor responded by ordering the secondary gunners to fire a warning shot, but orders were confused and instead A turret fired two of her 27.5" guns at the 36m craft. Very little of the wreckage was ever recovered and it was assumed there were no survivors. The navy promptly staged a cover-up in order to protect the project from political repercussions.
"Other than that, we are attempting to minimise and localise the damage." The Secretary of State's eye's flashed with anger and the Admiral quickly added, "Not for their sake, of course, but for the sake of the base. We have installed electromagnets which should cause most of the plutonium fragments to land in the sea. Not that there will be many, of course. This particular bomb uses very little fissile..." Sir Gregory had clearly stopped listening again. "There is of course the international response to consider," the Admiral, began, hoping to grab the Secretary of State's attention once more.
"And that would be my concern." The Admiral stayed silent for the next half hour, until a buzz of radio chatter came through from the Incident Ground Station near the rocket.
"We're almost ready to launch, Sir Gregory."
"Go right ahead."
The rocket, although the largest, most complex and most technologically and financially demanding of Praetonia's space programmes, carried the symbol not of the Imperial Space Defence Command, but of the Imperial Navy.
"The mine is ready for launch, Sir" Sir Gregory heard from a radio on the desk of a mission engineer in front of him.
These people, he noted, were all from ISDC, wearing khaki uniforms with cross belts and pistols on the left side. Much like the army, although the army wore their pistols on the right and their swords (absent from these engineers) on the left. These engineers also wore odd plastic-rimmed glasses which Sir Gregory thought most bizarre.
"Begin initial launch procedure," he picked out another random voice from the radio chatter.
Compacting into the 5,000 tonne craft was apparatus for the construction of a mine, a permanent lunar base, a payload delivery railgun and enough specialists to crew this base.
"Primary stage NTR boosters engaging."
The superstructure began to shake and finally break away from the gargantuan rocket that was slowly, painfully slowly, lifting away. It was being powered away by nuclear-thermal rocket boosters which would lift it away from the colony so that the nuclear pulse detonation procedure could begin over the ocean in international waters.
"Primary stage complete." This time it was the engineer talking, not voices from his radio. What Sir Gregory assumed were the NTR boosters broke away from the main rocket which dwarfed them and fell into the ocean. This tiny area of concern appeared to be his sole role in this play.
Suddenly a dazzling flash momentarily replaced the image of the rocket with nothing but white light before the computers feeding data into the screens filtered much of it out. Now he knew why the engineers were wearing polarised glasses. The directed blast of a small artificial sun slammed into the pusher plate and accelerated the craft to a huge speed. Another flash briefly appeared and was filtered out.
"If we hadn't spent considerable sums dampening it, you would have felt a shockwave just then, even here a hundred metres underground," Sir Thomas explained.
Sir Gregory did not even want to imagine the energy involved, but he knew that the craft would reach the moon in only a few hours.
"Secondary boost stage complete. Quartz has exited the atmosphere." This time the announcement came from a loudspeaker mounted in the ceiling, and it was met with a chorus of "huzzah"s from the exuberant engineers. Sir Gregory sat, bemused. It may not lose them the election yet.
Sir Gregory Thatcher shivered. It was always bloody cold on this godforsaken scrap of rock. He breathed into his cupped black-gloved hands in attempt to jumpstart the blood flow. The exhaled breath rose like a mist before him, partially obscuring the huge construct that loomed up above him him. In the distance, he could see soldiers patrolling in pairs. Their bayonets were fixed but their eyes were far from keen. Instead, they were huddling into their greatcoats and rubbing their thickly-gloved hands together in some vein attempt to keep warm. Beyond them he could see a Sovereign-class battleship breaking her way slowly through the ice-capped seas. Her deck was bejewelled with ice and her guns glittered in the fading sunlight. The sight was quite beautiful, but Sir Gregory did not dwell on it. Instead, he lit a cigarette.
Held up by dozens of steel-strutted supports, the cylindrical craft loomed over him. He had once, on his first visit to the Quartz site, walked into its shadow. The cloaking darkness that suddenly enveloped him was something he would never forget as long as he lived. He had visited the site more than a dozen times now, and yet he still did not understand how the vehicle was kept from falling over. The thing weighed more than 5,000 tonnes, and was propelled by nuclear pulse detonation. Thermonuclear bombs would be ejected from the spacecraft and explode beneath a pushing plate which he saw before him a disc of solid titanium carbide a metre thick and fifty wide. It would be the largest single launch into space ever conducted by Praetonia. If it worked.
If it worked, it would be a national marvel. On Industry Day each year children would make papier-mâché models to be displayed alongside Iron Duke kits and model factories and dockyards in assembly. It would be a testament to Praetonian technological and industrial expertise.
He inhaled another puff of smouldering nicotine. He didn't want to contemplate what would happen if it didn't. It could bring down the government. He shivered again, even though he was now quite warm. Whatever the risks, the navy needed it. The nation needed it. And he must do his duty before his King and his Country above all else, transcending politics. At least, that's what the Prime Minister insisted upon barking at the Cabinet at every opportunity.
"Bloody fool," he muttered to himself, shaking his head. Sir Gregory shivered again, and decided to turn his attention back to the assorted military personnel wandering around. Most of these people, he thought to himself, had no idea what was going on, no idea why their task was important, or even if it was important, and yet they stood out here in the freezing cold patrolling against a threat that would never materialise day-in, day-out, not allowed to even write a letter home until the project was over, at which point they would be scattered across the Commonwealth in a thousand different regiments they had never heard of before. And at the end of every day they would al gather round and sing 'God Save the King' or 'Onward marches Liberty' or 'Oh Glorious Commonwealth' with genuine joy on their faces. He knew he couldn't do it.
"Sir Gregory?" A voice inquired behind him.
The Knight quickly threw his cigarette to the ground and crushed it underfoot. "Yes what?" He snapped, his voice as icy as his surroundings.
"The, err, launch is imminent, Sir." He was always annoyed when people caught him smoking - it 'showed weakness', he said, although never where anyone could hear him. His anger soon melted when he saw the ever-jolly Captain Samuel Darlington cautiously indicating his staff car.
"I'll be along in just a minute." Darlington nodded, adjusting his pistol holster and crossbelt nervously. His khaki uniform jarred with the surroundings, and he was beginning to regret not wearing his greatcoat.
Quartz Programme Subterranean Control Centre
"Welcome to our humble home, Sir Gregory!" The base commander, Admiral Sir Thomas Arlington, took the Secretary of State's hand. He was met with an icy stare from Sir Gregory.
"This facility alone cost His Majesty's Exchequer more than a billion Praefelis. One should be forced to conclude that your home is anything but humble, Sir Thomas."
The Admiral ignored this remark. "Are you pleased with our progress, Secretary of State? As you know construction has been completed on schedule and we shall be ready for launch imminently. Just a few last minute checks and..." He tailed off. Sir Gregory did not appear interested in the slightest. Instead, he had sat down in Sir Thomas's chair and begun to consume a mug of tea. He was also looking with mild interest at the large LCD screens dotted around the room that were currently displaying camera feeds of the craft from various different angles.
"What kind of response do you anticipate from the Greenies?" Sir Gregory grunted in question.
"Well... we expect some repercussions at least. Launching a spacecraft with an atomic bomb is bound to cause some, ahem, mutterings, but I doubt the enviro-loons have any real ability to gain access to this base, as I believe has been shown..."
"Yes. Yes I think we can all agree on that." During Sir Gregory's last visit, a boat full of environmental protestors turned up and attempted to ram the PWS Lord Chancellor, a Royal Sovereign-class ship and flagship of the New Uxbridge Fleet Group. The Captain of the Lord Chancellor responded by ordering the secondary gunners to fire a warning shot, but orders were confused and instead A turret fired two of her 27.5" guns at the 36m craft. Very little of the wreckage was ever recovered and it was assumed there were no survivors. The navy promptly staged a cover-up in order to protect the project from political repercussions.
"Other than that, we are attempting to minimise and localise the damage." The Secretary of State's eye's flashed with anger and the Admiral quickly added, "Not for their sake, of course, but for the sake of the base. We have installed electromagnets which should cause most of the plutonium fragments to land in the sea. Not that there will be many, of course. This particular bomb uses very little fissile..." Sir Gregory had clearly stopped listening again. "There is of course the international response to consider," the Admiral, began, hoping to grab the Secretary of State's attention once more.
"And that would be my concern." The Admiral stayed silent for the next half hour, until a buzz of radio chatter came through from the Incident Ground Station near the rocket.
"We're almost ready to launch, Sir Gregory."
"Go right ahead."
The rocket, although the largest, most complex and most technologically and financially demanding of Praetonia's space programmes, carried the symbol not of the Imperial Space Defence Command, but of the Imperial Navy.
"The mine is ready for launch, Sir" Sir Gregory heard from a radio on the desk of a mission engineer in front of him.
These people, he noted, were all from ISDC, wearing khaki uniforms with cross belts and pistols on the left side. Much like the army, although the army wore their pistols on the right and their swords (absent from these engineers) on the left. These engineers also wore odd plastic-rimmed glasses which Sir Gregory thought most bizarre.
"Begin initial launch procedure," he picked out another random voice from the radio chatter.
Compacting into the 5,000 tonne craft was apparatus for the construction of a mine, a permanent lunar base, a payload delivery railgun and enough specialists to crew this base.
"Primary stage NTR boosters engaging."
The superstructure began to shake and finally break away from the gargantuan rocket that was slowly, painfully slowly, lifting away. It was being powered away by nuclear-thermal rocket boosters which would lift it away from the colony so that the nuclear pulse detonation procedure could begin over the ocean in international waters.
"Primary stage complete." This time it was the engineer talking, not voices from his radio. What Sir Gregory assumed were the NTR boosters broke away from the main rocket which dwarfed them and fell into the ocean. This tiny area of concern appeared to be his sole role in this play.
Suddenly a dazzling flash momentarily replaced the image of the rocket with nothing but white light before the computers feeding data into the screens filtered much of it out. Now he knew why the engineers were wearing polarised glasses. The directed blast of a small artificial sun slammed into the pusher plate and accelerated the craft to a huge speed. Another flash briefly appeared and was filtered out.
"If we hadn't spent considerable sums dampening it, you would have felt a shockwave just then, even here a hundred metres underground," Sir Thomas explained.
Sir Gregory did not even want to imagine the energy involved, but he knew that the craft would reach the moon in only a few hours.
"Secondary boost stage complete. Quartz has exited the atmosphere." This time the announcement came from a loudspeaker mounted in the ceiling, and it was met with a chorus of "huzzah"s from the exuberant engineers. Sir Gregory sat, bemused. It may not lose them the election yet.