I was going to comment on the other one, but
dang you're fast.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shane Enochs  I think I took what everyone said and made a better intro. Let me know if I'm still not getting something / infodumping.
Aboard the starcraft carrier Advent
Commander Gabriel Young walked around the small ship, touching the cold metal of the landing struts. Inky-black and windowless, it looked more like a drone than a vessel meant to be piloted by men. Its long, arrowhead-shaped body seemed to be very I think it would be better for him to be more definitive i.e. Its long, arrowhead-shaped body was aerodynamic...aerodynamic, obviously built with atmospheric flight in mind. "It's beautiful."
"First of its kind," Fleet Commander Arnold Smith said proudly. "The SR-78. One deck; maximum crew of five. It's got four pulse detonation engines with a maximum air speed of Mach 8. It's also equipped with the latest stealth technology."
Gabriel nodded with approval. "It's a short-ranged scout ship."
The old man grinned. "Not quite." He let his words hang in the air for a moment. "It's actually capable of opening slipstreams."
"This tiny thing?" Even the smallest vessels equipped with FTL drives were huge in comparison. It took an enormous amount of energy to create an aperture into slipstream.
"Yeah. Listen, Gabe," Smith's tone turned abruptly serious. "I wouldn't normally ask you to do this, but this is from way above me."
Gabriel's stomach started twisting. "Sir?"
"Two months ago we received intelligence that a colony on Cyprus has been building unregistered ships, so we sent drones in to investigate. They never returned." He suddenly avoided Gabriel's eyes. "I need you to take this ship and scout the planet. Purely a recon mission. If they are building ships, we need to know about it as soon as possible."
Dang, Gabriel thought. Building unregistered ships was a capital offense, especially if they were capable of interstellar travel. If the intelligence turned out to be true, Earth would send in dozens of capital the capital offence and the capital ships jar a little ships and bombard the planet. Nothing would be left alive.
"The plan is to drop out of slipstream in the nearest system, and then you and your crew will travel the rest of the way. It'll take the better part of a day to get there, but it should allow you to get in unnoticed," Smith said confidently.
Gabriel nodded. "When will I be launching?
"We'll be dropping out of slipstream in an hour. Be ready." |
I liked the other one and I like this one better. It's got a nice pace and we're straight into the action. Just a point on the SR 78 -- I presume you're referencing the SR 71. With science having advanced this far, wouldn't they be using different nomenclature i.e. if they were going to have an SR 72, SR 73 etc, wouldn't they have reached the SR 78 long before now?