Two men guarded a room that was near the computer centre. In it was a large chair where some sort of master A.I. robot must have sat in, interfaced with the entire ship and issued commands. Currently sitting in the seat was lieutenant Lapointe, nude and happily gibbering away to himself, apparently with no concern to those present. Entering the room, the colonel’s mouth gaped at the absurd sight for which he was ill prepared. “What the frak?! Lieutenant!” If the vision of misconduct caught the colonel off guard, the computer tech’s response practically knocked him on this ass. “Oh hey Bridgie. I’ve been field promoted to imperious cylon leader. How’s it hanging with you?”
Bridgeford shook his head, slapped the side of his own face and decided. “The man has cracked from the pressure.” The young marine that radioed the Colonel walked over to colonel Bridgeford and handed him a set of clothes. Bridgeford noted the foul smell and figured he had a partial explanation for the man’s nudity. The junior soldier then asked the two guards to wait outside the room before he spoke again to his commanding officer.
Drawing his attention to the left front pocket of the pants. The colonel scrunched his nose, because of their wetness, but still reached in. He pulled from the pocket a small packet of what were obviously narcotics. “What the frak! Is everyone on dope these days?” Lapointe jumped down from the chair and ran up to the old marine waving his arms. “Hey, that’s my bravery medicine! Just a little and I have the strength of 10 ordinary men. Now (snatching the package away from the colonel) get your own because I’m not sharing.” He then folded his arms and looked condescendingly at his new company.
Deciding to ignore the raving naked man for the moment, all attention focused on returning with the captured ship to the Argus. “Radio Turin and tell him to clear our vipers to land. Let’s get some of the fly boys piloting this bucket home.” Just then a loud alarm went off in the computer room and everyone looked about with expressions of confusion and impeding horror. But the nude lieutenant jumped up proclaiming that it was his 90-minute reminder to dance with an A.I.
Sitting on the floor, laptop propped up on his knees, oblivious to the on looking colonel and several marines, the tech-head opened his pouch of drugs, pinched a little bit between his thumb and forefinger and proceeded to snort it up his nose. “Oh baby that’s what I like. Now you fraking bitch, lets see if I taught you anything.” His fingers began typing rapidly across the keyboard and his excitement was difficult to contain. “Yea! yea! Hooga! Hooga! Hooga! I rule!” The colonel didn’t know if he should strike the man, be impressed by his abilities or just walk away. Finally he decided that he now had a big ship to command, and his efforts would be best suited doing something other than babysitting a drug addict. “Got you again you old mechanical piece of crap. Hey, did you guys know there isn’t a place to go potty on this boat?” Colonel Bridgeford exited leaving a marine guard in charge of chaperoning.
-----
“If the toasters are all cut up, and outgoing communication capabilities are destroyed, what is he resetting and can we trust him to keep doing it?” Major Assuras was now aboard and trying to make sense out of the current situation. She had known lieutenant Lapointe for a long time and the idea that he was using drugs was difficult to fathom.
The Colonel cleared his throat, “It’s like trying to get a stoned person to explain how the universe works. Apparently the computer that controls this ship is an AI too. It could still self-destruct or jump to another basestar. That’s why I need you guys to fly this thing home, then we can blow the computer.” The major nodded and headed down to what everyone believed was a control room.
Interfaces between the robots and ship ran everything. However, the cylons did factor in a set of manual controls. Given the age of the ship it was relatively easy to figure out the systems. The only problem was there were no displays or counsels to get readings from. Obviously the toasters didn’t need them because they would just interface directly with the ship. The raptors would have to be used as air traffic controllers and be the eyes for return trip. Cupcake couldn’t help notice the difference between the two species. Because one of the first things any human would have done was look for good places to put in windows.
Because the basestar was in more of a standby mode than completely shutdown, the engines were modestly warm and the restart sequence would be short. Perhaps more than 40 years had passed with various systems still drawing power, but whatever their source, the fuel consumption was negligible, leaving the tylium tanks modestly full. The design of ship might be simplistic and nothing to look at. But if nothing else good could be said about it; its power systems were efficient.
As engine thrust was tested the hull creaked and echoed. It was unsettling and had a haunting effect on those piloting the craft. However Bridgeford appeared un-phased as he walked into the room holding a cylon head. “Take a look at this major, one of my men gave me a gift. He hallowed out a toaster skull and put a flashlight in it. Too bad I don’t have grand children, I bet kids would love something like this.” Cupcake momentarily glanced at the Colonel, rolled her eyes and decided that marines were very strange.
“Just to keep you in the know, I’ve dispatched a raptor to jump to the Argus and fetch Reeves. They took Bear too; your pilot is going to need surgery. Although, Lapointe is now clothed, he’s still snorting and keyboarding; I’ll rest easier after he is relieved. One of my medics said if we took the crap away he might just pass out and we would be really screwed.” Major Assuras didn’t like the sound of that and issued an order to get the preflight done as quickly as possible. The moment the Captain showed up she wanted to be leaving. In hindsight, she wished she had originally taken him. He would have stayed awake by slapping himself in the face all night.
Because the raptor was free to use it’s jump abilities Captain Reeves came aboard within 2 hours and immediately relieved the drugged crewman. This was plenty of time for the motivated Assuras to get her crew ready for flight. So, as soon as the Captain was prepared, the ship headed for the Argus. As the vessel approached the battlestar and registered on dradius, the Colonel initiated communications. The old man of the ship had it pushed through on the speakers. “Argus this is colonel Bridgeford. Mission accomplished.” C.N.C. clapped and cheered with the good news. “For a supply ship this thing is damn cold and ugly but we got lots of toaster-ashtrays for everyone. Even if you don’t smoke.”
The Admiral had been slightly worried when Reeves had to be dispatched. But the Colonel and the Major were good capable soldiers. Although he hid it well, he couldn’t help his mother-hen emotions. Congratulating Bridgeford he told him to pull up alongside and then report to his office.
Chapter 13: Re-Supplying