ALJ Chpt 42

frameless|right|300px|link=A Long Journey
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==Chapter 42 - A Long Journey==
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31 March 2786
Mackolla (Federated Suns)
The first Tracker, three Aquilla Transport and single Conestoga Transport materialized at the Zenith Jump Point along with their escorting Tramp Jumpship to avoid prying eyes. Only the Tramp had a full crew, the other ships were running with the bare minimum of crew, they just did not have enough people to fully man the ships. Using coded transmissions, the Aquilla and Conestoga Transports were ordered into a stable orbit of the sixth planet and for them to be powered down for now. The Tracker was sent to the Olympus Recharge Station where it would enter the repair bay as soon as possible.
Warrant Officer Bart Cooks got notification of the first Tracker's arrival and ordered all work on the Aquilla conversion halted and for the Aquilla to be hauled out to make room for the Tracker. He was tired of all the problems dealing with the conversion of the Aquilla. At least with the Tracker it would be a more straight forward upgrade, it was already equipped with a fire control system at least. He just needed to get a good hard look under the hood to see what exactly they need to do to upgrade the ship. Plus, it had standard armor not that primitive crap.
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6 April 2786
With the Tracker securely docked inside the repair bay, Warrant Officer Cooks was able to really get down to business. He smiled when he found two reactors, one strictly to power the weapons mounts and it had power to spare, lots of power. He quickly made some calculations, checked their inventory stocks, ordered a slew of material to be brought up to the station from Mackolla itself and then started ordering people to get to work, mainly to begin locking down the ship's hull permanently instead of the good temporary job the crews at Site 222 had done to get her mobile.
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13 April 2786
"This is going to be way quicker than that damned Aquilla. Leave the existing capital weapons, Naval laser 45 in the nose, Barracudas in the Aft. I want two PPC, two Large Pulse, two Medium Pulse in every arc but the Nose and Aft section, then mount three small Pulse Laser in each arc but the Nose and Aft. They left all the damned spy equipment onboard, but we leave it alone for now. Get that salvaged Naval Comm Scanner installed in the hull and checked out, we have eight of the things stored. Yeah, the ones we ripped off all those Congress Frigates during the war and never offloaded. Make sure the fire control system is accepting the new weapons and get them bore sighted. I want every heat sink yanked out and replaced with Double Heat Sinks. Yeah, I know it will be over kill, but right now, I don't care if she is the coolest running ship out here."
"This is our test bed; we will learn a ton from this work so that the next one will go smoother. How many tons of Ferro Carbide armor do we have anyway? That much, don't let anyone touch it without my okay, I might have plans for it for the next Tracker if we have time. Double check those welds, I don't want the damned aft section falling off when they need it the most. We know the transit drive works, but triple check it and replace anything that is even suspected of being faulty. Run a full diagnostic on every system, same thing, if you even suspect a fault, replace it. We don't have anything that will work, make the damned thing. I want the helium flushed and fresh Helium loaded. Triple check the helium seals. I want a bow to stern systems check. Move it people, as far as I am concerned, we are behind schedule."
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