Midshipman Henry Gallant in Space (The Henry Gallant Saga) by H. Peter Alesso Page B

representatives, but we’ve had no response from them, or from any of the many encounters with their scout ships.”
    Gallant thought, It seems as if the mere act of communicating will disadvantage them in some way. But he quickly dismissed the speculation from his mind as fruitless.
    Caine ordered, “If we don’t get accurate intelligence, we will face dangerous surprises before long. Mr. Gallant, prepare to launch another probe to Saturn. Midshipman Mitchel help him set the parameters. ”
    “Yes, sir. I would, also, like to try another probe to Neptune. If we strip it down to bare bones, we might have some success getting through whatever sensor array they’ve deployed. Though, that will mean a very slow voyage,” suggested Kelsey.
    “All right, coordinate that with Mr. Gallant, as well. I hope we have the time. In any case, I think it’s time we came up with a few surprises of our own,” said Caine with a cagey look on his face.
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    An hour later, Gallant and Red were returning to Midshipmen’s quarters. As they walked through the corridor, Red said, “You saw the images with your own eyes. There were hundreds of ships around Saturn and we can’t even guess how many there are near the outer planets.”
    “I don’t know what I saw. Kelsey classified most of those ships as cargo ships or transports, only a hundred or so were possible warships.”
    “A hundred or so? Do you hear yourself? You say that like it’s a good thing.”
    “What’s your opinion of Captain Caine?” asked Gallant abruptly, lost in thought.
    "He's a great CO. Why?”
    “I think that before too long, we’re going to be glad he’s in command of the Jupiter frontier,” Gallant spoke with a faraway look in his eyes.

CHAPTER 11
    The unrestrained sky permitted an expansive view of the heavens as Flights 3 and 4 escorted Repulse ’s shuttlecraft to the surface of Ganymede and the Ganymede Research Laboratory. Flight 3 consisted of two Eagles fighters piloted by Neumann and Chui, while Flight 4’s Eagles were piloted by Red and Gallant. On board the shuttlecraft were the Repulse ’s Science Department Head, Commander Jackson and her staff of three science officers.
    The landing beacons guided the ships to the moon’s surface. Volcanic islands of circular cones protruded from rough mountainous terrain along the horizon which surrounded the smooth gravel-tar landing strip. Valleys of cooling lava flowed over the irregular surface signifying the evolving nature of the moon. As the spacecraft landed, the Ganymede director was notified.
    The Repulse study team, consisting of the four scientists, four pilots and four astrogators, disembarked and strode under the light gravity, only fourteen percent of Earth’s, toward several small hangars. Only the landing hangars and a few relatively small buildings were visible above ground. Constructing the accelerator’s magnets, delicate devices and long linear tubes underground was necessitated by the very real danger of meteorites.
    The Ganymede laboratory consisted of elaborate research facilities and one of UP’s largest particle accelerators. The Ganymede accelerator was the most powerful physicist's tool available on the Jupiter frontier. With it they were able to explore the dynamics and structure of matter and space-time. The accelerator was their aid for unraveling high energy particle interactions of matter made from leptons (electrons) and quarks, as well as, bosons (photons and gluons). It used electromagnetic fields to propel charged particles within well-defined magnetically controlled beams to high speeds. This particular accelerator was a synchrotron which could reach the very highest energies for antiprotons production (billions of electron volts, or GeV) in a ring of constant radius of about 8 miles.
    The accelerator’s primary mission was to produce and store antiprotons for the engines of the UP ships. However, during normal operations it was