"Exploration" - Part 3 (Final)

Eagle Has Landed

Exploration - Part 3

Continuing Essdy Yarnspinner's story:

However, Eagle had a plan. These Pirates had a rag-tag fleet of ships. In fact, they had a few Model Gs. In order for them to be as organized as they seemed, Eagle guessed that they had to coordinate their attacks using their computers. Thus, the computers must communicate between the ships. With them being in contact, that meant that their communication could be intercepted. If he could intercept their network traffic, and communicate with one of the computers, he could wreak havoc on the pirate attack.

Of course, the problem was he did not know how they communicated or whether he could hack his way in. Thus, determining the link protocol was the first order of business. As a first phase of this process, Fejj provided escort duty for several Mitciv trading runs. However, the pirates kept their distance during these runs. However, they did not establish a communication blackout, and Eagle got enough information from this escort duty to determine what communication standards these pirates were using. He also managed to capture a few of the communications streams for further study.

With the upgrades to Fejj's computer system, Eagle had no problem discovering the means of communication between the ships. He was ready for step two. Now that he was able to read the communication, he needed to be able to speak to the computers. With the continuing escort duty, he eventually was able to establish two-way communication with the pirate computers. Thus, he was ready to place his plan into action.

Since the pirates' attacks were well coordinated, these ships were lax on security to improve the performance of their ships. Most ships use their computers to manage all of the ships functions. The navigation and the sensors were all fed through the computer. Thus, if you tell the computer that the sensors detect a ship, the computer will report this to the ship's crew. This is true even if no ship is around. This is what Eagle planned to do.

If Eagle could get into one of the pirate ship's computer system, he could give that pirate crew false information. If the computers were passing information about enemy movements, this could be passed on to other pirate ships. With the proper sequence of events Eagle believed he could somewhat control what happened. Once he was confident that he could affect the pirate sensors, he created a program that the human's call a 'Trojan horse.'

Let me explain this reference. A Trojan horse is a reference to an ancient Earth story about the ending of a long war. The city of Troy had nearly impenetrable walls. Their enemies spent many years attempting to get inside the city walls. Eventually, one group built a large horse out of wood and gave it to the other warring faction. Inside the horse was a group of soldiers. So, once inside the protected city, they could spring out and do whatever they wished.

A Trojan horse program is one that sits inside a computer, and when the time is right it will spring into action. What Eagle planned to do was plant this program in the Pirate's computer system. With his ability to enter the pirate's communication stream, he could plant this program on any one of their escort missions. The pirates were wary of Fejj's ship and never attacked with his ship in the vicinity; however, they were close enough to make computer contact.

What the program did when it was activated was to inform the pirate crew that they were under attack by the Mitciv. No matter how this crew responded to the threat, the computer would indicate that the Mitciv had successfully counteracted their actions.

The program would activate as soon as they locked their weapons on any Mitciv ship. This program would cause ships to appear out of nowhere, and appear to inflict major damage on these pirate ships. Thus, no matter what actions these pirates took, their ship would become disabled. At least, that is what the computer would tell them. Since all system status went through the computer, the ship could be completely disabled without a shot being fired.

Once the program was implanted in several pirate vessels, Fejj stopped the escort trips. They just waited to see if their plan would work. After a few runs, the pirates noticed that the Mitciv were making unescorted runs again. Therefore, they attacked. The computer program activated, and the pirate ship would eventually be completely disabled. They had no choice but to surrender to the intended victim's ship.

This system worked remarkably well, and in a relatively short amount of time, the entire fleet of pirates had been captured. The Galactic Commonwealth put them on trial, and the pirate raids had been ended. For their work, Fejj received the reward promised by the GC. The Mitciv were so grateful, they rewarded Eagle with his own ship. The Mitciv received the pirate ships for compensation, and they offered Eagle his pick. He thought about taking one of the Pirate's Model Gs, but they required a crew to operate. He did not relish the idea of rounding up any type of crew. He knew the Model Gs backwards and forwards, but he decided not to take one of them.

He chose one that could carry plenty of cargo, but needed no crew to operate. It was a newer model than the G's, but no one knew what model it was. It was a custom ship, and it was just Eagle's style. It would give him the chance to learn different computer, propulsion and other systems. He could customize this ship to be one of the best ships in the galaxy.

He instantly renamed it to 'The Iguana II.' It was the same name as his old ship. This ship was much more fitting of the name Iguana than the original. At some point, someone had it painted green. Some of the paint had come off giving it the appearance of a green ship with brownish stripes. This is roughly the color scheme of an iguana. However, it did not look anything like the long skinny reptile. If you thought of a lizard eating its own tail, perhaps you could make out something vaguely lizard-like, but Eagle just liked the name. The whole ship suited Eagle just fine.

It was not at all pretty, but it was Eagle's ship. It was Eagle's Iguana. Once again, he was free to go anywhere he liked. While onboard Fejj's ship, he had saved up many galactic credits for provisions and tolls. He was ready to go out on his own and make his own way.

He was a trader again, but he had some valuable experience behind him. He made some contacts while working for Fejj. He had some trade routes and cargo in mind. He knew how he was going to make money without working too hard.

He learned quite a bit about galactic space ships while on board with Fejj Recked. However, now he would be able to customize his ship to his own liking. He did not have to answer to anyone but himself. It is how he liked things. Eagle Douglass was now a bounty hunter, trader, cargo hauler, and righter of wrongs. He could be his own boss and travel where he wanted. He was a human with knowledge of more technology than any other human was. He would go farther out than any other human. He would make many friends and have great influence on the Galactic Commonwealth.

"That is quite a tale. Thanks. Hey tender, give me one of those carbonic acids and sucroses. So, Yarnspinner, how do you know so much about this Eagle fellow? Yarnspinner? Hey tender, where did he go?"