Chapter 30
Fountain of Youth.
New Avalon
9th June, 3025
Hanse Davion
The trip to the ship called 'Forgeworld' had been a short one. Too short. Katrina moved nearby with her retinue of bodyguards as we looked around the chamber crackling with incarnadine arcs of power, where not forty seconds ago we had been standing on the landing field of the capital. The guards were all nervous despite Kane having said what was going to happen.
Fear reeked in the chamber as the high vaulted hall rose over them before from an adjacent one Kane emerged in his uniform. "Apologies, but only people being teleported should be in the chamber when its used, so I was in the control room." The lack of bodyguards for Kane caused them all to relax marginally, a dozen older mechwarriors had chosen to volunteer for the Rejuvenat. And yet, the relaxation was not entirely gone. They all knew the implications of a man who could pluck them from the planet from orbit. A man who could deploy just as easily from orbit to the surface. "If you'll come with me to the medicae deck."
Katrina spoke up as they began to walk through the corridors. "Duke Giordino, if you don't mind me asking, what is the crew on a monster ship like this?"
"Fairly low given it's size and mass, sixty thousand crew, and about four hundred and fifty-five thousand other citizens of Lathe. A bout forty-five thousand of us had been trained and moved onto the escort ships as crews. Before that, this ship housed five hundred thousand plus sixty thousand crew."
"Fairly low?" Katrina said almost disbelieving.
"The Legacy, the four kilometre long ship, has a crew of thirty-five thousand, and only because of extensive automation above normal, without it the Legacy would need a crew sixty thousand itself." Kane passed through a door into an observation dome and the visitors to the Forgeworld looked out and saw the ships structure around them, several suddenly experiencing intense agoraphobia. "The Escort ships use a crew of approximately fifteen thousand each."
Katrina moved closer to Hanse. "Well, I'm glad I hadn't considered trying to take these ships by force..."
"While we are here." Kane said suddenly. "This is the Duke. Extend spacedock piers. Allow our escorts and the Legacy to dock, they deserve some downtime."
"You aren't worried about us trying to attack and take over your ships?" Hanse said mildly surprised.
Kane only pointed out of the observation dome, and they could only watch as the vast arms of the spacedock piers began to extend. The escort ships moving in to take places on the piers as the more massive legacy slid into its own pier. It was slow going, and yet none of them could tear themselves from the sight as the realisation hit home.
"This is a Yardship."
"Yes, and a resounding no. The name of this ship is not some mysterious moniker, it is a functionally independent space-born colony. With the cloudmining facilities it can extract material from Gas Giants as required, the Asteroid Mining facility can break down asteroids and forge and reforge their minerals into more useful byproducts. Food is produced in the arboretum, medical facilities are present on the medicae deck, which is supplied from the Pharmacia, then there is the STC which is currently set to produce Knights." Kane seemed to have no fear about giving away the secrets of what the ship could do. But finally, he signalled and they moved on, climbing into a huge baroque monorail that descended deeper into the ship.
--------------------------------------------------------------
The Medicae deck stretched out from the monorail station and my guests were surprised with what they saw, the extensive medical facilities all too clearly were identified without difficulty as what appeared to be a massive hospital. One that was largely empty.
Hanse was the first to speak, "Kane, why is it you brought Miranda to New Avalon to give birth instead of using what appear to be extremely advanced facilities?"
"Miranda wanted our child, children, born on a planet under the air of a true planet." I said without any further explanation as the Chief Medicae emerged. "Meet Chief Medicae Karin Chakwas, founder of the Rejuvenat treatment."
Katrina looked at her cocking her head, "That cannot be, she doesn't look a day over thirty."
"Thankyou, but I aimed for thirty-five, much more than that and I find I spend more time fending off unwanted advances. Thirty-five is a nice balance between fending off suitors and being able to get work done." She said deadpan. "If I may see the volunteers?"
The mech pilots came forwards and stood waiting for her appraisal, she began to work with diagnositcator checking over the candidates. The process was rapid and she guided each to a bed as other medicae began to prepare instrumentation.
I headed into the offices overlooking the medicae decks main floor and looked down as the medicaes began hooking up the mechwarriors to various apparatus, Katrina and Hanse joined me shortly, followed by Medicae Chakwas. The procedures were not fast, nor were they pretty, but finally Hanse asked her how the process worked.
As I cocked my head slightly, a pre-arranged signal to give basic information, but nothing extreme, she too nodded. "In truth First Prince, Archo, the term Rejuvenat is not actually any one procedure or medication, but the umbrella underwhich all related procedures combine to regress ones biological age and freeze it in a semi-stasis." She moved and called up some diagrams, the 'dumbed-down' ones she used to explain it to those untrained as medicae.
"The basic, and initial process, is to modify the telomeres on a genetic level to increase the potential for cellular regeneration, as it is cells in a human body have a finite lifespan and a finite ability to replicate replacements. Particularly difficult ones being neural cells and nerve matter." She pulled up another diagram, "The first treatment of Rejuvenat is, generally, a medical injection of genetic markers that increase the number of telomeres in the cell, as well as regressing them towards baseline. This is followed by a light course of surgical procedures and hormonal treatment to further regress the aging, at best we can remove about thirty years off of a persons apparent age with such a minor treatment."
Katrina and Hanse followed along, having at the very least a passing knowledge of science.
"These treatments cannot be extended forever, naturally." She called up another diagram. "At about the hundred and eighty year mark, the treatment can no longer regress someone to youth, instead of being able to return to the fitness and suppleness of your early twenties, the best that can be managed is about the early forties to fifties, but also at this stage, your bone and neural matter is beginning degradation that the initial treatments absolutely cannot counter. Augmetic Surgery is performed to short up weak points in the skeletal structure, many might opt to have low level cogitation implants to boost memory and recall, any major failing organs, sort of the brain, can be, or need to be, replaced with augmetic options. Internal biocybernetics."
The images changed again. "From that point, most seek Rejuvenat treatments less often, the surgeries are more invasive and the youth restored isn't as much as they might prefer, according to our theoretical models, an individual might have their life extended to as much as eight hundred years... but" She shrugged.
"But what?" Katrina said, taking the bait.
"But beyond three hundred years, according to our studies and predictive models, successive Rejuvenat treatment would cease to be simple minor augmenting, and start to become a serious course of cybernetic replacements. The theoretical model suggests that by your six hundred and fiftieth birthday less than five percent of your body would remain human." Chakwas sat back. "But these warriors, the oldest is only sixty, per instruction i've ordered a rejuvenation to an apparent twenty-five solar year age."
"Is this likely to impair them?" Hanse said.
"Not at all, while many who receive the treatment do become more sexually active than they were before, this is not a product of hormonal activation so much as AAYS, Autonomic Amorous Youth Syndrome. Basically, they want to engage more as younger people because they feel young again. A basic placebo effect. All of them will basically exhibit increased reaction times, endurance, agility and dexterity."
"What about children?" Katrina asked.
"For men, there is no change. They will remain virile until they either suffer some sort of accident or choose to have that surgically stifled. Though many warriors choose to preserve their seed in case of the worst case. However, for women, that biological clock is finite, it is our advice that any woman who does not express a desire for children now put some eggs in stasis for when they feel that need or want to have children." Chakwas said plainly without any hint of unprofessional conduct.
Or so I thought. "But if I horribly misread your question and was asking if children could receive rejuvenat, I would not consider it very ethical."
Katrina looked horrified for a second before recognizing the deadpan joke for what it was.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hanse Davion
Kane had made his apologies and left us on the medicae deck with Doctor Chakwas as the procedures were done, and he had not jested, the procedures had taken hours, and the Doctor explained that it'd take almost forty-eight hours before the mech jockeys were fit to do anything other than sit in their beds and enjoy hospital food and banter.
For the next two days either Kane or Miranda escorted us on tours of the vessels they had brought, always somehow avoiding the revelation of anything truly and deeply informative. A fact that seemed to be quite easy given the vast area of the ships. I had seen it from the observation dome, and yet, the shock of actually standing within a forested farmland on a ship chilled me to the core. And now I found myself being escorted back to the Medicae deck. We had avoided checking on our people every few hours, so when I faced twelve mechwarriors who, two days ago, had been in their late forties and early sixties, I found a group of much younger warriors waiting for me at attention. Cold chills assailed me as I recognized warriors who'd been young when they fought with my father.
Kane wasn't present, none of the Forgeworlds crew outside of the medicae were.
"How do you feel Breckenridge?" I asked as the young man stiffened at my approach, always courteous, but always formal.
"Honestly First Prince? I feel like I have been taken apart and put together again with a much younger mans parts. My bung knee is gone, my aching back is gone, and they even did something to improve my vision."
"Breckenridge was exhibiting early signs of cataract development. As a courtesy I nipped that in the bud and repaired the minor damage it had already done." Chakwas said as she ran a battery of tests. "Everyone appears to be in perfect health with no complications."
"You didn't mention complications before?" Katrina said as she looked over Breckenridge herself.
"The chances of complications are so small as to be statistically insignificant, about one in a billion according to testing and simulations, the chances increase once actual augmetics are required to supplement the procedure, but that is only because more people seem to reject implants." She said without any sign of being concerned. "If you'll excuse me, I need to file these records. Feel free to talk plainly with your people, your words are protected by medicae-patient privilege."
We spoke with the men for almost an hour before, under escort, taking them to a gym on one of the crew decks. And yet, on seeing it. The scale was vast. And there were already several hundred training and honing their bodies, none of them seemed to resent or even consider our presence. But we could not say the same, we considered them carefully, as we had quickly noticed the gym seemed to be operating half a gravity heavier than standard, and all those present had the finely honed bodies of soldiers. As such, when our mechwarriors began running the course Doctor Chakwas recommended to display their fitness, a handful of their people joined in and began to make it a friendly competition, it was all the proof we needed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I watched them on the security feeds as Trotter came in, a concerned look on his face. "My lord, don't you think we're allowing them to see a bit too much?" He had been down in Cargo Hold 1. Where the STC was now producing the first two Cohorts worth of Knights and Armigers. It, like the weapons, shield, and powerplant, were off-limits to our visitors.
"Not at all." I replied shrugging. "I want them to see us, and think of us as similar enough to them to consider favourable partners. The Lyran Commonwealth, at the moment, has little investment in our region of space. But the Federated Suns, they will either see a potential enemy, or a potential friend who happens to share an enemy, and may be useful in other ways."
Trotter nodded as Miranda came in, bearing Zachariah on her hip. The other two were in the Arboretum with Ostergaard and Glitch watching over them, while Glitch was an unknown quantity, Ostergaard had been a father, and Chakwas thought some time with them would do the mans mental health some good.
"Hey hun." I said as I relaxed back into my seat. "Is everything all right?"
"Other than every crewman fawning over Zac, ... no. I want to get out there. The call is getting stronger." She said sitting down and I knew what she meant. And she was right, all of the Knight pilots, myself included, were feeling the call of the machine spirits more strongly, even though the machines themselves were shut down, the Thrones Mechanicum in the Chamber of Echoes were still powered and still called, with increasing insistence. The machine spirits knew my intentions, and the call to battle was growing to be overpowering.
"I feel the same way. But we need to wrap up business here. But I've had navigation working on a three jump plan back to Mandalas. Our jumpship fleet should be there already waiting for us." In truth, I had been wondering how much longer the Jumpships would remain relevant. Though I was quickly reminded that, for all the might of our ships, only the Legacy could really be used to deploy forces. The escorts were incapable of it, and the Forgeworld was far and beyond too valuable to risk as an army carrier. The fact was, I needed to design a dedicated troopship.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The conference room was one again occupied as we sat facing Katrina, Hanse and their attendants. This time the atmosphere was more relaxed. "We've verified the rejuvenat procedure as best as we can given the radical differences in medical technology evinced by the mechwarriors that had volunteered to undergo the procedures. Our own testing has been able to verify the facts we were presented, mostly."
"Mostly?" I asked frowning slightly.
"We confess, our medical technology was incapable of determining if the lifespan was truly extended or not, but given Doctor Chakwas' professed age we have elected to take your word on the matter. As I understand it, you will not be trading us the technology itself, but access to it am I correct?" Hanse said consulting his datapad.
"You are, the complexity of the technology is not something that it would be safe to distribute without the required knowledge base." This time it was Medicae Chakwas who answered, brought in as a specialist for the discussions.
"Unsafe? How so."
"The required technological base would permit for human biomedical augmentation, a process that can have unforeseen side-effects for those who don't understand the processes involved." She said and I nodded.
"Very well, the other offering is one we would like some verification and proof on as well, but neither the Archon or myself can afford to leave our duties, so we would ask you take a team of analysts and observers to demonstrate, and verify, the reality of the claims you make for your jump drive technology. But after extensive discussion, we've decided to offer our conditional support," Hanse said, "We will of course need to develop treaties and agreements. But we need observers to verify your value as a military ally. How do you plan to begin?"
I stood. "I plan to begin with three systems, one at a time naturally, Mandalas, Herotitus and Lyreton. Based on our presence here, we will likely begin with Lyreton."
"You're aware that the Capellans still feel a sense of attachment to it, it's independent for now but..."
"The Capellans are why we want it. That bitch Romano hired a Battalion of Highlanders to try and take us out, so we're happy to take their toys, and as they don't officially control it anymore, they can't afford to act." I said, "You will have one base station of the experimental tachyon communication system for trial. It will take us three jumps to reach it. Hopefully, we can demonstrate real-time communication over those distances, or at least only minimal delay."
"Did you say three jumps?" Hanse said standing up disbelieving.
"Three jumps. Two are two hundred lightyear hops, the last is about another hundred lightyears." The room was silent as they truly comprehended the depths of my meaning. With that sort of jump drive, even the furthest reaches of the Inner Sphere changed from over a years travel to mere weeks at most. "Now, I have a Unification to wage