Lost Empire Ch. 04

"Yes Primary," both ships answered at the same time. "I am EIG-0098F also known as Lucy by my crew," 0098 stated.

"I am EIG-0999M also known as Zan by my crews," 0999 stated proudly.

"Good, now then I will no longer refer to you as your EIG designation, neither will you refer to your selves as your EIG designations. You will from this day forward refer to each other by your name, again direct order, understood?" Derrick ordered.

All four holograms appeared before Derrick, each bowed, "Yes Prime Primary Commander, as always we await your orders."

"I have given specifications for upgraded weapons to Zan, I want these to be implemented as soon as possible I believe that these will give us more of an advantage in any further battles as will the other designs I am working on.

Each of the holograms looked at each other then Shelby who also smiled, Derrick didn't miss this as his suspicions began to grow more.

Derrick had just sat down when a steady tone came from the com, "Shelby report!"

"It is the unit we brought aboard I am reading failing power to it, I am not completely connected, oh Derrick I am losing it!" Shelby cried.

"I want you to give it a jolt of energy with what you have connected. Not enough to erase but enough to give it enough energy to possibly jump start the electrochemical cells and energy stimulators."

The Shelby hologram's mouth dropped agape, quickly she did as Derrick had ordered, there was a faint pulsing sound for a few minutes, and then it went steady again.

"Again Shelby, the unit had more energy than this, plus that jolt should have done the trick, increase the amount one micro unit," Derrick ordered.

This time the pulse was slightly stronger, breathing a sigh of relief Derrick collapsed into the command chair, damn it that had been close. Without the living A.I. the case and living metal were worthless. I better read up more on the problems of restart. The last connection on Shelby started to infuse energy as quickly as she could, lovingly she looked at the case another brother or sister saved again by her Primary, she'd never heard of the procedure that Derrick had her use, she was just glad that it had worked.

Looking in on Derrick she loving stared at him, he was by far greater than his name sake, or any other she'd met other than the Emperor, the Emperor! She remembered about the codes, she had to investigate!

For almost a week Shelby watched over the life case that they had recovered, even with the energy that Shelby was infusing it was still very slow going. It had taken her almost five days to reach the re-gen center of the box, but still she had no inkling to as who this case was. Though not frustrated, Shelby was perplexed as to the reason it was so difficult. It was sometime near the end of the seventh day that Shelby broke Derrick's train of thought.

"Derrick!" Shelby said more excited than she'd been to date, "We have found 0001! I thought to never see him again! He was lost with Conner and his wing mate in the first battle we experienced losses in."

"Why was it harder to re-gen him than it was Conner?" Derrick asked.

"0001 and 0002 had equipment that required massive amounts of energy, as I remember they had engines twice the size of the other 998 ships, twice the energy producers, they also had better shields, though their weapons weren't as good as ours, they possessed far more than the rest of us."

Derrick had read about some of the experiments that they had conducted back then. Were both of those ships carrying experimental equipment that they were going to try out on their enemies? Derrick wasn't sure, hell his great, great grandfather hadn't mention anything even remotely resembling secret weapons though at the time there had only been three ships. Derrick's mind was a whirl with conspiracies when another proximity alarm went off, huh? Another brain box? This close? Ok now things were starting to get weird.