The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Matter of Magnitude, by Al Sevcik

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Title: A Matter of Magnitude

Author: Al Sevcik

Release Date: March 27, 2008 [EBook #24927]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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A
MATTER
OF
MAGNITUDE

By AL SEVCIK

_When you're commanding a spaceship over a mile
long, and armed to the teeth, you don't exactly
expect to be told to get the hell out ..._

The ship, for reasons that had to do with the politics of
appropriations, was named Senator Joseph L. Holloway, but the press and
the public called her Big Joe. Her captain, six-star Admiral Heselton,
thought of her as Great Big Joe, and never fully got over being
awestruck at the size of his command.

"She's a mighty big ship, Rogers," he said proudly to the navigator,
ignoring the latter's rather vacant stare and fixed smile. "More than a
mile long, and wider than hell." He waved his hands expansively. "She's
never touched down on Earth, you know. Never will. Too big for that.
They built her on the moon. The cost? Well ..."

Swiveling his chair around, Heselton slowly surveyed the ship's control
room with a small, satisfied smile. The two pilots sitting far forward,
almost hidden by their banks of instruments, the radar operators idly
watching their scopes, the three flight engineers sitting intently at
their enormous control consoles, and, just behind, the radio shack--its
closed door undoubtedly hiding a game of cards. For weeks now, as Big
Joe moved across the galaxy's uncharted fringe, the radio bands had been
completely dead, except, of course, for the usual star static hissing
and burbling in the background.

Turning back again to his navigator, Heselton smiled modestly and noted
that Big Joe was undisputedly the largest, most powerful, most feared,
and most effective spaceship in the known universe.

As always, Rogers nodded agreement. The fact that he'd heard it a
hundred times didn't make it any less true. Big Joe, armed with every
weapon known to