by Andrew Beery
“Turn on your video feed that I might look upon the face of the creature lying to me,” the Supreme Guardian said at last.
I nodded to Mitty. A flat holographic display shimmered into existence about six feet in front of my command chair.
The creature in front of me appeared to be some type of lizard. Its skin was almost black and its eyes (it had the standard issue two) seemed to be compound multifaceted organs with thousands of individual lenses… not unlike the eyes on a housefly. My near-perfect memory recalled that compound eyes were able to detect both the polarization of light and colors. For flies at least, this meant they could recognize even the slightest movements in a wide field of view. I could see how this would be useful in an aggressive species.
I addressed the Supreme Guardian again.
“I hope this sates your curiosity. This ship has been gone for a very long time. What happened that causes you to say the Galactic Order has fallen?”
The image of the Guardian stepped closer to the screen. I could see thick drool dripping from its mouth… not unlike a Komodo Dragon on Earth.
“What species are you?”
I was getting tired of having my questions ignored.
“I’d be happy to tell you all about ourselves but first I want some answers from you. What happened. Why are you claiming the Galactic Order is no more?”
A long, bifurcated, tongue extended from the creature’s mouth and wiped away some of the drool. It seemed to be an automatic gesture like blinking one’s eyes to keep the cornea moist.
“The Order fell in battle to a more powerful opponent,” the Rohar said is a raspy voice. “There was no dishonor, they fought bravely, if ineptly. Are you returning in order to surrender yourselves and your ship to the victors?”
“Not a chance it hell,” I replied. “By the way. I honor my promises. I and most of my crew are of a race known as humans.”
The Supreme Guardian made the same barking noise it had made earlier. I was of the opinion it made this type of noise in response to something unexpected. After the barking ran its course, the Rohar addressed me again.
“Human Fleet Admiral Jeremy Riker, your news is unexpected. I would talk with you directly.”
“I’m not sure I follow?” I wondered if he was asking to come over to the Gilboa?
The Guardian licked more drool before responding.
“I would invite you and a small party to join me on my ship. I see one of the Archons with you. It appears to be unencumbered. I suspect you will need protective suits as our worlds have richer atmospheres than you will likely be comfortable with. Is this agreeable?”
I leaned forward and rubbed my chin. “Supreme Guardian. I thank you for your offer. I need a few minutes to consult with my crew.”
Again, I heard the barking noise. It seemed more violent this time… almost as if there was a hint of anger or irritation in it.
“We are not known as a patient people, Human Fleet Admiral Jeremy Riker. Respond soon or lose the offer.”
I signaled Mitty to mute the signal.
Shella walked up to my chair.
“Admiral, I would advise against traveling to their ship. You saw how testy the Rohar was. If you were there in person, you could easily come to harm without even knowing your offense.”
“I agree but there is another issue at hand. We need answers… and right now the only answers to be had are,” I gestured with my hand towards the viewscreen, “over there.”
“Then might I recommend taking me with you to help to avoid unfortunate cultural missteps.”
I shook my head. “I’m afraid not Ambassador. It’s not that you wouldn’t be immensely valuable but the risk to your person would be too great. The away team will consist of myself, Colonel Morrison and Mitty.”
***
It turns out that ‘richer atmosphere’ meant that the Rohar’s preferred atmospheric mix included low levels of ammonia… something on the order of one-hundred and fifty parts per million. That level of exposure would tend to cause serious lung damage to an unprotected human if they were exposed to it for even ten or fifteen minutes.
Our protective suits would be a new type of Marine Encounter Suit developed on Earth using Galactic Order technology and fabricators. They weren’t known for their comfort, but they were strong, and could take a beating. In addition, they had self-contained environmental systems including rebreathers.
In the old days we would have used spacesuits. Our Mark-One MES offered much better protection. In addition, the Rohar would not have seen them in action and therefore would have no idea as to their capabilities. If they decided to take offense at something we did or said, the suits would give us a chance to extricate ourselves from the situation.
I was hoping that it didn’t come to fighting our way out. We needed information and allies more than we needed another fight. Sadly, hope and reality sometimes intersect at a thing called disappointment… at least temporarily.
The Gilboa had sixteen shuttles of Galactic Order design as well as four much larger and more heavily shielded human-designed assault craft or ACs.
The ACs had been battle-tested in that last dust-up over Mars. The only real difference was the retro-fitting of a Galactic Order fusion core and shield emitters. Luxuries like gravity plating and more powerful plasma turrets would have to wait for the next round of upgrades… or more likely, the design of an entirely new assault craft.
I bring all of this up because in hindsight – often my best view – I really wish we had flown one of the ACs. The shuttles we used were faster and had the advantage of being something familiar to the Rohar… but we might as well have flown over in a paper bag for all the protection they provided.
The trip to the Rohar weapons platform took about thirty minutes. Just about the perfect amount of time required to feel and appreciate that twist in your gut –as you watch the alien station bristling with hot weapons systems slowly track your every move.
Did I mention how much the Galactic Order shuttle filled me with confidence in its defensive capabilities?
As a child I had visited my grandfather’s hunting cabin up near Owen Sound, Ontario. The cabin had an outhouse for doing your business. My grandfather swore it was part of the ‘roughing it’ experience. One day I was engaged in ‘said business’ when I heard a bear outside rummaging around the little shed; doing whatever it is bears do around outhouses when little boys are trying take a dump. My gut felt the same way then that it did now.
At last the shuttle docked on the Rohar platform. The platform was a fraction of the size of the Gilboa. That said, there were dozens of them in this section of the star system. Heaven alone knew how many existed in other parts of the system.
In a certain way, their presence here made sense. The gravity well produced by the black hole was kind of a ‘honey pot’ that would draw in ships from Skip Space. This would, in effect, allow the Rohar to act like the bouncers at a bar; to keep undesirables out of Galactic Order space. The million-dollar question was – with the Galactic Order possibly defunct, what were the Rohar doing by aggressively defending the honey pot?
It took the Guardians less than thirty seconds to surround the shuttle once it had touched down and the hanger bay clamps latched onto the landing supports. I watched them swarm the area around the shuttle on a viewscreen that showed the exterior of our craft. There had to be twenty of them out there.
I looked over at Mike. He gave me a thumbs-up and the two other Marines that he had insisted come with us, stood and flanked the door.
The Rohar were imposing to say the least. At almost two hundred pounds, they stood about seven feet tall when standing on their rear legs. Apparently, God issued them four in total plus a single set of two arms. When they stood on all four-leg s, which they were doing now, they were still five feet tall. Their hands had four opposable digits.
According to Mitty, they were cold-blooded but typically wore heated clothing that kept their bodies at a toasty one hundred
and one degrees Fahrenheit. My thought in bringing Mitty was to use him as an advisor for dealing with the Rohar. Sadly, the best laid plans of mice and men sometimes are for naught. This was one of those times.
I had Mitty’s holographic emitter tucked away in my armor. It was a transceiver unit like the one I had used when we first met Admiral Spratt on Lunar Two. That meant Mitty, himself, was still safely aboard the Gilboa. I needed his advice, so I tried to access Mitty on my comms. That was when I discovered that our connection to the Gilboa had been severed. I guess Mitty wouldn’t be joining us on this trip after all.
The ones that came to ‘escort’ us were wearing some type of ceramic armor that looked like scales. If it weren’t for the abundance of obvious bits of technology stuck willy-nilly here and there on their suits, I might have mistaken the armor for some type of flexible shell like an armadillo had. The only part of the Rohars that were exposed were their long snouts. I presume this was so that they could drool freely without getting the inside of their armor wet.
Each carried what could only be some type of rifle. I didn’t know if they threw slugs or some type of energy beam. Frankly, and I say this with all sincerity, I hoped never to find out.
Our hosts escorted us down a long dark corridor. We tried greeting them, but our escort was not interested in talking… except of course for the barking noise they made when startled or agitated or ticked-off that dinner was late.
Apparently the Rohar also didn’t like a lot of light. Either that or they were adapted to use a significantly different spectrum of light. I adjusted the optical sensors in my MES’s helmet display. This allowed me to see a broader range of light frequencies. To my astonishment, there was not a lot of light period. I would learn later that the dragons, as I had begun to think of them, used smell almost as much as they used their eyes to navigate.
Since I wasn’t going to be able to use my tongue to find my way around (and as a point of clarification… I wouldn’t have even if I could!); I opted to augment the available light with a dim ultra-violet emitter mounted on my chest plate. The Rohar didn’t react when I turned it on, so I was hopeful they weren’t seeing it.
My ongoing worry was that we would offend them in some manner. For all I knew, they might feel that the use of additional light was offensive. To make matters worse… I had no idea if the dragons would honor a parley truce.
After about ten minutes of walking, we finally came to a room where it seemed we would meet some of the Rohar that were actually interested in having a conversation. The dragons in this room were quite a bit stockier than the ones that had escorted us. Also, these Rohar wore what I can only assume were uniforms.
The room held three of the Guardians. I recognized the Supreme Guardian from the holographic display on the Gilboa.
I decided to take the initiative and speak first. What can I say? I’m given to reckless flights of fantasy upon occasion. I had a grand ‘delusion’ that we and the Rohar were going to be able to work together amicably.
“Greeting Supreme Guardian. I am Admiral Riker.”
The immediate response was more of the aforementioned guttural barking; followed by something I was hoping not to hear…
“Silence! The accused will be silent.”
Chapter 19: Lost Dog…
“I think there might be a misunderstanding here,” I said in the hopes of defusing the situation.
One of the armored guards took that opportunity to whack me on the back of the head with something that seemed pretty solid. Thank the Lord for our own armor. If I hadn’t been wearing it, I’m not sure I would have survived the blow. These guys were playing for keeps.
Sadly, or fortunately, depending on how you looked at it; one of Mike’s Marines decided to go red-shirt. Before Mike or I could stop him, he turned and planted a servo-enhanced fist in the snout of the dragon that had struck me. The result was spectacular.
Apparently, dragons had glass-jaws. The Rohar in question crumbled like a house of cards being toppled over. This, of course, precipitated a knock-down, drag-out fight between the Rohar escort and the crew of the Gilboa.
It wasn’t much of a fight. There was a hell of a lot more of them then there were of us. Still, we acquitted ourselves rather nicely. I don’t mean to brag – well actually I do – but I took down almost as many of the dragons as Colonel Morrison; and we were heads and dragon tails above the other Marines. Still, five-to-one odds were hard to overcome.
Thankfully, everybody was playing nice – a relative term I know – and not using weapons besides mark-one fists and, in the case of the dragons, the butt end of their rifles.
The melee was over when one of our opponents got a lucky hit on Mike and knocked his helmet off. The way his eyes bulged when he took that first breath of what the Rohar’s called air told me I wasn’t going to enjoy experiencing it on my own.
As my friend stepped back to reattach his helmet, three of the dragons pinned my arms. The rest of Mike’s men as well as Mike himself, soon found themselves similarly restrained.
The three Rohar officers had stayed out of the fight. Whether this was because they were not wearing armor or because such fighting was beneath them… I couldn’t say. At any rate, once we were restrained, the leader began to talk.
To be honest, I wish this had been where we had started things. Sadly, no one ever consults me on things like this.
“I am pleased to see you humans are a people with a strong scent. It is a refreshing change. I promise you that your end will be one with honor,” the Supreme Guardian said.
I had no idea at the time what the reference to ‘strong scent’ was all about, but that thing about ‘ending with honor’ was all too clear… and I wasn’t a fan.
“See, there you go again being negative,” I spat. “Why can’t we just have a conversation like civilized people. We have no idea what is going on and aside from unprovoked threats, you’ve not been very forthcoming. I’m beginning to think you are trying to piss me off.”
I had expected any number of reactions, but a very human type of laugh was not among them. Oh, don’t get me wrong, the laugh was much deeper than a human could have produced, and it was accompanied by quite a bit more spittle… but a laugh it most certainly was.
“Admiral Riker, I sense we could have been good friends. I must talk with my officers and decide what is a fitting fate. You are not personally responsible for the evils done to my people, but you now represent an organization that we are at war with.”
He sent some unseen signal to his men. Before I could say anything else, we were half-dragged, half-carried out of the room. Five minutes later, we found ourselves in a brig that could have found a home on any ship in the Federated Fleet. I guess certain engineering problems lend themselves to a universal set of solutions. As the solid door closed with an ominous clunk, we could hear the dragons marching off. We couldn’t know for sure, but it seemed like they hadn’t bothered to leave any guards posted by the door.
Thankfully, the dragons had let us keep our MES gear. Apparently, they didn’t want us to die of asphyxiation until they could agree how to kill us. I appreciated that. It was the little acts of kindness that made such a difference in the world.
Mike and I looked at each other. I was pretty sure that we were being monitored, but I doubted the Rohar knew how to interpret sign-language. I signaled that we needed to locate and disable the monitoring devices.
The four of us began a systematic search of the cell we had been placed in. It turned out that each of the corners had very small cameras located where the ceiling and two walls came together. Our MES gear included a supply of duct tape, affectionately known as 100 mph tape. A small piece in each corner solved the camera issue.
There was still the possibility that additional cameras where hidden about the room, so Mike had one of his boys… I think it was Corporal Ramirez, apply a mark-one fist to each of the lighting fixtures.
Now that the room was dark, we turned on our headlamps…
tuning them to the frequency of light that I had used earlier. It seemed probable that the Rohar weren’t able to see in such conditions.
Now that we had done our best to secure our privacy, we began to plan our escape. We continued to use sign language because we couldn’t know how well our hosts were able to monitor our comms as well as acoustics.
“We need to find a way out of here,” Mike signed.
I nodded. One thing was sure… the Gilboa was not going to be much help. Any action they took would very likely result in our deaths. As I looked around I saw few if any opportunities for escaping. This, of course, made sense as ‘containment’ was the primary function of a jail cell.
“Ideas?”
“It’s a good bet force is not going to do the job,” the Colonel responded.
“Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. The door has a mechanical latch, so we won’t be shorting it out. How about the ceiling?” I asked.
“It’s worth checking into. Whatever we do, we need to do it quickly. I can’t imagine our slobbering friends are going to leave us alone for that long now that we have disabled their cameras.”
I waved Corporal Ramirez over. Mike explained what we were after and then the two of us boosted him up towards the ceiling. This was the same trick we had used to smash the lights to begin with.
The Corporal felt along the edge of the light fixture. Eventually he found a recessed clasp which released the panel. Fortunately, Private Ryan caught the falling fixture before it could hit the ground.
What was left in the ceiling was a two-foot by four-foot rectangular hole. There was no way of knowing if it led anywhere but as our options were limited; we could stay where we were and die… or go spelunking through an alien spacecraft… I opted for the high-adventure route.
We formed a ladder. The Private climbed up us and entered the hole in the ceiling first. He then pulled up the Corporal.
At this point, it was just the Colonel and I left in the room. Mike signaled for me to step into his hand and he would toss me up, so the others could catch me and pull me the rest of the way. I nixed the idea. I ordered Mike to step into my clasped hands. He shook his head. I thought I was going to have a mutiny rather than a foot on my hands.