by Saxon Andrew
James’ expression showed he was still doubtful, as he turned to Danielle, “Why are you doing this now?”
“What have we been doing for the last three or four-thousand years?” Danielle asked.
James stared at them in silence and Rose answered, “You have been out attacking aggressive civilizations.”
“So, who are the most experienced warriors present?”
Rose’s eyes lowered, as she said, “Don’t even think about doing this?”
“Doing what?” James asked.
“That is not an answer, Rose.”
Rose took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly, “You know you and Tag are the most experience. But that…”
“Yes, it does, Rose!” Tag interrupted.
“What are the two of you talking about?” James asked.
JP turned to his father, “They are going out and getting involved in the fight, Father.”
James’ head went back slightly, and then he jerked his face around to Danielle, “This is not a good time for you to endanger yourselves!”
“It’s the perfect time, James. We have successors as talented psychically as we are, and the Realm needs us doing what’s necessary to protect it.”
“I WILL NOT DROP OUT OF THIS FIGHT, MOM!”
“No one is asking you to do that, Rose.” Danielle turned to Jimmy and Lola, “However, I do have a request of you.”
“What is that?” Lola asked.
“In the event both Rose and we die, you will be the Royal Couple. I need you and Jimmy to allow Atlas to extend your life spans, in the event that happens. Also, if two-couples are lost in the fighting, the surviving couple will withdraw from the fighting and return to the Realm to rule it.”
“Your Majesty, this is a lot to consider,” Jimmy replied.
“If nothing happens to us, you can always have Atlas return your life spans back to normal. Your baby will also have his life extended as well.” Jimmy and Lola stared at Danielle and she smiled, “Do you ever feel you’ll never get everything done you want to accomplish?” They looked at each other and nodded. “That will no longer be an issue, if you agree to do this. You can tell me your answer after the meeting is over.”
Rose’s expression showed she was clearly troubled, “You’re planning something dangerous!”
Tag looked at Rose, “Yes, we are and we’re the only ones that can do it.”
“What are you planning?” Sprigly asked.
“We’re going to fire a psychic blaster at an OA warship and see if it’s effective against them. We also intend to see if the OA’s have a dimensional drive.”
The gathering was silent and Sprigly raised his branches, “Both of those issues are extremely important. Why do you have to do it?”
“Because Tag has a talent that will allow him to hide from the OAs.” Danielle answered.
“I thought you weren’t going with him!” Rose interrupted again.
Danielle looked at Tag, as she said, “We considered that, but I will not allow him to go into danger without me.” She turned back to Rose, “Would you allow JP to go alone?”
Rose looked at JP staring at her and sighed, “No, I guess I wouldn’t.”
Danielle looked out at the gathering, “The problem of the Realm and Bristone Empire falling apart if Tag and I die, is no longer the problem it was when we came back years ago. Our experience is needed to defend all of us from the threat the OAs represent. Unless you can come up with a good reason why we shouldn’t implement these decisions, then they take effect immediately.” The giant chamber was silent, and Danielle smiled, “So, be it. This meeting is adjourned.”
“I have one more question!” Danielle turned to Rose, “What about Cassie?”
“HEY! LEAVE ME OUT OF THIS!!”
Danielle smiled, “Cassie will replace you as the Duchess of Earth and will rule there. If she marries, her husband will join her.”
Cassie turned to Marc and he rolled his eyes. Putting off asking the question just got more problematic. He leaned in and whispered, “We’ll discuss this later.” Cassie nodded and turned back to Danielle.
“Are there any other questions?” Danielle waited and finally said, “Ok, you may go back to your duties.”
• • •
Tag went over to Eddie and extended his hand, “It’s good to see you, Eddie.”
“Uhhh…Your Majesty, I rushed here immediately after we arrived at Kelen and there’s something that you might want to take a look at.”
Tag’s brow furrowed, “What is that?”
“We picked up a dead OA on our last trip.”
“Say what?!”
“We have it at the Defense Facility.”
“ARE YOU KIDDING ME?” Sprigly thought loudly.
Eddie looked across the chamber, “No, Sprigly, I’m not.”
“I have to go with you!”
“By all means.” Eddie turned to Tag, “You might want to delay your trip until we can process what happened to it.”
Tag nodded, “Danielle and I will meet you at the Defense Facility as soon as we wrap up here.” Tag looked up, “Hello, Bong; good to see you.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty. I’m still surprised you can.”
Tag turned to go speak with Danielle and Eddie rushed out of the chamber, “Janie, teleport me up and set a course for Kelen!” Eddie disappeared, and Bong was on the Nightmare a moment later.
• • •
Eddie arrived at the Defense Facility’s lab and found Bobby running scans of the dead OA. “The King and Queen are on their way; have you found out anything?”
Bobby looked up from the scanner, “I can’t get a look at what’s inside this creature, but it appears it was crushed.” A muscle twitched in Eddie’s jaw. Bobby saw it and said with raised eyebrows, “I know, that is thought to be impossible, but the evidence shows this OA was killed by a heavy object hitting it.”
“Sir, the Royal Couple have arrived and are teleporting in.”
“Thanks, Janie. Ask them to join us in the lab.” Bobby was staring at the huge creature and Eddie said, “Why don’t you wait for everyone to arrive before explaining how you arrived at your conclusion.”
“Yes, Sir.”
Tag and Danielle suddenly appeared, followed by Janie and Sprigly. “Oh, my God!” Danielle exclaimed.
Tag’s eyes darted to Danielle, “They’re larger in real life; the videos don’t do them justice.”
Tag turned to Eddie and he nodded toward Bobby, “Captain Cor has been investigating this creature and has a theory on what killed it.”
Everyone turned to Bobby and his skin turned slightly red, “I hesitate to even suggest what I’ve found; however, the evidence suggests this creature was crushed by a heavy object.”
Sprigly’s branches shook, “It must have been a planet sized object! Those things are indestructible. Just how did you arrive at this conclusion?”
“I scanned the creature’s body and entered its shape into my computer. You’ll notice that it’s shaped like an extremely large upside-down bowl. The center is higher than the outer edge and its body slopes up from the outer edge to the raised center; does everyone see that?”
“We do, Captain; continue,” Danielle replied.
“I entered that shape in a software program and began running it through multiple scenarios to see what events would cause the shape of that hole in the center of it.”
“What sort of scenarios, Captain?”
Bobby turned to Sprigly, “Everything from missiles, blasters, projectiles, high altitude drops, high speed collisions…”
“I get the picture!” Sprigly interrupted.
Tag glared at the dead OA and asked, “What did you find?”
“We don’t have a blaster hot enough to damage the outer skin. The thing is so large that it would not fall at a fast-enough speed to generate the forces needed to do it and the hole is in the top of the creature and not the bottom.”
Danielle’s jaw tightened, “Ca
ptain, these things survived a direct hit by a nuclear explosion. I find it hard to believe anything could damage it.”
Bobby’s face turned redder, “I ran everything I could think of but the only thing that caused a hole like the one in that dead OA was being crushed under a heavy object.” Bobby turned to Eddie, “Sir, do you still have the videos of the attack on a planet by the OAs?”
Eddie looked up, “BC?”
“I’m sending it to the lab’s monitor. The remote control is on the wall holder next to it.”
Janie walked over and took the remote control. She looked at Eddie and he nodded. She turned to the monitor and pressed a button. Sprigly immediately said, “This is just before the nuclear missile hit.”
Bobby stared at the video and saw the OAs stop their mad rush forward and remain where they were. There was a blinding flash and the view changed to after the shockwave had blown past their location. Everyone watched the OAs suddenly start moving forward. Bobby lowered his eyes and said, “Janie, run it back to just before the OAs stopped.” Janie pointed the remote at the monitor and the view changed back to the rush of the OAs toward a large city. “Stop it there?” The video stopped, and Bobby walked closer to the monitor. He turned around and looked at Tag and Danielle, “It’s clear these OAs were warned about the incoming nuclear missile.” Tag nodded. Bobby turned to Janie, “Put a number on all the OAs in this video.”
Janie pressed buttons on the remote and each OA had a number appear on it; there were sixty-five OAs on the monitor. “Now, focus in tightly on one of the OAs, start the video, and have it go to super-slow motion the moment they come to a stop.” Bobby requested.
Janie nodded and followed his instructions. The OAs suddenly moved forward and then came to complete stop. The view rushed in on the OA with the number-one imposed on it and they saw it moving. “Slow it down some more, Janie!”
The motion slowed, and everyone walked up directly in front of the huge monitor and Tag asked, “What are they doing?”
Sprigly shook his branches, “They’re digging.”
“What?” Tag asked?
“Watch the outer edge of that OA,” Sprigly answered. “Notice how much of it is above the street. Captain Roberts, back it up to the moment they stopped and then start it running again. Everyone focus on how much of the creature’s edge is above the street’s surface.”
The video started again, and it was clear that at least eighteen-inches of the creature’s edge was above the street they were on. Then they saw the edge start diminishing. After a few moments, at super-slow-motion, the edge disappeared. Sprigly’s leaves turned brown, “Why am I missing so much?”
“What do you mean?” Eddie asked.
“I never saw this until this moment, Admiral. The OAs dug in until they were at, or slightly below, the level of the street.”
Bobby turned to Sprigly and nodded, “The shockwave from a nuclear explosion travels faster than seven-hundred-miles-per-hour. I suspect if it managed to get under the OA’s edge, they would be blown away in the wind.”
Danielle spoke up, “But they’re still exposed, Captain Cor!”
Bobby nodded, “Yes, they are, Your, Majesty. But only their outer skin is exposed, and we know their outer skin can withstand a tremendous level of heat.” Bobby paused and then continued, “I think I know why they’re able to do that.”
Tag’s eyes tightened, “Do tell!”
Bobby looked at Eddie and he nodded for him to continue. Bobby looked back at the monitor and began, “I believe these creatures evolved on a planet circling a type-O star. Probably the planet they evolved on was far enough out to be hot, but not hot enough to prevent them from living. We have on Earth today life in the super-hot water that steams out of underwater volcanos. These creatures possibly started their existence in those conditions. Over millions of years, the Type-O star would grow hotter because it would burn up their hydrogen fuel at a much higher speed than smaller stars. The planet’s temperature would slowly, incrementally, get hotter over a million-years and these creatures evolved an outer skin that could tolerate the increasing temperatures. Remember, this would happen very slowly over millions of years. One of the first things to go on this planet would be its atmosphere. It would slowly be blown away in the solar wind the Type-O star caused, and these creatures would evolve to not need an atmosphere to survive. They could also not communicate using sounds; there would be no air to carry the vibrations, so, they evolved to communicate using different colors in their skin. Eventually, their skin evolved to handle the unimaginable heat from a growing Type O star and they developed intelligence.” Bobby paused to see if there were any questions. No one spoke, so he continued, “It wouldn’t take them long to discover their central star was going to go super-nova in the not too distant future.”
“So, they developed space travel and eventually discovered a stardrive to allow them to escape,” Sprigly interrupted.
Bobby nodded agreement, “Yes, but they had what appeared to be an insurmountable problem.”
“What was that?” Janie asked.
“The temperatures on the planet were so hot, any metal would liquify. Please keep in mind that the surface temperature would be hotter than our most powerful blaster beam. To build a starship, it had to be constructed under the planet’s surface and it would still melt if it moved above the planet’s surface.” Bobby paused and glanced at the monitor again, before continuing, “I believe the first starships they build had these creatures link together to make the ship’s hull. It was the only way they could escape. They didn’t need an atmosphere to survive in the vacuum of space and they could handle any temperature.”
“That explains how they were able to dig through the concrete street,” Janie interjected.
Bobby smiled, “I suspect this creature lived the early part of its life underground. However, at no point do I see these creatures having to deal with extreme weight.”
“Pardon me?” Danielle replied to his comment.
Bobby looked at Janie, “Move forward in the video to when the shockwave had passed, and the OAs emerged to continue their rush toward the city.” The view changed, and they saw the OAs emerge and slowly start moving forward, “Freeze it there, Janie!” The image froze, and Bobby said, “Put a number over each of them again.” Janie worked the remote and each of the OAs were numbered. This time there were only fifty-four visible.
“Eleven of them are missing!” Tag pointed out.
“Janie, see if you can match the surviving OAs with the one closest to them before the nuclear explosion.” Janie frowned, and Bobby smiled, “Move it back to when they first came out of the street and started moving forward. Superimpose the image of them just before the explosion.” Janie shook her head and smiled. She moved the video back and put a transparent image of the OAs just before the explosion on top of it. Bobby stared at the monitor and requested, “Match the numbers on the OAs in both images.” The numbers changed, and Bobby said, “Ok! Now, remove all of the survivors and let’s see what remains.”
They stared at the image and saw the eleven OAs were still on the monitor. “Janie, mark those locations and put them on the image after the shockwave.” Everyone stared at the monitor and saw that there were giant buildings covering the location of the missing eleven-OAs. Bobby turned around, “I believe those missing OAs were crushed by the buildings that collapsed on them.”
Chapter Sixteen
Sprigly stared at the monitor and then turned to Bobby, “How do we know those missing OAs aren’t digging their way out from under those buildings?”
Bobby shrugged, “We don’t; the probe’s recording doesn’t go any further for us to see. But if you couple this with the computer saying this OA was crushed, it does imply that they can be crushed and killed. Each of those pieces of evidence by itself isn’t enough to be sure; but taken together, I do believe they can be killed.”
“Are you suggesting we need to drop a building on them to do that?”
“No, Sprigly. I’m certain their outer skin is extremely hard but there is a limit to how much it can take.”
Sprigly went over to Janie and held out a branch, “May I?” Janie handed him the remote and Sprigly backed up the video to an image of a city being attacked by the OAs. He stopped it and turned to the group, “I want everyone to notice that the local soldiers are firing a handheld model of the missile that destroyed the OA warships. Watch what happens.” Everyone watched numerous missiles hitting the OAs as they rushed forward, and they weren’t slowed down at all. The explosions were huge, but the OAs overran the defenders.
Sprigly turned to Eddie, “The speed of that missile was impossible, and it didn’t make them flinch.”
Eddie turned to Bobby, “Do you want to tell him?”
“No, Sir. You do the honors.”
Sprigly’s branches turned slightly red in surprise and he turned to Eddie. “Sprigly, you can take a high-powered projectile and fire it at a sheet of hardened plastic tilted sixty-degrees and the projectile would be deflected. Run the video again in slow-motion and watch what happens to the missiles.”
Sprigly turned back to the monitor and ran the video again. The missiles hit the OAs and were deflected into the sky. Eddie smiled, “The explosions hid the deflections. And we know the OA’s outer skin can handle any explosive force.”
Sprigly ran it again and his leaves turned brown, “It appears you’re right.”
Bobby pointed at the charging OAs, “If those missiles were fired when they were about ten-feet away from the launcher, they might have penetrated the outer skin.”
Tag snorted, “If they’re ten-feet away, it’s too late!”
Bobby nodded, “Yes, but that is the best angle for the missile to not be deflected.”
Danielle stared at Bobby, “I can see you’ve been working on this. What kind of weapon could kill them?”
Bobby was silent, and Eddie smiled, “Come on, Bobby. Don’t be embarrassed; I know you’ve thought about this.”
Bobby’s face turned red again and he shrugged, “It would take a projectile shaped to eliminate the angle of deflection, traveling at a speed that’s beyond what we can currently produce.”