“Well done,” said Alenna, “What is this about a reward for those Pirates?’’
I replied to her, “There is a reward of five thousand alliance credits for each pirate, so we will be expecting fifteen thousand in total. We should receive this once they have gone through the formalities of authorising it.’’
Alenna then said, “That is a lot of money. I am not comfortable with the way we have earnt it.’’
I replied “I didn’t think you would be. So I would like to make a suggestion. Perhaps we could donate some of it to the senior citizens home that your great grandmother resides in. I know the home she lives in only survives from donations, although they do receive sufficient to feed and house them. They do not get quite enough extra for regular treats and they don’t get out as often as they would like. My suggestion is that we give them five thousand credits for the specific purpose of it being used for them to go to plays and concerts. What do you think Alenna?”
The average life span of an Alkarren female is one hundred and five years and the record is one hundred and twenty eight, males average is ninety nine with the oldest on record living to one hundred and twenty one. So you often find many generations still alive at the same time.
Alenna smiling at me then replied, “You do surprise me sometimes, I think that would be a great way to spend some of the reward. What should we do with the rest?”
I replied in a meaningful way, “I think we should divide it between all the members of our family including Pooky, when we see her next.’’
Alenna agreed by saying, “I will go with that.”
I now took out the weapons from the locker and Alenna spotted me, “What are you going to do with them? You should have handed them over to security,’’ she stated with a concerned look on her face.
“It is not mandatory that I hand them over. Besides I haven’t decided what to do with them yet. I may keep them or dispose of them. For the time being I will lock them in my man cave. Out of sight out of mind.” I reply.
Not out of mind! Alenna said, “I know you have them and I don’t like them being aboard, though I am now a little more relaxed that you kept those energy discharge rifles and you used them sensibly.’’
We were now ready to return to Alkarr but before we did I wanted to spend a short time studying Kelder. The atmosphere is around eight hundred millibars and the main gas is nitrogen, about seventy six percent with carbon dioxide at twelve percent the rest is made up of oxygen and argon. There is also a trace of methane. You need to use respirators to breath on the surface at present but this planet is a good candidate for terraforming. It does have a magnetic field. They only need to warm the planet a few more degrees. They could probably use a number of techniques to do this, such as grind up volcanic rock and darken the ice, so it does not reflect back into space so much solar energy. Also along with giant mirrors in orbit to direct solar energy onto the planet, the alliance have used this technique before on other planets. Once they can get vegetation to grow then the carbon dioxide levels should drop and at the same time oxygen would then increase, eventually reaching a point where respirators would not be required. I suspect it is already under discussion, so one day if we ever return here, we may see the planet as more hospitable environment than it is at the present.
The second thing I had to do on our return to Alkarr was to log with the authorities that shuttle we salvaged from the pirates, leaving its serial number with them. It would now be their responsibly to trace the owner and inform them.
In the meantime I would hover it out of our cargo ship and sit it down next to our warehouse. The first thing to do of course was to check on Lumi. She was fine, just a short time now to wait. Lumi would be left on Alkarr, as she was having twins it was only prudent that she was near to medical facilities should there be an emergency.
Chapter 6
Galaxy Class Cargo Freighter
We had to go and collect our ninth frigate for transport to Earth. With all that had happened we were running late by more than two weeks. Lumi and Rachael were to remain on Alkarr due to Lumi being so close to birth, most possibly within the month. Yarkeli was desperately missing Pooky and was hoping to go and see her on visiting day which by the time we had arrived at Lusiana was not for two further days, so we would be again delayed. As soon as we had arrived Yarkeli had taken the opportunity of this waiting time to go and visit some of her relatives. This left the rest of us to sit it out for two days. After I had loaded the frigate and four crates I had to decide how I would pass the time. Going outside was not really an option as it was far too hot even in the shade created by our cargo ship for all but a brief moment of time during the day, but at early dawn there was a window of opportunity. I wanted to collect some Plenngy seeds to give to Lidier when I next took Perri to the moon. So I was up early next morning ready to go outside. It was already twenty-eight centigrade as I left the ship and the sun was just popping up above the horizon. It looked so large. I quickly made my way towards a clump of Plenngy growing on the shady side of a large boulder and started to look for some seeds. Soon I had a small bag full. No further time was left as the temperature was quickly rising. In that brief time of less than half hour the temperature had risen to thirty nine degrees centigrade and was now fast reaching a point where I could not stand the heat anymore, so I had no choice but to return to the ship. I was satisfied with the amount of seeds that I had managed to collect. I had that strange picture in my head again of seeing Lidier sitting in her moon garden on a deckchair surrounded by Plenngy. What a strange and odd thought that was, of her sitting in a deckchair, very odd indeed. The family and I spent our time in our cool air conditioned ship. I personally spent quite some time just looking out of the bridge windows watching various space craft come and go. There were some Lusianians who had braved the heat. They were moving between buldings or from and to the ships nearby. If any Lusianian passing our ship spotted me watching them they would wave at me and I likewise would wave back at them. Yarkeli was up very early on the visiting day and was eager for us to set off. We had to fly some way to the where the officer training centre was located. Yarkeli, Alenna, Perri and I along with the three older daughters were to go on the visit to see her. I flew us there on the shuttle. What a reunion. Pooky was not expecting us due to a communication blackout and was so surprised but very pleased to see us. She had some good news to tell us all. Her superiors were so impressed with her abilities that she had after just a three weeks of being at the academy been promoted from the automatic rank of ensign at joining to a lieutenant bypassing sub lieutenant. This was almost unheard off. Pooky also informed us that she was due to be assigned to serve on a battle cruiser on completion of her basic training in just over a month’s time. After our visit and the tearful goodbyes it was time to return to our cargo ship and proceed to Earth. The adults and older children had spent a lot of time in space recently. We should before long spend at least a week on Alkarr for a well-earned rest.
“Alenna,’’ I said, “isn’t it time we had some time off? How about a week after our next delivery instead of the couple of days we have been having?’’
She replied, “I thought you wanted to get all the frigates delivered as quickly as possible and could not afford having time off.’’
I explained, “It’s not for me, I care about you all, I can see how the stress of continually being in space is affecting many of you now. We should consider it. Before you say anything, yes the younger children did spend some time on Alkarr, when they didn’t accompany us to Kelder, but then all the children plus the adults have not been able to visit the beach on Alkarr for months. I know how everyone finds going to the beach relaxing. Perhaps we should consider it.’’
Alenna thought and then agreed saying, “Ok you are right, we will spend some extra time on Alkarr after our next de
livery to Earth.”
We had finally arrived at Earth. We were now running almost four weeks late. On landing the base commander commented, “I thought you weren’t coming back.’’
“Sorry,” I replied, “we had a situation that came up that required our immediate attention.”
I went and hovered the frigate out of the cargo bay, sitting it down nearby. I noticed the base had this new fuelling vehicle, with the words Danger Multi Gas written on the side in large letters. There were two guards stationed at the vehicle.
I asked the base commander at the same time I was pointing towards the vehicle, “Is that for re-fuelling the frigates.’’
“Yes” he replied, “we received it only this week.”
That’s good you don’t need me to top up you frigate anymore. Anyway who is having this one?” I said pointing at the one we had just delivered.
“Oh that’s for the Australians. Their party are all off base at the moment,” he replied. “Their pilot has been waiting four weeks. She was getting bored so has gone shopping today, but we expect her and the others back soon.’’
I replied, “That’s Lucy isn’t it? I know Pooky and Lucy hit it off very soon after they met, Lucy is going to be disappointed as Pooky is not with us now. She has joined the alliance defence league and has already made the rank of lieutenant. Forget she was a captain when she was here, I gave her that rank to make sure she was in charge of the training frigate.”
“I know you did,” said the base commander. “I was told by Lucy, but a real lieutenant how did she earn that rank so soon and so young? Lucy told me she is just fourteen.”
“She is very talented and her race matures at a younger age,” I said with a smile.
While we waited for their return I unloaded the four crates of spares with our hover lift. This always draws attention and some of the lower ranks make snidely comments like, ‘You’ve lost your wheels mate or what’s keeping you up, you must be full of hot air,’ I just ignored them, though the thought did go through my head of shooting them with one of my rifles, set on stun of course. I saw this figure hurrying towards the newly delivered frigate, this person then started slowly walking around it. Lucy had returned along with the rest of her Australian party. Alenna was keen to conclude business as soon as possible so we could depart. Alenna, Jenna and I were escorted to the base commander’s office where again the business of concluding the purchase of the shuttle was to take place, I handed over another copy in English of frigate’s manual along with the mandatory fuelling nozzle which all countries were being presented with. No matter if they purchased one or three frigates they would only receive one fuelling nozzle. Alenna’s settlement was then paid in gold. We had no further reason to stay on Earth so after boarding our cargo ship we left to go once again to Lusiana.
I was very curious to know what Alenna was doing with all our gold we had earnt, so I said to her, “Where are you hiding all the gold Alenna?”
She looked at me and laughed saying, “I am not hiding it anywhere, I take it and have it converted into alliance credits. We now have many millions in our account!’’
“Wow!’’ I replied. “One more delivery and we can buy our new cargo freighter.”
I did not know what to do after we had delivered our tenth frigate. Should we go to the beach first or go all the way to Relnor for our new freighter? If we got the freighter first I might not wish to go to the beach (as I would want to play with my new toy, or be it a cargo freighter) and if we went to the beach first I might spend the entire time we were there thinking about getting our new ship, decisions, and more decisions. An inspiration suddenly hit me. Why did I not think of it before? I needed to speak to Alenna right away to see if she would now accept my new idea.
“Alenna,” I said, “I have missed an opportunity. I now think we do not need to go to the beach, we can bring the beach with us,’’.
“What do you mean bring a beach with us, are you going crazy?’’ Asked Alenna in a puzzled sort of way.
“Our new ship, it has a hologram room!!! All we have to do is select a beach scene from Alkarr and the family can spend their time during all future trips enjoying themselves. You know how real to life the illusion is.
“Why did you not come up with that idea before?” asked Alenna
I proclaimed, “Don’t know, it just did not enter my head. We could also go for walks in the forests of Mazar.”
After our tenth delivery we returned back to Alkarr. We were very eager to find out any news on Lumi. She was now due to give birth any day now, but still had not. As a result she would still be staying on Alkarr, only that her mother would now be looking after her along with the assistance of Lara in the evenings and during the night if required. My sister Rachael would no longer be staying with Lumi. Instead she would be accompanying us to Relnor to purchase our new ship. We first hired another landing zone at our local port. This was the largest space available and luckily for us it was not in use by anyone, due to the fact no other house owned a galaxy class freighter at our port. Alenna now called in that favour from the House of Tinter. Again Hera and her navigator along with a few other mothers from the House of Tinter would accompany us. Their job was to fly the Alkarren Princess back to Alkarr. What were we going to do with her after we had the new ship? At this point in time it had not yet been decided.
My sister Rachael asked Alenna in a hoping sort of way, “Please can I bring Sabrina with me on this trip, I have spoken to Perri and Luka who are willing to offer to their chaperon service for Jake throughout the journey.’’
Alenna replied with a smile, “Sabrina is a nice girl, we all like her, so on this occasion she may accompany us to Relnor.’’
Rachael in an excited manner just said two words, “Thanks Alenna.’’
So now we were all set to leave. I thought for a moment, you know this could be the last time we fly this ship anywhere. It has served us well and I will be very sad to say goodbye to it. During our trip to Relnor we packed our belongings and most of our provisions into storage bins ready to transfer to the new ship, though at the moment I had not done anything about packing my personal items from my man cave. I would do that back on Alkarr when hopefully I would get an opportunity to select a suitable room for my new man cave during our return trip. We were all excited at the prospect of acquiring this new cargo ship and doesn’t time drag when you are looking forward to something. The three days travel there seemed to last a week. I was also getting feed up of being chaperoned but I did have to accept it as I did not wish to be hijacked, though on this occasion only Sabrina could be considered a candidate as she was not married, but she would definitely not want to marry me. Finally we had arrived. Alenna, Jenna, Minty and I soon left the ship after landing. We headed towards the sales building. We could see lots of different space craft in a line, just like going to a garage to buy a car. We were eagerly greeted by a salesperson or rather a sales Relnorian. She could speak Zeln fluently, which was most probably mandatory in her job. Space craft sales is highly privileged profession earning her good commission. Excluding military space craft, Galaxy class cargo freighters are only second to star liners in their value. We were about to spend over a hundred million credits and you could see Alenna was a little nervous. There were three brand new ships all sparkling in the morning sun.
Chronicles of Jake 2: The Invasion Begins Page 9