First Admiral 01 First Admiral
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“What proportion of our military would you envision commanding?” the Praetor asked suspiciously, still seeing plots to trap and betray his people at every turn.
“Effectively Praetor Maximus, you would need very few personnel to protect this planet. No one has the technology to see through the Defence Screens or penetrate the Defence Shields. So, we would need to discuss a phased re-deployment of forces. It will take time to train and familiarise Thexxians with Garmaurian technology,” Billy said, “I could start with say fifteen thousand, about five percent of your military, which can be augmented over time as your people become comfortable with the situation.”
“That is a most practical, generous and reasonable offer First Admiral,” the Praetor Maximus considered, ”however, I cannot make agreements for my people of this magnitude without consulting them through a referendum.”
“I would not expect otherwise, Praetor Maximus,” Billy responded, realising that he had to get back to his life on Earth, “and if your people do not wish to join the new Alliance, they are free to resume their travels. Now, if you’ll excuse me I have an appointment elsewhere.”
The Praetor Maximus nodded his agreement to the flame haired, pink-skinned alien, who called himself First Admiral Caudwell, who had just handed the Thexxians a lifeline to a future they had not dared even dream about less than a day before.
Ten minutes later, standing on the balcony outside the apartments of the base’s former Commanding Officer, the Praetor Maximus of the Thexxians watched the Garmaurian space vehicle that was called the Black Rose streak away from one of the Landing Pads.
That morning, he had awoken to the waking nightmare of trying to hold his disillusioned and dispirited people together for just one more day. One more day of survival; just like all the other days. He was fully expecting to return to sleep, once again exhausted and having resolved nothing of any significance, but having staved off the inevitable disaster of the fleet falling apart for another precious day.
Instead, this night his people would sleep with full stomachs, the Praetor Maximus considered, on clean cots, wearing clean clothes, in clean surroundings.
The sick and injured were being tended to in one of the most technologically advanced hospitals in the universe. They were protected by defences no one, least of all their greatest enemies, could penetrate. And, as Caudwell had suggested, with an alliance, in time they might well be able to reclaim their old home planet from the Bardomil.
As the Praetor Maximus had said his goodbyes to this strange alien, he had wondered how his people could possibly refuse the offer.
Chapter 30
Jennifer Martin stood quietly in the doorway to the Sport’s Equipment storeroom. It was a deep recessed door in the venerable red sandstone façade to the rear of the school. Jennifer felt safe in the doorway. It was deep enough for her to hide in its shadows, yet not so deep as to afford her a good field of vision. From her secure vantage, Jennifer Martin could watch the activities of the playground and at the same time shovel crisps and sweets into her mouth. Like a starving prisoner having hoarded scraps of food, and hidden them from her fellow prisoners, she ate secretively and with a sense of guilt and shame.
Like some shameful activity, she quickly ate the items her meagre pocket money allowed her every day. To eat was something shameful to Jennifer Martin, because she felt that she did not deserve to eat, although it would not stay in her now shrunken stomach for very long. Jennifer Martin felt that she was unworthy to eat, that she was completely unworthy to live after all she was the one who had killed her own mother, wasn’t she? If she hadn’t insisted on going to ballet classes that night so many years ago, then her mother wouldn’t have had to collect her, and wouldn’t have had the accident. Her mother would still be alive today, the irrational thought gnawed at Jennifer’s mind like a cancerous growth.
Her mother would still be alive, she would be friends with her sister Julie and her father would still love her like he had before her mother’s death, Jennifer thought. That dark stormy night, nine years before, had seen five year old Jennifer determined to go to the ballet classes paid for by her father. She had begged and pleaded with her mother to be taken to her class. She had felt like a fairy tale princess in her little white outfit as she had spun, jumped and ran around with her friends. When it was over, her mother hadn’t come back to pick her up. It had been a kindly neighbour who had driven her home to face the terrible news that her mother had died in a road accident on the way to collect her from class.
Worse than that was to follow. Her once loving father had become cold and distant to her, silently blaming her for the death of his wife. Jennifer never seemed to be able to do anything right in his eyes. Meanwhile, Julie, always the favourite, could do no wrong in his eyes. So, the years of slow painful, mind-numbing neglect and emotional abuse had begun for Jennifer Martin.
So, like a criminal in the night, with her feral-eyed stare, she pushed the sweet and savoury morsels into her mouth, hoping that no one would see her. Secretly relishing that what she was doing was something that was illicit and forbidden. That her frame was now painfully thin was a source of concern for her class teachers, but had been dismissed as a girlish phase by the Headmistress. The black blazer bought for her at the beginning of the school year hung over her skinny frame like a potato sack, whilst her pleated grey skirt was held up by a safety pin at the carefully folded waistband.
To the rear of the school Miss Jean Connolly was stationed to maintain good order and behaviour on the playground. It was Miss Jean Connolly that had become the object of Jennifer Martin’s attentions. A few days before, espying the shy and rather secretive girl, who huddled in the doorway, she had spent a few minutes trying to coax her out onto the playground.
Ostensibly, it was to keep all of the students in front of her, rather than having to constantly check in doorways and corners of buildings. She had exchanged a few pleasant words of encouragement with the shy little girl, and had then moved on to tend her other more boisterous and rowdy charges. The following day she had tried the same, to move her out of her hidey hole, and into her line of vision.
To Jennifer Martin, not used to kindly words, especially from adults, those few words shone like a beacon. They gave her a feeling of hope in the miserable, monotonous darkness of her otherwise empty and meaningless life. Those few words magnified into a conversation in Jennifer’s mind, which took on greater and greater meaning as she remembered and repeated over and over what had been said to her. Over the space of a few days, a few random words of kindness and encouragement took on the aspect of a friendship. A friendship Jennifer Martin had never known before, and Jean Connolly had never intended.
Watching from her safe haven of the Storeroom doorway, Jennifer’s heart gave a lurch of elation as Miss Connolly approached, alone. This was the day she had promised to herself. This was the day she would tell someone what it was like for her at home. Usually there were two teachers walking together, however, the second teacher was involved in scolding some boys for making too much noise amongst the cacophony of the playground.
Silently, Jennifer Martin emerged like some small frightened forest creature from the safety of her doorway. With her heart pounding fit to burst and that strange feeling of tightness across her chest she carefully took the dozen or so steps up behind the solid frame of the teacher. With her head spinning, and feeling dizzy, Jennifer Martin approached, her fists bunched by her side with determination. She was determined to tell someone about what was happening to her at home. Someone like Miss Connolly who would understand, who would be able to do something about it.
“M…M….M….Miss Connolly ?” she stammered.
“Hello Jennifer, are you enjoying the sunshine today?” Jean Connolly’s broad and ruddily healthy face beamed, as she scanned the playground for any misbehavers.
“M…M…M…Miss Connolly, I……I……I,” Jennifer began, her heart soaring; Miss Connolly, her one and only friend, knew her name.
“W
ell, spit it out Jennifer,” Jean Connolly smiled.
“I…..I….I,” Jennifer began, getting angrier that her mouth was not doing what her brain was telling it.
She had practiced and rehearsed in her bedroom for hours what she was going to do at this moment, and now in the heat of the moment her words were failing her.
“You two, over there!” Jean Connolly suddenly bellowed spotting two boys fighting over a ball, “Stop that at once!” she added and strode away from Jennifer Martin purposefully to stop the ensuing combat.
Stunned for a few moments, Jennifer Martin dropped her head into her shoulders and scuttled back to the safety of her doorway. Where, her back braced against the doorway frame, she slowly slid down to the seated position, and clasped her arms in front of her knees. The betrayal was final, she thought. Her one friend didn’t listen to her. The one person she was prepared to trust didn’t have the time to hear her. Tthe whole edifice of her imagined friendship came crashing down in the head of Jennifer Martin. It was hopeless. She had no friends, no one who would listen to her, no one who would understand her. No one who could make the misery stop.
In that terrible moment of imagined betrayal, she had resolved to take steps to stop to her misery, once and for all.
Chapter 31
Falkus Margallan sat anxiously, alone, in his huge darkened formal office. Only the two small vertical lights on the edge of the large working desk provided any illumination in the room. Across his desk were strewn the myriad of folios and reports that were the daily requirement of Praetor Maximus.
But, for Falkus Margallan the daily administration of the Thexxian species would have to wait for a few more hours yet. Looking over at the timekeeper on his gloomy desk, he noticed that the numerals had not moved since the last time he had looked at them. He hated waiting. He hated not being able to take some kind of action. Sitting back on his chair, he considered whether he should take another walk through the deserted corridors of the Garmaurian military base that had become the temporary home of his species. No, he dismissed the idea, and glanced at the timekeeper again. He didn’t have time, and he needed to be here in his office for when the most important message in Thexxian history finally arrived.
As he looked at the timekeeper, the numerals changed to indicate a new hour. At that same moment, the intercom device on his desk blared.
Taking a deep breath, Falkus Margallan paused steeling himself for the message, daring to expect the best, but mentally preparing for the worst.
“Yes?” Margallan announced nervously as he touched the small circular answering plate on the silver intercom cube.
“Praetor Maximus, Election Officer here,” the disembodied voice from the cube introduced itself, “the polls have just closed.”
“Thank you for letting me know, Election Officer, do we have a preliminary result?” Margallan asked.
“Yes, Praetor Maximus, but as you know they are preliminary figures subject to verification and approval by the Council,” the voice responded.
“Very well, I understand, could you let me have a look at the numbers?” Margallan asked, knowing that the preliminary numbers would be no more than one or two percent adrift from the final figures.
“Of course, Praetor Maximus,” the voice from the cube complied, “I’ll send them over immediately.”
“Thank you, Election Officer, and may I thank you, and your staff, for your heroic efforts in this matter,” Margallan praised.
“It is always an honour to serve the Thexxian people, sir,” the voice responded, “may I wish you a good evening, sir,” the intercom closed down.
A moment later, a large, dull green light flashed, for the briefest instant, next to the desk light beside his right hand.
With his heart hammering, Margallan stretched out his hand and lifted the yellow folio sheet, with the black writing, that would carry the fate of the Thexxian people. For five days the debate whether to join with First Admiral Caudwell’s Universal Alliance had raged through the meeting halls. As Margallan had expected, Thexxian democracy could be boisterous, at best, and at times violent; views were held, arguments aired and passions roused. That was the way of things in the Thexxian political system.
As Praetor Maximus, Falkus Margallan, like every other Council Member, was banned, by the Constitution, from participating in the debates. So, for five days he had been forced to sit impotently on his hands and not interfere. Now, the preliminary result was in, the debates were over, the matter resolved. All that was left was the result. Had the Thexxian people voted to stay on their new planet, or had they rejected Caudwell and decided to go back to the ships and try to settle elsewhere?
Taking another deep breath, Margallan forced down the panic in his mind, and turned the folio sheet over. At first, the letters and numbers seemed to dance across the sheet, daring him to comprehend their meaning. As his mind cleared and the numbers computed, Falkus Margallan crumpled the sheet in his right hand and half choked back a loud sob. Wiping his eyes with his left hand, Margallan covered his mouth and breathed heavily through his single-nostril nose, stifling his tears, for several long seconds, before rising from his seat, crumpled folio in hand.
Walking over to the Synthesiser, next to his desk, he punched the keys for a large Thexxian brandy, with shaking hands. When the drink arrived, he quickly drank the sweet, throat-burning liquid down in one gulp, before ordering another. The next drink he held with slightly less of a tremble to his hand, and read the figures once more as if to convince himself that they were actually real.
Then, he returned to his seat, and dropped the folio onto the desk. With a huge sigh Falkus Margallan sat down again, closed his eyes and let his head rest on the back edge of the high-backed chair. On the desk, the most important message in the history of the Thexxian peoples lay next to the report from the Chief Physician on improved bone density of the children. The message read:
“In Favour – 87%, Against – 13%”
Chapter 32
“Jennifer Martin!” the booming voice of Mrs. MacGuire, the middle-aged headmistress echoed in the cold musty stillness of the great Cathedral.
A sudden buzz of excitement erupted from the gathered students as they began to comprehend that Jenny Martin was either not answering or, worse still, she was simply not there.
“Be quiet!” Mr. Brown, the young, former Scottish Rugby International Trialist, snapped to the students, in a voice that echoed sharply around the Cathedral, and immediately restored order and decorum.
“Thank you, Mr. Brown,” Mrs. MacGuire responded icily, bristling silently at the young handsome man, something of a rarity on the staff roll.
He had inadvertently usurped her supreme authority in restoring discipline to her sometimes wayward young charges.
“Jennifer Martin?” Mrs. MacGuire called again, her clipped Scottish tones echoing into the roof space and vaults.
“Has anyone seen Jennifer Martin?” Mrs. MacGuire asked.
She started to feel the first pangs of anxiety as her well-planned preparations for the conducting of this particular field trip began to crumble before her eyes. Once again her request was met with a stubborn silence. This told her wiser and more experienced mind that there would be no thin, reedy voice and feebly raised arm that would miraculously solve the mystery of the now absent Jennifer Martin.
“Perhaps, we should inform the police?” the young, timid and shy, Miss Poulson whispered into Mrs. Macguire’s ear.
“I think we can safely accommodate the return of a tardy schoolgirl without the assistance of the local constabulary, Miss Poulson!” Mrs. MacGuire snapped, just a little too loudly for the acoustic tolerances of the large enclosed space of the cathedral.
Intimidated and deflated, the shy young schoolteacher flicked her short bobbed blonde hair nervously behind her left ear. She then crossed her arms, protectively tight across her chest, and retreated back three steps, as was traditional when standing in close proximity to the headmistress.
Once again, the call was met with silence. Even the threat of a father’s wrath, which normally brought even the most disruptive and stubborn child to heel, went unanswered. This concerned Mrs. MacGuire. In all her years of organising school trips to the Cathedral, she had never lost anyone.
“Very well, then,” she announced, “right pick a partner, quietly, and we shall go looking for Jennifer Martin!”
With a great flurry of reluctance most of the students began to pair off. They really wanted to be heading home now. Having seen the Cathedral, they were now bored and tired of the whole experience. Billy Caudwell found himself reluctantly paired with a boy from another class called Stephen Baxter. Baxter was crowned with a mass of shortish blond hair that seemed to be constantly untidy and possessed an independent mind of its own. Baxter also wore a grubby uniform and sported an equally grubby face upon which stood a constantly runny nose.
Under the supervision of Mr. Brown, the two boys were allocated an area of the cathedral to search, which seemed to consist entirely of ancient, wooden varnish-peeling collapsible chairs that had obviously seen better days. The Lord may have provided for this magnificent House of God, but the Deity had come up a little short on seating provision. It soon became clear to Billy that the erstwhile Jennifer Martin was not cunningly secreting herself in this particular area of the cathedral. However, at Baxter’s insistence the two boys searched their allocated area twice more with the same, predictably negative result.
Billy was about to settle down to yet another pointless search of the same area of ground when he was disturbed by a loud metallic ‘clang’ emanating from the dark archway of the spiral staircase that stood close to their search area. Billy, ignoring Baxter moved over to investigate.