“We know, and we’re getting ready for that.”
“You’ll never be prepared enough. Can you even guess how much resources they have? How much further advanced they are in technology? There’s really no way you can win a war with them, they have infinite resources, infinite firepower and infinite time.”
“We have some tricks up our sleeves they don’t know about. We will not go quietly into the night.”
“Which is another reason why they want to talk to you.”
“What if we do talk? What can they offer? You said they were a large group, that doesn’t mean they’re a majority or that they have power. As far as I know this could be a trap to trick us into revealing the location of Earth.”
“I-I don’t know about that that,” she stammered, unsure with her answer.
Captain Cook decided change the subject. “What’s on the data disk?”
“Data disk?” Ann replied. “What data disk?”
“The one we found, what’s on it?”
She looked genuinely surprised. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“We found a small disk. It looks like some sort of data storage device. What’s on it?”
“I don’t know,” she replied. “I’m serious, Captain, I don’t know.”
Captain Cook leaned back in her chair and stiffly crossed her legs. Her posture and appearance matched that of Ann’s. It was almost like looking into a mirror that showed a younger version of yourself. “So if you don’t know what it is. Could it be dangerous?”
“They don’t mean you any harm, but I wouldn’t take the chance.”
The computer chirped and the Arwen broke into the conversation. “Captain Cook, you’re needed on the bridge.”
“Is it an emergency?”
“Yes. Commander Monrow needs you right away. She said she didn’t want our guest to worry.”
Captain Cook stood. “I’m sorry, Ann, but they wouldn’t have bothered me if it wasn’t important. I’ll be sure to get you some food and more clothes. I’ll be back to continue this conversation when I can.”
Ann nodded and took another sip of coffee. “I’ll be fine as long as I have this. Looking forward to seeing you again.”
Captain Cook placed her hand on Ann’s shoulder then left. When the door closed she walked briskly down the hallway toward the elevator. “Arwen, what’s the emergency?”
“The Corps contacted us a few minutes ago. They want us to change our course and to head to Regal. The Handlers have found it and are attacking. They need us to help defend the planet.”
Chapter forty-one
The Arwen was three days out when they got the call from Regal. The news they received while in transit was depressing and confusing. When the Handler’s attacked Ulliam it was quick and devastating. There was no regards for the planet, no regards for preserving anything on the surface. It was viewed as nothing more than a giant rock of material that would be used to help build the Dyson sphere. With Regal they were being careful, methodical even. The first wave of slabs was held off by the massive fleet protecting Regal. The Corps learned a huge lesson from the destruction of Ullliam. Most agreed the planet would have been saved had the fleet protecting it moved closer to the planet and if the planet itself have better defenses. Those lessons were put to the test at Regal and so far they had worked.
“We’ll be leaving Wormhole space in ten hours,” Commander Monrow said. “We’ll be coming out near the fleet. It should take us five minutes to charge the main guns once we get out there. All missile stations report they’re fully armed and ready.”
“Good,” Captain Cook replied. “Is the rest of the fleet ready?”
“Yes, the Gyssyc ships are even reporting excitement at the coming battle.”
Captain Cook smiled, those two Gyssyc ships had as much firepower as a small armada, having them in the fleet was a major advantage.
“Sounds like we have everything under control. Tell them to get some rest before the battle, we don’t know how long we’ll be out there or how long we’ll be fighting. Arwen, I’d like to talk to Ann please.”
“I’ll have the guards take her into the interrogation room.”
“Thank you,” Captain Cook stood from her chair. “Commander, you have control. Alert me if there’s any problems.”
“Will do, Captain.” Commander Monrow walked over to the chair and sat down as Captain Cook walked out the door and into the elevator.
Ann’s condition has been getting worse. She started exhibiting the symptoms of Fullerton’s a few days after she arrived. She tried to hide it but Marjorie knew the signs right away and immediately put Ann on the same meds she was on. It helped but because of the damaged DNA it wouldn’t last for long. Marjorie’s Fullerton was well under control, the nanobots, expelled from her body more than five years ago, had worked on fixing her damaged nerve cells. They did a good enough job where the disease was completely under control and could be easily treated with medicines. Ann wasn’t as lucky as she never had nanobots flowing through her body.
Captain Cook spend most of her free time with Ann now, trying to get more information from her. It appeared her only message was the one she gave the first day. Other than that all they talked about their shared memories with Marjorie trying to fill in some blanks or tried to explain to her what she was remembering. The discussion of men and all of Marjorie’s high school crushes brought back many good feelings from her teenage years and she went to bed happy hoping that Ann had done the same.
She walked past the glass wall and looked down at Ann. The night had not been good to her clone, her once beautiful brown hair had all but fallen out now and she wore a hat to cover that up. Her skin looked thin and frail, as if a simple touch would tear it off her bones. She was shaking now, like a person who had been left out in the cold too long. Her left arm was curled, her left wrist bent at an odd angle, useless. She sat in a wheelchair, her head slumped downward. According to their calculations she was now 26 years old, she had only two days left before she died. Nothing they did could prevent that.
Captain Cook walked away from the glass wall and down the small set of stair then into the room. Ann didn’t turn, she wasn’t able too because she no longer had that kind of control in her body, but she did say, “Hello, Captain Cook.”
“Ann, how are you feeling today?”
“No bad, I guess. What do you want to talk about today?”
Captain Cook sat across from her. “I think we should take a little stroll on the Arwen.”
“I would like that. When?”
“How about now? We’re going to leave Wormhole space in a few hours to help defend Regal, this could be the last chance we’ll have.”
“That sounds like fun,” Ann replied. Her head lulled to the left. She grunted and managed to move it back to the center of her shoulders. Her face contorted as another wave of pain assaulted her. “Ouch,” she laughed.
“What happened?”
“My darn head, I can’t seem to keep it in one place for long. But, I’ll be fine for our tour, do you think the crew will mind?”
“No, not at all.” Captain Cook walked over and took her wheelchair by the handles and turned her around. The door opened and she walked out into the hallway. “I think we’ll check out the engine room first, then head to the Strangelet bullet chamber visiting each section as we move from the back to the front of the ship, how does that sound?”
“Wonderful,” Ann replied. “I’m looking forward to see everything.”
******
“This is the strangelet bullet chamber,” Captain Cook said as she wheeled Ann through the door. “They’re busy right now but I’m the captain and I can have them stop any time I want.” She stood there and cleared her throat. One of the woman working a station turned, saw the Captain and yelled, “Attention!”
The rest of the crew snapped to attention. Normally they didn’t do that when she entered a room but Commander Monrow thought it would be fun if Ann saw the crew do th
at. From the squeal of delight that came from the chair she enjoyed the show. “At ease,” Captain Cook said. They all lowered their hands and went back their stations.
“Captain,” Ann said, “this tour has been fantastic. Thank you. I wish I could tell the other clones about this, we might be able to start a clone revolution.”
“Would that be possible?” Captain Cook asked.
Ann laughed, then started coughing. Captain Cook placed her hand on Ann’s shoulder until she was finished coughing. When she stopped she said, “I wish I could do that but since we die after five days it wouldn’t be much of a rebellion.”
“I guess not,” Captain Cook laughed. “Ann, I need to take you back now and I might not have time to see you again.”
“That’s fine, Captain. I understand, you have your duty.”
She turned Ann around and wheeled her out of the room and through the hallways. “Captain, have you been able to decipher the disk?”
“No, but we’re working on it. We don’t have the device to play it but we think we can get the information off it anyway.”
“Good, that’s good. I was thinking about that a lot. I wondered why they didn’t tell me about it. Why they hide it from me. I don’t think I have a good answer, but I’m sure it’s important. Maybe they didn’t trust me or maybe they wanted to test you. They’re very big on testing for some reason.”
“I know, I’ve had some experience with their tests as well.”
“Whatever is on that disk must be important or else they’d never let you have it. If you find out before I die could you tell me? I’m very curious as to what it is.”
“Yes, of course. We might even need you to help us understand the data.”
“You might,” Ann replied, her voice weakening. “I think I’m going to fall asleep now, hope you don’t mind.”
“No, not at all, you go to sleep, it’s been a very busy day for you.”
“It has, but I have too much to talk about, too much to see so I’ll just ignore this urge.” She looked back from the chair and at Captain Cook. “Captain, you should talk to them.”
“I want too,” Captain Cook replied.
“You should be with them. Live with them, let them see how a human is. The Handler’s are very paranoid, they hate aliens for no real reason.”
“We’ve known about their xenophobia for a while now.”
“I think if they really got to know you they would see that you’re worth working with. That’s what my Handler’s believe but they can’t convince everyone else of that fact. A real human, teaching them how to be a human, might.”
“They had their chance with Captain Ruzuto.”
“I don’t know who that is,” Ann replied. “But, I’m guessing he didn’t do a good enough job.”
Captain Cook thought back to her brief encounter with the astronaut. “I’m sure he was a good man at one point but by the time I met him he had lost his mind. He didn’t know how to deal with aliens”
“But you do.”
“Ann, I’ve love to help, I really would but trust me, I’m not the best person for that kind of job. I’m a Battleship Captain, not a diplomat.”
Ann’s head had slumped down and Captain Cook heard the heavy sound of deep breathing. She had fallen asleep, it seemed exhaustion had taken over. As she wheeled her thought the hallways she thought about Ann’s idea. It was appealing but how would she even begin to make it happen? She wasn’t a diplomat, but she was human and she had all the human strengths and weaknesses. Ann was a dreamer, just like she was at that age, so it didn’t surprise the Captain she would be optimistic about ending this war.
*****
It took Captain Cook a good fifteen minutes before she was able to walk onto the bridge. She spent that time in her room, thinking about Ann’s last days, trying not to let any emotion show on her face. It was a losing battle as the tears flowed freely from her eyes. Once they were spent she washed her face to remove the redness from the cheeks and the wetness from it. She had only known Ann for a few days and knew from almost day one she would die, she thought she could deal with that, treat her like a prisoner, instead she thought of her has a daughter. It was wrong, of course, since she was her clone but she was young enough to make Captain Cook believe she could have been her daughter. She was going to die soon and that tore Captain Cook’s heart apart.
She needed to pushed those feelings aside for the moment, a battle was taking place and she needed to be focused and ready. The Handler’s found Regal, the planet was most likely doomed but they had to fight if just to show the Handler’s they would not give up a planet without one.
“Report,” Captain Cook said just as the door opened.
Commander Monrow stood from the Captain’s chair and walked over her station. “We are one hour away from leaving Wormhole space. The Regals are still putting up a fight. From the last report they’re not winning but they are holding off the attackers. I’m sure we’ll be a welcome site for them.”
“I don’t doubt that.” Captain Cook replied. “This is going to be the longest hour if my life, it’s always the anticipation of battle that gets to me, never the actual battle itself.”
She looked over the reports, trying to analyze the situation. Regal had a fleet of over 20,000 Regal and Corps ships. Only the Corps ships had the sentient computers, the Regals were still using the standard ship’s computer system. Communication between the Corps ships and the Regals was difficult, but not impossible.
The Handler’s still attacked in waves. When one wave failed they’d open a wormhole in another location and attack from there. Some ships were always nearby and they would use all their firepower to destroy the slabs while the fleet readied itself for a quick traverse into Wormhole space to help. The wormholes the Handler’s were using weren’t that quick to open and they could easily be detected before the first ships came out, at least that’s what the report was telling her.
“Three minutes until wormhole departure,” Commander Monrow said. “Bullet is armed and ready to go. All ships in the fleet have reported in. We’re all ready and eager to leave.”
“So am I, Commander. Arwen, get us ready to fight.”
“The ship is running at full efficiently,” Arwen replied.
“All right, get ready to leave Wormhole space. This is going to be a long fight I’m sure.”
The Strangelet bullet fired from the front of the ship and exploded into a ball of a white light. As it grew the center became a dark black which expanded larger. Stars and ships were now visible as the fleet passed through wormhole space into real space. The glow from the Regal sun reflected off the mirror surface of the many ships passing through.
There is always a few minutes of nothing as a ship moved from one dimension into another. A few minutes where the power fluctuates, communications stop working and the body simply feels odd. Over the years they’ve managed to get that strange disturbance down from a ten minutes to less than 30 seconds but when you move into a battlepshere those thirty seconds can last a lifetime.
The Arwen was in real space for less than a minute before it started to receive hundreds of ‘welcome to the battle’ messages. “Arwen, reply to them all and thank them. Commander, do we have any specific orders yet?”
Commander Monrow looked at her screen as something scrolled by. Her face turned a visible white as she read. “Commander, what is it?”
“Captain, we’ve been ordered to take the fleet and head to Regal. We are then to drop a Strangelet bomb into the planet to destroy it.”
Chapter forty-two
“These orders are ridiculous.” Captain Cook said, mostly to herself. Commander Monrow stood in Captain Cook’s office and shifted uncomfortably. “They want us to destroy a planet?”
“The orders are pretty straight forward,” Commander Monrow said. “And I agree, it’s ridiculous. But, if they win, or even if they lose but get a hold of some information, they could find Earth.”
“But to destroy the
planet?” Captain Cook asked. “That’s throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”
“An order is an order,” Arwen said.
“You don’t understand,” Captain Cook replied bitterly.
“Because I’m just a computer?”
“Yes. We’re being asked to kill billions of Regal’s just to save Earth, it makes no sense. We don’t have many allies right now and those we do have will leave if they see we’re willing to destroy a planet to save our own. No, these orders can’t be right. It might be a Handler trick.”
“I’ve confirmed their authenticity,” Arwen said. “They’re from Earth, Grand Admiral Park to be exact.”
“He would never give this order. That’s not the Grand Admiral I know.”
“How well do you know him?” Commander Monrow asked.
“Well enough to know he would never give this order. I can’t see him wanting to destroy a planet. We here to protect our allies, not destroy them.”
“But it is his order,” Arwen said, her voice growing louder and stern. “We need to follow our orders no matter how horrible they are. It’s what you expect of me and I do all that you tell me to do even if I don’t agree. We need to do this, it’s our duty.”
Captain Cook lowered her head. She had to think for a few minutes, she had to organize her thoughts. “I can’t follow this order.”
“Then Commander Monrow has no choice but to relieve you of duty,” Arwen said matter of factly. The voice, more than anything else, startled Captain Cook. Arwen had never sounded so cold, so calculating, so computer-like.
Juliet stood from her chair and walked over to Captain Cook. The captain though she might be trying to arrest her, instead she placed her hand on Marjorie’s shoulder and said. “No, I will not follow this order either.”
The Arwen went silent. Captain Cook grabbed the hand Juliet had on her shoulder and said, “Thank you.”
“I don’t know any Captain that would follow this order.”
The Arwen interrupted the silence. Her voice was stronger than Captain Cook had ever heard, her authority surprised Marjorie. “Captain Cook, Commander Monrow, since you both refuse to follow an order it’s going to be up to me to execute the command. I have locked you both out of the computer and I’ve locked the door.”
The Arwen Book two: Manifest Destiny Page 32