Realms of Time (Scrapyard Ship)

by Mark Wayne McGinnis

  The admiral let that sink in. The room went quiet at the sobering numbers. “We’ve been fortunate and had a bit of good luck. But let’s not kid ourselves for one moment that we can match those numbers, in either ships or military forces—forces often composed of the inhabitants of the worlds they conquer. So, my question to you, what I have brought you here today to ask, is this: are we finally ready to begin warring aggressively, offensively? Take the battle to their worlds, before they visit ours?”

  More side chatter erupted among the military leaders. This was obviously a heated subject among them. The admiral took this time to motion toward the side of the large room. Gaddy appeared through a door and slowly made her way toward the pedestal. Wearing all white and with her hair tied back, she looked nothing like the scraggly young Craing who had recently traversed, and survived, the perils of HAB 12. The assembly went quiet as the admiral stood aside. Gaddy stepped onto a small footstool, enabling her to be seen, and nervously returned their hostile stares.

  “I am Craing. Until recently, I have always lived among the Craing worlds, specifically a world called Halimar. I am proud of my heritage and I love my people.”

  “Then why don’t you go back there!” retorted a dignitary, dressed in a long gold robe.

  Unfazed, Gaddy continued: “I certainly do not love their political system, nor the blatant disregard the Craing Empire has for other life forms. I am ashamed and I’m sorry. Please know we were not always this way. Several hundred years ago, our civilization was not so different from your own. We were a culture that loved the arts, sciences, and exploration; we were even good neighbors.”

  Gaddy paused for a moment, then continued: “I am young—a student at university. But my opinions are shared by many, and not just by the young. Our people, millions of them, are ready for change but are too frightened to act. We are a people ready to coexist with the other planetary systems. I am here to help … but not destroy, the Craing people. Please don’t think that. A political change is needed. In secret, I am a dissident and an underground leader. But I am also the niece of High Priest Overlord Lom, who is now the interim-emperor of the Craing Empire.”

  Her last remark got everyone’s full attention, including the admiral’s.

  “It’s true. What’s more, I have unfettered access to both my uncle and the Emperor’s Palace. You are planning an attack. I am aware of that. But first you will need information. I can get that for you. All I ask in return is that you join me in overthrowing a corrupt, misguided government, but do not destroy all peace-loving Craing people in the process.”

  Chapter 38

  A brief nano-text message appeared from Mollie. She missed Jason and was wondering when he would be coming back to The Lilly. She mentioned something about continuing her self-defense classes but the message abruptly cut off in mid-sentence. Again, Jason’s thoughts returned to home at the scrapyard, having Mollie around, and even enduring his father’s cursing as he tinkered with the old ‘49 Ford pickup truck. As Jason finished chewing on an energy bar and watched distant movements beyond the trees where the mother dinosaur had her nest, he knew returning home wouldn’t be an option until all the drone spheres were fully disabled.

  Jason had the Perilous shuttle moved over from the other lake and was now sitting on its extended gangway. Having seen the type of life that lurked beneath this lake’s surface, Jason opted to have the shuttle powered up and situated, instead, on the sandy beach. Grimes was instructed to stay at the controls while the next phase of the operation began.

  Chameli, the young Cheyenne woman, was back at Rizzo’s side and looked relieved to be free of the shuttle’s cramped confinement. As he let the team take a final few minutes to relax, Jason thought about Mollie and wondered whether he could, realistically, expect to survive the day. If not, what would happen to her? Would his father, or perhaps Brian, step forward and be the father she would need in her young life?

  His attention moved to Dira. She had her helmet off and was crouching down at the shoreline. Wetting her hands, she ran her fingers over her face and then through her short black hair. It was times like this, seeing her violet skin and her long eyelashes, that he recognized how different, non-Earthlike-human, she actually was. Yet, she was the most beautiful creature he had ever encountered. More than the sum of her physical parts, she was captivating and spontaneous, intelligent and magnificent. Jason wondered if she knew how important she really was to him. How he hated having put her in harm’s way. He realized he would make it a priority to visit her home planet of Jhardon and meet her father—do whatever it was he was supposed to do when courting a Jhardian woman. What the hell was he waiting for?

  Back in the present, Jason realized she was looking back over her shoulder at him, smiling. Yeah, she did know.

  Traveler and the two other rhinos emerged from the tree line and headed toward Jason. He glanced again in Dira’s direction, but she had moved further away down the beach.

  “We are prepared, Captain,” Traveler said, coming to a halt as he reached the shuttle.

  “And you think it will be enough to get her away from that nest of hers?”

  “Yes, there is no doubt about it.”

  Ricket appeared at the top of the gangway and hurried down to join in the conversation. “Captain, the next probe is ready. With that said, the time realms here are becoming more and more unstable. We have far less time to pair the two drones than calculated.”

  “In what way unstable and how much time are we talking about?” Jason asked.

  “Perhaps unstable isn’t the correct terminology. What seems to be happening is the opposite of that—more of a process of stabilization? The five probes have begun talking to one another again. They’re synchronizing, as they were originally programmed to do.”

  “Setting the timeframe to one hundred years earlier?” Jason asked back.

  “It could be that, or it could be any other past or future timeframe. Its priority is to lock down a unified time period—no matter the era.”

  Jason’s mind flashed to the Earth’s desolate, glassy landscape that they’d witnessed when paring the third probe, some thirty million years into the future.

  “Hell, the chance that a human is even present when the probes lock down a timeframe could be astronomically low.”

  “That is correct, Captain,” Ricket said. “I estimate we have no more than two days to pair up these probes, as well as pair the last remaining probe in Asia, before we lose the option to change the timeframe back to our own.”

  “Then we need to move it along. You’re ready, Traveler?”

  “Yes, we are ready.”

  “You’ve been practicing phase-shifting. You won’t have time to fiddle about setting new coordinates. You’ll need to have that aspect nailed.”

  Traveler made no attempt to justify himself any further.

  “The drone is sited within the far side of the nest. Well away from the eggs. You get too close to the drone and its proximity sensors will activate. It’ll bolt and we’ll have to start all over.”

  “We understand, Captain.”

  “One more thing. She’ll be defending her young, or what are her future young-to-be. We’re not here to indiscriminately kill that dinosaur unless absolutely necessary.”

  * * *

  They’d taken up their positions in the forest around the mother Spinosaurus’ nest. She began acting restless, agitated, seeming to sense the strange activity that was going on around her in the forest.

  Jason split his forces into three teams. The first team consisted of the three rhino-warriors: Traveler, Few Words, and Born Late. They would be the egg handlers. Ricket along with Navy combatants Billy, Rizzo and Myers comprised the second group; their duty entailed encircling and guarding the nest once the mother dinosaur was on the run. Chang, Goldstein, Mead, and Jason comprised the third team. Their task was to lure the beast away from the nest for as long as possible. Dira and Chameli would remain with Grimes, airborne and hovering
close by, in the shuttle.

  The teams’ objective was a simple one: get the dinosaur up and away from her nest—allowing Ricket sufficient time to bring in the other probe and pair them up—before any of them become the Spinosaurus’ lunch.

  Jason’s plan was to get her to move all the way back to the lake where he and his team waited. Two hundred feet above him he saw the Perilous; her rear hatch was open and the second-to-last probe, although barely visible, was poised and ready to be deployed.

  Jason used his NanoCom and hailed Traveler.

  “We’re in position, Captain, and waiting for her to move away from the nest.”

  Jason had tied his HUD to Billy’s helmet-cam and he could see Traveler and the other two rhinos in the distance, standing to the left of a large tree. The display on Traveler’s phase-shift wrist panel was open and he held a thick finger there, poised to initiate his phase-shift.

  The giant dinosaur seemed perfectly content to sit on the eggs in her nest.

  Jason hailed Billy.

  “Go for Billy, Cap.”

  “You’re going to have to motivate her to move off that nest.”

  “How am I supposed to do that?”

  “I don’t know … try approaching her. Phase-shift away if she gets too close.”

  Billy didn’t respond but Jason saw him on the move through his helmet-cam feed. Billy ran into the clearing, then ran back to his position behind a large boulder. The dinosaur stayed put.

  “You’re going to have to get in closer. Don’t be such a baby. Try to act threatening,” Jason suggested.

  “You do realize I’m the size of a rodent to that thing, don’t you?” Billy replied, sounding out of breath.

  “Do it one more time. This time, try shooting her with a few stun bursts.”

  Billy was on the move again. The female Spinosaurus turned her massive head in Billy’s direction. At thirty yards out, Billy moved closer than Jason would have risked, but then again, they needed to get things moving along. Billy brought up his multi-gun and fired off several quick plasma bursts into the beast’s posterior.

  Her reaction was near instantaneous and totally unexpected. A ball of fire, the size of a Volkswagen, blew from her gaping mouth and enveloped Billy. By the time the flash of fire cleared from Billy’s video feed, Jason was about to phase-shift over to help him.

  “I’m okay,” came back Billy’s startled voice. “Battle suit held up fine.” Billy looked down at the grassy brush smoldering at his feet. When he looked back up, the colossal snout of the Spinosaurus was mere inches away.

  He screamed. “Holy mother of—”

  The dinosaur ate Billy.

  Paralyzed, Jason’s heart stopped. Billy’s video feed showed nothing but blackness. Again, Jason was ready to phase-shift over when there was another flash from Billy’s feed. It was coming from deeper in the trees.

  “Billy?” Jason asked tentatively.

  “How about next time you shoot that dinosaur in the ass. And by the way, this battle suit is completely shot.”

  “I take it you phase-shifted out of her mouth?”

  “Oh no, not her mouth. Do you have any idea what it’s like to be swallowed whole by a fucking dinosaur?”

  Jason couldn’t help laughing out loud from relief. “Well, at least she’s off her nest.” He opened another channel. “Traveler … time for you and your team to get busy.”

  Billy’s video feed was acting flakey, so Jason tied into Rizzo’s helmet-cam. Rizzo’s visual perspective was from the opposite side of the dinosaur’s nest. She was loudly pacing back and forth about seventy-five yards from her nest; her massive head swung up and down, similar to a bird pecking for food. Traveler, Few Words and Born Late flashed into view behind the nest. They wasted no time climbing the ten-foot-tall collection of wood and bones. Traveler lost his footing and fell onto his back on the ground. The noisy impact was enough to catch the dinosaur’s attention. Surprised, or simply stunned, she didn’t move right away. Traveler was back on his feet and quickly climbed the nest wall before she could swing her massive girth around and storm back. Few Words and Born Late disappeared into the nest and then both stood up tall, holding bowling ball-sized eggs high over their heads. Moments later, Traveler stood next to them, holding up a third egg.

  Exactly what Jason didn’t want to happen — happened. Its proximity sensors must have triggered and the spherical drone shot up into the air, hovering there twenty feet up. “Stay, stay, stay … no, don’t go …” Jason said aloud, as if the drone could hear him. It hovered like that for a moment before settling back on the ground in a secluded area several hundred feet away between the thick trunks of two large sequoias.

  Incensed, the Spinosaurus charged. The rhinos waited, transferring the pilfered eggs to the crooks of their elbows and, at the very last moment, they accessed their phase-shift wrist panels. In a flash, they vanished. The momentum behind the dinosaur’s rush was such that she careened into the nest. Of her three remaining eggs, only one remained unbroken. The roar of anguish and pain that erupted from the dinosaur was mournful and deafening. She pointed her long snout into the air and let loose a fountain of gaseous flames that spread across the sky. Then she noticed the three rhino-warriors standing at the edge of the trees, each holding high one of her beloved eggs.

  The chase was on. Never appearing so far ahead of the dinosaur that she would give up pursuit and return back to her nest and the one unbroken egg, the rhinos let her come close—then, at the last moment, phase-shifted another thirty yards farther away.

  Jason felt the earth tremble and shake as the chase moved closer. Now was the time for Ricket to deploy the paired drone. As if on cue, he saw it speeding away from the rear of the shuttle above. Between the heavy earth pounding by the approaching dinosaur and the phase-shifting rhinos, Jason had a hard time staying on his feet.

  Jason opened a channel to Chang, Goldstein, and Mead. “We need to give them more room. Let’s give them a wider berth.”

  As soon as they’d phase-shifted deeper into the forest, the rhinos flashed back into view. Again, they held up the stolen eggs—taunting the frenzied dinosaur. Jason noticed that Few Words was looking a little worse for wear. One arm, and part of his chest, had been scorched and smoke was rising into the air off his hide.

  Another fireball-burst preceded her as the dinosaur thundered forward. The rhinos disappeared, with hardly a second to spare, only to reappear another hundred yards away by the edge of the lake. Again, in the distance, more taunting—the dinosaur’s eggs held up high. As soon as the Spinosaurus rushed past their position, Jason and the other combatants fell in behind her.

  She abruptly slowed and looked backwards. Jason brought up his multi-gun. It was clear she was weighing what to do: return to the nest and defend a single egg, or continue pursuing the rhinos, who held three of her eggs.

  Jason was being hailed.

  “Go for Cap. What’s up, Billy?”

  “We’ve got a problem here, Cap. Papa Dino is back and he’s not looking too happy about the mess we’ve made.”

  Jason heard repeated multi-gun fire in the background. Eyeing his HUD, life icons were spread out and moving here and there erratically.

  “Our current attack plan, using stun-level bursts, simply doesn’t work,” Billy reported.

  “Well, keep evading him as long as possible. Bring him down only if absolutely necessary. Sorry, but we’ve got our own crazed dinosaur to deal with.” Jason cut the connection as the female Spinosaurus seemed to have come to a decision and was charging back in the direction of her nest. Jason, standing directly in her path, fired his multi-gun, as did Chang, Goldstein, and Mead, at the approaching dinosaur. She stopped and brought her head down low, spitting fire in the process. Jason felt his battle suit’s temperature-control compensators kick into full gear. Everything around him, except for his teammates, had turned into charcoal. Jason hailed Ricket.

  “Go for Ricket.”

  “What’s going on with t
he drone pair?”

  “It’s here. Hovering fifty feet up, but it hasn’t paired yet. The male Spinosaurus must be making it nervous,” Ricket replied.

  Jason had to cut the connection short. Again, the female was poising to charge. Jason phase-shifted twenty yards to his right—Chang, the same distance to his left. Both Goldstein and Mead hesitated too long.

  “Get the hell out of there!” Jason barked over an open channel.

  While Mead miraculously made a successful dash through the dinosaur’s legs, and phase-shifted away once he was clear, Goldstein wasn’t so lucky. First he was sprayed with an up-close fireball, then snatched between the dinosaur’s forward teeth. With an audible crunch, the lower portion of Goldstein’s torso and legs fell to the ground.

  The female Spinosaurus rushed toward her nest, and it was apparent nothing was going to stop her. Jason, his two surviving team members, and the three rhino-warriors, followed behind her, phase-shifting in leaps.

  “Captain,” Ricket’s voice blared into Jason’s NanoCom. “She’s paired! The male Spinosaurus heard, apparently recognized, the female’s familiar snorts and left the area long enough for our probe to settle close to the other one in the trees. They’ve paired! We’re done here.”

  Jason phase-shifted once more, along with the others. The three rhinos, each still holding an egg, phase-shifted somewhat farther back into the trees.

  Jason watched as the two goliath dinosaurs frantically paced near the nest and its one lone egg. “Traveler, we need to get those eggs back into their nest.”

  Traveler set the phase-shift coordinates on his wrist panel, then took ahold of the other two eggs from the two rhinos. Nearly dropping all three eggs, he precariously cradled them in his arms while carefully extending a thick finger to press the activate key. Without further conversation, Traveler flashed away.