by Saxon Andrew
Allison stared at him and looked out at the ocean for a moment. “I’m being stupid, aren’t I?” Chris smiled and nodded. “Not only is Barbie telepathic, you are as well. You also know more than I ever will because of that ability.” Chris tilted his head and nodded again. “You will also be making the decisions and I can only stop you; I won’t be deciding what we do.”
“And what do you glean from this realization?”
Allison shook her head, “I need to go put on a swimsuit and come back to discuss what we’re going to do.”
Chris laughed, “Take your time. I’m going to spend some time with Michael before we start prioritizing our goals.” Allison stood up, saluted, did an about face and headed toward the dune. Chris shook his head. He remembered when she first showed up to lead his bodyguard at sixteen years old. She looked so young! He chuckled and then it struck him. He was ten years old when that happened. She was six years older than him then as well as now. No wonder she balked at giving up the lead. She was twenty-three now and she probably saw him as a sixteen year old. He thought about it and wished he was ten again.
He looked out at the ocean and remembered a pink and blue sail. No trace was found of the small boat carrying Audrey. It was vaporized in the nuclear blast. He sighed and was thankful he could remember her the way she looked as he pushed her out into the waves. Her smile was radiant and she was so beautiful. The blast happened so fast that he didn’t even have time to connect telepathically. He nodded and knew he could always come here and see her traveling across the waves anytime he wanted.
Chapter Nine
The Greatest Leader had learned how to manipulate the Legends. They had contacted him to order him to resume the invasion of the spiral galaxy and all he had to do to stop them was to suggest, “Great Leader, if I send my warships to invade the spiral galaxy, the evil ones that attacked the Others along with the ships rebelling in the other galaxy will combine and attack us here. They will probably target your planet first.”
“HOW DO YOU KNOW THIS?!”
“It’s what you would do. Did you not have us invade the first time to kill that entity there that was leading our enemies?” The Progen waited a moment and then gave them a way to save face, “Besides, you’ve seen the power of their new vessels. I need time to modernize my fleets to a level where they can stand up to them.”
“Then we should go back and retake the other galaxy.”
“The same thing will happen if we do. The attackers of the Others will return along with the forces from the Spiral Galaxy. Until we can match their technology, I would not want to see you placed in danger.”
The Legend disappeared and didn’t contact him again…until after the attack on the galaxy that invaded. He was ordered to send his fleets to take possession and knew he had no choice but to do it. But he was saved by the spiral galaxy. As his ships organized outside the edge of the galaxy, a giant fleet of ships arrived and hung in space waiting. They didn’t attack; they just held their formation and waited. The Legend’s Leader contacted him and called off the invasion of the Elliptical Galaxy. He moved his ships back into the galaxy and the giant fleet of ships hanging in open space disappeared.
His fleets still outnumbered the fleets sent from the spiral galaxy and the Legends were still unaware of the new technology he was using to strengthen his warships. He was also building new warships at an incredible rate. He wondered if they could stand up to the Silver Ships that invaded the other galaxy. He didn’t know but he had his engineers continue to work on even newer technology to handle that issue.
He left his tub and flowed to the table and inserted an appendage into the receptacle at his station. He watched the recordings from the probes that were placed in the Elliptical Galaxy and didn’t like what he was seeing. He pressed a button on the table and flowed back to his tub. He informed the lead scientist that if he didn’t develop the technology to defeat the ships from the spiral galaxy, that he, along with all of his team, would be replaced by those that could. He didn’t have to say the scientists would not be alive to witness their replacement. He smiled at the fear of the scientist as he ended the call. Sometimes, a little motivation was needed to get things done.
• • •
Allison sat on the beach chair waiting for Chris to return from putting Michael to bed. He finally returned and smiled, “Michael took a little longer to settle down. He’s aware that I’ll be leaving again and he worries about me.”
“He’s a fine boy, Chris.”
Chris stared at her and said, “You mentioned before that you challenged me because of your concern about me. I could look at your thoughts but I thought we would start this mission with the understanding that your thoughts will be kept private. I won’t violate your privacy. Why did you say that?”
“Because you were about to cross a line that you would never be able to return from. I knew that once you cooled off and looked at what you did in cool reflection, you would never be the same. You’d know that Audrey would have never approved of your actions and that realization would drive you insane. Your only option would be to become a real monster hell bound to kill every intelligent being you saw as a danger to Earth. I had to stop that from happening.”
“How did you know that?”
“Because I know you. Those years protecting you and Audrey gave me the opportunity to learn who the two of you were. You were almost a single person and you lost half of your life when she died. You had to be given the time to bring her back into your psyche. You didn’t take the time to do it before you left to attack M-84.”
Chris nodded. He looked out at the ocean and said, “That night you found me here…I asked her to forgive me and I knew I had done something she would have never accepted. If she had been with me when I confronted those leaders, she would have seen that the High Leader was the only one responsible for what happened.” Chris looked at Allison, “She’s with me now and I’ll never lose what she taught me. Now I have to live with all those that were murdered because of my rage.”
Allison hesitated and then said, “After the fact, it’s better it happened the way it did.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because it would have to happen before enough fear could be generated in M-87. They take us seriously now. However, to have carried our attack further would have left our forces with a monster leading them. You also had to learn a lesson.”
Chris sighed and nodded, “I never knew you were this wise.”
“Me either.”
“Huh?”
“I wish I could describe what was going on in my mind when I was watching you kill that Leader but I could see where you were headed. I had to stop you for your sake and for selfish reasons.”
“Selfish?”
“I didn’t want to lose the best warrior in our fleets. I had to try and save the conqueror we were all going to follow. I didn’t want to lose my soul with yours.”
Chris stared at her for a long moment and said, “I have to confess that I did not want you going out with me!”
“I felt the same.”
“But now I think you will be an asset. You’ll see things I miss.”
“Thank you, Sir. Coming from you, that means a lot.”
“I think I can convince Lukas to relieve you of this burden.”
“No, I think I want to see what a telepathic ship can do and you’ve tickled my curiosity. I need to see what we’re up against to plan an effective counter. Thank you for helping me see the situation. You did it nicely and I don’t know if I would have showed your patience.”
Chris nodded, “Let’s talk about what we need to do.”
“Obviously, we need to look at M-86 and then see where the Progen are in their ship developments.”
“Where do you think we need to go first?”
“M-86.”
Chris laughed, “Well you know what they say about great minds. M-86 it is.”
“Why do you want to go there first?”
&n
bsp; “Before we can take on the Legends and their forces, we have to see if the other galaxy represents a danger to us.”
“That’s how I see it.”
“I want a few more days with Michael and I understand our ship won’t be ready for another week. If you want to take a look at what they’re building for us and offer suggestions, I’d appreciate it.”
“My time is free and I’ll be glad to handle it.” Allison stood up and stretched, “I’ll go and start doing that in the morning. I’ll stay in contact and let you know if I see anything you would want input on.”
“Thank you, Allison.”
“Glad to do it.” She grabbed her towel, turned, and headed up the beach. Chris stayed and saw a pink and blue sail in his mind.
• • •
The next morning Allison parked the pod outside a giant manufacturing facility and walked through the entrance. She saw the giant converters scattered around the building and started walking into the giant structure. She walked up on an A-Pod that was being finished and saw the engineer working on the scoops. “Excuse me.”
The engineer looked up and saw the woman dressed in a military uniform. He looked closer and saw the two stars on her collar. He jumped up, “I’m sorry Admiral. I didn’t see you coming!”
“That’s ok. Can you direct me to Amanda and Trevor Ambrose?”
The engineer turned and pointed to the north end of the building, “They’re working on a ship over there.”
Allison smiled, “Thank you.” She walked away and the engineer watched her leave. He was stunned by what he saw. Her red hair was as fine as silk and her complexion was flawless. She moved with a smoothness he had never seen before. If ever an image was needed to show perfection, a picture of her would do it. He stared at her until she disappeared around the bow of the ship he was working on and he shook his head. He bent down to continue working but couldn’t get the image of the woman out of his mind. It was an image he would remember for the rest of his life.
There were numerous engineers that stopped what they were doing to watch Allison pass through the building. She was quite unaware of how beautiful she was and didn’t notice the stares as she moved between the ships being built in the huge facility.
She walked around the nose of a B-Pod and heard, “Allison, we’re over here!” She looked to the left and saw Amanda jumping out of the port of a large ship. Of course large was a relative term. It was small when compared to a battleship but it was twice the size of the pods. Amanda ran up and hugged her, “It’s good to see you again.”
Allison smiled, “It has been too long. How’s Trevor?”
“He’s inside installing the three computers. Come on, I have a lot to show you.”
“Lead the way.”
“You’re going to like your new ship. It’s really something.” Amanda started talking at a fast rate and though Allison wanted to interrupt her to ask questions, there was no way to get a word in edgewise. She mentally listed the questions and decided to hold them for Trevor. As they walked closer to the huge pod, Allison saw four disruptors instead of the usual three. They were lower on the hull and the twin barrels extended out of the ship’s hull from about six inches above. Amanda pointed at them and said, “Those are the new disruptors. Each of the two barrels pack the same power as the old single barrel mounts. The barrels can fire in unison at a single target or they can be independently targeted. The smaller mounts allow them to swivel at three times the speed of the old mounts.”
Allison shook her head, “The old mounts weren’t slow, Amanda.”
Amanda paused her running commentary and said, “Compared to the new ones they are.”
She began speaking again and Allison stared at the new disruptor barrels. They were three times the diameter of the old. She stopped walking and said, “How can these be powered without weakening the defenses?”
Amanda stopped talking and Allison discovered how to get her questions answered. Amanda could talk up a storm but didn’t miss anything that was said. “That’s one of the real surprises I was telling you about.”
“Oh?”
“The four DE reactors have been taken out and they’ve been replaced by one larger reactor.”
Allison stopped walking again and looked at Amanda. Amanda saw her expression and stopped talking. “Amanda, we switched between those reactors to use them where they were most needed. We could increase the power to our thrusters, disruptors, or force field.”
Amanda smiled, “Allison, the new reactor is more than ten times more powerful than all four of the ones they replace. You can still increase the power wherever you choose but there is a lot more of it than before. There is also no delay in making the changes unlike the switches that had to be used before.”
“How long will a full charge last?”
“The ship will have its mini-scoops extended whenever it’s not being hit by an enemy’s beams. The new reactor stays at full charge and will keep its charge a lot longer than the old reactors.”
“That’s incredible.”
Amanda smiled, “It is, isn’t it? Come on inside and take a look at the new stardrive.”
“New stardrive?”
Amanda lowered her head and leaned in to Allison and whispered, “The universe just got a lot smaller.” She grabbed Allison’s hand and started running toward the port. Allison started running with her and wondered if Amanda ever ran out of steam. It appeared she didn’t.
After meeting Trevor inside, she made a decision. She pressed her wrist unit and saw Chris appear, “Sir, I really think you need to come here and meet with Amanda and Trevor.”
“But I want to…”
“Bring him with you. It’s time he started learning about our ships.”
Chris looked away and she saw his lips moving quietly and then she heard, “ALLLLLL RIIIIIGHT!!!” He looked back at Allison and said, “We’re on our way.”
• • •
Two hours later, Chris was sitting in one command chair with Michael on his lap. Allison sat in the other command chair and Trevor and Amanda sat in folding chairs they brought in for the meeting. They brought Chris up to speed on the new armaments and reactor and Michael’s eyes stayed wide the entire time. Allison was shocked the young boy didn’t interrupt them once and then she realized that Chris was answering his questions telepathically.
Chris said, “I don’t understand what you mean by this new stardrive being faster.”
Trevor raised his hand and Amanda closed her mouth, “Let me try to explain.” Amanda leaned back in her chair and nodded. Trevor looked at Chris and Allison and smiled, “We discovered something entirely by accident. We had an A-Pod’s stardrive go haywire. It was attempting to skip back to Earth to have repairs done before it quit working all together. The thing is, the probes kept detecting it disappearing from the void and then it would reappear in a different place a lot further than it could have traveled in normal space. After the last attack, an alarm was sounded and a squadron of A-Pods was sent out to intercept it. They found it skipping in and saw it repeatedly disappearing and reappearing in the void. When they contacted the pilot, he kept telling them that he had not entered normal space. He insisted he had never left the void.”
Chris tilted his head, “Where was it going?”
“No one knew and they contacted us as it moved closer to Earth. The thing that didn’t make sense was that each time it disappeared, it would reappear a long way ahead of the Pods escorting it back to Earth. They were all traveling at their maximum speed so there was no way that pod should have been able to move that far ahead of them. I ordered them to stop the pod and have it remain stationary in the void. It still disappeared and reappeared.”
“What was going on?”
Trevor tilted his head and smiled, “Chris, something remarkable. We took a repair team out to the ship and managed to get an engineer on board before it disappeared. He hooked up his analytic computer to the drive and discovered that the stardrive’s frequency mo
dulator was going out. It couldn’t hold a frequency.” Trevor smiled and said, “It wasn’t going into normal space. We activated its scanners and found out that it was going into a small area of space that separates normal space from the void.”
“Say what?”
“The engineer on board was able to get a reading on the frequency that the stardrive was using when it disappeared. It took us a few weeks but we were finally able to duplicate that frequency and set a pod up so it could switch between the normal frequency and the new one. When we switched to the new frequency, the pod disappeared.”
“Was it able to see anything from that band?”
“Remember, the pilot never had any indication that he left the void. He was able to see everything in the void just as he normally would. We also discovered that he could see normal space as well.”
Chris looked at Allison and saw her shaking her head. He looked back at Trevor and said, “This is a way of hiding that can’t be traced.”
“Not until another species finds that barrier. We can track a ship in that barrier because we know its frequency. But that’s not the remarkable thing about this.” Chris stared at Trevor and he said, “We can travel to the Virgo Cluster almost instantaneously.”
“WHAT?!”
Amanda couldn’t restrain herself any longer. “We decided to check it out for speed and we set our course for open space in the Virgo Cluster. We overshot it by a million light years.”
Chris looked at Trevor and he nodded. “How were you able to find your way back?”
“M-87 can be seen from a lot further than that. We reduced the power going to the thrusters and found we could modulate the speed, but it wasn’t easy. We’ve developed a new system to make it easier but you don’t want to go to full thrusters. You could end up at the other end of known space. Maybe even further.”