by Saxon Andrew
The burning rock shattered and blew into the new cave they were working on. In less than a second, all three thousand humans were vaporized by the burning ejecta that hit them. Fifty minutes later, the shock wave arrived and blew their ashes away. Harmony was able to see it because a young woman who was in the very front of the cave was sheltered by the bodies of her friends between her and the cave opening. She managed to force her way through the dead bodies to get outside when the heat was low enough to breathe. She was blown away by the hurricane force winds being blown in front of the shockwave.
Andy lowered his head and closed his eyes. Those winds would arrive at the hole in another hour. For the moment, he sat and wept as Melody held him in her arms. Mat held Harmony and she remained silent. After the weakened shockwave blew past the Hole, she looked up and quietly whispered, “This telepathy is not something I would wish on anyone.”
Mat pulled her closer and quietly said, “Your father is right.” She looked into his eyes again as he said, “We can honor them because you witnessed their bravery and unwillingness to give up no matter what the odds. They are an example for all of us. They will be honored and it’s due to your ability to share their loss. I’m so thankful for you and what you can do. I’m so honored you care for me.”
Harmony lowered her head and sighed. After a moment she said, “What are you going to do about it?”
Mat stared at the top of her head and quietly whispered, “Harmony, will you consent to be my mate?”
Harmony hugged him tightly and remained silent. Mat waited and after an hour Harmony looked up at him, “You haven’t asked me my answer.”
“You’ll tell me when you’re ready.”
“You’re no longer insecure.”
“Life can end too suddenly to have room for insecurities. I don’t want to waste the time we have.”
“I will gladly consent to be your mate. It is I who is honored. We’ll ask Dad to perform the ceremony tom…”
Mat saw Harmony’s eyes widen and he said, “What?”
Harmony stood up and ran over to the Navigator, “I sense the thoughts of a being I’ve not heard before. They’re above the planet and moving toward the surface.”
The Regent looked up at the wall monitor and saw the water receding from the community and the dark clouds above. Large burning rocks were falling out of the dark cloud layer as far as the scanner could see. Andy heard Harmony and stood up from the deck and approached the wall monitor. The Regent looked at him and said, “What color was the ship your first leader saw?”
“Grey.”
They stared at the monitor and after an hour a small grey ship appeared above the community’s location. Huge explosions appeared around the grey ship as falling, burning rocks hit the ship’s force field. Harmony and Linnae had their eyes closed and Linnae said, “The one on that ship has detected your scanner on the cliff. It is contacting someone else on what to do about it.”
Everyone in the room watched the small ship hovering above the community and the Navigator said, “That ship is probably a lander. It had minimal scanning ability.”
Andy nodded and looked at the Regent, “That means their main ship will have to come and scan for your ship.” The small ship suddenly rose into the cloud layer and disappeared. Andy looked at Linnae, “Do you sense anything else?”
“That being’s last thought before I lost him was that he was going to meet whomever he was communicating with.”
“Did you sense where that other being is located?”
Linnae and Harmony both shook their heads. Linnae said, “Normally I would be able to find the other one communicating with the one that was here.”
The Regent shook his head, “The other one might be too far away.”
“Distance has never been an issue before.”
Andy shook his head with a small smile, “I know where they are.” Everyone looked at him and he looked at the Regent, “I wondered how the Time Takers would avoid your scanners. Where could they have gone and not worry about your seeing them?”
The Regent thought for a moment and started shaking his head. Grandel said, “They moved their ship above this planet several weeks in the future from now.”
Andy smiled, “You are one smart Talen!”
“Thank you.”
“That’s why my daughters couldn’t sense the location of the other being. They’re not here in this time.”
Harmony said, “They’re back! And there’s more of them.”
Everyone looked at the Monitor and after thirty minutes something huge began appearing out of the low cloud layer. It appeared over the community and everyone saw a giant circular shaped grey ship. The explosions on its force field were continuous and some were massive.”
“If you’re right about my mind weapon killing them, I could eliminate them now.”
Linnae said, “The first being that came here is not with them.”
Andy smiled, “The first ship is waiting for them to return. If it doesn’t appear within a specified time, it will go back in time and warn the ship not to come here.”
The Regent shook his head, “This manipulation of time is crazy. How did you see that?”
“I’ve had years to think about how they would plan to come and see if their plan was successful. Harmony, contact all the other communities and tell them to block their vents with camouflage material and stay inside.”
“Dad, they won’t dare step outside because of the falling rocks. I’ll send the warning out anyway.”
The Regent stared at the giant ship and shook his head, “I owe you an apology.”
“No you don’t. I know about them and still have great difficulty believing it.”
Linnae smiled, “Their leader is scanning your portable scanner and trying to understand how it survived.”
Andy smiled, “Give him some time. He’ll find a way.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because he can see the remains of your landers. The only explanation he can come up with is that it had to have been thrown out of your ship when the shockwave hit it. By being embedded in the cliff, he’ll surmise you were on the surface without your force field being active. The fact your ship is destroyed will confirm his plan worked. He’ll also see my community is now under twenty feet of mud. He’ll also justify our missing bodies by the heat of the shockwave vaporizing our bodies.”
The Navigator shook his head, “Wow, you have thought this thing through!”
The Regent stared at the giant ship and it disappeared. He was shocked and could only point at the monitor. Andy smiled, “Their ship just jumped ahead to see if any of my species survived the comet.” Andy looked at Linnae, “When will they appear again?”
“The leader ordered a seven month jump.”
“Mark that date on our calendar. We’ll have to be well hidden when they come back.” Andy looked at Linnae, “Why were you smiling?”
Everyone looked at Linnae and she smiled brightly, “One of the beings on that vessel met with the Original Andy less than two hours ago. I was able to see him, Dad! He was everything I thought he’d be. He faced the Time Taker unafraid.” Linnae paused and her smile grew larger, “Dad, he looked enough like you to be a brother.”
“Will you share with us what you saw?”
Linnae continued smiling and sent the images to everyone on the bridge. Tyler stood up and walked over to Andy, “This was worth it, Andy. I’ve lost my parents but you saved us just like the original Andy planned. One day, we will confront that ship and make them pay.”
“No, Tyler.”
Tyler’s eyes narrowed and he tilted his head, “What?”
“We’re going to thank them, Tyler. If our new friends and our descendants survive, and we’re able to make this universe less deadly, it will be due to their efforts.”
“But they planned for us to all die?”
Andy looked at the Regent and smiled, “Just like our new friends here did. But out of this, I pray a n
ew reality will be born.”
Tyler stared at Andy and after a moment smiled, “My parents would gladly give their lives to end the suffering.”
Andy reached forward and hugged Tyler, “Your parents will join the Community’s heroes and they so richly deserve our honor. All of those that died today will be remembered.”
The Regent looked around the bridge and saw his crew felt the human’s emotion. He nodded and said, “Perhaps all of us here at this moment in time will be remembered as well.”
Andy looked at the Regent and smiled, “It is that memory that will guide our descendants to keep to the path we set for them. All we need do is avoid being discovered by the Time Takers and the future will belong to our children.”
The Regent nodded and grabbed a panel as the floor shook again.
• • •
Four months passed and Tyler watched the Talens working on the huge blaster on their ship’s hull. He enjoyed working with them. He handed the engineer a spiral spanner and took the neutral wrench and put it in the proper pocket in the large tool bag. He squinted and said, “Shouldn’t those two connectors be reversed?”
The engineer looked at the wiring diagram and then looked at the two connectors. He shook his head, “You’re right. How did I miss that?”
“You’ve been working too long. You need to take a break.”
The Engineers round eyes blinked. They did have eyelids but they blinked very rarely. “Tell you what; why don’t you finish wiring this module and we’ll take a break afterwards.”
“Sure!” The engineer moved out of the small space and Tyler crawled in. “Hand me the neutral wrench.” The engineer handed Tyler the wrench and Tyler started disconnecting the wires. He looked at the engineer, “You should put the spiral scanner in the right pocket or we’ll lose track of it.” The engineer tried not to smile but couldn’t stop himself. He had deliberately hidden a tool three weeks earlier and blamed it on Tyler. Tyler promised him that he wouldn’t lose another tool and so far he was right. Even when he hid one, Tyler refused to leave until they found it. The Engineer had to produce it and he no longer worried about Tyler’s attention to detail. Tyler disconnected the two wires and stared at the control panel.
“What’s wrong?”
Tyler looked at the Engineer and said, “Why are you using leads from the primary reactor?”
“The new blaster should have maximum power.”
Tyler shook his head, “Not really. You’ve run the wires through an attenuator to reduce the power. If you ran the blaster’s leads from the secondary reactor, you’d put less stress on the force field if we’re under attack and the blasters would still operate even if the force field failed. You wouldn’t need to use an attenuator either.” The Engineer looked at the wiring diagram and followed the path of energy being sent to the blaster. He shook his head as Tyler said, “If you chose to do it that way, you could use the two primary leads to power the cutter beams. They need the maximum power you can send to them. I suspect their range would be greatly increased as well.”
“Tyler, how long have you seen this?”
Tyler shrugged, “About three weeks when you started creating the wiring diagrams.”
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“Polo, I’m just a human who’s never really worked with high technology. I assumed I had missed something that you knew.”
Polo stood and said, “Come with me.”
“What about the connectors?”
“We’ll come back to them later.”
Tyler followed the Engineer to the Lead Engineer’s office and had Tyler explain to him what he had said earlier.
• • •
Tyler met Linnae for the evening meal and she looked up at him, “What?”
“Say hello to the new Planning Engineer.”
“WHAT?!”
“Look at my thoughts; it won’t take so long.”
Linnae looked in his mind and started shaking her head, “How are you able to do this?”
Tyler sighed heavily, “I just look at energy like it was water.”
“What?”
“If you want to get more energy to something, you have to use a larger pipe and a direct route for the water to follow. The same is true of energy. If you want more power sent to a blaster, or cutter, you have to use a larger power source and a direct wire from the power source to the weapon. I noticed that the Talen’s were making the pathways more complicated than they should have been.”
“That comes from hearing their thoughts in your subconscious and developing an understanding of their science.”
“What?”
“Tyler, you’re not directly telepathic but you do have a subconscious connection to those around you.”
“I don’t understand?”
“Explain how you found Olivia when you were a baby.” Tyler stared at her and shook his head. “Tyler, Olivia told me that you wailed whenever they took you away from her. That behavior started from the moment she held you in the care center. The only way to stop your crying was to take you to Olivia.”
Tyler’s eyes went to the floor and he slowly shook his head, “I can’t explain it, Linnae. I just could…I don’t know…feel her and the feeling was so good. Just like you.”
“I think my sister and I sensed you and both of us wanted you.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“How did you end up being the lucky one?”
“I won the coin toss. However, I suspect your mind influenced it. I was the one you had chosen…right?”
Tyler smiled, “I mean no disrespect to Harmony, but you just made me feel so good when I was around you.”
“Just like your mother did.”
Tyler was silent and after a moment said, “What are you saying?”
“Tyler, I really think your subconscious mind is in contact with those around you and you’re learning, on an intuitive level, everything they know.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“You possess more knowledge than any one of them. If you see something, you need to say something. I suspect it could make a big difference.” Linnae saw his eyes narrow and she said, “What are you thinking?”
“I’ve been thinking about what might happen in the future.”
“Like?”
“If we’re successful in saving civilizations from destruction, some of them may desire to join us in the fight.”
Melody nodded, “I suspect they would.”
“What happens if the Talen are forced to use their mind weapon?”
Linnae stared at Tyler and after a moment began slowly nodding, “They would be in danger. The only ones that could fight would be the Talens and us. Any other species could die if they used it during a battle.” Tyler nodded and Linnae looked at him, “What are you thinking?”
“Harmony started me thinking about Mat.”
“What about him?”
“He is able to block her from seeing his thoughts.”
“Yes, so what.”
“I asked him to conduct an experiment with me. I took an extremely sensitive field meter and asked him to block his thoughts. I detected a small electrical field when he did it. When he turned it off, the field disappeared.”
“What are you saying, Tyler?”
“What if that field can be used to block the Regents mind weapon…” Linnae opened her mouth and Tyler held up his hand, “so that the weapon would only go out in a specific direction?”
Linnae closed her mouth. “Can you do that?”
“I don’t know. However, that field has a very specific frequency.” Tyler paused and said, “If I can build a helmet with settings to block his thoughts except for a specified direction, we could use other species to assist us.” Linnae nodded as she thought about it and he said, “I might also be able to build a helmet that would block you from hearing other’s thoughts.” Linnae’s eyes went wide and she put her hand on her throat. Tyler smiled, “It might
allow you and Harmony some peace.”
“Oh Tyler! If only you could!” Linnae went into his arms and Tyler pulled her close, “Let me see what I can do.” Linnae held him and cried at the idea of silence.
Chapter Twenty-One
The Regent sat in a room with forty of his warriors teaching them how to focus their thoughts into the mind weapon. More than three hundred of his subjects were able to produce the killing thought and their range was growing every day as they practiced using it. He heard the door to the room open and he saw Tyler standing at the door, “Hello, Tyler, can you wait?”
“Regent, I really need you to assist me while you’re conducting a class.”
The Regent’s head tilted, “What?”
“I think I’ve developed a way for you to control the mind weapon.”
The Regent’s head moved back, “What do you mean control?”
“I’m hoping that if you want to use your mind to kill one ship or a thousand, you could control which one you chose.”
“That’s not possible.” Tyler shrugged. “Is it possible?”
“I’d like to see.”
“What do I need to do?”
“I want you to wear this helmet whenever you teach a class. I need to have it calibrated to your vision.”
“My vision?”
“Yes. The helmet’s scanners will react to your eyes and focus on what you’re looking at. Will you wear it?”
“I’ll wear it.”
Tyler stepped outside of the room and brought in a helmet that covered the Regent’s head. “Tyler, I can’t see anything.”
“Give me a moment.” Tyler powered the helmet and the Regent saw a blue light shine into his eyes.”
“I can only see a blue light.”
“Give the helmet a few moments to adjust the light to your retinas. It should disappear in a few moments.”
The Regent saw the blue light slowly dim and then disappear. He found he could no longer see the helmet over his head. He knew he was still wearing it but he couldn’t see it. “What do you want me to do?”