Kael-ven looked back out to the middle of the room. He resisted the urge to see if there was any skin he could chew on. He had been informed it made the humans sick to watch and didn’t want to offend those around him.
“Have you talked with Marcus about what he plans?” Kael-ven finally asked.
“No, I haven’t asked him.” Bethany Anne said.
“You haven’t talked with Bobcat or William, either?” Kael-ven asked.
“No, in fact, I have not spoken to any human to ask what Marcus might be planning,” Bethany Anne assured him.
“They’re about to start,” John said to Kael-ven. “So your answer before they start is…” he prompted.
Kael-ven stared at the two on the floor, wondering where Marcus’s backup was. Finally, rushing before the two hit their flags in the middle of the table, “DEAL!”
--
“Good luck,” Marcus told Royleen.
“Where is your second?” Royleen asked him as he sat on his seat. “Not having a second will not require me to release T’llek here.”
“Oh, sorry,” Marcus said and grabbed the second box as he sat, “My second is right here, he can’t be here physically, so he’s speaking through this.”
Royleen looked at the box. “What is that?”
“That,” said a voice coming out of the speaker, “is my sound amplification box to allow me to speak to everyone so that they can all hear me.”
Royleen grimaced. “And who are you?”
“TOM,” the voice replied.
“Who is Tom?” Royleen asked looking from the speaker to Marcus. “There are so many human names, and some of you carry the same name.”
“I’m also known as Thales of Miletus,” the voice told him, humor coloring his tone.
--
“This name, this Thales of Miletus is familiar to me,” Kael-ven said aloud. He turned to Bethany Anne. “Why do I know this name?”
“Oh, just wait,” Bethany Anne said. “It will get better.”
Kael-ven turned back, dreading the next surprise the aliens were going to bring to the testing.
--
Royleen pointed to the speaker. “I thought you were going to have either of your two research friends back you up?”
“Bobcat and William?” Marcus asked, surprised. “They’re two of my best friends, and I would bust down the doors of hell with them. But I would just as soon have one of them back me up on science as I would trust Bobcat with beer,” he finished.
--
“Ouch,” Bobcat said from his seat next to William and Barnabas, as those on the human side of the room laughed.
“He was wrong to say this?” Barnabas asked him.
“Oh, hell no. I wouldn’t trust me with beer, but damn, he could have said it a little nicer,” Bobcat replied.
“Word,” William agreed. “And no I wouldn’t trust Bobcat with beer, either,” William told Barnabas.
“I hate you, too,” Bobcat shot back.
“I’ve got a fresh twelve-pack of Shiner Bock,” William said conversationally.
“I love you, again,” Bobcat replied automatically.
Barnabas smiled.
--
“Then, who is this?” Royleen pointed to the speaker. “How do I know he exists and is not a computer program of yours?”
TOM’s voice answered, “Okay, Scientist Royleen of the Chloret Caste of the Fourth planet revolving around the D-122.221star system found by the Kurtherians in Solar Year…”
“No!” Royleen shouted, jumping up from his seat, surprising those listening. “This is not possible!”
Marcus smiled and spread his arms. “Why not?” he asked. “You said I could have anyone be my backup.”
Royleen looked down at the speaker, to Marcus, to his Captain who was confused and then back to the speaker and asked the speaker, “What is your real name?”
--
“Why is Royleen so agitated?” Kael-ven asked.
“Because he didn’t do his research,” John answered, “He never found out what kind of friends Marcus has to call upon as his backup.”
“What friend could bother him so much?” Kael-ven said.
“The unbelievable kind,” Bethany Anne answered.
--
A string of numbers started spewing from the speaker and Royleen put up a hand after the first fifty. “I cannot keep them all in my head!”
TOM stopped.
Royleen’s shoulders slumped. “How many languages?”
“Dead or still in existence?” TOM asked.
“Never mind,” Royleen said and looked up at Marcus while pointing at the speaker. “How is it you have a Kurtherian as a friend?”
--
“TOM is a Kurtherian!” Kael-ven said, astonished.
“Well, yes. Didn’t Royleen just say so?” Bethany Anne asked.
“But you said… you said,” Kael-ven went silent then turned to look at Bethany Anne who returned his attention. “You told me you had not spoken to any human about his plans. It was a Kurtherian who said what was intended.”
“Perhaps I was informed that the Kurtherian was asked to participate. But you know Kurtherians, they decide for themselves what they want to do,” she said enigmatically.
Nice. Are you going to admit this Kurtherian is dependent on you for his life?
Hey, I didn’t start that situation. I woke up, and your alien ass was already along for the ride. You might remember that I never told you what to do with Marcus. That was you two cooking this up totally, so don’t tag me with this.
Would you look back over at Royleen? I want to enjoy his shocked expression again.
Bethany Anne turned to make sure she looked at the scientist, who was still looked bumfuzzled.
Don’t worry. I have ArchAngel keeping video records of all of this. We’ll watch it again.
In slow motion, TOM agreed.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Boston, MA, USA
Charles walked into the reading room, noticing the chessboard. He stopped, realized that Fred was going to win his match with David in three moves and then turned towards his chair to sit down. He pulled out his laptop and worked for a couple of minutes before he heard Fred and David coming down the hallway.
“I’m telling you,” David said, “that it was a TQB operation that attacked TarHunt in Kentucky.” David looked at the chessboard and moved a pawn and then continued toward his chair. He could hear Fred stop at the chessboard.
“TarHunt got hit?” Charles asked, looking up from his laptop. “When did this happen?”
“We got word yesterday morning after they did a complete review,” David answered, pulling out some folders from his briefcase. “They lost a couple of hours of video that wasn’t backed up, some people got knocked around, and one went to the hospital, but no one got into the data.”
“Your move,” Fred called out as he continued into the room. “I’ve got you in two moves,” he added as he took a seat and turned on the lamp next to his chair.
David looked over. “You always tell me you have me in this many moves, you rarely do.”
“You move your bishop to Queen’s four?” Charles asked Fred who nodded he had. Charles turned to David, “Yes, you’re done in two.”
“Well… shit,” David said, “I’ll double check, but I’ll move the thousand into your column.”
“What does that make me up to?” Fred asked.
“Not up to anything, you’re still down fifty-three thousand from the presidential race,” Charles interrupted.
“Well, who the hell thought that would happen?” Fred grouched. “It was a sure thing.”
David shrugged as he opened the tiny betting book. “Sure or not, you still owe the pot,” he said as he wrote in the win.
“You think TQB is behind the TarHunt attack,” Charles asked before turning back to Fred, “And you said the attack in South America was a bust?”
Fred grabbed a blue folder and set it on his lap. “Not
only was it a bust, it was a complete and utter failure that defies imagination. That is,” he amended as he looked up at Charles, “if you believe a bunch of South American yahoos that are probably coked up gutter slime.”
Charles thought about it for a minute. “I believe that we’re going to need to double up on our efforts in the United Nations.” He turned to David. “Don’t we have Timothy James working on that?”
“Yes,” he said. “He’s asked if we wanted to hop on with any of the countries that are making waves. At the moment, most of them are smaller and can’t get into the race to upgrade the technology. He feels the small ones are looking to leapfrog and catch up if everyone gets the technology at the same time from the United Nations.”
“Why they think TQB is going to listen to them,” Fred muttered, “I’ll never know.”
“TQB’s stocks are down ten percent across the board,” David told him.
“Lots of selling in damn near every one of their companies,” Charles added, looking at his laptop.
“Who’s buying?” Fred asked.
Charles spent a few minutes looking, long enough for Fred and David to go back to reading their own stuff before he answered, “Research says everyone from governments to large corporations.”
“Something is weird,” David said. “It doesn’t make sense. Those companies have been tightly held for years, decades even.”
“Well, is the U.N. stuff causing a loss of faith by some of the holders?” Fred asked.
“If they are, then there are some big players sweeping in on the change in ownership,” Charles said. “My vote is to tell Timothy James to find alliances and see who needs funding. We want to be in as many of these as possible.”
“For the least amount of money,” David added.
Charles looked over at David, a smile on his face. “You even had to add that?”
Near Dulce Lake, NM, USA
Patrick Brown headed down to the main spaceship bay, Bruce walking with him.
“I want four ships for this,” Patrick called over his shoulder. “Make sure they head up to space and then come down and try to either make it look like they’re from outer space, or coming up from the ice. If we get TQB blamed, that’s good or if we continue with the idea that it’s the Nazi society we’re good there, too.”
“You want us to deep six the Navy?” Bruce asked, no judgment in his voice.
“No, we aren’t against them here. Hell, we’re on the same side, they just shouldn’t be messing with this technology, so they need to back the hell off,” Patrick said as he punched a sequence into the lock, put his finger on a pad and then spoke into a microphone. A second later, a buzz occurred, and Patrick opened the door, waving Bruce ahead of him and closing it behind them.
“What we do want to do is find out where they’re going. We don’t have their direct coordinates so far, which is rather surprising.”
“How can that be?” Bruce asked as the two men continued down the rough-hewn hallway heading deeper underground.
“Honestly, I don’t know,” Patrick admitted. “I think the ships are being given coordinates to provide approximate locations and as they get near, their new coordinates. Someone is holding this information very close to the vest and none of our normal data acquisition has been successful, or we would have already dropped down to check it out.”
The two men walked to the end of the hall that opened into a significantly sized natural cavern that held twelve ships. Ten of them looked like round UFOs, sitting on four legs each. Two were bell-shaped, taller than the rest and one still had a Nazi swastika on the side and machine guns sticking out the bottom.
“You should take old ring-a-ding there,” Bruce joked. “That would cause all sorts of confusion for the Navy.”
Patrick laughed. “If I wasn’t trying to get TQB blamed for this shit, I probably would. That would be effective in throwing them off the scent, and the military would get their underwear all bunched up thinking we have a bunch of Nazis still around.”
“Don’t we?” Bruce asked. “Down in Antarctica?”
“Well, maybe.” Patrick allowed as they approached four men, all in dark gray flight suits with helmets in their arms.
“Okay, guys,” Patrick said as they joined the four airmen. “The Navy ships will be approaching the Schwabenland tomorrow morning. You guys are going to go up and hang out over the South Pole. When we have a pinpoint on where the Navy is going to land exactly, you guys need to get them to leave.”
“If we’re shot at, sir?” Primary flight leader Antony Rikert asked.
Patrick shrugged. “We shoot back. The originals did, they should expect nothing less. See if they’re going to pack up and leave and if not, then keep ratcheting up the response until they decide it’s a losing proposition.” He thought about it for a moment. “If you have to, sink one.”
“Understood, sir.”
A few more minutes of talking and the four men headed towards the latest ships Majestic 12 had been able to build with their advanced technology.
They were unleashing the latest of truly human technology. Not that hybrid bullshit of TQB.
Patrick and Bruce turned back around as the ships, silent in their flight, navigated out of the large caverns. They took the route that would have them rise silently to the sky thirty miles to the north.
QBS ArchAngel
Kael-ven’s feet clicking on the floor alerted Kiel of his arrival before his door slid open, and Kael-ven entered.
“How are you feeling?” Kael-ven asked, looking at the cast covering Kiel’s arm.
“Like I was tossed about by a Koron-dak,” Kiel grunted. “But the Koron-dak,” he lifted up his arm,” was nice enough to help try and fix what it broke.”
“These humans are difficult to understand,” Kael-ven said. “Now we see what must be Kurtherian modifications, but they do not have Kurtherian overlords.”
“Perhaps the humans kicked them out?” Kiel chittered his laughter. “I know humans can be a bit of a pain in the ass, and sneaky when they want to be.”
“Yes, I found that out.” Kael-ven turned and walked to the small chair and lowered himself down, locking his legs underneath. “Their Queen beat me in two different wagers. Now, I have to listen to her questions and, I have to consider her offer.”
“If they didn’t keep beating us,” Kiel offered, “I would think they were just lucky.”
“No, they are more than lucky. They have a history.” Kael-ven looked around the room and assumed anything he might say would be recorded. “I have spoken with the one named Frank Kurns.” Kiel groaned at Kael-ven’s comment. “You have met him?”
“Royleen calls him the human with a thousand questions. You can pick him out because he is always writing in his books.”
“Yes, that is the one,” Kael-ven agreed. “But he will answer questions as readily as he will ask.”
“I hadn’t thought to ask him questions,” Kiel admitted, trying to scratch his arm in the cast.
“I was top of my class in strategy, and I wanted to save my voice,” Kiel-ven said. “So I needed to come up with an idea quickly. As it worked out, he did not mind answering questions which helped explain to me why humans are so hard to pin down.”
“Okay, I have nothing better to do than stay in this bed and listen, sir.”
“Oh, I’m here to talk Kiel, both to you and Royleen. He is next.”
“Does Royleen know that you are coming to speak to him?”
“I doubt it,” Kael-ven said. “Because I have not informed him of it at this point. I figure if he knows, he will try to hide from me.”
“Is he still upset at losing to their scientist?”
“Yes, but in an area I was not expecting. Once he understood he was going to be challenged by a Kurtherian, he lost his courage. I think he is more bothered by the fact that TOM is the friend of a human, and he never expects to be able to overcome that advantage. I can’t understand scientists, Kiel.” Kael-ven said.
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The Kurtherian Gambit Omnibus 05 - The Fans Version: My Ride is a Bitch - Don't Cross This Line - Never Submit Page 21