Jupiter Fleet 1: Werewolves Don't Purr

by JS Rowan

“Commander, I need you to look at this.” The commander followed her, and the other werewolves returned to their drills.

  Across the hall and down in the lab, Leona walked over to the desk and brought up the display that she had configured for transmission to his werewolf brain. After the commander received the telepathic information, Leona looked at him.

  “So, Commander, what do you think?”

  “I think our chances have just improved considerably,” thought Commander Gupta.

  Thor was standing in the hallway, waiting for the return of Constable Chatterjee, when he spotted one of the members of another team. It was Constable Pawar, and he was escorting two green-collar wolves with thought-helmets on them. They were following him eagerly, hoping to get their chance at advancement to leader-wolf.

  Suddenly Thor spotted trouble. The security Supe that had stopped him and the commandos when they first met was heading to intercept Constable Pawar and his wolf charges. Thor moved as quickly but casually as possible toward the constable. He wanted to be near the three werewolves when the Supe caught up to them.

  Constable Pawar didn’t see Thor coming toward him. His attention was focused on trying not to look directly at the Supe, while keeping track of the alien’s movements.

  The Supe broadcast a command: “HALT!”

  All the slaves and werewolves in the hallway froze involuntarily, except for the two green-collars. They had not heard the command because they had the thought-helmets on. They stumbled to a halt when they noticed that all the other traffic had stopped. They could not see the Supe behind them, but they dared not turn around and look. They knew better, from harsh experience.

  “Let me see your arrest telos for these two,” the Supe broadcast to Constable Pawar. All the slaves in the hallway started to depart quickly. The werewolves faded away as well. All of them had dread on their faces.

  Constable Pawar pulled the telepathic holograms (the so-called telos) from a pouch that was attached to an equipment belt. Leona had made it up, using the authority of her “administration slave” identity. He handed the documents over to the Supe, keeping his eyes focused on his own hands.

  The Supe looked at the telos for a moment. “This is not right,” thought the alien security official.

  The Supe looked at Constable Pawar and invaded his brain. A powerful intrusive broadcast from the Supe beat down all resistance that the commando could have tried to make.

  “Tell me what is going on with these wolves.”

  The constable had no choice all the details that he knew were being transferred to the Supe. The security Supe grasped the magnitude of the plot and inhaled deeply. Thor, standing behind the group, realized that the Supe was a fraction of a second from alerting the whole ship to the plan.

  Thor struck the Supe from behind, killing him instantly. Constable Pawar stood there for a moment, stunned by the ferocity of the mental attack that the Supe had subjected him to. Thor mentally yelled at the constable to snap him out of his fog.

  “Move it! Get those two wolves into the room and don’t let anyone come out. Tell the commander what has happened.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Constable Pawar.

  “I am going to get rid of this body and come to the room, too, if I can.”

  The COBRA commando wolf grabbed the two green-collar wolves and forcibly dragged them into the empathic testing room. Thor was slightly relieved that the two had not fought the constable or raised an alarm. Maybe they were as shocked by the Supe’s death as was the constable.

  Leona was out of the lab, walking down the hallway. She was clad in a green slave smock similar to what the system had made for the Canadians. Unlike them, she had given herself some stylish green-and-silver sandals, to show her skilled status as a trusted “admin” slave. She hoped that she hadn’t made a mistake with the shoes. She was accompanied by ten werewolves.

  In order not to attract attention to themselves, they did not walk as a group. Leona was walking with two werewolves. One werewolf was about thirty feet ahead, and another two were ten feet ahead on the other side of the hallway. A group of three wolves were twenty feet behind, with the remaining two walking by themselves farther back.

  “Where are we heading?” asked Axel Chin, one of the recently reclaimed “human” werewolves.

  “Our destination is on the other end of the ship, about six decks down,” said Leona. She pitched her voice low to minimize the chance of being overheard.

  “How long do you think it will take us?” asked Axel.

  “I think it’s about a thirty-minute walk. You guys are all walking at a pace which is about as fast as I can keep up with which I suppose is also known as an average werewolf pace,” said Leona.

  Axel grinned a happy dog grin and nodded.

  They were heading to holding cells 15 to 28. What was in these cells could make a difference in whether their efforts to take the spaceship would be successful.

  Thor had carried the body of the Supe into a blind corridor. He tried to contact Leona telepathically, and he was worried.

  “Oh crap, oh crap,” he thought.

  Thor wasn’t worried so much for himself, but for the entire operation. If he were caught, it would ruin everything.

  “OK, Thor, think! Where can you dump this guy for a few days so his death will look like an accident?”

  Thor started running through his mind all the areas that the system had downloaded into his brain. He was coming up empty there just didn’t seem to be any “body-stashing compartments” on the map.

  “Oh crap, oh crap!”

  Just then, Thor noticed a wolf entering the service corridor where a door was starting to close, about fifteen feet behind him. What caught Thor’s attention was the cargo that the wolf had on his anti-grav pallet. It was a group of liquid gas containers.

  Thor waited until the wolf moved off a little, and then ran with the body as fast as he could. He passed a pair of human servants who were walking by. As soon as the green-clad slaves saw the body of the dead Supe, they looked away. Thor thought the less they saw, the less they could be tortured or killed for, if it came to that. Once past Thor, the pair of slaves beat a hasty retreat.

  Thor stepped up to the door and tried the panel. The jolt knocked him back across the hall and he dropped the body.

  “OK, Thor, what is the next step in your fantastically crappy plan?” Thor moaned.

  Thor then thought to try the dead alien’s hand to open the door. He put the hand against the door and willed the door to open. The jolt hit him again, knocking him down.

  “I’m getting so frustrated I could scream!” Thor thought.

  Just then, Ashley Murray’s thought-voice came to his mind.

  “What’s wrong, Thor?”

  “Ashley?” replied Thor. “How are you able to contact me? Where is Leona? Er, never mind that, can you locate me?”

  “Slow down a little, Thor! I am still learning how this computer system works. Um, I think I can locate you.”

  Thor waited impatiently for a minute. The fur on his neck rose up at the fear of being discovered with the Supe’s body.

  “OK, I found you. Now what?”

  “Can you open this door in front of me without leaving a computer record?” Thor realized that his mental “voice” sounded frustrated—and a little testy.

  “No, my opening the door for you would definitely leave a computer record. I mean, yes, I could probably open it, but it would probably set off some alarm bells, since the system wants a telos number and the name of the Supe that authorized it,” Ashley said.

  Thor frantically tried to think of what else to do.

  “Thor, I think that door is going to open by itself. Another werewolf has just sent a message that he is finished loading a cargo of liquid helium and compressed methane. He is requesting permission to transport it. The message includes the telos number already.”

  “Thanks, Ashley! Keep a lookout for any other alerts I need to know about.”r />
  “Alerts? What kind of help do you need?” Even telepathically, Ashley’s Canadian drawl and good humor came through.

  Thor grabbed the body and moved sideways along the wall on the same side as the door, in the opposite direction to the route that he hoped the other werewolf would take. The door opened and Thor was preparing to dash inside, when the other werewolf turned and noticed him with the body.

  Leona approached the doors to the main cell area. Just outside the cells were the barracks for the wolf guards. The door to the barracks was open, and perhaps as many as three hundred and fifty wolves were lounging around. There were bunks for about five hundred werewolves; however, many of the guard wolves were out on duty amongst all the many prison cells. Leona gave a little shudder. She walked up to the four wolves at the door as if she knew what she was doing.

  “My Master wants to purchase some of the humans in cell twenty-six. I am to inspect them. Here is my telos.”

  She handed the telos ticket over to the wolves, but they did not even bother to check it with the system. They just glanced at the plastic card and returned it. She was let in.

  Leona and the two werewolves she was walking with were escorted to the door of holding cells 15 to 28. She came up to the door and repeated what she had said at the outer doorway.

  “My Master wants to purchase some of the humans in cell twenty-six. I am to inspect them. Here is my telos.”

  Leona looked at the main door. The eight other wolves that had accompanied her were being shown in. They each had telos that said they were assigned to the section for cleaning and repair. The guard wolves were happy that they wouldn’t have to climb around the maintenance passages of the ship. Those were some tight spaces, as was indicated by the work tools many with handle extensions for those hard-to-reach places.

  Leona and her two-wolf escort were led into cell 26 by one wolf. The smell of unbathed humans was almost overpowering. The guard wolf was on high alert for any sudden movements by the captives. Leona’s wolves quietly took up positions behind the guard wolf.

  The system had said there were 1,432 men, women, and children in this one cell. No one was in restraints, but the solid metal door was three feet thick. There was no escape.

  Leona glanced at the telos for pickup of the humans. The small document cited a Supe lot number, and gave the leader’s name as a footnote.

  “US Marine Captain Lance O’Neil,” Leona shouted.

  A large blond man in a tattered uniform stood up. He was obviously trying to keep his appearance up to Marine Corps standards despite the conditions. He walked up to Leona and stared down at her menacingly.

  At six feet tall, Leona hadn’t met men who could tower over her all that often. However, aboard the spaceship she had become used to it, because all the werewolves were at least nine feet tall.

  “Relax, Captain, we’re friends,” said Leona.

  “Pardon me, ma’am, but a human in the company of wolves is no friend of mine.”

  “How about I prove it to you?” said Leona.

  She glanced at her wolves and gave a long blink. On that signal, Alex Chin grabbed the guard wolf from behind. The other of Leona’s wolves moved in front of the guard wolf and with three massive blows ripped out his throat.

  “Do you believe me now, Captain?” asked Leona. The smell of werewolf blood had become familiar to her, but mixed with eau d’unbathed human it turned her stomach.

  “Nah, ma’am, that don’t mean a thing. These wolves kill each other for sport,” said the marine officer.

  “A skeptic, I see. Well, in that case…” Leona turned and looked at the prison door.

  Leona waited. And waited. She started to worry that something had gone wrong.

  “Pardon me, ma’am, can you tell me why we are all staring at the door?” The officer kept putting extra emphasis on ma’am in a most insulting way. Plainly he thought of Leona as a traitor to the human species.

  Leona looked at him. She decided not to tell him. If the plan had gone wrong, the captain did not need to die too. Instead, she just turned and looked at the door. It opened, and standing there was the rest of Leona’s escort, as well as one very beat-up guard wolf.

  Constable Saxena, one of the COBRA team, thought-said, “It took longer than we expected to convince our friend here to open the door.”

  The constable then shrugged and went out the door, dragging the beat-up guard wolf with him.

  Leona remembered that the human captives could not “hear” the telepathic communications of the werewolves. She mentally shook her head. This was like Thor and her mother all over again—only without the bonds of love and family to keep things cozy!

  She looked Captain O’Neil full in the face, and her eyes flashed dangerously. “Captain, I don’t have a lot of time. These werewolves are all converted humans. They didn’t volunteer for that. Before being taken captive they were all fighting against the aliens, just like you were—and so was I. None of us would willingly help the aliens attack our people—our planet. And unlike the enemy wolves, our werewolves remember what it’s like to be human. They are on our side! We intend to take this ship away from the aliens. We have secured weapons, and I need your and your unit’s help. I know that almost all your rifle company is here so what say you?”

  Thor threw the body of the dead Supe at the other wolf’s head and charged at him. He caught the other werewolf in the midsection and knocked him backward into the liquid helium tanks. The containers were each about six feet tall and very solid-looking. The air left the other werewolf’s lungs with a grunting oof! sound.

  Thor leaped across the room and tried to kill the other wolf with a blow to the head. His opponent ducked and gave Thor a counterblow that sent him sprawling. Thor was on his feet in an instant, but the other wolf was already striking. The six-inch claws sliced through Thor’s thick hide. Thor’s red fur started to darken with darker red blood.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Thor saw that the door to the corridor had partially closed enough to block most of the view from the hallway into the room. That was fortunate.

  Thor backed up a step and the other wolf went for a killing blow. He leapt at Thor’s exposed throat, massive jaws open wide. Thor swung with an uppercut just before those jaws struck, hitting the wolf in the open jaw. As a boxing blow it was clumsy, since Thor had been a little off balance. However, his big werewolf fist (fueled by adrenaline no doubt) snapped the jawbone nearly off the other wolf’s head. The wolf jumped back in a howl of pain.

  “Thor, what is going on?” asked Ashley in his head. “There are alarms going off in your area.”

  Thor did not respond, but he somehow transmitted an image of the other wolf picking up a liquid helium bottle and hoisting it over his head. The flopping jawbone gave the other werewolf a grotesque laughing appearance.

  “Oh, I see,” was all she said. Then Ashley went quiet.

  The other wolf threw the helium container at Thor, but missed. The bottle hit the opposite wall and exploded. Thor felt a piece of shrapnel from the bottle tear into his back. He picked up a bottle that was lying near his feet and swung it like a club. The other wolf had already grabbed another container and decided to use it to block Thor’s blow.

  That turned out to be a bad decision. Both bottles broke and most of the liquid helium hit the other wolf. Thor’s opponent was instantly flash-frozen from the head to about mid-chest. Covered in frost, the other wolf fell backward and his head shattered on the floor.

  A wisp of memory from his engineering knowledge echoed through Thor’s werewolf consciousness. Some of these probably contained methane pressurized to eighteen thousand pounds-per-square-inch. That many psi of compressed gas… Thor picked up a bottle and threw it as hard as he could at the other bottles that were lying near the Supe’s dead body. The steel bottle smashed open and exploded, flash-freezing the alien’s body. A second later, two of the other containers, weakened by the impact, broke open and exploded.

  Thor had pivoted
and run out the door at werewolf speed as soon as he had thrown. Even so, the blast caught him and propelled him down the hallway. Thor lay on the floor, groaning. A Supe ran up and demanded to know what was happening.

  “It was accident with a faulty bottle, I think,” Thor signaled telepathically. Thor thought-projected the image of the bottles flash-freezing the other Supe, and then the explosion. He was careful not to look at the Supe that stood over him.

  Just then, Constables Chatterjee and Bhatnagar ran up, along with other wolves that were coming to combat the fire.

  “Ashley sent us. We arrived as soon as we could,” thought Constable Bhatnagar.

  Thor passed out a mess of metal fragments, frozen skin, blood, and burnt wolf fur. The two commandos carried him quickly away from the “accident” before more questions could be asked.

  Captain O’Neil had gathered his troops around him. All of them had varying degrees of caution showing on their faces.

  A grey-haired gunnery sergeant was sitting with his blonde-haired little girl on his lap. Despite the tense situation, when Leona looked at the girl, her heart melted. It must have shown in her expression.

  “This is my daughter, Amy. My wife—her mother—was killed last month. Since then, she won’t let me go anywhere without her,” the gunny said.

  “Do you think she might stay with another woman while we take over the spaceship?” asked Leona.

  Amy cuddled close to her father, sucking her thumb. The gunnery sergeant’s eyes went to his captain.

  “So, you and your used-to-be-human werewolves think you can beat out the thousands of alien werewolves on board this ship? Who all know its internal layout?”

  “Yes. In addition to werewolves like Axel here,” she said, motioning to Axel Chin, “we also have a company of commandos from India, and some Canadian human fighters. But we need more humans to use the weapons that we have…‘liberated’…and we have access to the ship’s computer for gaining intelligence. Our plan, Captain, will work a lot better with your participation. What do you think?”