“Which was?”
The Lady rotated on her spider legs to face Philip, and the teenage boy stared at the carpet.
“That we can’t go home,” he whispered. “That was the lesson.”
“Ridiculous. Sunflower said we could link the power of all the transmat chambers and get to the dimension we wanted.”
Philip shook his head. “You saw the results of that experiment.”
“I did the best I could,” said Sunflower. “It’s not the kind of thing you can look up on SpaceBook, you know!”
“Returning home is incredibly difficult,” said the Lady. “It was important for both of your futures that you understood that in the strictest of terms. Billions upon billions upon billions of dimensions exist. The transmat chambers can narrow the range of general time periods, but returning to the same dimension is like finding a needle in a haystack the size of the Milky Way.”
Amy rubbed her nose and thought for a moment. “But … you’re saying that needle is still out there.”
“Yes,” said the Lady. “For your sake, I hope that it exists.”
A beam of jade flashed across the blackness outside the window and the floor vibrated. The displays in the room changed to red triangles and a beeping cacophony filled the air.
The silver legs of the Lady whirred into action, spiking on keyboards with a rapid blur.
“The problem, Amy Armstrong, is that by connecting all the transmat power sources and activating a linked dimensional demat, you caused a gravity rift. Kepler Prime was the largest mass within a light-second, so Kepler Prime was absorbed in the rift.”
“Great poona droppings,” whispered Sunflower. “I’ll be known as the cat who stole a planet.”
Betsy jumped in the air. “Chicks will love it!” he barked.
Amy shook her head. “A planet can’t disappear! A Twinkie or a Super Nintendo, sure, but not a planet!”
“In the case of a linked transmat, mass on a planetary scale is no different from the mass of a high-calorie snack,” said the Lady. “The immediate problem of recovering Kepler Prime, if that is even possible, is of less importance than dealing with the incoming battle fleet.”
“Of Kepler Prime?”
“Sauros,” barked Betsy. “Smelliest bunch of space lizards in the galaxy!”
Sunflower sighed. “Actually, the only space lizards in the galaxy.”
“No! My cousin went to Cassiopeia and saw pink lizards.”
“Those were humans, you moron. Your cousin is the dumbest dog I’ve ever met, and that’s saying a lot.”
Multiple beams flashed the window and the room vibrated again. The scaly green face of a sauro appeared on one of the Lady’s holographic displays.
“Dream Tiger, this is Admiral Sistra of the L.S.S. Deathspar. Energy traces link your ship to the disappearance of Kepler Prime. Respond immediately or prepare to be boarded. Spoiler: we need killing practice and will probably board you anyway. Dream Tiger, do you copy? Is this thing even on?”
The Lady tapped a keyboard. “Deathspar, this is Dream Tiger actual. We copy your boarding request. We have the individual responsible for stealing your planet. Opening hangar bay one; please follow the beacon.”
“This is turning out to be a perfectly horrible day,” said Philip.
Amy steadied herself against the wall. “We can’t just give up! Is there some way to fight back?”
“Certainly, there is,” said the Lady. “This ship has enough radiologic missiles to turn half the Sauro fleet into space dust, and hundreds of snub fighters and bombers manned by the best cat and dog pilots. I am the captain, owner, and spiritual leader of this ship, and I would sacrifice hundreds of pilots and kill thousands of Sauros if that was the only option left.”
Amy shook her head. “You’re looking at me like I’m the other option.”
“Very smart,” said the Lady. “But you always were a quick-witted girl, Amy Armstrong. Simply put, to meet the Sauro force directly will cost hundreds, perhaps thousands of lives. If I yield to their demands to turn over the criminal responsible for making their homeworld disappear, along with the incriminating evidence, then no one will suffer.”
“Apart from Amy!” yelled Philip. “I won’t allow it!”
“Better to go out with a bang,” said Sunflower. “Send a few radiological missiles up those Sauro tailpipes.”
“The Sauros will take you to a prison station in this sector,” said the Lady. “This will give me and my crew valuable time to prepare a rescue and investigate methods of pulling Kepler Prime from the gravity rift. If we can return their homeworld, the sauros will look upon your disappearance from their custody as a sort of fait accompli. I promise, Amy––you won’t be in the sauro prison for very long.”
“That’s the worst plan I’ve ever heard!” said Philip. “We can’t throw her to those beasts without a fight.”
“Every man must choose his battles, or have them chosen for him,” said the Lady. “Amy, what do you think? I will accept either course of action you choose. The pilots are already suiting up, and can launch in seconds.”
Philip glanced around. “Where did Sunflower and Betsy go?”
Hundreds of holographic screens flashed to life around the Lady, each with a cat or dog wearing a protective EVA helmet.
“Commander SF063 finishing initial check,” said a flickering image of Sunflower in a helmet. “Red Squadron tubes are green.”
“Ensign BL8519 here,” growled a helmeted Betsy. “Blue Squadron tubes green.”
Amy gaped at the floating displays. “They were just here. How did you––”
“It’s not important,” said the Lady. “We have seconds before we lose tactical advantage. Do you want to make the smart choice, Amy, and give yourself up for a short time? Or do you choose to sacrifice your friends?”
Philip grabbed Amy’s hand. “Don’t listen, Amy. It’s a trap!”
Amy squeezed back. “I still have to do it.” She faced the Lady. “The smart way.”
The Lady bowed her gray head. “I will escort you to the hangar and transfer you to the sauro representatives myself.”
Chapter Sixteen
Fangs bared, Sunflower watched the platoon of sauro troopers in gleaming black armor march Amy into the docking tube that linked the hangar bay with their transport. After all hatches were sealed the bulbous, frog-like craft jetted away and quickly shrank to an emerald dot on the display screens.
The orange tabby sprinted through the corridors of the hangar bay and out to the streets of Junktown, at last arriving panting and out of breath at his apartment. He dug into piles of neckties on the floor and raced around the room, flinging combs and brushes behind him.
“Where is it? Can’t find anything when you need to … a-ha!”
Sunflower pulled a black box about the size of a pack of playing cards out of the mess and shoved the silver disc the Lady had given him into a slot on the side. A speaker on the flat side crackled and a female voice began to speak.
“Stardate eleven-thirty-three point seven one. Personal journal of Operator AN015, Andy Nakamura. The Lady has given me another sealed order for the same prop on Old Earth. What’s so special about a gold video game console from 1995? I’ve already brought back twelve of the useless things. Why would the sauros want any in the first place? Had a physical check and Thor calibration this morning. Some slight frequency variations in the Thor beacon, but the medic said it won’t cause any problems. Wish I could tell Sunnie about it, but everything’s top secret and hush-hush. Andy signing off.”
Sunflower sighed and rested his head on his paws.
Twelve hours later, after quite a bit of waiting in the waiting room and very little torture in the torture room
The penal station turned slowly in the vast emptiness of space like a wagon wheel tossed into the night sky by a lonely cowboy. Constructed in high orbit around Kepler Prime and designed to hold the most dangerous criminals in the galaxy, the fact that Kepler Prime no lon
ger existed to be in orbit around caused quite a commotion among the sauro staff. However, the administration of the “High-security Anti-recidivist Long-term Penitentiary” were less concerned about the lack of a home planet than lack of quality, lizard-friendly television programming. At last the commander of H.A.L.P. ordered the staff to “stop whining about gravity and rogue moons and crap” and promptly went back to sleep. He’d had quite an exhausting morning filling out the forms on the new prisoner. She was apparently the mastermind behind the disappearance of Kepler Prime, but the commander couldn’t believe such a pale and unimpressive human female––one that lacked armor or natural weapons of any kind––could steal a newspaper, much less a planet.
A thousand kilometers from the station a strange craft approached, its wide metal branches shining in the light of Kepler 22 like a silver tree. A dozen black knobby globes––each about the size of an Old Earth trash can––hung from the titanium branches. A long silver spear formed a central axis for the supports, had a small cockpit at the tip, and a cluster of powerful intersystem engines at the rear. A pair of large winged craft were attached to the silver trunk directly above the engines. The craft were ten meters wide and flat, like interstellar manta rays the color of asphalt.
Sunflower’s voice crackled over the inter-ship radio. “Red and Blue Squadrons, prepare for detach. Mother One, detach.”
“Copy, Red Leader,” said a perky female voice.
The black spheres separated from the long stalks of their moorings, followed by the gray manta bombers. The tree-like carrier reduced speed and curved back the way it had come, while the fighters hurtled forward through space like a swarm of buckshot.
Inside the lead fighter, faint crimson light reflected on the glassy surface of Sunflower’s helmet as he stared at the spinning wheel of the prison. The orange cat bared his teeth inside the pressure suit as he thought of the horrible tortures Amy was almost definitely experiencing at the hands of those degenerate sauros.
The tiny fighters were designed for short-range defense, not assault, necessitating the use of a transport for anything over a few thousand kilometers. The latest in military design from Tau Ceti, the ball-shaped fighters had thrusters mounted at sixteen different points around the fuselage, allowing it to instantly change direction. A cocoon of anti-accelerant gel surrounded the cat pilot, who operated the fighter by sticking his paws into control pits on either side of the main display. The minuscule radar profile of these tiny and nimble craft made a swarm deadly for even a sauro cruiser.
“Target in sight at Zebra 15,” Sunflower whispered into the comm. “Red Two and Red Three, take the CAP at Zebra three zero zero. Two sauro bandits on my screen.”
“Copy, Red Leader.”
No wind resistance or sound traveled in the vast emptiness of space. The only frame of reference for speed––apart from the digital numbers on the readouts––was the slowly increasing size of the space station on Sunflower’s display. The anti-radar coating on the fuselage of the twelve fighters and the fact that they were almost completely powered down––having used the inertia of the fighter carrier to continue forward––meant that they could approach the station undetected.
Sunflower hummed a tune to himself as he watched the closing distance spin down on the digital readout.
I come in last night about half past ten
That baby of mine wouldn’t let me in
So move it on over. Rock it on over
Move over little cat, a mean old cat is movin’ in.
Betsy’s voice crackled over the inter-ship radio.
“Red Leader, your mike is open. Also, you got the words wrong.”
“Shut your trap, Blue Two,” hissed Sunflower. “Keep that bomber on target.”
“Okay, okay! Don’t be so mean.”
Sunflower wished he could scratch his nose. That was the worst thing about a pressure suit.
The wheel of the station grew larger and larger in the display. When the closing distance dropped below one hundred kilometers, Sunflower touched the mike button with his chin.
“Red Squadron, charge reactor and power on. I’m marking the target on my display. Red Two and Three head for vector zebra-niner, guns free. Repeat, guns free.”
Radioactive energy spurted from two of the black spheres and they darted below the pack to intercept a pair of arrow-shaped sauro fighters. The rest of the spheres and the two gray bombers continued toward the silently turning wheel of the station.
“Red squadron, retro burn,” murmured Sunflower as the station filled his screen. “Alpha Wing follow me. Bravo take the far section. Blue team, start your op.”
Bright jets flashed at the front of the black spheres as they slowed and matched the rotational speed of the station. The fighters separated into two teams thirty meters apart and arranged themselves around the tubular fuselage. A clawed silver arm emerged from the knobby front of each fighter and snapped into the metal like a hungry alligator.
“Red Four has contact,” crackled the inter-ship radio.
Sunflower nodded at the stream of radio chatter.
“Start cutting,” he ordered.
He toggled a switch inside the control pit and the viewscreen automatically darkened as a brilliant aquamarine laser began to burn through the skin of the station along a pre-programmed line. On either side of the tubular section the ten fighters followed his example, cutting through the curved steel of the fuselage like blades through cooked macaroni. The blue lasers were normally for anti-missile point defense, but cat engineers had modified the powerful equipment for close-range work after a few hours of tinkering.
Sunflower’s fighter rocked from a series of vibrations. He twisted his arm and deployed another claw for stability as the laser at the front of his fighter continued to burn a black line through the skin of the station. Both teams of fighters had almost finished the work of cutting through the left and right sides of the thirty-meter-long tube.
The inter-ship comm crackled with a female voice. “Red Leader, this is Red Three. Bandits are down, repeat bandits are down. Red Two is disabled, not responding.”
Sunflower touched the talk button with his chin. “Red Three, grab Red Two and exfil to Mother One.”
“Copy.”
The station shuddered as the gray manta bombers settled onto the center of the curved section, one to each side, and fired spiked landing gear into the metal.
“Red Leader, Blue One is attached.”
“Me, too!” crackled Betsy’s voice.
Sunflower winced. “Turn your volume down, Blue Two.”
The control panel beeped and the laser on Sunflower’s fighter shut off automatically. He double-checked the readings and clicked his talk button.
“Structural integrity zero percent,” he said. “Blue One and Two, you are go for departure. Repeat, go for departure. Red Squadron, dig in those claws and hang on!”
White streams of radioactive energy poured from the large engines at the rear of the manta bombers. The curved section that the bombers and fighters were hanging on to ripped away from the space station in a spray of gas and plastic and insulation, and accelerated away rapidly from the giant wheel.
Complete darkness covered Amy, but she could feel irregular vibrations and hear strange creaks and popping sounds from outside her prison cell. She tried to push away and stand up, but a strange and powerful force kept her pinned to the wall.
“Is this some kind of stupid trick?” she yelled. “I don’t know what happened to your planet, you big, ugly crocodile!”
No response came. After a few minutes, Amy wondered if this truly was another strange torture or if something had happened to the space station. Were those lizards just going to leave her to die while the station broke apart? Was it a simulation of a slightly disconcerting ride at a theme park, intended to make her spill the beans? Maybe sauros were afraid of the dark. Or roller coasters.
The force pinning her to the wall gradually softened and Amy floated wei
ghtless into the center of the prison cell.
“Hello? Anybody there?”
Lucia had always said the only thing doctors couldn’t replace was your brain, so Amy kept her arms up in case the gravity came back and she was upside down. She bounced gently from wall to wall, gradually feeling numb, cold, and sleepy.
After a series of loud bumps and clanks, a moderate gravity returned. Amy slid to the concave floor of the cell, blinking drowsily with her arms over her face. She didn’t stir when the door broke open and lights waved into the cell, nor when a pair of cats in white spacesuits and bubble helmets expertly wrapped a rope under her shoulders and pulled her rapidly along the corridor toward a blinding white light.
“Not the light,” Amy murmured and closed her eyes. “Not … die … in space.”
She heard a door click and a warm breeze that smelled of new plastic and rubber tossed her hair. Something hard covered Amy’s mouth and nose and she inhaled cold, dry oxygen.
Amy opened her eyes and saw a black cat in a space helmet. Above the cat spread the segmented white ceiling of a small compartment.
“Where am I?”
The cat reached up with thick gloves and twisted his helmet ninety degrees. He pulled off the helmet and blinked yellow eyes at Amy.
“You’re on the Dream Tiger, Miss Armstrong.”
Amy groaned and tried to sit up, but the cat’s gloved paw held her down.
“Please wait for a moment, Miss Armstrong. The atmospheric adjustment needs a moment.”
Amy looked around the small compartment. From the warning diagrams and cat-sized spacesuits hanging on the walls, she guessed it was an airlock. The other spacesuited cat in the room was a gray tabby, but neither he nor the black cat were very talkative as they took turns unzipping each other and pulling off sections of the white spacesuits. When the gray tabby pulled the gloves from the black cat’s suit, Amy saw skeletal metal hands wrapped around the cat’s paws, like a bracelet with long fingers.
“Looks like she’s never seen a manos before,” whispered the gray cat, his blue eyes on Amy.
The black cat chuckled. “She’s from Old Earth, poona brain.”
The Girl Who Stole A Planet (Amy Armstrong Book 1) Page 23