Battle for the Earth

by John P. Gledhill

  The view from Tukie’s front window was mesmerising and very relaxing. Tukie was taking full advantage of this as he relaxed back into his comfortable pilot’s chair, watching the stars slowly rotate past the horizon on his soul mate, the boulder.

  Nine days had now passed after his inventive escape from the Annunaki. Had it all been for nothing?

  Two of those days had been in hyper-drive, and the rest of the time just drifting with a huge boulder in tow. Round and round they tumbled together, like some kind of crazy waltz, making their way through space. The idea had even occurred to Tukie that his boulder could serve as his headstone.

  I wonder what inscription should be put on it, he thought?

  Several other ideas had already occurred to Tukie, but the one he liked best said it all.

  Here lies Tukie the Dropas who gave his life in friendship with mankind to benefit Dropas and mankind alike. He reached for the stars and the stars took him. Rest in peace.

  All of a sudden a flash to the left-hand side of the craft made Tukie spin round. His first thought was that an Annunaki assault craft had followed him. He knew what he would have to do, he must not be taken alive. He had far too much information for that.

  **

  14

  As Lee came out of hyper-drive, he could see a large boulder on his right-hand side. It almost looked like it had a squashed shuttle craft on its surface, an odd sight at the best of times, he thought.

  Lee banked sharply and pulled alongside the shuttle’s observation window. To his delight he saw a very relieved, if not embarrassed, Tukie waving at him. Fortunately as Lee’s shuttle craft banked, Tukie instantly recognised it as Dropas and had gone to the observation window to watch.

  Lee turned his shuttle round and applied his tractor beam to Tukie’s shuttle. Slowly he tugged the battered shuttle away from the boulder and repositioned it in a parallel course next to him. He wasn’t sure if Tukie’s shuttle would stand a few seconds in hyper-drive, and because Tukie had no communicators that worked, he used sign language to communicate his concerns.

  Tukie responded that they at least had to try. Before Lee took the chance, he contacted Jumouk to ask his advice and to pass on the good news. Everyone was delighted, especially Konoco. Jumouk agreed with Lee that the chance was worth taking, and wished them both luck.

  Lee sat back in his seat and waved over to Tukie, they both smiled and Lee engaged the hyper-drive. Seconds later both craft dropped out of hyper-drive and Lee gave a concerned look in Tukie’s direction. Tukie was fine, and waved back at Lee. Lee towed Tukie’s craft down to the Blue Star Base on the lunar surface and both of them went off to get debriefed.

  **

  Jumouk carried out the debriefing himself and it soon became clear how big a task they were going to face.

  ‘Ten battle cruisers, you say?’ he said, looking concerned. ‘Are you quite sure, Tukie?’

  ‘Definitely,’ replied Tukie. ‘Remember three of them ran me down, and they have got a lot more besides.’

  Jumouk started to pace the floor of the room.

  ‘I didn’t expect that many, that’s two and a half to one. Any ideas, Lee?’

  Lee looked at Jumouk. He knew the awesome power of a battle cruiser, and thought to himself, for the Annunaki to have six more than us is a huge advantage for them, and a major disadvantage for us, no matter how well we have prepared.

  The room fell into a deathly hush. Then Lee stood up suddenly and started to pace up and down the room. Thinking out loud he said:

  ‘We can’t attack them when they come out of hyperdrive. That would spoil all the preparations on Earth. But what if they left hyper-drive, and thought they were encountering some natural disaster?’

  Jumouk looked encouraged, and asked Lee to carry on.

  ‘Perhaps a meteor shower? Or something similar?’

  ‘Good,’ said Jumouk. ‘Let’s get some ideas on the table.’

  The idea was simple.

  Place objects of sufficient density and mass in the flight path of the Annunaki fleet, so when they drop out of hyperdrive, as much damage as possible is done to the fleet. The objects would be natural in origin, and with luck the Annunaki would put this down to meteor strike and extreme misfortune. The proximity detectors on the Annunaki fleet would be useless, as the craft travels faster in hyper-drive than the detectors signal. It would be a bit like putting your hand out a car window at 70mph and feeling it getting blown backwards. Mapping technology had to be used in hyper-drive, not unlike a high-tech shipping lane.

  **

  Jupiter’s moon Callisto was selected by the Dropas scientists, and the Dropas miners set to work.

  Time was now very short, but the miners were very determined. Large pieces of Callisto were mined and transported into the Annunaki orbital approach, then finally Callisto was blown up strategically, and the larger debris was towed and placed at calculated points where the Annunaki would drop out of hyper-drive.

  **

  Five days had now passed, it was now December 16. Konoco and Lee were checking the mapping of the approach to Earth.

  ‘It looks good, very good,’ Lee commented. ‘That should do a bit of damage when they drop out of hyper-drive. With a bit of luck we might get one or two of their cruisers.’

  Konoco nodded in agreement and said:

  ‘Lee, that was a brilliant plan you had, let’s just hope it works as well as we hope.’

  Lee smiled.

  ‘I think under the circumstances we’ve all done brilliantly.’

  Everything was now in place awaiting the imminent arrival of the Annunaki fleet, and Earth was in the hands of its destiny.

  **

  15

  December 20, 2020, 23.15 GMT. Jumouk, Konoco and Lee were in a shuttle craft standing off Earth, in orbit at around 600 miles. They were watching the Annunaki globes orbiting the Earth. Just forty-five short minutes to go and it was game on.

  Terry was back on Earth. Everything had been done to ensure minimal damage from the EMP charge. He couldn’t help thinking to himself, ‘Bring it on.’

  There had been so much anticipation of this moment it had been a physical drain on everybody.

  **

  Midnight arrived, and sure enough the twelve globes detonated in unison and delivered their devastating pulse. The bright flashes could be seen in the night sky, a few seconds of intense light, dazzling to watch and quite spectacular in their own way.

  Ten minutes later the viral orbs released their payload to allow the dust of death to slowly filter into our atmosphere.

  Unfortunately for the Annunaki plan, Dropas engineers had surrounded each of the viral orbs in a protective skin, stopping the deadly payload from being dispersed into our atmosphere.

  The deadly dust now trapped within their new containment package could be safely collected by a few assault craft, and the twelve packages taken deep into space and destroyed safely by members of the newly formed Tactical Android Group.

  This had been the plan from day one, but had been a closely guarded secret. The introduction of the flu virus back in 2009 had just been a back-up in case one of the orbs or protective skins should leak.

  Lee engaged the drive on the shuttle and flew it into the upper part of Earth’s atmosphere. As he did so they could see one of the protective skins being picked up in a tractor beam from an assault craft, ready to be taken out into deep space.

  As far as the Annunaki were concerned everything would be going to plan. Lee circumvented Earth at high speed, scanning for traces of virus as he went.

  After six sweeps of Earth’s atmosphere, Earth was given a clean bill of health. They all breathed a quiet sigh of relief and returned to Blue Star Base.

  **

  Back on the moon base, Marie was waiting for Lee, and as he came into the control room she smiled, a radiant smile with warmth and genuine affection. This had, after all, been one of the trickiest parts of the plan so
far. One wrong move and the whole plan could have been exposed, or God forbid, everyone exposed to a lethal virus.

  Lee smiled back and said:

  ‘Job well done, Marie. Have you heard anything from Thourus yet regarding the disposal of the virus?’

  Marie nodded.

  ‘Yep, just finished talking to him. All the virus has been destroyed by his Androids. You could say the mission was a total success.’

  Lee sat down at one of the consoles and let out another sigh of relief. He looked tired. It had been another long night, but again Marie came to the rescue with a steaming hot cup of green tea. Lee looked bemused as he took the tea from Marie.

  ‘I don’t deserve you, do I, Marie?’ he said with a weary smile.

  Marie just smiled, this time a smile of satisfaction.

  Next morning Terry was up bright and early, another two runs had been completed to check for any viral contamination and a complete systems check had been run to check for damage from the EMP discharge. All the checks had come up green, and Earth was good to go.

  **

  16

  Standing on the bridge of his flagship Nephilimis, Tannacha looked mighty pleased with himself. Yes, he had suffered losses, but not due to direct action. The date was now December 28 and everything had more or less gone to plan so far, except of course the unfortunate meteor incident. Still, that was all behind them now.

  The plan was to take the eastern seaboard of the United States of America first, establish a main base there and then pick off the continents of Earth one by one. Tannacha barked out the command for the routing to begin and a squadron of fifty assault craft sped out of the landing bay on board the Nephilimis. This was of course Tannacha’s personal guard, the elite of the fleet.

  The squadron streaked up the eastern coast of America heading directly for New York. Anything in their path that moved, was annihilated. The lead assault vessel piloted by a particularly vicious Annunaki called Verton, was just arriving over Charlotte, North Carolina, when he began to break left slightly with a group of five other craft, to head directly for Washington DC and the White House. The rest of the squadron would carry on to New York.

  **

  Verton had slowed the speed of his six craft down to a minimum and looked downward to his left. They had just entered Virginia, and he could make out the Mill Mountain Star just ahead of him. With a wry smile on his face he disengaged the auto-targeting system on his console and, selecting the landmark manually, loosed a volley of weapon fire on it.

  The Star imploded violently, then erupted into atoms. Verton rolled his craft in a sick victory roll then sped on northward towards his chosen target, the White House. Back on board Nephilimis, Tannacha gave the command for a troop transport to be dispatched to New York, and a second troop transport to go to Washington DC. Both transports were to have an escort of six assault craft, which would allow ground bases to be set up and a foothold be gained.

  **

  Verton was just passing over Bailey’s Crossroads, Fairfax County, Virginia, normal population around thirty thousand, just another wholesome American town. Flying in diamond formation, the six Annunaki craft were preparing their targeting systems for an all-out blitz on the White House, and central Washington. Suddenly and without any warning at all, the craft to Verton’s left erupted in a flash of white hot alloy and disintegrated in front of his eyes. Unwittingly, Verton had just flown his wing of six Annunaki assault craft directly over Earth Central.

  Deep beneath the suburban streets of Bailey’s Crossroads, Terry had been watching Verton’s approach and had timed his strike precisely, ordering the two pods to fire at the most opportune second, and with devastating effect. The defence of Earth had begun.

  Verton spun his craft into a vertical dive, flipping it over at the same time to allow him to see where he had just come from. The formation had fractured and two more of the Annunaki assault craft were in real trouble from the pods. Verton watched in disbelief as the two craft disintegrated before him. He still couldn’t see clearly where the ground fire was coming from. He barked commands to the two remaining craft to follow him. Abruptly and at high speed he shot upwards.

  Terry ordered five of the camouflaged ESG assault ships to take up the pursuit, Appearing from nowhere, the ESG vessels sped after the Annunaki craft. Their advanced targeting systems scouring the skies for a lock on the Annunaki targets. A volley of pulse weapons spat out from the first two ESG ships and found their target, a trailing Annunaki craft. The craft spun from the violent explosions on its hull and tore into three pieces, in an inferno of white-hot fire.

  The two remaining Annunaki vessels powered their engines to full, and rocketed off to join the safety of the squadron heading to New York. As Verton approached the squadron heading for New York he could tell all was not well. They were just over East Freehold, Monmouth County, New Jersey, and had run into another two of the Dropas pods.

  Fifteen of the Annunaki craft had already succumbed to the devastating fire power of the pods, and the other twenty-nine craft were in a desperate struggle for survival. The element of surprise had been well worth all the secrecy and given the Dropas and mankind a huge psychological advantage.

  Verton immediately gave the command for all the Annunaki craft to withdraw. He was still physically stunned from what had just happened.

  The Annunaki ships sped eastward and down into the depths of the Atlantic ocean, two hundred miles offshore, and on the sea bed Verton took stock.

  **

  On the west coast of America, the calm, shallow waters of San Francisco Bay, just east of Point Blunt Rock, erupted as eighteen Dropas assault ships, piloted by the Tactical Android Group, or TAG, blasted from the waters in a perfect wing-shaped formation.

  The leader of this group was Balac, Thourus’s right-hand man, so to speak. Thourus had ordered Balac to take the group, three assault wings, eighteen assault vessels in all, and intercept the Annunaki troop transports before they could reach their destinations. Balac spotted the first of the troop transports and its escort. Without hesitation and ignoring the escort vessels, he and the rest of his group tore straight in, releasing a cataclysm of pulse weapons fire at the troop transport.

  The troop transports were fairly large, and could carry up to five thousand troops at a time. The two that had been sent to Earth were both full, so that ground bases could be established.

  Now the lead transport was taking direct fire from eighteen TAG assault ships. Inside the Annunaki troop transport confusion reigned. No one knew what was happening or who was attacking them.

  On the bridge the commander was desperately trying evasive manoeuvres, but nothing seemed to shake his attackers off, there was just too many of them.

  Balac watched the explosions rip through the troop transport, as it tried desperately to crash-land, so as to evacuate surviving troops to safety, but one of the Annunaki escort vessels had just taken a direct hit from a TAG craft and was spinning violently towards the bridge of the transport.

  The impact was tremendous. The explosion ripped right down the length of the troop transport and ruptured the on-board armoury. The troop transport’s nose rose up and its back broke in four places, then it exploded into a thousand flying fragments.

  The TAG had already broken off their attack and were now in the process of mopping up the escort craft.

  One by one the Annunaki assault vessels fell, some spectacularly and some in a flash and a puff of smoke, but all six fell with no Dropas casualties. Balac was as close to exhilaration as an Android could get. What a result! The wing re-formed, and proceeded to speed off to intercept the surviving troop transport.

  **

  17

  Tannacha stood on the bridge of his flagship. Proximity alarms were sounding everywhere, Annunaki officers were running backwards and forward trying to verify reports, and confusion had replaced the calm of a short hour ago, Tannacha spun round and shouted in his low growling to
ne, ‘Stop!’

  Everyone on the bridge came to an abrupt halt.

  ‘Will someone please tell me where these attack vessels have come from and who the hell is behind it?’

  ‘Dropas, sir, we think, but we’ve got no idea where they’re coming from.’

  ‘Find out, then get me our losses so far in this abomination. No excuses, recall everything till I find out what’s going on.’

  At that moment as Tannacha turned round, the Nephilimis banked hard to its right. Several juddering movements followed, the sound of weapons fire spoiled the quiet on the bridge, and smoke started to taint the air.