The presence of a smaller, space-worthy vessel in the mothership’s bay was a real boon. The carriers in the bay were not capable of space travel, so were useless for their needs.
“So, the real question remains,” Titan summed up the crux of the conversation, “can we program it to work?”
Gee straightened in his seat and bobbed his head.
“With a ninety-eight percent probability of success.”
* * *
“Gee, are we close enough?” Titan asked. The engineer consulted a readout on the console and nodded. “Okay, then. Halt the ship’s progress. Ceeray, send the message to the Minith.”
Titan felt the aliens had reached the end of what little patience they still had. The incoming messages from the alien War Council were arriving with increasing regularity as they approached the planet. The last one announced the impending arrival of a contingent of Minith fighter craft and demanded the immediate halt of the mothership.
Ceeray keyed in the message they had worked up days before and sent it. It informed the Minith that there were problems with the communications system, but everything was fine. It also alerted the aliens that Commander Brun, the former commander of the Minith forces on Earth, would be boarding his personal vessel within minutes for a final approach to the planet.
Without waiting for a response, Titan sent Derk a message over the ship’s internal comm system. Titan, Gee, and Ceeray all watched the video feed as the interpreter went about his task. It took him less than two minutes to prep the small ship and exit the bay. A few seconds later, he gave a wave to a video feed from the adjoining corridor, indicating that the passage to the bay was secured.
“Send it on its way, Gee,” Titan ordered.
“Here goes,” the engineer replied as he pushed several buttons.
Three pairs of eyes were glued to the video feed coming from the launch bay.
The seconds crawled by.
The gap between the bay’s top door and bottom door grew from a thin crease into a smile, then into a gaping yawn as the doors opened fully to the vacuum of space.
A moment later, the ship carrying the Minith bomb lifted off and exited the mothership. As one, the group released their breath and looked at each other.
“Well, let’s hope we can avoid your two percent margin of error, Gee,” Titan remarked.
* * *
Vantgo slapped the lone button on the gray metal console and growled at the incoming barge.
“Proceed to the right.”
A single tone of acknowledgment was returned by the barge. It veered to the right and lumbered away. Where it was headed was anyone’s guess. Vantgo did not care where it went as long as it followed his instructions.
“A ten-year-old pre-recruit could do this job,” he hissed and pounded the console again.
His request to transfer from the Minith home world to the secondary planet of Waa had been denied, and Xrla was not pleased. As every Minith knew, when the female was not pleased, the male was not pleased.
Xrla had not been pleased for some time.
The looks of disapproval that had once motivated him to work harder and strive for higher positions had stopped long ago. They had been replaced by blistering, verbal assaults against his competence as a male. She blamed her lack of status on his lack of aggressiveness toward peers and superiors. He suspected she was courting other males and wondered when he would be tossed aside for a more suitable partner.
He slapped the button harder this time.
“Proceed left!” he shouted into the communication unit. The incoming troop transporter ship sent the obligatory blip and proceeded left.
He acknowledged Xrla’s right to push him toward advancement—and to seek another mate if he could not meet her expectations—but acceptance of her prerogative did not dampen the rage he felt, a rage fueled by the suspicion that she was correct.
As a race, the Minith were experiencing an unprecedented period of growth. They had captured and enslaved more than a dozen worlds over the past thirty years and had established trading agreements with a half dozen others. The raw materials and wealth they took from their conquests were used to fuel the Minith expansion to other worlds. What they could not use themselves, they traded or sold to other, lesser worlds. Worlds they had not yet conquered.
Vantgo knew that his inability to improve his standing and position was unacceptable. He and Xrla were being left behind as more capable males seized the best housing, won the best positions, obtained prized relocations to less-populated worlds—worlds where opportunities were even greater.
Vantgo’s new posting was the final act that tipped the scales against him. He, Xrla, and every other Minith above the age of eight knew this job was given to the lowest dregs of workers. It was awarded to those who could not fight, who showed no promise as a leader, who displayed no ability to trade, sell, or administer.
He was an Incoming Ship Director.
Vessels carrying cargo were sent to the right. All others were sent to the left. The senior Ship Directors took over down the line, passing the vessels along the system until each reached its destination. The responsibilities of those males were no greater than his—most still just provided “proceed left” or “proceed right” instructions—but the Incoming Ship Director was the low male in the pecking order.
The console squawked to alert Vantgo that another ship was approaching. He scanned the data that showed up on his console and saw that the personal travel carrier belonged to a senior general in the Minith Command, General Brun.
Vantgo slapped the communication unit, but restrained himself from shouting at this vessel. Even he was not so incompetent as to shout at a Minith general.
“Proceed left.”
He switched off the communication unit and revised his previous assertion. “A five-year-old could do this job.”
Vantgo waited for the required blip.
It did not come.
He peered out the thick glass window that looked over the pad where incoming vessels entered the Minith system. The small personal craft hovered above the pad, not moving. He slapped the button again.
“Proceed left!”
Seconds ticked by with no acknowledgment tone. No movement. He growled.
How does someone rise to the rank of general when they cannot even follow simple instructions?
A small flash appeared from within the vessel, and Vantgo stared intently at the craft. He noticed that no one was at the controls. That was odd.
He was deciding on his next step when the flash grew into an explosion.
* * *
Even from four million kilometers, a distance roughly ten times that of the moon from Earth, it was clear that the deadly device had done the job it was built to perform.
The external video feed of the planet showed the four what they hoped to see. They sat in stunned silence for several minutes.
The silence was shattered as a thunderous–CRACK!—exploded across the room, followed by a vicious shaking sensation as a shudder passed through the ship.
When the shudder ceased, Titan found himself on the floor of the command center.
“What was that?”
“Um. We’ve got a problem here.” Gee’s voice sliced through the confusion a moment before a second, equally brutal, explosion ran through the mothership.
Chapter 17
“We’re stranded here?” Ceeray asked.
“No. I did not say that,” Gee replied patiently. He held an ice pack to the side of his head. The bleeding had slowed, then finally stopped, but the dull throb remained. “What I said is that we cannot make it back to Earth.”
“So, tell us, Gee. What’s the difference?” Titan came through the attack by the Minith fighters with minor bruises. Ceeray was unhurt. Of the four, Derk took the most punishment—a broken arm and a sprained knee.
But the mothership suffered the worst damage. The alien craft had been hit hard by the smaller, weapons-bearing craft. The half-dozen vessel
s had made two successful passes on the larger ship before Gee could engage the interstellar drive. The damage was severe. So severe that Gee was uncertain they could make it back to Earth. Besides sustaining multiple breaches of the outer hull, the support systems that manufactured water and re-circulated the oxygen supply had been damaged.
The ship had automatically sealed those areas of the damaged hull. Unfortunately, Gee did not know if the seals would hold for the months of travel required to reach Earth. The other systems could be repaired with time. Perhaps the seals could be repaired too. The problem was that he did not know, and he was unwilling to risk their lives on a coin toss.
“The difference is that we may be able to reach any one of a dozen planets that are closer than Earth.”
“Other planets?”
“Yes, Derk,” Gee confirmed. “Other planets. According to the ship’s data files, there are two or three within a few days’ travel. We should be able to make any of those with little risk. Anything further, and…” The engineer shrugged.
The message was clear. They had to decide quickly, and choices were limited.
“Do the files indicate which might be best?” Titan asked. “I don’t know much about other planets, but I’m guessing they can’t all be habitable, can they?”
Gee consulted the data files and replied, “Of the three closest planets, two appear the best suited for us. Fortunately, it looks like the Minith only take over planets with atmospheres that are compatible with their biology. And fortunately, believe it or not, our biology appears to be compatible with theirs.”
“Um . . .” Ceeray raised her hand and caught Gee’s attention. “Are you saying there are going to be Minith on whatever planet we choose?”
Gee swallowed, then nodded.
“Apparently so.”
* * *
Titan studied the data for all three planets. Based on the information contained in the ship’s databanks, he settled on one. It was the third choice from Gee’s list, but it had a distinct advantage over the other two. The number of Minith posted to the planet was substantially fewer.
“Telgora, here we come.”
Gee was less than pleased when Titan informed him of their destination.
“Telgora? Seriously, Titan, did you even read the data on that dreadful place?” Gee dropped the foreign-looking tool he was using on the piece of alien machinery and turned to face the larger man.
“Yes, Gee. I did.” Titan was calm and prepared. He knew Gee would not be keen on the idea of Telgora, but it was the only one of the three planets that made sense. “There are too many Minith on the other planets. Plus, this one has an actively resistant population. They fight the Minith there, Gee.”
“And did it never occur to you to wonder why there are fewer Minith there if the population actively resists their presence?”
Titan bit off his reply. Gee had a very good point. He had not questioned that. Why would the aliens post fewer soldiers on a world where the population was actively resisting their presence?
“They have fewer overseers on Telgora because there is very little of the planet that is habitable,” Gee continued before Titan could acknowledge his oversight. “Less livable land means fewer inhabitants to enslave.”
“But that could be a good thing,” Titan countered. “It doesn’t matter why there are fewer Minith. The fact that there are fewer is still in our favor.”
“Perhaps,” Gee conceded. “But the planet itself might kill us before the Minith get a chance. Although the gravity is approximately the same as on Earth, Telgora is roughly a third its size—but that’s not the problem. The planet rests on a ninety-degree axis. That means it rolls around the sun like a ball. One side is always facing the sun; the other is always pointed away from it.”
“And?” Titan did not see a problem.
“That means there is a very narrow band of land along the equator that can sustain life, and the life that is there has evolved under some of the harshest conditions possible. Did you study the data the Minith have on the Telgorans?”
Titan felt like a child. It was apparent that Gee had studied the possibilities in much more detail than he had.
“No, I did not.”
“They are an intelligent race. They are also very strong, tenacious, and dangerous. They also appear to hate the Minith with every fiber of their beings. Can you imagine how they will react to us when we land in a Minith mothership?”
“Gee, there’s no indication that they’ve ever seen a mothership. The Minith don’t arrive in anything but the smaller carriers like the one we sent to their home planet.”
“Is that true?”
It was Titan’s turn to tutor the engineer. It felt good to be on the other side.
“Yes. The Minith have a limited number of motherships.” Gee nodded in affirmation. “Which means they cannot place one on every planet they hold. Telgora is one of those planets without one, but that doesn’t mean we can land among the Telgorans and walk off the ship as if we belong. We have to be careful.”
“Titan, that is an understatement. How will we be any more successful with the Telgorans than the Minith have been?”
“We have three things the Minith don’t have.” Titan raised a finger. “One, we have no desire to take anything from the local population.”
He raised a second finger.
“Two, we have two interpreters capable of learning the Telgoran language, which is contained in the ship’s data files. I checked. That gives us the ability to communicate with them right away.”
He raised a third finger.
“And three, we have the same hatred for the Minith that they do.”
Gee nodded his head slowly. His eyebrows creased and he started to chew his thumbnail. Titan recognized the motion and waited for Gee to complete his thought process. It didn’t take long.
“We have one other thing, Titan.”
“Yes?”
“We have video of the Minith planet disintegrating.”
Chapter 18
The next few days were a rush.
Derk and Ceeray spent most of their time on the training table in the Zone—the room used for interrogations and for implanting knowledge. It was the room where they were originally taught the Minith language.
Similar to the education-transference devices used on Earth, the education systems used within the Zone increased learning speed exponentially. The key difference was that the learning provided within the Zone came at a price.
Pain.
Intense pain.
Gee surmised that the Zone’s systems were not specifically designed for human brains. Ceeray and Derk persisted through the pain and, by the end of the second day, both had a solid grasp of the Telgoran language. To Titan and Gee, who listened to the interpreters practice their new skills, Telgoran communication consisted of incomprehensible grunts, nasal wheezes, and intricate hand motions.
The combination was so intriguing to Titan he took a few turns in the Zone. He had a higher tolerance for pain than Ceeray and Derk, so spent longer on the learning table at each turn. Unfortunately, his inexperience with foreign languages held him back and he picked up only the most basic skills. When Derk and Ceeray practiced, he could follow their words and understand the conversations, but joining in was beyond his ability. By the time he caught up to what they were saying, the discussion thread had moved on to something new.
As far behind the others as Titan was, none of the three could be considered fluent. According to Ceeray, the most intricate details of the language, those key phrases and nuances of speech that would allow them to speak as natives, could only be learned once on the ground and immersed with native speakers. Hopefully, their basic understanding would be sufficient to gain them that additional learning opportunity.
Gee declined to submit to the pain. He elected to rely on the interpreters when it became necessary. Instead, he—and Titan, when he was available—studied the ship’s files for data on the native population.
They also looked for clues that might point them to the ideal landing spot. They needed a location far away from the Minith, but close enough to a Telgoran population to allow contact.
Titan reminded Gee of the combustion forces generated during takeoff and landing, so they focused on landing sites that were no closer than ten kilometers to known Telgoran communities. That turned out to be a fairly simple task. Because of the slim band of habitable area on the planet, all Telgoran population centers were within two kilometers of the equator, and all of them lay on the side that faced away from the sun. Titan referred to it as “the cold, dark side.” Similarly, the sun-facing side of the planet was the “hot, bright side.”
While those descriptions were accurate, Gee’s fastidious mind craved more precise descriptions. For lack of a better term, and because the Minith data did not specify, Gee referred to the cooler side of the planet as the northern hemisphere. The sun-facing side was dubbed the southern.
After some discussion, they decided to locate a landing site in the northern hemisphere.
* * *
“Amazing. The Minith don’t use the Telgorans for slave labor,” Gee announced. “It looks like their mining operations are all robotic.”
“Makes sense,” Titan answered. “It’s more difficult to enslave a race that is willing and able to fight back. Did you see the data on the Telgoran fighting capabilities?”
The two men sat next to each other, eyes glued to separate, but identical, consoles. Each studied data on the planet and its current inhabitants—both native and invasive. For the past twenty-four hours, they had rarely moved from those spots except to eat, sleep, and take care of bodily functions.
“Yes.” Gee sighed. “Though I have to admit, I don’t understand much of it.”
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