The Long Road to Gaia

by Timothy Ellis

  They hadn't mentioned the missile launcher, which would give them some bad moments, but for the rest, they certainly could do all that.

  I waited a good long moment, and surrendered, unlocking one of the external airlocks so the shuttle could dock. I stayed where I was, and waited for them to come to me.

  An officer type in a business suit entered the cockpit behind me, with two muscle types who pointed guns at me.

  One of them frisked me, and found I wasn’t armed.

  "Good," said the suit. "Stay docile and you get to live."

  "What do you want?" I asked.

  "Nothing much. This ship is going to be a decoy to lure someone we want out into the open. All you have to do is fly it back to the Bad Wolf system. When we have who we want, you can return back here to pick up your team."

  "It'll take too long. I'm expecting my team back in a few hours."

  "We arranged for them to be delayed. As it happens, they just dropped into the middle of a civil war. We made sure they would be warmly welcomed."

  I looked at him with a shocked look on my face. Twelve was laughing at my acting skills.

  "We're going to seal all the hatches except for the cockpit and the mess. You fly the ship, you can eat, and use the facilities off the mess. Coms will be destroyed so you can't contact anyone for help. There are Bounty Hunters in the Azgard system, who will hunt you down if you don’t appear there on time. Our own forces will be in the Midnight system waiting for you. You fly there as fast as this ship can go, we take our prize, and you fly back here in time to save your team. Got it?"

  "Got it."

  "Stay where you are until the shuttle undocks. Oh and by the way, we'll be leaving a few combat droids behind a few of the doors, just in case you get a case of the stupid's. The AI will get a set of instructions in case you decide to kill yourself."

  He paused and looked at me. I said nothing.

  "Good, behave yourself, and everyone lives."

  They left. One by one, the ship layout chart I threw up showed doors being sealed. There was no sign of combat droids though.

  At last, they left the ship. As soon as the shuttle was safely away, I turned Moose for the jump point, and set off at full speed.

  Behind me now, the fighter squadron had taken up picket duties, so no-one could fly between the planet and the jump point. The shuttle was heading back to the station.

  Twelve winked at me, and vanished.

  There was nothing in the Miami system to worry me, at least not until I neared the jump point to Midgard. Over by the planet, I saw an old Frigate begin to head to the Pompeii jump point. With no coms, I couldn't warn them.

  Twelve appeared, shook his head, and vanished again. I wasn’t allowed to warn them.

  There were Bounty Hunters in the Azgard system. I powered past them, and they ignored me.

  In Midnight I found an old Midway class Carrier. After I passed it, it launched squadron after squadron of fighters, and a single Gladiator.

  The AI played a recorded message for me.

  "Fly nice and steady for us, we need to make you look to be in serious trouble. If you change course or do anything hostile, you won't survive. Now and after the jump."

  I flew steady for them, and watched as all the fighters took a pass at Moose and her shields shredded. None of them went down completely, but they obviously wanted her looking shot up to any senses looking at the ship.

  I kept going, the Gladiator taking station a fixed length behind Moose.

  The jump was routine, and immediately Jon's Excalibur popped onto the nav map, too far away yet for him to engage the Gladiator.

  Suddenly, the Gladiator fired three missiles at Moose. Bugger it, I thought, and activated the Point Defense turrets. They picked off two of the missiles, but missed the third because of the delay turning the system back on. It impacted the rear shield, which went down.

  The ship vaporized around me, leaving Twelve and me standing invisibly in the middle of a dust cloud.

  "Nuke. You can't trust anyone these days, can you?" laughed Twelve.

  I hit him.

  I shifted myself to stand beside Jon, and found him blazing in an anger the like I’d never seen from him before. We jumped into Midnight, and straight into the fighters I knew were there.

  I didn’t need to do anything. Jon became a stone cold killer, dispatching ship after ship, until only the Carrier in the distance remained. At which point Jon proved to be not so much stone cold, by disappearing into the fresher and vomiting. I was actually glad of this. Events like this down the centuries had turned some people to the dark side. But vomiting usually signaled staying in the light.

  Jon's next action was to capture the Carrier.

  You could have knocked me over with a feather when the ship was his.

  One tickled me with one instead.

  "Good," she said. "Everything is proceeding according to plan.

  * * *

  I walked through the new Gunbus Corvette with Jon and Bob, and couldn’t fault the design at all.

  In as far as you can't hear a smile, I could hear One smiling.

  * * *

  Twelve and I watched Jon tear through a formation of one Corvette and twelve Gladiators. The last four surrendered.

  "I think he's ready," said Twelve, sporting a shiner.

  "Ready for what?"

  He tapped his nose and vanished before I could hit him again.

  * * *

  I watched as the little white kitten chose Jon. Just for once, I wished I could be corporeal just then, so I could pat the kittens and play with them.

  I sighed.

  The kitten glanced in my direction, and I froze. I wondered for a moment if she knew I was there, but it was a momentary look, and I dismissed the notion.

  There was something different about this litter. And it wasn’t just that I wanted to have one of them.

  "You will," said the voice of One. "Wait."

  * * *

  The full council sat in the lush green countryside of the Pure Land. We'd all watched the events in the Midgard and Pompeii systems, as Jon went through them like a tornado.

  "Congratulations Thirteen," said One. "Your training has paid off handsomely. The boy is gone. The warrior is emerging."

  I nodded to her, but wasn’t going to say anything.

  We kept watching.

  * * *

  The station assault had gone off without a hitch, under Jon's leadership.

  The warrior was now fully in control of him.

  But as we were celebrating, the Colonel caught our attention again. We went silent.

  "This won't work," said the Colonel, shaking her head.

  Everyone looked at her.

  "First you collect a Frigate. Then a Passenger Liner. You go head to head with a Cruiser, and instead of it blowing you away, you capture her single handed. And now you own a station? This won't work."

  "What won't work?" Jon asked.

  "Forget we ever talked to you about joining us. It won't work."

  Silence. Unhappy faces looked at her.

  Twelve looked sharply at One.

  "We're joining you!"

  The room went wild.

  Twelve looked embarrassed. It didn’t help that he was still showing signs of the shiner I’d given him.

  We all went wild as well, other than Twelve. One finally managed to get us to calm down.

  "It wasn’t his ability to command that was important to us. But his ability to lead, and more importantly, to be followed."

  She paused and looked at us all.

  "The leader we need is now among us. Now it really begins."

  It was not often we reveled in human form. Most of the others rarely took this form after all. But on this occasion, with One beaming a smile around for a change, we partied Human style.

  Three

  "Why did you do that?" I asked One.

  "Which that is this?"

  "Don’t you start. I hear Jon say it way t
oo often."

  "Yes."

  The grin was almost enough for me to want to wipe it off her face.

  "Why the nightmare of the station breaking up?"

  "Jon needed a reminder of caution. Things have gone his way too well, and he's ripe for making a mistake. I thought a small reminder of how fragile things are, might keep him focused. He has to do more than lead now. He has to keep people alive."

  "Using a dream?"

  "Dreams teach."

  "Fine, be enigmatic."

  Her grin became Cheshire.

  * * *

  "Bloody Hell," said Five, as Jon gave his crew his maniac grin. "You deliberately created this?"

  One and I laughed.

  A lot of Humans love what they call roller coaster rides. Very few of them could have kept their lunch down on the ride Gunbus had just given its crew on re-entering the Midgard system.

  "The boy has talent," said Nine. "Gotta give him that."

  Gunbus blasted its way through the missile barrage.

  "Guts too," said Four.

  "Yes," said One, "but look at the crew."

  "That man at the back is beyond shit-scared."

  "He didn’t choose to be there," I said.

  "Everyone else looks almost serene about it."

  "Exactly," said One. "They've accepted both his leadership, and his fighting skills. Which is what we need."

  "The two Americans?" I asked her, thinking I knew the answer.

  "Will take the experience back to their people, and start the process of accepting him there."

  I looked sharply at One.

  "Did you…"

  "Yes."

  I nodded to her.

  She'd whispered in the American Admiral's ear of the need to send observers with Jon. Thus ensuring they would be fed back the right information for future decisions to be based on.

  Sneaky!

  * * *

  Jon bolted upright in bed and fell off it completely, before crawling into the bathroom to throw up.

  "Was that really necessary?"

  "Giving him a dream of his station blowing up and his people dying?"

  "Yes."

  "I didn’t."

  "Who did?"

  "He did. His own fears manifested it."

  "So it's not going to happen?"

  "Of course not. At this point, if such a thing was going to happen, I’d be sending you in to stop it."

  "Ah."

  I looked around the glade. There were more than thirty of us here now, all watching a small group of Humans. I tried to think when this had happened last, but as far as I could remember, it was unheard of. Nothing had ever been this interesting to all of us at the same time before.

  I looked at One, and she nodded in another direction.

  I followed her gaze.

  My jaw fell open.

  * * *

  "Was that your doing?" I asked One.

  Jon had just been promoted to Captain.

  "None of it," she said. "The combat was all him, and the decision to offer him a commission in the ASF and promote him was purely theirs."

  I looked long and hard at her.

  She seemed sincere.

  It was hard to tell.

  * * *

  "Pilots, I give you, Jon 'Maniac' Hunter."

  I took one look at One's face, and started laughing at her.

  She hadn't seen that one coming.

  * * *

  One got everyone's attention.

  "Now that Jon is beyond Midgard, we can expect nothing much of interest to happen for a while. I suggest you all go back to what you normally do."

  No-one moved.

  I couldn’t help it, but started chuckling. My normal was at least, staying with Jon.

  One by one, everyone left. The historic occasion ended.

  One nodded to me, before she too left.

  I shifted myself to Gunbus, and continued watching from close up.

  Angel gave a quiet meow as I appeared, but no-one seemed to notice anything.

  * * *

  "Who'd have known?" said Jon. "I started out to rescue you guys with a Corvette and a Privateer, and I'm returning home with a station and a small fleet. With enough credits to refit every ship. Wonders will never cease."

  Amanda was suddenly serious.

  "Is this all for Prophesy?" she asked.

  "I don’t know. Could be. But one thing is for sure, as a Mercenary force, this team just became a whole new level of bad-arse to be reckoned with."

  Jon, the twins and George all high fived.

  Twelve had appeared next to me.

  "It’s a good question," I said to him. "Is this all for prophesy?"

  "Just the beginning," he replied. "Drop in the bucket."

  "What am I doing here Twelve? It looks like things are going as One wants them, and Jon seems to have a handle on things."

  Twelve laughed.

  "He may have a handle, but it's not attached to anything yet. You trained him well Thirteen. He's dealing because he can. But this won't last forever. You need to stick with him for when things become unglued again. And they will."

  "Swell."

  * * *

  "Ah, sirs," said Jon into a vid. "Apologies for appearing to be giving you orders. Suggestions, sirs, suggestions."

  He gave them a big grin, and closed the vid.

  One and Twelve had appeared to watch him giving orders to superiors. We were all grinning.

  "Is this what you wanted?" I asked One. "Someone who ignores the chain of command and just gives orders anyway?"

  "Exactly what I wanted."

  She and Twelve left me alone, and I watched Jon eat.

  Truth to tell, I was bored. Once the battles stopped happening, normal space travel didn’t have anything to keep me interested.

  To amuse myself after Jon left, I turned on Angel's cat ball, and she jumped on it. So I kept nudging it aside as she tried to jump on it. Eventually, she tired of missing it, looked in my direction, and meowed. She put her tail up straight, giving me a brown eye, and walked out.

  Twelve's chuckle could be heard without him needing to appear.

  I joined Jon on the Bridge, and slouched into a chair at the back unnoticed.

  * * *

  Jon threw a vid from Miriam to the side screen.

  The opening notes of 'You can leave your hat on' began, with Miriam standing in front of her pilot's chair, in full uniform, with cap on. She proceeded to do an incredibly erotic strip tease, in time to the song, ending with her saluting, stark naked, except for the cap.

  Jon went bright red.

  So did I. For the first time ever, I felt embarrassed. Which didn’t really make sense to me, considering I’d seen them bonking already. But I guess this was my first genuine strip tease, and, damnit, I was reacting like a Human again.

  Miriam was incredibly sexy though. She looked rather like a young Nicole De Boer, much like she was in the original Deep Space Nine. Only projecting a lot more authority and command presence.

  Odd. A strip tease with command presence. Strangely provocative.

  Far too Human!

  I sighed.

  * * *

  There was the sound of a heavy weapon firing and Jon was slammed backwards, landing heavily on his left side. He stood up. His hands went for guns that weren't there. He'd never expected to need guns on his own station. Sloppy thinking.

  I was equally as guilty. It hadn't occurred to me either.

  Jon got angry. It wouldn’t be enough.

  I got angry too. Together we could do anything.

  A platoon of soldiers were standing there looking stunned that after a Pulse Rifle hit, Jon had stood straight back up again.

  I attached myself fully to Jon. His combat routines had gone primary, but they wouldn’t be enough.

  I took full control of his body.

  We ran at the nearest soldier, who went white. It didn’t help him, and our suit belt augmented fist slammed into him,
and he went down for the count.

  Cold fury dominated us both, as we tore through half the platoon, ignoring hits on our suit, arms and legs working in a ballet of perfection, going from soldier to soldier, putting them down.

  Another Pulse Rifle shot knocked us down again. We got straight back up.

  We went for the heavy weapon holder, put him down, and kept on going.

  Within minutes, the entire platoon was down.

  I eased back from Jon, remaining only partially attached.

  He checked his suit integrity and found it at thirty six percent, but improving. We'd taken a lot of hits without being aware of them. We looked at the people lying there.

  "Stun them," I whispered to him.

  He picked up the nearest gun, changed it to a stunner, and shot all but the Colonel, who was out cold anyway.

  One materialized next to me.

  She took me back to the previous day.

  Jon stood facing troops in formation.

  "What the fuck are you people doing here?" he bellowed at them. "You want a fair fight? Be a Boxer! You, are supposed to be soldiers. This is a war. Our job is to hit the enemy and put them down before they even know we're a threat."

  "You, are on my station. The AI that runs this station is reading your thoughts as you have them. The next person who even thinks about defying the chain of command, who disrespects anyone for any reason, will find themselves doing guard duty, outside an airlock, without a space suit. Do you understand me?"

  One dragged me back to the moment we left.

  "You understand what must be done?" she said.

  I looked at her, shocked.

  I looked again at the bodies on the deck.

  I nodded to her, and she vanished.

  I whispered to Jon again. He didn’t hesitate.

  "Janet, send me a grav sled please. I have some trash to take out."

  While the bodies were being loaded, I monitored his thoughts. I threw a "No more Mr. Nice Guy" in there for good measure. He might do what he had to, but he was too much of a nice guy, and this image had to change. Spiritual or not.