Death Never Leaves a Calling Card

by Saxon Andrew

  Jek watched the destruction of the Tronan Fleets and smiled. The Tronan didn’t have a filament map of the space they were in, but he did. He sent his forces in a roundabout route to every intersection ahead of the fleeing Tronan Ships. Fifty-thousand of his Tronan crewed scouts left the furthest intersection and boosted at full speed on the filament.”

  • • •

  The surviving Fleet Director heard the cries for help and said, “Connect me with all of my ships on the ship-to-ship communicator.”

  “You’re connected, Fleet Leader.”

  “All ships, you will leave the filament and move into normal space where all of us will move directly away from the filament at maximum speed. You will keep complete communication silence and I will destroy any vessel that violates it. You may communicate on the ship-to-ship frequency once my vessel comes to a stop.”

  The Second looked at him, “What’s going on?”

  “It’s turned into a rout. We can’t outrun those small ships and we’re headed toward some of them if we continue on this filament. We are going to move more than triple our scanning range from the filament and go to limited systems.”

  The Second nodded as the Fleet Director led his fleets away from the filament. They recorded everything that was being said over the communication frequency until they moved out of range. Only then did the screams stop.

  • • •

  The Tronan Commander of the fifty-thousand scouts flew at maximum speed in the filament and he pressed a button on his console.

  • • •

  Tommy knew the Tronan would be arriving soon. He looked at Leb and said, “I’m going to order all non-essential personnel to board our scouts and leave. I’m sorry that none of your Dragons will fit in them.” Leb nodded and smiled. “I will remain of board the Maw.”

  “SIR…”

  “Would you leave if our roles were reversed?”

  Leb stared at Tommy and chuckled, “If our roles were reversed, all of your crews would fit on our ships.”

  “You know what I mean, Leb!”

  Leb nodded, “I do, Sir.”

  Tommy touched his collar and said, “Netty, order all non-essential personnel to start boarding our scouts and get them off the Maw. You and Lynch will take the Command Scout and direct our scouts in the coming attack.”

  “AND WHERE WILL YOU BE!?!”

  “Netty, you promised me that when we revealed our affection for each other that you would obey my orders and not allow our feelings from you doing your job. I’m giving you an order.”

  “Tommy…” Netty said with tears in her eyes.

  “I know. But one of us must be with the scouts to organize them and make sure some of them survive. This task falls to you. Make me even more prouder than I am every day I’ve known you.” Netty nodded and Tommy ended the call.

  “Sir, the Tronan from the Sand Planet are on the long-range scanner.”

  “Order all lines to increase speed one-third.” He shook his head and said, “All scouts holding back the probes will move into our filament and start picking up crew members. Once they are on board, you will move in front of the Dragon and remove all Tronan Warships you encounter.” Leb stared at his monitor and heard Tommy say, “There’s no way we can complete our mission.” Tommy looked at the Scanning Dragon, “Have you detected the Tronan Force on the reverse flow?”

  “No, Sir.”

  “They should have been here by now.”

  “All I detect are probes, Sir.”

  Suddenly, A grey colored alien appeared on the wall-monitor, “Admiral Cranton?”

  Tommy and Leb’s heads went back at the same moment. The Alien was a Tronan. Tommy managed to say, “Yes?”

  “I am Commodore Bcref. I have been sent to make sure you get home.”

  “What?”

  Bcref smiled, “I am from the planet where Admiral Oliver allowed some of my species to survive. There are more than 350,000 of us flying scouts in this fight and I’ve been sent to get your ship and crews back to safety. I have fifty-thousand scouts and I will be arriving at your location in two-weeks.”

  “How did you get here so fast.”

  “My units have been waiting at an intersection not far ahead of you. Now this is important. We must get your transport to the short-cut filament within two months. The Tronan in our space have been routed and they are moving down the reverse flow at their best speed.”

  “We can’t go to maximum speed. There are too many Tronan Communication Ships ahead of us. We won’t be able to launch our Eggs if we go to full speed.”

  “We no longer use Eggs in the filaments, Sir. You just make sure you stay ahead of the ships pursuing you. You have enough ships to form what we call a Ronco. I’ll send you the information on how to form up and you must make sure your transporter stays more than five light minutes behind it. When we arrive at your position, half of my forces will take up the rear-guard and the other half will join your scouts leading you.”

  “I’m expecting a large Tronan Force to be approaching us on the reverse filament.”

  “I’ll keep my eye out for them and will remove them.”

  “They should have been here by now,” Tommy said.

  “Once your scouts form a Ronco, they can cross over to the other side of the filament and hold them off until I arrive.”

  The monitor went dark and Tommy pressed his collar, “NETTY!”

  “WHAT?!”

  “Stop moving the crew to the scouts. I’m sending you a new formation and I need to get our scouts formed up into it.”

  “WHAT’S GOING ON, Tommy?”

  “I’ll tell you later. Just start moving.” Tommy smiled, just when you least expect it…help shows up. He looked up and thought, “Thank you, Gloria.”

  Leb looked at Tommy, “Should I stop the static-field? The probes are going to get information back to the Tronan Leaders.”

  “No, keep it running.”

  “Why?”

  Are you able to stay ahead of the Sand Fleets?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then do it just to tick them off!”

  Leb smiled and then started laughing, “You should have been born a Dragon, Admiral.”

  “Maybe I will next time if I live right.” Leb laughed even louder.

  Once the Ronco was formed, Leb said, “I’m ordering all of the forces in the rear lines to maintain their distance from my ship; I’m sending out orders to the Ronco formation to fall back and close the gap between them and the Dragon’s Maw.”

  Tommy nodded and looked at Leb, “I often refer to the Dragon’s Maw as either the Dragon or the Maw, does that bother you.”

  “Would it bother you if you were referred to as Tom?”

  Tommy stared at him and said, “Not very much.”

  “The same is true when you shorten my ship’s name.”

  Tommy was silent and after a moment said, “Point made.”

  Leb smiled, “It’s really not a big thing.”

  “Even small things can be irritating.” Leb smiled and turned to the monitor.

  • • •

  Leonidas watched his wall monitor intently and shook his head, “I need a bigger monitor.”

  Bart mumbled, “What you need to do is cut your hair, it keeps getting in your eyes.”

  Leo’s eyes narrowed and Desiree said, “Why have you allowed it to grow so long?” Leo looked at her and she saw he was clearly irritated by Bart’s remark. “It used to be shorter than mine when you were a Purple Card Carrying Agent of the Unity.”

  “The Unity is gone!” Leo replied curtly.

  “But it’s starting to get in the way. You’re constantly having to throw it over your shoulder and God help you if you have to put it in a spacesuit helmet.”

  “I grew it out when I was assuming the role of a pirate to infiltrate the pirate stronghold on Fellowship.”

  “But you are no longer a pirate, Leo.”

  “I just…like it.”

  Desiree sh
rugged and Leo looked at Bart, “Now you’ve started a disagreement, are you happy.”

  Bart raised one shoulder as he stared at the wall monitor, “Truth hurts, doesn’t it?”

  Leo rolled his eyes and pushed his hair out of his face. It was now below his waist and he usually just let it hang. He said very deliberately, “The reason I need a larger monitor is due to dividing it into nine segments to track our forces makes the images too small!”

  Bart shrugged, “I can see them fine.”

  “You’re just jealous because you’ve lost your hair.”

  Bart replied, “No hair makes things clear and doesn’t interfere with my thought processes.”

  Desiree said, “Enough!”

  She stood up and walked off the bridge. Bart watched her go and said, “What’s up with her?”

  Leo shook his head, “I don’t know. It’s not like you and I never disagree.”

  Bart nodded and turned back to the monitor. She returned ten-minutes later holding a heavy-duty pair of cutting scissors. Leo’s eyes narrowed and she said, “HOLD STILL!”

  Leo raised his hands, “Just what are you doing?”

  “That hair of yours is a nuisance. Either it goes or we start sleeping in different beds; what’s it going to be?” Leo stared at her and she said, “I can’t tell you how many times you wake up at night, and wake me with you, pulling you hair out from under me…decide!”

  Leo lowered his hands and sighed. Desiree went behind him and cut his hair off at his neck. She cut it on the sides and then sat back down. The bridge was silent for at least thirty-minutes until Leo said, “The monitor is easier to see.”

  Everyone burst out laughing and Leo’s face turned red. Even Bart knew that was not the time to say anything. A few minutes later, Leo looked at Desiree, “What’s the status of the intersection?”

  “Admiral Hummel’s command has them on the run. If we can remove the Tronan on the nine filaments before we make it back to the intersection, then there will be no Tronan forces threatening to enter our sector.”

  Leo looked up at the monitor and said, “It looks like we’re going to make that happen.” Desiree nodded. Leo continued to watch the monitor and said, “It appears some of them are leaving the filament.”

  “They are.”

  Leo lifted his communicator, “All scout units following the Ronco’s will follow any Tronan Warships that leave the filament and take them out.”

  Embree said, “Sir, that would remove our buffer stopping any warships from making it through the Ronco.”

  “Have any made it through?”

  “No, Sir, but we also use those scouts to relieve our forces in the Ronco.”

  “They’ll just have to work longer; I’m not going to have any Tronan Warships left behind to threaten planets in our sector.”

  Embree nodded, “Yes, Sir.”

  • • •

  Randy looked at his four monitors and saw he had Ronco Formations scattered at vast distances in the filament. The length of the Tronan forces was incredibly long and it was going to take a long time for the scouts to complete their destruction. He looked at Emily and shook his head, “Our scouts are going to need a break. They can’t keep up combat for months at a time, the stress will cause them to make mistakes.”

  “We should send our Transports behind the fleeing Tronan.”

  “That would put them in danger if some of their ships move into the filament leading toward our space.”

  Emily nodded, “We’re going to have to pull the lead Ronco out and have it move into the reverse flow to return to their transport. They’ll remove any Tronan Warships that have moved into the reverse flow. We’re also going to have to move the transports at full speed so our scouts can get to them without a huge loss of time.”

  “But that puts the transports in danger. They are not immune to the Tronan Blaster Barrages.”

  “Order them to move in directly behind the last Ronco Formation chasing the Tronan. That Ronco will not rush into the Tronan Forces but will maintain a small gap between it and the fleeing enemy ships,” Emily replied.

  Randy thought about it and then, nodded, “Once a Ronco is on board its transport, the scouts will rest and afterwards, move out and take position at the rear of the fleeing Tronan. The one holding the gap will accelerate into the Tronan Forces once the rested scouts form up behind them.”

  Tasha nodded, “And the rested scouts will remain there until they are replaced by the next Ronco that is rested.”

  “That’s the only way we can make this happen.” Randy shook his head, “You do realize that once all the Ronco Formations scattered among their fleets come back to rest, there will be only one Ronco attacking them from the rear of their forces?”

  “Randy, this is going to take a very long time to take them out. This will at least give us enough scouts to attack any that move into the reverse flow or leave the filament for normal space.”

  Randy nodded and looked up, “Open the general frequency to all of the transports under my command.” Randy saw the green light illuminate and he began issuing orders. Four days later, the transports accelerated from where they were pacing the attack and moved in behind the rear Ronco Formation. He then ordered the lead Ronco to cross into the reverse flow and return to their transport. Within eight weeks, all the Roncos had left the fleeing Tronan Invasion Forces and returned to their transports.

  Randy looked at his tactical monitor and saw the Ronco pacing the fleeing Tronan forces suddenly accelerate into the massed warships as it was replaced by another Ronco Formation, with rested scouts, directly behind it. He stared at the monitor and said, “It’s a good thing we brought the scouts back.”

  Emily looked at him, “Other than allowing them to rest, what other reason is there?”

  “The leading elements of the Tronan Fleets will be arriving at the Death Filament in a couple of months. To block it will require a Ronco more than seven-times the size of those being used in the filament we’re moving in now.”

  Emily’s eyes widened and she shook her head, “I didn’t think of that. Are we going to be able to make a Ronco Formation that big?”

  “The Death Filament is about two-hundred miles wide in each filament. That means it’s about a million-feet line wide in the flow moving toward Tronan Territory. With our current spacing of sixty-feet between each scout, that means each line in the Ronco will have to have 10,560 scouts. It’s a hundred miles high and will require a hundred lines to completely fill the filament. That’s over a million scouts.”

  “We only have a little over 400,000 scouts. What do we do?” Emily asked.

  Randy kept punching keys and Emily said, “I said, ‘what do we do now?!’”

  Randy looked up, “Well, currently, each Tronan Warship is being punctured a hundred and fifty-eight scouts in each line that hits them. They are two-miles high which means two scout lines will hit them for a total of more than three-hundred scouts cutting through them.” Randy thought a moment and said, “The intention of the Ronco Formation is to destroy the warships such that those hit by our lines will not be operational or able to make repairs to make them operational.” Tasha nodded. “The question becomes, how many punctures will insure they will not survive?”

  Tasha raised her shoulders, “I’ve always thought more than three-hundred punctures were a little overkill.”

  Randy nodded and as he punched numbers on his calculator. He said as he entered them, “I guess I could allow the computer to work this out but there are some things I need to see.” Emily sat back as Randy continued to enter numbers.

  Finally, he looked up, “If we increase the spacing between each scout from a hundred-feet to four-hundred feet, it would then require 2,640 scouts to make a Ronco Formation.”

  “How many punctures will those numbers make in each warship hit?” Emily asked.

  “Each line will make forty-punctures, totaling eight per Tronan Warship hit.”

  “Don’t you honestly think that
would be enough?”

  Randy lifted a shoulder, “Probably, but we’re going to have to do it this way even if it doesn’t.”

  “Why?”

  “Emily, it will take 264,400 scouts to make this formation and the bulk of the travel is going to take place on the Death Filament. We are still going to need to give our scout crews some time to rest. We’ll have about 135,000 scouts not in the Ronco at any given time and they will be divided into fifty-lines. Half of the lines in the Ronco will be relieved and will go to their transports to rest. Once they’re ready, they will go out and relieve the other fifty-lines. This process will continue until we remove all of them.”

  “You’re still planning to have one-mile of space between the lines.”

  “I am. Any more than that would mean that some of the warships would only be hit by one line.”

  “I would think forty-punctures would put them out of action.”

  “Our scouts cannot vary their positions in the formation, Emily. It’s possible they could puncture an area that is not critical depending on where they hit. Two lines will insure the warships are put out of action.”

  Emily nodded and Randy looked up, “Computer, I need you to organize our fleet such that they know their position in the Ronco Formation I just described. Once that’s done, show me on the monitor what you came up with.”

  “Do you want scouts from the same fleets kept together?”

  “As much as possible.”

  “Working.” Two hours later, they had their formation.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Tronan Commander looked at Tommy on his monitor and said, “We’re cutting it too close; your forces have not moved far enough. Recall the forces protecting your rear and I’m moving all of my units into a Ronco formation in front of your transport.”

  “But that will leave us undefended behind us!” Leb responded.

  “All of your forces will go to full-speed to make it to the short-cut before the Fleeting Tronan Forces arrive. The Tronan Fleets behind you cannot get close enough to attack. The short-cut can’t be left open for them to escape.”