by Saxon Andrew
TK turned and stared at Trey and decided that she was not going to challenge his future decisions. He was possibly going to give her a chance to kill the murderers of her parents. For that reason alone she could hardly wait for him to grow up. Revenge was a feeling she was very familiar with.
Trey was reclining against a log in a clearing looking up at the stars. The fire was smoldering with red hot coals which allowed him to see the heavens with a sky ablaze with millions of points of light. He sighed and knew that most of the planets circling those stars had been killed by the invaders. The orange pods didn’t leave anything living to enjoy the view he was taking in. He looked over at the vast field next to the clearing and saw the second Flock of Grang’s Division preparing to join him in another universe. He could hear the thoughts of the thousands of Flyers and felt their excitement at the coming fight. He looked back up at the stars and felt the immensity of the universe. He was such an insignificant speck against the scope of creation. He looked back at the Flyers and knew that their efforts were a wasted effort if an answer to the Invaders was not found. Why was he pushing sending the Flocks to fight?
“Cassie.”
“I can see you’re troubled.”
“I am. Why do we go out to fight when it could all just be a wasted effort if we lose to the Invaders?”
“The Invaders are just one part of the imbalance in Creation, Trey. They are the most dangerous enemy but they are not the only species that feeds on the death of others. What happens if we win?
Trey thought about that question and said, “We would be compelled to go out and follow our principles.”
“Should we put those principles on hold until the end is determined?”
Trey sighed, “No, I guess not.”
“It’s more than just guessing. If we can make life more bearable for just one civilization, then it would be worth the effort. A tool has been forged by the Creative Force and it’s ready to be used. To withhold it from those that need it would be wrong.”
“I thought this tool was created to defeat the Invaders.”
“No, you are the tool created to make that happen. The Flyers are for making creation a safer place to live.”
Trey straightened up, “Are you saying the Flyers won’t be in the battle against the Invaders.”
Trey waited for an answer and finally Cassie said, “They may be used against their ships but they will not confront the power behind the Invaders.”
“You mean I will be facing them alone.”
“No, Trey. I’ll be there with you.”
“That’s not really reassuring, Cassie.”
“There will be others helping.”
“Who?”
“Look inside yourself and ask that question.”
Trey played with the question and smiled, “You’re right. I didn’t see it.”
“Now you do.”
“I wish you were her, Cassie.”
“I am, my Love, I am.”
Trey smiled and felt her in his heart.
Trey leaned back and closed his eyes, “When do we build it?”
“Soon.”
The former Distributor looked around his new quarters and was impressed. He was just promoted to the number four position on the Council. The supplies had finally passed the previous level of inventory and the quality was outstanding. The First Three of the Council ordered him to keep close watch on the new Distributor and make sure the supplies continued to be as good moving forward. He checked his board and saw that the new Distributor was looking at former records of the universes that had been destroyed. Ummm…he keyed his board and transferred all the records to his console.
The new Distributor saw the records disappear and knew that he was being watched by a member of the council. He had noticed a remark by one of the former Ten Masters that two galaxies were missing from one of the universes that was destroyed. He was going to take a closer look but the information was taken. He turned his board to the new universe being attacked and worried that the Council Member observing him might take action to punish him for not doing what was desired. He waited and after nothing happened, he put the missing galaxies out of his mind. It wasn’t worth being punished over. This was his first mistake and was not going to be his last.
Jingos and Ron stood outside a twenty story building that was damaged during the attack on the surrounding city. There were huge fires burning in the streets a half mile to the North and explosions could be heard from the South. “It appears the dictator of this planet is being held by our Flyers. Do you want to take part in the questioning?”
Ron looked to the East and could see hundreds of flyers circling a large military base. They were invisible to the naked eye but his armor allowed him to see them. “No, I think one of us needs to take charge of the cleanup. It appears these beings don’t surrender.”
“They don’t and I suspect there won’t be much questioning to do.”
Ron gave a slight shake of his head, “I wish there was some way to get them to see the error of their ways.”
Jingos looked to the East and saw a ship come charging in firing green beams. It was blown out of the sky by a well placed penetrator. “I don’t think they have the capacity to see anything different. The slave camps are pretty much a testimony to how they view other species. They didn’t even have food to feed them.”
“Call them what they are; they’re execution camps.”
Jingos heard a voice come in over his com, “Sir, the spaceport defenses are starting to fire on the city. It appears they are attempting to hit the camps on the south side. They’ve burned through the first row of buildings between them and the camps.”
Jingos looked at Ron, “This is Major Kune, take out the spaceport.”
“Sir, whoever is left after this exercise will need the spaceport?”
“Then they’ll have to build another one. Take it out.”
Jingos and Ron looked to the East and saw a huge fireball erupt from the port. “I’ll go with you, Sir. There’s not much cleaning up left to do after the destruction of the port.”
Jingos turned and walked into the building. Ron raised his hand blaster and hit a sniper on the roof of the building across the street and followed Jingos through the front door. The ships arriving with food would be arriving within three hours. The Wasps were providing the transportation and delivery. A full grown Wasp could lift eight hundred pounds. They’d get it distributed in time to save the bulk of the starving masses. He chuckled at a joke one of the Wasp Commanders had shared with him. Imagine; an insect with a sense of humor.
Alex watched the display and paid close attention to the rate of transfer. Vring and Weed were controlling the probe and were moving it slowly into the core of the star. After thirty minutes the probe melted.
“We’re close.”
Alex announced, “Yes we are. This is unbelievable; the energy stored in that probe was greater than any ship we’ve built.”
Trey watched the screen and said, “I think you have your answer now.”
Weed turned and said, “We didn’t absorb the star.”
“Why do you need to?”
Kreej looked at Trey, “That was our bellwether for this project.”
“Did you want to absorb a star or the energy of a star?”
“What’s the difference?”
Trey looked at Weed and smiled, “I recently saw a Blue Giant Star in another universe that has a mass of more than eight hundred G-Type Stars. You could just absorb the energy from the outer corona and gather more than you’d get from a G.”
Weed looked at Kreej, “He’s right. We wouldn’t need to go into the core.”
“But that means that there would only be ten or less stars in a galaxy to power our ships.”
Trey shrugged, “And there are how many dead galaxies in the eight universes that were killed by the invaders?”
Alex said, “We can power our ships.”
“We need to take one to that Blue Gian
t and see.”
“Not just yet, Weed.”
“Why not?”
“Before we start absorbing the power, we need to make sure the weapons can draw it from the skin inside the hull and send it to the appropriate location. You don’t want to overload the systems. You also need to develop a force field that uses that power instead of conventional designs.”
Weed looked at Trey and then at Kreej. Kreej said, “I’m not sure what you mean?”
Trey looked at the energy absorbed by the probe, “Do any of you remember the old force fields used by the first ships of the Realm?”
Alex pulled up a picture of a Washington Class Ship and they watched a recording of it as it fought in the first battle against the Alliance. “Notice that the force field was actually a hot energy field around the ship that burned anything coming at it out of existence. Beams that were fired into it actually raised the power of the screen and missiles were just burned. That is the simplest method to handle this level of power. If you try to build a screen that harnesses that magnitude of energy, you’re looking at more years to develop it.”
Weed looked away from the display, “How do you know this?”
“Run a program using the amount of power collected in that probe through the software we currently use to make our force fields and tell me what you see.”
“Let me get Seed in here.” The other Algean came in and Weed said, “Link with me a moment and let me run some programs with you.”
Kreej and Trey listened in on their thoughts and Kreej said, “They’re thinking too fast for me to follow.”
Trey shrugged, “The first hundred programs they ran had screen failure.”
“You can follow what they’re thinking?”
Trey nodded.
“Can you slow it down and show me?”
Trey smiled, “Take a look.”
Kreej looked at Trey’s thoughts and followed the data through the various permutations. “You’re right. Anything we could build into a force field would be weaker than the method used by the old ships.”
“That’s the way I see it.”
“While they are still working their way through all the possibilities, I want to share something with you Alex.”
“What is that?”
“I have a plan for a ship I want to build. I want you to take a look at it.”
“The Algeans and the Zord could do a much faster analysis than I can.”
“Even so; I want you to examine it and let me know when you’re ready to discuss it.”
“Send me the data.”
Trey put a clear square into the reader and pressed send. Alex started receiving the information and said, “Is the size that big?”
“Yes it is.”
“I’ll get back to you.”
“Thanks, Alex.”
Kreej looked at Trey, “Did you send the Algeans on their little trip to la-la land so they wouldn’t hear what you just did?”
Trey smiled, “You know they can’t be reached when they’re this deep into computations.”
“I know it. Did you?”
Trey shrugged and smiled.
Cassie sat in class in the Robbins Fleet Academy and listened to an Engineer describe the circuits of a beam projector. She was listening to Trey have his conversation with the group at the Defense Facility and found it amusing that he had excluded the Algeans from his little building project. She smiled and enjoyed Trey’s back and forth with Kreej.
“Perhaps you would like to comment on this particular circuit, Cadet Blake!”
Cassie brought her attention back to the class and saw the visiting engineer pointing to a power coupler on the circuit diagram. She glanced at her Professor and saw he was cringing. She took a deep breath and smiled at the smug Engineer, “Actually, that power coupler is being replaced in the next generation of ships that will be coming on line shortly. As you probably know, the main channel for the energy transfer can only handle the power of three reactors before they melt and the new level of power that’s going to be used is more than a hundred times that amount.” Cassie walked forward and took the pointer out of the engineer’s hand and used it to indicate where several electrical circuits passed very close to each other in the coupler. She looked at the Engineer and pointed at the confluence of circuits and said, “Do you know what amperage this board can handle before these four paths melt?”
The Engineer stared at her and didn’t know what to say. She smiled and said, “No, I guess you don’t. The power of a Zeta-A would fuse this circuit. That’s why they are being replaced. Why don’t you look it up?” Cassie turned to go back to her desk when she stopped and said, “You already knew that board was being replaced. Why are you here teaching us useless electronic circuits? Did you perhaps miss your last briefing on the updating of the Zetas?”
Cassie went and sat down. The Professor said, “That concludes this training. Please report to your next class. Cadet Blake, may I see you for a moment.”
The Class left and Cassie walked up to the Professor and Engineer, “Yes, Commodore Jekins.”
“I thought we had an agreement not to embarrass visitors.”
Cassie saw the Engineer was angry, “Did the Professor warn you that you shouldn’t even think about singling me out?”
“What if he did?”
Cassie turned to Commodore Jekins, “Some get what they deserve. Further, the Empire really doesn’t need engineers that refuse to pay attention to those with experience they can learn from.”
“Cassie, she didn’t know. She took it as a challenge.”
“Then shame on you for not telling her enough to protect herself.” She looked at the engineer who was starting to show some concern. She stared at her for a long moment and then said, “Here is the update on the new Zetas.” She gathered her thoughts and sent the entire package. The engineer stumbled and sat down quickly at a desk. She had a stunned expression and was having difficulty focusing her vision.
“She’ll be fine before the next class. This time she can teach them something they can use.”
Commodore Jekins watched Cassie walk out of class and wondered why she attended. She was so far ahead of everyone on the faculty that they all left her alone. She said from outside the door as she walked away, “I’m here to find a crew.”
Catherine MacDougal finally regained her senses and discovered that she now knew a Zeta-A from bow to stern and port to starboard. She looked up at the Professor and said, “Next time I’ll listen. She can’t have me removed from the service, can she?”
“Yes.”
“Who is she?”
Professor Jekins looked at the door Cassie had taken and said, “I really wish I knew.”
“Now that was interesting.”
“Don’t tell me you were watching?”
“Of course. Do you want that engineer reassigned to a public job?”
“You didn’t take a good look at her did you?”
“No, I was only seeing you; like I always do.”
“Really, Trey, you should expand your horizons. That engineer is going to be on the ship.”
“Are you serious?”
“Absolutely. She was warned and had the courage to find out for herself what she was being told to avoid. She has courage and the will to take a risk.”
“What do you want her to do?”
“Have the Emperor reassign her to the Defense Facility and have her go over the plans with Alex. She’s more bored with her current assignment than I am.”
“Consider it done.”
“One other thing, Trey, see if Emperor Valrico will send Junior to the Facility to assist her and Alex in drawing the plans.”
“I’ll have to tell him about the ship.”
“He’ll know anyway as soon as we ask for the facilities to build it. Junior is also being stifled here. He’s pretty much absorbed all he’s going to get out of this training and it’s time to start challenging him.”
“I can’t promise anyth
ing but I’ll do what I can.”
“That’s all a lady can ask for.”
“I love you, Cassie.”
Cassie smiled and went to her teleportation class. There were a couple of students that she was watching that may have what it takes to be on the ship. She smiled again and walked into class.
Jingo watched his display and saw that he had lost more than a hundred flyers to the ships that were attacking a civilized planet. The invading ships had weapons that were the most advanced he had ever seen outside the Black Ships. The Flyers ability to teleport to different attack locations is all that prevented him from losing his entire command. More than a thousand ships had been destroyed but he still had more than seven hundred advancing on the planet, “Jessica, can you call in a few friends and help us with these ships?”
“Greyson will be here in a moment and Grace is coming with him.”
“Will Trey be with them?”
“No, he’s with Alex working on a project.”
“Do you think you can handle these ships?”
“I believe so, Jingo. Why don’t you assign a Flyer to each ship and when we hit their force fields have a flyer teleport in next to the ship and take it out. I think they can use the training.”
“That’s why I’ve not called you in yet. We’ve lost a lot of Flyers but those that made it through this attack will be considerably stronger now.” Jingo issued the commands through the Division’s Com Links, “Alright, Jessica, they’re ready.”
“Commencing attack in 3, 2, 1…”
The seven hundred ships moved inexorably toward the planet and would soon be in range of their orbital beams. The fleet has lost two thirds of their initial attack force but the Heramu never retreated. This planet was going to die. The Fleet Commander looked at his display and saw a ship’s force field blown away. The ship then exploded from something. The beam had not hit the ship but it blew up as if it did. Then he saw ship after ship in the front ranks exploding. His weapons officer yelled, “Our screen just died.” He had just enough time to realize that his time was up and life was ending. The initial blast tore through the bridge and he never felt the disintegration of his body.