“I will stop my troops from flanking you, but I will not come closer to the Dragon.”
“Druk, stay here, I will go and speak with him.”
“I strongly advise that you don’t. But we are out of time, just let me burn them.”
“I will come to you,” David shouted across to him. He walked forward to gasps from the wall behind him.
David walked close enough to the Death Squad Guy that they could talk without having to shout. But not so close that he could lunge to grab him.
“You can’t convince me to back off, nothing matters but the mission we are given.”
David thought for a minute. “Ok. So your government has totally brainwashed you to be its tool, I get that. Maybe we could start with you telling me your name, that way I don’t have to keep calling you ‘Death Squad Guy’ in my head.”
“There is no harm in you knowing the name that will bring your death. My name is Salim.”
“Wow,” said David. “Your name means ‘Peace’ and yet here you are proposing anything but that.”
Salim was taken aback by David’s knowledge of the meaning of his name.
David continued. “Look, Salim, we can talk all day, but your family and friends back home are about to die in a nuclear holocaust. If you do stand down, Nato will disarm the missiles and we can get on with trying to save all of humanity. We are broadcasting what is happening here, it will happen immediately if you choose to honour your parents’ naming.”
This really hit home with Salim. “I do not want my family to die, but they will be killed by my government anyway if I fail. All of our families will. It would be better for them if your dragon burned us all in the attempt.”
David was totally dumbfounded by this. “So that is how your government controls you.” A statement, not a question.
David got a message from Skye on his comm, “David? Raj has spotted the twelfth Death Squad Guy. He is up at the foot of the glacier in hiding. He is no threat to us right now.”
“So be it then. We have located your Twelfth man, Salim. Thank you for giving us the time to rest for a minute to make sure we weren’t going to be ambushed while speaking with you. You are now free to attack us and die if that’s what you feel you need to do. It looks like either way your family and nation dies, for what?”
David turned and walked away, he could sense Salim place his hand on the handle of the dagger at his side. He looked down at the staff. “HIT THE GROUND NOW.”
David hit the ground face first just as a fire ball roared over his head. He didn’t want to look back to see what had happened to poor Salim. He couldn’t feel anger towards a man who was nothing more than a tool of his bitter and twisted masters.
“And Then There Was One,” the staff read.
Chapter 47
“It’s Going To Be Nasty”
As David ran back through the village gate, he called to Lurch and Flynn. “Guys, I need a conversation with whoever is in control of that missile strike. What do we know about that? And keep live streaming this shit, there will be no secrets about what we are up to.”
Lurch announced, “I have a General Georgina Worthington wanting to speak with Outer Space Nature Boy.” Chuckles went around the group.
Tandin and Jasprit walked back to the group carrying a heavy little bag. Tandin nodded to David to indicate that they had been successful finding food.
David addressed Lurch as if he was talking to the General. “General, I want that missile strike called off.”
“David,” said the General rather condescendingly. “I thought that you would be the last one who would want the strike called off. There is still one member of the Death Squad out there.”
“He is not an immediate threat, we know where he is, and we will deal with him when we have to. We don’t want innocent people to die and escalate this thing into all out nuclear war. The new way is peace. The North Africans should deal with their own leadership how they see fit. It’s time for them to step up and stop being manipulated by fat old men who don’t care if their people live or die.” David paused, “General?”
General Worthington commed David privately. “David. I think we can compromise here, largely I agree with you. Your immediate threat is over, for now. I don’t want to detonate the warheads any more than you do, but I do want a better response from the NAU. If we can force them to capitulate, we could avoid civil war, which is what we will get with your plan. Continue on your mission David, maybe we can still get number twelve to stand down before you have to deal with him.”
“I will agree as long as we have an understanding that the warheads won’t be detonated.” David affirmed.
“Ok David, but I need you to make a public statement that the missiles will keep going unless the NAU leadership surrender to NATO within the next five minutes. We have nine minutes to impact.”
David turned towards Lurch who nodded, indicating that the camera was rolling. “This is Outer Space Nature Boy. If the NAU leadership publicly surrenders to NATO within four minutes, the missiles will be disarmed. I’m sorry I could do no more than that. Outer Space Nature Boy out.”
“Let’s eat,” suggested Lauren. “Ten minute break, by then we will know what has happened and we will be able to form a new plan.”
“There is no new plan Lauren,” Grandpa Jack said calmly. “We head up to the glacier to connect with the Princess. The only variable now, is whether or not we have to deal with the twelfth member of the death squad.”
David and Skye both grabbed a handful of little white square blocks threaded onto a string. They walked off from the group a bit, trying to chew the weird food that later they would find out was dried Yak cheese.
Skye spoke to David quietly. “Are you Ok David?”
“As good as anyone else I suppose. One minute I am thoroughly enjoying myself and the next minute I am being hunted by a Crazed Death Squad and the minute after that I have kicked off a nuclear war. So yeah, I’m fine.” He smirked at Skye, “I suppose what I mean is, we kick on, keep going, there is no other choice.”
“Yep, I know exactly how you feel,” said Skye. “You know, the really disturbing thing is how much Grandpa Jack is enjoying himself. What’s that about?”
They both laughed and gave each other a really big hug. “Let’s go find this Princess.”
They walked off and indicated to Tandin and Jasprit to walk with them. “Tandin?” David asked, “What’s the trail ahead like? What can we expect now?”
“Ok,” said Tandin, “We have a short walk, about one and a half kilometres to Jomolhari base camp. There is an old castle ruin there. If it is clear, we will have a beautiful view of Mount Jomolhari. We turn left up that valley and then have a fairly easy walk of about three hours to the base of the glacier. That is where the last Death Squad guy is waiting. Beyond there, I do not know, but the trail should be clear unless it has been snowing. We still need to get there before that happens.”
“Raj? Weather update please.” Asked Skye.
Raj was quick to reply. “Nothing much has changed. The front will arrive in about three hours. And it’s going to be nasty. Expect a total white out Skye.”
Chapter 48
“And, We Wait”
A lonely observation satellite orbiting between Gamma Cygnus Five and Six, both huge ‘Jupiter like’ gas giants, exploded forty-nine seconds after recording the details of three ships dropping out of FTL, thirty four light minutes out from Soom.
The shift communications officer, Madeline Anderson made an urgent connection to the fleet command group. “Sirs? Sorry for the late hour. I received an unscheduled data package from one of the long-range observation satellites, just before it exploded. I’m decoding the data now.”
Commander Owen Matson fell out of bed and face planted into the deck as he tried to clamber out of his tangled sheets. Blood was pouring from his nose as he activated his comm implant. “What have we got Maddy?”
“Sir,” Maddy gulped. “The satellite
recorded three unidentified ships dropping out of FTL, thirty-four light minutes out. They are not large ships, but they destroyed the satellite with some kind of beam weapon just after it got the data package off to us. Assuming they are hostile sir.”
The rest of the command group stayed silent, allowing Owen to formulate a plan. This was what he was good at.
“Ok Maddy. There are three things I need you to do. First, sound General quarters and inform the fleet.”
All ships in the fleet started sounding the General Quarters alarm, waking the sleeping crews.
“Secondly, I want you to broadcast the first contact package to the alien fleet. Let’s roll out the welcome mat.”
While Maddy was sending off the data package, Owen commed the fleet command group to arrange an immediate holo meeting. Figures started appearing in Owen’s office that adjoined his cabin.
“Thirdly, Maddy, get the tactical crew together and implement defence plans Alpha, Charlie and Gamma.”
Owen heard a little leakage of the word ‘shit’ from Maddy. “And Maddy, stay calm, we will get through this, Ok?”
“Yes sir, I’m on it.” Maddy said shit again, this time after she had disconnected.
Evan was the next one to speak. “Well, we were worried that this planet was a little too perfect. It looks like it has been previously terraformed by someone else. Do you think they are here to clean out the cockroaches before they move in to the new apartment?”
“It’s way too early for that,” said Russell. “Maddy, what’s their course and if they are headed for us, how long have we got?”
“Satellite one and four have just picked them up. It actually looks like they are heading for an insertion orbit over Gamma Cygnus Four. That will take them sixty-seven minutes at their current speed. Wow, that’s fast. The welcome package has been sent, but with the distances involved we would get a response in fifty-eight minutes minimum. That’s if they can decode and respond immediately. Which probably won’t happen.”
Three shield domes rolled down over the three colony sites as a result of defence plan Alpha. Beta was a bit larger, the low orbit satellite network wasn’t only there for global comms. It also created a large global shield, one thousand eight hundred kilometres above the planet. It is a great system, as the satellites remain inside the shield, making it impossible to take down the network from outside, as long as the shields hold. So that made two layers of shields over the new colonies.
“Is defence plan Gamma too provocative? At least until we have a response from them?” Indah Matson asked.
Plan Gamma made very clever use of Soom’s three moons. All three moons orbited Soom at almost equidistant positions around the planet. During mission planning it had been decided to put major resources into planetary defence. They just didn’t know who was out there.
Three automated ships had been built. One to land on each of the three moons. But here was the clever part of the plan. They landed on the sides of the moons that faced in towards Soom. This meant that they couldn’t be detected by anyone approaching from outside the system. It also gave them a field of fire that could cover the entire orbital zone.
When the earth fleet had arrived, each ship had divided into four units and landed in strategic locations on their respective moons. Each surface module had its own shield dome generator to protect itself. Offensively, they packed quite a punch. Each unit had a gigantic Neutron Pulse Cannon with enough range to take out its sister platforms on the other moons. They also had a point defence platform that could take out any kinetic weapons or missiles fired at them.
Aisha offered her input in response to Indah. “I think we will find out if someone more advanced than us can detect the lunar defence modules. Maybe that’s a good thing. Also, I have my team going back through the logs to see if there was any signal sent off the planet when we arrived. That might tell us if this is a chance visit or not.”
“Good work Aisha.” Said Evan. “I have to say that I agree. Let’s offer to be friendly, but it won’t hurt for them to know that we are prepared to defend ourselves. Let’s also see if we can find out if this new fleet has sent data out of the system since they arrived.”
“Then it’s agreed,” said Russell. “We prepare as ordered by Owen. We find more information that might help us. And, we wait.”
Chapter 49
“Indeed”
David and Skye led the way out of Jangothang village, having received word that the North African people were uprising against their leadership. As agreed, NATO had disarmed the missiles, waiting to see what the outcome would be.
“I must say,” said David, “That I think I’m feeling the effects of the altitude now. My heart is racing, and I feel a bit light headed.”
Skye responded. “Or it could be that you just witnessed how powerful your pet dragon really is David.”
“Hmm, there is that.” David mused. “Let’s pick up the pace again. Jasprit said that the foot of the glacier is three hours walk from base camp. That has us arriving after the storm front. Besides, my feet are getting cold.”
Surprisingly, as they started to run again, no-one complained. It seemed as though everyone was feeling the cold, and this was the best way to avoid that.
Not long after this, they came to a large flat open area with an old ruin at the bottom of the valley that led up to Mount Jomolhari. This was the area known as Jomolhari Base Camp.
David and Skye both gasped in wonder at their first real close up look at the mountain.
“Wow,” Skye exclaimed, “No wonder they call it “The Princess.”
Jomolhari was framed by the valley leading up to the glacier. With the old ruin at its foot, it was picture perfect. Snow covered all but the lowest and steepest sections.
Tandin and Jasprit came up to stand alongside them. “I’ve seen this view so many times in my short life. Yet I never tire of it.”
“What is the story of the old ruin Tandin?” asked David.
“Ahh, that is quite a story, I will tell you as we walk.” They headed towards the valley entrance.
Tandin continued. “See that other peak, hidden behind the valley wall?” He pointed off to the right side of the valley.
David could see another perfectly formed peak, but just the very top of it.
“That is Jichu Drake.” Tandin said. “Possibly a more beautiful mountain than even Jomolhari. But from this point it mostly can’t be seen. This ruin is what remains of a castle, not a temple or monastery as most people think. This was the castle of a local crazy King. After he had built this castle, he decided that he couldn’t see Jichu Drake from it, and ordered his people to dig out the valley wall that obscured the view, a large mountain in itself. His people thought about that for a short while, pretending to prepare for the ridiculous job. Then, collectively, they all decided that it was much easier to kill the King, than remove the mountain. So, kill him they did, and they promptly fled across the mountains to Tibet to escape retribution. The castle was never occupied again.”
David and Skye felt a chill as they walked past the ruin. Thinking about the ridiculousness of leaders who completely lose touch with reality. “Well. That’s a lesson to be learnt right there, I think. Let’s run again.”
They stepped lightly over the rocky ground and didn’t notice the dark clouds suddenly enshroud the snowy peak high above them.
The little group moved surprisingly quickly up the valley as Druk circled watchfully overhead. They had all fallen into a silent rhythm almost like a moving meditation. The world was very quiet, like it was holding its breath.
The peace was interrupted by Raj opening a comm link. “David, Lauren? Visibility is falling rapidly. I am going to have to head to Paro while I can still land with visuals. I will re-fuel and be standing by if you need me. Remember, you can relay a link to me through Druk if you need to. The last guy is still in the same place I marked on your map display, two kilometres from your current position. He must be very cold, his heat signat
ure is much weaker than it was ten minutes ago.”
Lauren replied, “Thanks Raj, I only just looked up and saw the storm approaching. Hopefully the Princess has a nice warm cave for us to hide in soon, it’s getting bloody cold down here, even with my smartsuit on.”
“Thank You Raj. We will let you know as soon as we know what’s happening next.” Replied David.
“Be safe my friends, Raj out.” He banked Priscilla hard and made a loop around Jichu Drake just below the clouds. He couldn’t see the peak at all. Once he was back over the Paro valley he levelled out and hoped the cloud was going to stay high enough to land.
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