A flash and the Searcher exploded in a ball of fire. Sending large sections of her hull and other debris outward, like missiles through space.
Chapter 1
Stardate, 2330 Kepler 186
Location.
Kepler 186. 493 light-years out from Sol.
Some seventeen years earlier, the renegade Time Operator Charlotte had taken over a Crillon ship and its crew and had instructed the Crillon ship’s pilot to take her to a planet she’d named Cradle.
The planet was one of the five orbiting a red dwarf star called Kepler 186 and was far enough away from any space-faring races for her to decide that it would be a safe hiding place to give birth to and raise her children.
Charlotte had done her research and knew that Cradle supported a breathable atmosphere that was 0.6 percent of Earth’s. There were also some derelict buildings that had been constructed by the Varons. Plus a Disruptor, that had been used by them to speed up the terraforming process, before the Varons were destroyed.
The crew members of the Crillon ship Charlotte had taken over were vital to her plan, in that they were to be used for reforming and furnishing the derelict buildings, and installing a water purification system and food and drink replicators. Plus a large force-field dome that would provide both climatic and security protection for her and her family.
Over the years as her children named Garth and Tarra, grew towards adulthood, Charlotte concentrated on enhancing their mental abilities, using the remaining BEC Cryopreservation brain cell injectors that had been replicated by Andromeda.
The Last Day
Charlotte’s enjoyment of watching the dwarf star sink below the horizon every evening was spoiled, now that she knew that her children Garth and Tarra had grown to hate her. In fact, they had made it patently obvious that they both thought she was weak, and a danger to them. Even worse, for Charlotte, was the knowledge that they would almost certainly leave her to rot here when they both left the planet.
Charlotte sighed, she couldn’t remember why. But, she knew in the back of her mind that today was the last day of her life.
Garth and Tarra were about one point eight-three meters tall and were striking looking with reddish hair and vivid fluorescent green eyes. But they were unlike any other sixteen-year-olds. They had special gifts.
Today, both were dressed in their newly designed Crillon light-blue uniforms, with a golden bird-like emblem on the upper left front of their uniform that Charlotte had designed as a symbol of her vision of a new Galactic order she called the Trexis Empire.
Garth sat in his auto-fit seat on the veranda. The seat floated forty-five centimeters off the floor and comfortably supported him even though his body didn’t touch the seat.
‘Tarra, join me’ he mentally ordered his sister.
Moments later Tarra joined him. With an auto-fit veranda seat rising out of the floor for her as she went to sit close to Garth.
Then Garth and Tarra readied themselves to watch the approaching sunset. They knew it was going to be the last sunset they would see on the planet their mother had named Cradle. And, they knew that tonight’s sunset was going to be spectacular.
Why? Because, this rare once in every fourteen years event, would end with the sun setting midway between two V-shaped rock formations in the mountain range close to them. These rock formations were riddled with rose-colored quartz crystals.
Both sat in silence, waiting patiently for the approaching sunset.
From the air, the mountain range seemed to be horseshoe in shape. With a large fresh-water lake lapping the mountain’s shore within the shoe-shaped end. Both knew that this was the main reason why their mother had named this planet, Cradle.
The sun’s yellow-orangey light was just starting to flare around the peaks of the mountain range that curved away into the distance. Across the broad expanse of water directly in front of them, wisps of cloud reflected and shimmered across its surface, with its color slowly changing through the spectrum towards blood red.
Then, the moment Garth and Tarra had been waiting for arrived, as the Sun’s rays filled the V shape in the mountain range. Its rays, refracted through the V’s crystal populated sides, bathed the waiting Crillon shuttle’s metal hull in a blood red glow.
Then, the light almost blinded them as the mass of rose quartz crystals also refracted light which then mixed with the light that reflected off the water, creating an illusion of a blood-red and shimmering sphere.
To the left of their dwelling, a Crillon shuttle, whose hull had already been glowing red, suddenly flared with light as her cockpit’s atom glass received and reflected the light back towards the lake. The moving beam of light then traveled slowly up the mountain face.
‘Wow. Fantastic,’ Garth excitedly sent to Tarra.
‘Yeah. But we’ll never see this again, Garth,’ Tarra reminded him.
‘I know.’
Then, the giant blood colored sphere appeared to slowly flatten as the sun sank further down the V in the mountain. While the sparkling light from the rose quartz crystals gave the illusion of motion, and the impression of a sea of blood.
“Just like a river of human blood,” Garth said aloud.
‘Your ancestors,’ Charlotte sent, mentally punching the reminder into his mind.
“Shut-up,” Garth and Tarra snapped as they both sent Charlotte a mental bolt, causing her to slump forward onto her knees while holding her head in her hands to ease the pain.
The sphere of fire fluctuated between blood-red and crimson, illuminating the dwelling, and the waiting Crillon shuttle. Then, as quickly as it came, the spectacle was over.
Garth cocked his head slightly as their mother’s ship made contact with him.
“Time to go, Tarra,” Garth stated as he stood up, “We have the location of our first target… Get your things, we’re leaving now,” he ordered.
Tarra felt the urge to tell Garth not to boss her around but thought better of it. She stood up and both left to collect their already packed belongings.
Tarra wanted to say goodbye to her mother, but Garth stopped her.
“She’s nothing but a useless and vacant shell,” he coldly stated.
Tarra said nothing but raised a temporary mental block against any more probes from Garth.
Neither sibling uttered a word as they headed off. Five minutes later they arrived at the Crillon Shuttle that was waiting at the edge of the protective force-field dome to transfer them up to the Crillon Cruiser orbiting the planet.
Once aboard, the Shuttle’s four force-fields activated, lifting the shuttle twenty meters off the ground. The shuttle’s rear end dropped slightly to provide the flight angle, then a clap of thunder denoted the shuttle’s departure.
Charlotte had stayed on her knees while her mind slowly recovered from the mental blast her dark and sadistic children had shot at her. Then Charlotte finally stood up and wiped the tears from her eyes.
Her head still ached, but she had regained her composure now and knew that her original mission had begun. And that her children, evil as they might be, would be capable of ruling the Galaxy without her.
Then something popped into Charlotte’s mind. Something was coming back to her. Was it true? Was this really the last day of her life, this belief that had been at the back of her mind all these past years?
Charlotte’s pre-programmed Orb suddenly materialized and hovered just above her shoulder. She felt it make mental contact, sending her mind whirling as the memories that had been deleted from her mind flooded in and automatically created their connectivity.
She gasped as the memories of her preparation for this very moment, became vivid and accessible again.
Now that the erased part of her mind had returned, Charlotte remembered how she had manipulated a Time ship's pilot to help steal and hide the Crillon experimental vessel. Then, she had mentally persuaded the pilot to track her own uptime future’s timeline. And, to precisely pinpoint, the critical moments where she needed to a
ct to save herself from her own children.
Charlotte had used her time well during the early part of her pregnancy. By sheer luck, she had managed to acquire a support vessel. In fact, the same Garoden ship that had been operating close to Garoden itself when she rescued Frank Richardson. This second vessel had plenty of room and life support for up to ten occupants. So, the seven Garoden troopers and one pilot on the ship had been converted and were kept under Charlotte’s control. These troopers were the Garoden’s version of Earth’s Space-Marines.
A year and a half after she had given birth to the twins, Charlotte had split her own Delta Orb again, and placed one half within her acquired Garoden ZX122010 support ship.
Once control of the vessel had been passed to the Orb, Charlotte ordered the ship and its Garoden crew to the other side of the planet, to stay hidden until called for. She knew they were entirely loyal to her and would remain hidden for years in suspended animation, without question.
When Charlotte was satisfied that everything had been prepared, she had finally taken the drastic step of copying all the information from her memory, to her Orb. Including the details about the second ship, the timings, and all her preparations. Then deleted this information from her memory to ensure her children could not extract it from her.
She had then ordered the Orb to execute her orders. At the precise moment when her Uptime future’s Timeline had pinpointed the exact day, hour, and minute, for the Orb to come to her aid and return her missing memory.
Now, with her memory complete again, Charlotte knew that time was of the essence in getting off the planet now that the Crillon vessel and her children had just warped out of orbit.
She had sensed that her Garoden support ship, which had been hidden on the other side of the planet, was already preparing to come to her.
However, Charlotte knew that if she had any chance of being equal to her children, she needed more of the BEC Cryopreservation brain cell injectors. But stealing them from Delta was a definite no-no. Then she realized that the solution was obvious. The StarShip Andromeda would still have a brain cell and cryo-injector replicator unit onboard.
Yes, she decided. Andromeda will be my savior.
Chapter 2
Stardate, 2330 Beta Aquarii
Location:
Beta Aquarii. Approximately 600 light-years out from Sol.
Commodore, Jack Earhart didn’t exactly know why he was sweating so profusely. Or why he was pacing up and down the bridge of his battle group’s command ship, the Invincible, which was one of the latest advanced Heavy Cruisers to come out of the Jovian shipyards.
He had no reason to feel so jittery this far out from Earth, and in an entirely different location from the Garodens homeworld. Yet, he had just felt that same mental contact he had sensed when he was on the Argonaut and met Frank and Susanna Richardson for the first time.
Suddenly, the mental contact was back. But this time, it was continuous and aggressive.
He tried to block the mental tendrils invading his mind. Whoever, or whatever it was, was attempting to convert his allegiance.
Thankfully, the lecture on Mental-Control that had been given by Frank and Susanna to all upper ranks a year ago was paying dividends.
At the time, he hadn’t understood the reason why special cells had to be injected in all attending officers. Or, for the creation of a so-called mental Bolt-hole in his brain, by Susanna’s children, Alex and Carina. He had found it mind-blowing how easy it had been for them to alter his mind without him feeling a thing. Now though, he knew just how essential it had been, particularly for his survival.
He struggled to reject the intrusion. At first, with some success. Nevertheless, he knew that he would eventually succumb. So, he concentrated on activating the mental Bolt-hole, or pocket, in his mind. While at the same time, tapping the symbols, and the word Track, into the central ship’s security AI, to activate a super-encrypted code.
Earhart could see his bridge crew’s demeanor changing by the second. But, the weapons and tactical assistor AI droids were unaffected and still busy carrying out their tasks, oblivious to what was happening to the human crew.
He watched Captain Carpenter try to stand up but slump back in his seat.
“Commodore, pocket done…,” Carpenter muttered, then was silent.
Meanwhile, Earhart was astounded at the speed with which his special cells had copied vital recovery data into his mental Bolt-hole. And were already hiding it with a stealth memory membrane, to prevent Mental probes from detecting his bolt-hole.
He imagined that the crews on the accompanying cruisers, Victor and Excalibur would be suffering the same mental attack as his crew was. But, more importantly, be following Richardson’s mental control recommendations.
Commodore Jack Earhart’s mind clouded as an unsteady Holographic image of a young man and woman established in the center of his Bridge. Both were smartly dressed in what appeared to be full-length pale-blue garments, with a bird-like emblem on the top left front.
Earhart noted that they had both been staring directly at him for several seconds before the man’s voice finally came through the comms system. The man’s voice was hard and firm.
“You will work, only for us,” the man ordered.
Earhart felt strange, it was as if his mind was being rewired. And, it was at that moment, he knew he had lost.
Chapter 3
Fear
Stardate, 2330.
Monitor station, MV210.
Location: HD 212771, 427 light years out from Earth.
Gerry Stevens studied the automated SOS call he’d received from Commodore Jack Earhart’s security AI, on the Invincible.
The Monitor station’s sensor grids had picked up the transmission from the Invincible, three minutes earlier. However, Gerry had already decoded it and, as instructed by High Command, had verified that it was to be immediately retransmitted via hyperlink to Space Navy HQ, and Frank Richardson.
Gerry then sat back and studied the accompanying security matrix for any hidden messages, but there weren’t any.
The MV210 Monitor station had only been commissioned last year and was situated approximately four light-years from the closest star, HD 212771.
The Star itself was located about 427 light-years out from Earth and was a yellowish G8IV type, with only one known planet, HD 212771b. And, even though the Planet was 1.220 AU from the Star, it was nevertheless uninhabitable.
MV210 had been designed as an automated monitoring and relay station for the Navy's new observation and communications network and was scheduled to become fully automatic in a week’s time. Then, it would no longer need its human crew to carry out its functions.
The station was disc-shaped and over two-hundred meters in diameter. With long-range sensor grids populating its outer edge.
A centrally located, fifty-meter diameter tubular shaped section extended above and below the disc-shaped part of the station.
The upper part of the tubular shaped structure was some eighty meters in length. And had a mass of communications arrays protruding out of it. While the lower tubular shaped section was longer, at almost two hundred meters in length.
The lower section incorporated temporary living quarters for the commissioning and service crews, at the top end.
Below these were three docking airlocks, then the large bulbous shaped end that held the nuclear fuel cells.
It had been a mystery to Gerry why the Navy had placed this station here at all. Especially as no one had bothered to thoroughly check out the star system.
However, Gerry thought that the Naval authorities had at least been prudent in placing a short range FTL Runabout at the station, in case of emergencies.
Although the faster than light Runabout had only a ten light-year jump capability, it had already proved useful when rendezvousing with supply and equipment delivery ships, as and when needed.
Even though Gerry was the youngest of the three crew members at a mere thir
ty-five years old, he was nevertheless, head of this commissioning team.
Gerry had been selected for this post because he was highly intelligent, and had master’s Degrees in Temporal Physics, AI Programming and Specialist Crystal Growth. He had also been involved in Warp Crystal Development, while on Delta Pavonis’s planet DPav4.
Gerry was taller than the other two, at about 1.86 meters. With short, light reddish-brown colored hair and piercing fluorescent green eyes. He had always been keen on exercising and was proud of his physique.
Bruce was 36, stocky, and fair-skinned, with a chisel-chin, and a shaven head. While Mark, at 38, was almost the opposite. He was tall and slender, with short chestnut brown hair.
Gerry had been lucky to have been the only one of his technical commissioning crew to have attended a lecture by Frank Richardson and Susanna before leaving Earth to commission this station, a year ago.
Like most of the officers attending one of Richardson’s lectures, the injection of special brain cells, and the creation of a so-called mental Bolt-hole had been an obligation, even though this had seemed weird to him. Then, unusually, he had been one of the few personnel to have been given a second injection just as he was leaving Richardson’s establishment.
He had overheard Fleet Admiral Chilton talking about two females. And, about the source of these special cells. Apparently, they were from the Andromeda, Richardson’s old ship.
Galactic War Page 2
