Chapter Twenty
As soon as the truck carrying the two statues passed through the gate at the air base, Loni Chen whipped out her cellphone. Pramilla, who was an actual Indian diplomat, had told her that the base had its own cell tower and she would be able to check in with Colton Banyon. She put the call on speakerphone.
“Loni,” Banyon said sweetly when he answered the call. “I was worried about you. Is everything alright?”
Loni knew that Wolf had kept a close eye on her and the rest of the team. She believed that Banyon probably already knew that they were safe, but it was nice to hear his concern, especially since she had been in a fight with the Sumi. That always made her excited and overly stimulated.
“Colt, I can’t wait to see you,” she gushed back. This told Banyon that she was turned on, something that happened whenever she got into a fight, which was often. It was kind of like their secret code.
“We’re going to take a long vacation when this is over,” he replied.
“As long as it isn’t in New Delhi,” she responded. “It’s a mess here.”
“Did you get the statues?” Banyon asked.
“We have them, but about fifty Sumi attacked us. Thanks to some quick thinking by Maya, we only had to kill some. The rest were taken care of by the Indian military,” she responded.
“Actually, the Sumi that followed you were recalled to their ship.”
“What?”
“Carol sent a message to the captains and told them to recall their warriors and not attack until an hour after we have our meeting tonight,” Banyon explained.
“So the attack on New Delhi has stopped?” Loni asked happily.
“Yes, and with any luck, it will be over for good,” Banyon said. “Are you guys going to get to Cambodia on time?”
“We will be fifteen minutes early,” Pramilla chimed in. “See you then. We have to get to the plane now.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Eric drove the big truck right up to the diplomatic jet that Pramilla had commandeered from the Moroccan Ambassador. It stood ready to take off. As soon as he braked, everyone piled out. Maya and Previne began moving the statues to the cargo area. The rest of the team scurried up the stairway and into the plane. A lone man stood on the tarmac. Pramilla saw him and headed his way. His name was General Earnest Grupta. Pramilla gave him a big hug when she reached him.
General Grupta was head of security for the Indian government and knew Pramilla well. They had actually met each other when she was a teenager and a belly dancer at a club. He was an up and coming soldier. It was a secret that they keep between them because of her age at the time. About a year ago, she and the general had been major participants in dismantling a large crime ring in India while stopping a world financial crisis.
“It is a pleasure to see you again my dear,” the always cordial soldier expressed. “I wish the circumstances were better.”
“I’m always happy to see you too,” she cooed. “Thanks for your help.”
“We did not get to kill the Sumi following you. They turned and left before they were in range of our guns,” the general told Pramilla.
“I don’t have time to explain why right now,” she leaned back and said as she looked right into his dark eyes. “But I do have some information for you.”
“Tell me what is in your pretty little head,” he responded. This made her blush. The general had a way of affecting her and she knew it.
“The Sumi attack on New Delhi has been halted for now,” she said. “The cease fire will last another four hours. We’re headed to Cambodia to hopefully put a stop to it permanently.”
“That is indeed very good news,” the Indian general exclaimed and hugged her strongly. “I must go and tell my people, but is there anything I can do for you first?”
“Pray,” she replied. She then turned and raced to the jet and her destiny.
Chapter Twenty-Two
As usual, General Woods waited impatiently on the shoreline of the Mississippi River. He prowled back and forth along the shore like a caged animal as he tried to figure out how to deal with his new orders and the Sumi leader. How will I even communicate with him?
Many people had died fighting the invaders and he had trouble justifying the need to help them. He wanted to kill them, but he understood that his new orders were quite different. His thinking was interrupted by a subordinate who was watching the sunken starship.
“Sir, I see one huge Sumi standing on the apex of the ship. He has his arms raised.”
General Woods quickly brought up his binoculars and studied the monster. He was about ten feet tall and with his arms raised he looked more like a blue tree than a human. He didn’t wear any armor and only a loin cloth. Even from where the general stood the Sumi looked very intimidating.
“Send the cargo helicopter and four men to guard him,” the general ordered. “Bring him to the command tent.”
***
A few minutes later, the Sumi entered the tent with a military stride that the general recognized. He had to duck his head to come inside. Four marines with machine guns accompanied him. They took up positons in the corners of the tent.
The two leaders stared at each other for about a minute. General Woods could not detect any hostile signs in the big Sumi. Suddenly the Sumi spoke.
“My name is Captain Bly,” he said in clear English. His voice was a strong baritone that nearly shook the papers on the table nearby. “I am the leader of Maltos starship number four. The one you have sunk into the river.” He pointed his arm to the damaged ship. The arm almost reached outside the tent.
“What the hell,” the general gasped. The Sumi speaks English.
“I have come here to surrender and beg for your help in saving my people.”
“How is it that you speak English?” the general asked.
“This necklace around my neck is a translator. I speak in my own language, but you hear in English and I hear you in our language,” the big Sumi stated.
The general was stunned, but quickly recovered. “My name is General George Woods. Please take a seat,” he offered.
The space captain looked at the folding chair. “I do not want to damage your chair. I will stand.”
“Then I will also stand,” the general replied. He had wanted the very tall Sumi to be closer to eye level by sitting him down.
“What are the terms of our surrender?” the no nonsense captain inquired.
General Woods had given the issue some thought and replied. “We want all the warriors to remove their armor to start. We will confiscate all your weapons as well. If we see any of your people leave the hull for any reason, we will kill them. Is that clear?”
“Yes, your demands will be met.”
The general pressed on. “We want access to all parts of your ship as well and…”
The captain interrupted him. “You cannot be allowed in the vessel.”
“But we can offer you medical help for your wounded and maybe also help you repair the ship. Why won’t you allow us inside?” the general asked tactfully.
“Sir, there are several raging fires, poisonous gas in several areas, and some structural damage as well,” Captain Bly responded. “If you send your men inside, some will surely die and we don’t want to be responsible for their deaths.”
“But we can help,” the general argued.
“Allow us to open the upper hatches and to draw water from the river then.”
“Do you have a way to communicate with the ship?”
“If I yell they will hear me,” he replied.
“Then let’s go and tell them to open the hatches and draw water to stops the fires,” the general said, and headed out of the tent.
When they reached the shore, the giant bellowed in a strange guttural language. A sound that sounded like his voice answered. Within seconds many hatches opened and a long hose shot out from the ship. Smoke and a green colored gas immediately began filling the sky over the ship. They watc
hed for a minute and then the Sumi and the general returned to the command tent to finish their negotiations.
“Are you sure that we can’t help you repair your ship?” General Woods inquired.
“Our maintenance shop and all the manufacturing areas are undamaged,” the big Sumi answered. “We have enough replacement parts to make the ship space-ready. We just need about three hours to finish the work. It is not the first time that one of our ships has been damaged.”
“Oh?” General Woods questioned.
“We have been traveling in space for five hundred million years. Damage happens.”
Changing the subject, General Woods asked. “How many wounded do you have on board?” he asked subtly.
“We can accept your help in healing the wounded, but we will have to ferry them here to be treated. Our medical area is heavily damaged,” the Sumi responded. “We have one shuttle craft that is undamaged.”
“How many wounded are there?”
“We have about five hundred,” the captain offered. “Many of them are women and children.”
“What?” the American shouted. “But I thought that there were only Sumi warriors on your ship,” the general said with sudden concern.
“General,” the captain replied. “All of our starships were designed to be complete cites and self-sufficient for the long journeys that we must endure. Maintenance people, bakers, shop keepers and everyone else we need are on the ship. Our military leader, whose name is Erox, replaced a hundred thousand families with warriors on this trip. Only about thirty thousand remain. The rest of the people are regular Sumi.”
The general quickly ordered a subordinate to set up a triage center in the open park. “We will do what we can for your wounded,” he said. “You can start bringing them over immediately.”
“Thank you. You are most kind,” the captain responded. “I must inform my people.”
“Go,” the now sympathetic leader said. “I’ll stay here.” The Sumi understood that the gesture was a sign of trust.
***
Within ten minutes the shuttle craft landed on the park lawn and Sumi men wearing only loin cloths carried twenty-five wounded children to the hastily set up triage. The military had sent out a call to all the doctors and nurses in the area and they were arriving in droves to help.
“I have a question,” General Woods asked back in the tent. “You parked your starship over water for the attack, yet you must have known that the warriors would all drown in the river because they can’t swim. Why did you do that?”
“Oh,” the Sumi replied with the small smile. “We can swim alright, but not with forty pounds of armor on.”
“So you knew that the warriors would drown.”
“I’m not part of the lunatics who are in charge of this invasion. The Sumi warriors are a fanatic minority group that has taken over the government of my planet. There are only about three million of them. Now there are seventy thousand less.”
“Are some of you against this invasion? Is that what you are saying?”
“Let’s just say that we understood that the insane Sumi warrior attack method would result in thinning their ranks considerably,” the Sumi said with a straight face.
“So you could retake control back on Maltos, correct?”
“That would be a correct assessment.”
And yet you volunteered to come to earth knowing that millions of our inhabitants would die,” General Woods screamed at the captain.
“I did not volunteer,” the Sumi roared. The guards quickly became more watchful. “Erox has placed my family in a detention camp. If I don’t follow orders, he will have them murdered. I was conscripted, just like some of the other starship captains. I’ve done what I can to protect both your people and mine.”
“So you parked over the water to aid in the death of the warriors,” the general said in understanding.
“I also didn’t allow the warriors to arm themselves with the green gas you saw earlier. As a result many more of my people have died.”
“I didn’t know that,” the general responded sadly.
“Can I return to my ship now?” Captain Bly asked.
“I’m afraid that you will be our guest until this is over.”
“Then I am going to the triage area and help the wounded,” the big Sumi said.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Colton Banyon swept through the rented safe house in Turkey. Almost everyone else, along with their gear, was already packed into the three vehicles outside. He wanted to make one more check around the house to make sure they hadn’t forgotten anything, too much was riding on their plan should they make a mistake and forget something.
As he searched each room he recapped in his head the pieces of the puzzle that needed to come together.
Let’s see, he thought, first the Sumi part. The King and his minions are in the vehicles, the amber chariot is at the airport, the sarcophagus is already in Cambodia, and Loni and the Patel clan have the statues.
I have the time warp weapon from Colonel Cole in my pocket, I have two speak devices, and between Maya, me, and Heather we have all the Orion weapons.
The President just told me that troops are already in position, the volunteers are headed to the site, and the equipment will be set up on time.
The team will all have their cellphones, a personal gun, the surfboard sleds in the vans, and Steve has the reviewed the confrontation site with the military.
What am I missing? Oh, yeah. We’re missing Erox. I’d better check on him.
Banyon came back to the front room where Carol Cole, Colonel Cole, and Timmy were still manning the computers. Once they closed their laptops no Sumi in space would receive any information from earth.
“It’s time to go,” Banyon said. “Is anything new?”
“We’ve stopped the two ships in India,” Colonel Cole responded. “The ship in St. Louis has surrendered and is under repair.”
“Good job there,” Banyon said as a compliment.
“But there is still one starship that is cloaked and somewhere on Earth. We can’t seem to find out where it is located. We keep sending messages, but they haven’t replied.”
“There is also something strange going on in space,” Timmy threw out.
“What do you mean?” Banyon asked.
“There have been no communications, no commands, and no new orders from the lead ship for almost twelve hours. We’ve been feeding them lots of false information, but nothing has come back.”
“Yeah,” Carol Cole added. “I got a little nervous and sent a transmission requesting new targets in the hope of finding the missing starship, but all I got back was a curt reply.”
“What was the reply?”
“It said that Erox was sleeping and could not be disturbed under any circumstances,” Carol said.
“How ironic,” Banyon responded with a laugh.
“What’s so funny Colt?” Colonel Cole inquired.
“During World War II,” Banyon the historian said. “When the allies invaded France, that was on June 6th, 1944, Hitler had gone to bed and placed an order to not be disturbed. His minders were too afraid to wake him. As a result, his subordinates were unable to move men and equipment into Normandy that could have repelled the invasion.”
“That is ironic,” Timmy said and laughed.
“Let’s just hope that he wakes up in time for our little meeting in Cambodia,” Banyon responded.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t want him to be late for his own funeral,” Timmy joked.
“Let’s go,” Banyon uttered.
Part Three
Collision
Chapter Twenty-Four
Behind the moon, in the lead starship, the Sumi warrior leader Erox was dressing in his finest uniform. He wanted to look both intimidating and regal as he prepared to become the King of Earth and also Maltos. It will happen in just a few hours, he thought happily as he pulled his shirt cuffs straight.
He had not slept very much
during the night. He had spent most of his precious time alone preparing his acceptance speech and plotting how he would double-cross the stupid non-blue people of Earth. He had no intention of allowing a ceasefire. He wanted to own Earth.
He decided to take all of his best and most loyal commanders along with twenty of his Sumi warriors to site two for the ceremony. He and six trusted commanders would accept Earth’s surrender. The warriors would stay hidden in the shuttle craft until he called for them.
Once the Earth representatives agreed to unconditionally surrender and was recorded by cameras, he intended to unleash his warriors and kill all the non-blues there. That would include the news reporters that he expected would attend. He knew that on Earth the pesky vermin always attended an event of this magnitude.
Once he had one of his maintenance people doctor the recordings, it would look like the non-blues had attacked him. It would provide the bloodlust that he desired. His warriors would kill everybody on Earth with no mercy.
Next, he would uncloak his hidden starship and destroy the building holding the acknowledged Earth leader known as the President of the United States.
He would then bring down his starship with the poisonous gas and destroy the entire infrastructure of the government by flooding the city where they worked and lived with the deadly green gas. Erox knew that the government of the area known as America was the only possible fighting force that could provide resistance to his Sumi warriors. He had learned the lesson from the picture books of World War II. He wanted to destroy them first.
And I will still have six starships in space, he thought happily. I’ll send them down to Earth and have them form a line. They will sweep through the most populated areas of Earth. It will create chaos and give us time to complete our new cities at sites three and four. Too bad that I had to destroy site two, but there are always setbacks in war.
He was very pleased with himself by the time that he finished combing his slicked-back hair. He began to fill his pockets with his personal weapons. He made sure that the Shield weapon was the ‘leader’ version that his people had developed. The weapon could not be turned off by a Jammer. He and all his commanders carried them all the time. His profession was a dangerous business. There was always someone who wanted him dead. The Shield weapon would protect him.
The Society of Orion: Book Eight The Sumi Collision (Colton Banyon Mysteries 22) Page 7
