by Max Swan
The Vaman, so intent on killing Paul, didn’t notice the soldier. The soldier found himself confronted with an ugly black alien about to kill another human. As fear gripped the soldier he forgot his orders, and opened fire on the Vaman filling it with bullets. It fell backward off Paul, as its green blood splattered everywhere. Paul rolled out from under it, climbed to his feet, and kicked the carcass of the Vaman hard.
“You lose, cunt!” he shouted at it and kicked it again.
Walking to where his disruptor pistol lay, he picked it up and set it to maximum. He fired, completely vaporizing the Vaman’s body leaving a black crater.
“That’s for Sheena!” he shouted.
As he looked at the crater where the body once lay, someone hit him from behind, and he fell unconscious.
*****
Moments later, Richard and Marcus emerged panting into the clearance with the soldiers they’d been with. A soldier stood over the unconscious body of Paul, and looked intensely at the disruptor pistol in his hand. Richard walked over and grabbed Paul’s hair lifting his head.
“Is this the one that tried to replace me in Melbourne?” he asked Marcus.
Marcus shrugged. “I don’t know, that guy looked and sounded exactly like you. He looks as if he could be a relative of yours, I spose.”
“His DNA will tell us,” Richard said.
He stood letting Paul’s head hit the ground and looked around reaching out with his mind. The alien is still lives, this isn’t what we planned, he thought. He should be dead. The presence of the Vaman, which Richard had come to know well, had gone. Certain he felt the Vaman’s presence as they climbed the hill, dread began to grow inside him. Where are you, he shouted in his mind?
The Captain retrieved the disruptor pistol from the soldier who seemed reluctant to hand it over, and began talking with him. The soldier spoke animatedly, and pointed to a blackened crater around two-meters deep, not far from where Paul lay. Richard felt his insides freeze, he knew immediately what that meant.
“What’s he saying,” he demanded from the Captain.
“Herr Professor, he says the alien was killed by that man with this gun,” he said holding up the disruptor pistol.
Richard took the gun and examined the settings with a gasp. “What did the alien look like?”
The Captain spoke to the soldier who replied gesturing wildly. The Captain said to Richard, “He says it was big and had horns on its head. Its skin black like tar, and its head looked like a dog’s head. If you ask me I think this soldier is lying.”
Richard suddenly fell to his knees holding the gun close to his chest, whispering harshly, “Nooooooo!”
He clenched his eyes tight but tears began rolling down his cheeks.
Marcus came up to him concerned, “Are you OK?”
The German soldiers watched him, giving quick derisive glances to each other as Richard grieved the loss of his friend. Richard looked down at the gun, and at the unconscious body of the man on the ground, he pointed it at Paul.
Tears rolled down his cheeks as he said, “You fucking bastard.”
Marcus knowing that the Pedigree wanted to talk with the alien panicked, and suddenly jumped into Richard yelling, “Don’t do it!”
The gun went off, and hit the German Captain and soldier standing on the other side of Paul. They were vaporized, with three soldiers standing behind them, and part of the forest as well. Another soldier came running from Richards’s right side and hit the disruptor pistol with the butt of his gun making it fall to the ground. The rifle butt hit Richard hard in the forehead, and he went down unconscious. The soldier stood over Richard, spitting on him.
“Stand down, we need both alive,” Marcus yelled at the soldier, as a sergeant pulled the soldier away with difficulty.
Marcus sighed thinking Richard had finally lost his sanity pulling a stunt like that. “Get one of those choppers down here, we need to evacuate the Professor, and the prisoner immediately,” he ordered the radioman who nodded and began speaking into his field radio pack. Marcus said to the sergeant, “Bind these men, the last thing we need is an incident on the chopper.”
So not long after a helicopter rose out of the forest and headed for Berlin with Richard, Marcus, and Paul aboard. Outside of Earth’s atmosphere another vessel flew silently toward the moon. Inside Jane struggled for her life from the wound in her abdomen, and the poison that now coursed through her body. Nadirs voice could be heard over the speakers willing her to hold on.
“You’re nearly home, Jane, hang on! Don’t you let go, and that’s an order, Captain,” he said.
*****
In the Hanger Bay all four Officers stood waiting anxiously for the shuttle to arrive. Jane’s life signs were weak, but she’s alive. They knew given she had been stabbed with a cutchla blade her chances are not good. The blade is a venomous fang taken from a creature on the Vaman’s home world. The poison is deadly, and this added to Jane’s wound, is cause for alarm. The shuttle pulled up and the door opened with them careening to look inside. The platform blocked the way inside, but Dexter got down on his hands and knees and crawled under it to get into the crew cabin. Jane lay on the floor between some seats looking awful. Her breathing ragged, her lips, nose & eyes, and fingers were blackening, a sign the poison is effecting her. He spotted the remote for the platform and picked it up. Crouching beneath the platform again, he threw it back out to the others.
“Get that med-evac stretcher in here fast. She’s in big trouble,” he shouted to them.
The GFM-platform containing the plutonium began to move quickly out of the Shuttle as Lijuan adjusted the remote.
Nadir shouted, “We’re coming.”
Once the GFM-platform moved out of the shuttle, Nadir rushed in pulling the GFM-stretcher behind him, followed by Blake. Dexter squatted next to Jane administering medications via a hypo syringe when he seen them. He looked up, his face pale, sweaty, and full of concern.
“There’s no time for niceties. Lift her on the stretcher so I can activate the stasis field. That’s the only thing that can save her now.”
Nadir grunted and laid the GFM-stretcher on a bench seat above her. Dexter moved out of the way as Blake grabbed her legs, and Nadir under her shoulders.
“OK Gordon, on three. One, two, three,” and they lifted her onto the GFM-stretcher.
Dexter hit a button on the GFM-stretcher, and a panel shot over Jane’s abdomen connecting to the other side. Jane suddenly looked blurry as the stasis field established itself over her. Dexter watched the readouts on the panel over her abdomen in deep concentration.
“I need to start emergency surgery now,” he said looking up at Nadir who watched everything.
“Do it,” he said, and Dexter started typing into the console on the stretcher.
After a few minutes, Dexter said, “OK let’s move her to medlab12. The Captains chances are slim, but I’ll do my best.”
Nadir bent over and grabbed the handle on the head end of the stretcher and pulled it up into the air. He maneuvered it over the shuttle seats, and they walked out of the shuttle. Lijuan joined them as they came out, and looked down the blurred image of Jane under the stasis field. The blackness around Jane’s mouth and eyes made her shiver. They briskly walked to the lift, with Dexter and Nadir entering with Jane. Blake and Lijuan stood outside as Nadir turned and pressed the button for the trail.
“Gordon, you have your plutonium so go build me a qdrive,” Nadir said as the door closed leaving Blake and Lijuan staring at it in silence.
Lijuan turned looking at Blake with tears running down her cheeks. “W-What about Paul?”
Blake felt his own emotions swell, putting his arm around her shoulder, he said, “The one thing I’ve learned about the Major is that when things are at their worst, he’s at his best. That man has an uncanny knack of surviving anything.”
“But that Vaman had him…,” she started to say. but Blake cut her off.
&nbs
p; “We didn’t see how it ended.” He looked back at the lift door, almost looking through it saying, “Those two paid a big price to bring us this chance. The best way we can respect that is do our jobs.”
Lijuan nodded wiping her eyes. “You’re right. Let’s go build ourselves a qdrive.”
Chapter 18
Paul’s body shivered making him pull against the manacles that tied him to a bed in a small grey cell. The image searing into his brain of the Vaman hovering over him ready to plunge a cutchla blade into his chest. Its hissing voice whispering repeatedly, “I killed Sheena.”
Each time making his body jerk, as he cried out her name. A few times he opened his eyes to see strangers standing above him, looking concerned. They spoke to him but their words were distant, garbled, and unrecognizable.
The Vaman would hiss again in his mind, “I killed Sheena!” as his blade rose into the air ready to strike.
Paul screamed making the men jump back with wide eyes, one drawing a weapon. A man stepped forward, and Paul felt a sting in his right upper arm. The men began to seem even more distant, and the pain behind his eyes began to recede as sleep came upon him. When he opened his eyes again, Julius Octavian, Marcus, and a couple of guards were in the room. Octavian talked into his cell phone, dressed in his customary expensive black silk suit. His head slightly cocked with his lips downturned. Marcus leaned against a wall watching Paul, his tie loosened and shirt unbuttoned, surreptitiously glancing at his watch. Paul’s headache seemed better, even if the whispering voice of the Vaman still echoed in his mind.
Marcus noticed Paul looking around and stood straight saying, “Your Highness, our guest is awake.”
Octavian looked at Paul and nodded, ending the phone call quickly. The guards shifted on their feet, becoming alert.
“You had us worried there for a while. I hope you’re feeling better?” Marcus said.
Paul wondered what that meant. His memory of recent events seemed hazy. “Where am I?” he asked.
“You’re in Berlin,” Octavian said.
“Mr. Octavian?” He looked at Marcus, “Dr. Smythe?” He pulled on his arms realizing for the first time he had been shackled to the bed. “What’s the meaning of this?”
“That soldier must’ve hit your head harder than I thought. You stole a large quantity of plutonium from us. Don’t you remember?”
Paul shut his eyes and tried to think. “I killed Sheena,” a whispering voice rattled him making him jolt and open his eyes. A dark figure loomed in the periphery of his vision and he turned sharply toward it to see a shadow on the wall.
Octavian sneered saying, “He’s still not right, what the hell happened to him?”
“I’ll be all right,” Paul said forcing himself to concentrate.
Marcus fidgeted with his tie with a nervous smile. “You’re DNA matches the person who impersonated Professor Starr. So we know who you are.”
“Do you have a name?” Octavian asked.
“Paul,” he answered.
“Paul?” Julius considered the name, sneering again. “OK… Paul, I believe we met at the Forcedes plant, in Melbourne.”
The words rattled in Paul’s mind, so he focused on them. Forcedes, Melbourne, my mission, he thought. “How could I forget? So why am I here, why didn’t you kill me?” Paul asked.
“You’re here because your race is planning to invade our planet. We want a chance to speak with you before it’s too late,” Octavian said. Paul tilted his head slightly and pursed his lips, looking at Octavian who stood in front of him with a stooped posture, and blank eyes. “We hope to negotiate a peace treaty with you before the rest of your fleet arrive,” Octavian said.
“A peace treaty?” Paul said with eyebrows raised.
“We’re keen to limit any further loss of life, and unwarranted destruction. Surely you can understand that?” Octavian said.
Paul realized that The Pedigree is still none the wiser about anything that’s going to happen. The earth was attacked by aliens, to them Paul is an alien, so in their eyes he represented the enemy. He’d assumed that the Professor would’ve told them everything by now, however, judging by the anxiety on Octavian’s face he decided they knew nothing of the Garan’s.
“What makes you think I can arrange such a thing?” Paul asked, looking at Octavian and Marcus.
Marcus twisted his mouth and wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Stop treating us like fools.” Octavian raised his hand, making Marcus turn away trying to calm himself.
“So is this how you always negotiate a peace treaty? Using force to capture a representative, and chaining him to a bed?” Paul asked, with a smirk.
“We apologize for using force, but since you disappeared before we could speak to you what choice did we have?” Octavian said trying to sound charming and gracious.
“I’m sorry, I can’t discuss a treaty with you. I’m a soldier, not a diplomat,” Paul said with a shrug.
“Maybe someone on your spaceship will speak to us?” Octavian asked, watching Paul.
“Not while I’m chained they won’t,” Paul said rattling the manacles on his leg.
Octavian nodded to a guard, who proceeded to unlock Paul’s manacles. Paul stood, stretching his body and rubbing his wrist. He spotted a drinking fountain and took a drink from it while the others watched him in silence. He straightened, wiping his mouth with his sleeve.
Turning to Octavian he said, “OK, I’ll need that device that looks like a cell phone. It would’ve been in my pocket when you captured me.”
Octavian spoke to the guard who poked his head out the door and shouted to someone outside in German. Moments later another soldier entered the room holding Paul’s cell in his hand. Marcus took it, and handed it to Paul who turned it on clicking Nadirs icon on the screen.
“Fox-one to Fox-three, do you read me?”
“Fox-three receiving, identity confirmation code required,” Nadir responded.
Marcus lunged forward and took the cell off Paul and turned to Julius saying, “We should be careful here, Your Highness.”
Paul glance up briefly, and said, “I’m MIA, so without my identification code he won’t speak to me. Its standard operational procedure in the military, ask one of your own soldiers if you’re not sure.’
Octavian looked at the blond soldier who nodded at him. “Give him back the phone,” he said.
Marcus frowned at Octavian, and handed Paul the phone stepping back. Paul said, “Fox-three, this is Fox-one. Identification code: twelve, sixty-four, sixty-eight. Gamma hydra delta. Do you receive?”
Nadir answered, “Received and understood.” The code meant: Being held prisoner, unharmed, and proceed as planned.
“I have a native representative with me that wishes to speak with you, sir. Do you wish to take the call?” Paul asked.
“Very well, put him on,” Nadir answered.
Paul handed the phone to Octavian who took it tentatively and said, “I’m Julius Octavian, a member of the earth’s Government. Who am I talking too?”
“I am Nadir,” came the reply.
“Uh… Mr. Nadir, my Government wishes to discuss a peace treaty with your race before any further conflict arises. We know we’re powerless to stop an invasion, and if necessary we will surrender, and cooperate fully with the objectives of your Government.”
Nadir felt a sudden coldness in his core. “May I speak to my officer?”
Octavian handed the cell to Paul and said, “He wants to speak with you.”
Paul took it and said, “Sir?”
“Why the hell are they surrendering to us?” Nadir asked.
“They wish to prevent an invasion of this world, sir,” Paul said looking at the wall blankly. The others watched him intently.
“They think we’re invading them? Don’t they know about the Garan’s?” Nadir asked.
“Negative, sir.”
Nadir thought for a moment. “That Vaman no doubt trying to keep his data mule low key to Th
e Pedigree. Is it dead?”
“Affirmative, sir.”
“Well at least that’s something. What of the Professor?”
“Negative, sir.”
“We have to proceed with the plan. Hand Octavian back to me. Good luck, Major,” Nadir said.
“Received and understood, sir,” Paul said and held out the cell toward Octavian.
“Mr. Nadir?” Octavian said into the cell.
“Octavian, release my Officer immediately,” Nadir said coldly.
“And if I don’t release him?” Octavian challenged.
“Berlin will be vaporized in the next twenty-four hours. I won’t negotiate while my officers held prisoner,” he said and the call ended.
Octavian turned pale as he stared at the cell mouth open. “He hung up,” he mumbled.
Paul shrugged. “Nadir isn’t one to trifle with, I suggest you do whatever he told you.”
Octavian’s eyes bulged and looked at Paul, “He’s threatened to vaporize Berlin if I don’t release you. The nerve of you people.”
Marcus began clutching himself tightly, his arms wrapped around his chest hard as all color drained from his face. “What do we do now?”
Octavian almost stumbled toward the door. “I need to talk with my father. Keep Paul here for now.”
He walked out of the door with Marcus following him. The guards pulled their weapons on Paul, and backed out of the room. The last one shutting the door and locking it. Paul wondered if Nadirs gamble would pay-off. Dexter had warned them that day in Nadirs office when they first discussed this plan that desperate people can be unpredictable. He sat on the bed with a sigh, rubbing his hand across his aching forehead. They’ll kill me if they decided they have nothing to lose, Paul thought. He clasped his arms to his chest and shivered. It annoyed him that he didn’t get a chance to ask Nadir about Jane. The thought of what happened to her broke his heart, she didn’t deserve that. It sucks being like this, he thought bitterly.
*****
Nadir sat quietly on the Bridge after he was contacted by Paul, feeling relieved that his Greeter is alive. He had worried their plan had backfired. The Garan invasion is getting closer by the minute, and they only have a few days left to build a qdrive and clean-up the mess they made on Earth. The mess named Professor Richard Starr.
