“Why are your troops not attacking the enemy?” The translation device said in its metallic, computerized voice, following the squeaking of the alien.
“Sometimes it is better to resolve problems by negotiation. We are in Highline Corp space and have lost our sail ring to combat. This ship is not going anywhere and we still have that monster of a ship off our starboard beam. There is no escape for us, even if we win. I won’t throw the lives of my people away, we have lost and we will not be acquiring those freighters you wanted. So tell me, do you really want the humans in those freighters for their brains?”
It took a short time for the translator to convert what was said into Saltic. The alien rotated his eyestalks to look straight at Captain Neumann, “Humans are inferior to the Saltic and our god has given all sentient species to us for our use. Since your government chose to ally with us, we will allow you to live. Just make sure you bring us the other humans we need. Now kill or capture these humans and bring us the freighters.”
Captain Neumann was shocked. There was not even an attempt to hide their intentions and obviously they had no idea about the capabilities of human ships, or lack thereof. With his ship in the state it was in, there was no possibility of coming out of this with a victory. The captain looked at his communications tech, “Open a channel to the enemy.”
“Yes, sir. Channel open.”
“Attention Highline forces. We surrender.” He then ordered the combat channel opened, “This is Captain Neumann, lay down your weapons and surrender. This battle is over.”
On the hangar deck, Major Falkhern told his troops to surrender their weapons, at which point Centurion Marshal said, “Major, tell your troops to keep their weapons. We have a common enemy to deal with. Please lead me to the bridge that I may meet with your captain and the Saltic aboard.”
The major told his marines to stand down. When Centurion Marshal told his cohort to stand down, for the first time the Brandenburger marines had a look at the forces they were going to fight, and when they saw the serpent centuries, they were shocked.
“Centurion, are you using combat animals?”
“No Major, we are allied with a sentient reptilian race we call serpents and they form part of our military and are also part of our government. They have been with us for the past three centuries.” Bill Marshal then called over the serpent centurion from the third century, “This is Centurion Itak of the first cohort, third century. Centurion Itak, this is Major Falkhern of the Brandenburger marines.”
“Sss. I am pleased to meet with you, major,” Centurion Itak said in the soothing way serpents spoke human standard. Marshal could see the marines nearby starting to relax as the mesmerizing sounds of the serpent began to sink in.
“Major, if you would be so kind and lead the centurion and myself to the bridge, I would like to speak with your captain.”
Major Falkhern led Bill Marshal and the serpent centurion forward to the bridge. It was now that the Romani saw how much damage the broadside from the battleship actually did. The interior of the dreadnought was a shambles and they had to dodge fallen beams and jagged metal all the way to the bridge. When they finally reached their goal, the bridge doors were open and the marines on the bridge had laid down their weapons. The humans were at their stations and the captain was standing in front of the captain’s chair with the Saltic standing next to him.
The Romani were dealing favorably with the corporate humans since it was their hope to unify the corporations against the common threat posed by the Saltic. Bill Marshal had not expected to find a human corporation allied with the despicable worms, but it was clear that the front line troops had no idea of the danger the Saltic posed. The centurion walked over to the captain. As the door cleared, the serpent centurion entered and everyone on the bridge was agog at her appearance.
“What is the meaning of bringing this animal onto my bridge?” Captain Neumann stated when he saw the serpent.
Bill Marshal had to chuckle and couldn’t help himself when he said, “Well Captain, you have your aliens and we have ours. This is a sentient being as intelligent as we humans are, if not more so.”
The bridge crew was now presented with the strange vision of two aliens standing near each other. One looked like a human sized worm with a piggish face, and the other looked like a human sized dinosaur out of nightmares. A year ago man was ruler of the galaxy and perhaps the universe, now they were confronted with the realization that there were others out there and not all were friendly. The entire bridge crew had heard the conversation regarding the motives of the Saltic and the arrogant response of the one on the bridge confirming it. Centurion Marshal then turned his attention to the Saltic.
“Why are the Saltic invading human space?” The translator converted human standard speech into the Saltic language of squeaks.
The Saltic then responded, “We need human brains for our fleets and our computers. We no longer have a source and need many more. We claim the freighters and the humans in them as spoils of war, since Coreward Industries now belong to us by conquest.”
As this conversation was taking place, Christopher Slone had taken a shuttle over to the Brandenburger dreadnought. He now arrived on the bridge and Centurion Marshal snapped to attention and saluted.
“My name is Captain Christopher Slone of the Romani battleship NR Tempestas. I came over to deal with the Saltic personally, since I have fought them in our galaxy and in their own.”
The Saltic suddenly perked up when he heard this. “How can you have fought us in our own galaxy? How do you know where our galaxy is?”
“You came here from the Andromeda galaxy. There you destroyed my ship, the SS Hayden from Sinclair Corporation. You made a deal with Horatio Sinclair and he sacrificed my crew for your brain collection. We destroyed your harvester ship. Then a few human years ago my ship destroyed your human colony for brain harvesting by evacuating Heimat. In so doing we also destroyed your planetary wormhole drive. In time we will push you back, so don’t talk to me about your superiority, you are helpless against us. Let that fear sink into you. Now tell me what you are doing in the Brandenburger Corporation.”
As the translator finished converting the conversation, the Saltic appeared to become more agitated. “There is a bounty on your head. We have video from our cruiser showing your ship attacking us.”
“If the Saltic have a bounty on my head, all the better. Why didn’t you bring a harvester ship with you?”
“One will come; it is taking care of the home world of Highline Corporation. Spying it out for harvesting.”
It gave Slone more pleasure than he thought to say, “We destroyed that ship and its escorts. We are perfectly safe here for now. So I ask you again, what is your plan for the Brandenburger Corporation?”
“They are being processed as we speak. This ship and the others would have also been processed but you have disrupted that. They were so easy to conquer, since they wanted so badly to have our help against the other corporations.”
Slone could see that the Brandenburger bridge crew was holding back, since they had surrendered and didn’t want to pull a weapon and kill the Saltic as long as there were armed Romani, but Slone had all he needed and had no love loss for the Saltic. He wanted to see them all dead. “Captain, if you would like to put the Saltic under arrest and punish him as you choose, be my guest. They killed too many people I cared about for me to care about them.”
“Thank you Captain Slone,” Captain Neumann said and pulled his side arm. He aimed the gun at the Saltic and proceeded to empty the clip into the worm and no one on the bridge objected. “If what he said is true, then our entire corporation is at risk of annihilation.”
“We have to get to your home world and find out what is happening,” Slone pointed out. He then activated his comlink and contacted the battleship, “Paul, what is the status of repairs on the surrendered ships?” Slone was asking Paul McMann who was his second in command.
“Captain, the two dreadno
ughts that were reparable are able to maneuver. Their sail rings are damaged, so they cannot take the slipstream. The third dreadnought is a total loss. We managed to save some of the crew but most died. The fifth one surrendered when a lucky shot from the serpent ships took out its sail ring. It is returning with the serpent ships following.”
Slone was glad to hear they prevented the last ship from returning home and certain death. He ordered the Brandenburger captains to transfer to the battleship for a meeting. He also requested the captains of the freighters, who were now under the protection of the fleet, to join them. A lot had to be discussed. Those who had never been aboard the battleship were shocked at the size of the vessel. The intact dreadnought was on the other side of the system and its captain would have to be filled in on the plan later. Once everyone was seated and refreshments were served, Slone called the meeting to order and began the discussion. His bridge officers were also there as well as his wife Alaya.
“Let me get right to the point. The Saltic have invaded three of our human corporations and completely conquered Coreward Industries and made inroads into the Brandenburger and Highline Corporations. This is the greatest danger ever to visit human space and our entire species is at risk. We must unify the corporations or we will all fall. We were sent here to assess the problem and see if we can find a way to unify humanity. The fact that Brandenburger Corporation would ally themselves with the Saltic tells me we may never get a consensus. But we have to try.”
Admiral Holt, who was functioning as the Highline Corporation representative spoke up, “I am not sure we will ever be able to unite the corporations, even against a common enemy. They will try to leverage an alliance with the aliens against the other corporations, even if it means they endanger themselves. Basically, the corporate CEOs hate each other more than they hate the aliens.”
“If that turns out to be true, then we may be doomed. I prefer to believe humans will look to survival rather than getting a leg up,” Slone said optimistically. It was a shame he did not believe the optimism he tried to project. “What we need to discuss is what we will do now. We have to get the Highline ships and the Freighters and Brandenburger ships back to Highline Corp. I think we can all agree that Highline Corp is next on the list, now that Brandenburger willingly gave itself to the Saltic.”
Captain Neumann was about to object to this last statement when Slone raised his hand to silence him, “I know you don’t want to believe that your Corporation was so blinded to the real motives of the Saltic, but I dealt with them before and I gave them the benefit of the doubt and they killed my crew. Later I found out that Horatio Sinclair had made a deal with them that led him to commit terrible atrocities. They seem to have that effect on some people.”
“So what do we do now?” Admiral Holt asked no one in particular.
“First we need to get all of these ships to the Highline home world. Since the wormhole drives used by the Saltic allow them to drop into any system they want, only the home systems will be safe and only if they are well protected. Have the Highline techs make low yield nukes for your missiles and be ready to use them. Make sure you stay away from the large ships so they don’t incapacitate you. Their EMP pulse is their most potent weapon against us.”
“Some of the ships in this system cannot take the slipstream.”
“We will open a wormhole for you directly to the Highline home world. It will be up to you to make sure they don’t fire on the Brandenburger ships. After you are all through we will close the wormhole.”
“What will you be doing after we leave then?” Admiral Holt asked.
“It’s time we head to the Brandenburger home world and find out what’s really happening over there,” Slone said. “Alaya, I want to take the Mary Rose to scout out the situation in the Brandenburger home system. I need someone from the Brandenburger navy to come along, since none of us have ever been in that system.”
The Brandenburger personnel present looked at each other. Captain Neumann decided he would return to Brandenburg, since they may need his presence as a guide if they land on the home world. Highline Corporation also wanted to know the extent of the danger and decided to send a representative as well. Ironically, it was determined that the one person able to be detached was Captain Morel, Slone’s son. The logistics were worked out and Christopher Morel and Captain Neumann stayed aboard the Tempestas as the rest of the combined fleet of Highline, Brandenburger and Coreward Industries ships moved through the wormhole the Tempestas opened to the Highline home world. When the last ship was through, Slone ordered the wormhole closed. After the closure, the only vessels left in the Border System 13 were the Tempestas, the Avenging Talon and the derelict Brandenburger dreadnought. Engineering was repairing the battle damage inflicted by the Brandenburger ships. Fortunately this was minimal due to the sheer size of the battleship and the fact that all of the vital parts of the ship were centrally located. It also helped that the space between the double hulls was occupied by a force field to immediately patch any breech. This new arrangement worked well during its first test in actual combat. Slone called a meeting of the department heads along with his son, Captain Morel, and Captain Neumann. When all were seated, he began the discussion.
“We were tasked by the Senate to determine the extent of the Saltic incursion into human space. Suffice it to say that it appears to be worse than we imagined. They have conquered Coreward Industries and have attacked Highline systems, even the home system. Now it appears, from what Captain Neumann and the Saltic on his bridge said that they have also conquered the home world of Brandenburger Corporation. If this is true, then we now have a Saltic presence in the coreward areas of human space. We must see how significant this is and report back to Nova Romae.”
Captain Neumann spoke up at this point, “How do we get close enough to the home world to spy out the situation. Surely any human vessel entering the system will be subject to attack from the Saltic.”
“I propose we go in with the Mary Rose,” Slone said and for the benefit of those not aware of the scout ship, he added, “that is the scout vessel carried by the Tempestas. It is able to hold its own against the smaller Saltic ships, but I hope to get in and out without detection.”
“How do you plan to do that?” This time it was Captain Morel asking.
“We have a few tricks the Saltic are unaware of. Captain Neumann, what is the nearest uninhabited system to your home world?” Slone ordered Paul McMann to put up a star map of the systems around the Brandenburger home world.
Captain Neumann looked at the projection and pointed to a system two jumps from the Brandenburger home world. “This system is uninhabited. There are also no early warning systems. We do not routinely patrol that system, because it has only inbound and outbound slipstreams from inhabited systems. In the absence of a wormhole drive, any ship going to that system will have to pass through patrolled and inhabited systems.”
“Excellent, we will drop in there then. Alaya, I will be going along as will Captains Morel and Neumann. Order your crew to prep the ship.”
“Yes, Chris.” Alaya left to get things ready.
“We will leave as soon as the Mary Rose is ready,” Slone told the others.
Chapter 6 - Brandenburg
A wormhole opened in an unnamed, uninhabited system of the Brandenburger Corporation. The wormhole stayed open for a few minutes and then closed again, leaving the system just as empty as it was before. Only, it was no longer empty. There was now a ship present, invisible to the eye and to all electronics. The Mary Rose had arrived and Hatch made them invisible. On the bridge of the scout corvette was the usual crew. Alaya sat in the captain’s chair with Tavia Marshal at the forward flight controls. The ship was modified so Alaya could also fly it from the captain’s chair. All consoles were designed to allow both humans and serpents to control them. This allowed the usual cross training so important to the scout service. At navigation was the serpent Blue Scale and the weapon’s console was crewed by the se
rpent Deadeye. Hatch manned the invisibility controls that humans would never be able to work. Lastly was the sensor and engineering console crewed by Olivia Slone, who was yet to learn that her half brother, who she never knew she had, was also on the bridge. Blue Scale and Olivia Slone also handled the communications for the ship. Christopher Slone, Captain Morel and Captain Neumann were also present. The rest of the ship had a crew of 25, 10 human and 15 serpent special forces trained by Centurion William Marshal to serve on the scout ship. All were under the command of a serpent Optio Brave Claw with a Decanus commanding each group of 10 with the extra five consisting of support personnel. The scout ship was fully able to handle all situations, unless they were involved in a fleet battle. She was armed with turreted energy pulse weapons and missiles.
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