Acarea parked their skimma around the back and after checking it was well-camouflaged, went inside, putting her blaster next to his on the table.
The main room of the cabin was sparsely furnished. Just a table, bed, cabinet, sideboard and sofa. Through the doorway, there was the kitchen, then a shower room.
At the back, there was a small workshop, with a bench, storage, and some tools.
“Where's the radiation meter, Bren?”
“With the Blasters, on the table.”
She picked it up and turning it on, swept first herself then Bren. The meter beeped, and she saw it was reading ten times the safe level.
“Outer clothes off now,” she ordered firmly.
Both took their overalls off, and she swept again. This time, it was six times the safe level. Better, but still too high.
“Still contaminated. Everything off.”
Bren did as he was told.
“It’s almost all right Bren,” and she swept again.
“Shower,” both said together.
“I'll put our clothes in the decontamination machine, first,” Acarea said.
Bren stepped into the shower cubicle. As he did so, the pump automatically started pulling lukewarm water, from a well deep underground.
He showered himself very thoroughly, then stepped into a small ICO drying cubicle. Twenty seconds later he was dry. Acarea followed him through the process.
His shower had left Bren feeling better than he had for a long time. He turned to see his wife step out of the ICO dryer.
She was about six centimetres taller than him, and as he watched, she stretched her arms upwards flexing her muscles.
Bren realized he’d forgotten how attractive his wife was. Her curvaceous body rippled with the muscles she had built up from their special ops training five years earlier. Both he and Acarea had continued to exercise, and their bodies showed it.
She stood in front of him, her red hair flowing down over her muscular shoulders. He could swear she had a better six pack than he did. Her breasts weren’t large but were firm.
He found himself beginning to have feelings that had lain dormant for too many years.
She watched him staring at her.
“Do you like what you see,” she said. Then softly asked. “Are you undressing me in your mind, Bren?”
His gaze shifted to her smiling face, and her emerald green eyes met his eyes. She had a slightly turned up nose, and her full lips were inviting.
It had been almost three years since their last embrace. Maybe it was the unexpected action.
Or, maybe he realized what he had been missing.
It was two hours before they dressed in fresh clothes and returned to the real world. A deep bond having been re-established.
Feeling good, he sneaked a look at himself in the mirror and was shocked to realise that he had let himself go.
He got out his scissors cut his hair short. Then combed his newly trimmed ginger hair smartly to one side.
‘That’s better,’ he thought. ‘Better sort my beard out as well,’ and shaved if off with his sonic trimmer. He winked at himself in the mirror and was surprised to see that his eyes were as green as Acarea's.
‘Well, I never,’ he thought, smiling.
Acarea came up behind him. “It must be the crater rim that's radioactive. We'd better not go up there again.” She said.
The reality of their situation, bringing Bren back to earth with a bang.
“Agreed. Oh, and we haven’t checked the bags.”
“We'll do it after I’ve measured the levels again.”
She swept them both and saw the meter was only reading twice the recommended radiation level.
“That’ll be all right. Let’s get everything out of the bags and put it outside.”
Once the bags had been emptied, they put the computer they’d taken from the underground cavern onto the table. Connected it to the cabin's electrical supply and powered it up.
They started to look at the other bits while it warmed up, but the screen then came to life, so they left the rest for later.
Acarea's fingers danced over the keypad in such a blur that Bren couldn't follow.
“I see you've not lost your touch?”
“You never do. See that square grey box, near the table end?”
“This one, here?”
“Yes. Can you plug it in here?” She asked, pointing to a connector on the side of the computer.
After a moment, the screen lit. Showing a location map of the three remaining cities on the planet, together with the industrial compounds that were adjacent to each of them.
At the bottom of the screen, they saw what seemed to be the communications access codes for all the cities governing councils.
“Is that map in real time?” Bren asked.
“It should be.”
“Then, where are the military bases?”
She looked and saw there weren’t any showing.
“They must all have been wiped out,” she replied, with dismay in her voice.
“Like our city, all gone.”
Bren studied the map
“Yes, but it also means that right now, the rest of the Cities and industrial compounds are still intact.
Try city Marca's communication’s access code again.”
She typed it in and almost at once a middle-aged man’s face appeared on the screen.
His smart appearance and clean shaven chin indicated he was well up in government. But the bags under his eyes showed that he was a very weary man.
“Acarea, isn’t it? We thought you were all dead.”
“Most are,” Acarea explained. “Brendereen’s here with me. The computer we’re using to contact you is from an underground lab that was hit.
There weren’t any survivors in the lab. I reckon we’re lucky the computer still works.”
“That explains why you appear to be in the wrong place then.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “We can see, from the real-time mapping in the computer, that only the military bases have been hit. But, unfortunately, all of them.”
“Yes, sadly I know that. I assume you also know that City Atreen tried to resist. You know the result of that, don’t you?”
“Yes. They destroyed the city as well as the military base. So I reckon they only need to keep our processing and manufacturing compounds intact.
We also saw them killing some of our people. For, not helping at the industrial plant, I think.”
“You've seen them?” the man queried, looking startled.
“Yes. Haven’t you?”
“No, but they’ve sent us a translation package.
It’s a bit limited, but these aliens seem to have built up a knowledge of our language, so they can communicate and make us comply with their orders.
One thing we know for certain is that they're called Crillons.”
Acarea thought a moment before replying. “Can you send the translation pack to this computer?”
“Yes, one moment.”
Ten seconds later, a new folder appeared on Acarea's screen.
“Got it, thanks. What can we do to help?”
“We have no idea Acarea. They're out of reach up there. Anything we might have had to help us is gone.
If we try to attack them on the ground, they’ll wipe out another of our cities,” he paused. “At least we know that, at the moment, the rest of them are all right. Be careful what you do, or the rest of us may perish.”
“Don't worry, we will.”
“I'll inform the other cities that you’re outside the alien’s web, but don't call too often. They may be able to monitor the transmissions.”
“OK. We'll only call when we have something useful, good luck.”
“And you both.”
Then he was gone, and they were alone again.
Acarea turned to Bren, “Not a good situation.”
He kissed her on the forehead, saying, “I’m tired and hungry.”
>
Then both went to the kitchen to rustle up something to eat. Luckily, they had a well-stocked food store, with enough provisions to last about a year.
After they had eaten and cleared up. Bren said, “We need to go back to the industrial site.”
“I know, but to do what?”
“I don't know. Let's have a siesta for a couple of hours, then go.”
“OK,” she said, turning off the computer. “Set your wrist alarm.”
He did. Then they lay on the bed and closed their eyes on the suddenly altered world around them.
Two hours later, the alarm woke him as it vibrated against his wrist. He rolled over, shook her gently, and said. “Up love, time to move.”
Within ten minutes, they were ready and dressed in their now decontaminated clothes.
Acarea poured the hot drink she’d made into a vacuum container, then put it in their bag, adding some small energy squares to sustain them during the day.
“Here you are,” she said.
“I think it’s a good idea to take another filter tablet before we go. The radiation level will still be high on that ridge.”
“Good idea. Can we upload that translation folder to the skimma’s memory, Acarea?”
“I think so. Hoping to talk to them Crillons, are we?”
“No, but it might be useful.”
She turned the computer back on and rummaging around found a Byte. “This should have enough memory to transfer it.”
The computer seemed to take forever to start up. Finally, she plugged the Byte in and copied the folder then unplugged it and turned the computer off.
“Well, how slow was that? I thought computers were instantaneous.”
“They probably are usually,” Bren agreed. “But this one may be damaged.”
“True,” she acknowledged.
“Well, it's done. Let's go, Bren,” she added, as she picked up their blasters. While Bren collected the emergency transceiver and the food.
Then both left, making sure to lock the cabin door this time.
They sat in the now uncovered skimma, activated it and uploaded the folder.
Bren tapped in the destination on the skimma’s map, and off they went to the industrial park some thirty kilometres away, each immersed in their own thoughts.
Acarea pointed to a ridge close to the park, “See that's the place we stopped at, over there. We can easily see the park from there.”
“You're right Acarea, but we’d better cover the skimma when we get there.”
“Agreed.”
Five minutes later they were there, and leaving the covered skimma just below the ridge went the rest of the way by foot. At the top, they crouched down and surveyed the area.
The two shuttle type ships were still on the ground in the park's open area. Two aliens were standing near them.
“Those floating drilling rigs seem to be out of sight now,” Acarea said.
“Good,” Bren replied.
Then took a small digital spy-glass from the back of his emergency transceiver. Now, he could see more clearly.
“Be careful of the reflection from the lens.”
“I will,” he muttered.
As he watched. One of Brendereen's own race came staggering out of one of the buildings, followed by a Crillon with a weapon in his hand.
The Crillon faced the man. There was a flash, and the man was gone, just leaving a red mist that gently settled to the ground.
Bren swore.
“Don't do anything silly Bren.”
“I won't. But look, what's that Crillon doing?”
She took the spyglass from him. “He's gone out of sight of his mates. Now, he's smelling or sniffing something in a little box.”
Looking again, she said. “Like sniffing ‘snuff’ maybe? Now he’s sitting down on top of what appears to be a tyre or something lying on the ground.”
“Let me see.”
She handed back the spyglass. He watched for a few seconds. “Right. Now’s the time to make use of our Ops training. We need to take the ‘Medic’ kit or at least a syringe with us.”
“I won’t ask why. But let’s just take the syringe, the needle’s retractable.”
“Well,” Bren said, thinking. “It’ll take us about three minutes to get onto that roof above where he's sitting. If he doesn’t move, I can drop down on him and hit him with my blaster’s ‘butt’ on the way down.”
“You hope!” she exclaimed as they started off at a trot.
Time was of the essence. They would have to abort their mission if the Crillon moved. They belly-rolled over a wall. Then, crouching to reduce the risk of being seen to a minimum, ran across a small yard containing gas bottles. Then, up a short ladder to the roof and crossing it, again crouching as low as they could like phantoms in the night.
Finally, they reached the place just above the Crillon.
Bren looked at Acarea and tapped the syringe she now held ready. She nodded. He checked his position above the Crillon one last time making sure the coast was still clear. Then slipped down over the side of the roof, landing just behind the Crillon.
Then, using the butt of his blaster, hit the alien's head hard enough to knock him out. Then, putting the blaster back in his belt, he put his hands up, just in time to break Acarea's fall.
She gave him that sort of tut-tutting look, as she knelt by the fallen Crillon, searching for, and finally finding, a vein. Then drew blood with their syringe.
Once done and with a syringe capped and safe. Bren then punched the Crillon's arm hoping to bruise it, to cover up the needle mark, if that was even possible with this alien race. He then placed the tyre over the arm to cover the bruise and signalled Acarea to go.
Three minutes later, they were back at the skimma, just below the ridge. They climbed up and lay on the top of the hill again. Then, using the digital spy-glass, Bren watched the Crillon as he stirred. He got up slowly rubbing his head. Looked at the tyre and kicked it in annoyance. Then left to team up with the others.
“That went well,” Acarea said.
“Yea, not bad for farmers,” he replied, and they both chuckled.
Taking a last look through the spyglass, Bren exclaimed in dismay, “Oh no! Look he's come back.”
“Be careful, remember the reflections from the lens.”
It was true. The Crillon had come back to the scene. They watched him, as he looked around, then felt his head, then his arm.
“He's suspicious,” Bren said, keeping his eye on the Crillon.
The Crillon looked up at the roof. Stared at it for a moment, then looked around again. Seeing nothing, he shook his head turned and went back to the others again.
“Phew! I think we're safe,” Bren said as he replaced the spy-glass and walked back to the skimma.
“Acarea, can you remember where that underground entrance was?”
“No, but I know something that does.”
“Don't tell me you entered it in the skimma's memory?”
“Catch on quick, don't you?” she answered, grinning with relief.
He grinned back and checked the outcrop's location on the skimma’s digital map. “OK, got it.”
With both of them back on the skimma, he pointed it in the right direction, and they headed out.
Parking the skimma when they were about a thousand metres away from the rocky outcrop, which was located out from, and to the left of the industrial park.
Walking over, they found the man-made opening. Bren, touching its rock wall, said,
“Look this is warm, it’s the spot that we used before.” Placed his hand firmly on the area and held it there for a good ten seconds, until they could see the three glowing lights through the rock face.
“Touch the amber light, Bren,” Acarea urged. He did, and the rock section’s ‘door’ started moved a fraction, then slid open.
Then they quickly descended on the platform, which stopped smoothly and silently on reaching the bottom.
“I
hope we can find something to check the sample of blood,” he said as they hurried along the tunnel with their Blasters at the ready.
The tunnel then opened into a vast cavern, where the small nuclear reactor was still quietly whistling to itself. They had gone about half way towards the inaccessible part at the end of the cavern, finding nothing anywhere that could help them.
When, suddenly, they heard a voice from behind them. Saying. “Who are you?”
Chapter 8
Reunited.
Frank and his crew watched as their shuttle approached Andromeda7, which appeared to swell rapidly in size as they came closer and began their swing in towards the holding bay door.
Andromeda looked the same to him. But he noticed that the newer ships had a blister on their underside that blended into their hulls. The blister was large and had a black hole at its centre.
‘Of course, it’s our new Antimatter weapon,’ Frank thought.
Unlike the Crillon's weapon, this only needed a ten-metre long guide tube between the outlet and the antimatter storage and firing unit.
He was disappointed that the Andromeda hadn’t been able to have it installed. But, she didn’t have the extra length that the newer ships had, to accommodate the massive unit that was needed to generate enough of the precious antimatter to make their new weapon viable.
He also noticed the rear of the ship still had the same slight difference in colour, even though it wasn’t needed now as the photon drive had been removed to accommodate the new Skippa sub-light drive.
As their shuttle swung around to come alongside Andromeda’s holding bay door, they could see the stars, twinkling in the background behind the other four ships as their crew shuttles also approached.
'What a beautiful sight,' he thought. 'At last, the human race was getting its act together.'
The Definitive SpaceFed Trilogy (SpaceFed StarShips Trilogy).: A thrilling, action-packed Sci-fi space adventure. (SpaceFed StarShips Series Book 8) Page 24
