by JS Rowan
Two of the guard wolves went flying past her and out the door. Ashley collapsed on the floor, her legs turning to rubber now that she was safe. She could hardly breathe and was shaking violently.
Admiral came over and picked her up gently. He carried her to a chair. He told his attending wolf to find a blanket and some coffee for her. Someone had told him about Leona buying coffee when she redeemed Commander Gupta’s commandos, and he had obtained a small supply.
“What are you doing out here so late?” asked Admiral.
“You sent for me?” replied Ashley, more as a question than a statement.
“I did not—it was probably a Master ruse to get you out there alone, late at night, with no help around,” thought Admiral. “The Master prisoners are becoming a serious problem,” Admiral continued. “This is the fifth hijacking they have done to one of my wolves, and I do not like it. I do not know which one it is or how they are doing it.” Admiral growled his deep bass rumble. “The wolves are not the same after being controlled by them. All they want to do is the Master-imposed task. They don’t eat or sleep—they just keep doing the task or die trying,” thought Admiral.
“What happens if they are successful at their task?” asked Ashley.
“The last controlled werewolf just opened an air lock and walked out into the vacuum. Maybe that is where I should send the whole group of them.”
“No, please. While I’m sure the Supes deserve spacing, I could not live with myself if we did that. It goes against all the best traditions of the human civilization. Give me a day to come up with another plan, please,” said Ashley.
“Very well, you have a day,” replied Admiral.
At that moment, a human fighter brought Ashley the promised cup of coffee. It was even mixed with something resembling milk and sugar, like a “double double” from Canada! Bliss.
“I have heard that the Jupiter Station Alpha adopted the name Frosty. That was said as a joke by O’Neil. You might want to talk the Alpha out of that,” said Ashley, hugging the coffee mug.
Admiral started laughing with deep barks, wagging his tail. “You should have heard him when he found out! He is looking for O’Neil now. Don’t worry, I wouldn’t expect that he will suffer more than a few broken bones.”
“Why doesn’t he just adopt some other name?”
“What? And admit that O’Neil got him on a joke? Never! It is better to settle this like true Alphas.”
“But O’Neil is not an Alpha, or a werewolf!” said Ashley.
“Then you don’t know him very well, my small human friend,” replied Admiral.
Communication between the ships was becoming more difficult. The Space Dog and the Victory were communicating via a tightly focused laser beam. It was like a fiber optic cable without the cable. It was impossible for the Earth or the intruding Supe ship to intercept communications, or even to know that they were communicating.
However, there was now a fifteen-minute delay between sending and receiving. Conversations were limited to a series of video messages with long waits in between. It would be worse once they reached Earth, when there would be a forty-five-minute delay.
Leona had just received the latest message from Admiral.
“Leona, I hope you are well. I have decided what to do with the Masters we have captured. I’m giving them better choices than they have ever given any other species.” On the screen image, Admiral put his ears back. “We cannot keep them here—they are causing too much mischief and death with their ability to take over our people’s minds. So I am giving them three choices: they can become werewolves, with no memory of their former selves, but they will be free; they can choose to terminate themselves, and we will give them a blaster loaded for one shot; or they can be sold back to the next passing Master ship that we don’t capture, as slaves with no property but the clothes they are wearing. The image of Admiral bared his fangs. “The choices are running sixty percent for werewolf conversion and thirty-nine percent for termination. Only one percent are opting to be sold back. While they are waiting to be sold, the Supes will have to wear thought-helmets and red collars. If they try to remove the helmets and take over anyone’s mind, we are going to detonate the collars.” Admiral’s image became more “fangy” yet. “I thought more of them would want to be sold back to their people, but I guess they do not want to be slaves of their own kind. They already know how they would be treated. That just shows that the supposedly superior Masters are really cowards lacking any pretense of honor.”
Leona smiled grimly. Yes indeed, the “think they’re superior” Supes were a despicable bunch.
“I like your idea of forming a combined space fleet separate from Earth,” continued Admiral. “I propose that we form a command council. I have handed over command of the Jupiter Station to Frosty. He is a very old Alpha that I have known for quite a long time, although his choice of name is new. You can ask O’Neil about it when he gets out of the Med Bay. End of message.”
Heh, thought Leona. Frosty!
The next message was from Thor, which surprised Leona. She had not realized fourteen days had gone by so quickly.
In the image on the screen, Thor had drooping ears and calico tri-color chest fur, but otherwise he seemed all right.
“Hi, sweetie, I just wanted to say sorry for getting myself trapped on this other ship, Victory. I’m all better from getting shot by the auto-turret and blown up a little bit.”
Leona gulped. Blown up “a little bit”?
“Ashley, O’Neil, and I are working on strategies for your battle with the Supe ship attacking Earth. Ashley has found a way of running our scenarios on the battle computer. So far we have not found a strategy that doesn’t just involve shooting up the other ship. It will be very hard to do, as you want and capture it intact. We don’t think you have the element of surprise, so it’s hard to say. Whatever you do, don’t get yourself blown up. Love you. End of message.”
Leona smiled at the irony of Thor telling her not to get blown up, after the number of times in the last couple months that he’d wound up unconscious in the Med Bay.
The Jupiter space station had two main purposes when it was built. It was a refueling spot and trading center. The station was also designed to build new ships from the resources of the “Sol” solar system.
The station was teeming with robots for doing the myriad of things required for construction and maintenance. Even so, some of the items that a new ship would need when it was first put into service had to be built in more sophisticated facilities.
Such an item was the laser-cannon, like the one that had cooked the Earth’s laser facility when the Supes first arrived. The lasers required gems not found in the Sol system. So the Supes would trade for them with things that could be obtained in the system, like slaves. Many, many slaves.
The station had in its stores twenty-four large ship laser-cannons. These were designed for use on a ship like Victory. Normally there were only two cannons per ship. The cannons had their own fusion reactors to provide power. As a result of this, they took up a lot of room.
Admiral decided that two cannons and their reactors could fit in the cargo areas of the shuttles. Nothing else but its small crew would fit in such a shuttle, but it would be armed to the teeth. As far as anyone knew, no one had armed shuttles like this before.
Ashley was working with the new trainees learning to pilot the shuttles and the ship. It helped that they were all former military pilots. There were two marines from the United States, one pilot from the Israeli Air Force, two Royal Navy pilots, and one Russian cosmonaut. It had been twenty-six days since capturing the station. These men had been working as many hours as they could, day and night, to train themselves on the Victory’s computer system.
Oleg the Russian was the best at piloting a capital ship, with his Israeli copilot, Saul Elhanan. The two marines, Captains Vince and Copeland, and the two Royal Navy pilots, Lieutenants Stanley and Robinson, worked as two-man teams flying the large shutt
les. It was one man’s job to fly the ship, while the other operated the armaments.
“No, no, no, gentlemen. You have to stay in my gravity field until I go to maximum acceleration. Otherwise, you will be an obvious target out there,” said Oleg to the shuttle pilots.
They were practicing a maneuver that would allow the shuttles to hide behind the Victory until the last possible moment.
Meanwhile, Jupiter Station had been provided with ten of the laser-cannons, pointing in every direction, including one over each Docking Bay. If these had been operating when Victory and Space Dog had approached, the two ships would have been blown to space debris. The station’s gun crew was working at “shooting down” the ships as they tried to attack. The low-power test setting made sure that no one got hurt.
Oleg was about to start the drill again when he noticed something on the console.
“Ashley, Admiral—we have a contact from one of the radar drones.”
“When was the contact?” asked Admiral.
“I saw it come in just now, but it was sent five-point-five hours ago. There were three ships of the same kind as Victory. The contact was traveling at zero-point-three of light-speed. That puts it twelve-point-eight-three hours from us. We have another sensor drone at two light-hours away, so we should get another reading in about ten hours,” said Oleg.
“Stop the practice drills. Get those shuttles to the defensive positions. Ashley, notify all personnel, and the station, that we are going to have visitors.”
“Right way, Admiral.”
“Also, Ashley, get the telescope to have a look at the contacts’ estimated position. Let’s see if we see them and determine their size and armament.”
“Will do, but I thought these ships could not be picked up on radar.”
“This is not radio radar like Earth has. It is a broad spectrum, laser and radio detection and ranging system. If we used an acronym, it would be called BS LARDAR,” said Oleg.
“Sounds French,” said Ashley.
Admiral gave her a quizzical look, but the humans smiled.
Ashley sent out the notifications, and then she set to work with the telescope. The telescope in the ship was a sixteen-meter single mirror one. Compared to the first human space telescope, the Hubble (at 2.4 meters), it was huge.
She had to take the last known position and heading of the ships and estimate for the 5.5 hours that the data had taken to travel to the Victory. Then she had to calculate a position along that route where the light would have had time to reach her. She found the ships.
“Putting the view up on the main viewer now,” Ashley announced.
Admiral stood silently for a time, his ears pricked forward and his lips slightly lifted from his fangs. Finally his tail started to wag slowly.
“This is a good sign—they are running with all lights on. I don’t recognize the clan markings. Ashley, please run those markings through the database. Find out if they are at war with the clan we took these ships from.”
Ashley had never done this kind of task before, but she wasn’t surprised that the Supes had such a database in their computer. After a few minutes she had an answer.
“They are not formally at war with them, but they are not friendly to the Green clan that had these ships.”
“Right. Ashley, please broadcast the standard greeting that the Station Master had pre-recorded. Let’s see what kind of response we get. In the meantime, ask Frosty to come aboard so we can have a chat,” thought Admiral. “Oleg, bring the ship in for docking at the station.”
“Sorry to wake you, Leona, but you asked to be notified if there was any change in the status of the ship at Earth,” said Hiroshi via the console.
“Uh, no problem.”
Leona sat up, struggling to wake. She had just been dreaming of a nice warm beach and Thor. Somehow Thor had been wearing swim trunks, but in her dream he was a somewhat furry human, with a very toothy grin and a calico beard. She became aware that Hiroshi was politely waiting for her to shed the fog of sleep, and the dream slipped away into the mists of forgetfulness.
“The ship has gone dark,” Hiroshi said, once he knew that she was awake. “It doesn’t appear to be orbiting Earth anymore.”
That news roused Leona with a spurt of adrenaline. “Where is it?”
“We don’t know. It went to the far side of Earth as part of its orbit. Then it didn’t come back around. It has either left orbit or is hiding from us on the far side.”
“OK, I’ll be on the Command Deck in ten minutes. Call Commander Gupta. Have him meet me there.”
Leona broke the connection. She went to the washroom to freshen up and then dressed quickly. Her quarters were very close to the Command Deck. She was there in less than the ten minutes she had quoted.
“Are we sure yet that it has left orbit?” asked Leona.
“No, we just stopped seeing it,” said Hiroshi.
“Let’s see the recording of the last orbit we saw,” said Leona.
“On screen.”
“Play that side by side with an orbit from three days ago,” said Leona.
The two images were played as requested. In the newer image, the ship stayed on screen for just a few seconds. It had not gone a quarter of the way across the planetary disk.
“Wow, those Supes are moving much quicker. The ship was definitely accelerating to break orbit. However, they did not want us to see a full power burn,” said Leona.
Commander Gupta arrived on the Command Deck and Leona brought him up to speed.
“Can we look along all possible routes?” Leona asked.
“I have been looking, with no luck,” said Hiroshi.
“So much for the element of surprise,” said Leona.
“It has been my experience that often the element of surprise only exists in the mind of the commander,” thought Gupta wryly.
“Good point!” Leona chuckled. “Hiroshi, let’s find out where that other ship is. Please set our radar to maximum and scan the area where we might expect the ship to be. How long will it be until we can expect to see some returns?” Leona watched as Hiroshi started the radar scans.
“Given his distance from us, at least twenty minutes,” said Hiroshi.
“Sometimes even light-speed seems really slow,” said Leona, her lips quirking upward.
“Why don’t we put the element of surprise in the other commander’s mind?” thought Commander Gupta.
“What have you got in mind?” asked Leona.
“First, please tell me, what is the status of the gravity units that are being repaired?”
“They finished being repaired forty minutes ago. The maintenance bots are just doing final testing before we bring that system online,” said Hiroshi.
“Do we have any of those remote radar systems on board?”
“Yes, Commander, we have six of them. I think I know where you might be going with this,” said Leona.
Commander Gupta stood looking at his thoughts for a minute, flexing and retracting his claws several times. Then his eyes focused on Leona. She was not sure, but it was almost as if the commander winked at her. Then he addressed Hiroshi again.
“Hiroshi, bring that gravity system online as soon as possible. Plot an alternate course for Earth around the far side of the planet—with plenty of clearance around the moon,” thought Gupta.
Fifteen minutes later, Hiroshi sighed and straightened his back. His vertebrae clicked faintly. “The gravity system is tested and ready for use.”
“Launch one of those radar systems, set at the maximum strength and aimed at Earth. Prepare to change course to that new heading you plotted,” said Leona.
Three minutes later Hiroshi smiled. “Radar system deployed. Changing course to the new heading.”
“Kill all exterior lights, go to radio silence. Now give us everything she’s got, Hiroshi. Maximum speed,” said Leona.
“Hiroshi, make sure you stay out of the radar beam of our sensor probe. No point in telling our adversary
what we are doing,” thought Commander Gupta.
Leona set the telescope so that it was focused on the radar system. She thought about the times she had gone fishing with her dad when she was a girl. He used to say, the kind of fish you catch depends on the bait you use. It was time to go fishing, and the radar system was the bait.
CHAPTER 10
Homeward
December 4, 2038, 1:29 p.m.
Leona had never seen the Earth from this vantage point before. The view was beautiful. When she was taken by the Supes’ werewolves, Leona hadn’t seen anything but the inside of the transport shuttle and a prison cell. But now, she drank in the view—so many clouds, such a thin blue layer of atmosphere!
The sight of the Earth made Leona homesick. She missed the smell of the air on her farm. She wondered if she would ever see her house again. A deep yearning overtook her, for home. She ached to hear the swish of leaves in the treetops, the music of frogs and crickets, and the sound and smell of rain.
But Leona realized that she—and the crew of the Space Dog—were the defense of Earth. In order for her to enjoy her life on planet Earth, she would have to turn her back on the safety of every human being, including herself.
And what about Thor? Leona’s throat constricted. Could she abandon him, her beloved Wolf, for the sake of clouds and wind? No, she would deliver the passengers that wanted to return to Earth, but then she would go back to space and the war against the Supes.
The Earth was growing in the window at an incredible rate. Ordinarily, it was hard to imagine the speed they were traveling until there was an object to compare with and put it in perspective. The ship’s telescope automatically adjusted the picture that was displayed, so it took away from the sense of speed. But nothing compared to looking out a window.
It had been almost two months since they left Jupiter. They had been playing “hide the spaceship” with the other ship for ten days now. The Space Dog had accelerated to .01 of light-speed and was approaching the Earth and its moon from the direction of the North Pole. They were still 1.5 million kilometers from Earth. Their closest approach would take them within six hundred thousand kilometers. They would be past the Earth in nine minutes.
