It took him in the second week as he watched Dover, Hutton, Collins, Daley and Cappilo in the old Wasps and modern Sabers. They had been shaking out the operational fighters and working on the two rebuilt Wasps they had taken from the base. They were flying mock attack sorties against the Wolf as well as each other in battle training scenarios.
Usheiba watched on until finally, the former navy pilot just couldn’t take it any longer. There was still an unclaimed Wasp that had just been repaired and was yet to be assigned a pilot. It was just sitting there on the flight deck as the five pilots would fly out into space and joust back and forth amongst the stars.
His dream, the dream of his youth, a dream he had given up on eighteen years ago was now within his grasp. Ken knew that he would never be given a chance like this again. He had even tried to join up back when the war broke out four years before but they had told him that he still couldn’t be a fighter pilot. He was too old, and a shuttle pilot or ship’s helmsman was his destiny. Now, he had the only chance he would ever have and he had to take it. He explained this to a doubtful Hope as he stood there before the old captain with his head bowed. He knew his chances were slim but he was willing to eat crow or do whatever he was told to do just to fly a fighter in combat.
Hope’s faced frowned as he listened to the man’s story, including the part about trying to re-up. He knew that it was tough to give up a dream and that the man was spiteful and petty for losing his dream but even that was somewhat understandable.
“Mister Usheiba, I’m willing to give you a chance, but hear me when I say that this crew is who you’d fail if my trust in you is misplaced.”
“Sir, I give you my word. I’ll do my duty to the best of my ability, just give me a chance.”
“Raise your hand,” Hope ordered and proceeded to swear him in with Commander Richards standing by as a witness. He had even extended to him his previous rank of O-2 Lieutenant, Junior Grade.
Lt. Usheiba was then ordered to fly both fighter sorties with the other pilots as well as shuttle missions. It was the first time in his life that he was happy to hear those words - shuttle missions. He would also be in charge of shuttle maintenance and would also do time as the Wolf's helmsman. The smile on his face said it all as he left the captain’s office. He had never been so happy in his life and felt as if he was twenty-two again, especially when he went out on his first shakedown flight in the tiny Wasp.
The skilled pilot proved his worth and his talent as he quickly became one of their best fighter pilots. He had spent a lifetime maintaining and modifying his own shuttle and now along with Cappilo, it seemed that the two men were always tinkering around the fighters, trying to boost their performance.
Though Admiral Kirkland had willingly helped with repairs to the Wolf, he still hadn’t joined their cause in earnest. The crew liked him; he even had several previous friends from the veteran club among them. He had especially enjoyed working with the eager young middies, yet he still remained in Austro uniform. This was even after the other three former prisoners had joined the crew and had changed into proper Confederation duty uniforms.
This behavior puzzled many men who grew to respect the former Confederation officer. Of all people, Captain Hope seemed to understand his friend’s resolve for having taken an oath in earnest, and it was hard for a man of honor to do otherwise. Instead of pressing him to join them, he simply allowed the old warrior to help as he wished.
Mike continued in his various roles as bridge officer, assistant physical training officer, fighter pilot, armory officer, and all-around scrounger. He was working double shifts and loved it. He wasn’t alone; not only were all of the officers doing double shifts, but he never had trouble finding volunteers to help with various projects.
He had collected all of the numerous personal weapons and demolitions from the pirate base and from the derelict ships. It was a wild assortment of shotguns, assault rifles, machine pistols and handguns. He had decided along with Commander Hutton to make the old Colt M-21 caseless assault rifles and the Browning hyper-shot assault rifles the standard ship’s weapon. Each man would also have an 8mm gyro pistol or a standard automatic pistol. Ship swords and bayonets were also made available. The few gauss pistols he had he’d given out to Commander Richards, Cappilo and Dover who gladly accepted his gifts. Daley already had his Browning Star-Master gauss pistol. Mike had two more Browning’s he had taken from the Austro police; one that he had given to Mister Rabb and the other to Chief Watts, both of whom would be his ship’s chief security officers as well as the leaders of his boarding parties.
They also had the munitions taken from the Austro police officers outside of the commandant’s house as well as the weapons taken from the Karduan security officers. The Karduan rifles were copies of Confederation gauss rifles, and their pistols were old, slow-firing, EM-powered slug throwers, which were basically copied from a twenty-year-old Vorooshin design. Their pistols were DNA gene-locked – which was something that they had learned from their Confederation enemies. The DNA lock meant that you couldn’t fire their weapons even if you captured them.
Bre-Nan gladly offered to help. He had managed with ease to get the weapons to fire for him, though Mike noted that the Blue male had almost no skill or familiarity with the handling of weapons. He and Cappilo then proceeded under the strictest of safety protocols to dissemble the weapons to try to deactivate their gene-locks.
Lady Seil-Ca’s strange cane weapon became the next mystery waiting to be solved. It turned out that Bre-Nan had told them that all of the noble caste carried such pain sticks to discipline male slaves or even female subordinates. Some even fired a laser as well as its normal disabling pain beam.
The pain function seemed to utilize a focused wave energy beam, which made the water molecules in a person’s cells vibrate, heating the skin and causing intense pain. It was a weapon that created a millimeter-long EM waves similar to microwaves, although much more powerful and shorter in wave range. Such waves were intended to create intense pain, yet remain nonlethal or permanently disabling.
After some consideration, he presented the cane to Doc Beilor who thought it was just a lovely gift until he showed her its true function.
Edie frowned and then showed him a large caliber stainless steel revolver that she kept in her doctor’s bag. “It’s my granddaddy’s old Smith and Wesson, Model 629, .44 Magnum,” she said. She then opened the slug thrower’s six shot cylinder to show him the ultra-modern armor piercing rocket rounds that the old pistol was loaded with.
Mike smiled as he shook his head in disbelief. “Remind me not to make you mad.”
She smiled sweetly in return and snapped the cylinder of the heavy weapon shut with a simple twist of her wrist.
“Dear boy, you could never do that,” she said, patting him gently on the cheek, and then gladly accepting his odd gift. Before he left to carry out his duties, he was forced to have two cups of Earl Grey tea and a half a dozen chocolate chip cookies. He also had to promise to take it a little easier on the older veterans who had been coming to her with a multitude of injuries stemming from hand-to-hand combat training to general physical training.
Mike also had been tasked to help Commander Hutton with the interrogation of the Karduans - a job he wasn’t looking forward to doing. Gunny Masters would be invaluable from his police experience but he had pointed out that the noblewoman could read him. He also was the person who reminded them that the Lady didn’t seem to be able to read young Mr. Collins.
Hutton’s training had also made him a likely part of the interrogation team. His years as a commando had prepared him to actively steel his mind against mental intrusion. In Special Imperial Forces Commando School, he had been taught that complex math, deep meditative thought, and even intense emotions such as anger could block telepathy.
Bre-Nan was very forthright in his help, having lived his whole life under such mental scrutiny. It seemed that the men of Kardua had grown use to either filling their minds
with images of simple base desires like hunger or fear. Focusing intensely on only one thing like a scratch on the floor or a blemish on the wall helped to discipline their thoughts and make them uninteresting to read.
He explained that such safeguards could protect them because when they were scanned by a noblewoman, it was usually only briefly and only when they wanted something. The noblewomen often became lazy with their scans, unwilling to read the thoughts of males and accepting them as being filled with stupid or even childish images of petty wants and desires. Every Karduan male spent years training their sons to mask their thoughts, passing on their only means of defense and privacy.
Some, both human and Karduan, had taken a different tack and tried to fill their minds with nothing at all. Allowing their thoughts to be a still pond or as blank as a board, empty of desire or contemplation. This was similar to Hutton’s training and that of numerous religious and martial orders. The high focus of intense prayer or the training of martial arts allowed a person to reach this level of stillness, or as it was called in Japanese martial arts, the Void or No Mind.
The martial term Mushin literally means “No Mind” in which thought and action became one without hesitation. Fudoshin, or the “Immovable Mind,” was another such mental discipline. This one allowed for such focus that the mind could not be distracted from its set task or center. The practice of Kata, a shadowboxing type of patterns of pre-designated moves and mental encounters along with traditional Zazen seated meditation gave an advanced student of the martial arts a heighten level of control and protection.
Both Mike and Hutton had trained in the latter method, being familiar with the martial terms and concepts of the structured mind of a warrior. Commander Hutton had also spent years of his youth training in a highly religious structure, having grown up in the care of the Knights of the Order of St. Michael.
Bre-Nan had willingly given them all the information he could on Lady Seil-Ca. She was a member of one of the twelve ruling houses of Kardua, her mother was Lady Seil-Den, and was a member of the Matriarchal High Council. Her mother had been a fearsome ship commander and fleet mistress in the Karduan Civil War, rising quickly to power in a war that had been fought after the Kazad had removed the Voroosh from power. This Karduan Civil War had been waged to fill that power vacuum. The individual planet mistresses, who had once been servants to the reptile men, now each house vied for unity and control of the Karduan worlds they held.
He had served Lady Seil-Ca for the last year, having been given to her by a subordinate who wanted to curry favor with her. Bre-Nan had found her to be a fair, if a demanding mistress - one who wanted things done to perfection and who recognized the need to gain power. He worked hard for her, catering to her every want or need. Service to the Lady held one charm for him - the chance to leave the confines of Karduan space and maybe give him the opportunity to escape. One that he successfully guarded in his mind everyday of his service until he finally found himself - free.
Despite himself, Mike liked the Blue even though he was once the enemy; the Blue was almost refreshing in his desire to be free and to be treated as an equal. It was hard for Collin’s to now think of him as an enemy or even as a traitor to his own people. It almost seemed that in Karduan culture, he was really a slave to the Karduan females just as their whole race had once been slaves to the Voroosh. That thought made him think of Earth’s own brief taste of slavery, and he shuttered.
The Voroosh or “Reds” as they were called due to their reddish scales, had conquered Earth in a matter of weeks, and for a little over a year they had ruled the broken world until the remnants of the Earth’s military had risen up to cast them out. With the help of the diminutive Kazad, who had been the first slaves of the Voroosh, mankind had broken the yoke of slavery and in so doing, freed both the Kazad and ultimately the Karduans.
If the Karduans won this current war, Earth might just face another conquering master or in this case, a mistress who would make them their slaves. Heck, if they made their own males into slave than what would they do to the men of Earth?
After the first three weeks of work on the ship and mental preparation, they were finally ready to break the Karduan’s isolation. Before the first meeting with the female security officers, they became aware of their growing desperation and gradual mental breakdown from their isolation ever since they had been captured. Both guardswomen had taken to talking to themselves, singing, and even praying in odd humming chants. One had screamed at her captors for honorable combat while the other, who was by far the younger, drew into herself, becoming increasingly quiet and depressed.
All of their ranting had been in Karduan, which the computer easily translated. Words that seemed to be slang or were not in the database were translated by Bre-Nan. He also helped them to understand some of nuances of their culture.
The Karduan ambassador Lady Seil-Ca acted much differently. She had started her stay with a brief but loud tirade stating in perfect if slightly British accented English the numerous laws they had violated in taking an ambassador under previous agreements of truce. After there was no response, she seemed to accept her situation and proceeded to regiment her days. Every morning she rose and did a series of calisthenics followed by ritual chanting like those of her guardswomen.
Bre-Nan explained that in their people’s culture, the women believed in an ultimate force of the goddess that ruled the universe and all that was within it. When he asked about human religions, Mike explained that humanity had a variety of religions with some believing in multiple gods and goddesses. Others religions had fallen to myths, and yet others who believed in one single god or creator.
This revelation amazed Bre-Nan, and he proceeded to immerse himself in the various teachings of the principle religions of Earth. What astounded him the most was men were equal to women and that many religions saw a male as god or at least one of their major gods. Some religions had no goddess at all but believed that a person was brought back time and again to be reborn in various forms until they themselves reached a state of godlike being. This was similar to the monotheists’ religions that not only believed in a single god, but in an idea that a person had something called a soul, which was in itself a form of immortality.
To a Blue like Bre-Nan, this was all very confusing and wonderful. The men of his people received only minimal education, and they were taught that the Karduan Goddesses were supreme and that men were preordained to be servants to their females. It was the right and proper way, and how it had always been done since the beginning of recorded knowledge.
When the Voroosh came, the lizard men used this system to their advantage and allowed the women to continue in their roles as political and religious leaders. The Karduan men were only given a greater degree of education to make them better servants, and in some cases were trained to perform in the role of common foot soldiers.
After the Kazad removed the Voroosh, they broke off all contact with the Karduan worlds and with Earth. This allowed both cultures to resume their natural progression or at least that’s what the dwarves’ thought. The humans had gained the keys to space travel and were not about to return them.
Across the galaxy, the other new spacefaring race had also learned these secrets stolen from the Kazad. The Karduan caste system had never been disrupted and had simply carried on as it had before, though it did change over the hundred-plus years of more or less unwilling servitude. The onetime arts oriented and peaceful matriarchal society was now as warlike as their former masters. Many Vorooshin ideas and customs had been adopted including a growing inter-house rivalry. The Voroosh had done this on purpose to keep the Karduan Houses from forming any type of alliance and rebelling against them.
When the Voroosh were taken from the picture, the Great Houses fell on each other and a war erupted that had lasted until the last few years before they united under one government. They then attacked the same people who had helped them to become free - the people of Earth. The war was not only to de
fend their borders but it served a purpose to unite the fragile government as one people so that each matron’s house had to cooperate against a common foe. The defeat of humanity would give them complete control of known space and another source of slave labor. It was their divine destiny - one that they would kill to fulfill.
Bre-Nan had numerous questions as he learned more and more about religion. The crew did their best to answer them, though many of their answers created only more questions. In desperation, Mike directed him to the Padre who, though reluctant at first to interact with a Karduan, in the end he was a patient guide to this new seeker of faith. Now the Blue couldn’t be found without a bible in his hand and was more than willing to discuss either old or new testaments with anyone who would listen.
Collins wondered if he was the first Karduan to become a Christian and if he would be the last? No matter the eventual outcome, it was clear that the Blue had not only embraced his independence but had also found one of its principal tenants: freedom of religion.
Lady Seil-Ca had also spent numerous hours in silent mediation, which reminded most of her jailers of a Buddhist monk in a Zen-like trance. Bre-Nan again explained that she was practicing her mental discipline and was trying to improve and extend her mental powers. This drew some concern from the command staff. They were unsure of the limits of the telepath’s powers, and were scared that she might be able to control a person’s thoughts.
Again, Bre-Nan came to the rescue with information and advice. It seemed that only the most powerful of telepaths had the ability to influence others and even then, it was only in a limited fashion as well as being incredibly draining. For the most part, mind readers could only scan surface thoughts. To perform a deep probe, a telepath had to actually touch a person and maintain contact to go beyond the surface level.
The Log of the Gray Wolf (Star Wolf Squadron Book 1) Page 21
