“Are the people in there forever?” Dr. Van Loon asked, wondering at the possible implications of eternal servitude.
The League was personally very pleased with that choice of words. Not every human considered other races people, particularly not Second Lieutenant Abigail Elizabeth Jones.
The frog cleared its throat. “No, the chosen members serve a term of fifty standard years and are then released. Looking, we might add, no older than when they entered. Suspended animation means just that."
As the humans reacted to that startling news, a tiny door opened in the side of the pedestal and out buzzed a fly. The Galactic League snared the insect in mid-air with its sticky tongue and closed its jaw with a satisfied snap.
Prof. Rajavur took a deep breath. “Getting down to business, when will be our trial?"
“Trial?” the League repeated. “Oh, that. Its already over."
Captain Keller arched an eyebrow. “I beg your pardon?"
It took the League a second to realize that was an expression of disbelief and not a plea for clemency.
“Allow me to explain,” the frog began didactically. “As you entered this room, telepathic machines read your minds, assimilated the data and fed it to us."
The amphibian rubbed a tiny webbed hand across its bumpy brow. “We must say that we haven't seen a comedy of errors to match this since the committee to name Big."
“So what is your decision?” asked Prof. Rajavur.
The frog gave a leathery smile. “You will be pleased to know that Terra has been found innocent and will be immediately admitted to League status."
Relief washed over the humans and they relaxed tense muscles to smile. Delighted beyond words, Trell hugged himself with all four arms. The Avantor and The 16 suddenly felt very foolish with their disrupters hanging out and holstered the weapons. From enemies to allies with the single flick of a froggish tongue. Ah well, that's life in a city on Big.
But the Galactic League had not forgotten about the two Gee officers. Their punishment would come later, and in a most devious form. Oh, that dramatic streak.
“The crew of the Ramariez is also found innocent,” the frog went on. “Or rather, guilty with mitigating circumstances."
I hear a but, thought Rajavur, Keller and Sakadea.
“However,” the League continued.
Close enough.
“Quite accidentally in your admirable quest for the stars, you have caused the Gee's to look like idiots. A not all together bad thing in private, but in public it could undermine the very fabric of galactic society. Interstellar crime is hard enough to control as it is. So in order to preserve the integrity of the galaxy, a public trial must be held in which you will be found guilty and sentenced."
“To Galopticon 7?” The 16 asked, who now had a sneaking suspicion where this was leading to.
“That is what we will tell the public,” the frog acknowledged regally. “Actually, their place of incarceration will be someplace far more exciting."
“Where?” Prof. Rajavur inquired, before Captain Keller or anybody else could ask.
The Galactic League blinked. “Why, the planet Gee, of course. Where else?"
EPILOGUE
In the subsequent lunar rotations, galactic society adjusted itself like a robot automatically fine tuning its own powerplant.
First and foremost, the blockade about Earth was removed, and in a brilliant piece of diplomacy, the nation of Greece redeemed itself by giving the Galactic League the isle of Crete as a planetary landing base. The pleasant weather, lack of price and the begging on hands and knees were sufficient inducement for acceptance.
The Gunderson Corporation went interplanetary, Ms. Bolivar got a raise, and McDougherty was fired for excessive cruelty to the employees, after which the softball team began winning games on a regular basis.
A mentally disturbed wino claiming to be Hector Ramariez, was adopted by a cult of Hector worshippers as their hero's reincarnation, and he lived a long and happy life indulging in wine, women and revival meetings that culminated with egg tosses in Central Park.
Jose de san Martin, the Secretary General of the UN, found himself a very busy man as hordes of planets had issued awards and bounties for the death of Leader Idow, Gasterphaz, Squee and Boztwank. Unexpectedly inundated with hard cash, Earth used the tidal wave of funds to modernize the entire planet to contemporary galactic standards, eliminate street gangs, repair the hole in the ozone layer, and build a really fine luxury hotel on the nice side of the moon.
Curiously enough, there was no bounty on Trell as nobody had known of his existences prior to the trial, and the biggest reward for Boztwank was issued by his own world. Proof that vengeance, like charity, begins at home.
Lt. Amanda Jackson of the NYPD SWAT, and NATO Colonel Robert Weiss were married and opened a chain of martial art schools, specializing in surprise attacks and misdirection.
Out of the hospital at last, Agent Taurus decided to quit his profession and retired to the suburbs of London, buying a cottage right alongside a nuclear power plant. Just in case.
Dominic Mastramonico, the Italian ambassador to the UN, and the person who first conceived the idea of the FCT, was chosen as Earth's official representative to the Galactic League. The elderly gentleman had no objection to living an additional fifty years, and looked forward to dancing on the graves of his political opponents who had laughed at the idea of a First Contact Team.
On the planet Koolgoolig, Dr. Paul Van Loon (in disguise) was placed in charge of a maximum security greenhouse to help with the replanting of the Koolgoolagan race. It was a hard row to hoe (so to speak) but the physician was content, knowing that the Galactic Medal of Smartness waited for him upon his release. And he could have his pick as the Chief Surgeon in any hospital anywhere in the entire galaxy! Including Boston.
When news of the trial finally reached him, the disgusted freelance reporter, Bachalope Thintfeesel left the planetary system he had been so sure the humans would go to. The crimson salt water fishoid sighed deeply. When he missed a call that was this important, perhaps it was time for him to change jobs. But aside from working as a newsgatherer, what else was the red herring good for?
The asteroid, Buckle, underwent a purge of almost biblical proportions, and the status of every other secret weapon cache was carefully checked. Many varied and interesting things were found, but happily Leader Silverside proved to be an only child.
During the fight with Silverside, Einda had rushed into the office to find a mortally wounded Chisel. Using the adaptive protoflesh of her own body to staunch his wounds, she carried the unconscious boy from the battle zone and escaped in a stolen starship. Hurriedly, the medical robots on board effected repairs on the human, but luckily his wounds proved to be minimal as his accidental body armor of knives stopped the majority of the anti-personnel darts. The holes in flesh, organs and ruptured arteries were easily fixed, along with a particularly nasty abnormality in his brain that confused the robot med tech no end. It almost appeared as if the child had been allowed to be born with the disorder. Now Einda realized why Chisel had proposed to her.
Bracing herself for the worst, she waited patiently by his bed for the boy to awaken. The memory of the confusion on his face and how it turned into a radiant smile when he saw her, remained with the female for the rest of their long life together.
Fleeing to the other side of the galaxy, the newlyweds used his two pound bag of thulium to buy a small mansion and open a legitimate tavern upwind of a downtown spaceport. A bar which Chisel insisted be named MacDonalds, a word he told everybody meant ‘a distinguished place for fun and good times’ in his native language.
The giks staged a bloodless revolution, and won the right to dissimulate whenever they wanted to. Even though nobody had ever stopped them from doing it before.
On the planet Gee, Captain Keller and the crew of the Ramariez took great pleasure in teaching classes to the Great Golden Ones on Basic Evasion, Elementary Tactic
s and Combat Made Simple. The golden warriors just had to grin and take it, plus take notes. However, every night in the privacy of her cubicle, Lt. Jones showered and scrubbed herself from the close association with so damn many aliens. Bleh.
The sole known surviving member of the ill fated Bloody Deckers, Drill received a full pardon, assumed his real name of Thomas John Glenn and joined the UN Space Marines.
In basic training, the first thing Private Glenn was taught was the proper name of his assault rifle: The Furstenburg. Yes, it was awkward and a bit clumsy, but deadly in combat. It was PFC. Glenn (drunk on wine liberated from the locked supply cabinet in the PX), who wrote the justly famous phrase, “First in peace, first in war, Furstenburg!” Then he burped and passed out.
Landing on RporR was officially made illegal.
With joyful celebrations, the FCT was reunited and began immediate work on their new job as the First Contact Team for the Galactic League, which included designing a mobile Command Bunker to be fitted inside the reconditioned Ramariez. In their off duty hours, the humans introduced the game of poker to the Gees and did serious damage to the planetary economy before the rule of table stakes was invoked.
And then, there was the terrible punishment of Avantor, the junior grade avantor, and The 16.
* * * *
Summoning their resolve, the Gee officers knocked on the door of the office assigned to their new commanding officer. A voice told them to enter.
Dressed in casual duty fatigues, Lt. Sakadea glanced up from his pile of paperwork at their approach and grinned.
“Avantor! The 16! What a pleasant surprise! Please, have a seat,” he said, gesturing at a couple of chairs.
“Thank you, sir, but no,” The 16 replied in a stiffly formal manner, handing the puzzled officer a featureless sheet of thin gray plastic.
At Sakadea's touch, cryptic symbols appeared on the sheet and the human reached for his English/Gee dictionary.
“We have been assigned to your military unit for retraining,” the avantor translated, the words stinging on her lips like lashes from a tiny whip.
The human went pale. Oh no, anything but that.
Avantor and The 16 felt sick in their stomachs, misinterpreting his expression as annoyance. Not even aliens wanted their company after their series of monumental blunders, and who could blame them?
With a mounting feeling of helplessness, the Marine officer scanned the plastic sheet, reading what few words he could. “If I have this right, it says here that you are supposed to report to me tomorrow at 0900."
“Tomorrow, then,” the avantor snapped, and the Gees pivoted on their heels to leave.
“Wait!” Sakadea cried franticly.
They stopped, and The 16 turned. “Is it tomorrow already, sir?” he asked sarcastically.
The lieutenant rose from his chair and hurried about the desk. “No, but by then it would be too late."
The 16 looked puzzled. “I do not understand."
Lt. Sakadea ignored him. “Avantor, I don't know how your people handle this, but I have always been very sexually attracted to you and would like to engage in fizzlorp.” Kurt Sakadea hoped he had said that right, the medical manual which stated their races were sexually compatible did not have a pronouncement chart.
Both Avantor and The 16 blinked in surprise, and then slowly smiled. With only each other for sex on the old X-47-D, things had been pretty darn dull in bed. Now they were outcasts among their associates. Perhaps a mass joining with the humans is just what they needed to work off some tension and cement their new working relationship. What the Void, it couldn't hurt.
The 16 touched her hand, Sounds good to me, my liege.
Then let's do it, studmuffin, she sent in return.
“Accepted,” Avantor said, feeling a preliminary rush of passion tingle at her golden lions. “Gather four of your friends and meet 16 and I back at our room in say, ten Earth minutes?"
Kurt hesitated. “All males?” he asked.
In feather softness, the female reached out to caress his cheek. “That would be boring,” she murmured in reply.
“Definitely boring,” The 16 said, adding his two copper units. He wondered if human females could mikgorgle? They certainly were equipped for it!
Reeling slightly from raw lust, Lt. Sakadea felt his face burn at her touch. Hot damn, she was his kind of woman! The Marine glanced at his watch. “Ten minutes and counting!"
Very excited, The 16 scampered from the office. As Avantor strolled slowly away, already starting to unbutton her uniform top to expose the amber swell of her full breasts, the female Gee coyly added over her shoulder, “I'll bring the nose flute."
THE END
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
NICK POLLOTTA has written over 70 novels, ranging from Military/Thrillers to the best-selling Fantasy/Humor trilogy, Bureau 13, with over a million copies sold worldwide. (available at www.WildsidePress.com) Nick resides in northern Illinois with his beautiful wife Melissa, three computers, two cats and an antiquarian book collection that someday will crush their house.
PHIL FOGLIO started as a fan artist back in the early 70s, for which he won two Fan Artist Hugos. Since then, he has worked as an illustrator for MAGIC, the Gathering, and is producing a monthly comic What's New With Phil & Dixie for Dragon magazine. He has written several short stories, done book covers for projects as diverse as the Klingon Language Version of Hamlet, Robert Asprin's Myth Adventures novels, and a memoir of San Francisco's gay leather scene. He has worked primarily in comics, where he has scripted such series as Dynamo Joe, Starblazers and Plastic Man, adapted stories by Harlan Ellison and Robert Asprin. Through Studio Foglio he self-publishes the comic books: Buck Godot—Zap Gun For Hire, MythAdventures, XXXenophile and his newest series, Girl Genius. He lives in Seattle with his lovely and talented wife Kaja, and extremely loud son, Victor. Their work can be seen, and purchased, from their website at www.studiofoglio.com. This is his first novel.
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Visit www.Wildside.com for information on additional titles by this and other authors.
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