by Ryk Brown
“No problem,” Josh agreed. “On course and speed.”
“Jumping in three……two……one……jump.”
* * *
Abby sat behind her makeshift desk inside one of the few solid structures in the Terran settlement on Tanna. She had been reviewing the proposed fabrication schedule for going on three Tannan hours. It was boring, mind-numbing work, but she had volunteered to work on the planning committee in the hope of not only helping the fledgling settlement, but also to be in a position to hear news of Earth as soon as it arrived. The settlement’s ‘town hall’ as it were, was located next to the spaceport that the Tannans had constructed before the first Terran refugees had even set foot on their world.
The Tannans had done a lot to help them. They were a technologically advanced society, but lacked the population necessary to support a large industrial base. Because of this, the Terrans were forced to fend for themselves with the resources eagerly provided by their hosts. It was a hard life, but it was safe.
“How does it look,” the young woman asked from the doorway to Abby’s office.
“Honestly, I don’t think we can do much better than what has already been proposed,” Abby said, offering the data pad to the woman. “Making more fabricators is not going to help unless the amount of processed material needed to keep them running is there, which it is not. I’m afraid we will have to make do with this schedule for now.”
“Then I should tell the director that the schedule is approved?”
“Might as well,” Abby answered.
A thunderous clap was heard in the distance. The young woman’s eyes grew wide with fear, remembering the sounds of Jung bombs falling on the Earth in previous attacks. “What was that?” she exclaimed.
“It was a jump flash!” Abby said as she jumped to her feet.
“Are you sure?” the young woman asked.
“Trust me!” Abby exclaimed as she ran out of the room.
Abby dashed through the outer office and into the corridor, dodging other workers as she headed for the main entrance. Bursting through the doors, she ran several meters before stopping to turn around and look skyward. In the distance, she could see a familiar black object heading rapidly toward the spaceport on the other side of the building.
A Terran patrol cart pulled up behind Abby. “Everything all right, ma’am?” the security officer inquired.
Abby spun around. “Can you take me to the pad? I need to speak to that flight crew.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the officer answered, recognizing the ID badge hanging from her blouse.
Abby ran around the cart and took a seat next to the officer, who immediately put the vehicle in motion. She kept her eyes on the approaching spacecraft. “It looks like the Falcon,” she exclaimed, more to herself than to the man driving the cart.
“I thought the Falcon was destroyed,” the officer said.
“It was,” Abby agreed as they passed through the outer gates of the spaceport, “but that sure looks like her.”
A minute later their cart came to a stop, barely far enough away from the main landing pad to avoid the jet wash of the approaching ship. Abby continued to watch in fascination and disbelief as the black shape rapidly grew larger. It was the Falcon, or at least it looked like it. There was, however, something different about it. “That’s not the Falcon,” she said.
“Are you sure?” the officer wondered. “It sure looks like the pictures I saw of her.”
“I’m sure, I think.”
Two large Tannan security vehicles pulled up on either side of them, their wheels locking up as they slid to a stop in the dirt. Ten armed men quickly jumped out of the back of the vehicles, moving into position to surround the landing pad.
Abby watched in dismay as an officer climbed down from the front cab of the vehicle and headed toward her.
“What’s going on?” the officer asked Abby.
“I don’t know.”
“Do you know who is flying that spacecraft?” the Tannan officer inquired with suspicion.
“Not really, no,” Abby admitted.
“Did the Aurora have more than one Falcon?” he demanded.
“How would I know?” Abby answered, pretending to be ignorant. No one other than her immediate family knew of her involvement with the Aurora and its jump drive.
The Tannan officer looked at Abby with distrust. “Then why are you here?”
“I work for the settlement leadership,” Abby explained, holding her ID badge. “That is obviously a ship from the Aurora. I am here to see what news they bring of Earth!” she yelled over the scream of the approaching spacecraft’s descent turbines.
The Tannan officer grabbed hold of his hat to prevent it being blown away by the spacecraft’s turbines as it settled down onto the landing pad. Its landing gear touched the pad and its descent turbines instantly went to idle, their jet wash diminishing in accordance.
Abby’s eyes were on the cockpit as it began to open. The pilot removed his helmet and set it on the forward console glare screen, revealing a head covered with thick, untidy, blond hair. The pilot saw her and a grin came across his face as he waved excitedly.
“Oh, my God!” Abby exclaimed as she headed toward them.
“Stop!” the Tannan officer ordered.
Abby turned back toward the officer. “I know them!”
The Tannan officer looked confused, as did his subordinate next to him.
Josh quickly climbed down from the cockpit, jumping down the last step onto the landing pad. Loki was not far behind him.
“Josh!” Abby yelled as she ran to them.
Loki dropped from the last step built into the side of the spacecraft down to the pavement as Abby arrived and flung her arms around Josh.
“I’m so happy to see you!” Abby exclaimed.
“I didn’t realize you’d missed us,” Josh said, a surprised look on his face.
Abby immediately released Josh and proceeded to hug Loki as well. “I missed you both,” she exclaimed.
“We hardly ever hung out,” Josh said, still in shock at the doctor’s greeting.
“Don’t you understand,” Abby said. “If you’re here, and in another Falcon, that means the Earth survived.”
Josh and Loki both looked at each other.
Abby noticed their exchange of glances. “The Earth did survive, right?”
“Oh, yeah, it survived,” Loki assured her.
“It got the crap bombed out of it again, but it’s still there,” Josh added.
“What is this?” Abby asked, pointing at their Falcon.
“That is exactly what I would like to know,” the Tannan officer said as he approached.
Loki pulled an ID card out of a pocket on his flight suit and handed it to the officer. “We’re from the Aurora,” Loki told the officer.
“But the Falcon was destroyed,” the officer said.
“The first wave of reinforcements arrived from the Pentaurus cluster,” Loki explained.
“The first wave?” Abby exclaimed, barely containing her excitement.
“Yes, ma’am,” Josh added as he opened the control panel on the side of their interceptor and activated the security systems.
“We’re here to deliver a message to the leaders of Tanna,” Loki explained. “The message is from Captain Scott of the Aurora. Can you take us there?”
“I’m afraid not,” the officer said as he handed the ID card back to Loki. “We are assigned to this sector. However, I can arrange transportation for you. It may take an hour or more, however.”
“That’s okay, we can wait,” Loki assured him.
“You can wait with me,” Abby told them. “My office is nearby, and I want to hear everything that has happened.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Loki answered. He turned to Josh. “Is it set?”
“Locked and armed,” Josh answered.
Josh and Loki began to follow Abby to the security cart.
“I’d tell your men not to touch a
nything,” Josh told the Tannan officer, “not if they want to make it home for dinner.”
CHAPTER TWO
“As you were,” Nathan said as he moved toward his seat at the head of the conference table in the Aurora’s command briefing room. “As you might expect, we have several things to discuss this morning,” he continued as he sat. “First off is the state of Earth. The bad news is that it’s considerably worse off than it was before. The good news is that it could have been much worse.”
“How?” Doctor Chen wondered.
“Only about fifty percent of the weapons used against the surface in the last attack were nuclear, so the amount of radioactive particulate matter in the atmosphere is not as heavy as we expected.”
Doctor Chen looked bewildered. “Beg your pardon, Captain, but according to the reports that I’m getting from medical facilities on the surface, it’s still pretty bad.”
“Yes, it is,” Nathan agreed. “But it could have been much worse. At this point, at least there are areas that are not yet affected by the fallout.”
“Not yet,” Cameron emphasized.
“The result of so many nuclear detonations in a short period of time has played havoc with the planet’s normal weather patterns. Winds, temperatures, humidity, solar energy levels at the surface, all of it in a state of flux at the moment,” Lieutenant Yosef explained. “This makes it very difficult to predict where the fallout will eventually spread with any degree of accuracy.”
“Still, you have some idea, right?” Cameron wondered.
“An idea, yes,” Lieutenant Yosef agreed, “and the people of Earth are basing their survival strategy on those forecasts, at least for the time being. Everyone just needs to remember that things are likely to change in the future.”
“Understood,” Nathan said, interrupting to take the conversation in another direction.
“Captain,” Cameron interrupted, “shouldn’t this require a bit more scrutiny on our part?”
“Actually, no,” Nathan said in matter of fact tone. “The fact of the matter is that the Earth’s recovery is not our mission, at least not at the moment.”
“Captain…”
“Our mission is to prevent another attack, and if possible take away the Jung’s ability to ever attack us again,” Nathan said with conviction. “Is that understood?” he added, looking directly at Commander Taylor.
“Yes, sir.”
Nathan looked at the faces of his command staff gathered around the table. “I want everyone to be absolutely clear about this. We have neither the capability nor the time to spend helping the Earth to recover. We have a war to fight. Granted, a war requires infrastructure and a working industrial base, but no matter what we do, that support is not going to come from the Earth within the next few months, perhaps years.” He scanned their faces again, noting the impact of his words. “That being said, if there is something that we can do to assist the Earth, and it does not interfere with our primary mission, then of course we shall do so. Now, I have already spoken with President Scott about this and he is in agreement. The Jung are our number one priority at the moment.”
Another glance about the table told Nathan that his command staff understood the situation. None of them liked it, he could see that in their faces. However, there was nothing he could do about it.
“I believe the commander is correct,” Lieutenant Telles said. “The matter does require greater scrutiny. At least the question of why the Jung did not simply lay waste to your world. They obviously had, and still have the ordnance to do so. A few dozen well placed nukes could have rendered your world uninhabitable.”
“An uninhabitable world would be of no use to the Jung,” Cameron stated.
“Actually, it would,” the lieutenant disagreed. “The Jung appear to be nearly as advanced as the Takarans in most areas. The Ta’Akar destroyed entire planetary civilizations in four separate instances. Each time, they used their technology to clean up those worlds and make them usable once more. In fact, the world of my birth is one reborn by a Ta’Akar cleansing.”
“A cleansing?” Doctor Chen wondered. “Is that really what you call it?”
“I did not invent the term,” Lieutenant Telles pointed out, “I am simply reporting the facts as accurately as possible.” He turned back to the captain without waiting for further response from the doctor. “The Tannans also experienced an attack of such magnitude. Millions, if not billions, were killed by the original Jung invasion of their world. Yet millions were allowed to live, in order to provide the labor needed to clean and rebuild their world into one better suited to serve the needs of the Jung Empire.”
“Then why didn’t they do the same thing to Earth?” Vladimir asked.
Nathan sat motionless, his eyes shifting from speaker to speaker as he listened to each of their comments.
“I am convinced that the Jung wish to take your world, the birthplace of humanity, wholly intact,” the lieutenant continued. “Look at the list of targets that were struck. Infrastructure, such as transportation and communications, power and water, sanitation, health care, agriculture, manufacturing…”
“Everything needed to maintain civilization,” Nathan said.
“Precisely,” Lieutenant Telles agreed. “And what was missing from the list?”
“Historical landmarks,” Jessica realized as she examined the list more closely.
“Indeed,” the lieutenant agreed, “as well as natural resources. The Jung wish to preserve that which makes the Earth a strategic asset. Its location—which obviously cannot be changed—its vast resources, and its historical and cultural significance to humanity.”
“Why would they care about the Earth’s significance to humanity?” Lieutenant Yosef wondered.
“Icons,” Doctor Chen explained. “They represent what we are, where we came from, the journey that we’ve all shared.”
“Something that is very important if your goal is to rule over all humans in the galaxy,” Lieutenant Telles added. “It was Caius’s biggest mistake. He tried to not only erase the past, but to change history altogether, in order to portray himself in a more favorable light. One cannot change the past. You see, Captain, it’s not just the Earth’s central location that drives the Jung’s obsession with capturing your world. I expect they believe that making the Earth their seat of power will help to unify all the worlds they fold into their empire. If they wipe it clean and start over, they will lose most of the psychological impact it would have on those they conquer.”
“Why now?” Doctor Chen asked, “why not ten years earlier, or twenty, or one hundred?”
“The Tannans said that most of the worlds in this sector believed that the Earth was still infected. The Jung may have been avoiding your world out of fear of re-exposure,” Lieutenant Telles explained.
“We didn’t start broadcasting radio signals again until a little over two hundred years ago,” Nathan added. “Once the Jung began to pick up our broadcasts, they knew.”
“Fleet intel believed that Jung spies had been on Earth since before the discovery of the Data Ark,” Jessica said. “However, they only have evidence of their presence as far back as forty years ago.”
“Jung interest in your world no doubt grew after the discovery of your Data Ark,” Lieutenant Telles said.
“So they are after the Ark as well,” Cameron said.
“We’ve barely scratched the surface of what is stored in those data cores,” Nathan reminded them. “Remember, the foundation was deciding what technologies to release, and in what order.”
“All in the name of protecting us from ourselves,” Lieutenant Commander Kovacic mumbled.
“Let’s not go there,” Nathan warned. “We’re already wandering from the primary purpose of this meeting, which is to decide what to do next.”
“The point I was trying to build to, was that the goal of the Jung works to our advantage,” Lieutenant Telles said. “The Jung warrior culture seems to follow orders, even if it means dying
. They have a very strong sense of honor and service. If, in fact, they were ordered not to destroy the Earth, then they will do everything they can to capture it.”
“But we have already witnessed the contrary,” Nathan argued. “In fact, three separate commanders have ordered the all-out bombardment of the planet.”
“Have they?” the lieutenant asked. “Or do we just perceive it as such?”
“Frankly, I don’t really care,” Nathan answered. “Our job is to see that they don’t get another chance, one way or the other.” Nathan looked around the room briefly. “To that end, I have decided that we must attack the battle platform currently in the Alpha Centauri system.”
“Captain,” Vladimir objected, “we are in no shape to go on the attack…”
“We have damage, yes,” Nathan agreed, “but we’re still eighty percent battle effective, and the Celestia is seventy percent battle effective. And now we have the additional Falcons as well.”
“But why so quickly?” Cameron wondered.
“Major,” Nathan said, signaling Major Prechitt.
Major Prechitt picked up the remote from the conference table and activated one of the large view screens on the wall of the compartment. “While reviewing the sensor logs from the four zero twos during their engagement with the battle platform over Earth, we discovered these images.” He pressed another button on the remote, causing computer-enhanced sensor images of the Jung comm-drone to appear. “We’re pretty sure that it’s a Jung comm-drone. It went to FTL shortly after these images were captured. Its course indicated a destination of the Alpha Centauri system.”
“How fast was it going when it went to FTL?” Cameron asked.
“At least half light,” the major answered.
“The fastest we’ve seen the Jung FTL drives travel is twenty times light,” Nathan said.
“Since the Jung linear FTL systems appear to be comparable to those of the Ta’Akar, it might be best to assume a similar capability,” Lieutenant Telles suggested.
“My thoughts as well,” Nathan agreed. “That’s why we need to attack within sixteen days.”
