Then he started thinking about their upcoming Jump as he watched the Jump-time countdown, and wondered what these alien creatures would try to do when they saw his and Stugron’s Star-Destroyers exit jump right in their midst.
“Griken. Any queries?”
His Science Officer double checked his displays and interrogated his own Companion brain.
“No. All is in order, your Excellency.”
“Cratic. What about your team?” he asked. The navigation officer checked with his own companion, then informed Verice that the coordinates were correct.
“Yes, but what about your team?” He snapped.
“Likewise, Excellency,” Cratic replied. He hated the Viceroy. Verice always found a way to have a dig at him. ‘One day, I’ll get back at you’ he thought to himself, trying not to let Verice’s companion read his thoughts.
Using his own Companion, Viceroy Verice verified that what his officers had given him, was indeed the correct information. Then, noting that the countdown was almost at zero, he ordered his Companion to give the final go-ahead to his plan. And, savoring the upcoming thrills, he started counting down, out loud. He knew Captain Stugron would be feeling exactly the same as he did.
Five… Four… Three… Two… One… Zero…
Then he felt his skin tingling, as the ship’s enormous power generators produced an energy pulse that punched through space, directly in front of his vessel.
He caught a fleeting glimpse from the corner of the bridge windows, of Captain Stugron’s Star Destroyer doing exactly the same.
Space seemed to froth and boil for a second, then opened like a gigantic flower, with a jet black center. Then, everything around him elongated, including himself, as the Star Destroyer surged forward and into the wormhole.
This was their fourteenth jump. And each time it had been the same, almost hallucinogenic sensation.
Viceroy Verice, slowly relaxed. The Jump had, as usual, been exciting but exhausting.
Unfortunately, their exit from the wormhole wouldn’t be the same. With hardly any out of the ordinary sensations at all, he decided, sighing under his breath.
Anyway, there would be nothing for him to do for the next three periods. Everything would run itself, so it was rest time for him, now.
Nevertheless, he felt sorry for Griken and Cratic. They would have to stay on watch, along with the rest of his crew. Just taking time out when they could.
‘Rank does have its privileges,’ he thought to himself, not worrying if any of the crew’s companions picked up his selfish remark.
“I’m going to my Pod,” he informed his officers. Pictured the area in his personal pod. And was instantly there.
-Ω-
Frank and Susanna had felt the sensations caused by a warp space disturbance before. But, both he and Susanna knew that this was enormous. He could see the fear in her eyes.
“How long, Frank?”
“I’m not sure Sues,” he replied, then mentally contacted Charlotte.
‘Did either of you feel that warp space disturbance?’
‘Yes,’ Charlotte confirmed. ‘We estimate, another one and a half to two days, and they’ll be here.’
‘That quick?’
‘Yes… However, something’s strange, we only sensed two ships, each one entering a different wormhole. But the ships were full of alien minds.’
‘Well, I would have expected them to have more crew members. But, then again, I would also have expected a whole fleet of vessels. So, why aren’t they bringing their entire fleet through in one go?’
‘We’ve no idea.… But, you’d better be careful, Frank,’ she warned him.
‘These two ships are separate for a reason. But, for a reason, that isn’t yet obvious to us.’
‘Point taken, Charlotte.’
He pondered, on whether or not he should ask Charlotte and Cindy a couple of, what might be awkward, questions.
He was pretty sure they knew that he could be trusted. But, he was well aware that he already knew some things about them, that, maybe, he shouldn’t. Even so, he felt he should learn more about the girls, before any battles commenced, he finally decided.
‘Charlotte. Can you both join us, now?’ he asked.
‘No, Frank. You will have to come to us. Just you, on your own,’ came her firm reply.
‘Just go, Frank,’ Susanna mentally told him, on hearing this.
‘OK, in ten minutes,’ he reluctantly agreed.
“While you’re gone, I’ll send a message to Jack and Georgina, back on Earth. With a special message for Alex,” Susanna told him. “Just don’t tell me what you get up to,” she added.
“Don’t be silly Sues,” he said getting up and heading for the door. While thinking to himself, I should be so lucky.
Charlotte and Cindy’s cabin door was already open as he approached.
‘Come in, Frank,’ he sensed Cindy say and felt as if he could hear her soft voice in his mind.
He entered the cabin, turning nervously as the door slid silently shut behind him while wondering if they had heard his, ‘I should be so lucky,’ thought.
The girls were sat on their sofa, both of them wearing identical silk-like, bright green dresses. With their long reddish hair cascading over their shoulders.
“Sit, there, as before,” Cindy ordered, pointing to the seat facing them.
Frank did as he’d been instructed, but with trepidation. He hadn’t seen them like this before.
They sat, unmoving, with their blue-green eyes peering out of their almost perfect faces as they studied him a moment. Making him feel more uncomfortable than usual. Then, as if reading his mind. Both, slowly, and teasingly, opened their legs slightly, in unison. Then grinned mischievously at each other.
The little sods, they do know what I thought. Damn teasers, he thought to himself. Then, getting himself together, spoke to them both.
“We haven't got time for that sort of behavior,” he loudly stated, trying to sound authoritative.
“Did you think that you might have sex with us, after all?” Charlotte asked, attempting to unsettle him.
“Of course not.”
“We might have decided the same,” Cindy added, her words sounding more like a threat than just banter.
“Anyway, Frank. We know what you’re going to ask. But ask it anyway, if you wish,” Charlotte ordered.
“And why do you keep calling us, girls?” Cindy interjected her tone sounding abrupt.
“Yes, Frank. Why? … Cindy’s twenty-three, and I’m twenty-four. I’m also interested to know why you insist on calling us, girls?”
Frank tried to mask his thoughts, having realized that he’d misjudged them. Of course, they were young women. Not girls.
However, he still believed that they had been intimidating and childish in their behavior to him, to say the least.
Even so, he had to admit that he was attracted to them, and they knew it. So, he supposed that, thinking of them as girls had been a way of making them untouchable, for him. After all, he was married and had a son… So, why was he still so smitten by them?
“An answer would help, Frank,” Cindy urged.
“You know the answer to that already,” he said. “And I apologize. Of course, I know you are women, not girls,” he added, then paused seeing them both relax a little.
“Charlotte, I’m aware that you could mentally force me to do whatever took your fancy. But, I reckon that you may not be able to go that far, Cindy?”
Cindy stared at him a moment before commenting on his belief.
“You are misguided, Frank. We enhanced your mental ability to a height that will enable you to…”
Charlotte stopped her. “Enough, Cindy,” she ordered.
“A bit late for the coming war. But now we’re getting somewhere,” Frank said.
“So, now we know you two were in both mine and Susanna’s dreams… You injected something in us while we slept… Was it special stem cells or something like
that?”
“No more questions, Frank,” Charlotte snapped.
Nevertheless, Frank was on a roll now, and couldn’t help thinking about their strange DNA chain that Andromeda had said was different from humans. Then, there was their mental ability, which didn’t seem like a human trait.
“OK, but how did you both get aboard the Andromeda on our way back from our first trip?”
“Time ship,” Cindy couldn’t help saying.
“Enough,” snapped Charlotte.
“Why?” He asked.
“Too much knowledge is dangerous, that’s why Frank. You’re undermining your own future,” Cindy answered.
“What? Me, threatening our future?
What about that split-second slip of Charlotte’s own defenses, and that glimpse of something that I wasn’t supposed to see,” he furiously retorted.
“I might as well go the whole hog while I’m at it. Neither of you has a standard Human DNA strand in your bodies.
Then, we have your comprehensive grasp of Spatial engineering, let alone your mental ability… No… You’re definitely not human, are you?”
Both Charlotte and Cindy were taken aback at Frank’s attitude and his suppositions.
“My, you’re certainly on form today, Frank,” Charlotte replied, after having a mental discussion with Cindy.
“I’m sorry, we can say no more… But, I promise we will tell you all, at the end.”
“There you go again, Charlotte. What end are you talking about?”
“No more questions, Frank. We don’t have much time. Leave now, Frank,” Charlotte ordered him.
“Use your imagination, Frank. Consider the options that are impossible. To find the possible…,” she urged him.
Realizing he wasn’t going to get any more from them, Frank stood up, and went to speak.
“Yes Frank,” Charlotte said, answering his mental question before he asked it.
“Yes. The universe is, in our four hands.”
Frank stared at Charlotte for a moment before leaving. Her last words proved that these two women must know much more than they had said.
Once in the corridor, he paused a while, before going back to his cabin and Susanna. He was acutely aware that there were just a few hours remaining before possible death and destruction brushed them all aside.
He had no idea how to stop the Garodens. Nothing that any of the races here had could. Even a quad-sync mental attack would be useless, against so many brains.
His thoughts left him feeling like a child, fumbling in the dark.
Chapter 21
Time is not enough
It had been more than thirty-eight hours since Charlotte’s warning on when to expect the two Garoden ships to exit warp. No one knew how she could make that sort of prediction, or even cared whether or not both she and Cindy were human.
At the moment, Andromeda was busy using her enormous correlating power, in checking, then bringing together the data that Susanna had earlier received from all the ships.
Once done, the information packs on the aliens would then be sent to all three homeworlds, for their input to be added.
However, Frank needed to see if any of the Crillon, Solveron or Earth scientific communities had anything that might hold out a glimmer of hope for a solution. So, having waited as long as he could, he asked Andromeda for a progress report.
“Nothing of any use yet, Frank. But, I am passing every bit of information I receive to our own specialists.”
“Good. I thought there wouldn’t be anything readily usable to us,” he remarked, noting Susanna’s almost desperate gesture.
“Andromeda. Set up an All Ships, live meeting in four hours, that should give everyone plenty of time.”
“On it,” came the calm voice of Andromeda.
Frank knew that Andromeda had the preliminary analysis reports that Susanna had received from his crew. And, from the Crillon and Solveron captains. Even so, it was well known that he seemed to gain inspiration from talking things through with the individuals involved. So, Frank tapped Quantum Engineering’s tab and brought up Professor Ned Parker’s face on his screen.
“Hi, Ned.”
“I know what you’re going to ask. And no. The blast you idiots gave it, fused everything,” he irritably snapped.
“Grumpy, as usual, Ned?”
“Frank, you always ask me things you already know.”
“Maybe… In a way, you’re right, Ned. But, sometimes we get a feeling, a suspicion about something. Call it a hunch if you like. But, perhaps it’s not formed enough to put forward as a possibility?”
Ned stopped to think, for a moment. “Hmm, I must admit I do that, as well, Frank. Still, I haven’t got any more info. I wish I did have something. The sample from the alien’s ship that Thomas collected for us is crap.”
“Marine Captain Reece received your section from Argonaut. The part you were given isn’t T-Rex’s fault.”
“I know that, Frank. But anyway, it doesn’t matter now, because our Droid 23 has found something.”
“What?”
“Ah-hah. Something your tin-can doesn’t know, at last.” Ned replied, then put his hand on his head as Andromeda gave him a jolt through his transceiver. “Damn computer,” he grunted.
“Anyway, Drone 23 registered a wormhole thread. It was still there right up to the time you blew that ship apart.”
“Yes, but we all know about these wormhole threads, Ned. That just means the aliens could just as easily know we had vessels close to their defunct artificial wormhole.”
“Exactly, Frank,” Ned replied, leaving Frank shaking his head.
Frank then thought about Charlotte’s last words as he left her. Consider the options that are impossible. To find the possible, she had told him.
“Ned, could we re-establish that thread?”
“No, not that one… But, if any more alien ships turn up and move away from the area before battle commences. Then it may be possible to open up one of those threads. Even so, you know the Solverons are much more capable of doing that than we are.”
“True enough, Ned. Thanks,” he glumly replied, and broke contact.
Frank then decided to ask Tim Watson, in Astrophysics, if he had a theory on the direction the Garoden ship might have come from, taking into account the line it took on exiting its wormhole.
He tapped Astrophysics Icon, and Alice Cummings’s face immediately appeared on his screen.
“Oh…, Hello, Alice.”
“Hello, Frank.”
“How’s married life?”
“Fine, Frank. I assume you really want to speak to Tim?”
“Please,” he said, as Alice’s face morphed into Tim’s.
“Yes, Frank, what can I do for you?” Tim calmly queried.
“I know you’ve got plenty to work on. I just need to know if you’ve given any thought to the direction the wormhole exit was facing when the alien’s ship exited from the hole?”
“No, because no one had any time to take any readings before you destroyed its wormhole thread,” Tim told him.
“Shame…Any good news, straight off the press?”
“Well, maybe… Brian’s working with us, and he’s found an encrypted link between that cylindrically shaped missile of theirs, and their ship.”
Frank thought for a moment. Remembering that Charlotte had said that she thought the Garoden’s second brain seemed inferior in some way. And, that it was in all probability, an operator, geared to performing functions as directed by the primary brain.
“I know Andromeda gets continuous updates from all of us. But make sure that Brian asks Mark if he thinks that link is some sort of weapons control.”
“Will do Frank,” Tim replied, then his image morphed into the Astrophysics Icon.
Frank sat back and thought about what had been discussed, before deciding on whether or not he should call his Weapons specialist, Mark Trask.
“Here, drink this,” Susanna urged, handing him
a hot drink.
“Thanks, Sues. M’m, chocolate, just what I need,” he said.
“Frank. Do you think it’s possible that the alien’s cylindrical shaped weapons have a brain? Let’s say, a version of the Garoden’s second brain,” she asked him.
“Why?”
“Well, it’s just the way those things actually managed to miss the Carga’s weapon’s fire, then went straight through the Carga’s screen.”
“Sorry, Sues. I don’t follow you. Any computerized device could do what it did,” he replied. Then started thinking about her question, appreciating that Susanna’s logic often led directly to unexpected but correct solutions to strategic problems.
After a while, he called Charlotte.
‘Did you sense any mental connection between where the Garoden missiles were heading, and where the Carga’s targeting operators were aiming?’
‘Ah. This is from Susanna, isn’t it? It’s a good point. I didn’t look for it at the time… but now, thinking about it, they did seem to be able to predict where the Carga was aiming its fire, then to move elsewhere at the right time.’
‘So, is it possible that they have a brain, like the alien’s second brain, for instance? And, that these brains are specifically trained to sense what enemy weapons operators, are aiming at?’ He asked.
Susanna joined in. ‘Yes, and could they also deviate away from the danger point, then quickly realign in time to hit their original target?’
‘Well, it would certainly give the Garodens an advantage, in knowing where, and when, their opponents were going to fire at them,’ Cindy interjected.
‘Suicide missile, ugh,’ Susanna thought.
‘Cindy and I will consider this aspect further, Frank,’ Charlotte suddenly stated. Then was gone.
The Garoden War. (SpaceFed StarShips Series) Book 6. An action-packed follow-on story that sees the Earth's Space Navy in action.: ‘Into the Fire.’ Page 12
