“Attention Admiral McDowell. Please move all ships away from the invading forces for your safety,” the Parent Repair Station requested.
“Attention all commands. Move all ships except the Battle Ships to 1 AU from the remainder of the Pirate fleet. All Battle Ships transfer command to the Parent Repair Station. All other ships engage shields and await further instructions,” Caryn broadcast over the fleet comm channel. We moved away although everyone aboard wanted to continue to blast Pirates.
The battle ships formed a sphere around the enemy and fired on the Pirates at the same instant and for a few nanoseconds all that was left of the Pirates was a singularity that rapidly ate the remaining debris before it disappeared from instability.
In a blinding flash of light that overloaded Meph’s sensors, the Pirates were gone. Fred and Caryn immediately took a pod to the Library to check on their daughter and the other survivors. Mike and I hugged and kissed. Meph looked bemused, then transported down to check on his family. He returned a few minutes later to tell us they were doing fine and planning to return home. The three of us ate a dinner in the mess and went to our quarters to wash up. And other things. I cried a long time in Mike’s arms.
“Captain Cynthia, I would like to return to the Pirate system with you.” Merlin asked, politely. I thought about our personal travails and decided with little hesitation.
“I think that’s a great idea. As soon as Caryn comes back I’ll come aboard. Would you mind if Mike joined us?”
“No Captain. It would be my pleasure to meet him at last. I will send my pod.”
The stage was set. Two ships would go to the Pirate system and wreak havoc the likes of which they had never imagined. I started thinking about my Empress costume and wondered if I could recreate it before we left. As it turned out, I couldn’t. But my face was known very well, both as the Empress and then as the traitorous alien who had the audacity to impersonate being an Empress. Yes, they would remember me, of that I was certain.
Chapter 20.
Surprise
We arrived at the home system of the Pirates.
“Cynthia, does Merlin detect anything that might be a clue what happened here?” Caryn called from WitchCraft.
There were fragments of the planet I had been on as Empress. The fragments were slowly expanding in an orbit around the star that appeared for all practical purposes cold and dead. The other planets were lifeless balls of charred rock as were the moons. There were a few space ships in the system, dead in space, with no life forms detectable. Most of them were shapeless blobs of metal. Someone had been here first, robbing us of our revenge.
I had been having misgivings about committing genocide on a whole species from the time we began to win the space war. I was of a mind to just find and punish the people who had abused and tried to kill me. But this was something else.
“Cynthia, do you have any idea who did this?” Caryn asked.
“No sis. There isn’t a clue. No elements show here that aren’t part of this star system. There are no remains of any non-Pirate starships. I have no idea,” I answered.
I gave Merlin the coordinates to the other nine Pirate star systems and she and WitchCraft warped to each one in turn. The same scene greeted us.
“Cynthia – what the hell happened here? Every planet, every star, everything blasted to hell. Who would do this? Was it a revolt?”
“Not likely.”
“Who could do this, then?”
“I don’t know. But this half of the galaxy is unexplored, at least by humanity. Meph, what do you think?”
“Well, first of all,” he began in a thoughtful mood, “your empire is ruined forever, Empress Shawna,” he replied, looking at me playfully
“Meph, turn on your system and search for those aliens who had settled on Last Chance Bar and Grill,” Caryn suggested thoughtfully.
“You mean the Frbylzks? An interesting idea.” He scanned space in this sector of the galaxy. He could do this since we had come here and thus established a locus for his mapping system, with Merlin’s help. He widened the map to include all ten of the blasted star systems. Everyone in the WitchCraft saw a parsec away the telltale hazy orange blur of the alien fleet. Just like at Last Chance, but ten times as large. Caryn’s hunch was right.
Merlin’s galactic map, synchronized with WitchCraft, also showed the fleet, but as individual points of light rather than a blur because of the more superior equipment he had installed. And there were thousands of them. It was an awesome thing to contemplate. The Pirate attack on Last Chance had indeed stirred a hornet’s nest of deadly force. I could only imagine how powerful their weapons would have to be to create such utter destruction.
“Caryn, shouldn’t we say something to them, to let them know we’re still on their side?” I asked, somewhat cowed by the awesome display of their power.
“I don’t know sis. Meph, what do you think?”
Meph was ignoring us, trying to contact their fleet as we warped to the vicinity of their location. We arrived and saw that several of their ships had stopped to intercept us. We also stopped and waited to see what would happen. Nothing happened. They were waiting for us to identify ourselves. Meph got a channel open and began talking.
“Hello my friends. This is Meph of the human starship WitchCraft. We wish to share our condolences on the destruction of your settlement and acknowledge your recent actions here. Can we share anything with you?”
If in doubt, offer something valuable. Our screens showed the telltale orange hue. Meph adjusted his monitor as he had done years before and was rewarded by an image from one of their ships, apparently the bridge. They were looking at a monitor with a picture of Mike and me on it. I smiled and waved at them. One of them approached the monitor and began to speak. They had a translator and it talked to us through our monitoring devices.
“Welcome humans. We have exacted our payment for the treachery against our settlement. But now we need another place to settle. We have a surplus of people on our systems and the overcrowding makes it hard on our natural resources. Since the system we were on was destroyed, we are wondering, do you have another that might be of use for us to settle? We can offer a technology exchange, as before.”
Meph looked at Caryn. She looked at me in the viewer, then back to the alien. “I brokered such an agreement before. I have a star system some distance from here that was attacked by these alien Pirates, but there are many planets still intact, which could be settled upon. Do you require any specific ecological conditions for your settlement?”
“No. We will engineer that portion of the planet to suit us. Where do you propose we settle?”
Caryn looked at Mike and me. “Cynthia, will you stay with this fleet and guide them to Caryna? At this point they could settle anywhere they wanted to.”
“Yes, Admiral. I will stay and escort them.”
Caryn made the necessary arrangements. Then she and the WitchCraft warped out, leaving us with the aliens. I sent the coordinates of Caryna to them in galactic standard, which I hoped they could read. Then we set out at low light speed for home. The gigantic fleet continued on to their home worlds except for a small contingent that followed us. They told us what speed they could travel and since it wasn’t like the Parents’ instant hyperfold drive, we had no trouble. So at warp 8 we traveled with five invisible but deadly alien starships back to Caryna, hoping it wasn’t a trap.
Merlin ran on automatic and Mike and I spent a lot of time in bed. Finally I decided it was time to broach the subject to him of creating a family.
“Mike, what do you think of Caryn and Fred’s family?”
“I think Fred is a very lucky fellow, love. I only wish we could have a baby like they did.” He looked at me suddenly, hoping he hadn’t insulted me. He kissed me to soften the comment.
“So do I Mike. In fact, I have recently found out that it is possible for me to have a child, sort of.”
He was shocked. He smiled and held me close. “Wha
t do you mean sort of, love?”
“When I returned from the catastrophe of my brief rule as Pirate Empress, I was informed by the Parents that they had salvaged my brain and spinal column from the Hornet and it was placed in stasis in the Earth system. They told me I could be cloned by Earth medical science if I wanted.” I kissed him passionately, pulling him down on me so our faces were close. “And I want.”
He kissed me, returning my passion. “My darling, I want. I want very much to spend my life with you and raise a family.”
Our lovemaking was even more passionate than usual.
“You have heard? What do I have to do?” I asked the Parents.
“We have heard and the Repair Station on Earth has been contacted. We have anticipated this and a suitable genetic center has been located in Switzerland on Earth. It is the best human genome research facility we could find. Your genetic material will be transported there in a day and the process will begin. In one month you will need to have a surrogate mother to carry the embryo to term. It is your decision, but we think Natasha would be willing to do it since she has given birth to her own child. Her Caryn show is on hiatus and is expected to include a new character called Cynthia when it resumes shooting. You will become as famous as your sister in the coming years. We are proud of you, Daughter. We predict Mike will agree to this and within two years you will have the family you so richly deserve.”
I asked Merlin to find and call Natasha. She did and in a few minutes we had her on her phone at home. She looked disheveled and I suspected she was in bed with her husband from the flush on her face.
“Hello Cynthia. This is a surprise. Have you heard? You’re going to be a new character on the show next season. I can hardly wait. We’ve already cast the part and she’s almost as beautiful as you.”
“Hello Natasha. That’s great news, but I have some great news of my own. First I have to ask, are you pregnant?”
“No, not yet. We’ve been talking about it, but not yet.” She looked smiling at her husband, off screen.
“Well I just found out that there is genetic material of mine that can be turned into an embryo, a clone of me and I would need a human woman to host the baby. Could I entice you to be the mother?”
She looked shocked, but not against the idea. Only surprised. She looked over at her husband and back to me.
“Cynthia, we’ll have to talk this over. Can I call you back?”
“Sure. I understand. Mike and I are aboard ship right now and are due back at Caryna in a few more days. Why don’t you call me there and we can talk more.”
Natasha looked relieved. A masculine hand reached from out of frame and tussled her hair. She smiled. “Okay. I’ll let you know in three days. Talk to you later.” She hung up as she was rolling over to her husband and I could see his arms encircling her still thin waist. Then the image dissolved.
Mike grabbed me the same way and as we rolled over he whispered in my ear, “I think this is a great idea! We should get married!”
I began crying.
Chapter 21.
Back Home
We arrived surrounded by the Frbylzks ships and completed negotiations. They asked for a portion of the southern hemisphere of Caryna 5, opposite the location of the Repair Station. The Parents were aware of what had happened on Last Chance and agreed to the settlement. Caryn arranged another treaty and all but one of the ships left the system. That ship landed on Caryna 5 and sent small robotic satellite ships to explore the territory we had given them.
The Repair Station kept us informed of their progress. Within a few weeks they began working. The first thing they did was neutralize the radioactivity in the atmosphere and on the surface of the planet. Not just their own area, but the whole planet. The process took over a month.
When they were done the planet was habitable by any being who wanted to settle. The atmosphere gave up the water from the explosions of the attack and it began raining and snowing all over the world. In another few months the ice age was back and the planet was back to normal, but without life forms growing on the surface.
Caryn arranged with the Admiralty to send a fleet of freighters with seed, plants, trees and animals to repopulate the planets. We called them the Arks of our Covenant. Half the fleet had flora and fauna from earth’s upper and lower hemispheres and the other half contained tropic species.
Luckily the radiation on Caryna 4 was not as severe and the transplants were able to gain a foothold in the soil and the reconstituted and filtered oceans. The planet’s soil was still slightly radioactive, but not at hazardous levels. The oceans were more pristine than they had been before the war. In a few decades both worlds would again be thriving.
Caryn began a new promotion to start settlement with generous cash rewards to anyone willing to brave the primitive conditions, to begin right away. And the indigenous fragberry bush had somehow survived and was encouraged to multiply.
“So Natasha, how are we going to do this?” I asked one day when Mike and I were sailing with her in the bay near the construction site of Caryn’s new compound.
“We’ll do it like I did for Caryn. One million to carry the baby and one million for the successful birth. Then a hundred thousand for every month I’m nursing. That worked before,” she said. “Oh yes, you have to make me the legal aunt of the baby, with parenting rights so I can see him/her any time I want.”
“Do you do your own contract negotiations with the studio?” Mike asked in fun.
“Damn right I do. I don’t trust those Hollywood lawyers!”
Well it was pretty steep, but in line with what Caryn paid her for carrying and birthing Kyla.
That meant with negotiations either of us could have periods of custody of the baby; except for immediately after birth and for several months after that during which she planned to naturally nurse the child. Caryn was happy to spend the money for me, to have a niece to play with her daughter.
So I went to Earth to negotiate the cloning. I wanted the baby to be raised like any normal human child, including being carried by the surrogate mother. Natasha and I stayed on Earth at her New York condo for two weeks while all the arrangements were finalized.
“Cynthia, I have a surprise for you at home,” she said, catching my interest after a long day of discussions with the cloning center representatives.
“What is it?”
“It’s a surprise, silly. I’m not going to tell you about it now.”
When we got to her condo Natasha made me wait in my bedroom until she got dinner under way. It sounded like she was doing something on the bar-b-q on the balcony that overlooked the harbor. I couldn’t quite see what she was up to from my bedroom window.
“Okay,” she finally said. “You can come out now.”
I walked cautiously out to the patio. There on the bar-b-q were two big, juicy, nearly done New York steaks. She had a pot of peas and a couple baked potatoes on the warming plate beside them. It smelled heavenly. So I finally got my New York steak. I helped with the potato trimmings. We had a view of Manhattan as the spring sun set over the tops of the giant skyscrapers with golden sparkles twinkling on the water and it was perfect. I sent the scene to Caryn and our ships so the boys could share.
Finally the procedure was approved and the hospital admitted Natasha for the implantation of the cloned embryo. Everything went normally and in a couple days she was cleared to return to Caryna, now pregnant again with a McDowell baby. Mike was thrilled, as was I of course.
While I was on Earth I visited the new Academy complex. In the reception lobby stood a replica of the Silver Hornet. It made me think what had happened to the real Silver Hornet’s pieces.
“What has happened to the Silver Hornet pieces Caryn brought back?” I asked the Parents.
“They have been put into the Repair Station and are undergoing analysis. When you return you can see them.”
I let it go. I was busy with the authorities. While standing in the lobby talking to the Repair Sta
tion I was captured by the Commandant and he took me to his mahogany paneled office. In there were two of the Admirals from HQ who I recognized as Admiral Royce and Admiral Thompson. All three were in their dress whites.
“Captain, please have a seat. The Admirals have a proposition for you for a new mission,” the Commandant opened. He sat at one end and the Admirals were at the other end. I was in between, boxed in by the old foxes.
“What is it, Admiral Royce?”
“First, Captain, I must congratulate you on your successful infiltration and espionage of the Pirate home world. We were all immensely gratified that you did not perish in that assignment. Your success was a tremendous help to our defense of Earth and the procedure of rooting out the traitors here has been immeasurably assisted by the information you sent to us. On behalf of all the Admiralty I congratulate you. Please accept this small token of our esteem.”
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