Defending Earth-Discovery Means Death (4 page)

“I thought our minds are invisible to the Feeders?”

“They can’t see us or hear our thoughts but they are able to sense our presence. If they know we’re in their space, they have enough ships to find and attack us. I’m hoping your device will prevent them sensing our presence. That new ship has an advanced sensor array that detected one of our ships that entered that species domain. The Feeders now have ships that represent a real danger to our civilization. Will you help us, Jack?”

Jack sighed and looked at Genny, who stared into his eyes and nodded slightly. He looked at Lukas and said, “If I say no, you won’t allow me to just walk away, will you?”

Lukas smiled, “I’ll do everything in my power to allow you to do just that. I’ll even allow the two of you to leave here with your device and hide from those that will accuse me of treason.”

“Why would you do that?”

“I listened to the recording of your sister when she chose to go on the mission. The love she has for you amazed me. That deserves my respect.”

Jack nodded and said, “I’ll help you.”

Lukas closed his eyes and nodded, “Thank you, Jack. I really appreciate it.”

“You were being honest weren’t you?”

“Yes.”

Jack smiled and stuck out his hand, “I’m your man, Admiral.” Lukas took it and shook it firmly.

“P
rime, we have failed to find the species in this cluster as well.”

“Did you find anything worth invading?”

“There are thousands of intelligent species in this cluster but none of them are telepathic. Do you want to extend our domain this far away from where we’ve consolidated out conquests?”

“No, I want that telepathic species found that attacked me and destroyed my largest city.”

“Great Leader, we’ve been unable to find anything during our search. We’ve gone more than a billion light years and have nothing to show for the effort.”

“So you are also of the opinion that the attacker went in a direction that was chosen to deceive us?”

“I must say that I am and I ask forgiveness for disagreeing.”

“That’s unnecessary. I want the fleets that have completed their searches to return to our domain and I will choose another place for them to search.”

“Do you think we should start expanding our territory again? I have received reports that population pressures are starting to be a problem.”

The first four fleets to come back will be sent to attack the next targets on our list. The others will be sent out to continue the search.”

“That species has not shown up again.”

“But they are still out there somewhere and represent a real danger to us. We will find them and remove them as a threat.”

The Senior Fleet Leader knew that the Prime’s thoughts were a product of all the Death Feeder Leaders on the two Capital Planets that were linked. The majority of them still feared the species that attacked more than three centuries earlier. “I will start the voyage back in six days, Prime Leader.”

• • •

Rocky listened to the powerful thoughts of the two Keeper Leaders and looked out of his viewport toward the bow where Jill was working on her panel. “How’s it going?”

“I think I’ve got a basic understanding of how everything works. I do have a concern.”

“What is that?”

“If you choose to attack a Feeder Fleet, we are going to run out of missiles pretty quickly.”

“I understand that we have more than ten thousand stored in the armory.”

“Have you taken a good look at the size of the Feeder’s smallest fleets? They’re larger than a hundred thousand warships and if we go in with our weapons blazing, we’ll exhaust the missiles in less than twenty minutes.”

Rocky sighed, “We’ll just have to use the disruptors.”

“That’s what I’m planning to do and only use the missiles to target ships that are moving in on us. Our disruptor beams will give away our position when they’re fired putting us in harm’s way even if we move the ship immediately after firing. Once we start using the disruptors, the Feeder’s Warships will start jumping in on us. We need those missiles to keep them at bay.”

Rocky saw Jill looking at him through her cockpit window. “What do you recommend?”

“Why are you asking me?”

“Because you are the weapons expert. I would think you know more about them than I do.”

Jill shook her head and looked up, “Amber.”

“Yes, Jill.”

“Do you know how far along Fleet was in producing the Missile Magazines when we left?”

“I believe I received an update that said the first transport had passed trials.”

Jill looked at Rocky through her viewport, “We need to go back to Earth.”

“For God’s sake why?”

“If they’ve managed to complete the construction of the Missile Magazine Transport, we need to pick one up and bring it out here.”

Rocky’s eyes narrowed, “I don’t remember hearing anything about this transport you’re talking about.”

“I heard about it by accident. Two engineers were discussing it when the Commodore had me tied to the couch.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a large flat vessel that has more than two hundred portable armories installed on it. A ship like ours lands on the hull and is locked in place. The missile magazine in our ship will drop into an empty slot and another full magazine will slide forward and be inserted into our armory. The entire process takes less than ten seconds.”

“This ship isn’t designed to do that.”

“That’s why we have to go back or would you prefer to go back over and over to rearm our ship?”

Rocky stared at Jill and said, “Are you doing this to confirm the High Leader kept her word about your brother?”

“That’s certainly part of it. This does give me a good reason to go and see. However, if you don’t see the benefit, I’m fine with it. We’ll be going back a lot and I’ll see about him when that happens anyway.”

Rocky stared at her across the space between their cockpits and shrugged, “Amber, skip us out of here and contact Fleet Construction. Find out if they have this transport and how long it will take to modify our ship to use it.”

The galaxy they were in disappeared and the Light Ship reappeared in intergalactic space. Rocky waited and after a few minutes, he said, “Amber?”

“They have a transport ready but it’s not loaded. It will take five days to get it ready and about the same amount of time to modify our ship to use it.”

“Willow, where is the Fleet of that Keeper that was communicating with the entity in their central system?”

“That particular Keeper is on the right edge of the Keeper Fleets conducting the search.”

“That is the fleet we’re going to have to go after.”

“Why?”

“Jill, we have to make them think they were slightly offline in their searches. We’ll move in on that fleet from outside their locations and it may cause them to start searching again.”

“You’re right. That does make sense.”

“Fleet tells me that if we’re coming back they have a software update that will improve our targeting systems.”

“Then we need to go back anyway. However, I will not wait until that fleet packs up and leaves. If we’re not ready in five days, we’re coming back. Everyone understand?” His question was greeted with silence and he said, “Get us home Amber.” An instant later, they landed outside the construction facility and engineers and technicians surrounded the ship.

“I’ll see you shortly.”

Rocky saw Jill stand up in her cockpit and walk out of view. He stood up and pressed a number on his wrist unit, “I’m back for a few days. Are you free?”

“Rocky, I didn’t expect you back for a long time.”

“Something happened and I’m back for five days. I figured we would make the best of it.” Rocky saw Olivia’s expression change. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry, Rocky. I can’t sit at home and wait on you to just show up when you can. I’m seeing someone else.”

“Olivia, you knew I was in the Navy and what that meant.”

“Yes and it hasn’t been a problem in the past. However, Intelligence is of the opinion that your mission is a one-way trip. Tell me honestly, Rocky; are they wrong?”

Rocky stared at her on his wrist unit and, after a long moment of silence, he said, “Good luck with your new relationship.”

“Rocky!”

Rocky ended the call. Olivia was a captain in Fleet Intelligence and she was privy to everything happening in Fleet Operations. She was beautiful, highly intelligent, and a fast riser in the Fleet hierarchy. He really cared about her. She had won his heart from the first moment she called him Stone Hinge. He had looked at her and she smiled, “Or should I say, Stone Head?”

She knew about his evaluations and used it to poke fun at him. He pulled up his files and saw that his promotion wasn’t recorded yet. He hated to believe it but couldn’t prevent the thought that if she did know, she wouldn’t have left so quickly. “Captain, are you leaving the ship?”

“No, I’ll stay on board and you can update me on what you’re doing. By the way, where’s Commodore Jekins?”

“He was reassigned to command the Planetary Force Field Projector located at the South Pole.”

Rocky smiled. That change didn’t take long to become known. He wondered how long it would take for his promotion to become known. That evening, his communicator on the console in his personal quarters beeped. He put on a shirt and pressed the button, “I just wanted to call and apologize for not offering you the courtesy you deserve with your rank, Admiral.”

“You didn’t know about it, Commodore. Don’t give it a second thought.”

“Yes Sir. I’ve brought in three shifts to assist in getting your vessel ready on time, Sir.”

“Thank you.” The display went dark and Rocky smiled. No Commodore wanted a Fleet Admiral anywhere near their command. The faster he could be sent out the better. No one liked a superior officer looking over their shoulder.

Two hours later, Olivia’s code appeared on his wrist unit and he ignored it. After ten more attempts at contacting him, he erased her code from his unit and blocked it. He hated being right about her. Sleep came hard but it finally overcame his melancholy and he closed his eyes. She was just one of many that proved to be less than he thought. The last thought he had before he slept was that after so many failures, it might be him that was the problem.

Rocky watched his ship being modified and he had numerous questions that were quickly and professionally answered by the teams working on it. It was surprising how much respect he was given by the hundreds working on the ship. He walked into the giant building and saw the Missile Transport across the huge hangar with large cranes lifting enormous containers and placing them inside it. The giant transport dwarfed his ship and he called an engineer over, “How am I going to move this vessel?”

The Engineer smiled, “You won’t, Sir. Your light signature will be loaded into its Light Drive and it will skip directly to the location you want it to go. It will remain at that location until you send it another signal to move to your ship.”

Rocky smiled, “That’s a great system. Thank you.”

The Engineer smiled; he wasn’t accustomed to Full Admirals being so polite. “Glad to be of service, Sir.”

Jill arrived at the end of the third day and found Rocky at a terminal with a Transfer Band on his head. “What’s going on?”

“They’ve changed the missiles in the new magazines. They’re about half the size and feed through the belts at four times the former speed. I’m having all the information on them transferred to my learning centers.” Rocky paused the transfer, “Is everything ok with your brother?”

Jill smiled, “It’s like he died and went to heaven. They have him working with the top scientists in the Alliance and he’s loving it. They even gave Genève a position and both of them live in the Officer’s Village next to the beach. The High Leader kept her promise.”

Rocky’s eyes narrowed, “I’m surprised you didn’t just disappear.”

“I thought about it. My brother will be fine no matter what I do. The Alliance really needs his device and he won’t be put under any pressure no matter what happens.”

“So why did you come back?” Jill sighed and remained silent. “Are you going to tell me?”

“I guess it’s because I didn’t want to disappoint Amber and Willow. I think they expect better of me than I do myself.” Rocky stared at her and nodded. He reached for the button to continue the transfer and heard, “Besides, there’s some Captain in intelligence that has contacted me repeatedly asking me to tell you to contact her.” Jill looked at her wrist unit, “It’s a Captain Olivia Collins.”

Rocky nodded and pressed the button. Jill stared at him and tapped him on the shoulder. He paused it again and turned around, “Are you going to contact her?”

“No, I’m not.” He started the transfer again and turned his back on Jill.

Jill stared at him and then pressed one of the messages. A very pretty woman appeared on her wrist unit and Jill said, “I’ve delivered your message so you can quit contacting me.”

“WAIT! Did he say he was going to contact me?”

“No.” Jill saw the woman’s expression and said, “What did you do?”

“I told him I was seeing someone else.”

“Then you deserve his scorn. Don’t contact me again.” Jill ended the call and blocked the code.

Olivia tried to call back but saw she was blocked. She decided that she would have to take matters into her own hands and just go and see him the next morning. She signed up for Off Time and went to the construction site. She was greeted by Commodore Nelson, who told her that the Admiral had left the night before. She waked away and felt her tears. There wasn’t anyone else. She told Rocky that lie to remove any pressures or fears he might have about leaving her. She was stunned when the Commodore called him Admiral. She found out an hour later that he had been promoted. She now knew why he refused to speak with her. She took the rest of the day off and fought with her emotions. Why did she do it? She felt like the biggest fool but knew in her heart she had done it for him. Now, she had lost the only man she ever really cared about.

• • •

“Jill, do you think this is a good place to drop off the missile transport?”