Tongue stuck out like a little kid drawing, James watched the feeds from the sensor platforms. When the aliens came to a stop, he said, "They're here."
Ann shook her head knowing that he had stolen the delivery of that line from a movie. Captain Klein, blissfully unaware of the cultural reference, said, "Send the greeting message."
Ann hit the button that broadcast the message across the known communications channels. It was a declaration of peaceful intentions and an invitation to talk. To prevent giving away the location of the ship, the communications were routed through a small communications satellite that was located a quarter of a light second away. Almost a minute passed before she reported, "There's no answer."
"They're scanning the area," James said.
Captain Klein said, "Open the umbrellas and rebroadcast the message."
James typed a few commands on his console while Ann sent out the message a second time. When the Chitiniodians opened fire on his umbrellas, James said, "They sure aren't a very friendly bunch."
Captain Klein stared at the screen. A number of holes had appeared in the umbrellas where the weapons had passed through the thin metal foil. He said, "Return fire."
James ran his fingers over the keys for a second and said, "Fire returned, sir."
Captain Klein looked over at James and shook his head. He didn't trust it when James talked like that. He watched the screen. There were massive explosions at six of the alien craft. Unlike the movies, the explosions didn't make a sound. They were just little flashes on the screen.
The ships weren't destroyed, but they did start to spin in an uncontrolled manner. Frowning, he asked, "What happened?"
"The Electromagnetic Pulse probably fried all of their electronics," James answered studying the feeds from the sensors. He had expected the ships to get vaporized, not spin out of control. Nodding his head, he studied the sensors. He said, "Yep. They are electrically dead."
"Oh," Captain Klein said. He figured that the enemy would have been shielded against an EMP.
The last remaining ship fired another salvo at the umbrellas. James asked, "Should we torpedo it?"
"Not yet," Captain Klein said. He turned to Ann and said, "Send them a message demanding their surrender."
"Yes, sir," Ann said as she entered the appropriate command.
The last remaining ship fired another salvo at the umbrellas. The result was the same as the first two salvos — a bunch of holes appeared in the foil, but none of the weapons exploded. There was one minor problem and that was that one of the weapons passed very close to their ship. James asked, "Now?"
"Yes," Captain Klein answered thinking that they had been lucky with so many missiles fired in their direction.
James was about to type the command when he noticed something on the sensors. He said, "Hold on a minute."
"They're firing at us man," Captain Klein yelled.
"No. They've been holed," James replied watching as fragments of the ship separated.
"What do you mean, they've been holed?" Captain Klein asked staring at James.
"Uh, it looks like the cannons took out their ship," James answered scratching his head. He had just meant to use the cannons as a distraction. Although he didn't know it, he had just discovered a major weakness of the Chitiniodian ships. Like all ships that fired weapons from within their meteor shielding, they had to lower a portion of their shields when they fired their weapons. By a very odd bit of luck, two 50mm projectiles managed to reach the ship at the same time they had lowered their shields for the third salvo.
Captain Klein asked, "How did they reach the ship in that short of a time?"
"I launched them at five hundredths of the speed of light. It took them nearly fifty seconds to reach them," James answered. At the high speeds they were traveling, the two projectiles had torn through the ship leaving a swath of destruction behind.
Captain Klein stared at the screen unable to believe that they had managed to defeat the enemy fleet with umbrellas. At nearly a light year from their position, there were flashes on the screen showing that the first salvo of missiles fired by the aliens had exploded. Frowning, he asked, "What was that?"
"I guess their weapons have an autodestruct if they don't encounter a target," James answered. It made sense. It wasn't particularly healthy to have armed missiles cruising through space forever.
Captain Klein turned to Ann and said, "Have our fighters investigate the wrecks."
Ann relayed the orders to the four fighters that had moved into fighting distance once the umbrellas had opened. Fire King and Ice Queen would investigate the lead ship while the other two pilots would investigate one of the other six ships.
James looked over at Captain Klein and said, "I'd say that went well."
"It went better than I expected," Captain Klein replied.
Standing up from his console, James asked, "Do you know what the best thing about this was?"
"I'm afraid to ask," Captain Klein answered. He ignored the next set of explosions that were taking place a light year away. His attention was focused on the fact that James was wearing his cape. He hadn't realized that.
Taking a heroic pose, James answered, "I can tell my uncle that I, Super-spaceman, and my wife, Super-spacewoman, have protected him from the evil intergalactic hordes on their way to ravage our solar system!"
"I feel sorry for your uncle," Captain Klein said shaking his head. The sad thing was that it was true. James had protected them.
James looked at Captain Klein and said, "Do you want to know something else, Captain Klein?"
"What?"
"You're a hero for saving Earth. Who knows, you just might get a cape of your own," James said with a grin.
The reaction of the Quatyl aboard the Quatyl scout ships to the unfolding battle was one of stunned shock. They had been ready to flee the moment the Chitiniodians had opened fire. The first salvo had consisted of a hundred and five missiles. The second and third salvos had consisted of fifteen missiles each. The idea that any race would travel with that kind of destructive intent was staggering.
The human response of six missiles had looked rather pathetic compared to the rate of fire unleashed by the aliens. All of the servant species had watched the initial exchange assuming the worst. The result of the human missiles had been extremely surprising.
The sudden destruction of the final Chitiniodian ship had appeared like magic. Captain Beac stared at the feed from the human ship wondering what had happened to destroy the ship. The small projectiles didn't even register on the sensors. One second the ship was firing and then the next second it was coming apart.
Captain Beac asked, 'What happened?'
'They destroyed the whole fleet, ' Bear answered staring at the sensors. The destruction of the last ship didn't make sense to her.
'How did they destroy the last ship?' Captain Beac asked.
Bear answered, 'I don't know. These humans are dangerous.'
'I know, ' Captain Beac answered staring at the scene of destruction that was floating in space.
From aboard the Explorer, Siegfried used a Slathern to communicate to the Quatyl Scout ship. He said, 'The humans have been victorious.'
'What are they doing?' Captain Beac asked.
Siegfried answered, 'They are celebrating their victory.'
Bear said, 'These humans are very dangerous.'
While investigating the remains of the lead ship, Ken noticed that one part of the vessel was nearly intact. He maneuvered his fighter to investigate the matter further. As he came around, he could see that it was laid out like the bridge of a ship. Excited, he got on the radio and said, "This is Fire King. I've found something interesting."
Ann replied, "What?"
"It looks like the command deck of the ship. It is pretty much intact," Ken answered.
There was a long moment of silence while Ann relayed the news to the captain. Ann said, "Stay where you are, Fire King. We're sending a shuttle out to tow it back to the ship."
"Will do," Ken said resigned to floating in space for a while longer. So far this engagement had been pretty boring from his perspective. He didn't even get to fire one of his torpedoes.
It was nearly an hour before two shuttles appeared beside Ken's fighter. The pilot of one of the shuttles said, "Fire King, this is Dowser. We're here to tow your find back to the ship."
Ken replied, "Dowser, the find is right in front of me."
"We see it, Fire King," Dowser replied.
"Good, Dowser," Ken replied.
"This is Ice Queen. I'm on my way over to check out one of the other ships," Kim announced.
"Hold on Ice Queen," Ken said, "Dowser, do you need me here?"
"You're free to go, Fire King. We can handle it from here," Dowser answered.
"Ice Queen, this is Fire King. I'm on my way to join you. You need a little fire by your side," Ken said.
"Promises, promises," Kim answered.
The six intact ships were found to have no survivors within them. All that remained of the aliens were green smears on the interior walls. The electronics systems throughout the ship were fried, but they could still learn a lot from the remaining hulks. All of the races, except for Quatyl, were aboard the ships poking and peering into every nock and cranny. Unexploded missiles were neatly lined up in the racks that feed the launching mechanism. The ships were a treasure trove of technology and the humans loved to reverse engineer alien technology. After all, that was how they reached space.
The little Dactites, wearing their space suits, swarmed over the wreckage of the lead ship that had been towed back to the human ship. They were having more fun than any Dactite could recall having since the race first encountered the Quatyl. They appreciated the chance to completely dismantle the alien space ship.
The Dactites had just removed a large console and discovered what appeared to be the hardware of a computer. Their initial examination convinced them that it had been undamaged. It was immediately brought back to the human ship by the four Dactites that had discovered it. They knew that it would require the cold logic of a Dromat to figure out how to access the computer.
Wearing a space suit, James met the Dactites in the dock. They were soon joined by two Dromats. It was an odd group of suited figures that stood around the computer trying to decide what to do with it. Grabbing a pencil and paper, James started drawing as the others gathered around him. There were head shakes, arm waves, and other gestures as the pencil was passed from one to the next.
For the next two days, no one saw or heard from James, the Dactites, or the Dromats. The dock remained locked and inaccessible. Much to the displeasure of the crews, the shuttles and fighters that had been on duty had to land at the Quatyl ships. Every one was demanding that the dock be redesigned.
While having James locked away for two days was viewed as a positive turn of events by Captain Klein, Ann was worried. The great fear was that there might be some disease that could be brought aboard the ship with the introduction of alien germs. She stood beside the door to the dock worried that he was lying dead on the floor.
Ann did not have a reason to be worried. Working with the Dactites and the Dromats, James had constructed an isolation chamber. They had kept the dock in a vacuum until the alien computer had been put into the isolation chamber. It was only after getting a good connection to the computer and filling the isolation chamber with nitrogen that the atmosphere was returned to the dock.
James and the Dromats had attacked the problem of decoding the programming with a vengeance. They worked with single-minded intent to learn the secrets of their attacker. The Dactites scurried around making the electronics required to interface with the machine. Everyone was having a great time.
Two significant successes occurred while they were working together. The first was that James, the two Dromats, and the four Dactites had figured out how to communicate without requiring the presence of Quatyl and Slatherns. The second was that they had managed to decode the programming language of the Chitiniodians. It should be mentioned that the first success was far more important that the second, although it would be a while before that was realized by anyone.
James, the two Dromats, and the four Dactites went over the data contained within the computer. They had been extremely fortunate in the find. The computer had been the tactical computer for the Chitiniodians. The picture that emerged was disturbing. The entire history of the ship was encoded within the crystalline memory of the computer. All of the battles it had engaged in were recorded. The tactics used by the Chitiniodians were described in gory detail and it should be acknowledged that the details were pretty gory.
James had viewed the data with a growing sense of horror. The sheer number of alien ships that had been destroyed was mind boggling. He realized that if his tactics had failed, that the Chitiniodians would have gone on to Earth and bombed it into dust. He had managed to stumble upon a strategy that the Chitiniodians had never encountered. After reviewing the data for a day, he said, "We need to tell the others."
One of the Dromat said, "This is very disturbing."
"There is no talking with them," the other Dromat said seeing that they received the communications to talk and had ignored them.
"We have to prepare for war," James said knowing that it was inevitable that the Chitiniodians would be back. The record was very clear in what they could expect.
The two Dromat discussed the matter between them for a full five minutes. After their discussion, one of the Dromat said, "You are right. Logic dictates that course of action."
"Quatyl and Human have to form an alliance or all will be lost," the other Dromat said.
James didn't realize that having a Dromat agree with him was so significant. He didn't know that no one ever argued with a Dromat and won. If they agreed with him, then everyone would ultimately agree with him. The Dactites stared at the Dromats understanding the significance of their statement.
Safely nestled in his safety pod, Captain Beac listened to the report of the Dromat. About the time the Dromat had started to convey how many space faring species the Chitiniodians had eliminated, he lost consciousness. This was the great enemy that the Quatyl had feared ever since getting control of their environment. The other Quatyl listened to the story with a growing sense of horror. The idea of facing an enemy in battle went against their inner-most character. It was impossible for them to even consider war.
Captain Beac regained consciousness about the time that the Dromat announced, "Quaytl and Human will have to form an alliance or all will be lost."
"All what will be lost?" Captain Beac asked thinking there had to be some way to hide until this threat passed.
"The Chitiniodians will kill all Quatyl and servant races. Every settled planet will be destroyed. There will be nowhere to hide. They will launch a half of a million ships to find us," the Dromat answered.
Hoping for the best, Captain Beac asked, "There's got to be a place to hide."
"They will search every star and every planet around every star in our entire sector of space," the Dromat replied.
"Every star?"
"They have done it before and they will do it again," the Dromat said. He shook once in a manner that set his hair floating around him. This was used by the Dromat to indicate that what it had just said was inevitable.
"The Humans are crazy," Captain Beac said. The whole idea of aligning with a slightly insane species over which they had no control was terrifying. The mental image evoked was similar to that of saddling up a tiger and taking it for a Sunday afternoon ride. That thought wasn't reassuring.
In total agreement with Captain Beac, the Dromat replied, "That is why they won the last battle. It is our only hope."
Captain Klein thought his head was going to explode as he listened to Captain Beac. The conversation had started out innocently enough when Captain Beac had come over to the ship. He should have known that it was a rather significant for the Quatyl to leave the safety of his ship to visit. With Siegfried and a Slathern present, the Quatyl Captain said, "You are concerned about our mind control over the servant races."
"Yes, we are," Captain Klein replied.
"You would be willing to fight us over that matter," Captain Beac said. The leadership within the Quatyl Space Exploration Agency had come to that conclusion based upon the information provided by the Earth Quatyl.
"That is a possibility," Captain Klein said although no one had explicitly mentioned it to date.
There was a long moment of silence while he considered how to express his orders. Explaining the actions of the Quatyl was a completely new necessity for him. Finally, Captain Beac said, "The Quatyl Space Command has authorized me to surrender."
That was about the time when Captain Klein thought his head was going to explode. Shaking his head, he said, "Surrender?"
"Yes. You declare war on us and we will surrender," Captain Beac said.
Captain Klein knew that the only person crazy enough to understand what was going on was James. He couldn't help but think that turning to James for advice was the act of a truly desperate man. He was desperate. Looking over at James, he asked, "Does this make any sense to you?"
"Yes," James answered nodding his head, "It makes perfect sense to me."
Hating himself for the words that were about to come out of his mouth, Captain Klein said, "Explain it to me."
James said, "They want you to declare war on the Quatyl so that they can surrender."
"I figured out that much. What does it mean?" Captain Klein asked.
"Well, we can say that we fought the Quatyl to free the servant races. We won, so they're free," James answered.
"Will they be free?"
"No," James answered with a smile. Judging by the expression on Captain Klein's face, he wasn't too happy with that answer. James added, "But it does mean that they are free to travel with us outside the influence of the Quatyl."
"Oh," Captain Klein said frowning. Shaking his head, he asked, "So why don't they just say they're free?"
"Because they won't be," James answered. Looking at the vein in Captain Klein's forehead as it throbbed, he added, "They can't free them, so saying that they'll do it is a lie. They can surrender to us and make it our problem."
Starman looked at James and said, "My pet is getting smarter."
"Really?" James asked with a grin. He looked around and said, "You can't be talking about me. You're my pet. Where's your pet?"
"You're my pet," Starman said.
"No way," James said with a grin.
"What's the hurry? I mean why can't we spend a little time trying to figure out if there's another solution?" Ann asked ignoring the side conversation between James and Starman. She knew that with any attention the two of them could keep up the debate all day.
"The aliens," Captain Beac and Captain Klein answered together.
"What about the aliens?" James asked.
"The Dromat say that the Quatyl and Human have to join forces to win this war," Captain Beac answered.
"You can say that again. We aren't going to be able to fight them alone," Captain Klein said knowing that with a single ship that Earth wouldn't stand a chance. James had told him what was on the computer and he had forwarded the report to space station. It was a forgone conclusion that Earth was in trouble.
"So can we get the formalities out of the way so that we can join forces?" Captain Beac asked.
"Sure," Captain Klein said, "What am I supposed to do?"
"Declare war on the Quatyl," James answered.
Looking at the little Quatyl, Captain Klein said, "On behalf of Earth forces, I declare war on the Quatyl."
"On behalf of the Quatyl Space Exploration Agency, the Quatyl surrender to the forces of Earth," Captain Beac said.
"Oh behalf of Earth forces, we accept your surrender," Captain Klein said.
"Excellent," Captain Beac said somewhat relieved that all had gone well so far. His wife had feared that the Beasts would have to sacrifice at least one Quatyl in order to say that they had actually fought. In what was a cruel twist of logic, he had argued that humans were slightly insane, but not in a bad way. That still left a lot of room for doubt and his wife had not been convinced.
"That was the shortest war in history," James remarked, "and I was there for all of it."
"Shut up," Captain Klein said to James fully expecting him to start a fictitious blow-by-blow telling of a gargantuan struggle between two mighty military forces. He could hear it already. It rather disturbed him that he was starting to anticipate James.
Captain Beac said, "I propose that Quatyl and Human join forces in defending ourselves from the Chitiniodian Space Fleet."
"I accept that proposal on behalf of Earth Forces," Captain Klein said hoping that he wasn't overstepping his authority.
"Excellent. I shall report that to the Quatyl Space Exploration Agency," Captain Beac said. He hoped that they would be happy that he had followed orders.
"I shall do the same with Earth Command," Captain Klein said.
Captain Beac knew that what he was about to say was not going to be accepted too well. He looked over at Starman for a second and then used the Slathern to discuss something with him. Starman looked very surprised at what the other Quatyl had said. It seemed like a full minute went by before Starman answered.
James looked at the pair of Quatyl and said, "This doesn't sound good. They just said something about giving you bad news."
"Who? What? Give who bad news?" Captain Klein asked wondering how James had picked up on that.
"You," James said.
"What kind of bad news?" Captain Klein asked getting worried. The last thing he needed was some sort of surprise. Then he realized that he was talking to James. The guy had to be playing a trick on him.
Following Starman's advice to tell them straight out, Captain Beac said, "The command of the Quatyl Space Exploration Agency had a long discussion about who should lead the war. Understanding how much this is going to upset you, I want you to know that this is not my idea."
"Oh. Who?" Captain Klein asked wondering how he was going to break it to Earth that the Quatyl wanted to lead the fight against the Chitiniodians. He was pretty sure that they would want to lead it.
"James," Captain Beac answered.
"Me?" James asked standing up a little straighter. He was pleased that the Quatyl had developed a sense of humor.
"Yes."
"Oh God," Captain Klein said feeling dizzy. He really needed to sit down before he fell down.
Knowing that there was no way that he'd be put in charge of the war effort, James tugged at his cape and, winking at Ann, announced, "I, Super-spaceman, shall protect the planet of Earth from the evil intergalactic hordes on their way to ravage our solar system!"
"We're doomed," Captain Klein said sitting down on the floor.
"Why James?" Ann asked. As much as she loved him, he was the last person she would put in charge of a war. Just about anyone on the ship would be a much better choice.
Captain Beac answered, "According to the servant races, his thinking is unique."
James grinned upon hearing the answer. He pointed both of his thumbs at himself and said, "I like the sound of that. My thinking is unique."
"What does that mean?" Ann asked looking over at Captain Klein thinking that he didn't look too well. The poor man looked like he was going to be sick.
"He's saying that James is crazy," Captain Klein answered.
"Yes and no," Starman said. It was a little more complicated than that.
Lazlo Zalezac