New Neighbors

Chapter 32

ORGANO SYSTEM

Amy and her staff read the reports from Alpha and Sol systems and were at a loss as to how to interpret the situation. It appeared that the ship was not a threat and took no interest in any of the ships or planets. The only thing that stood out was the disappearance of that one man from Earth, even though the ship had captured one fighter with pilot, and several people from Earth; every person and object was returned except him. It did catch Amy, John, and Kate's attention that the missing man was from their place of birth and in the area that they grew up in; not to mention the area where this whole adventure started. Amy noted that Sally had started the process of examining the abductees, but the results were days away and they had a major battle ahead in four days.

The next thing the group discussed was the readiness of their ships and troops for the invasion of Empire space. The production platforms had been doing upgrades and producing as quickly as they could. A couple of the other systems had committed to provide troops or supplies. The mechanical translator was being redone and improved so that the reptilians could now be represented on the council after this was all over. There had been a small amount of resistance at first until Amy pointed out that they were just as much victims as everyone else in this matter.

The staff meeting was just finishing when they were notified that several of the council members from other systems were reporting visits from strange ships and wanted to talk with Amy about protection for their systems. Amy, Jake, Tuvok, and Ted went to hear the reports via a conference call since they were still in the home system of the reptilians. Kate had been left on Organo home world as Amy's stand-in during this reclaiming of the reptilian home world and system. Kate had each of the representatives linked and was ready when Amy called. Ted suggested that Alpha and Sol systems be added also as this would save having to forward the minutes of the meeting to them. The results of the meeting were that all the aligned systems had been visited and the descriptions of the ships were almost the same as those from Alpha and Sol. Some of the systems reported the same planet explosions from the planets closest to the suns. Although several were just like Sol system in that a ship just passed through the systems and collected beings and craft then returned them to where they had been. There were only five reported incidents where the being abducted wasn't returned. In each case of a non-returned being, the level of violence in that system dropped. Sally reported that the attacks on her centers had ceased within hours of the ship's passage. This was very confusing to Amy, her staff, and the various representatives.

T-3 (72 hours)

Amy and Jake were jarred awake by the alert tones. Now the reptilian system was being looked at by one of those strange ships. Amy immediately had the order passed to be passive unless the ship acted hostile. Reports started coming in that the ship was ignoring the ships on patrol and that two of the ships had disappeared only to reappear in a matter of seconds instead of the usual five to ten minutes. The only exception was the disappearance of "Ralph", he wasn't returned for about fifteen minutes. But when he did return he had been changed, he now didn't need to use the translator to speak with John and he had an idea about improving the translator so that it would be usable as a subcutaneous implant. Once he had given the changes to John, "Ralph" couldn't remember anything about those changes or where the ideas came from.

The ship traveled to the center of the system and took up orbit around the sun for about eight hours then started back out of the system. As the ship pasted the Reptilian home world Amy noticed a weak psionic pulse come from the ship, so she "bounced" the pulse back to the ship. The ship stopped almost immediately and turned towards the planet, Amy detected another pulse that was stronger and sounded like a question "Who?". Amy didn't reply, she had seen what happened when she sent the first pulse back towards the ship. After several minutes, very tense minutes, the ship resumed its outward course, left the system and jumped. As soon as the ship was gone Amy contacted Jake and Ted and told them about the pulses, they had detected both pulses also but had not replied to either one of them. Between the three of them they agreed that if or when one of the ships showed up again nobody was to use their telepathy while the ship was near; this idea was also passed on to all known psionic crew members.

AL reported that he had not been able to detect anything new about the ship that was not already known, which wasn't much, except that the ship was much warmer going out than when it came in the system. But that could be the result of its orbit around the sun in such close proximity. AL also reported that the new design supplied by "Ralph" showed very advanced technology, technology that was not known or found in any of the databases he had access to. A covert scan of "Ralph" showed that he had an implant in place just behind his right ear that wasn't there before his abduction. This situation was getting stranger by the minute and that worried Amy, especially with the upcoming attack.

SOL SYSTEM

Luna reported the outcome of the strange ship's passage through the Organo system, after being informed by AL, to Sally. Marcie made the same report to Nate. Sally had a few preliminary reports on the abductees, there had been nothing unusual found except everyone of them had a latent mental ability and could not remember being taken. Each of the "victims" thought they had blacked out for a few seconds, in fact one of them had a history of petit mal seizures and thought that was what had happened. As Sally was reviewing the reports she was notified that several people were trying to contact her from Earth in regards to the abductions. She had a message sent to them that the people were being examined and that so far there had been nothing found and they all appeared unharmed.

Sally was thinking about the one disappearance from Earth that didn't return, and it had been in the area she grew up in to boot. Sally had Luna do a very detailed scan of the area to see if they had missed something in previous scans. Luna found something that wasn't shown on previous scans, a weak signal indicating some sort of psionic activity. She was just about to report this to Sally when the amount of activity increased ten-fold and just a second later the relay on the moon sent a signal. Both signals were reported to Sally who instructed Luna to have Linda and a squad of security join her in the hanger. They were going to Earth and see what was going on in that area, the  timing was just to close together to suit Sally. It took about an hour to get the team ready for the trip to Earth, Sally was wearing a full battle suit with weapons when they left the moon.

The two shuttles were only a few minutes out from the moon when the alert sounded that one of those strange ships was entering the system and headed towards Earth at a quick pace, it would get there within minutes of Sally's arrival if she continued with the excursion as planed. Reports of the ship's progress kept coming in, a couple of the fighters from Mars had tried to attack the ship and the crews were removed for about thirty seconds and returned unconscious. When one of the destroyers tried to attack, the whole bridge crew was rendered unconscious after the first shot, which just bounced off the ship's shields. Luna reported that fighters from the moon were launching to intercept; Sally had them to stand-by and not to attack unless attacked first. Luna also reported that the ship had increased speed and would arrive before Sally could get to Earth. Sally thought about returning to the moon when the ship became visible and it was too late then.

"Oh shit, what have I gotten myself into this time" Sally thought. Without thinking Sally thought this too hard, the ship made a course correction and was now on an intercept course and would either divert at the last second on hit the shuttle. Everything went black for Sally suddenly.

Linda had the shuttle hold position when Sally just vanished from the shuttle, since Sally had shared the reports about these ships Linda made sure that none of the fighters attacked the strange ship which had continued on towards Earth. It was an hour later when the ship passed by the shuttle on its way out of the system and Sally suddenly appeared on the deck of the shuttle and her armor appeared next to her.

"What happened? How did I get on the floor and out of my armor; and what is that ship doing now?" Sally asked.

"You were here one minute and gone the next. You've been gone for an hour, I assume that the ship took you with it when it went into orbit around Earth. The ship is headed back out of the system; I took the liberty of telling all forces to stand down and not attack it, unless attacked first." Linda replied.

"An hour? I don't see how that is possible. I was sitting there thinking 'What have I gotten myself into' and the next thing I know is that I'm lying on the deck without my armor and you tell me that I was gone an hour" Sally commented.

"Linda have the other shuttle continue to Earth and check out that area, we are returning to the base for a complete exam on me. Luna any reports of any more people being taken while the ship was in orbit? I want a full report ready as soon as I get finished in Med Bay, I want to know everything that ship did and what the sensors showed. Also, coordinate with Marcie and include the reactions of the fighter crews and the crew of the destroyer. Hold off on sending a report to Amy until after I have reviewed what happened today. I assume that my missing was already reported to Nate, so let him know I'm back and headed to Med Bay for the works." Sally said.

"Sally I am detecting a subcutaneous implant behind your left ear that was not there when you left the base. Basic scans of the implant show that it appears to be the same as the one found implanted  in 'Ralph' after his abduction. There were no implants found in any of the previous persons who were taken by the other ship and returned. I have continued to monitor the area on Earth and there is still a very weak psionic activity present. Med Bay is standing by for your arrival." Luna replied.

It was several hours later when Sally exited Med Bay with a clean bill of health, the doctors had run every scan that was known in the medical database and the only thing that was pending was a very detailed gene level test and that would be a few more hours. Sally went straight to her office to start reviewing the reports from that days activities. The sensors had not detected anything new from the ship, the exams of the fighter crews and the destroyer crew were negative for changes. The report from the security force that went to Earth showed where they had found a camouflaged cave that they were still trying to gain entry to see what was inside. A maintenance drone had been sent to try and bypass the entrance security. Sally added her own impressions to the report and had it sent to Nate, Jones, and Amy.

Sally had found that the implant allowed her to understand any language on Earth and Luna had even tested her on some of the known languages from space, even reptilian.  She had also found that what she said would be translated into the correct language for the person or creature she speaking with. Sally had included this information in her report.

It was time for her evening meal, so Sally headed to the dinning room to join Linda. As they were talking and eating, Sally wondered aloud that maybe if she had not removed her helmet the ship might not have been able to "hear" her and therefore might not have taken her. Linda asked what made Sally think that way.

"Well we know our little friend from the center in Chile is a very active psionic but the ship ignored him both times. It might be that the shielding we developed to keep everyone safe from his control also blocked the ship from detecting him. We know so far that the full armor protects our people from psionic attack, and that all the people taken were found to have latent psionic abilities. And after the other day we know I have very strong, at times, psionic abilities. It seems that the ships are drawn towards psionic beings" Sally replied, then added that she didn't know anyway to test her idea safely.

 Sally and Linda had just finished eating when they were notified that the security team was requesting that someone with the understanding of alien technology to come and take a look at what had been found once the entrance had been breeched. Sally had Luna to summon their most qualified person to meet her in the hanger to go to Earth and see what had been found and yes she would wear full armor and keep the helmet on at all times.

What Sally found when she got to the cave was very much like the cave Jake had discovered that started this adventure. There was a large amount of electronics and there seemed to be a very primitive AI, at least compared to Luna and the rest. But the most surprising thing was that there were traces of SuLak DNA found! While not surprising, there was signs that some of the Iberians had been there and some reptilian DNA was found. It took most of the night to dismantle and ship the electronics back to the moon to be examined by Luna. Once the site had been taken care of Sally had the two relays brought to the moon base to be examined also.

T-1 (24 hours)

Amy reviewed the updated report from Sally regarding the cave, the ship, and her idea about the strange ships actions. Amy had an idea about how to test Sally's thoughts on the strange ships. They had found that a very minor criminal on the reptilian planet was borderline psionic, the fact that he was sentenced to death for trying to pick the pocket of one of "Ralph's" sons was in her favor. She would propose that he be used as bait to lure one of the ships back, and at place of her choosing, and allow the criminal to be taken, hopefully, by the strange ship. If they took the "man" then that would come very close to proving Sally's idea. Now all she had to do was convince "Ralph". After much discussion it was agreed that the "man" would "volunteer" for this in exchange for not being put to death. What Amy didn't tell "Ralph" was that the "man" would be put in a disabled ship with one of the SuLak clones and the ship would be towed to the outer edges of that system.

Amy had one more trick up her sleeve, she would link together with Jake and Ted and send a very powerful psionic message out, then the three of them would enter a shielded room and wait for the ship to show up, if it did. The trick worked, one of the ships showed up within an hour of the psionic pulse from Amy, Jake, and Ted. The ship approached the disabled ship and stayed near it for about fifteen minutes before leaving. When the small ship was retrieved it was discovered that the reptilian was the only one onboard, he explained that the other being had just vanished. One moment they were trying to get the ship running and the next he had found himself in the small cabin alone, but he had noticed that the time was fifteen minutes later than when he had last looked at the time. This young man might be reptilian but he wasn't dumb, except for trying to pick-pocket the rulers son. What surprised Amy was that given more time he might have gotten the ship running; then it dawned on Amy that she had not been using any type of translator and yet they understood each other. A quick scan showed that another implant was in place. The young reptilian was offered a place onboard or he could go back home; he stayed onboard and said it was safer than going home, he said he hated digging in the mines and wanted to see space.

T+6 hours

All one hundred ships appeared in Imperial space followed shortly by three Reptilian ships full of ground forces and two new platforms (in travel mode). It was time the Empire learned that they had upset too many people and stepped on too many toes. This was WAR.