Part 3 - Part 06

Finally Captain Orihci said, “Let’s have some food, I’m sure we’ll think of something.”

While the ladies went away to bring food Captain Orihci brought a bottle of rakia and glasses.

We each toasted in our own language and had a sip. As usual it burned as it went down. As I felt the burn I realized that we did have something in common; it was Delche’s rakia. We were now drinking before breakfast, something my grandfather used to do back in my village. I also remembered Delche learned how to make rakia in my native Macedonia. I don’t know why I thought of these things. Perhaps this was a time for reflection.

By the time the women came back with the food we were working on our second drink. I was surprised at how much Ukasnek drank in his condition.

The food again was plentiful and consisted of leftover fish, a variety of biscuits, jellies and aromatic tea.

After we ate I thanked our hosts for the food and apologized for depleting their supplies. I took the girls back to the ship and asked Ireva to take some of the extra food we had, which I figured we wouldn’t need. There was no objection from Vel and Daf. We had enough food to last us months and we figured our mission wouldn’t take more than a week.

Both Captain Orihci and his wife were in tears when they saw all the food that we gave them. In return they gave us tea and jelly which they said was a local product. The jelly was made from the fruit on the trees that grew around their home.

The girls opened a jar of meat and passed it around. Everyone took a bit to sample it. Our hosts approved that it tasted okay and were grateful to have it. Captain Orihci then plopped the rest of the meat on a plate and he, Ukasnek and I shared it as we drank rakia.

“Your ship is legendary,” said Ukasnek. “They’re still talking about you outfoxing our most capable captain even today. So I don’t think for a moment it would be difficult for you to destroy the robots in a conventional sense. The problem is that there are two of them. The moment you hit the first the second will come after you with a vengeance in which case you’ll have two options; fight or run. If you run you accomplish nothing. They’ll come after you and hunt you down until they destroy you. If you fight you’ll be facing fierce opposition. They’ll throw everything they have at you until you completely destroy them or they destroy you.”

“What if I offer assistance to one robot to eliminate the other?” I asked.

“Perhaps you misunderstood me,” said Ukasnek. “Outside of themselves, the robots consider everyone an enemy; they have no concept of what an ally is. Besides, they are constantly looking for bodies to turn into soldiers. They see us as raw material to make more soldiers. That’s what their programming tells them to do. The only way to get near them is to surrender and let them grab you. But if you do that then you’ll no longer be you. You’ll become one of their zombie super soldiers and kill your own mother if they order you. The only time the robots will fight one another is when they’re after gold. But I doubt that they’ll fight each other, they use the super soldiers for that.”

I looked at Captain Orihci and at all the eyes looking at me, scratched my head and said, “This is a tough one…”

“What about a simultaneous attack on both facilities?” I asked.

“With what? You have another ship?” asked Ukasnek.

I didn’t reply.

After sitting there silent for what seemed like an eternity I said, “I’m going alone. I’ll destroy one of their processing facilities and then go after the other and take my chances. I’ll fight until I destroy them or they destroy me. In the meantime I want you all to help me prepare a report so that, when I’m far from here, I can send it to Ostikon to let Asora know what’s happening. Can we do that now?” I asked.

Everyone was in agreement, except about going alone. Captain Orihci, Vel and Daf objected to me going alone and the three volunteered to go with me. I told them that we’d settle that later, first we needed to write the report.

Captain Orihci said he was going to Ukasnek’s ship to get me his logs and give me the coordinates. When he came back we were all inside my ship and Ireva was entering the report into my ship’s communications computer.

After Ireva was done she read back what she had written and while Vel translated for me Ireva translated for the captain, his wife and Ukasnek. Ireva was very good, we all agreed on that. The report was accurate. And even though she was best suited to go with me on this mission, she was still not allowed. I wouldn’t even allow it. I told Captain Orihci I couldn’t take him either. He had a family and was needed here. He agreed and then gave Ireva the coordinates and their descriptions from Ukasnek’s navigation computer which Ireva and Daf then entered into our navigation computer.

After we finished the main report I asked Ireva to include the names of all of us who were involved in its preparation and a short description of who each person was. I then asked Vel and Daf to prepare a separate report for Gen and tell her what we were going to do. If she didn’t hear from us in a week’s time she was to send attack ships to the coordinates given to us by Ukasnek and finish the

job. Under no circumstances was she to send soldiers. We told her we were going to look for and destroy the other robot first.

“It makes sense,” said Captain Orihci. “You already know where this robot is and you don’t have to look for it once you destroy the other one.”

“Do you know anything about how the robot communicates with the super soldiers or with the other robots?” I asked Ukasnek. “The reason I’m asking is so that we can find a way to disable their communication.”

“I’m sorry I don’t know anything about that but I assume the robot sends commands through the chips in the back of the soldiers’ necks. I’m sorry but anything more I tell you will only be a guess and I don’t want to mislead you and make things worse,” Ukasnek replied.

After we were done with the reports we went back inside the house and resumed drinking rakia while discussing various scenarios of what was going to happen if we succeeded in destroying the robots or if we failed.

At one point Ireva gave Vel some channels she could call and leave information with her on our progress. This would be one-way communication but Ireva assured us that she would receive the information because her receivers would be on at all times.

My heart began to pound as I began to think about our departure. Everyone looked nervous when I said, “We should get going. It’ll take as about a day and a half to arrive at the planet and I have no idea how long it will take us to find the second robot.”

After we said our goodbyes, which were very emotional with these people, we took off into space and remained in communication silence until we reached the galaxy trader frontier; the place where we were turned back the last time I was there with Ori and Delche.

The moment we arrived we were approached by three attack ships. I asked Vel to open a channel and tell them that we were mercenaries

and we had soldiers to deliver and needed to know where to deliver them. After some silence we heard a voice say that the soldiers had to be delivered to a facility which had coordinates on the other side of the planet and that we would be followed to the destination by one of their ships.

After we agreed the same voice came back and said that we weren’t allowed to proceed beyond this point because our ship was armed.

When I asked what they suggested we do, the voice said to proceed to a small space station ahead and surrender the prisoners there. We agreed as long as we got paid.

“This is foolishness Sir,” said Vel. “You’ll get us killed.”

“My dear Vel, just play along and see what happens but be prepared to act quickly when I tell you.”

After being escorted by the ships, one in front of us and two behind, we arrived at the space station where a hatch began to open and the voice instructed us to fly inside.

At that very moment, instead of flying inside, I powered up all our energy cannons and torpedo and quickly flew under the station and behind it. I then turned our ship around and fired a torpedo at the space station.

I asked Daf to lock-on to the three ships that were momentarily disabled by the blast. I fired the three cannons at them split seconds apart. Two of the ships exploded and were destroyed. The third was crippled but kept firing at us. When I saw that it couldn’t maneuver, I flew away from its firing line and zapped it with my last charged energy cannon.

After it blew up I asked Vel to check all communications and see if any of the ships had sent a distress call. Vel said there were none.

We then scanned the region with our long range sensors to see if there were any other ships in the area. There weren’t any.

“Well, what do you think ladies?” I asked.

“All in a day’s work, Sir,” said Vel and saluted.

“Shouldn’t we be sending our reports right about now?” asked Daf.

“Yes we should,” I said. “Vel will you please do me the honours and tell me how long it will take for them to get there? And… please include a request for acknowledgment to let us know they got them.”

“Yes Sir. It will take twenty minutes for the messages to get there, another twenty to get back plus the time it takes the people to read them and decide what to reply. In other words it will take about a day or two before we get a response, Sir.”

“Vel, what’s with the sarcasm? You were so nice to me on the planet… in front of Ireva,” I said.

“You and her are a perfect match, Sir,” she said and mumbled something in their language.

I was going to say, “You’re jealous,” but I didn’t say anything.

Daf shook her head and she too said nothing.

“Do you think robots were flying those ships, Sir?” Daf asked.

“Yes Daf, I’m sure robots were operating the space station too. A computer can fly a ship. It does every time we activate the autopilot. Imagine if we were smart enough to anticipate everything that might happen and program that into our computer. Then the computer could fly our ship too,” I replied.

“So, it’s possible…” said Daf.

“It’s not only possible it actually happened. Those ships didn’t expect our brave captain to do what he did. We didn’t give them a reason to suspect anything. They accepted what we said to be the truth. Like you and me, they had no idea that our courageous captain

was going to fly under the space station just like he did and blow them out of the sky. And we had no idea that we were flying into a trap,” replied Vel.

“What trap?” asked Daf.

“My dear Daf, luring us into the space station was the trap. They wanted to capture us. They would have agreed to give us all the gold on the planet to get us to go inside the space station,” I said.

“And you cooperated with them knowing all that?” replied Daf.

“You’ve got it my dear Daf…” said Vel.

“We’ll wait here until we hear back from Ostikon and then decide what we do next. Is that okay with you lieutenants?” I asked.

After I got a positive response from both of them I told them to keep a close eye on the long range sensors for approaching ships. I then pushed my seat back and stared at the dark space outside our windshield.

Moments later I noticed a flash above the window on the right side of the windshield.

“What’s that?” I asked Daf, pointing at the right corner of the windshield. I asked her because she was closest to where the flash had taken place.

After looking in the instructions manual Daf said, “It’s a visor for the windshield, Sir.”

“Not that. The flash I saw.”

“I didn’t see any flash, Sir” she said, “There are all kinds of activities in outer space; perhaps we got hit by something microscopic that caused a flash.”

Looking at Vel I said, “Daf, I didn’t know we had a visor on this ship.” I actually didn’t.

“Now you’re making fun of me…” said Vel. “You know every ship has a visor, a metallic shield to protect the windshield when flying through meteor storms, Sir.”

“Daf, show me how to close and open it…” I said.

Daf came over and showed me on my panel which button to push to close and open the visor, which I did several times.

After Vel mumbled something I stopped doing it and asked her how long it had been since we sent our transmission.

“Ten minutes, Sir,” she said.

“I’m going to sleep now,” I said, “wake me up when something happens…”

“Like what, Sir?” asked Vel and looked at me with a funny smile on her face.

Daf said something to her in their language and Vel replied in Macedonian, “Why shouldn’t I make fun of him… while I have the opportunity? Tomorrow we could all be dead…”

An unexpected turn of events

Just when I thought I’d fallen asleep I heard a single loud beep that sent me flying off my chair. At first I didn’t know where I was but then I heard Vel laughing.

“On your feet soldier!” she yelled in a man’s voice. “We have an incoming message from Ostikon”.

“What does it say?” I asked.

“Just got it, I haven’t read it yet!”

After I composed myself and pulled my chair back to its sitting position I asked Daf how long I’d been sleeping.

“Nearly six hours, Sir,” she replied.

“Oh, wow, that long. What have you been doing all this time?”

“Watching the sensors and waiting for the reply, Sir.”

“Are you ready to hear this, Sir?” asked Vel.

“Yes, go ahead.”

“They received both of our messages and they’re okay with them,” said Vel.

“What? That’s it?” I asked.

“And, oh yes, they said the galaxy trader outpost which continuously sent them information on the war… has gone silent. They are no longer receiving information and want to know what happened,” said Vel.

“How should I know what happened…?! Now they want us to find out what happened to the outpost?” I asked. “Daf, what are the coordinates of this outpost?”

“We’re sitting on top of it, Sir,” replied Daf.

“Now you’ve done it, Sir. You blew up their stupid propaganda machine,” Vel said, paused for a moment and continued.

“So the space station, this tiny little speck of metal in space, was their famous galaxy trader voice that got my entire planet involved in an insane war to which we were going to commit five million lives?” Vel said angrily and began to yell at the top of her voice in their language.

Just as Daf was about to yell at her to stop yelling, I grabbed Daf by the arm and said, “Leave her…”

After Vel yelled for about a minute, Daf, looking annoyed, put her hands over her ears and stared out into space through the ship’s windshield.

About a minute later, still yelling, Vel got up, rummaged through the big box and pulled out a bottle of rakia. She then grabbed our plastic cups, washed them, poured rakia into them and handed me one.

Daf didn’t want any.

When I took my cup I looked at Vel. She said something in her language which made Daf blush. After Vel took a big gulp of rakia she said, “I feel better now…”

I asked her what she’d said but she wouldn’t tell me. I asked Daf what Vel had said but she wouldn’t tell me either. All Daf said was that she didn’t know the words in Macedonian.

After I drank my cup dry Vel refilled it and said, “How can an entire planet be so stupid?”

She took another sip, looked at me and said, “At first I couldn’t understand why you wanted to investigate this damn war rather than just fight in it like you were expected to, but now I get it, and you, you can gloat all you want but you were right. There, I said it.”

“Does that mean that we’re friends now and you’ll show me some respect?”

“No, don’t count on it, but I will have some appreciation for your crap and maybe listen to you once in a while.”

Daf shook her head.

After she poured us a third drink Vel went and got a jar of meat and three spoons and we passed the jar around.

Half drunk Vel looked at me and asked, “Do you think we’ll come out of this alive?”

I had another sip and shrugged my shoulders.

Daf also looked at me and was expecting an answer so I said, “Given our track record I’d say that not only will we come out alive but we’ll win the war and save your planet.”

Daf looked at me with her sad eyes and soberly said, “I believe you, Sir, thank you,”

Vel didn’t say anything but moments later passed out in her chair.

“So Daf, it’s you and me now. Tell me something, the propaganda messages coming out of the galaxy trader outpost didn’t exactly fit the robot agenda. I doubt that the robots were even aware of Ostikon’s existence or the mutual defense agreement between Ostikon and the galaxy traders. Don’t you think we’re missing something here?”

“You’re right, Sir, do you think the galaxy trader ambassador has something to do with this?”

“Well, for one, he’s the one informing the war council and Asora’s government. He’s the one receiving and translating the diplomatic dispatches to and from the galaxy trader outpost. Has anyone from Ostikon looked at the original dispatches coming from the outpost?”

“I don’t know… I don’t even know how we can find out.”

“Before we destroyed it, was the outpost transmitting?”

“I don’t know, you’d have to ask Vel. She’ll need to find its frequency and check the logs, Sir.”

“I don’t want to disturb her. Let her rest, we have lots of time. We’ll look at the logs later. For now let’s assume the galaxy trader ambassador is involved. The question is why and what does he have to gain by all this?”

“Maybe it’s not him. Maybe Anelia put him up to this. Maybe it’s Anelia who, through him, is bribing government officials to support the war. She’s the one who insisted on sending our military to the war. To me it makes more sense that she’s behind this than the ambassador. She wants the military off our planet so that she can execute her coup. That’s what I think,” replied Daf.

“I’d have to agree with you and we can prove this by looking at the dispatches sent and received from the outpost. And if that’s true then we need to inform Gen and fast, before Anelia makes her move.”

“I agree, Sir.”

“I think it was a mistake to inform Asora’s government what we found about the war. This will alert Anelia and I’m sure she’ll act before Gen is ready for her. We need to go back to Ostikon and put the ship’s support behind Gen,” I said.

Daf looked at me and saw that I was genuinely concerned. She kicked Vel on the right hip and the two began to yell at each other in their language.

After yelling and swearing Vel finally looked at the logs and said, “The outpost was sending a signal with no data in it. It was just a beacon to let ships know where to arrive and check in before entering the galaxy. Why didn’t we look at that before?”

“I’m sorry to say this but we were all fooled…” I said.

“I agree we should go back and make the jump. We’ll be there in less than an hour. I hope Asora has already sent the troops home to keep them out of harms way.”

“Wait a minute, there’s one more question that’s unanswered,” said Daf.

“Which is?” I asked.

“What were the robots going to do with five million of our people?”

Vel and I looked at each other.

“Vel, since you don’t like my crap, you can take this one,” I said.

“My dear Daf, like any other machine the robots will continue to do what they’re programmed to do. They’ll continue to make super soldiers until they run out of fuel or break down, which may take centuries. In the meantime they’ll continue to abduct people and turn them into zombies. And the idiots from our planet will supply them with all the people they need without question.”

“That makes sense, thank you,” Daf said.

Vel looked at me.

“What?” I asked.

“Well, am I right?”

“Are you asking for my approval?”

“No! I’m asking you if you agree with me.”

“You’re right! Your crap makes perfect sense to me. Now prepare for the jump. That means you Daf.”

“There’s nothing to prepare, Sir, just activate the hyper drive and punch it.”

“Thank you Daf. Vel put away the cups, jar and bottle of rakia and strap your seatbelts.”

After Vel sat down I turned the ship around and lined up with the green vector showing on my panel, set the timer to one minute and forty five seconds, turned the cannons on and set them on auto fire, turned on the retrorockets and punched the hyper drive activation button.

“We are on top of Ostikon, Sir, I have confirmation,” said Daf.

“Not bad flying, Sir, but I see you still guessed at the travel time. But more accurately this time… Congratulations, Sir.”

“Coming from you Vel, that’s a real compliment.”

The moment we arrived Vel made contact with Gen who gave us the bad news. Anelia had already made her move against the base in Nulos and was about to wipe it out with all the soldiers on it. Asora had done nothing to send the soldiers home because she didn’t have the vehicles to transport them. She was still arguing with the local authorities about getting vehicles.

“Ladies we need to stop this and fast,” I said.

“Gen told me she can’t do anything; she can’t even warn the soldiers to abandon the base. No one will take her calls. Besides, there’s nowhere for the soldiers to go. Anelia’s forces have surrounded the base and are waiting for orders to start the slaughter.”

“Daf, quickly point me in the direction of the base,” I said.

I didn’t bother to run diagnostics after the jump. I just punched the autopilot and powered the torpedo and all the ship’s cannons. I then asked Daf to arm the torpedo for maximum impact and to explode it above the base at a safe distance from the ship and the base. The moment she was done I fired it.

“This should get everyone’s attention and let them know we’re here,” I said.

It was a powerful explosion. It shook the ship.

“What happened, Daf? Did you do what I asked you?”

“No Sir. You launched the torpedo before it was ready.”

“And why did you give me the signal to fire?” I asked.

Vel began to laugh and said, “We have a war going on here and you two argue about semantics? What do we do next?”

“Contact Gen and ask her to contact Anelia and ask her to pull her forces back. Tell Gen to give her two hours. When you’re done with Gen contact Asora and tell her what’s happening. Tell her to issue an arrest warrant for Anelia and charge her with something… treason… an attempt to commit genocide… think of something.”

“Sir, my com is jammed with messages accusing us of firing at the base.”

“Forget the messages and do what I tell you. Now!” I said. “And let me know when you’re done.”

Moments later Vel said, “I contacted both Gen and Asora, now what?”

“Now contact Ruzha and let her know what’s going on and who is behind all this. Then tell her to get on channel 45 and inform the people of what’s happening.”

Daf said, “Won’t Anelia take advantage of the situation, invade the base and convince the soldiers to fight against us given the torpedo situation? I’m sure she’ll make the argument that we attacked the base unprovoked and she and her forces were there to save the soldiers… and then start killing them and blame us for it?”

“Ruzha is with Gen and Asora who are closely monitoring the situation,” said Vel. “Now that the ship is back Ruzha will explain to the people why we’re back. She’ll not only tell them that the war is a hoax but also that Anelia and her supporters are behind the hoax. Ruzha will also read out lists of names of people wanted for treason which will include the galaxy trader ambassador. Ruzha was certain he would have a lot to say to save his own skin. And Gen is making contact with her friends in Anelia’s army as we speak and is trying to convince them to surrender.”

“Vel, can we make a general announcement to the troops inside the base from here?” I asked.

“No Sir, not directly but I can ask base command to patch us in on the public announcement system which is tied to every building. Every soldier can hear us.”

“Do it then?”

Moments later Vel slammed her hand on her panel and went into another yelling fit.

“What now!?” I asked.

“Now I’m stonewalled by bureaucracy. I’m told it’s against regulations to have an outsider address the troops inside the base, Sir.”

In response I armed the torpedo tube, activated the torpedo cannon, pointed the ship at the base command building and said, “Vel, ask them again.”

But before Vel had a chance to open a channel they contacted us and said, “There was a minor misunderstanding, we have patched you in and everyone is waiting for your message.”

I pointed to Vel and said, “Vel, it’s your time to shine, do your thing and tell them everything.”

Vel opened the channel and began to speak in their language.

“She’s good. She’s a match for Ruzha. Very convincing too,” said Daf proudly with a big smile.

“Tell me Daf, can the base monitor what we’re doing in here? How did they know about the torpedo, which reminds me I’d better turn it off before I accidentally launch it...”

“No, don’t turn it off. The base is equipped with everything; monitoring equipment even energy cannons that can blast us out of the sky and they may do that now that you’ve threatened them directly. They can monitor all energy fluctuations and outgoing communications. But I don’t think they can decode our communications because we use encryption. They can decode them but it will take them a long time.”

The moment Vel was done talking we saw soldiers running out of their barracks and onto other buildings and breaking doors down.

“What in Mother Nature’s name are they doing?” I yelled.

“They’re breaking into the armories and arming themselves,” said Daf.

“What did you say to them?” I yelled at Vel.

“I told them everything like you asked,” she replied in a disappointed tone of voice.

“I can vouch for her, Sir,” said Daf.

“So, why are they getting guns and who are they going to turn them against?” I asked.

“Oops, I also told them that their base was surrounded by Anelia’s forces, I guess I shouldn’t have done that.”

“Get back on the com and tell them to hold their fire. We’ll resolve this problem peacefully. There’s no need for them to get involved,” I said.

But before she got on the com a message came in requesting that we open a channel with base command.

After Vel opened the channel she informed me that all the top commanders in the base had been arrested and the troops had taken over command.

“They’re waiting for our orders on what to do next. What shall I tell them, Sir,” asked Vel.

“Tell them to take defensive positions and wait for further orders, then contact Gen and Ruzha and tell them to get their butts to the base and take command of the troops.”

Just as Vel relayed the message we could hear cheers from the troops.

“What did you tell them now?” I asked.

“Exactly what you told me… Plus I told them Ruzha might be coming to visit them.”

“Why did you tell them that?”

“Because that’s what you would have done, Sir, I’m learning from the best!”

“Now contact Gen and Ruzha.”

“Yes Sir!”

Moments later Vel said, “It seems that Ruzha anticipated your move and she and Gen are on their way to the base. And, according to Gen, there is discontent in Anelia’s forces.”

After thinking for a moment, I said, “Vel, contact Ruzha and tell her to make an announcement on channel 45 and say that there are unconfirmed reports that Anelia has been arrested and urge her

forces to surrender to Gen now and there won’t be consequences for them.”

“But Sir, isn’t that a lie?” protested Vel.

“I’ll take responsibility for it,” I said.

“So, it’s another bluff to scare Anelia’s forces to surrender quickly,” said Daf.

“I just hope it doesn’t backfire, Sir, especially if Anelia shows her face on the viewer,” remarked Vel.

“Then we’ll have egg on our faces…” I said.

They both looked at me and Daf said, “I don’t know what that means, Sir.”

I didn’t bother to explain.

About five minutes later, we saw Gen and Ruzha arrive at the base in a little ship. About five minutes after that we saw women soldiers coming out of the bushes with their hands up.

“It looks like Anelia’s troops are surrendering, Sir,” said Daf and smiled.

“Vel, contact base command and ask for permission to land,” I said.

After she did, Vel said. “Gen answered and told us to find a place inside the walls of the base. She also said that she’s now in command of the base.”

“Okay Daf, where do you suggest we land?”

“I don’t know, there are soldiers everywhere and they’re cheering.”

“How about we start coming down slowly in the middle of that yard and hope that everyone moves away,” I said.

After I turned off all our weapons we began to descend. The soldiers started to move away.

“The moment we open the hatch you must warn the soldiers about my guards… No lunging and no grabbing. I don’t want anyone to get hurt or killed,” I said.

After we touched down and the dust settled I opened the hatch and to my surprise the soldiers had formed two lines, starting at our hatch and extending to the door of the command building. They were all quiet and saluting.

“I guess Gen and Ruzha beat us to it,” said Daf.

“No, this is Ruzha’s work, I’m sure of it,” said Vel.

And sure enough Ruzha’s crew was there filming us getting off the ship and making our way to base command.

“Yeah… another historic moment for us, eh Vel?” I said.

“Not now, Sir,” she answered quietly.

When we arrived inside, Gen gave us a military salute. The girls saluted back but I didn’t. I found it a bit formal. I hugged and kissed Ruzha and then went and grabbed Gen and gave her a kiss too.

“That bad, eh?” asked Gen. “And it’s only been a couple of days.”

“All joking aside, I’m so glad you showed up here when you did. We will always be grateful to you for that. I thought we were done,” said Gen, lunging forward and giving me a hug and kiss and then hugged the girls, first Vel, because she was closest to her and translating for me, and then Daf.

I looked at the girls and winked at them but I doubt they knew what that meant.

When we were done with our greetings Gen asked, “What can we do for you?”

“It looks like you two have things under control here but there is the matter of the two robots on the galaxy trader planet,” I said. “I’m going back to destroy them as well as fulfill your agreement with the galaxy traders about supporting one another during a war, but I’ll need help. I need attack ships so I can attack both robots at the same time.”

Gen looked at me with a sad look on her face and said, “We thought about that when we got your first message but, I’m sorry we can’t help you. First, thanks to our former leadership, we don’t have the kind of ships you’ll need and whatever little we have we’ll need here. Our planet at the moment is vulnerable to inside and outside attacks. We have no idea who is behind Anelia with regards to this coup so we’ll need everything we have until we get to the bottom of it.”

After looking away to hide her emotions, she continued, “If you stay around for a month or two and help us out then maybe we can put a force together and carry out your plans.”

I looked at her and said, “Gen, every moment of every hour we’re here the robots are turning your soldiers, your fathers, your brothers, your sons, your people into zombies who, one day, sooner or later, will attack your planet and turn everyone of you into zombies. Every moment that we wait, one of your people dies and one more super soldier is added to the menace that exists on that planet. And for that reason I must go now.”

They all looked at me and didn’t know what to say. Was I insane or pointing out the reality of the situation that no one wanted to face?

As I stepped away I said, “Are you coming little sisters?”

Both Vel and Daf began to follow me.

Ruzha yelled, “Wait!”

I stopped. She ran over and dragged me into the corner away from her cameras. She then squeezed me, gave me a long kiss and said, “You come back… Do you hear me?” as I walked away.

Ruzha then hugged the girls and said something to them in their language, laughed, looked at me and said in Macedonian, “Little sisters.”

Gen came over and did the same.

After we boarded my ship the soldiers who were hanging around it moved away and we gently lifted off vertically. I then pushed the joystick forward to max and cause a huge explosion as we shot into outer space.

When we leveled off I stopped so that we could run diagnostics and prepare for the jump.

“You never fail to show off, do you, Sir?” said Vel.

“I’m Macedonian and we Macedonians don’t show off,” I replied.

The com began to beep repeatedly. Both girls looked.

Moments later Vel started laughing and said, “My com is jammed with messages, hundreds of them, and they’re all coming from the same source, the base.”

“What are they saying?” I asked.

“The idiots are proposing to us. They’re all marriage proposals to me and Daf, I can’t believe it,” Vel said.

“Any for me?” I asked.

Daf looked at me.

“I’m joking, I’m joking,” I said.

“I don’t know how you can joke at a moment like this, Sir,” Daf said.

“I know,” replied Vel. “Isn’t he something?”

“So, you think you’re any better?” I asked.

“STOP! Stop your constant stupidity, it’s annoying!” yelled Daf.

We didn’t say anything. I guess she was right.

“We’re ready to do the jump, Sir, but first we need to get to the jump coordinates. Just tap the autopilot, Sir,” said Daf.

“Thank you Daf. My diagnostics are almost done. I’ll do it as soon as they’re finished.”

Moments later I got a beep on my console and there was a red indicator under something in the diagnostic results.

“We’ve got some sort of problem. I’ve never seen this before,” I said.

“What is it, Sir?” said Daf and came over to look.

After touching a few buttons and looking into the instruction’s manual she said, “It looks serious, you’d better activate the repair robot. Move over, let me do it for you, Sir.”

I didn’t know what to do so I let her sit in the captain’s chair to do her thing.

A second later the repair robot came alive and did a number of things before it docked again.

“How many problems did we have?” I asked.

“Oh, I had the robot replace our fuel cells and energy cells for our weapons. The fuel cells were nearly depleted. I figured we’ll be doing a lot of fighting and flying and it’s best to be prepared.”

“Thank’s Daf,” I said and punched the autopilot button.

Seconds later we were at our usual launching spot. After lining up my ship with the green vector on my screen I powered up the ship’s cannons and set them on auto fire, turned on the retrorockets and hit the hyper drive button.

The moment we arrived at our destination and stopped we were attacked by three galaxy trader attack ships like the one’s we’d destroyed the day before.

I instinctively fired back and hit the first one. It was a direct hit and after firing a few flashes at us, it exploded. The other two left, regrouped and came back at us from two different directions. I knew if I fired at one the other one would certainly fire at us. So, instead of attacking them I flew up perpendicular to them into empty space. They both fired at us but missed. By now we were out of range and too far for them to fire at us but they were in pursuit.

“I’ve never seen you do that before, Sir,” said Vel.

“How I demolished the first ship?” I asked.

“No! How you ran away from a fight!” she replied.

“Vel, there are two of them and they were lined up to take us out. I could only shoot at one of them, not both. The other one would have certainly got us. So, what choice did I have except to run?”

They both looked at me strangely.

“Am I missing something here?” I asked.

“How far are you going to run now, Sir, until one of us runs out of fuel?” asked Vel.

“Well? What do you suggest I do?” I asked.

“Turn around and chase them. Our ship is much faster. Catch up to one, shoot it and then chase the other one until you get it too,” suggested Vel.

I did exactly that but before we got into firing range the two ships split apart and took similar positions like before. This time I flew down and escaped again. They both flew up in anticipation but we fooled them. They turned back and followed us again.

“Hmmm!” said Vel.

“So, that’s all I get from you two!” I said.

I then turned my ship around and headed back for the ships. The moment I lined up my ship in a direct line with them I locked onto the one on the right and fired my two right cannons simultaneously. There was a huge flash and a bang and the target ship was obliterated. My ship shook like a giant hammer had hit it. We had never experienced such a shock, not even when four of the cannons were fired at once. As soon as I regained control I went in pursuit and shot down the third ship which was still coming for us at full speed on a suicide mission.

After I stopped dead in space I looked at the girls. They were both in shock and wondered what the hell had happened.

After Daf looked at the logs she said, “I know what happened, you fired two cannons simultaneously. That’s a no-no and everyone, even cadets, knows not to do that.”

“My dear Daf, why did the ship allow me to do then it?” I asked.

“Now I know what Ori meant when he said ‘this captain is crazy, so don’t mess with him’…,” said Daf in a man’s voice.

Now she’s making fun of me, I thought to myself.

“Daf, why are the cannons firing so much more energy? What did you do?” I asked.

“Nothing! I didn’t do anything!” she replied and went to check the logs. “I ordered the robot to fine tune the cannons for higher efficiency but that idiot changed them to use double the energy.”

“So, the robot is an idiot now…” I said before I was interrupted by Vel who yelled.

“Stop that. Stop arguing and help me here.” She sounded like she was in a lot of pain.

We both jumped out of our seats. I lifted her out of her seat and sat her on the floor. She was holding her left hip. Daf pulled her camouflage pants down and we noticed a huge bruise the size of a grapefruit on her left hip.

“I hit the side of the chair when the explosion took place. I guess my lower seatbelt wasn’t tight enough. A good lesson for the next time,” said Vel.

“Daf, where is the first aid kit? Do we have something we can give her for the pain?”

Daf looked at me and shrugged her shoulders.

“There’s nothing you can do for a bruise, just pour me some rakia,” said Vel.

I went over to comfort her but she pushed me away.

“That hurts my feelings…” I said to Vel while Daf was pouring the rakia.

“You have feelings… for me?” Vel said sarcastically and then asked me to hold her head up so that she could drink the rakia. She drank it all and moments later she was out… with her pants down to her knees.

I looked at her and smiled. When Daf saw me she shook her head and said something in her language.

“What?” I asked.

“You two have the strangest relationship. I’ve known her almost my entire life and I’ve never seen her act this way. What’s with you two?” replied Daf.

“I wish I knew? I wish I knew,” I said.

I looked at Daf and said, “How did you know what Ori said and were you making fun of me?”

“Sir, that line is now a famous line in the academy. Everyone has heard it… And yes… I was making fun of you, Sir.”

“Why not? Everyone else does,” I said and sat down in my chair.

Moments later I said, “Daf, how about we eat something and take a short rest while Vel is resting. We’re in no condition to go into battle like this.”

“Will the robots be expecting us, Sir?” Daf asked with a mouthful.

“My guess is no. But they knew about us when we arrived. I suspect they also knew that we shot down their ships and destroyed their outpost. They must have another way of communicating, one we can’t detect. But I can tell you with some certainty that they don’t know we’re here to destroy them. However, they’ll take precautions against the kind of firepower we carry and the next time we fight them it won’t be so easy.”

After I started the diagnostics on our weapon’s systems I pushed my chair back and closed my eyes.

Battle at the green valley

“Do you think we’ll find any of our soldiers alive, Sir,” Daf asked while looking outside through the windshield into dark space.

“Go to sleep Daf, please… No more questions…” I replied.

“You said some things to Gen about rushing to do battle to save our soldiers, did you mean that or were you upset because she couldn’t help you?”

“Both! Now go to sleep!”

“Why are we sitting here and floundering?”

“Look, I don’t know why? All I know is that I need to do something but I didn’t want to get involved in the affairs of your planet again. Your people will have to learn to defend themselves on their own and me being there doesn’t help them.”

“Sure it does, Sir!”

“Look what happened when I interfered the last time…” I said.

“Are you feeling guilty for abandoning Gen, Sir? You put her in that position and then abandoned her just like you did Asora?”

“Well, what do you think, Daf? She asked me to stay and I left. Now tell me, if we don’t find any of your people alive and return to Ostikon with no one or we return to Ostikon to find Gen, Ruzha and Asora in chains; whose fault do you think that would be?”

“I’m sure that’s not going to happen, Sir. It’s best we get some sleep,” she said and went to her bed.

“But, at the same time, I can’t keep coming back to rescue your people every time they’re in trouble,” I said.

Hours later I was awakened by a bright flash that hit our windshield. I jumped up and must have yelled something out loud because I heard Vel yelp and then make groaning sounds.

“Daf, wake up!” I yelled.

She ran over and helped Vel up and put her pants back on. She then helped her sit on her chair.

“How are you feeling Vel?” I asked.

“Okay, I guess.”

“Are you in pain?”

“Yes, but I can manage.”

“I saw a bright flash on our windshield. Can you please check the logs and see what it was?”

“There’s nothing in the logs, Sir, not for the last seven hours. Nothing,” replied Vel.

“What do we do now, Sir?” asked Daf.

“Any messages from Ostikon?”

“None, Sir,” replied Vel.

“Well Daf, do you still have the coordinates the voice from the outpost gave us to deliver the prisoners?”

“Yes Sir?”

“Patch them in, we have prisoners to deliver.”

“All done, Sir.”

“Vel, make sure everything is turned off, except for our short range sensors and keep one communication channel open, the universal one. Make us look like a shuttle delivering prisoners.”