Escape to Earth 1: Running From Fate (31 page)

The Myot and Welken Fleet Leaders contacted their leaders as they turned and moved away from the planet. This was not something they were going to allow to happen. The Welken Royal looked at the Myot Ruler and said, “The Johan really pulled one over on us.”

“Yes, but what are we going to do about it? We can’t allow the Johan access to the petroleum on that planet.”

“We can still take possession.”

“But no one knows where the Johan home world is located.”

“They are going to have to send ships here to transport the oil. We’ll follow the skip trace and attack their planet. We’ll then possess everything they currently own which will include that planet. If they don’t send ships, we’ll follow the ones at the planet until we find them.”

“They could start making alliances with other civilizations.”

“Let them. We can take them all on and still win. Are you in this with me?”

“You know I am.”

“This is a long way from being over. We can’t enter the planetary system but we can implement a blockade and keep them from using that planet’s resources.”

The hundreds of thousands of Fellowship Warship entered the void and saw the skip traces of the Johan fleet moving in toward the planet. Many of the civilizations leaving were saying that at least the Myot or Welken didn’t take possession. They were right about that…for the moment.

• • •

Julie heard, “Message coming in from Central Command.”

“Put it on the screen.”

Julie saw Lukas appear and heard him say, “Julie, take Kathy and her baby to the Learning Center and tell Stoney that I want her put on a simulator immediately.”

“She’s had no training, Sir.”

“I don’t care if she hasn’t. I want her to be able to fly a ship if escape is called for. Now do it.”

Julie tilted her head and pressed a button on her panel, “Julie, I’m busy at the moment.”

“Lukas has ordered me to bring Kathy to you and for you to put her on a simulator.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“As a heart attack.”

Stoney lowered his head and said, “It makes sense. We’re going to need him later. Bring them directly to me. Contact me when you arrive.”

Julie looked at Kathy, “Why is your baby so important?”

Kathy took a deep breath and blew it out, “Lukas is the baby’s father.”

Julie stared at her for a long moment and smiled, “Now it all makes sense. Hold on, I’m going to full speed.”

“I thought you were going full speed.”

“I didn’t want to cause enough turbulence to harm the coral. Coral won’t matter if we don’t stop this invasion. I’m going to drop you off and leave you with Stoney. He’s a good man and he’ll take care of you.” Kathy nodded as the ship’s forward speed pushed her back into her chair. She felt her fear start to rise but her baby’s smile calmed her down.

• • •

Lukas yelled over his wrist unit, “Get the local into the main building and have them start gathering the disruptor modules for insertion into the pods.”

The local workers were summoned to the main building and the huge monitor on the wall was playing the local news program. They saw a massive fire burning and under the picture they saw, Tehran Destroyed by Nuclear Blast from Space. The satellite view from space showed the once giant city was burning. Everything within fifty miles of the center of Tehran had been knocked flat and set on fire by the nuclear shockwave that blew out when the Johan missile hit. They listened and heard that hundreds of thousands of space ships had appeared between Earth and the moon but had disappeared soon afterwards.

The workers started yelling as the first wave of Gold Star Pods arrived and moved into the huge building. Jinks blew a blast horn and everyone grew instantly silent. “I need all of you to take the modules and start inserting them into the front row of ships.”

The workers started demanding to know what was going on. Jinks blew the horn again and yelled, “Our planet is being attacked by a civilization from outer space. These ships in front of you are the only thing we have to stop them.”

The oldest worker yelled, “You’ve lied to us about what we’ve been building.”

Jinks looked at George and nodded, “Yes, we have.”

“Then tell me why we should help you at all, Señor?”

Julio jumped up on a table and yelled, “Are you blind, George?” George looked at Julio with a sneer and Julio pointed at the screen, “That city tells me that whoever is coming doesn’t care about whether we live or die!” Julio looked at Jinks, “What are you going to do with these things we’ve helped build?”

The silence was thick enough to hear Jinks breaths. “These ships are the only thing we have to prevent your families and loved ones from facing what happened to that city. More are going to die if we don’t get these pods ready to meet this invader.”

Julio looked at the workers and yelled, “I’VE SEEN THE HEARTS TO THOSE THAT GAVE US WORK!” Julio paused, “If you haven’t, it’s because you didn’t look.”

George looked at Julio and said, “Do you believe in them, Julio?”

Julio looked at Jinks, “I believe in him. That’s all I need.”

George stared at Julio and shook his head, “Grab the modules and start getting them aligned!” The workers looked at each other and saw George and Julio run over to the stacked modules and run back to the line of forty ships in the front row of pods that were arriving by the hundreds. The workers broke away from the huge monitor and ran to the disruptor modules. Jinks looked at Julio and smiled. The scooter was worth every cent he had spent on it. The workers worked fast but did not rush the alignment process. No ship was cleared unless the ship’s computer verified the alignment was accurate.

• • •

Lukas said, “What’s going on, Willow?”

“It appears the Johan have won the right to take possession of Earth. Twenty of their Dreadnaught Class Battleships have emerged into normal space outside Earth’s gravity well and are moving on the planet. They’re launching attack craft as we speak and they are headed toward their initial targets.”

Lukas said, “Damn, we’re not in time to stop them.”

Salud, Trevor, Amanda, and Jinks gathered around Lukas as he stared at the images Willow was providing on another monitor with his passive scans of the satellites orbiting above Earth. They saw thousands of small ships leaving the twenty giant warships. Lukas shook his head and Salud said, “What did you mean we weren’t in time?”

Lukas pointed at the small craft moving at high speed toward Earth, “The Johan are following standard procedure. The probe out here by the fellowship has been collecting targeting data since it arrived. No one would be given that data except for the civilization that takes possession. Those small ships have been given targets on Earth’s surface and they’re on their way to the ones they’ve each been assigned. If we had been ready, we could have gone after the battleships before they launched their attack ships and prevented what’s about to happen.”

Trevor stared at the images, “Can’t we go after those small ships with the ones we have ready?”

Lukas looked at Trevor, “Each of those twenty battleships launched a little over a thousand ships each. We only have twelve hundred pilots that have been simulator trained to fly a pod. They’ll be outnumbered twenty to one. Not only that, but if those ships are attacked by local ships, they are ordered to start bombarding every major city until we call off our defense. There is no possible way for us to take out that many attack ships.”

Salud sighed, “What do you think they’re going after?”

“The first wave will go after every military installation on the planet. The second will have the location of every center of government on the planet.”

Jinks looked at Lukas, “What do you mean every center of government?”

“Those attack craft are going to hit every national, state, and local building where elected or chosen representatives meet. It is likely that most of those buildings are currently occupied by the leaders of the people trying to come up with an emergency plan to save lives. The disruptors used by those attack craft will vaporize those buildings and everyone in them.”

Jinks looked back at the monitor and shook his head, “That’s pretty cold blooded.”

Lukas nodded, “The process has been developed over centuries of invading helpless planets. Remove the leadership and most of the resistance dies with them.”

Salud looked at Lukas, “There’s something you’re not saying.”

Lukas took a breath and said, “They’re also going after the centers of religion. The Vatican, Mecca, Medina, Jerusalem, and any other holy site will be hit.” Lukas looked at the group, “Once those targets have been removed, they will wait for a response from the planet’s defenses. If the ships in orbit are attacked, they will recall the attack craft and move around the planet nuking cities at random telling all the people on the surface that they’re doing it in retaliation for being attacked.”

“Why would they recall the small ships?”

Lukas looked at Amanda, “They wouldn’t want to accidently damage any of them with a nuclear blast.” Lukas looked back at the monitor, “That is when we’ll take them.”

Jinks looked at the giant ship on the main monitor with its force field glowing bright white, “Do you honestly think we can?”

Lukas pointed at the first row of ships that were having their disruptors quickly armed, “Trevor, if we can’t, then there’s no choice but to take these ships and escape to a habitable planet and try to rebuild another society that can take them on one day in the future.”

Salud crossed her arms, “Do you think we might be a target?”

“I set our project up here because there is not a large population center. These are cars that aren’t anywhere they can be used against the Johan. I suspect we’ll be ignored by the first wave of attackers. However, if any of them come this way, Willow will activate the main force field.”

“Won’t that bring rain?”

Lukas smiled sardonically, “Indeed it will.” Lukas looked up at the monitor showing the twenty battleships, “Willow, are our military friends planning a welcoming party for our guests?”

“The countdown is now at thirty seconds. The Fleet Leader knows about the coming launch and is amused by it. The attack craft have completed their initial attacks and are waiting for the launch before attacking the launch sites.”

Lukas shook his head, “General Amerson should have paid attention to the power of the weapons being used by the ships when they were fighting for position. He’d know that his nuclear arsenal poses no danger to them. They’re just going to use the attack to teach Earth the futility of resisting.”

Willow announced, “The countdown is complete, the missiles are now leaving their launch sites.”

Lukas yelled, “Julio, are you finished with the first forty?”

“Si, Señor!”

Lukas yelled, “Pilots, you have your assigned target, get out of here now and move above the planet while the nuclear explosions are happening!”

The giant front door to the huge metal building moved up and the forty Attack Pods flew out of the building at blinding speed. Lukas watched them disappear into the evening sky and said, “They’re not using their force fields until they open fire. Their hulls have a layer of paraffin on the surface so the Johan electronic scans will not detect them.” Lukas looked down and yelled, “Lower the door. Get the next forty ready to go!”

Julio shouted, “We got this! We’ve done it once and now we can work faster.” Julio was right, the next three rows were done in the time it took to do the first one. Lukas smiled at Jinks, “That’s some student you have there.” Jinks nodded and smiled, “After the Gold Stars are completed, give the workers some rest time and then move them to the storage hangar at the learning center and start arming the ships for the next class of Gold Stars.”

“That’s going to take some time, Lukas.”

Lukas looked up at the monitor as it suddenly overloaded and went dark for a few moments. “If things go well, we should have some time.”

• • •

Jim sat in his office and knew the missiles were on their way. He looked out the window and saw every cherry tree was burned into smoking, burnt, twisted branches. The Washington Monument was burnt black on one side but was still standing. He walked up to the window and looked through the twisted branches and saw the smoking ruins of the Capital Building.

Not far away he saw the crater left where the White House had formerly sat. Ordinarily, he wouldn’t have been able to see them through the trees…but there wasn’t much left of the trees. He went back to his chair and sat down. He’d know shortly if the missiles were successful. For some reason, the aliens had not destroyed the communications satellites in orbit. He wondered why and looked at the TV on the wall. All the news channels were showing the massive launch as thousands of nuclear missiles boosted into space.

He watched the missiles on a monitor that was receiving a feed from the hardened spy satellites. They should survive the massive electronic pulse from the nuclear explosions. He watched the image of one of the giant warships in orbit and saw hundreds of massive fireballs explode around it. The monitor went dark and then rebooted. The giant was still hanging in space and it did not appear to have been affected at all. He lowered his head and shook it. He took a deep breath and knew it was hopeless. Then he discovered why the aliens had not destroyed the satellites. They had actually moved close to them so that they were inside the protection of the battleships’ force fields. A mechanical voice began speaking.

Chapter Nineteen

The Johan Fleet Leader leaned back in his chair and shook his head. He waited for the nuclear blasts to slow and then stop. He straightened up and said, “Recall the ships.” The Communication Operator sent the message and the thousands of small ships attacking the planet’s surface accelerated away from the surface and flew toward the ship that had launched them to be rearmed for the next round of attacks. The small ships arrived and were rapidly being taken on board the giant battleships. Finally, the Weapons Operator looked at the Fleet Leader and nodded.

The Fleet Leader sat up straight, looked at his Communications Operator, and smiled, “Make sure this goes out in all the appropriate languages.” The Operator nodded and then pointed at him. “I would think that you would know that your attack on my ships would not go unpunished. I will be moving around your planet momentarily and I’m going to start hitting your largest cities with nuclear missiles. When I tire of it, I’ll consider allowing some of you to live. Any further resistance will lead to my killing every one of you.”