Lens of Time (24 page)

“I’ve had Boden make me some new toys and I believe in sharing them with others. Sharing is something I want Leigh Anne to learn as she grows up.”

“What kind of toys?”

Cyanna talked with RV for the next three hours and then they went to bed. RV fell asleep with a smile on his face.

• • •

“Attention all fleets. I am sending you your next missions and you will follow your instructions to the letter. All ships in our combined fleets will download the following frequency and coordinates into their drive systems and activate them before jumping to your assignments. You will also be given the first coordinate to use when you jump away. Notify the Havana when you have complied.”

Kenny contacted Kate, “What’s he doing?”

“I don’t know. I’ve just looked at the attack profile for the ships I’ll be taking and we are to fire at any ships that move our way and then jump to a specific coordinate.”

“I also notice that we are ordered not to jump away but to run in normal space from the pursuers. It even dictates the direction we are to flee.”

“This is highly unusual.”

“He has to come up with something better than this. We can’t continue to lose ships at the rate we’ve been enduring.”

“I notice he only has fifty of our fleets involved in the next attack.”

Kenny ran his hand through his short hair, “He doesn’t want to lose all our ships. This accounts for half of those we have remaining. Uh oh, the countdown is starting. We’re all jumping in an hour. I’ve got to make sure everyone follows his orders. If we’re confused, I know everyone else is as well.”

Kate sighed, “I hope he knows what he’s doing.”

Just before Kenny ended the call he said, “The assignments were made by Cyanna. She’s back on board the Havana.”

Kate was surprised and looked to confirm Kenny was right. He was. She didn’t know if this was a good thing or not.

• • •

Loree and Mikal looked at their assignments and wondered what was going on. “Mikal, if we survive this, I need you.”

“I’ll come to you, my love. Be careful.”

“Come back to me!”

“I’ll do my best.”

• • •

The fifty fleets entered their attack coordinates and then the escape coordinates into their jump drives. The drive officers then activated the automatic frequency. The fifty rear-admirals watched the countdown and then every fleet jumped to their targets.

Melodie said, “They’ve seen us and are jumping in. Jump us out; NOW!” Melodie’s fleet jumped and emerged in normal space close to a star. Greg looked at her as Melodie said over the general fleet frequency. Go weightless and accelerate until we’re twenty thousand miles from here. Lock you ships to the Hiroshima and stay in formation.”

“What are we doing, Sir?”

“The fleet directives order us to flee through normal space at one tenth light speed.”

“Sir, the pursuit will be able to close on us at that speed.”

“Follow your orders, Captain.” Melodie watched as the five million Major Ships emerged into normal space and gave chase. She watched as they began closing the distance and wondered what the Admiral was doing. It wasn’t going to take long for her fleet to be reeled in.

“Should I move further out from the star?”

“No, our path has been set. Maintain this course.”

Greg looked at his board, “Sir, the star we’re running close to is unstable.”

Melodie looked at her board and frowned. What was going on?

• • •

The Major Fleet Commander saw the fleeing ships and ordered full speed ahead. The distance started closing and his second in command looked up from his sensor panel, “Should we jump some ships in front of them?”

The commander thought about it and said, “No; I don’t want two groups of ships moving toward each other at their next jump. It will slow our pursuit and I think they are expecting us to do that. Have you detected any other ships in this system?”

“No, I have not.”

“Continue the chase; be ready to follow their next jump.”

• • •

On the opposite side of the star from the two giant fleets, ten huge transports opened their massive doors. A huge object inside the hangers moved forward and the blast doors went up behind it. “We’re clear for launch.”

The Captain waited and after two minutes, all ten lights glowed green. He keyed his board and said, “Launch in ten seconds from my mark. Frequency broadcast in nine seconds.” He paused and said, “Mark.”

The sensor buoy on the side of the sun where the Allies Fleet was fleeting the Majors received the signal from the other side of the sun and then broadcast a broadband frequency to the fleeing Union Ships. One moment thirty thousand white ships were fleeing from the Majors and the next, all had disappeared. The Major Commander yelled, “Get us to their exit point.” A moment later he died in a blast that burned his ship to vapor. The other five million Major Ships died with him.

The ten thousand foot long Light Wave Penetrators launched from the giant weapon transports and hit the star at light speed. The explosion at the core of the star instantly ignited the slowly dying furnace and exploded it out toward the stars surface that had almost become too heavy for the core to hold. The result was a super nova that blew out from the star at half the speed of light. The Major Fleet had less than one ninety thousandth of a second to escape, but no being could move in that short moment. In less than ten minutes, fifty new novae appeared in M87.

• • •

The Dark Creature looked at the Magest King and felt his frustration. He tried one more time, “You must call off the pursuit of the white ships!”

“We’ve already discussed this. We will not call off the pursuit. We will destroy large numbers of their ships this time.”

“Why can’t you see that they want us to chase them? None of their fleets fired a shot; they jumped in and jumped away as soon as our fleets arrived. They’re baiting us to pursue them.”

“Our fleets respond so quickly now that there is no time for them to fire at anything. Now give it up. We’re going to chase and kill their ships.”

The Dark Creature looked at his display and saw that hundreds of the other civilizations on the call were starting to wonder what was going on. He leaned back on his pad and cursed under his breath. His alarm sounded and he saw his aide outside his door. He raised it and the aide came in shaking, “What’s wrong?”

“All of our fleets pursuing the white ships have been destroyed.”

The Dark Creature was stunned and he looked quickly at his display and saw someone on the screen with the Magest King whispering in his ear. He looked back at the aide, “How?”

“They exploded the stars where our fleets were pursuing the white ships. All of them were burned in the blasts. It appears no one in the fleets noticed that they were chasing the white ships close to an unstable star.”

The Dark Creature smiled. He was the only one that had called for the pursuit to be called off. He knew the current civilizations leading the war against the White Ships were going to be challenged. This could help him. The aide said, “We lost fifty percent of our ships today.” He nodded and waved the aide away. He wasn’t completely sure he wanted to be in a leadership role. He closed his door and listened to the uproar on the display.

• • •

Melodie’s fleet appeared in open space. She looked at Greg and he said, “Ten more fleets have just jumped in; make that thirty fleets now.”

Melodie looked at her display as all fifty fleets jumped in and remained in formation. Then she heard Admiral Arvolo say…

“I want to thank all of you for following your orders. The ships that were in pursuit of your fleets have all been destroyed.” Melodie looked at Greg and he shrugged. “The stars that we had your fleets jump to were very unstable and would have eventually gone nova; we assisted them in doing it now. The Major Fleets were unable to jump away before they were caught in the blast. We have reduced the Major’s ship count by two hundred and fifty million ships. Their numbers are now reduced by half. This buys us time to continue our efforts to wear them down. Thank you again and Admirals, you may jump your fleets back to your support facilities.”

Melodie looked at Greg, “What a clever idea. I wonder how he came up with it?”

Greg smiled, “It happened after his wife rejoined him on the Havana. I suspect she had a lot to do with what happened.”

Melodie thought a moment and said, “It’s unusual for a husband and wife to be on the same ship in command.”

Greg looked at his board and said, “It wouldn’t be that unusual if more officers tied the knot.”

Melodie jerked her head toward Greg and he continued to stare at his board. “You’re right about that.”

“You would think someone would start the process so more could follow.”

Melodie continued to stare at Greg until he spun his chair around and said, “Permission to start that process, Sir.”

Melodie smiled at Greg and said, “Permission granted, Captain.”

The bridge crew watched them and wondered if they were going to kiss or do something romantic but they remained at their stations continuing to direct the fleet. Until they arrived at port and then everyone was ordered off the bridge.

• • •

Three weeks later, two million ships jumped in and immediately jumped away from the unstable star. The white ships were not far from the star and they waited for the Major Fleet to move in on them. The Major Fleet Commander stared at the display and took a deep breath. His ship commander said, “What are you going to do?”

“Are you that dense? What options do I have?”

The ship commander looked at the Admiral and said nothing.

“If I jump our fleet in, they’ll explode the star and kill all of us. If I jump in a small group, those ships will destroy them.”

“You could chase them when they jump away.”

“Would you like to go to their exit and collect the coordinates?” The Ship’s Commander looked back and his display and was silent. They watched the white ships disappear and after a few moments returned to their home port. It was far too dangerous to risk his ships. His civilization was going to need every one of them to defend themselves later. He was not the only Fleet Commander to make that decision.

Chapter Nineteen

T
he Ramst King looked at the quiet leaders on the display and said, “Now are you ready to decide?”

No one spoke. They had all witnessed the destruction of the Major’s Fleets and knew that the enemy they were facing was a clear and present danger to all of their civilizations.

The King said, “Here is our decision. The Majors are now so weakened that we can go in and take their territories and then fight among ourselves as we’ve always done to eliminate any of us that are weakened in the effort to conquer them. That is how we’ve always operated in the past. We are now down to six hundred and twenty one civilizations where there were once more than a million. If we continue down this road, there will one day in the far future be only one survivor. I must say from a selfish point of view that I’ve not been really concerned about that path, because I know we have some of the most advanced ships in this sector. However, that view has changed now that the white ships have appeared. What will happen if we attack the Majors and all of us are weakened? They are growing in numbers by the moment and once the Majors are gone; who will stand between them and our citizens? We have never been able to come together to accomplish anything. I don’t trust any of you and it goes without saying that none of you trust me.”

The Prusem Ruler said, “What is the other choice?”

The King hesitated and said, “We go to the defense of the Majors and eliminate the ones that built those ships. We make an agreement that we will not attack each other for a hundred years and we all rebuild once the white ships are destroyed. We will all search for the galaxy of those beings and once we find them we terminate their existence. That will start the hundred years of peace and recovery.”

The Rhys Councilman said, “How can we trust everyone to comply with this?”

“We must all agree that anyone that attacks another during that time will be attacked by all the other members and we must keep that promise. None of us can stand up to our combined fleet.”

“What if the Majors turn on us?”

“They have lost so many ships that they will not be an issue once this is decided. We will all combine against them if they are foolish enough to even think about it. However, we must include them in our plans of non-aggression in order to get their agreement to work with us.”

The Hoyeis Representative said, “And if they don’t agree?”

“We combine our ships and go destroy them all. However, they still have more than two hundred million ships. I would rather have them working with us.”

The Lunje said, “Are you saying we send all of our ships into this war and leave none to defend our territories?”

“No, I am not. We will leave a hundred thousand ships at each of our territories. For those whose ships are not as strong as the advanced ships among us, they will leave an additional number of ships to balance the forces. The Chairman of Sensor Control knows the power of our ships. He has to have that information to use them to attack any force coming from outside our sector. He will dictate the numbers each of us will have to make sure all of us are of equal strength. Remember, we will not attack each other for a hundred years. That allows enough time for us to reach equilibrium again.”

The Prusem said, “Have you determined how many ships that we would be sending to the war?”

“I only have a rough estimate.”

“What is it?”

“Six hundred million ships give or take several million based on the Sensor Controller’s balancing.”

There was silence and the King waited. Finally he said, “I recognize that many of you will have to discuss this with your civilizations to make a decision. However, we need to decide if all of us must agree to this or a majority.”

The Negrant Representative said, “What happens if a majority votes to do this? Will those that vote no have to participate?”