Nowhere to Hide (23 page)

The Senior Father was surprised at the announcement. The ritualistic suicide was extremely rare. “You don’t have to do that.”

“As long as I’m alive, the surviving members of my family will not be able to embrace their new family. You know it; and I know it. This is the only gift I can offer to them and you for your kindness in adopting us. You know I have to do this.”

The Senor Father swelled with a deep intake of air and let it out quickly. He looked at the former Senior Father, “Are you able to accept me as your Senior?”

“I am. I didn’t expect you to do this.”

“I really didn’t intend to do it but you were right.” The Father looked at him wondering what he meant. “I knew about the Green Ships and didn’t share it with you; not that it would have made any difference. However, you showed me what bravery really looks like and I can use you to strengthen my family.”

The Grandfather said, “I wouldn’t have assisted you if our roles were reversed. I don’t blame you for what happened.”

The Senior Father looked at his new family member, “What do you think about going back to that galaxy?”

“If you go there, your family will die.”

The Senior Father stopped in his tracks, “We won’t be going alone.”

“If you go, your family will die. They allowed me to escape to bring this message back. Oh, I believe we will win because we’ll overwhelm them with numbers; but the price will be astronomical. You’ve seen the recordings?” The Senior Father nodded. “Tell me how you’re going to get a transport anywhere close to a planet?” The Senior was stunned by the question. “If you can’t move their populations to our transports, how are you going to survive?” The Father paused and said, “They have gotten stronger each time we’ve faced them and no one has told me how they killed ten million ships. I humbly say to you, Father; if you love our family, you will not go there.”

“That may not be an option.” He paused and looked at the two defeated leaders, “What would you do?”

The adopted Father said, “Knowing what I know now, I would avoid going; no matter what it took to make it happen, Father.”

“I’m not sure I’m as paranoid about that galaxy as you are.”

The Grandfather said, “Neither was I; and look at where we are as a result of that.”

The Father looked at his new leader, “Just do this; when the call is made to organize to invade, delay moving your ships out of the galaxy you’re currently harvesting. Let others start organizing first.”

“Why?”

“Ten million dead ships tell me that is the safest course of action.”

The Senior stared at him for a long moment, “You will be assigned to my ship. I need your council in helping me decide the path we’re going to follow.”

“I will assist you any way I can, Father.”

He started moving forward again and said, “You know if we refuse to follow an order from the High Council, we will, at the very least, be banished. We may even be attacked by the other Families.”

“But we’ll still be alive.”

The Senior Father smiled; the former Senior Father said we. That meant a lot.

I
an held his new baby boy and Drey could see the love in his eyes. Dee seemed to be getting larger by the moment and soon they would have their child as well. Dee stood next to Ian admiring the new born. Drey smiled, “It looks like we have a new little prince.”

Ian shook his head but didn’t take his eyes off his child, “No, I’m not a Prince anymore.” Drey snickered and Ian looked up, “What’s so funny?”

“You.”

“What about me?”

“Ian, the only reason Albert is King is because you have declined to accept the throne. The conditions that existed then still take precedence now. If you announced today that you would accept the throne, Albert would be forced to step down and give you the Crown. Trust me on this, you are still a Prince and the Union sees you as one.”

Ian’s eyes narrowed and he looked at Violet. She shrugged and sighed, “He’s right.”

Ian looked back at Drey and smiled. He looked at his baby, “Well, I guess you are royalty, little one.”

Ian handed Junior to Violet and turned to Drey, “I guess the real trouble starts now.”

“Yes it does.”

“Have you thought about our next plan of action?”

Drey shrugged, “Finish moving our populations to the other galaxy and try to delay the next invasion as long as possible.” Drey looked at Violet, “Have the Invaders sent any ships back to the galaxy we’re moving to?”

“No, and we’re keeping communications to a minimum. All communications on the colonized planets are being done by microwave. Moe is handling communications between the planets with the telepaths from Santa Rosa. There’s no reason for them to come back to a galaxy they’ve attacked.”

“Have you encountered any survivors?”

“We have and they are quite happy, for the most part, we’re moving in. Most of them were in a sad state of affairs before we arrived and we’re including them in our civilization. No matter what the outcome is in the Milky Way and M87, our survival is ensured by the exodus.”

Ian turned from Violet and said, “We’ve lost a lot of ships, Drey.”

“Yes we have; fortunately, our building efforts are just now getting into high gear. We’ll have all those lost replaced in less than two months. Most of the new ships are being built here but the new galaxy is starting to really kick in with their share. In half a year they will be producing the Lion’s share of all our new ships.”

“What about pilots? There’s no way we can train the new ones in time.”

“Actually, most of the new pilots won’t need as much training as the others.” Ian tilted his head, doubting Drey’s statement.

Dee looked up from the baby, “We learned a lot in the last fight. Our new pilots will follow a neutron missile into the invader ranks and fire at the ship it hits and break away. That won’t require much training at all. Of course they will continue working on the advanced attack patterns whenever they can but they will be effective as soon as they complete their flight training.”

Violet looked at Dee, “Are we getting enough qualified recruits to fly?”

Dee nodded, “We actually have to turn many away. Remember, the Kilper Civilization and the Union had more than three quarters of a million civilized planets before the exodus. There are a huge number of citizens in the pool to fill the military’s ranks.”

Ian sat down beside Violet and stared at his baby. Drey looked at Dee and she nodded. Drey said, “Ian, we’re of the belief that we’re going to have to slow them down in order to build up the forces we’ll need to face them.”

Ian looked up, “What do you mean; slow them down?”

“We feel we need to hit any fleet that begins organizing outside the galaxies they’re currently invading with a Neutron Mine.”

Ian looked at Dee, “I thought you said that wasn’t a good idea?”

“It wasn’t…then. But now we know they’ll be coming with multiple fleets so there is no reason not to hit them as hard and as often as possible.”

Violet nodded, “We shouldn’t allow them to choose when and where to hit us. We should take the initiative; so far we’ve just been reacting.”

Ian stared at his wife and turned back to Drey, “Can you set it up?”

“I can.”

“You know I don’t like to kill huge numbers if it can be avoided.”

Drey said, “But….?

“Blast them back to the hell they came out of.”

***

Chip sat with the Green Fleet Controller onboard his flagship and stared at the information on his screen. “Our Neutron Warheads were quite effective.”

Chip nodded, “I hate we had to use so many. We’re really going to need them in the next round.”

The Fleet Controller moved back and forth with his laughter, “We didn’t waste any.”

“I know you used them wisely but the next fight will dwarf the last invasion.”

“What I’m trying to tell you is that none of our warheads were destroyed.”

Chip jerked his head around and looked at the Controller, “What?”

“The substance of a neutron star is indestructible. It hit the Invader’s force field and transferred all of its kinetic energy into it violently pushing the ship. The warhead was not destroyed by the impact; it just stopped and remained where it hit. We’ve been collecting them since the last battles and putting them into new missiles.”

Chip shook his head and smiled, “How many will you have for the next attack?”

“Not enough; however, we’ve learned a lot. We’re going to have weapon transports come in after each attack we win, collect the warheads, and reload them immediately. They’ll then take them to rearm our ships where they’re needed. Of course we’re continuing to build new missiles, but it’s my understanding that half a trillion ships may come in the next invasion.”

“You may be right. However, we can only do what we can to survive. The reason I’m here is to ask if you can give me four hundred thousand of your ships that use that missile.”

“What are you going to do with them?”

“I’m assigning one of my ships to one of yours and they will work together to take out an Invader Battleship.”

The Controller thought a moment and looked at Chip, “You don’t want massive waves of missiles fired, do you?”

“No, we need to use them in precision strikes. My idea is to have your ship fire a neutron missile and one of my ships will follow it in. Even if the missile is burned, the warhead will continue. It will shield my ship from the full intensity of the Invader’s beams until it hits and that’s when my ship will fire on the target.”

“Have you trialed this?”

“I’ve had two ships follow each other to a target. The ship following the first one was able to stay close behind it. Your missiles are not faster than my ships, so I believe we can do it.”

“Why don’t we run a trial? I’ll fire a missile at an asteroid and have one of your ships follow it in.”

“Sounds good to me.”

“You might want to make sure your ship isn’t too close to the missile when it hits.”

“Oh?”

“Check with your computer for the appropriate distance.”

Chip nodded but thought the Controller was being too careful. He looked at his chronometer, “Let’s do this in ten hours from now.” The Controller nodded and Chip went back to his ship. “Salud, do you have any recordings of a neutron missile strike?”

“I do.”

“Please put one on my display and tell me what you can determine about the blast.” Chip watched the huge missile moving in at high speed toward an Invader Battleship. He glanced at the top of his panel and saw the recording was at one hundred thousandth speed. He was stunned. The blast that blew out from the hit was enormous and the giant Invader ship was shoved violently away from the place the warhead hit. Chip stopped the recording, “Salud, how far from that ship does the blast extend?”

“Ten miles.”

“What?”

“Ten miles but it does dissipate rather quickly.”

“Could one of our ships survive inside that blast?”

“Well…yes.”

“Why do you say it like that?”

“If the blast has not reached the limit of expansion, our ship will be shoved just as hard as the Invader ship it hit.”

Chip stared at the frozen image on his screen. After a moment he said, “So our ship will have to enter the blast at the edge of its widest expansion to stay on course.”

“Yes.”

“How far away would our ship have to be moving at an identical speed as the missile to do that?”

“Chip, you might want to do this another way.”

“What way would you suggest?”

“I think we’ve not thought through the new Boson Combo’s capabilities. Our ships have been running in trying to get close to fire on the Invader’s ships. Why do we do it that way?”

“So the beam will be strong enough to either severely weaken their force fields or knock them down for the three missiles to complete the job.”

“What happens to a high energy beam when it hits a boson beam?”

Chip did a double take, “I have no idea.”

“The boson beam will strip the Higgs field from the excited particles that make up the beam and they will lose all their mass. What do you think would happen if a highly excited particle hit you that had no mass?”

Chip thought hard but couldn’t put it together. He finally said, “I guess the same thing if a bowling ball with no mass hit you; it would stop and probably be deflected.”

“It’s mass that gives energy beams their power.”

“So if our ships fired a boson beam on their approach, you’re saying the beams fired at them would not get through to our force field.”

“We won’t know unless we try it but that’s what logically should happen.”

“Will it defeat their force field?’

“I just don’t know; however, it should allow our ships to get close.”

Chip thought a moment, “The Invader’s beam will cancel the boson beam.”

“It will.”

“And our three missile package is not strong enough to break through their force field alone.”

“That is also true…but the neutron missile coming in behind the ship should break through.”

Chip stared at the image on his screen for a long moment and looked up, “We have a lot of work to do.”

***

Fifteen hours later, the issues were resolved. The Fleet Controller called in and said, “It appears the best strategy is for your ships to follow my missiles to their target.”

“Yes it does. With so many explosions taking place in a small area, the following missiles could be knocked off course and miss the Invader Battleship we hit with our beams.”

“That’s an accurate assessment. If your ships are following the missiles, it will just follow it until it hits another target. The Invader formations are so tightly packed it should hit another ship if it misses the first. You also don’t need an equal number of my ships.”

“No, I don’t. Your ships can fire a spread of eight missiles and eight of my ships can follow them in. Fifty thousand should be enough for my four strike groups.”

“Are you going to use this tactic with your other fleets?”

“We are and I need you to coordinate with our Obelisk Computer to get the assignments done. We will, of course, designate most of your ships to defend the Grey and your Civilization.”