The Black Planet (8 page)

‘Let’s get to it folks.’  Kelly grabbed a pair of gloves and slid them on, grabbed a pile of clothing and placed them on the table; he began to rummage through them.

‘Oh I think I'm going to be sick,’ moaned Lady Jane picking up the tiniest of piles.  A few minutes later she held up a skimpy garment, ‘what on earth are these?’

‘Ladies underwear,’ supplied the grinning Finn.

With a squeal she tossed them away and they began to laugh.

Chapter 13

They stepped out of the airlock onto the thick black dust.  Colonel Howe and Cookie held a long pole in front of them.  Buzz looked up and the colossal battle cruiser, ‘this things bigger than the empire state building.’

For an hour they had flown above it but none of their scanners had penetrated its shields.  Despite Babes protests that they were on a fool’s errand, they had decided to try and penetrate the ships shields on foot.  Colonel Howe pushed the pole towards the invisible shield.  A buzzer sounded and the two men began to put a bit of effort into it.  The whole exercise was futile; even trying to push the long pole through the black dust and penetrating the shield from below was a waste of time.

Steven looked up at the ship with a sense of disappointment, ‘ach well it was worth a try I suppose.’

Cookie tapped him on his shoulder, ‘maybe not sir, look!’

A light had appeared in the darkness about a hundred meters away.  ‘I am detecting a break in the force field my heart.’

‘OK everyone back on board and Babes, take us down to that light.’

‘Yes my heart.’

‘Is this wise?’ Cautioned Colonel Howe.

‘Looks like a clear cut invitation to me old boy.  Who knows how they may react if we are rude and just fly away.’  Tapper grinned in the manner that normally infuriated the colonel but Steven could see the doubt in his Howe’s eyes.

He made his decision, ‘I have to agree with Tapper.  Obviously there is someone alive on board that ship and that has to be an invitation.  They may require assistance.’

Howe nodded, ‘yes sir but I'm quite sure they aren’t expecting us.’

‘That is true colonel, however I believe we are now committed.’  He turned to the others, ‘I now want military only on this mission.  Buzz do you want to come?’

‘You couldn’t hold me back man.’  He laughed, ‘a chance to meet a real alien.’

Steven felt his spirits rise, ‘in that case Mr Meyers you have the bridge.  If anything goes wrong get the hell out of here.’

‘I understand captain but I doubt if you will have communications from inside that shield.’

‘If they start charging weapons Mr Meyers.’

‘Yes of course captain.’

‘Do not try and fight.’

‘I won’t sir.’

Babes sat down and they stepped off again.  Cookie was in front with a hand held device, ‘there is a small corridor through the shields sir.’

Steven tried to quell his excitement and fear, ‘gentlemen, everything we have achieved so far pales into insignificance with this moment.  We are about to make history in a manner only dreamed up by fiction writers.  Please don’t shoot anyone unless you really have to.’  The chuckled at his humour.

‘Aye well my arsehole is already beginning to pucker at a rapid rate of knots,’ Cookie added to a howl of nervous laughter.

‘I bet dey leave Cookies comment out of de film,’ Lewis added to more laughter.

‘Stop pissing around and get your heads wired on straight,’ Howe growled.  ‘Move out Cookie.’

‘Yes sir.  One giant step for man, one giant leap for Scotland,’ Cookie laughed as he stepped through the shield.  Steven couldn’t help himself grinning while Howe could only shake his head.  They moved through the shield and the moment they were through it closed.  Steven felt the connection lost with Babes.  His heart began to beat faster.  A large airlock opened in front of them.  Cookie never hesitated he simply walked inside.  The rest followed. 

There was no joking now, ‘keep your weapons slung low and your fingers off the trigger,’ Howe warned.

The outer-door closed and after a minute the interior door opened.  They entered and a flashing light like the ones Babes had, beckoned them in the right direction.  Cookie was monitoring the atmosphere as they followed the pulsating light.  ‘No one remove your helmets, this corridor is filled with a noxious gas.’

‘Do you know the type of the gas Cookie?’  Steven asked.

‘Looks like corpse gas captain.’

The reason for the gas soon became evident.  Black swollen bags began to appear in their hundreds.  ‘Looks like they are using this tier as a graveyard,’ Howe mused.  The ever-faithful Beaver who marched at his side like a taught bowstring only grunted in agreement.  Huge doors appeared that they would speculate on later but the pulsing light drew them on.  It ended at what was obviously an elevator and they entered it.  The door closed and it began to move.  Steven was sure that he felt it move sideways as well as up and down.  He struggled to increase the saliva flow in his mouth as it had dried up.  He knew he was perilously close to panic.  They had all seen pictures of this race and knew their reputation.

He took a step into the unknown and walked onto the bridge.  There were creatures at consoles and Steven immediately noticed that they were unarmed and sighed with relief.  One barked a warning and a huge seat that had its back to them spun round.  A big ugly giant of a creature called out in alarm and stood, as he did so his arm dropped to a pistol and tried to draw it.  The men backing Steven whipped their weapons up.  The creature froze.

‘Hold your fire,’ Steven warned them.  The creatures at the consoles rushed forward but they never attacked they simply placed themselves between their captain and kicked up a din.  Their captain barked a command and they shut up.

‘You aren’t of the builder’s race.’

‘No we aren’t, we are from a planet called Earth.’

‘How did you come to be in possession of those ships?’

‘They came to us and offered their service after they lost their crews.’

‘Then they must be young ships.’

‘They are; first generation.’

The creature nodded, ‘I have heard of such things happening but never seen it until now.  That will explain why the ships carry decent weaponry.  I was curious, I thought a crew of builders had finally grown a pair of helois.  I am captain Gairloch of the Modloch battle cruiser Burning Wind, who are you?’

‘I am Captain Steven Gordon of the Planet Earth.’

‘Take your helmets off and reveal yourselves properly.’  He barked a command and his men slinked back to their posts.  With a nod Steven and his men lowered their weapons and removed their helmets.  Gairloch grunted, ‘you are a very small and ugly race.’

Steven studied the face of the creature before him; it was huge, dressed in a black uniform with strange badge like decorations on it.  His face was brutal with tusks and two wicked looking horns where its nose should be.  The skin was multi-coloured going from grey to a brown colour up the middle of the face.  ‘To our eyes you aren’t exactly pretty either.’

It grunted and the pistol slid home, ‘what is it you wish of this ship?’

‘We were going to try and salvage it for the defence of our home world.’

It nodded in a very human manner, ‘it is a very desirable ship but it would do you no good, you could not cross the barrier, every race would hunt you down and kill you.’

‘We are not from your universe, we are from this one.’             

He roared something then calmed down again, ‘your people can survive the death from this sun.’

‘Yes of course.’

‘How many inhabited planets are there?’

‘Just the one in this solar system.’

It grunted again, ‘then who do you need to defend yourselves from?’

‘From a race from your universe.  They have been travelling to our world and abducting our people to try and develop a serum to protect themselves from our sun.  Now they have succeeded they intend to invade.  We do not have a space fleet capable of defending our planet.’

The captain nodded, ‘you have no fleet because there are no other inhabitable planets you need to defend yourselves from.’

‘That is correct captain.’

‘I understand your wish to have this vessel, you thought us dead?’

‘Yes we did.’

‘What will you do now, attack us?’

‘No we will leave you in peace.’

‘When the last of us dies the ship is rigged to self-destruct.’

‘Thank you for that warning.  Before we leave is there anything you or you crew require that may make your time pass a little more comfortably.’

‘No, we have supplies enough.’

‘Then we will leave you in peace sir, thank you for this opportunity to talk.’  The beast barked something and sat down.  ‘Let’s get out of here gentlemen,’ Steven ordered.

‘They don’t have any blue grass or blade wine do they?’  Came a shot from somewhere in the room to a roar of what the humans thought may be laughter.  Even the captain thought the remark funny. 

Steven saw an opportunity and seized it, ‘we have continents covered in it,’ he shouted back.

The captain’s laughter turned to a snarl, ‘it is illegal to sell blue grass.’

Steven turned on him, ‘what you call blue grass we call savannah grass.  It grows wild on the great plains of Africa and feeds the wildlife there.  It is a native species of grass to our planet.  Seeds were stolen from our planet and sent to your universe.  The proceeds from which are being used to build a fleet to invade our planet.  A little ironic I know but those are the facts.  As for it being illegal; well not here, not on our planet and not in our universe.  Our species are not part of any formal treaty or organisation and recognise no authority on this side of the barrier other than our own.’

He had all their attention now and he could see the captain frowning with concentration.  ‘If indeed the blue grass is native to your planet then of course it would not be illegal, even by our own treaties and laws, but why would a species let such a commodity grow wild?’

‘It is only a commodity if it is of any use to a species.  Our species only have one stomach, there is no commodity in grass, we cannot eat it.’

The captain slid forward on his seat, ‘that would explain why your race is so small.  Do you have a lot of grass on your planet growing wild?’

Steven shrugged, ‘thousands of different varieties. ‘

‘No wonder a species from our universe wishes to invade.  Can you provide proof of what you have been saying?’

‘Exactly what kind of proof would you like?’

‘Proof that there is indeed wild grass and of the species that wishes to invade.’

‘Of course, if you wish.  Can you open a communications channel to my ship?’

He nodded and all of a sudden Steven could here Babes.  He sent her some orders and she complied, ‘my ship is going to send you what we call a documentary on the African plains.  She will also send you our files on what we have discovered here.’

‘I will study this evidence.’

‘Before I go may I ask what it is you are doing in our universe?’

The captain thought it over for a moment, ‘as we are in your universe I suppose we may owe you an explanation.  We were fighting a species called the Droning.  They are a breakaway race from my own species.  They decided they no longer wished to be ruled by our emperor and one even had the audacity to call himself emperor.  This false emperor became enamoured of himself and decided he should like to rule both kingdoms.  He was once one of our greatest generals and fought a long and bloody war.  We finally had him cornered in a decisive battle.  To escape he crossed the barrier, believing we would not follow.  He was just mad enough to try and re-cross it and my emperor asked for volunteers to pursue him and destroy him once and for all.  I volunteered this ship and its crew.  We caught him the moment we crossed; he had stopped to make repairs and we destroyed his ship and the remainder of his fleet as they sat defenceless.  Ten years of war finished.’

‘I congratulate you on your victory and your sacrifice.’

The captain nodded his acceptance of the compliment, ‘we may well meet again Captain Gordon.’

Chapter 14

It took a few weeks more for them to be ready to depart for Earth.  By then all were nearing exhaustion.  The freighter was ready to take off.  Earth was screaming for them to return as quickly as possible.  Babes and Ico were laden with nanobots from the two ships that had died and were twice their normal size.  Every corpse now lay within the hull of both ships ready for their return to Earth.  Steven considered leaving booby traps within the complex should they fail to be able to return before their Enemy.  His eyes swept over the huge battleship that had been poised as if waiting for a week now.  If they wanted to enter the complex then he could not leave a booby trap.  The last thing he wanted was that thing on his tail all the way to Earth.  He was going to let everyone get a goodnights sleep and start the homeward journey in the morning. 

There had been little communication with the aliens.  A few strange requests; some for information and another for more documentaries.  He sent some of David Attenborough’s making sure that Babes removed any references to men being meat eaters.  Now he wondered if he had done the right thing.  Colonel Howe had hit the roof when he had told him and had chastened him for his lack of thought.  Could they now have even more enemies out there?  Steven shook it off, he could only hope that his forthrightness would bring dividends in the future.  He had one more thing to deal with before he turned in. 

He returned to the complex and sought out Kelly.  He was in what had become a make shift canteen.  Steven knew he was alone; the sergeant had his feet up on a table and he was cleaning a strange looking weapon.  The barrel was bent out of shape.  Steven smiled, ‘Sergeant Kelly, why on earth are you cleaning a broken rifle?’

Kelly laughed, ‘it isn’t broken sir.  It is actually designed this way to shoot round corners.  German ingenuity sir, you just can’t beat it.’

‘You jest!’

‘Nope, it’s what it was designed for.  Your men told me there were very few of them left back home.  I am glad you arranged external storage for them on the freighter sir.’

‘After you and the rest of the soldiers kicked up a stink about them I thought it wise, rather than face a mutiny.  What the hell do you want them for anyway?’

‘According to the guys sir most are museum pieces now and can fetch a fair price back home.  A little nest egg if you will.’

Steven grinned, ‘after the work you have put in over the past few weeks Sarge I won’t begrudge you that.  You have a talent for organisation and motivating people even if your methods are a little unorthodox to say the least.’

Kelly laughed, ‘well I have had my ass kicked by some of the best sir.  If you don’t mind me saying sir you have far too much grey matter and not enough muscle on board these ships.’

Steven laughed, ‘I know, but none of them signed up for this Sarge.  You will be glad to know that we have initialised a new space academy back on Earth.  The youngest brightest minds along with a fair bit of military training thrown in.’

‘Glad to hear it sir.’

‘Don’t be too hard on them Sarge, they did their best.’

‘They did really well sir if you don’t mind me saying.  A lot of what they were doing was also way over my head.  I think I have a lot of catching up to do when I get back to Earth.  Can’t say I'm very fond of the music though.’

Steven laughed, ‘yeah, I’ll bet it’s really strange to your ears.’

Kelly joined him in his laughter, ‘so what is it you really want to see me about sir?’

‘Am I really that transparent Sarge?’

‘Seen that look in a man’s eyes before sir; right before they gave you the butcher’s bill for an operation.  I take it you got the figures back.’

Steven head dropped, ‘yeah, she made a rough estimate, have you any idea?’

‘I gave up trying to keep track when it reached about five hundred sir, I would say roughly ten times that number.’

‘You’re way off Sarge,’ Steven took a deep breath, ‘Babe’s estimates about fifteen thousand.’

Kelly let out a long breath and stood up, ‘coffee sir?’

‘Yes please.’

‘Ain’t no milk left sir.’

‘Black and sweet will do fine.’

Kelly poured them both a coffee and sat it down in front of Stevie.  They sat in quiet contemplation sipping on their hot drink.  ‘May I ask how many were women and children sir?’

‘Half we think.’

Kelly shook his head in disgust, ‘bastards.’  Steven raised an eyebrow at the language but let it slip.  Kelly was deep in thought and took another sip of his coffee before slinging his boots back up onto the table.  ‘You didn’t find any kids amongst the sleepers did you sir?’

Steven shook his head, ‘no, nor amongst the dead Sarge.  Why the hell did they take all those women and children and then kill them?’

Kelly was shaking his head, ‘don’t think that was why they took them sir?’

Steven looked up from his mug, ‘you have formed some kind of hypothesis Sarge?’

‘Yeah recon I have sir.’

‘Want to share it?’

‘I been told they were sending some of those captured home sir.  Breeding them too.’

Steven shrugged, ‘we know they certainly sent some home, we haven’t found the exact records yet.’

‘I would take a bet on it sir and I'm not a betting man.’

Steven shook his head, ‘OK you’re going to have to help me out here Sarge.  We know women who have had children were unsuitable for the serum.  Having a child takes something out of them.’

‘Yeah I’ll say, but there is one thing a woman who has had a child is good for sir and that is having more children.  Why use up a good specimen for the serum when you have a woman who has already had a child.’

‘You think you sent the women and children home as part of a breeding program.’

‘I think that would depend on the age of the child sir.  Teenagers close to breeding age maybe, the very young I doubt very much.’

Steven shook his head, ‘if the reason is to breed why get rid of perfectly good children.’

‘Something the doc said to me sir; she said those units could only hold one body; no more, not even two small children.  A pregnant woman yeah but not a woman and her child, not even if it was a baby.’

Steven shook his head, ‘still not getting you Sarge.’

‘You got to stop thinking with your heart sir and start thinking with your head.  That means you got to stop thinking rationally sir.  Way I see it is this, you got a pod that can hold nine people, why nine.  Could it be that they send eight women and a man.  One man can service eight women without any bother sir.’

‘You mean like a breeding unit Sarge?’

‘Yes sir.’

Steven nodded, ‘yeah OK, I can see that.’

‘If you sent one man, four women and four babies, the babies would have to be female.  Then the man would have to wait between fourteen and sixteen years for them to mature enough for them to have children.  In the meantime the four women could have a child a year up until the babies are old enough.  So that’s 64 babies to four women before the babies they took with them are old enough to breed.  But if you took eight women sir.’

Steven held up a hand, ‘I get you Sarge; that would mean in that fifteen years they could produce one hundred and twenty eight children in that sixteen years.’

Kelly sat back and drained his coffee, ‘yup, of course they won’t all be female babies but they wouldn’t care would they.  They could use the females for breeding and the males to experiment on.’

Steven was struggling to comprehend, ‘but there was a mixture in your pod.’

‘That’s right sir but they had perfected the serum, no need to send breeders.’

‘I can’t see it Sarge.’

‘You don’t want to see it sir.  In the nineteen thirty’s and forty’s they gave women in Germany medals if they produced over a certain amount of children.’

‘Did they?’

‘Yup they sure did.’

‘I didn’t know that.’

‘Families were big back in my day sir, I hear today most folk have two or three kids at most.  It was nothing unusual to have families with ten or more kids when I was growing up.’

Steven stood, ‘you have given me a lot of food for thought Sarge.  I can’t say I like what you're saying but damn it man it makes a lot of sense.’

‘I know you don’t like it sir,’ the Kelly shook his head sadly, ‘I think one of the reasons I stayed in the army was because of the things I saw during the war.  I didn’t feel I was capable of living a normal life again.  I know a lot of good men who left and just never made it in civilian life.  I just didn’t feel clean enough if you can understand that sentiment sir.’

Steven smiled, ‘I get where you are coming from Sarge.  You have been a great help these past few weeks but I think I said that already didn’t I.’

Kelly grinned, ‘it is always nice to hear sir.’

‘If you ever get stuck for a job when you get home Sarge I could always use a good motivator.’

They both burst out laughing, ‘I will bear that in mind sir.’

‘What are you planning on doing?’

‘I got a thing called an email from my great nephew.  They still stay on the old homestead where I was brought up.  They have a spare room above the garage and the old family rocking chair.  I think I will give that a try to start with sir.  It’s kinda hard to believe that my wars were so long ago there ain't anyone still alive from them, apart from me so far that is.’  He shook his head slowly, ‘I have never been able to distance myself from them until now.’

Steven nodded, ‘you feel you can now?’

‘Yeah I do sir; I already feel a great distance from those wars.  I feel different.  Didn’t at first of course but I do now.  Maybe it was helping all those people.  Maybe it is knowing that there is something out there that is far more dangerous and even more evil that the people I once fought.’

Steven smiled, ‘you mean even more evil than man himself.’

Kelly grinned, ‘that’s a bit deep for an old soldier like me sir, but I hear yah.  You look beat you should turn in.’

‘I am just going too and so should you.’

‘Babes gave me a nice grease to protect these weapons with sir.  I'm just going to finish them up, then she is going to beam them into those pods on the side of the freighter.’

‘How do you think your pod mates are coping Sarge?’

‘Some are coping just fine sir but those who have been asleep longer are finding it harder to adjust.  I have kept them busy and the crew have been really nice to them.’

‘Glad to hear it; right I'm turning in.’ Steven stood.

‘Night sir.’

‘Good night sergeant Kelly.’