Terran Characters.
Ianna Tropper -- Human -- Communicator, Swiftleaper -- Dolphin -- Pilot Flops -- Dog -- Technician Stardust -- AI -- CaptainMother characters.
Alicky -- Telogy -- Inventor Glucky -- Telogy -- AdventurerVeen Characters.
Kelp -- Veen -- Admiral Tag -- Veen ? Tasway -- Veen ? Goomba -- Veen -- A Captain--- (The world Mother)
The stink of the gas-powered motor washed over Alicky's nose as he helped push the heavier than air flying machine out into the bright golden sun with his brother. "You sure this is going to work?" He twitched his whiskers and scratched at his short tail. "I mean it looks kind of like the old one." He distinctly remembered the old one. He could still see what was left of it in a pile next to the barn.
His brother was large for a Telogy, with bright green eyes and more webs between his fingers than most. He had very thick fur like all of the people. Glucky, as well, was a better name. ( If a human was around he would just say that he looked like a big fat otter. )
"Yes, yes... it will work. I got the design from the Som brothers. They are the ones that got that one craft to fly last month. The very first ones!" Glucky had an almost worshipful tone to his voice.
Alicky mumbled to himself as he lay himself down in the control area. "Why do I have to fly the thing, though?"
"Don't you know anytyhing? You're smaller than I am!" huffed Glucky.
"Right." Alicky looked over the controls and pulled on the cord for the motors to start. He might as well get this over with. Thick clouds of black, stinking smoke billowed out of the exhaust. The aircraft of wood and animal skins started to taxi down the makeshift runway. Glucky ran along its side with the plane going faster and faster, trying to keep the wing off the ground. He shouted encouragements until he couldn't keep up anymore, and the aircraft lifted off of its sleds.
There was the thrill of wonder as Alicky looked out over the land as it dropped below the wings. It was also that moment where he lost control of the aircraft and its left wing dipped down to catch the ground, smashing itself into bits...
The fuzzy images of Glucky looked down at him. Alicky blinked his eyes and the forms came together fully. "You're lucky there, Alicky. Good job though! You were in the air!"
They both laughed and headed to the workshop to put together another aircraft. They listened to the news on the radio before turning it off for the night. "That is mighty strange," commented Alicky. "Flying things being seen all over the world."
Laughing, Glucky shook his head. "People are just seeing things is all."
Alicky grinned. "Maybe the Actesens are coming!"
With a snort, Glucky waved that off. He didn't believe all the stories about Actes and life being on that other world. "You go to sleep..."
Alicky did.
--- (Over the World Mother)
Klep laughed and clapped his blotted paws together. "Tag! Was there no response from the flyovers? Is this world really that primitive?"
Tag looked up from the spaceship scanners. He was important to the Veen right now. "No sir. Nothing. This world looks ripe for the plucking!"
Klep looked at the viewscreen, showing the 'world Mother' as the locals called it. "Then send out the call. I want the rest of the fleet here in one week. We begin the invasion."
--- (One week later, somewhere in deep space with the terran fleet)
The ships were tight up near each other as Ianna Tropper watched the main viewscreen. The Terran fleet was ready for the jump. "Tell me again how this is going to work?" She kept the marking packets from the Stardust flowing to many of the other ships.
The Captain's holo image of abstract color hung in the air behind the human Ianna. "Do not worry so much about your children, Ianna. The combined hyperjump will get us all there in no time, faster than any one of us could move by ourselves."
Ianna snorted. "They are not my children!"
Swiftleaper swished his fins through the water in the pilot's tank, while Flops wagged his tail. Both dolphin and dog were finding Ianna's mood funny today. The Captain just flicked quietly.
Ianna herself was too intent on her work to notice any of this. Still she couldn't help but remember her history. Humans had given the gift/curse of sentience to the other three races of Terra, the AI computers, built as one into ships. Dog's and dolphins join them in the more mundane world.
"We are jumping in 5... 4... 3.." Ianna counted down to the jump. Moments later, every ship in the Terran fleet folded in space, and headed to an unknown world to help. An hour later they slid back into realness again, near the world of Mother.
The Captain flickered. "Report!"
Swiftleaper, pilot of the craft, spoke up first. "Most of the fleet is lagging behind us. I think there may have been a problem with the warp jump."
Stardust elaborated, "Out of 95 battle cruisers and 6 fleet beacons, a total of 2 cruisers successfully made the warp jump to this point."
Ianna banged her instrument panel irritably. "Great. Stardust, where are they?"
"Working on that Ianna. It seems an unknown force has caused the misrouting of 85% of the Terran fleet. 12% are within one day's standard drive. 3% present yet unaccounted for."
It was at this moment that Flops bounded into the room, looking somewhat eager to put the Stardust's engines to the test.
"We have weapons online. What's more, I've managed to get a little extra speed out of us. Get this! We have double the... speed... of... hey, what's the matter?" Flop's ears flattened to his skull.
The silence in the room spoke for itself. "Alright, who left the food dispenser spitting coffee again?"
Stardust flickered for a moment. "Flops, the rescue plan has changed. We have to find out how we can use ten battle cruisers, only two for a probing attack." The AI focused a sensor on flops for a moment too long, until Flops couldn't stand the notion any more, bursting out with laugher.
"You can't... how do you expect to protect a planet with only two cruisers?"
"I have no idea, but I mean to try. Swiftleaper, contact the Trident. I want you two to figure out how best to position the Stardust and the Trident to set up... *sigh* something. Anyway, we have to use what we've got. We'll have a ten more cruisers to help in a day... if we're lucky. Ianna, do you have another report?"
Ianna worked with the sensors, tracking down what happened. "97% of the fleet is now unaccounted for, Stardust and Trident. Other than the other ten ships we can detect inbound, the rest of the fleet isn't without a light day."
Flops gulped. "She's kidding, right? Its us, and that's it?!"
Ianna glared at Flops. "I don't kid around. Humans don't have a sense of humor that we are aware of."
Swiftleaper turned his focus back to the main bridge piloting controls. "Silly dog... who do you think you're talking to? As if she could kid about something like this..."
Stardust flashed. "The point is moot. I can verify what Ianna said; AI's aren't capable of kidding."
Ianna drummed her fingers absent-mindedly as she tried to come up with a solution to this dilemma. Suddenly, she smiled. "Stardust? What if we use the two cruisers as decoys? Would that be possible?"
Flops looked confused. "A decoy for *what*?"
Ianna looked at Flops. "Well, you know it's theoretically possible to use the same field that protects us from energy beams to mask our electromagnetic signature. You were working on something like that, right?"
Flops scowled. "I never got anywhere. It's really hard."
Stardust turned the holo image a deep blue. "Go on, Ianna."
Ianna grinned. "...But the Veen don't know that, not for sure. We could route all our excess energy through the shared-jump drives to make a large signature, and modulate the fields to ripple visual and infrared in an area around us --- fake that we were hiding the rest of the fleet."
Flops paused motionless, thinking. "I think I could do that... it'd take a few hours to set up... I'd just need to -- "
Stardust listened as Flops' musing dissolved into techno-speak. After a few seconds, she interrupted with, "Just do it, Flops. Thanks for the fast thinking, Ianna."
Flops nodded eagerly and ran off, as Ianna grinned to herself.
---- (Veen Fleet)
Kelp silently looked to the viewscreen, surveying all that would soon belong to the Veen. It's resources would surely provide enough to sustain their populus for at least 3 lifetimes.
"Lt. Serols," he ordered his subordinates, "prepare a team to explore a suitable landing site for the vanguard of the invasion fleet to land. Make sure it is wide enough at the terran level so ground forces can be sent out soon after."
"Acknowledged, sir. I will begin scanning the area."
---- (On the planet surface below):
Glucky and his sibling had just enough time rebuild the flying machine before the wind changed course or died down. They had hoped to go twice as far as they did in their last test run. "I smoothed out any of the rough spots in the skin. With the wind up at this speed, we might even reach over ten feet in altitude! Remember, keep her steady and don't look down."
The makeshift aircraft trundled along the runway once more. As the wings caught a passing gust of wind, Alicky quickly adjusted the controls to use the draft of wind to his advantage, letting the wind carry it upwards like a kite. The view was incredible. He could see the vast expanse of grasslands that stretched for miles abroad, and the treetops of a forest in the distance. Alicky carefully steered towards the trees, making sure not to brush against any of the taller ones.
"I did it... this is the longest anyone's been in the air! This could change everything for---." Before Alicky could pull himself out of his brief daydream, a large shadow had blanketed the area, which was followed by a loud humming. The Telogy looked up to see a red metallic shape pass by swiftly. Glucky was right... flying ships from afar. His brother had been right about this!
Within an instant, Alicky tried desperately to force the aircraft to turn around sharply. Before he could fully turn, the heat the thrusters were generating melted the binding holding the wings together. He steered as best as he could, and shortly crashed into the branches of a tree, watching the spacecraft land in a nearby clearing, and literally, out on a limb.
Alicky gaped at this ship that just set down. He had not imagined it. It had been in the air. Now it was on the ground. Carefully he looked around the top of the tree where he was. His race was not made for climbing. He did manage to crawl to the trunk of the tree and stare out at the ship. The side opened and people... no!... *monsters* started to come out in numbers. Little wuurring metal seed pod things started to dart off in all directions. One of them came right up to him before it darted off again. He was still watching it when he heard voices and looked down. The squid looking things were looking right up at him with what was some kind of gun aimed right at him!
Already Serols could just see the credit that he would get for capturing the first slave. He pointed his blaster up at the native. "Come down here now you filthy animal! It will go good on you if you do as I say!"
One of the subordinate commanders looked at Serols. "Would you like me to turn on the translator, sir?" he hedged. (You could end up dead in the Veen command if you pointed out that the commander was being dumb.)
Blinking a couple of times, Serols waved his hand. "Yes, yes. I thought it was already on," he covered for himself. 'Can't let the underlings think less of you,' he thought.
Alicky gaped at the monsters. Then they started to talk his own language. "Get down here slave! Or die...."
Alicky went down the tree as fast as he could. 'Oh, Mother!... who were these people!?'
--- (In orbit around Mother's only moon):
Ianna crowed and danced a little jig in the middle of the command cabin. "You did it, flops! The fake cloak for the fleet is ready!"
Flops wagged his tail and barked happily. "Could do it! I knew I could!"
The Captain interrupted. "Five other ships have come in from the fleet. I have a feeling the others will get here by ones and twos for the next couple of weeks. We need to move now, though. Long range detectors show that the Veen have already started the invasion. We need to move now or lose this world and its people to them."
Swiftleaper looked out of his piloting tank. *click* "What will scaring them into thinking that the whole fleet is here do?"
The holo of the AI flickered. "Delay them at the least. I hope."
--- (On Mother's surface):
Alicky hopped the last few feet to the ground as far away from the monster as he could get. His eyes scanned the landscape around him and silently he pleaded, "Oh, Glucky... please, please don't come near here." He didn't see his sibling anywhere near, and tried hard to keep his composure.
Serols stepped forward and thrust his blaster towards the Telogy. "Move animal!!" Alicky jumped and started backing up, hoping that maybe he could draw the monsters in the opposite direction from which he expected Glucky. But, Serols would have none of that and jabbed him with the blaster. "No, you stupid thing... not that way, towards the ship. Come on, now!"
Alicky meeped and grabbed his side. He started moving toward the vehicle that the monsters had come from. Just as he started towards the opening...
...there was a commotion a ways away from the ship. All the alien monsters turned to look, as a swarm of metal seed pods drove another Telogy out of hiding. It was Glucky!
"Run! Run!" Alicky yelled, but it was no use. Faster than he'd have thought they could move, two of the monsters grabbed Glucky and carried him towards the ship.
"Move," said the monster near him, prodding him again, and a dejected Alicky slinked towards the monster's vehicle.
As they passed through the door, into metal corridors that looked more like a building, or maybe a ship, than a plane, he saw squadrons of the monsters forming up to scour the countryside and round up more slaves.
--- (Terran Fleet):
Ianna watched as they approached the fleet of Veen ships, keeping their pulse thrusters down low to avoid detection.
Stardust began to formulate a plan to keep them distracted long enough for the other ships to arrive. She figured it would be best to turn the ships on one another. "Ianna, scan for the location of the torpedo bays, then position us just below the ship and out of viewing range."
--- (On the Veen Ships):
Kelp was listening to Serols' incessant talk of his first captured slave in the name of the Veen, and how many more were to follow, as a movement through the framework of the ship grabbed Kelp's attention, along with a message from the bridge. "Admiral Kelp, the Attack Cruiser Peezonteen has just fired a torpedo, which has damaged decks 23A and cargo bay 10."
Kelp immediately stood up. "What? Have they gone mad? Get the commanding officer on the view screen."
Tasway leaned forward to take the view screen over for the Kelp's call. "Tasway of the Peezonteen here. What may I do for you admiral?"
"If you think firing on us will allow you to reap the glory of first strike, think again, Tasway!" Admiral Kelp sneered. "When I was in charge of first landing forces, I eliminated my rivals just as you seek to, but I didn't have the guts to fire upon a superior force!"
Tasway blinked. His mind panicked. "Sir, I . . . I didn't fire. . . ."
"We know otherwise." Admiral Kelp turned and nodded sharply.
Tasway shouted to his crew. His ship shuddered under the impact of something that breeched its hull. An explosion rumbled through the superstructure and the bridge collapsed under him. Tasway screamed. His crew reacted. They returned fire on the admiral's ships.
Admiral Kelp stared at the view screen with satisfaction. "Go out there and execute any of the bridge staff you find."
"Serol here! Our shuttle is being fired upon!" The admiral blinked. Then his shuddered under the impact of something large, then another, and another! Multiple explosions ripped through the aft sections of Kelp's heavy cruiser; it listed heavily to one side for a moment, then plummeted groundward as its engine cores collapsed and shut down.
--- (On Mother):
Alicky stumbled out of the broken slave pen. Out of the corner of one eye, he saw something trail smoke and plummet to Mother. The ground rolled under him and a black mushroom of smoke rose menacingly upward. For a moment he did not move, then he remembered. "Glucky!" He made his way through the smoldering wreckage gingerly. The explosion that had ripped the ship apart had left him banged and bruised. Blood ran down his muzzle from a contousion on his forehead. Other than that, he thought he was okay. At least, he could still move without much pain.
"GLUCKY!" he shouted. Glucky had to be here someplace. He saw him taken prisoner. He HAD to be here . . . HAD to be all right!
The search went slowly. Dead squiddy things were everywhere. Their burned and torn carcasses reeked of something nauseous and malodorous. Alicky tied a strip of cloth over his nose in an attempt to screen out the smell, but to no avail. He needed a mask to block it.
--- (Terran Fleet):
Flops clapped his hands. "DAMN! Who'd have thunk it! The Veen took each other out!"
Ianna grinned from ear to ear. "I did! The Veen have a murderous advancement system in their ranks. One way for them to advance is to count first coup in an invasion. There is murderous competition for that 'badge.' We made it look like the one commander was trying to prevent the cruiser from claiming it with their shuttle. I didn't expect the destroyer's commander to be sly enough to launch a retaliatory strike as his ship blew, but . . . Hey! We got rid of both!"
Flops looked back at his monitors. "Are we still disguised?"
Ianna looked and nodded. "Let's go cause some more mischief!"
Flops grinned. "YEAH!"
--- (Veen Fleet):
Many of the other Veen commanders took the death of the Admiral with rather high hopes. They had all been waiting for a week to invade but the Admiral had been going so very slow. With him gone, many of the ships took off to different orbits. Without further ado, most of them launched their own invasions!
--- (Terran Fleet):
Stardust's holo flickered with shapes of cones and ragged edges. "Good job, Ianna. You managed to blow up the Veen Flagship."
Flops went over to another terminal and frowned as he readjusted it for his black and white vision. "Looks like the Veen have formed 8 different groups, all with their own plans."
Ianna bent over her com panel and listened into the Veen. She also tapped into the Native channels. "Looks like the Natives know what is going on now as well." She looked over to her Captain. "What is the plan now? The rest of the fleet is not here yet."
Swiftleaper slashed at the water in his tank. *clink* "Hide no more say I. With the first plan that we had go with. Scare the Veen into thinking the fleet is here!"
--- (Back on the planet):
Alicky climbed over some more wreckage and finally found Glucky. He was pinned under a metal bar. "Glucky! Can you hear me?"
Wincing, Glucky looked up and whispered, "Will you please keep it down? I have a headache."
Alicky lowered himself down next to Glucky and grinned. He reached out and started work on the beam. He whispered, "I will have you free in a moment, Glucky."
Over in one corner some radio thing was still working. It still was set to translate for the natives. Alicky tried to ignore it, but in the end he couldn't. "You hear what they are saying, Glucky?
Glucky nodded, "Yes."
After a few minutes Glucky was free, and they turned to the radio, both feeling rather helpless. Then something strange happened.
~Buzzzz...~ "What is that, Zook?" "Ships coming from starboard?" "Terrans!" "Recall all fighters!" "Ceek... report!"
Alicky and Glucky looked at each other. "Terrans?" they both said.
--- (Terran Fleet):
"We have to do it now, before they regroup," Ianna said, looking at the scans.
Stardust flicked. "What are our chances with the eight ships we have now, Swiftleaper? Flops? Ianna?"
"I recommend you develop another plan, *click*" the Swiftleaper responded.
Flaps whimpered. Ianna shook her head.
Stardust thought fast and came to a plan. "Have the other ships form a wedge in front of us while we fake a cloaking field. Make sure they shoot down any missiles that'd hit the 'main fleet'. Aim for the weakest Veen squadron. Do it, Swiftleaper."
"This plan has limited chance of success." Ianna looked at the stats board and growned. "We must develop another..."
"We cannot watch them die!" Swiftleaper chirped, "and they have seen us now, so it's too late!"
"All ships, form a screen for us, we'll fake a cloaked fleet," Stardust said over the com. The other ships slowly moved into position, the entire fleet gathering momentum as it shot out of the moon's shadow towards the planet.
Stardust suppressed punitive urges. There would be time for court martials later. It began calculating the targeting and trajectory data needed for the attack.
--- Veen Fleet.
In the Veen fleet, Kroll's flagship desperately sent out coms to the only loyal ships left its group. "Retreat to the moon! We'll let them fight it out!"
"Sir," his com-tech said, "an alien fleet is between us and the moon. I can barely make it out through all the debris and radiation..."
Kroll glowered. The debris and radiation was from the other ships that had flocked to his banner. Even now, Goomba's fleet circled for another attack.
The com-tech continued hurriedly, "There's only eight ships. We can defeat them easily!"
Kroll nodded. "Fire all weapons at the new aliens. We must escape this deathtrap!"
Kroll's ships veered into the attack, sprayed their weapons over a large area, and hoped to cause chaos long enough for them to escape to the moon. Incoming fire ended that chance. It was not from the new threat, but a strike by Goomba's flagship in a premptive attempt to become fleet admiral. As Kroll's ships scattered before the incoming fleet, the terran ships were waiting, cloaked, weapons at the ready.
--- (Terran Fleet):
Stardust finished calculations. Weapons arrays sprang to life and began automatic fire.
Flops watched through his monitor and shook his head. "Doncha just love their advancement system...? Can't figure out how they manage to be so effective an empire with the rate they waste their own people."
Ianna glanced his way with a wry smile on her face. "Ain't it the truth. How'd we make out?"
"Ninety-eight percent of our shots found targets in both fleets." Stardust recalculated and the weapon arrays came into play again.
Flops shook his head. "Captain, you take all the fun out of it. I read only two enemy vessels, both scout class.
Stardust whirred. "What two ships?"
Flops looked again and found nothing but debris in the fields.
Stardust whirred again. "Take us out of cloaking. We can take care of this area until the fleet comes. What of the other Veen squadrons?"
Ianna grinned. "More infighting to become admiral is my guess. No ground troops yet that I can pick up."
"Good! Perhaps this worked out for the best." Stardust made a mental note to work out the ramifications of court martials and rules infractions at a later time. Right now it was feeling a bit cocky . . . also a bit out of line for an AI, actually.
--- (On Mother):
Alicky listened to the alien radio. No more voices were heard over it. A slight hiss continued from it.
"What happened? Where'd they go?" Glucky blinked, ears focused tightly on the radio.
Alicky slipped an arm around his brother's shoulder. "Terrans. They said Terrans were attacking them."
"D'ya suppose they all got . . . you know. . . ?" Glucky hesitated.
"I think so . . . Must have. . . ." He shuddered. "If-if they could kill these things . . . I don't wanna see what they could do to us."
Glucky agreed with a rapid nod. "Jeez! If these things were afraid of these 'Terrans,' think how ugly *they* must look. Let's get outa here!"
Alicky nodded and the two brothers left the wreckage and hurried away as fast as they could, never looking back.
--- (Terran Fleet):
Up above, the Terran fleet gathered around the Telogy planet, Mother, and formed a defensive sphere which they fortified with mines, effectively blocking off all retreat from Mother's satellite. The Veen were caught in the trap they had tried to avoid, but their own ambitions and greed had caught them, and the trap had closed.
Stardust fretted. Its ship had started all the infighting and looked to be overshadowed by the fleet admirals who were making speeches about the heroic efforts of the native populace who turned out in fierce numbers to face and fight the invaders wherever they landed. It whirred. "Hmph! Listen to all that! The way they tell it, they did all the work and all we did was stand guard!"
"Politics," said Ianna. "Sheer political gobbledegook!"
Flops laughed. "At least the Veen are stopped and the natives have their world back. I'd hate to be the mop up operation on their moon."
Stardust whirred. "I only worry how the native's culture has been disrupted by all this."
Flops turned away. "Not likely! Happened way to fast and mop ups are underway already."
"I am not worried in that way," said Stardust. "Mere alien contact can have terrible consequences."
"I guess that's why you aren't going down, eh?" Flops chuckled and Swiftleaper chittered.
"I doubt a talking ship would be well received," Stardust said, undaunted.
Ianna laughed. "Where to now, Captain?"
"Back into the defensive perimeter again. We have the 6th quadrant to ourselves until help arrives."
--- (On Mother):
Glucky and Alicky sat amidst piles of Veen technology and rummaged about. Alicky looked over his plans and smiled. He picked up a small hand console and pressed one of the buttons. A small model plane lifted and zipped around the room amidst a cloud of soft buzzing. On the ground next to them were plans . . . plans for their full sized aircraft. Glucky grinned and clapped his hands softly.