Saxon Andrew - Tommy’s Tale

The crew looked at each other wondering if their commander had lost his mind but they announced the news over the general ship frequency. Every one of the crewmen on board had seen the destruction of the Moscow during their academy training and the entire ship was wondering about Mikado’s sanity until the announcement came in from Castle Gardner that the news was true; Kosiev was back. The entire Stars Realm was stunned but then the celebrations began. The Realm’s greatest hero was alive and in this time of fear, it brought a new sense of courage and belief that the Realm would prevail. Kosiev was back.

Kosiev sat in the library at Castle Gardner while Twig fed all of the history of the Stars Realm since the destruction of the Moscow into his mind. The previous three days had been a mad rush from celebration to celebration. Tgon-Gee, Admiral Mikado, and the Eldest of the Algeans had come to welcome him home. He acted in high spirits but he felt that time had passed him by and left him with nothing to do. The thought of these new ships and the race of Captors that the Realm was now fighting for survival left him hollow inside. He was used to being in the center of all the action and now he knew he was not going to be where he wanted to be. The Statue of him at the fleet academy and the outright adoration of everyone he encountered only served to make him feel like he should have just stayed dead. How could he possibly live up to the legend that had been built around him? “Oh, well, I’ve never met a legend before. At least my actions saved the fleet.” He then thought about Tag and how he now looked as old as he did. According to what he had been told, he had died more than twenty six years ago but Tag did not look twenty six years older. As he thought about it, Danielle didn’t either. “I’ll have to ask him about that.”

Then he leaned back on the couch and Twig entered his mind and began the transfer of information. He closed his eyes and felt the rush of new knowledge. He stayed like that for two days which only seemed like a couple of hours.

Twig began the transfer and sorted the information into his memory centers and organized it so that it would make it seem like he had lived all of the time that he had been gone. She also looked into his mind and got a full account of the war between the Realm and her race. She was amazed that the humans had worked to prevent the destruction of her species after all the worlds that the Algeans had destroyed and harvested. “I’ve got to share this with Sprig,” she thought and then focused on the transfer.

Kosiev opened his eyes and blinked. “Wow, a lot has happened,” he looked at Twig and said, “Thank you. It’s like I’ve been here living all of this history. Now I know what I’ve missed. I also noticed that you’ve given me a full understanding of the new ships, weapons, and teleportation devices.”

“Admiral, how can you be an asset if you don’t know how everything works? I suspect you will be put to work shortly.”

“I really hope so, Twig. At least I won’t be lost now in the details. How did you do this?”

“We’ve learned how to download information in tremendous quantities and organize it. This transfer was really rather simple and I think that if you focus on a problem you’ll find what you need to know in your mind now.”

Kosiev smiled and stood up, “It’s time to go to work. I’m truly glad we came to be friends with your species. I would have never guessed that we would become friends during the time of our conflict.”

“You have Queen Rose and Admiral Dorg to thank for that.”

Kosiev frowned and said, “I wish he were still alive. I grew to have a tremendous respect for that Cainth. We could use him now.”

Twig lifted her limbs indicating a smile and said, “We feel the same way about you, Admiral.”

Kosiev smiled and, “Thank you again; I hope I can meet your expectations. Do you know if Cade McAllister is still around?”

“Yes he is; he’s retired and living on Ross.”

“Will you give me his com number; I need to talk with him about an idea I have.”

Twig put the number in Kosievs’ mind and he left the library to make a call.

Five days later Tag, Danielle, Rose, Tommy, Cassandra, Tgon-Gee, Admirals Mikado, O’Donald, and recently promoted McAnn were in the map room of Castle Gardner discussing the upcoming battle with the Captors. Tommy said, “We have to attack within twelve weeks. The places in space that the Captors use to see the universe will be cooled enough for them to find us in sixteen weeks. We have to prevent them from seeing the planets of the Realm. We’re only going to have 150,000 ships to fight more than four million of the Captors and if you look at their world you’ll see that they are staged in multiple layers expecting us to come.”

Danielle looked at Tommy and said, “Why can’t you heat those nerve centers again?”

Cassandra shook her head and said, “Last time I entered one of those centers, I almost exploded the energy particle in it. If I had, it would have created at new universe with a big bang. I’ve gotten a better feel for what is happening in that particle and I don’t think that it will endanger our universe but I also sense that now is not the time for it to happen. I don’t know for certain what the consequences would be if it happened too soon.”

Admiral Mikado frowned and said, “How are we going to do this? Are we just going to jump in and start shooting or do you have another plan?”

Tommy looked at Cassandra and saw that she was letting him come up with the strategy for the battle but Tommy was just not certain if what he was planning would work. “If we just jump in and start shooting, we will be barraged by millions of those energy balls that can destroy our ships. We have to come up with a strategy that allows our ships to escape those barrages.”

The door to the map room opened and Admiral Kosiev and Cade McAllister entered. “I hope you don’t mind if we join you,” Kosiev said. “I understand you are working on the battle plans for the upcoming campaign against the Captors.”

Rose stood and went to meet Kosiev and said, “We are and you’re certainly welcome to join us. We just thought that you needed some time to get up to speed.” She then hugged him and indicated two chairs at the end of the table. “Hello, Colonel McAllister, I thought you were retired.”

“I am your Majesty, but Admiral Kosiev contacted me and asked me some questions that generated my interest.”

Tag looked at his two old friends and said, “Uh oh, you have that look on your faces.”

Kosiev smiled and said, “Some things never change.” He then set a bag of popcorn on the table with a drink and said, “You’re stuck on how to attack without losing ships.”

Tommy did a double take and said, “As a matter of fact we are. How did you know that?”

“It’s obvious. However, I want to discuss an idea I have about getting the numbers even before we take them on ship to ship.”

Tommy cocked his head to the side and said, “I’m all ears.”

Kosiev looked at McAllister and he stepped out of the room and came back in holding a white ball about four feet in diameter. Kosiev leaned back and said, “This is a ball made of Coronado Power Cells. I learned that we are now able to mold the cells into any shape we need.”

Tommy looked at the ball and said, “Is this something significant?”

McAllister said, “What would happen if we pushed this ball into the skin of the Kosiev?”

Cassandra immediately said, “It would take on the characteristics of the skin.”

“Exactly, and if it were put in next to the dark matter inside that skin,” Kosiev asked?