Saxon Andrew - Escape to Earth-The Legacy of a Conqueror

“No problem.” The call ended and Allison sat on her bed for a long time staring at her wrist unit. She finally took it off and got ready for bed.

Chris looked at the fleet of large Orange Ships going through maneuvers above the planet where they were being built. Allison’s demeanor was normal and it appeared she had forgotten what happened. He watched the ships and shook his head, “I think the ships in M-86 would stand no chance against these ships, even with the fusion reactor and new disruptors.”

“I hate to agree with you but you’re right. I do think the M-86 ships will be slightly faster.”

“I agree but the speed of the Orange Ships has gone up considerably. I don’t know how strong their beams are; they’re using training beams in these maneuvers.”

Allison looked at her panel and then looked at Chris, “There are ten of the Orange Ships moving in normal space toward a large asteroid. They might be taking target practice.”

“Send me the coordinates.” Chris saw them appear on his drive board and he skipped the ship through the barrier toward the asteroid. They arrived twenty miles from it in the barrier as the ten Progen Warships moved in. The ten ships stopped thirty miles away from the giant rock and the disruptors on one of them started glowing. “Record this!”

“I’m on it.” Chris watched the Progen Battleship fire a brilliant beam at the end of the asteroid. A large piece of it was cut off. Chris’s eyes narrowed as Allison said, “A large ship is being towed in the void below us.”

Chris looked at his monitor and saw a large black ship being towed by a large shuttle. The shuttle dropped the line to it and the Black Ship’s force field came on. “Allison, is that one of the ships we saw in M-86?”

“It looks like it but without doing a full scan, I won’t be able to tell for certain.” Allison paused and smiled, “And you know about making a scan without proper preparation.”

Chris laughed, “Indeed I do. What do you think they’re doing?”

“What we do. They’re checking out the weapons on two newly built warships.”

“We couldn’t have asked for something this good.”

“I know.” Chris looked at the monitor tracking what was happening in normal space and saw the ships move out to forty miles. Once again the asteroid was hit on the end and another piece was sheared off. “They’re launching a missile!”

Chris tore his eyes from the monitor and looked at the monitor showing the void. A missile leapt out from one of the ten orange warships that had dropped into the void. The missile closed the gap between the two ships so fast he had to replay the recording of what happened in slow motion. The missile hit the Black Ship, blew through its force field, and burned a huge hole through the center of it. “This is not good!”

“It’s not as bad as it looks.”

Chris looked at Allison, “Oh?”

“The new ships can handle the beam.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because we also practice with our weapons on asteroids. By comparing how long it took for the piece to shear off with our own beams, they aren’t powerful enough to penetrate the force field or the silver coating on our new ships.”

“What about ten of them?”

Allison looked at her panel and shrugged, “That may be a different story.”

“What about the missile?”

“They fired it from twenty miles. The new ships can easily avoid them by going into the barrier and allowing them to fly right by. They’re traveling so fast that, if they miss their target, they’ll run out of fuel before they could turn and come back.” Chris raised his eyebrows. “I had Alley do an analysis of it. It appears a force field generator has taken up space for fuel. Only a fifth of it is used for fuel.”

“They built it with our former ships in mind.” Allison nodded. “A ship that can’t go into the barrier will be in real trouble.”

“Our old pods and battleships can handle a few of them but a salvo of thousands would take out those that are hit by eight or more.”

“We won’t be able to face off against them like we did in our battle in M-84.”

“No, their beams would start hitting us from fifty miles out and the missiles from even further.”

“And they still outnumber us by the millions.” Allison shrugged. “We have to develop new tactics if we’re going to use the pods and battleships.”

“This will require some rethinking about how to attack them.”

“CHRIS!”

“Go ahead, Loree!”

“Something has entered M-87and is destroying all of our probes ahead of it on a line from the edge of the galaxy directly toward the Legends’ planet. The probes have not seen what is killing them.”

Chris’s eyes went wide, “If you have any of your scouts near that line, get them out!”

“Already done but we have no way to know what’s doing it.”

“I’m going into the barrier and see if we can find out.” Chris looked up, “Barbie, do you have the line the probes are being taken out?”

“I do.”

“Give me the coordinates in the path of whatever is doing it. Do not pick a location close to the Legends’ Planet.” Chris saw the numbers appear on his panel and he turned the steering wheel and pressed the right pedal. He saw Allison buckle in and activate her armor. He pressed a button on his chair and his armor immediately surrounded him. The Barrier Pod skipped across the giant galaxy in an instant and came to a stop at the coordinates on his panel. “Estimate on how far out it is?”

Allison looked at her panel, “It will be here in less than ten seconds. Chris keep your foot on the pedal and be ready to get out here!”

Chris stared at the void monitor as he said, “Why?”

“This may be more Legends.”

Chris’s eyes widened and he started to run but it was too late. They stared at the void monitor and saw a ship coming at them that was beyond their worst nightmares. It flew past them in an instant and Chris held his breath. He waited for it to turn and come back toward them but it continued toward the Legends’ Planet. Allison was shaking and she looked at him, “Why didn’t you run!?”

“It was on us before I could. I was too stunned to react.”

Allison blew out quick breaths and fought to gather control of her breathing.

“I guess that answers one question.”

Chris exhaled, “What is that Barbie?”

“They can’t see us in the barrier.”

Allison shook her head, “That’s a helluva way to find out!”

Chris thought for a long moment and looked up, “Barbie, disable the telepathic broadcast portion of you module.”

“Done.”

Allison shook her head, “Chris, what are you thinking about?”

“Allison, they didn’t detect us.”

“They might have been traveling too fast.”

“I’m shutting down all non-essential systems and I’m going to move toward the Legends’ Planet until we can optically see what’s going on.”

“Chris, this is crazy!”

“Loree.”

“Yes!”

“I’m sending you what we recorded. Get it out to fleet and I’ll contact you later.”

“What are you doing, Chris?”

“That thing that destroyed our probes is a Black Ship that’s nearly the size of a small moon. It blew past us and did not see us in the barrier. I’m going to move until I can see it on my most powerful passive scanner. If it moves toward us, I’m going to run.”

“You shouldn’t be the one doing this!”

“I have the only ship in the fleet that can! We have to find out what’s going on!”

Chris shut down the communicator before Loree could respond. Allison began shutting down most of the systems on her panel, “I have the passive scanner searching ahead of us.”