Chapter 7

Annette said, "Incoming message. Looks like they want to talk."

Bonnie and Sue overheard just as they reached the bridge.

Sue said, "I suggest you shoot first, talk later."

"Open a com. Let's see what they have to say," I said. looking at Sue, I added, "Sorry, but it is going to take two cycles before we are at full power."

"Captain Miller, this is Ramie of the Permethian Alliance. Today is your lucky day. I am more interested in what you are carrying, than in destroying you. Be a good boy, now, and turn it over. If you do so, we may even let you live."

"They will kill us as soon as they can. No one can deal with them," said Bonnie.

"Yes, I know. Com open."

"You are on the air... now," Annette said.

"Captain Ramie, This is Captain Miller. What exactly do you need a load of Food Staples for?"

"Please, Captain, don't toy with me. You know what I want."

"Maybe I am just dense," I said in as agreeable a tone as possible. "Please spell it out."

"Very well. I want the Ambassador and AI data crystal you took onboard, back at Lackey Station."

"Obviously, You have fallen for some disinformation. I have no Ambassador onboard. As for my Personality crystal, you can buy the Jenny AI unit, at most any starport."

"Come, come, Captain. Do not play games with me. The Ambassador was seen boarding your ship less than five cycles before you left the station."

"Oh, you think my First Officer's collage room mate is an ambassador?"

"Enough games! Prepare to be boarded. Resist and I will blow that hunk of space garbage you call a ship to pieces."

"Com Off," I said.

"Com is off line, Sir."

"Annette, Left Laser; Jenny, Right Laser; Bonnie, take the rear.

Fong said, "I can handle all of them."

"No, Fong, I order you to sleeper mode."

Sue, "That would be a mistake."

"Fong! Off line! Now!' I barked.

Annette said, "The Fong AI is off line."

We watched as her image vanished.

"I have a sick feeling about that," Sue said.

"We are at full power now," Jenny said. "Twelve ships heading at us, in battle cone deployment pattern."

"Full speed ahead, at my mark."

Jenny replied, "Ready."

"Mark."

With that, the 'My Love' burst towards the twelve ships. I hooked my missile guidance on the first ship, and toggled the laser. The beams reached out and connected with the lead ship once, then twice. On the third hit, the bridge of the lead ship erupted in a flash of light.

"One down, only eleven to go," I said.

I toggled the cycle switch on the tracking system. The next lock was achieved as a bolt of laser light passed to the right of the ship. I toggled the firing switch again, and the Type Nines launched out five salvos of energy into the next ship. The flash wasn't as gratifying as the first salvo. The blasts only disabled the targeted ship. I cycled the firing control, again.

Whap! The distinctive sound of a direct hit could be heard throughout the bridge, as one of the enemy's lasers stuck the port side of the ship.

"Shields holding at ninety-five percent," Annette said.

Jenny added, "Heat ratio up to twenty percent."

I selected an anti-matter torpedo from the missile list. A moment after firing it off, I flipped the ship over, and headed away at maximum power.

The enemy fleet followed behind me.

The rear laser was firing as Bonnie poured it into them.

"Heat ratio at twenty-five percent," Jenny said.

Bonnie got a good lock on one of the pursuing vessels. She toggled the cyclotron-firing switch to auto-fire, and watched as over twenty bolts of high energy laser fire poured into the Permethian ship. She was rewarded with a brilliant flash, as the ship exploded into space dust.

The lead Permethian ship toggled its ECM (electronic counter measures) system, in an attempt to confuse or detonate our missile. The Permethian commander, Ramie, was shocked to see that it had no effect on the missile.

'Thank Toran it's not targeted on me, ' Ramie thought.

The current situation was now very confusing to the Permethians. They had lost three ships, and were about to lose a fourth. Commander Ramie was not happy, at the moment. Worse than that, the trade Alliance ship was pulling away from them, it was faster than they were!

Their only chance was to disable it before it could get out of range.

The antimatter Hunter missile was tracking in on the fifth vessel. It was fully active, and three of its multi-plexed sensor systems had a positive lock. Laser fire was passing left, right and below it, as it approached to within one thousand meters of its target. It calculated an opportunity. The deadly military AI brain of this version of the missile, noted that if it switched between the fifth and sixth vessels, instead of directly on the fifth, it could kill or disable two additional ships. Being a military model, it chose the greater of the damaging possibilities, the better to create havoc in the enemy's lines.

Military AI's were like that. To them, death was their greatest service. They were the ultimate 'Suicide Bomber', and it did make them rather unpredictable. The Missile locked on to the intercept point just in front of the sixth ship. It approached to one hundred meters and detonated its anti-matter charge.

Well, detonate is not really the correct word. The anti-matter mass was held in a stasis field. The stasis field coils required only minimal power to maintain that containment. The anti-matter mass was locked into an unchanging state, while in the field. What actually happened was the AI unit turned off the stasis field coils. This resulted in the anti-matter being set free to interact with the matter around it. The matter/anti-matter reaction began almost immediately. The single ounce of anti-matter, reacting with several hundred pounds of normal matter, produced energy levels unrivaled even in the core of a star. Trillions of angstroms of raw energy were released in a nano-second, producing a miniature star in space. The fifth and sixth ships were engulfed completely, vaporized in the ongoing expansion of raw energy. Ship seven was next, as the energy expanse reached its hull at the very edge of the short-lived suns expansion. What little remained of number seven, was dust in the vacuum of space.

Ship Number eight, was a different story. Being barely singed by the expanding energy burst, the well-shielded ship succumbed only to the massive electro-magnetic-pulse wave. The ship was just too close to the source to avoid it. The EMP wave fried the circuitry that was supposed to protect the ship, thus disabling the ship's electronic equipment and controls, permanently.

However, the ship was just too close to the event. Free neutrons and gamma radiation invaded the ship next. The three-man crew of the ship didn't feel a thing as their bones went from 98.6 degrees to 15,000 degrees, far too quickly for the Permethian body to perceive. Combustion followed, and the process was complete in only a few microseconds.