Chapter 75: What’s that Old Proverb?

JB POV:

Prior to taking off on our mission, Max and I recognized that four of our crew needed some extra ‘education’. We included Peter in that group, even though he had been very thoroughly educated by Ibera, as far as all the science behind space travel was concerned.

Neither Amy, Sheila nor Maggie have any experience as far as piloting a spaceship is concerned, or even, for the most part, anything about astral navigation or many of the physics behind either our spaceship or space travel. So, we took an extra day to try and get the four of them up to speed, at least somewhat.

We decided to use our teaching hats to educate Amy and Maggie on as much of the physics element of space travel as possible. And, to a somewhat lesser degree, the actual functional elements of piloting and using our spaceship. Since Sheila had a true photographic memory, and could read over 10,000 words a minute, we set her up with the ship’s computer to let her get educated on the mechanics of how our spaceship was put together and operated. At the same time, we set Peter up with nearly the same program, telling him to concentrate mostly on the sections that dealt with piloting our spaceship.

Since Peter was not a speed reader, I set him up with the area concerning the actual usage of our spaceship. By that meaning the flight controls, weapons controls and communication controls. Also, by having him and Sheila sitting side-by-side, Sheila could ask him any questions that might come up concerning the physics of spaceflight. That way he could just tell her instead of having to have her look through the terabytes of information she would have to sift through.

Meanwhile, Max, Lonnie and I began taking care of loading everything like personal items we would want for our trip. And, it was during that process that Max realized we needed to do an inventory of what, if anything, we had as far as spare parts were concerned for our spaceship.

And that caused us some great consternations!

The one thing none of us had ever considered was just how few spare parts we had for our spaceship. Thankfully, Tumrik had set us up with a materials fabricator, similar to the one on his ship. But, that would only be good for manufacturing pieces of things, not entire mechanical or electrical objects.

Another thing we were lacking were simple tools! While the engineering section had many of the special tools needed for things like replacing power crystals, and whatnot, simple things like screwdrivers, pliers, hammers, etc. were entirely absent. Thankfully, with the family’s credit card and a trip to Sears, $20,000 later we had virtually every tool they made, along with two very large rolling tool chests.

We then made a quick trip to RadioShack. We spent another several thousand dollars buying things like blank circuit boards, transistors, resistors and everything their best salesman could think of. We told him we were planning on building our own electronics devices like radios and possibly a robot, and that’s what the salesman based our electrical supplies and toolkit on.

Lonnie was teasing Max and I, insinuating we were becoming paranoid.

Max scoffed at him, “Hey, there’s an old saying that goes ‘anything they can go wrong, will go wrong, and at the worst possible time!’ I’m pretty sure they call that Murphy’s Law! And all JB and I are trying to do is to hopefully take ‘THAT’ Murphy as far out of the game as possible!”

Lonnie just laughed and shook his head. “Relax guys, I’m not saying it’s not good to be prepared. It’s just that I couldn’t help but get the feeling you guys are more nervous about this mission than you originally let on?”

Max huffed, “I’ve always believed in the Boy Scout motto of ‘always be prepared’. Especially since, we know we’re going into battle, not to mention going to be gone searching for that Gromorik spaceship for God only knows how long.”

By the time we were ready to go to bed, for one last night before we took off, our four ‘newbies’ felt they were as prepared as they could be. We all decided to spend the night with our lovers. Amy and Peter chose to spend the night with Monte and Maggie.

In the morning the whole family attended breakfast, then wished us safe travels on our mission.

We decided to let Peter sit next to me as I carefully maneuvered us off the ground and into space. I was impressed that Sheila, manning the navigational console, kept us informed of all the air traffic that was in our area. Lonnie, who was manning the communications console, was showing Maggie how to program in all the different frequencies we needed to monitor when we intercepted the two rogue Bargantuan motherships.

The five hours it took us to travel to our intercept point seemed to fly by. We finalized our plan which was to only use our telepathy in ‘private mode’. And, to only ‘listen in’ telepathically to what might be said amongst our adversaries.

When we broke out of hyper-warp, we immediately turned on our scanners to see where our targets might be.

Amy and Max were manning that part of our control console. Upon not receiving any feedback, Amy activated the nuclear residue sniffing program. That also came up empty. Good thing was, that indicated our two rogue spaceships had most likely slowed down and were still in front of us. I activated the impulse engines and began going forward at one half impulse power.

After a few hours, Max finally told us they got a reading approximately two light hours ahead of us. Remaining fully cloaked, I slowed to 1/10 impulse power. I felt at this point we were better off letting them come to us.

Approximately an hour and a half later, Max said, according to their scanners, it only appeared that one spaceship was present. It was definitely big enough to be Bargantuan, so we waited until we could visually see that there were actually two of them, flying closely above or below each other.

I decided to maneuver out of their way to get behind them before doing anything to get their attention. While there was probably 500 meters between them, I found it very curious that they were flying this close together.

Especially, since we still hadn’t heard any telepathic communications going on! While 500 meters sounds like a lot, considering these ships were each more than a mile and a half long, stem to stern, it seemed quite dangerous to be flying this way with little to no communication going on!

Then, Lonnie announced that they were picking up traffic on a little used subspace frequency that he had decided to scan. Sure enough, much to our continued confusion, it was between their pilots. They were closely monitoring the distance between each other.

I realized, looking at our speed, that they were only traveling at about half the speed of light. Much slower than they should be, considering the distance they still had to go to reach Earth. At this speed, it would take them nearly 10 years to even reach our solar system.

Lonnie locked in the frequency they were on, then began scanning all other frequencies in this range, just for grins. He found a couple others and it sounded like different fighter pilots making plans of some sort, yet, there were no signs of any of them being anywhere in the vicinity. A few minutes later, he confirmed that these communications were going on inside the Bargantuan’s motherships!

We were all extremely curious!

Knowing that all Bargantuans were telepathic, why were none of them communicating telepathically? Plus, the more we were listening in to what we felt were their fighter pilots, we picked up the fact they kept referring to some kind of targeting device.

Peter asked if, perhaps, all this meant they might have the technology to target telepathic communication?

Max and I looked at each other with raised eyebrows before I said, “That’s a good question, Pete. That would certainly help explain why we haven’t picked up any telepathic communications yet.”

I decided that caution might be the better part of valor and verbally reminded everyone to refrain from using our telepathy at all, even in private mode, until I advised them otherwise.

We followed them for over an hour before the only communication we kept hearing was between the two mothership’s pilots. I’d been monitoring the distance between the two spaceships closely, noting that they were maintaining a steady distance between them.

So, I decided to take a chance.

I carefully maneuvered us between them until I reached a point just short of the noses of their spaceships. Then, holding my breath, I keyed the mic and hailed, “Bargantuan mothership number three, this is Captain JB of the Starship Redemption. It seems you have decided to ignore my previous warning about not continuing toward Earth. If you know what’s good for you, please respond!?”

“This is Colonel Ketch, Commander of our ship Number Three, my fellow commander, Colonel Flynn and I were ordered by our general to break off in search for a planet with a food source so we might resupply. However, we became lost and have been trying to make contact with them. We have been unsuccessful, and were not aware that we were heading toward Earth at this present time.” He said, in an almost smug tone of voice.

I knew this bastard had just lied to me, and I was getting pissed, “I know that’s a blatant lie, Colonel Ketch! We have been monitoring your armada’s progress and when we noticed two of their ships were missing, your general, Clyde, informed us your two ships had slipped away from their armada and fled. I’m quite sure if he had sent you out somewhere, he would have told us! Now, do you want to lie to me again, or tell me just what the hell is going on!?”

After hearing what sounded like the end of a chuckle, he came back, “Okay then, but answer me first, why have you chosen to not contact us using just your minds as well as over our communicator?”

I let the bastard hear me chuckle back, “That’s simple, we have been monitoring both of your ships for the past hour and have not heard any telepathic communications so far. So, we felt that for some unknown reason, perhaps the occupants of your two spacecraft’s don’t have that particular ability?”

This bastard wasn’t the only one proficient in the art of bullshit!

“Perhaps you’re right, Captain JB?” He said then laughed, “Now, why don’t you show yourselves instead of staying hidden?”

“Because, I’m no fool, Captain Ketch. We both know the second I uncloak you will have countless fighters attack us! You obviously didn’t learn the lesson we tried to teach General Clyde. Perhaps, since it is apparent you don’t fear what my tiny spaceship can do to yours, maybe I should just show you!?”

That’s when Lonnie alerted me that he had just intercepted a radio transmission stating that somebody was certain we were between them. Then, Max nearly screamed, “HOLY SHIT JB, these fuckers are trying to squish us between them! Get the hell out of here!”

Knowing that I might not have time to hit the brakes to get back behind them, I shoved the throttles to full impulse power to shoot ahead of them, then quickly turned in an attempt to get back behind them.

That’s when I noticed that both of the motherships had launched countless numbers of fighters. I decided that it was time, and told Peter to target the ship directly in front of us and fire three bursts from our Gauss cannon directly into the center of their engine array.

I knew this was approximately where we had done the most damage the last time, and was hoping for the same result.

We watched many explosions before I rose up so we could target the other spaceship’s engines. Just before I could give the order to fire, somebody, either Sheila or Amy began cheering, telepathically, that we’d hit our target!

The next thing I knew, it seemed like every fighter pilot was now maneuvering around behind us.

Quickly scanning the distance currently between the two motherships, I decided take a chance and zoomed between them again. I felt this would hopefully dissuade our attackers from firing on us. I was also verbally admonishing against anyone using any more telepathic communication until I said otherwise!

Unfortunately, it appeared the damage had already been done when Lonnie screamed that there were literally hundreds of missiles inbound. I crammed the throttle forward until I just cleared the front of the two spaceships, then moved up and slammed on the brakes, using maximum reverse thrusters.

I immediately maneuvered to just over what I felt was their control room or bridge, then began talking telepathically to everyone on the ship, urging them to do the same.

Suddenly, our downward monitors displayed the mothership we were hiding above was rocking violently beneath us. I decided to cram the throttle forward to get as far as I could ahead of these guys.

Unfortunately, I didn’t think to remind everyone to stop using telepathic communications! As we watched in our rearview monitors, both motherships were colliding with each other in an out of control fashion! Then, we also saw what looked like hundreds of missiles being fired from both of the two motherships!

I began a series of tight turns, hoping to evade these missiles. Unfortunately, it became instantly apparent they had somehow or another locked on to us and were now relentlessly following us.

I activated the hyper-warp drive just as our starship began rocking violently. Max said that our shields were holding, but were degrading rapidly. We were still rocking violently when we shot into hyper-warp.

As we were warping away from our adversaries, I told Peter to have the computer do a damage assessment.

It began running down all of its standard checks, saying ‘operational’ after all of them, with the exception of the hyper-drive control circuits. When it said that those circuits were still ‘marginally operational’ I looked around at my crew and saw that, like me, they had very confused looks on their faces.

Peter wasted no time in instructing the computer to define ‘marginally operational’.

It informed us that while the engines themselves were still operational, and we were now at warp factor eight, several of the navigational and controlling circuits had been short-circuited by radiation and the violent explosions we’d been subjected to. We were all holding our breath when I asked it if our inventory showed replacement parts on board?

The computer took long enough, that I was afraid all of us were going to pass out from holding our breaths.

Finally, it told us that while we did have almost all of the parts, much reprogramming would have to be done once the parts were replaced. That’s when Peter told the computer to assess the myriad of electronic parts we had purchased from RadioShack and advise whether or not we had the necessary components to repair the one bad circuit we didn’t have.

Again, it seemed to take forever before the computer noted that it was possible, using some of the parts we’d \purchased, along with what was still in inventory to successfully repair that circuit.

For the first time since the beginning of the attack, we breathed a sigh of relief.

Since I had not programmed a destination into the computer, I decided it would be wise to pull the ship out of hyper-warp before we went too terribly far. We all heard Max query the computer to display our current position, relative to heading back to earth.

I know I wasn’t the only one to groan, when it said that due to the damaged circuit, it was unable to assess our current position. Then, we all heard Maggie gasp, “I ... um, can’t get a hold of Monte, telepathically!?”

Suddenly, we all began trying to communicate with somebody back home. After a minute, we were all looking wide-eyed at each other, realizing none of us could contact anyone, outside of our ship!

I know I wasn’t the only one who was beginning to panic, knowing that irregardless of the damage to the ship, there was no good reason we couldn’t still communicate with those we were ‘chemically’ linked to.

Especially, since we weren’t nearly as far away as Tiny and Steve were when they were able to communicate with us back on Earth.

Peter had Sheila and Amy looking over his shoulder as the three of them began studying some of the information the computer was displaying about exactly what had gone wrong with the controlling circuits.

They were kibitzing furiously with each other about what certain things each of them were now pointing at, might mean.

Then, Peter and Sheila looked at us dejectedly, then Peter said, “Guys, I don’t know how to tell you this, but it’s quite possible that we’re not just lost in space ... But, much worse, we may not even be in the same time period we were in when the hyper-drive engaged!”

Monte POV:

I’d been sitting here at Ibera’s with Glenn, Darren and Ed listening in to our space crew just as they approached the two rogue Bargantuan motherships. I was connected to Maggie while Glenn was connected to Amy. Darren and Ed were connected to many of the other members of the crew through Ibera. We all felt JB’s concern that these two ships were acting very strangely. And, the fact that they were flying extremely close to each other.

Ed suggested, after listening to everything, that there had to be an ulterior motive as to why these two ships were flying so closely together without using any telepathic communications.

The fact that our friends were also not using telepathy between themselves was somewhat curious also. We watched closely as JB maneuvered their ship directly in between the two motherships before summoning them on the radio. When we heard some unknown fighter pilots talking on a different radio frequency amongst themselves, I suggested that we all disconnect from the ones were connected with, just in case our telepathic communication might unknowingly hurt their plans.

Ibera told us it probably wouldn’t, since we’d been connected for the last few hours or so. But, nevertheless told us it couldn’t hurt. We’d all gotten the idea that it was possible these Bargantuans might be somehow able to target telepathic communication. After all, all Bargantuans had been using telepathy for God only knows how many centuries. And because of that, it wasn’t out of the question they had someone who had somehow figured a way to target those communications.

When we suddenly saw what looked to be nearly 100 fighters exit the 2 motherships we were glad to see that our crew picked up on it right away.

It was very tempting for us to try and warn them, telepathically!

Then, when it appeared the two motherships were attempting to crush JB’s ship between them, we weren’t surprised that JB immediately got into position and fired what I was pretty sure was there Gauss Cannon directly into the rear of the mothership he was following.

Then, since we were watching this live, we heard both Amy and Sheila cheer, telepathically, telling JB he scored a direct hit! Unfortunately, the second they did that, all those fighters shot nuclear tipped missiles at them! I was impressed at JB’s quick thinking as he once again flew between the ships then flew above the mothership he hadn’t targeted yet. Then, he slowed down to put himself directly above the front of that ship.

We watched all of those missiles begin detonating as they hit the bottom of the mother ship in an attempt to reach their ‘psychically targeted’ prey up above. Not knowing just how much damage JB had done to the lower mothership, there was no doubt the higher one sustained catastrophic damages! However, just before the top ship began coming apart, both ships launched what looked to be hundreds of missiles directly at the fleeing Starship Redemption!

And these weren’t the smaller missiles that were carried by the fighters.

While we couldn’t see our ship, judging by the way the missiles were all swerving around it was apparent they were locked on to our starship! Then, the last thing we heard was JB slamming it into hyper-warp to get the hell out of there!

Then, for the next 5 to 10 minutes we desperately tried to reconnect with our friends.

Even in hyper-warp, because of the way we were all connected, we should’ve been able to hear them. But no, as the minutes turned into hours, none of us, including Ibera, were able to connect with anyone on our ship!

Ed and Darren began to wonder if those missiles, which we all saw detonate, may have just killed all of our friends! I told them, with Ibera agreeing with me, that even if they had destroyed the ship, as soon as their ship began coming apart we would have seen the debris! We continued watching as the lower ship, which had only been targeted in their engine area, quickly moved away from the mothership that was now quickly disintegrating.

Ibera told us that this ship was now moving very slowly, at perhaps 1/10 impulse power. We watched as many of the fighters began landing in the lower (now only) ship’s docking bay.

It was apparent there wasn’t room for all of them as we watched many of them being seemingly pushed overboard so the others could land and the pilots de-board. Unlike the first time that JB had targeted the engine area, it became apparent that this time his shots had not managed to destroy their main nuclear reactor.

We watched them for over two hours while, at the same time, desperately trying to reconnect with our friends.

Since we knew the secret transponder code of the Starship Redemption, Ibera continued scanning for their signal. The mood here was very somber as we were now all wondering if we would ever see our friends again.

After six full hours, while not giving up all hope, we decided to go home to give everyone the bad news that something had happened, and whatever it was, was not good.

To me, not being able to connect with Maggie left me feeling sadder and lonelier than I ever had in my life. It was like the biggest, most beautiful part of my life had just disappeared.

When we got home and began telling everyone what happened it’s like the whole family was stunned at the possibility they could all be dead! Thankfully, Charlene and Jamie had been watching the kids so they didn’t know about any of this. We all felt that until we could be 100 percent certain as to what really happened it was better for them.

To me, the only shred of hope I was clinging to was the fact that we hadn’t seen any debris from our spaceship.

And, just as we were leaving, I saw a very strange look Ibera’s face.

Several weeks later...

Brad Lowenstein POV:

With the disappearance of JB’s spaceship, life up here at Ibera’s has been anything but cheerful. Darren and Monte have been here numerous times, mostly just seeing if Ibera had seen or heard anything encouraging. She told them, sadly, she had not and would certainly send word the second she knew anything for certain.

Brenda and I found it curious that it seemed like she wasn’t nearly as upset acting after they had left. I don’t know the reason for that, only that we rarely saw her when we were working, following the people on Perdition Island.

Speaking of which, many interesting things have certainly been happening there.

First off, after spending several months in Frank’s ‘Pleasure House Bar’ it was quite apparent that the Normistronzo’s were rapidly wearing out their welcome. Precious and Cecelia were getting fed up with the rest of their family just sitting around getting drunk and mooching the majority of their hard-earned money.

Both of the girls’ attitudes began to suffer and the number of ‘Johns’ that were propositioning them was falling off rapidly, too.

When Frank suggested that Markus and Sonny try to find something constructive to do they just scoffed at him. Elmer was drunk almost all the time as were Lola and Marcella. And, of course, Elmer would only drink the very best stuff that Trevor head, which was George’s Makers Mark bourbon. And, of course, Elmer always complained that it didn’t taste anywhere near as good as scotch.

He had been spoiled with the Macallan 25 that he was used to having for the short time he was masquerading as King Flombay.

When it got to the point that Elmer’s drinking was costing Frank far more than he was getting from Precious and Cecelia, he basically cut him and his sisters off.

Somehow he rounded up 10 of the biggest bouncers he could hire then threw the entire clan out on their asses! He must’ve also spread the word as every other pleasure house they tried to enter told them they weren’t welcome.

They immediately considered trying to hitch a ride on a Merchant Marine boat. However, when they were told they’d have to work as unpaid crew to earn their passage, they declined. Markus, Sonny and Elmer weren’t crazy about working as rowers and Lola and Marcella absolutely refused to be ‘maids’ and do cleanup and fixing meals.

So, being nearly broke and desperate, they got the bright idea to try to ‘hijack’ an ox-drawn wagon and head west across the mainland!

After asking several natives how to get to Port Loma, they were told to take one particular dirt road. So, they slowly headed west on foot, hoping to get a wagon in an area that wasn’t so crowded with natives. Markus was sure it wouldn’t take long before they’d be able to hijack a wagon with their survival knives and ‘swords’ they’d hung onto when leaving their island.

However, after walking for three days, with endless bitching from all the women, they decided to rest by the edge of a stream that was not far from, and was following parallel to the road.

With only having food and water for three days, they were all getting very hungry. Sonny tried fishing with the hook and short line he found in the handle of his survival knife. Then, using his survival knife, he managed to dig up a couple worms for bait. After carefully threading the worm onto his look he tossed the hook into the stream. When he immediately caught a small fish he felt inspired.

While Markus congratulated him, Lola huffed, “You’re gonna have to catch a dozen of those just so that each of us can get a mouthful!”

Sonny just told her to shut the fuck up as he put more of the worm on the hook and recast into the water.

You know what they say about beginner’s luck? Well, that was the only explanation for Sonny’s quick catch. The next two hours only saw him catching one more six-inch fish. Now, even Marcella was getting the idea that it was going to be slim pickings for dinner.

Just before he gave up, Sonny managed to catch one more five-inch fish. While he set about cleaning them, Markus used the flint from his survival knife to try and start a fire. After struggling mightily for over half an hour, Sonny, having cleaned and filleted his three fish, decided to give it a try.

After watching both of them fiddle around, not really knowing anything about starting a fire with a flint, Brenda giggled, “It’s obvious these two morons were never in the Boy Scouts! If Sonny isn’t careful, he’s going to break that little piece of flint!”

And sure enough, a few seconds later he struck the flint so hard it broke.

Of course, by now, Lola and Marcella were really letting him hear it. Then, Markus yelled for everyone to shut up. With everyone looking at him, he pointed up the road and put his hand by his ear.

As we zoomed out, we saw a wagon coming from the west, just getting ready to come around a sharp bend in the gravel road.

Both Sonny and Marcus grabbed their machetes and ran to intercept whatever was coming down the road. Their eyes lit up when it was an ox drawn cart loaded to the gills with goods. And, it only appeared that a rather small man and a young girl were driving the thing.

Unfortunately, they didn’t see the 12 guys on foot following about 50 yards behind the wagon. When they rounded the corner and saw that Sonny and Markus were about to stab both of the occupants with their machetes, they all nocked arrows in their bows and let them fly. Within seconds both Markus and Sonny fell to the ground with what appeared to be fatal wounds.

By now, the rest of the family had come running to see what the boys had managed to commandeer! Elmer was the first to verbally assault his nephews’ attackers. And he got three arrows into his chest which successfully shut him up, permanently!

At this point, Brenda and I were hoping the four girls would just put their hands up in surrender. However, Lola was fit to be tied and unleashed her own verbal assault laced with many curse words and insults.

We watched the 12 men as they looked at her and began laughing. When the guy in the wagon told her she better shut her mouth while she still had one, Marcella took that opportunity to join her sister!

When the guy leading his 12 armed friends threatened to cut their heads off if they didn’t shut up, Lola decided she wasn’t through speaking her mind yet. The second she lit into another tirade, both her and Marcella found themselves getting bitch-slapped.