Chapter 1

The battle was lost. Standard military strategy dictated this would be a good time to fall back and regroup before trying again, but these were no ordinary circumstances. There was nowhere to go, no one to trust but each other. Saug, a warlord from the Mintaka system had been able to weaken, undermine and eventually invade the peaceful Alnilam system, thus displacing the legitimate ruling family. Their only hope now was to flee (abdicate) and reach out to whatever allies they had in hopes of leading a resistance until there was a way retake their world. The king, queen and the rest of their family were killed in the surprise attack, but the heir to the throne had been able to escape along with his wife and closest advisors.

The star cruiser Eclipse dropped out of Star Drive near a Class M solar system while retreating from the fall of their home world. Ja’mir, the now dethroned prince called back to the head engineer and his most trusted friend, Lon. “Hey, what’s the problem? Why have we dropped out of Star Drive?”

“There was a coolant leak and the manifold pressure was beginning to red-line. Sensors showed a possible class M planet in this system so I dropped us out nearby so we could investigate while trying to make repairs. Looks like we might’ve taken a little more damage escaping than I thought.”

“I hope you’re right about that planet. What are our chances of getting it patched up?”

“The chances of restarting it are slim to none since there are no known spaceports outside of our own. You never know, there might be something on the planet to help us out.”

“We were coming out of Star Drive one way or another. I preferred to do it in one piece. Besides, when was the last time I was wrong about a planet?” Lon said with a big grin on his face.

“When was the last time you were right?” Ja’mir muttered under his breath.

“We’ll take cover in a nearby asteroid belt so we are not helpless out in the open,” said Lon.

Ja’mir’s father had been the king of the Alnilam system, which is located in the belt of the Orion constellation as viewed from Earth. It had once been a part of an alliance with Mintaka, until a man named Saug overthrew the government, and set himself up as Despot of the entire planet. From the very beginning, his plan was to annex Alnilam into his budding empire so he kept the alliance intact to use as a pretense to execute the second part of his plan. The alliance gave him access to Alnilam and thus a way to infiltrate strategic Alnilam organizations. He would eventually use trumped-up charges against Ja’mir’s father so he could take justice into his own hands.

Prince Ja’mir was heir to the throne and currently the only known survivor in the royal bloodline. For Saug to cement his rule, he’d have to deal with Ja’mir and any offspring that might happen to still be alive. In his previous conquests, he had determined the most effective methodology was to kill the royal family and everyone in the bloodline to forever remove any possible future claims to the throne based on heredity. Ja’mir received information about the coup from an inside source which allowed him and his close friends time to escape. They were lucky in that they only had to fight their way past a smaller expeditionary force before escaping. Had they waited any longer, they would have surely been destroyed by the main fleet.

Ja’mir jumped as he felt the soft touch of a hand on the base of his neck. “Honey,” his wife Zamora said. Zamora was his soul mate. She had long jet-black hair, and in spite of being petite in statute, she had an athletic build with a slender waist. Her eyes, like those of all her people, were a little larger than humans and a deep coal-black color. Her skin had the slightest tint of green. Not only was she alluring, but her intelligence surpassed her beauty. She had been one of the top geneticists in her field when they met and the chemistry was immediate. After spending some time on the Nanite project, she became disenchanted with the politics of science so she decided to devote herself to being a good wife, continuing her research as a hobby.

“Gael is in the scout ship awaiting your orders,” she said with her warm breath passing over Ja’mir’s ears.

“Oh farkle, how am I supposed to concentrate around here when she’s doing that to me,” he thought to himself.

“Proceed with caution. We don’t have another ship to save your butt so you’d better not wreck this one. Standard planetary approach. Make a few passes, release a drone or two if things look interesting, and then get back,” said Ja’mir.

“Aye, sir,” replied Gael. “Tell Jovana that it will be lonely without her.”

“Well then, I may just have to go keep her company myself,” Ja’mir teased.

“I’m sure she’d like that,” Gael said as he exhaled sharply, shaking his head.

Several hours later, Ja’mir, Lon and Gael were going over the information from both the fly-bys and the drones.

“Our drones got their attention. Several areas launched crude flying crafts that tried to approach them, but they never got close. My gut feeling is the lower profile we keep, the better. Anyways, from monitoring their communications, it would appear the local calendar here is March 3rd, 1947. The world was at war not too long ago and two superpowers have apparently emerged from the conflict. Neither side likes or trusts the other. Both sides use crude tube-shaped objects as transportation and weapons, much like the ones that chased our drones. Nuclear technology seems to be in its infancy. I hope they learn to push through that, because it’s some nasty stuff. There was a lot of radioactivity coming from the desert southwest of a particular continent so make a note to stay away from there since it affects our instrumentation. They apparently do a lot of testing that involves the splitting of atoms. Based on the technology, it’s most likely for weapons testing.”

“Gael, thanks for the information,” replied Ja’mir. “Oh, and hey ... Jovana was emitting some serious radioactivity, too!” he said with a wink.

Gael just grinned and shook his head... “Prince SOB had better watch it!” he said with a smile while punching his friend in the arm. They were good friends and were always teasing each other.

Ja’mir returned to his quarters where Zamora was waiting for him.

“Have you had a chance to study the briefing on the humanoid life forms there? Gael went through a lot of effort to get the information. The lack of technology made it difficult to gather. Do you think your idea will work?” he said to her.

“I won’t know until I can get my hands on some of their DNA,” she replied.

“You know how risky it is for us to initiate contact in our current state? Normally, I wouldn’t consider it, but times are desperate. OK, what do you need?”

On his way back to the planet, this time with a few extra crew members to help him out; Gael was muttering aloud to himself.

“Why me? Always me? It’s a thankless job. Abducting humanoids is not as glamorous as one would think!”

Not realizing he had left his transmitter open, he was surprised when Ja’mir replied.

“Hey ... do you always talk like that when flying your saucer around? You better pay attention to what you’re doing or you’ll get pulled over!”

Despite his complaining, Gael was eagerly awaiting spooking the locals. These “grab-n-go” missions were almost always fun and he would sometimes leave funny symbols in their fields as a calling card.

In the meeting room, Lon addressed the team: “Our Star Drive is down until we can replace some parts. The problem is, there is nowhere to get them and no one to call for help. We are basically stuck here for a while. We think we can scrounge the needed raw materials from this planet so we will keep running missions here until we have what we need. It’s not optimal, but at least it’s a chance. Worst case is we have to live there for a while and ‘assist’ technological advances in just the right areas to allow us to build the needed parts.”