Chapter 25:The Moon

Jenny groaned as she came to. Her jaw hurt, and her body hurt even worse. She could still feel the effects of the device he had used on her. Opening her eyes, she saw she was in a metal room lying on a bed. Groaning, she stood up. She examined the bands on her wrists and tried to remove them. Each time she dug her nails under the band she got shocked.

"Damn it, that hurts."

"Then I would advise you not to do it, human."

Jen jumped when she heard the voice. Turning around, she saw a creature standing on the other side of a glass wall, or what she assumed was glass. It stood roughly six feet tall, and had four arms. Its crystal-like skin looked as if it was solid stone. Its skull-like head watched her through his three eyes, as she studied it.

"Ok. You are not T'Lari, or Tralcan, so what the fuck are you?"

Startled, he blinked all three eyes at the human girl whom he estimated was around eighteen years old.

"How do you know of the T'Lari, human? You are not pretty enough to be a Tralcan, you don't have the right skin tone or hair color, and our scanners would have detected their blood in you. Also, how did you find our procurement officer?"

"I know they love to eat anything they can get their hands on. As to whom I am, you will find out soon enough."

She grinned evilly, as she felt the tickle in her communications chip.

"They cannot hear you human. Your communications device has been blocked."

"Wanna bet?" Jenny closed her eyes.

'Hi, Amy, I am in some type of a lab, I am looking at a crystal like creature with three eyes, and four arms. It has a skull like head and... '

"Captain I have a transmission from Jenny I am relaying it now. "Hi Amy, I am in some type of a lab, I am looking at a crystal like creature with three eyes and four arms. It has a skull like head and..."

Amy's head popped up and she shouted through the com unit, 'Jen, that's a Crytherian warrior be caref... '

Jen grinned at the creature as she opened her eyes.

"So, you are a Crytherian."

Jen watched the creature stagger back at her words. It reached to the wall and pressed something she could not see. Pain shot through her body and she started screaming.

Amy looked at Ken and said, "That's a Crytherian base down there. They are a race of slavers. They kidnap other races and sell them as slaves to their people or to other races as slaves or guinea pigs for lab experiments. We must rescue her and any other humans and put a stop to this. I am scanning their base now. I detect life signs of two hundred and ten men, woman and children in cryogenic sleep and ten who are awake. I have relayed all I have to Jenny."

Ken sat in his chair now that Tammy had vacated it.

"Amy, please raise their base and translate for me."

"I am contacting the base now."

Amy activated the communications board and started contacting the base,

"Crytherian base this is the Terran Federation Battleship Washington, which is hovering above your base, put your commander on for my commander. You have twenty seconds in which to reply."

The Crytherian who was on duty in the communications room looked up in surprise at the speaker as the voice came through in flawless Royal Crytherian. Getting up he walked over to the door, and went in to a command room where everyone was packing up the equipment. Looking around, he saw Commander Vkranske talking to his flight officer. Walking over, he came to attention.

"Sir, you are requested in the communications room. We have a communiqué in Royal Crytherian from the alien ship."

"What alien ship?"

"Sir, the one that said it is over our base."

Vkranske looked at the inferior in surprise.

"Very well, I will be right there."

"Sir, I was told you have twenty scions to be there, or else."

"Who do they think they are?" Commander Vkranske stormed into the communications room and grabbed the com unit. "Who do you think you are that you can order me around like some animal."

Aboard the ship, Ken sat in his chair waiting for an answer when a voice came over the speakers.

Ken listened to the voice being translated and replied, "I am the one who has the firepower to blow your entire base away, within a blink of an eye. Now, you will release all the humans and prepare to surrender to me. You have thirty seconds to comply with my demands. To prove how serious I am, watch your monitors."

Ken turned on the ship's intercom.

"Mech Force One! You have a go."

Down in the Mech bay the two transport shuttles dropped out of the bay and flew over the base. They flew about a mile from the base, at a height of thirty feet. They hovered, and six Cheetah scout Mechs dropped to the ground, and quickly started lining up on the base and began to advance.

Commander Vkranske watched the six strange vehicles move towards his base.

"All defense batteries engage those monstrosities."

Around the base, laser cannons popped up out of the ground and opened fire on the six Cheetahs that were moving around the field of stone, at close to one-hundred miles per hour. On the screen, one of the machines was caught in a cross fire of seven lasers. The shields start glowing under the combined attack, then the Cheetah dodged and ran into a small cavern.

Ted turned his lance of Mechs towards the enemy base and started closing with it. His scanners searched for the Crytherian defensive weapons, and found them. The cannons popped up out of the ground and opened fire.

"This is Command One, take out those cannons," Ted said.

The rest of the Mechs acknowledged and rushed towards the laser cannons, firing their lasers back and letting loose a massive barrage of missiles. Three of the defensive lasers blew up when the missiles come down on top of them. Ted saw one of his Mechs caught in a crossfire.

"Matt! Jink and duck into that cave, or they will overheat you." He saw an explosion on Matt's leg, and one of Matt's laser cannon exploded under a direct hit.

"Aye, aye sir, I am moving now, minor damage to my leg and loss of my right laser quad, but I am still combat efficient."

Matt dodged his Mech into the small cavern and runs out the other end onto a small cliff. Sighting another defensive laser with two cannons on it as it swivels towards him, he let loose with all his remaining weapons and the weapon emplacement blows up.

"That's another down! How about some music guys and gals?"

Matt pressed the switch for the internal speakers on all the Mechs and played Richard Wagner's, Ride of the Valkyries. The ghostly music played in the mechs as the charged in and fired their lasers in pairs, destroying three more of the dual mounted laser cannons.

Ted laughed as the music played.

"From now on this scout force will be called Valkyries! This is Valkyrie One to all Valkyries, fall back to the ridge and give them time to think about what is going to happen to their base if they continue."

Ted flipped another channel on and contacted the ship, while the music died in the cockpit.

"Captain, we have destroyed about half of their defenses. I have located a hanger bay protected by a force screen. I don't know what they have in there, but I have my missiles targeted on it. If the force screen drops I will put all my missiles into the bay, nothing is getting out if I can help it."

"Very well, Commander White. Be prepared to engage if you must, but I don't want unnecessarily deaths. I will get back to you; the base commander is contacting me."

Commander Vkranske was fuming as the strange vehicles ripped through his defenses.

"What right do you have to interfere with our culling of this planet? We own the charter to this system, you have no right to interfere, and we take very few of them for the trade, now."

Ken was livid when he heard the words of the creature.

"Amy let these bastards see who they are dealing with."

The main viewer came on and they were looking at Commander Vkranske.

"You are on screen, Captain," replied Amy as she activated full communications.

Ken stood up showing that he was human and the anger was in his face.

"I am Captain Kenneth Thompson of the USS WASHINGTON, and the planet you say you have been 'culling', is my HOME WORLD. Now, you either surrender or my Marines are coming in there with orders to kill every last one of you slime buckets. Your race has been kidnapping, murdering and who knows what else to the human race for far too long! It stops, now!"

Commander Vkranske staggered back as he looked into the face of a human in command of the alien ship.

"How ... what..." he sputtered. "You humans don't have the technology to build something like that."

"We do now, Commander Vkranske! Now, are you going to surrender?"

"I..."

Ken turned his head and looked over at the weapons officer. "Lieutenant, target that tall mountain to the north of the base and fire all main batteries that bear on it at minimum power settings."

Commander Vkranske looked in horror as the huge mountain was literally cut to rubble as two hundred and fifty laser batteries blew the mountain clean off of the moons surface. Looking back at the human he faced, he saw the determination in the human's eyes, and knew he was looking at his own death.

"Now, Commander Vkranske, does that look like we don't have the power or the technology? Also, do not even think about trying to escape with a shuttle or a larger ship. If you blow up the base, we will go to your home world and blow it to bits. You just saw what we did to that mountain, and that was at minimum power."

Commander Vkranske nodded his head at the human's words. "We have no choice but to surrender."

Ken reached over and turned a microphone on.

"All Marine shuttles! You are a go."

The secondary screen showed six shuttles dropping out of the bay and heading for the surface. The Mechs move in closer to the base and started to cover the landing zone incase the Crytherians attacked.

Deep in the base, the Crytherian named Joshua Howard walked into the processing center and saw the human woman lying on the floor. Dropping his laser carbine on the floor outside the room, he opened the door and walked in.

"Human, you are going to tell me what I want to know, or I am going to hurt you."

He looked at the naked woman and then noticed the blood on her wrists and moved closer.

"Damn it, she's sliced her wrists with her nails."

Grabbing a medical kit, he moved towards the woman.

Jenny played as if she was unconscious, and waited for the creature to get closer. She heard his words and smiled inwardly, as he fell for the cuts on her wrists. As he knelt beside her, she made her move. Snapping her leg up, she hit him in the head, staggering him back. Jumping to her feet, she executed a kick that hit the creature's right hand sending the device he was holding flying across the room, where it was smashed to pieces against the wall.

Joshua saw the pain stimulator hit the wall and shatter.

"You will pay for that, bitch. When I am done with you, you will beg for death."

His lower arms ripped out of his fake skin and he reached for her with all four hands.

Jenny jumped back as the new arms came out of his body and swung at her. Executing a flying kick, she hit him in the chest, knocking him against the wall.

"Think you will kidnap me and kill me like you did the others? I don't think so you fucking son of a bitch." Jen moved in, did a leg sweep, which dropped him on his ass. Getting back up as the creature started to stand, she did a snap kick to his jaw and felt something moved under the contact of the blow.

Joshua could not believe this puny human was hurting him like this! He was a Crytherian warrior. Through his broken jaw, he said.

"You will die now bitch."

Turning his upper hands to crystal spears, he started jabbing them at the woman's face while his lower hands were used to block her kicks.

Jenny looked in shock as his hands changed, and realized that if she did not finish this battle fast, she was a dead woman. Dodging the thrust at her eyes, the second hand cut her left shoulder to the bone. Jen staggered back and looked at Joshua.

"Son of a bitch! That hurt, you bastard. I was playing with you before, but now you will die." Jen moved in after his next attack, snapped her bare foot against his right kneecap and shattered it. Her second kick hit him in the groin and smashed his testicles.

Joshua roared in pain as his knee shattered and then grinned as the human wasted her second attack on his fake testicles.

"You are one dead bitch, so lie down and let me make it easier on you." Joshua started the healing of his knee as he waited for her response. Watching her, he noticed her blood was not flowing out of the wound he had given her.