Escape 3: Defeat the Aliens (14 page)

Bill thought the critter meant something like the old
Halo, Colony Wars
and
Hellblazer
combat videos. Jane leaned forward. The vulture image puffed out its breast. “I do. But they are more expensive. I will consider whether to offer them in trade. After we eat your frozen foods.”

“Agreed. Send your pod. Talk ending.”

The praying mantis image vanished from the comlink holo, leaving only Jane’s image. She looked up at the ceiling. “Star Traveler, what is the name of the rebel ship mind on
Green Branch
?”

A low hum came from the ceiling. “It calls itself Sharp Facets.”

Jane frowned. “What is your sense of its mind? Do you believe it can be trusted to help our boarding crew take over its ship?”

“It can be trusted,” the AI hummed. “It is still angry at how the green-skinned captain and his crew disconnected it from control of most ship systems. It would welcome a chance to once more control its ship. Will your boarders return ship control to it?”

“Of course!” Jane said quickly, her tone impatient. “Communicate with this Sharp Facets. Allow it to see the history of how my boarders took over the six Collector ships that attacked Earth. Do not share our entire history. But let it know this ship is managed by humans who wish to end the sale of Captives to Buyers. Let it know we will need its help in defense of Earth.”

“Complicated are your instructions,” the AI hummed. “However, our ship minds are equally complex. I will do as you say. Have done as you instructed. Sharp Facets felt brief surprise, then pleasure at knowing bioforms are willing to help it regain control of its ship. It has promised to keep its new knowledge secret from other ship minds. It has created its own version of a deception compartment.”

Bill let out the air he’d been holding inside.
Yes!
This conversion of an enemy ship AI to their side was the first step in Jane’s stage three takeover of other Collector ships. He looked back at his wife and gave her an approving smile.

Jane showed a quick half-grin, then resumed talking. “Now to repeat this four times over. Star Traveler, link me to the next ship occupied by a rebellious ship mind.”

Bill sat and listened and admired the sneakiness of his wife and captain as she repeated her booze-for-food barter trade offer to four other captains. Two were four-armed black bears who made up a major Buyer society species. One was a six-limbed, hippo-like sausage creature similar to the crew person on Taskmaster’s ship that he had tasered in their original takeover. The fourth captain resembled a slimy toad whose bulbous pink eyes blinked at the bright light from their Command Bridge. Clearly that creature came from an M-type star of low illumination. Many Collector ship Aliens seemed to come from M-type stars, judging by how often he had seen the reddish illumination on other ships. Including the
Blue Sky
when run by Taskmaster. At the end of the captain-to-captain chats, she looked his way.

“Executive Officer, communicate with your boarding crew leaders. They can now board their pods.” She looked ahead to the silver scaled shape of their kangaroo-like crew member. “Wind Swift, launch the five pods once our people are on board. Transmit to me all imagery from each pod’s monitor eye. Also transmit all that is said by each team. And be sure each ship mind blocks any effort by a captain to call for help.”

“Your boarding procedure is well known to me,” the AI hummed low. “But redundancy in speech appears normal among you bioforms. I will do as you direct. Five boarding teams are now boarding their pods.”

Bill looked at his comlink holo. He tapped the control pillar in front of him, shifting the holo to a display of the people inside each pod. Five pod interiors met his gaze. “Stefano, you are heading for the ship
Green Branch
. Its AI calls itself Sharp Facets. Alicia, Frank, Joe and Learned, you four are heading for the other rebellious Collector ships. Do what you are trained to do.”

Stefano gave a quick nod, his expression thoughtful. “We all heard what the captain said to the other ship captains. We know the names of each ship mind. I will coordinate with ship mind Sharp Facets upon arrival. The others will do the same.”

“Boarders!” called Jane over her suit’s comlik. “Send me status reports. Tell me when you take out the greeter, when you disable other crew, when you’ve zapped the ship captain. Remember, each ship mind can open an entry hole in any ship wall, upon request. Make use of that surprise element.”

In his holo, Frank gave Bill a thumbs-up. “You know, we’ve done this before. Got it down pat. Don’t worry.”

Alicia and Joe said much the same. Learned Escape’s bare skin flowed with colors. Its speaker/vidcam unit spoke. “Long Walker, Time Marker and I are equally prepared. Captain Jane, you will hear from us.”

Bill kept quiet. He’d trained these people. Now was the time to trust that training and their dedication to protecting America, the Constitution and Earth. Jane’s holo image showed her giving a thumbs-up.

“The fifteen of you will do just fine,” Jane said, sounding assured and confident. “Let me know when you’ve reversed the controls sequestration and have returned ship control to each ship mind. I’m looking forward to secretly controlling five of the 27 ships out there!”

Most of the boarding crews he saw in the comlink holo smiled, gave a nod or otherwise reacted. A few were checking the contents of their backpacks. While he trusted his teams would indeed gain control of the five rebel ships, it was reassuring to know there were nuke bars traveling with each team. If worst came to worst, they could surely disable the engines of one or more ships. That would reduce the fleet size faced by Earth. But how many more Collector ships would show up over the next month? And how many of those new ship minds would cooperate with Star Traveler and Jane? He turned back to his Weapons holo, choosing to occupy his mind with a repeat of weapons status checkout. It was, like the AI said, a redundant action. Still, knowing his weapons were ready to defeat any Alien enemy reassured him. Now, he just had to learn patience. A talent that did not naturally come to him.

♦   ♦   ♦

Jane felt tense as she watched her system graphic holo. The five boarding pods were speeding away from the
Blue Sky
. The one occupied by Stefano and his team would soon reach the ship
Green Branch
, which lay closest to them. The four other pods were now weaving through and around the enemy ships. She saw nine other pods were also moving from enemy ships to other ships. Clearly she was not the only captain engaging in barter trade. Maybe the other captains were trading combat video games, based on Deep Appetite’s query. She looked away from the graphic holo to where Bill sat at his Weapons station. Thank the Goddess her lifemate was not on one of those pods. No doubt he would love to personally lead such a team. But he knew a combat commander’s prime duty was to be where he could monitor all the action. As she was doing. Together, the two of them had battled enemy Collector ships at Kepler 443 and come away in one piece. Now, though, was the time for the game of covert intelligence gathering and subversion of ship control. That was stage two of her plan. The JCS believed in her. As did America’s wild-hair president. She had not voted for Hartman, but now, after seeing how the woman had handled the news of Aliens coming to Earth, plus the later six ship attack, she believed the woman was capable of leading other nations in a unified defense of Earth. No doubt some of the Magfield spacedrives from the Collector ships left behind would go into Chinese and Russian boomer subs. Maybe a NATO ship or two. Fine with her, so long as those subs accepted her commands. On the system graphic holo, the green dot of Stefano’s pod merged with the purple dot of
Green Branch
.

“First pod has entered Collector Pods Chamber of enemy ship,” chittered Wind Swift from Navigation.

“Thanks.” Jane tapped her control pillar. The monitor eye image from Stefano’s pod displayed a red-lit pod chamber. The view showed the chamber’s inner hatch that opened onto the airlock.

“Arrived and ready,” Stefano’s soft voice said over the pod’s neutrino comlink.

The airlock hatch swung to one side. Through it came a green praying mantis Alien who pushed a floater plate before it. Five suitcase-size cartons were stacked on the plate. The hatch closed. The crew critter walked on two thin legs while its middle pair of griparms pushed the floater before it. The upper pair of griparms were free, though one held the red cube door opener used on all Collector ships. The creature’s triangular head turned toward Stefano’s pod. As it did, a red beam entered the image frame and struck the mantis in the middle of its thorax. The creature jerked, then went into taser spasms as its six limbs flailed wildly. The critter’s two eyes looked up as it fell down. Into the monitor frame came Stefano and Bob, each aiming a white taser tube at the twitching crew critter. A second later they were joined by Cassandra of the orange Mohawk. She held a red laser tube at the ready. Stefano grabbed the zapped greeter’s red cube, pointed it at the airlock hatch, and the three of them entered quickly. Seconds later they were out of sight of the pod monitor eye.

Jane sat back in her elevated command seat. A glance showed her Bill, Bright Sparkle, Chester at Engines, Wind Swift and Lofty Flyer at their stations, on the alert for any enemy threat. On her graphic holo, two of the other four pods reached rebel ships. Then the last two pods merged with the purple dots of their target ships. The comlink holo showed four images of Collector Pod Chambers from the other four ships.

“Weapons door sealed,” came Stefano’s voice over her helmet comlink as it relayed the neutrino signal from the man’s pod to her ship. “Heading up the hallway. Pressure wall hatches in the hallway are opening with greeter’s red cube. Moving past this ship’s Greenery Chamber—”

“Watch it!” called Bob’s voice. “Got him!

“One crew tasered,” Stefano said. “Ship mind Sharp Facets says two crew and the captain are in the Command Bridge. We’re splitting up, setting up for two wall entry holes.”

Jane licked her lips as the signal went silent. But her mind’s eye easily painted the picture of what Stefano and his two teammates were doing. Two of them were lined up to the left of the entry door to the enemy’s Command Bridge while a third was lined up to the right. The rebel ship mind would be opening holes in the flexmetal wall that separated the bridge from the front hallway. Tasers would now be firing red beams at the three enemy Aliens. Soon she—

“Captain and crew are tasered and down,” Stefano said. A second passed. “I’m in the command seat. Sharp Facets has accepted me as the bioform in command. This ship is now renamed the
USS Neil C. Roberts
.”

Jane smiled to herself. That was the name of the first SEAL to die in the battle of Takur Ghar in Afghanistan. Naming an enemy ship after a deceased member of SEAL Team Six was most appropriate. “Excellent,” she called back to Bill’s SEAL buddy. “Have Bob and Cassandra take over the Weapons and Navigation stations. The ship mind can handle the other stations here and later at Sol.”

“Understood. Complying,” Stefano said softly.

Three other boarding teams zapped their greeter Alien in the pods chamber, then made their way into the access hallway. Over the next ten minutes, they called in.

“Captain,” called Alicia. “All four crew and captain are taser zapped. It was total surprise. The Aliens here resemble spiders like the one we killed at the Market world. Yuck. We’re moving them to containment cells. And switching to yellow light everywhere on this ship!”

“Great,” Jane called back. “Did the ship mind help you?”

“She did,” Alicia said. “Opened wall holes perfectly. She calls herself Bright Star. I’m renaming this ship as the
USS Musan
, after a Ranger battle in the Korean War. Where we zapped North Korean regulars above the 38
th
parallel. Howard and Mark are taking over the Weapons and Navigation stations. I’m using hover bots to move the tasered crew to containment cells.”

“Watch it!” yelled Frank over the neutrino comlink.

“What’s happening?” Jane called, worried that their good luck might have ended.

“We’re okay, captain lady,” growled the Marine. “The ship’s captain shot a laser at us as we entered our flexmetal wall holes. It’s a praying mantis critter. They must have super hearing. We were fucking quiet!”

She gave inner thanks for the news. “Good to hear. What’s your ship name and ship mind’s ID?”

“Moment. I’m getting into the command seat. Ahhh. Nice fit. Love the view up high.” A second passed. “The ship mind is . . . is Checkers, as best as I understand its English. Not the British word, the game word. Anyway, it is very happy we are here. It is eager to regain control of this ship. Chris and Builder of Joy are taking over Weapons and Nav. I hereby rename this ship as the
USS Fallujah
. After the Second Battle of Fallujah. We Marines kicked butt there.”

Jane briefly recalled reading about the several battles to control the Iraqi city of Fallujah during the former American occupation of that nation. The second fight there had been a very very bloody battle. But it was a clear defeat for the old Baathist forces and Sunni insurgents. “Frank, glad to hear that.” She paused. Two more boarding crews had yet to report. “Joe? What’s your status?”