END of LINE: Humanities Last Stand - part 3 (37 page)

Phillie looked up at Jarrieal with love in her eyes. “Later.” she smiled up at him. Jon noticed the change in both of his friends right away. They had
become close. Good for them.

“I hope I didn't interrupted you two.” Jon said

“No.” Jarrieal quickly said, “We're both glad to see you up again.”

“We certainly are. You can be the Boss again starting right now! I know we only told you we would leave you in the tube for one month, but the Healer said
two would be better. If you walked all the way from Med to here then he was right, cause at first we thought you'd still need the frames.” Phillie assured
Jon.

“Was it that or did you two need time alone with me out of the way?” Jon kidded which earned him another slap on the arm from Phillie.

“It wasn't like that Jon.” Jarrieal told him. “We kind of fell over each other one day.”

“Yeah, he kept calling me a furball, and when I told him to stop it he explained why he did it and I was lost.” Phillie confessed.

“Even then, it took us a while to get past our own hurts to see the other one's needs.” Jarrieal told him. “Now I want to be with her all the time I can.”

“He's a big child Jon.” Phillie went on. “He sees me for exactly what I am and he doesn't care about my past. He just loves me.”

“I'm happy for you both.” Jon said sadly as he finished his soup. “I think I'll go to my stateroom and rest now. I am more tired than I thought I would be.
Tell Jinkly that I enjoyed his chicken soup and this stuff he calls bread. Oh and Jarrieal, I don't know what a chicken noodle is either. Maybe we should
find out before we allow the crew to eat too much of this stuff.” Jon rolled away from his friends and out of the mess room headed for his stateroom behind
the bridge on Leviathan.

“Maybe we should have handled that better Phillie.” Jarrieal said.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“I thought you would have already known. I mean we all know how much you two mean to each other. I just assumed that he would have told you.”

“Told me what?” Phillie demanded.

“His mate rejected him and he's made up his mind never to have that happen again. With a male as strong willed as he is, I believe that our friend will
live out his life alone.”

“That's impossible! No Lexonian female has ever rejected her mate. They can not do it!” Phillie exclaimed.

“Why not? Females choose new mates all the time. I told you about my own wife taking another over me. Heck furball, he messaged her everyday, sometimes
several times a day, and she never returned a single one.” Jarrieal insisted.

“You wife wasn't a Lex. Listen and I'll teach you a secret. Pure Lex females mate for life!” Phillie then went into what she knew of Lexonian females and
their mating habits before saying, “Something is wrong here. Someone is going to great lengths to keep them apart.”

“Who would do something like that Phillie? Its just one more male and female in love. It happens all the time. Just look at us!”

“Not just another male and another female. Jar, it’s a Human/Umin Dragon Flier and the Crown Princess of Lexon II! She will one day be Queen and he has
already claimed the most feared Warcarrier of legend in five galaxies! With this ship he could well be King of the known universe!”

“What's that mean? Him being a human I already know. Are you trying to tell me he's one of the ancients too?” Jar asked. “Besides, I don't believe he would
ever go that far as to start taking over the planets. Phillie, before he went into the tubes he asked me if I thought he was doing the right thing by
waking this ship up. He wanted to leave it sitting out here and just go away. I told him that we all trusted him to do the right thing with it. I still
trust him. Are you sure it was the Princess who claimed and then mated him?”

“So do I Jar, trust him that is. My people were closer to the early legends of the Unims. Jar, our Jon looks exactly like the ancient Umin King, he
called to this ship and it welcomed him as if he was coming home. Jar even the dragon ship below answers him like it was tuned to his mind from the day it
was first built. He is in for trouble Jar and we must help him. My people's legends speak of the battles the Ancients fought. Every one of those battles were fought to protect entire worlds! I have to figure out who would want to keep him from his mate. Yes, it was the Princess. I met her myself and sensed her essence on him. I call him sweet cheeks because her essence makes him taste sweet to other females who can sense the essence. Her continued absence maybe what is driving him into the darkness?

Jar, the Healer told me that there is a special marker in his blood that marks him as a Umin. So yes. He is somehow connected to both the Ancients and the
humans. He's given me so much Jar, I cannot let him fall.”

Pulling her close and wrapping her in his strong arms to give her a reassuring hug, Jarrieal softly told her. “We won't let that happen to him my beautiful
little furball. He kept me alive during the worse of the battles we faced together and because of him I now have you!” then he leaned in and kissed her
lips.

Phillie melted into him before pulling back, “Stop that before we put on a show for the whole crew.” she giggled.

No one heard from or saw Jon for another three full days. His walk from the Med Lab to the mess room had been exhausting and he'd spent the time in his
stateroom either sleeping or planning his next moves. Looking over star charts he worked out what he thought was a good place to hide Leviathan away from
the prying eyes of the media and any slipway ships running the outer rim. Then he checked with operations to see how long before all of the debris had been
salvaged and they could safely move Leviathan. Finally he spoke with Phillie to ask about whether she had figured out a way to upgrade all of his ships
with the new jump drives. She had assured him that she had mounted two of the spare jump drives to the Defiance and taken her out for several test runs.
She could only jump tens of light cycles instead of the hundreds that Leviathan could, but that let her make any jump between the known systems in under an
hour from Lexon II even to the most distant planets on the rim. Measuring the distance that Defiance could jump compared to the new shuttles they had found
in Leviathan’s bays confirmed that the destroyer and the shuttles could jump the same distance. It was time for him to try another walk.

With all the pride he could muster he strode onto the command bridge and called out, “REPORT!” The crew erupted in applause before the Commander got them
settled and told Jon, “Leviathan is ready sir. She is yours to command.”

“Very good Commander. By the way, if I have to be an Admiral, you have to be a Captain. Congratulations Captain.” Jon told the man while holding out his
own Captain's insignia for him to wear.

“Thank you sir.” the male responded. “Your course sir?” Jon handed the male his calculations and he relayed the coords to the Nav officer who plotted their
course and then called out for coms to give the jump warning.

“ALL HANDS PREPARE FOR JUMP IN...3..2..1 JUMP!”

The forward screen turned glaringly white before darkening again and showing a different set of constellations. Wrenches was on Jon's com in seconds. “DAMN
YOU BOSS!”

Stifling a laugh Jon asked, “Something wrong Wrenches?”

“Is something wrong Wrenches, he asks as pretty as a pink dress! Yes, I was lubing the Jump drives!” Phillie yelled. “Next time give a person more notice!”

“I'm sorry Wrenches. How much time do you need?” he asked her.

“Maybe 5 minutes would be nice when we are jumping from a stand still. Less if we're under attack. Did you forget that this boat hasn’t moved in over two
hundred cycles? YUCK! Now I need an other bath!” she complained.

“I'll send Jarrieal to your quarters right away.” Jon joked with her.

“You do that. Wrenches out!” she angrily exclaimed. Jon broke into a laugh that was soon picked up on by the entire bridge crew. “I guess those two won't
be available for the rest of the day.” He said out loud and the laughter got even more joyful. He was still hurting inside, but there was no reason for his
own personal pain to spoil the whole crew's lighthearted laughter. “Here goes nothing, coms, connect me with Captain Jarrieal.”

“Jackal here. What's up Butcher?”

“I have been ordered to have you report to Captain Wrenches quarters on the double.” Jon told him.

“On my way sir!” Jarrieal told him.

“Maybe we should make that two days.” Jon told the command crew to their continued laughs and giggles. “Nav., where did we end up?”

“According to the scans and the star charts, we are right where you wanted us to be. I can put it up on the table sir.” The command table that stood in the
center of the control room suddenly came alive with a star chart of this area in space. It showed ten solar systems and the planets in orbit around
their suns. It also showed the inner planets in orbit around their own suns. Also shown in red for inbound and blue for outbound streaks were the slipways.
Sitting off to one side away from the charted star systems was the system where the Canari raid had been. Leviathan's location was shown in gold out far
away from any of the charted stars of the slipways. It also had something that Jon had never seen before. Floating just above the table was a detailed
holographic image of the display. The 3D image even showed the ships that traveled the slipways!

“What are the chances of anyone finding us out here who doesn't know where to look?”

“Someone could always stumble on us by getting lost, but I think we're safe enough and considering how fast this ship can move, all they'd see is a glimpse
before we'd be somewhere else anyway.” his Nav officer told him.

“If they are really lost, they'd be calling for help. We could send the shuttles to bring them where they're going.” the coms officer volunteered.

“OK, I'm going aft for a while. Have all shuttle crews meet me in the pilot's ready room.” Jon told the bridge crew. Then he stood to walk out but before
he left he motioned to a crewman standing at the door. “Follow me crewman.” he ordered. Once outside the bridge Jon sat in his wheelchair and began to roll
himself aft. “I'll need you to take this chair back to the ready room for me please.” he told the crewman. Then he went straight down to where the Dragon
Ships were berthed.

Before turning the hanger lights on Jon asked the young male, “Ever seen a Dragon Ship?”

“No sir.” he replied. Then Jon rolled into the bay which turned the lights on and the kid's mouth suddenly dropped open. “By the Goddess, they're beautiful! I sure wish I could fly
one of those.”

“Captain Phillmma is working on getting them to fly for anybody. Right now you'll have to settle for one of the others in the forward bays. Have you
started training on those yet?”

“Yes sir. Captain Jarrieal says I'll be ready to fly solo in another month.”

“You listen to what he's teaching you. He knows what he's doing better than most.” Jon assured the kid.” He's the one I trusted to fly me around when my
legs wouldn't let me fly myself.”

“He never mentioned that sir. If the others knew about that, I think they would have more respect for him. He comes off as a bit of a jerk, sir.”

“Yeah, that's why I like him so much. He makes me look like a saint.” Jon laughed as he stood up from the wheelchair. “Here, take this back up front, leave
it in the ready room please.” Jon walked over to the Dragon Ship that carried his family's house colors and climbed in. Shutting the hatch behind himself,
he began the process of using only his mind to start the engines. Then just as Phillie had shown him, he used his mind alone to open the outer doors and
fly the fierce attack shuttle out of the bay. Once on the outside, Jon again used his mind to close the hanger bay before turning the ship to move it
forward to what he had started calling the lesser attack shuttle bay doors. He'd be flying this Dragon Ship from now on whenever he was on a combat
mission. While it was smaller than the other attack birds, it had more powerful weapons and better shielding. Not that the other shuttles onboard Leviathan
were weak. All of them were far more powerful than even Defiance; he just liked the idea of having a ship no one else could fly.

The News vids had turned his good humored call sign into some kind of a badge of heroism. Jon never wanted to be a hero. His actions that day had not been
heroic. All he'd done was stay alive despite almost being killed. The only person he'd saved that day was himself. Many of the men in his unit, not to
mention his close friend had died. So he changed his call sign from Butcher to Dragon.

Pulling along side the forward bays Jon tried the mind trick to open the hanger bay and found that it did not seem to work at the regular bays the way it
did at the rear. So he commed over to have the doors opened and was told that the landing bay was not yet clear of personnel.

Then on a private channel he received, “Damn it Jon Connell, are you trying to be annoying today?” Phillie asked.

“Phillie? Are you in the forward landing bays?”

“Yes, Jon.”

“I thought you were going to go take a bath? I sent Jarrieal to help. How is that annoying?”

“Because I wanted to test the showers in the forward bays... and we well.. just give us a minute.” Phillie told him. Jon sat quietly in his shuttle
slowly shaking his head as he held it up with his fingertips trying desperately not to laugh. He was not able to prevent an ever so very small grin on his
lips. “Try it now Boss” Phillie suggested privately and again Jon sent the mental command for the bay doors to open. This time it worked and the lights
from the bay slowly became brighter and brighter in the darkness of space. Jon flew the shuttle inside, ordered the doors closed and settled the ship onto
its landing struts before mentally ordering the engines to shut down and the hatch to open. From there it was just a few short steps over to the ready room
where he had asked the pilots to meet him.

Walking to the front of the room and standing behind a podium Jon addressed the men seated in the room. “Hello everyone. I trust you have all had a chance
to try out the new shuttles and their jump drives while I was in the tube.” He looked around and saw the group nodding in the affirmative. “Well I hope to
put that experience to good use. As soon as I can get the rest of my cargo ships out here, we'll begin in the cargo business with those four ships.
Leviathan and Defiance will become the security arm and will both be flying the “Stars and Stripes” clearly seen on the bow of Leviathan. Defiance is
having them painted on her own bow as I speak to you. The next time she flies, she'll be under her own colors. Defiance will pick up some extra credits
making selective runs that require a faster more powerful ship. Phillie has located a store of the outer hull armor used on Leviathan and is attaching it
to her now. When she leaves to fly on her own again, she'll be faster, stronger and have more powerful weapons than any other ships currently flying. She
will also be able to jump much like Leviathan does, just not have the same range. She will be able to jump with the shuttles though, so you shuttle crews
won’t have to worry about being left all alone in the middle of a battle. Once we've located more qualified pilots, I'll be stationing attack shuttles and
fighters on her. Our buyer at the military surplus yards is purchasing those now where our main ships came from under the name of “Stars and Stripes
Security”. They will be transported here on the Mars, which is due to arrive later this week via a normal slip drive. We also have a full compliment of
fighters and shuttles onboard Leviathan to help round out our fighting capabilities.