Beyond Galactic Marshal
by
Hilltopper
Chapter 15
With me now healed, we needed to decide where to go. Rosco wanted to go home if it still existed. Lilly was not too thrilled about leaving Earth. So, the consensus was to check on the destroyed observation site.
When we reached the hill where the site was located, every one was pleasantly surprised. It had been a surgical strike. The observation room including the gate had been obliterated but there was very little collateral damage. Rosco yelled.
“My cabin! It’s still there!”
Sure enough, it looked as good as ever. His mules had even found there way home. Janna settled the ship down close to the cabin. I found a jumpsuit like thing on the ship that fit me OK, It was better than the shredded Indian dress. We all disembarked. I looked up toward the damaged site.
“I don’t see how they destroyed it without causing more damage to the surrounding area.”
Janna nodded.
“It was a very accurate strike for one from orbit. I don’t know what kind of weapon was used. The site is gone with not much to suggest it was ever there.”
“Yeah, it reminds me of the weapons portrayed on those old sci-fi videos; disrupters or something.”
Rosco shuttered.
“I just hope their gone.”
Lilly sighed.
“There is no reason for them to stay unless they know about the ship.”
Janna glanced over.
“I don’t think they do. We were very careful in concealing it.”
I looked at her.
“Won’t they spot it when we leave Earth?”
“Probably eventually. It depends on whether they have gone and if they left any probes behind.”
She stared at me a few seconds.
“You seem to want to leave.”
I looked at her in surprise.
“Don’t you?”
She sighed.
“I guess but where would we go. Our base is apparently gone and we are 1500 years in the past.”
Lilly spoke up.
“You’ve convinced me. I’m staying here. Our home isn’t obtainable and I wasn’t that crazy about it when I was there. This is my home now.”
Rosco grinned.
“That’a girl.”
I frowned.
“What about Slago?”
“Oh, he won’t bother us. You’re the one he’s after.”
“True”
Lilly had tears in here eyes.
“I wish you would stay too. There’s nothing out there for you.”
I sighed.
“If there is any hope at all to be rejoined with my family, I’m going to take it. It is a dead end here with the gate gone. The gate at your base may still be there.”
“So might those aliens.”
“I know but I’m for checking it anyway.”
Janna nodded.
“OK, it is a possibility. I’m not keen on staying here so I guess we could go.”
Lilly turned to me tearfully.
“If you go, won’t see you again. I know it!”
I hugged her.
“It’s something I must do.”
“At least stay overnight.”
I shook my head.
“We can‘t risk anyone seeing the ship.”
Janna agreed. We said our good byes and went back on board. I hoped Rosco and Lilly will be OK. They are right to stay. They both have a life here. We got into the command chairs. Janna powered the craft up.
“Let’s go into a low orbit first. If the aliens are still about, we can get back down quickly.”
“Sounds good to me.”
We lifted off and were in orbit before long. The ships sensors started their search. While waiting, we discussed our situation.
“How long will it take to get to Prowhiness?”
Janna looked puzzled and then it registered.
“Oh yeah, that is your name for the planet our base is on. AI, plot the quickest route to the base.”
The AI came right back.
“It will take 13 hours.”
I nodded. Janna looked at me a few seconds.
“So what’s your story anyway?”
I briefly went through how I came to be here. Janna smiled.
“Now I understand why you were startled when waking up from your surgery. Jees! It’s a wonder you’re still sane.”
I grinned big.
“Who says I am?”
This got us both laughing. The AI chimed in.
“There are no probes or ships within range.”
“OK, good, take us to the base post haste.”
Janna looked over at me.
“I imagine you are still recovering. Why don’t you lie down for a while.”
She pointed at a door.
“There is a bed of sorts in there.”
“Yeah, I do need it.”
I went into the room. There was a bunk attached to a wall. It reminded me of the ones on the old warships. I lay back and sighed. What if we don’t find anything on Prowhiness? I don’t think I can handle living in this time like I am now. With another sigh, I dozed off.
I awoke to the ship shaking violently. Rushing out, Janna yelled back at me.
“There’s no damage.”
“What the hell happened?”
“I don’t know. There are no ships showing on sensors. Besides, while traveling in hyperspace, all should be calm.”
“Could it be something wrong with the ship’s drive?”
The AI spoke up.
“All systems are nominal.”
I sat down beside Janna.
“So, any guesses?”
Janna looked thoughtful.
“Just a theory. Time travel into the past is a delicate thing. No matter how careful you are, some changes are going to occur. I’d say we caught up to time waves. They are greatly enhanced while in hyperspace.”
“By time waves, you mean changes in the time line.”
“Exactly”
“Hmm, if time travel is so dangerous, why do it at all?”
“Good question. I’m not privy to our leaders reasoning. The rumors I heard were that the discovery of males on an old Earth colony scared them. I don’t know why.”
I frowned.
“After living on Fledora, I can believe that. Those people are completely paranoid when it comes to the male members of our species. Of course, history does show that male domination is a strong trait and one that has caused many problems for women. I guess that I am unique in that I have experienced both sides.”
“Yeah, but how that could relate to the observation post here in the past is beyond me.”
Just then the AI made an announcement.
“We are approaching the planet. There are two unknown ships orbiting it.”
I looked over at Janna.
“Uh oh!”
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“What just happened?”
Tinker smiled.
“I’d say the future race brought Karen to them.”
I glared at Tinker.
“You expected this!”
“We expected something. This was one of the possibilities.”
“You are despicable!”
I turned and went to George’s shuttle. Once inside, I broke down. Linda rushed over to me.
“I can’t take much more of this.”
Linda patted my back.
“Those alien assholes will get theirs. Where’s Karen?”
“That’s just it! They tricked her into the gate and now she is gone!”
George walked up.
“You mean into the future?”
“That’s what Tinker said.”
I went into the galley and picked up Raylan.
“Oh my angel, what are we to do?”
George was mad as hell.
“I’m going out there and confront them.”
I shook my head.
“No, all we can do is wait.”
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I put my hand into the depression in the gate control. The next thing I knew I was looking at the bright room in the future. Cautiously, I walked out of the gate. The room the gate is in is quite large but contains nothing but the gate. Going over to the door I had gone through last time I was here, I found it to be locked. I pounded on it but, after several minutes, I gave up. I went back to the gate to see if I could operate it. Like last time, it was now dead. Hearing a noise, I turned around. A woman I had not seen before had entered the room. She stared at me a minute and then motioned me to follow her. With no other choice, I complied. We entered a small room with a few chairs. She sat down and just looked at me. So far she had said nothing. With a sigh, I sat.
“OK, enough of the silent treatment, did you bring me here?”
She nodded but said nothing.
“Hmm, you know I’ve been here before.”
She nodded again.
“OK, so how much time was passed?”
She smiled.
“I read about the incident. A debate has been raging for years.”
“Years?”
“Yes, it has been 25 years since you appeared here.”
This stunned me. Of course, with time travel, years mean nothing. She noticed my shock.
“I set a program to automatically return here with any one that tried using the gate again.”
I nodded.
“You said something about a debate. Have any decisions been reached?”
“Some. I guess you deserve to know what has really been going on. I think you were told that the observation site on distant Earth was set up to study male behavior because a planet with males on it had been discovered.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“That is only partially true. We did discover that colony but what puzzled us was the primitive nature of it. On further exploration, it was found that this was the last surviving colony of ancient Earth. All had been wiped out by an alien force.”
This shocked me to the core.
“You mean that in your time the Planetopolis no longer exists?”
“Yes, we and that colony are all that’s left of Humanity. We realized that our planet was most likely next. Our only hope was our secret weapon; time travel. We set up a base in the past on an uninhabited planet to try to determine what the threat was. The Putarks, the aliens you and Jonnie were dealing with, discovered our old base hundreds of years later. At this time, they were under attack by the same aliens. They used some of our technology to stave off an attack using Jonnie to operate it. When she used the device, she was transported here. We sent her back as close to her time as we could with no knowledge that she had been here. The information gleaned by us from the device was invaluable. We realized that our best hope of surviving was to get rid of the aliens when they first entered this part of the galaxy 1500 years ago. We set up the observation site on Earth to attract their attention. The plan is to draw them in before they are ready.”
“In other words, defeat them in the past before they became too strong to handle.”
“Correct. At the same time though, we must do it in such a way to not affect our time line. If we did something in the past that significantly changed our history, we might cause something worse that what the aliens could accomplish.”
“So our going through the gate to Earth was not foreseen.”
“No and it has caused much consternation and discussion.”
I grimaced.
“Wow, I reckon so. What have you decided to do?”
She sighed.
“We are going ahead with our plan of attack and hope that your Jonnie doesn’t screw things up too much.”
Comments
Back and Forth
This time travel stuff is making my head spin -- but just a little. It's fun so I don't mind.
I'm looking forward to seeing those pesky aliens dealt with. They need a timeout. Heh.
Thanks and kudos.
- Terry
Different agendas
With so many different agendas in the mix here it is going to be hard for Jonnie and Karen to navigate them to reunite Jonnie with her family. Tinker's people have yet again been economical with the truth as well. *rolls eyes*
Great story and looking forward to the next chapter. :-)
"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."
Beyond Galactic Marshal
Good chapter
++++++++++++
Cartman: A fine day of plundering we had boys. What about yourselves? Here you are lads, plenty of booty to go around. A round of grog for me boys. A round of grog for everyone!
The Putarks, eh?
So, now we know the name of the Race that Tink & Bell belong too.
May Your Light Forever Shine
"We set up...on Earth to attract their attention..."
So that's one answer -- though not necessarily the best of one. If they were trying to goad an attack before the aliens were ready, they were doing so in an environment where their own failure would eliminate humanity entirely and render their future existence void.
(Is that where the "primitive colony" came from? Somebody from the future grabbed some 19th-century humans and separated them from Earth before the alien attack destroyed the worldline that created us and the Planetopolis and everyone else? If so, why does Isham's world survive at all, if Fledora, Prowhiness and everything that led up to it is gone? "Logic" suggests that it could only still exist if it's also off the aliens' worldline, but then they wouldn't worry about their own survival; they'd be safe and out of sight from the aliens.)
The other new consideration here: Isham (or whoever's talking to Karen now) says that Jonnie's dealings with Tinker and company (now aka the Putarks) resulted in their getting the technology to stave off an alien attack in that spacetime. We know about Jonnie's various trips, and about the aliens' destruction of the base in the Planetopolis time period after (so to speak) those trips took place. But if I'm reading right it's news that the Putarks actively fought back with that future (Isham's time) technology and prevented the aliens from destroying a lot more. Are we "there" ("then?") yet, or does some of that tech still need to be acquired? Does Karen have some involvement in that -- including her present trip?
(For that matter, does the Fledoran/Putark technology that initiated all this strife with the Planetopolis figure in this somewhere? Or was that whole thing simply an excuse to gain access to Karen and then Jonnie?)
One more thing: I assumed that the aliens had time travel and were attacking humanity in strategic time periods of their choosing. Isham's people are telling us the opposite: that the aliens are evolving as humans are, technologically at least, from relatively primitive attackers in Earth's 19th century to more effective ones in Planetopolis time and to truly fearsome adversaries between then and Isham's era -- strong enough to wipe out the rest of humanity, the Putarks and any other relevant species.
Finally, a point that I've brought up before: supposedly, practically no one can operate the time travel equipment: Jonnie, Karen, probably someone who survived the 19th century attack (Janna?), and one remaining person at Isham's base. Yet Isham hasn't seen any problem with this, and would even have kept Jonnie and Karen out of it if that had been possible. It hardly seems that they can overwhelm the aliens with a surprise attack with only one new operator -- unless the plan is to send the same ship back there a large number of times, and have it/them attack simultaneously. And the problem with that is that once the aliens shoot it down, what happens to the other versions, or whatever damage they did to the aliens?
Well, a lot to think about. Hope our author can make it all work.
Eric