The Quantum Connection

connection through the Infrastructure, warped into the bellies of the oncoming assault fleet and took the ships from them.

Tatiana and I were along for the battle. We took several of the ships ourselves. In fact, the entire crew was along. Our battle plan required everybody aware of the SuperAgents and warp armor and the Infrastructure to be involved. At such short notice, only a few weeks after returning from Lumpeya City, we were not really completely prepared for an attack of a fleet of a thousand ships. After all, we had only captured and refurbished some thirty- odd Gray ships to date. But we weren't giving up.

Tabitha had developed a great tactical plan of slash and burn and move on. She decided that as many of us as could, would teleport from one ship to the next ship, kill the Gray crew, then move on to the next one, and repeat the process until there were no Grays in the attack fleet left standing.

There were a hundred and two of us, each with warp armor and we had had enough time to create a hundred new SuperAgents, each with its own personality. All of the slash-and-burn team members had volunteered to have the SuperAgents implanted in their respective abdomens and each of us had temple implants. We would take teams of two through to each alien ship and therefore each team would have to take at least twenty of the Grays' ships. Tabitha rallied us before the plan was implemented and gave us a pep talk.

'Attention all personnel, this is General Clemons.' She paused for a second and cleared her throat. 'An alien threat of far superior firepower is approaching us at superluminal velocity. These aliens are known as the Teytoonis, and indeed are as powerful as the gods from our ancient mythology. These aliens . . . these Teytoonis are self- centered and believe themselves to be the only species that should exist in the universe. Well, I disagree with them and I am sure you do too. We are going to strike these monsters with cunning and human brilliance the likes of which this alien species has never seen before. Leave no alien survivors . . . our own survival depends on this. You must also not be captured under any circumstances. The aliens must not have access to our technology. If you are caught, you have been briefed what to do and I expect—humanity expects—that you follow orders. Good luck, good hunting, and God bless.' Tabitha paused again to let her words ring through the lunar base and then she added in her voice of command, 'MOVE OUT!'

Tatiana and I were second in line on the Phoenix and were preparing to quantum connect to our first target. Michelle had already passed through the first two-man team of Jim and 'Becca. We nearly had to hogtie Anson and Tabitha in order to convince them that they couldn't lead this assault, just in case we failed. Humanity needed a commanding general and lead scientist that understood the threat it was facing. If the slash and burn failed, Tabitha and Anson would have to devise a Hail Mary play. We hoped that it wouldn't come to that.

Phoenix 2 going for quantum connection, I thought over the net as we shrank down through the Infrastructure connection inside Michelle. Mike, have you turned the destination ship's SuperAgent?

Steven, Michelle has beaten me to it. 

I see. 

Coming out of warp now, Steven! Mike said as Tatiana and I hit the floor inside a little white room.

There were no Grays waiting on us and there were no human abductees on board. That was a good sign, I guessed.

Warp armor! Mike, where are they? I asked. Mike displayed a map of the ship and indicated where the Grays were hiding out—actually they were just hanging out since they were not expecting us; they had no reason to be on their guard.

Steven, I've got the six up top. You take the six below, okay? 

Right! Race you back to Michelle, last one buys. 

You're on. 

We made short work of the unsuspecting Grays on board and were back through Michelle to the next craft on our list. Fifteen seconds later we were on to the fourth. Thirty seconds later we had taken all twenty ships. We paused on the last one and listened in to the battle to see how it was going. Mike opened a channel to the operation net and it was rather quiet. The mission had been a success!

In less than one minute and twenty-three seconds the entire alien fleet had been destroyed. There were no survivors and we had not lost a single soldier during the operation.

'All of the alien ships are to be brought to the rally point at Mars except for one. I want three teams to volunteer to take all of the Grays' remains that can be gathered and load them into that ship. We will load the ship that Phoenix team four is presently on.'

We took that one alien ship and packed it full of dead Grays as Tabitha had ordered. She then ordered it sent it at maximum velocity back to the Ringworld hive center.

'Great job, everyone! Operation Slash and Burn was a success! We will see you on Mars.' She cheered.

We hoped that the Grays would get the message to leave us the hell alone.

CHAPTER 29

Tatiana and I went down to Bakersfield not long after Operation Slash and Burn and found Lazarus's body. I could barely do it. I cried and cried but Tatiana held my hand and helped me through it.

We cloaked the Phoenix with the Gray cloaking system, and landed where I had parked the SUV those months before when I had driven out to bury him. God, our lives had all changed a lot since that day—the day I tried to kill myself—that day I buried Lazarus. We landed far enough off the road that oncoming construction traffic would not run into the cloaked ship. We could have parked in a hover above the ground and used either our warp armor or the tractor beam, but I wanted to land.

'It was this way,' I told Tatiana. I was beginning to tear up a little. It was going to take a lot of courage to do this.

Tatiana grabbed my hand and whispered, 'It's okay, baby.' She was quiet after that.

I found where I had buried old Lazarus. There wasn't any sign that anybody had been through there since I