Bracing his arm against thecockpit panel, Con asked, “Do we need to call forback-up?”
“Not yet. Their heads andwings are un-plated – I’m gonna try concentrating fire there.”Decker whirled the shuttle into a wide-circle to obtain a betterposition. After gaining a little distance, Naiche found it easierto target the now disorganized creatures. Her next shot scored adirect hit on one of them, blowing the top of its skull off; thecreature plummeted out of view. She drove towards the remainingtwo, targeting their heads. The animals abruptly ceased theirattack and, in full retreat, wheeled away towards the mountainrange.
Decker, breathing heavily,absorbed in battle mode, raced after them until Con’s voice brokeinto her fugue state. “Deck, let ‘em go. This isn’t the missionright now.” She took a deep breath, nodded, and swung back towardstheir planned landing spot.
Within minutes, theshuttle was sailing over the downed ship they had noted from orbit.The L3 crew were close enough to see several distinctly humanfigures emerge from the hatch. Lindstrom pointed towards the group.“That’s ourmission.”
***
Deciding it was best toinitially investigate the damaged ship with a small team, Lindstrombrought with him only Lateef, Kennedy, and Decker, who wasaccompanied by Kay. As they got within sight of the ship, a smallgroup of people moved towards them. Rather than uniforms, they wereall dressed in sturdy, utilitarian outfits in a rainbow of colors;the effect was rather startling. Lindstrom was about to issue afriendly greeting – until he noticed the weapons pointed atthem.
A short, stocky,gray-haired woman yelled, “Don’t come any closer!”
Lindstrom motioned his teamto stop, while slowly advancing alone. “We mean you no harm. We’rehere to—”
“Didn’t you hear her?”screamed a tall blond man, pushing to the front and boldlybrandishing his weapon.
Standing behind the armedcontingent, a young woman studying a small instrument caused aslight commotion by calling out, “I’m reading them ashuman!”
Kennedy and Decker tookfull advantage of the momentary distraction, slinging theirparticle rifles up and moving smoothly into a firing stance. “Dropyour weapons,” Kennedy ordered.
The older woman, apparentlyrecognizing Lindstrom as the one in charge, shouted to him, “Itseems we’re at an impasse.”
Nils easily read thenervousness and uncertainty of the armed humans facing them. “Notreally. Have your people ever shot anyone?”
His counterpart hesitatedbefore admitting, “No.”
“They have,” Lindstromwarned, gesturing behind him, towards his Tactical team. His voicelow and steady, he urged, “Please, put your weapons away. We’rehere in response to your distress call. We’d like to offer ourhelp.”
After a fraught moment, thewoman said to her people, “I think we shall be safe,” and theirweapons were holstered.
Lindstrom glanced behindhim and nodded to Kennedy and Decker, indicating they, too, shouldstand down. He extended his hand. “I’m Commander Nils Lindstrom, ofthe Uniterrae Defense Corps.”
The woman shook it,saying, “I’m Captain Abigale Maddox.” She stared at theLovelace crew whileLindstrom introduced them one-by-one. “You reallyare human – aren’t you?”She looked down at Kay. “Except for this one. This is a…fox? Fromancient times?”
Lindstrom had to admire hercomposure as Decker answered evenly, “This is Corpsman Kayatennae.He’s a dog.”
“Ah, like in the storiesof Earth. It’s good to know that some of them survived as well.”While Lindstrom was trying to parse that sentence, Maddox offered,“I’m sorry for greeting you with threats of violence. You see, wethought this was some kind of an alien trick. We never realized anyother humans had escaped.”
Lateef asked, “Escaped?From what?”
“From Earth.”
Lindstrom hesitated beforesaying, “I’m afraid we don’t understand. We’ve recently come fromUniterrae…Earth, as you call it – but there was no needto—”
“Are you telling us Earthis livable?” A rumble of shock and agitation arose from Maddox’speople. Her face reddened as she demanded, “Then why did theValiant go out todistant stars, if it wasn’t in search of a new home?”
“Oh.” Lindstrom exchangeda long look of befuddlement with Lateef before turning back toMaddox. “Perhaps there is somewhere we can sit andtalk?”
“Yes, yes. Come to ourgathering room.” Maddox gestured towards the ship’s hatch. “All ofyou, come aboard the Aurora.”
***
A short while later theywere collected around a gleaming table in the dazzling conferenceroom of the Aurora. The technology was beyond anything the UDC possessed andLindstrom couldn’t help but be impressed. The holographic relay wasso good that if he hadn’t known better, Nils would have swornCaptain Ricci was sitting beside him rather than simply being aprojection of light.
Maddox introduced the tallblond hot-head as her first mate, Prince Croker. No one else seemedto have a formal title – though also present was the ship’sengineer, Felix Yang, as well as the dark-haired young woman whohad pronounced them human, Sanaa Jallow, who appeared to specializein matters scientific.
Croker evidently fanciedhimself a ladies’ man and had already managed to annoy Lateef andBrodie with his oily attempts at charm, issuing boorish comments onLateef’s “bedroom eyes” and Brodie’s purple hair. With Decker hestumbled even more badly. When Croker archly apologized for scaringher, she’d coolly retorted that her only fear had been possiblyneeding to kill them all. Though Lindstrom had directed a scowl atthe errant lieutenant for that response, privately, he didn’t blameher.
Once general pleasantriesand basic information had been exchanged, Ricci got down tobusiness. “Can you explain for us, your exact relationship with thecrew of the Valiant?”
“We are all Children ofthe Valiant,”Maddox responded. “Some of us, are people from theValiant….” indicatingherself and Yang. “While others, are those who came after,” shecontinued, pointing at Croker and Jallow. “Ourdescendants.”
Lateef asked, “Do youactually remember being on the Valiant?”
Yang brushed his straight,graying hair out of his eyes, stating, “No, no one remembers thebefore times – except the Lignatians.”
“Who are?” Ricciprodded.
“The all-knowing givers,”Maddox explained. “They rescued the people of theValiant in our time ofneed, brought us to Jileesa, and imparted the ways of our distantancestors. Now they give us the means to find a new home.” Maddoxwaved a hand around. “This ship and all you see.”
“I don’t know how to tellyou this,” Lateef said, “but everyone on the Valiant died. Their bodies werebrought back to Uniter— umm, Earth, that is.” Aqila paused andglanced at her hand-held computer. “You and Yang somehow share thename and general appearance of two of the people who died – butthey are dead.And have
