Adventures of Space Cadets 101: Weddings. Darryl Dean Wright
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who was in immense pain in every possible way. He would have been eaten too, but the Leos needed him and his codes.
The Leonsian captain had watched his entire fleet destroyed or taken captive, and he wanted revenge. Running into the Earth ship was pure luck, because now he didn't have to use his own ship for a suicidal run. Now he could destroy this solar system and still make it back home to report to the remaining fleet. And if his luck held out, maybe be promoted to general.
His brother was also a captain in the Leonsian Fleet, but he had no idea if he was alive or in one of the many ships destroyed in the battle, or floating in space. He could not believe that the massive fleet was lost in the battle. Leonsians rarely lost to a planet they set out to conquer. He was dumbfounded because he was now on a ship that had defeated his fleet. They had no super weapons; the enemy only had a handful of ships, and the ship he was on didn't even have hyper-jump capabilities. How could this have happened? He had never known anger like that before.
He had interrogated the captain of the vessel and yet got no answers as to how it had happened. Captain Glasier never gave up the Houstons since he witnessed his crew being eaten. It was driving the Leo captain mad, but at least he was able to join his crew in a feast. It had been a while since he had eaten.
He missed his mate and cubdren, and as soon as he turned the primitive ship into a nova-bomb, he would set sail back to his planet Bullos and see them again.
The Leo-ship and ED ship were attached to each other and in high orbit around Venus, the second planet from the sun in that solar system. The Leo captain was very fortunate that they went unnoticed with both the conquering of the handful of ED ships, and in getting far enough away from the massive battle.
The captain was hoping his luck would hold out for another day, long enough for the nova-bomb to be built and to aim the ED ship into the sun. He would be able to jump all the way out of that solar system in just one jump, but it would probably take a month for the primitive ship to fly into the sun with its engines. At least he was sure nobody would notice it until it was too late for them. The ED sub-ship, the Lexington, had gold panels built all around it to bounce off the heat and all the radiation that the sun would feed it until penetration. The Leo captain was unimpressed because Leonsians had more gold than any other planet because they conquered so many planets and took all their gold. They even used gold for fuel in their warships.
Chapter 3
ASSASSINATION
"Are you positive we're on course to this planet Kess, Captain?" Admiral Foremen asked Captain William Marcus onboard their new Trexian ship. The ship was hot, and it stank, but it was more advanced than anything Earth had.
Earth Defense felt lucky indeed to acquire a Trex ship without the Houstons' knowledge. With its star-drive, they were on course for Kess in the hopes of assassinating the Houston captains on orders from the President of Earth Defense who was on Earth where it would be safe from the Houstons.
They also had a Trex, probably the captain, and he was tied up on the bridge. He was drugged, and he was willing to tell these humans anything they wanted to know for the chance to escape closer to home. He would have to tell his people that only he survived the battle at Earth. Of course, he would have to escape to deliver the bad news.
The captain answered the admiral, "According to this beast, we are, Sir. It seems to be answering all of our questions, and it gave us no problem on the running of this ship. It says that we should be there in about a week at this speed, Sir."
The admiral noticed the captain's demeanor, so he asked him if he had a problem with their mission to assassinate the Houston captains. Captain Marcus asked if he could speak freely, and the admiral nodded, yes.
The captain said, "Sir, I am a soldier and as a soldier, I do what I'm told, but … These targets prevented two invasions on Earth, built us two shipyards and several defense platforms which came in handy, and gave us over six hundred ships to add to our fleet, and that makes them targets?"
The admiral answered, "They took out all of Earth's defenses in just a couple of hours. They humiliated the President, and they possess a ship that could do it all over again even with our massive fleet. So yes, that makes them targets. Hell, we've assassinated people for a whole lot less." He took a clipboard from an ensign, signed it and then gave it back to him. He then said, "The President thinks that if we can get rid of the Houston leaders, we can get their crew to hand over that ship that looks like a turtle. Worst-case scenario, the new captain might work for us."
The Trex was shackled, feet and hands, and feet to hands, and he was wearing a muzzle that would allow him to talk but not open his mouth enough to bite any of the humans. He was tied up on the bridge by two armed guards, and he was listening in on the whole conversation between the admiral and captain.
The admiral continued as the captain took his seat on the bridge, "Besides, we need to set up shop on Kess for mining rights and repopulating the planet with humans. Also, we need to get to know the lizard people that are already there. This is one hell of a road trip."
Captain Marcus asked the admiral, "What about their brother on our defense platform. He might object to our killing his younger brothers."
The admiral smiled and said, "Don't worry about him. The President will take care of him and his alien friends soon enough. He wants their ships too for our fleet."
Meanwhile, the Turtle crew was headed for the Tauri System to help the humans from the lion people. The Houston admirals were in the "situation" room fighting killer robots in an old castle-like atmosphere, getting combat training the old fashion way, from experience. The admirals always enjoyed this exercise; it was their idea of fun.
The "situation" room was through one of the quantum doors on the Turtle. All anyone had to do was program the computer there, and then nanites reconfigured whatever was needed - anything. The room was where everybody went to learn and get experience for anything and everything. There were safety algorithms built into the room so nobody would get hurt unless someone turned them off.
Austen and son Noah, Derek and son Kirk, the alien lizard Qworn, Dale, and Jeanette Clark had the high ground wearing their nanites spacesuits, which was cool, because if you didn't need a helmet, it just disappeared, and the H.U.D. in the helmet went straight to a wristband so any information you might need to know was still accessible. In a way, it was like cheating, though.
Poor Will Cooper was also with them in the beginning, but as soon as they were beamed in, the teenager decided to test his weapon out and blew himself out of the exercise. He was only three seconds into the game, so he could at least say he held a record in combat training.
Kirk asked his dad why he was throwing so many grenades and Derek replied, "Look at your heads up display on your wrist. I've killed fifteen robots and kept them from advancing on our position. All is fair in war games. Now you, Noah and Clark go take that stairwell with your sniper rifles and help the rest of us advance to the next flag's position."
Clark said, "Move out, Cadets," and she let the two boys go first. As she followed them up the stairway, she laid out claymore mines behind her.
As the admirals and crew made their way to the next flag, Derek asked Austen if he had an Indian name what it would be, but Austen said, "You first."
Derek said that his name would be "Morning-wood." Austen could hear Clark on their headsets giggle and he said, "Running-squirts" would be his.
Now they could hear the boys laughing.
As they came around a corner, there were robots in formation coming their way. They both let loose with their lasers as Austen ordered everybody to double time it, and they ran in a different direction.
Beaming in to join them was Commander Jackson who was letting her rockets fly true into the swarm of killer robots. Derek said, "Glad you could join us, Commander, but how are you here?" He asked because once the game was started no one could join it.
She said that since Will was shot within one minute of the start of the game, she was able to join them. Austen said, "Actually, he blew himself up." Then he noticed