Aliens Vs. Humans (Aliens Series Book 4) (4 page)

The trim Asian woman, who showed the shoulder patch of a chief warrant officer, gave him an easy smile. “We do, Fleet Captain Jack. I will return with beer, wine and some of your Johnny Walker Black Label scotch.” The woman exited through the slidedoor into the larger Mess Hall of the
Bismarck
.

He looked back to the eighteen people gathered at the oval table in the middle of the room. At the far end was the large wallscreen which they had been watching. It now showed the busy interior of the Dock Cavern. Nikola sat to his left while Maureen sat to his right. At the far end of the table was Admiral Hideyoshi Minamoto, leader of the Mars fleet. Between them and on the left side of the black granite table were Elaine, Ignacio, Denise, Max, Blodwen, Archibald, Cassie, Captain Zhāng Dingbang of the
Nimitz
and, coming up the right side of the table, were Belter ship captains Minna Kekkonen, Akemi Hagiwara, Júlia Araujo, Aashman Dasgupta, Kasun Guardiya, Helena Antonov, Vigdis Sturludottir and Gareth Davies, the Welshman who was romancing Maureen. Or being romanced by her. It was hard to tell, given the woman’s ‘take-charge’ manner for all things in life. Jack fixed on the elderly admiral.

“Hideyoshi, while I am a skeptic when it comes to second-hand information, I am worried by the threat posed by this Arbitor. Your thoughts?”

The Japanese native rubbed his clean-shaven chin, then showed his trademark stern look. “We resist, of course. But with subtlety and much advance planning. As Sun Tzu said, ‘Secret operations are essential in war, upon them the army relies to make its every move’.” The veteran of the First Belter War scanned the table, then fixed back on Jack. “I like your idea of meeting this Arbitor with ships from our Alien allies. Seeing other species involved may cause this Alien to be more restrained.”

Jack nodded, then fixed on Maureen. The woman’s expression would have scared a pit viper. “Yes, Combat Commander?”

“Kill the dino bastards,” she said in Gaelic-accented English. She pushed up the sleeves of her black leotard and clenched both fists. The hair fine wrinkles on her rad-tanned face grew deeper as she frowned. She gestured at the wallscreen. “We go to Tau Ceti. We meet and make talk-talk with this reptile abomination. We lie to it, as you, young man, have suggested. Then we kill it with an antimatter beam. Or with Archibald’s Higgs Disruptor beam. The belly nodule that the Mathilde engineers added to the
Uhuru
gives us the Higgs option.”

Nikola leaned forward. “But what if the Arbitor ship really does have a field able to resist lasers and beams? What then?”

Maureen shrugged. “The shield can’t stay up forever. My guess is that so long as we can see starlight reflecting from its hull, then its shield is not up. Photons going
out
mean photons and other stuff can go
in
. So, while young Jack here makes talk-talk, I put on my vacsuit, load up with contact explosives, and then launch myself through space to the Arbitor ship. I plant the charges and blow a hole in its hull. Let the bastards suck vacuum!”

“But Maureen!” cried Elaine. “You could die from the explosion! Or from this shield if it activates.”

“Let me do this!” cried Akemi of the
Orca
. “My ancestors understood the need for one person to sometimes perform
hara-kiri
for the benefit of all.”

Jack did not like the way things were going. “Maureen! You have grown kids and grandkids who need you here on Mathilde. Anyway, the
Uhuru
would be toothless without you in the Combat Module. And Akemi, your Belter Academy students would miss you. And I would miss your
katana
blade.” He looked to Archibald. “Physicist, is this shield thing possible? And is this Isolation Globe just a version of the weapons shield?”

The man who had invented the Higgs Disruptor that could disintegrate all matter it contacted, and who had worked with Max to reverse-engineer the Alcubierre stardrive pedestal they had salvaged from the first Alien ship to contact humanity, frowned thoughtfully.

“This shield cannot be a function of the electromagnetic spectrum nor something subatomic,” the middle-aged Brit said. He reached up and pushed back a shock of unruly reddish-brown hair. “For this shield to resist all forms of directed energy weapons and all solid matter weaponry means it is something else. What, I don’t know.” Archibald smiled at Jack. “Take me with you to Tau Ceti so I can see this shield in action. My guess is this Arbitor will give you a demo of it since this is the first time it has dealt with humanity. This T-rex Alien surely knows a new predator species will only believe a threat that is real, versus theoretical. As for the Isolation Globe, I don’t know. But if we can figure out a way to kill this shield, then no Arbitor ship will ever make it into Sol system to put such a device next to the Sun.”

Jack planned to do just that. The trip to Tau Ceti was as much a trip to gain covert intelligence as it was a trip to lie to this Alien. Or to talk it into believing his contact with juvenile species Aliens did comply with the Rules of Engagement. He looked around the table. “Other thoughts? Worries? Suggestions?”

“Me,” said Cassandra.

Jack focused on the narrow face and hazel eyes of his younger sister Cassie. Who had pulled her thick black hair into a topknot similar to how Denise had arranged her own thick red hair. “Yes?”

“This Arbitor ship arrived four months after we killed the Boolean ship captain,” she said thoughtfully. “That tells me the T-rex dino heard the FTL neutrino complaint when it was 480 light years distant from Tau Ceti.” She fixed on his lifemate. “Nikola, can you project that star holo you got from the Nasen? So we can see what Hunters of the Great Dark exist at that distance? It seems to me that these Arbitor people may be a listed Hunt predator, but they refuse to admit they are species X or Y. After all, my Spy side tells me it makes sense for these Arbitors to fly under a false flag identity.”

“Yes I can,” Nikola said from Jack’s left. She pulled out her yellow datapad and pointed it at the center of the table. A person-high holo took form. The base of the holo linked to Sagittarius-Carina Arm while the top ended in the darkness between Sagittarius and Perseus arms. Within it shone millions of stars in a rainbow of colors. Globular clusters were distinct, as were nebulas like the Orion Nebula. Sol blinked one-fourth the way up the holo, which covered the 8,000 light year length of the Orion Arm. The holo imagery now moved inward so they could see the stars lying closer to Sol. “I’ve adjusted the projection to show just those stars lying within a 500 light year radius of Sol and Tau Ceti. Which makes for a thousand light year expanse in this new holo image.”

Jack saw so many stars even in this limited area that the holo resembled a tornado of stars. But there was black space between them. Hunter systems numbered 27 out of the 113 in the arm. Juvenile star systems looked to be in the thousands. Subject people systems were in the hundreds. All of them were marked by coded colors. “Chief Astronomer, can you remind us what the color IDs mean?”

“Sure.” Nikola gave him a smile, then gestured at the starry holo. “Predator stars are purple and marked by a black claw. Subject people stars show a blood-red slash. Juvenile people stars carry a yellow bar. The Nasen star Zeta Serpentis glows white. The HikHikSot star Delta Boötis B glows blue. Sol is blinking yellow. And the Hunt territory boundaries are purple.” She leaned forward, squinting. “Of the 27 Hunter stars showing, I see only two that lie close to the 480 light year boundary.”

Cassie nodded eagerly. “What are the names of those two systems? And their exact distance from Sol?”

Nikola looked down at her datapad’s screen. “The Hunter system that lies uparm from Sol belongs to the species named Dakto, while the downarm system is the home of the Usulungun species. There is no species imagery for any Hunter system. Though we can be sure these two Hunter peoples are social carnivore predators, like the Hunters we’ve fought.”

“Distances?” Jack reminded her.

She brushed back her brown bangs and squinted down at the datapad. “The Dakto Hunt star lies 489 light years from Sol, while the Usulungun Hunt star is 478 light years from Sol.” Nikola fixed pale blue eyes on him. “Jack, this is the best I can get from this holo data.”

He gave her a thumbs-up. “You did fine, just fine.” Jack scanned the Hunt territory stars and boundary for each species. “The Dakto Hunters control only nine subject people stars, while the Usulungun Hunters control 23 stars. Plus their star is closer to the center of Orion Arm.” He fixed on his Spy sister. “Cassie, you think one of these two Hunt stars is the home for the Arbitors?”

She raised both hands in a Who Knows? gesture. “Hard to say. If we accept the 3,000 year age for this Hunters of the Great Dark system, then it makes sense the oldest members might be in the center of Orion Arm. With a large number of subject people stars under their control. Like these Usulungun carnivores. But it could be either species.”

“Or neither species,” said Gareth from his seat next to Maureen. The trim, broad-shouldered man looked around. “My friends, my combat allies, it could be this Arbitor ship was tending to a dispute at a distance of 480 light years. Its home system could be anywhere in Orion Arm. Especially if multiple Arbitor ships are roaming through space, on the alert to respond to dispute calls.” The black-bearded Welshman looked to Jack. “Fleet Captain, I’m sorry. But there are many unknowns and few facts about this Arbitor threat.”

Behind Jack the Asian crewwoman entered with a large carton of booze. When she pulled out a bottle of Europa Light Ale, he reached out for it, beating Nikola by a few milliseconds. “Mine!”

“Of course.” The woman handed him the bottle, then walked down to Hideyoshi. “Fleet Admiral, please take charge of allocating who among your guests receives which liquid refreshment.”

They all laughed at the woman’s pleading tone.

Jack popped the cap off the bottle, inhaled the aroma of hops, and took a long drink of the brew. Licking his lips, he looked around the table. “People, I do not pretend to have all the answers to something this serious. Just some hunches. And a determination to resist this Arbitor. Anybody else?”

“I do. An observation I mean,” said Zhāng, whose destroyer
Admiral Chester M. Nimitz
was holding station in open space near the tunnel entry to the Dock Cavern. The middle-aged captain, who had fought well in their second star venture, was dressed in the red uniform of Hideyoshi’s Mars fleet. She fixed black eyes on him. “Fleet Captain Jack, if this Arbitor threat is real, and its ship as powerful as these Nasen say, then we must look at the possibility of failure.”

“Shit no!” yelled Maureen, lifting a clenched fist.

Jack gripped Maureen’s left hand. “Patience, Combat Commander. Let us hear what Fleet Commander Zhāng has to say.”

The Belfast native gave him a sour look, pulled her hand from his with an abrupt jerk and scowled at Gareth when he tried to hold her other hand. “Talk. Then we kill the bastards!”

Zhāng looked around the table, her manner professionally calm, drawing in the attention of everyone. “Our three fleets have won every space battle to date and we have defeated every Hunter of the Great Dark who has challenged us, or who controlled a star system we chose to liberate. Thanks to the leadership of Fleet Captain Jack, Fleet Admiral Hideyoshi and the wondrous weapons of Professor Archibald and Engineer Max. But . . . ” she grimaced. “But any combat veteran will tell you that past successes do not guarantee future success.” Zhāng fixed on Maureen. “Combat Commander, I respect your battle experience from the First Belter Rebellion and your fighting achievements since then. But I ask my failure question for a specific reason.” The Chinese woman fixed on Jack. “If we cannot defeat this Arbitor and his ship, and the Arbitor decides to surround Sol system with an Isolation Globe, then humanity must already have a colony ship on the way to a colony world at another star system. Just in case. In my opinion.”

Jack felt his body sweat despite the air cooling of the Admiral’s Mess. And the fast beating of his heart was not something he cared for. He nodded slowly. “Fleet Commander Zhāng, you make a good point. So. While my Belter fleet is heading out to Tau Ceti with the
Bismarck
and the
Dragon
, will you take the lead in convincing our friends on Mars, the Moon and in the outer solar system to begin construction of a colony ship? The Mathilde engineers can provide you with the fusion reactors, a grav-pull drive and the Alcubierre stardrive needed to move such a ship.”

“I can,” Zhāng said softly. “I will.”

“Good.” Jack fixed on the man who had led the Second Belter Fleet in the last interstellar trip. “Gareth, can your Vigdis take her ship
Hawk
out on a four month trip to this Dakto Hunter star? With two allies from the third Belter fleet that has been abuilding since our return?
Hawk
now has a Higgs Disruptor in addition to an antimatter beamer. She and a few allies could pose a threat to the home planet of these Hunters.
If
they are the T-rex dinos we saw in the Arbitor ship.”

“I’m willing,” said the Icelandic native.

“She can.” Gareth pulled at his full black beard, glanced hopefully at Maureen who continued to ignore him as she worked on a combat simulation using the datapad she carried everywhere, then fixed on Jack. “But what about the Usulungun people? They could be the home star of these Arbitors. Do we send some ships downarm to check them out?”