Galactic Axia Adventure 1: Escape to Destiny (25 page)

“Is it true?” Daren asked in disbelief.

“Yes, it’s true,” replied Robert with a grin, handing the legal title to the couple. RoseMary shrieked and she and Daren hugged each other in an embrace of joy. The room became noisy again as friends congratulated the couple about their new home. Two troopers hauled out a large wooden sign engraved with
The Sabeti Farm
and gave it to Daren and RoseMary.

Walking shakily with the help of friends, Daren returned to his chair in the living room. RoseMary sat on the arm, her right hand resting on her husband’s shoulder. Plates with pieces of cake, along with cups of punch helped liven the party. Daren and RoseMary answered a bombardment of questions about the farm and baby. Robert and Agnes held hands and watched the happy couple.

HasselFarm>gss.bv.er

Deagle>gss.3703.775.fwtb

Subject: title to the farm

Dear Son,

Daren came home from the hospital yesterday. The doctors attached the new cloned leg three weeks ago and he’s doing well. To their total surprise, when we got to the house, the troopers from his unit and several neighbors had a welcome home party waiting on them and presented them with the title to the farm. Of course, RoseMary knew about the party since it was at her house but not about the deed to the farm. You helped make a young couple very happy!

The escrow account the judge set up for you now contains the proceeds from the sale. It’s not as much as we’d hoped for, but with the interest it will draw over the next several years, it will give you a nice little nest-egg for when you do decide to settle down.

The bank will send the statements here unless you direct otherwise. Dad felt that it was better this way so you don’t have to lug around all the extra mail they tend to send.

Spring has finally arrived. In another week or so, the fields should be ready to plow and plant, and Dad is anxious to get started. I think being cooped up in the house so much is starting to wear on him.

We were excited to read about your interest and training in electronics. Jake suspected that you might be inclined that way. He said you really enjoyed the science museum on Mica, especially the computer wing. Although your training will help you gain an overall knowledge in many fields, having an area of expertise helps quite a bit.

Well, I better go for now. I can see Dad coming in from the field and he’s probably hungry. Take care and greet Stan for us.

Love, Mom and Dad

Delmar received the letter shortly after the unit came back from weapons training. There had been some limited training in fencing, and then they moved on to the other weapons.

Puzzled at first by the need for fencing, their instructor explained that using a blaster, for example, did take out your enemy but it also took out the ship wall behind him. Swords were preferable on ship because they didn’t damage the equipment. He remembered Jake Sender telling him the exact same thing months ago.

Training on the blaster and long-weapon (why they didn’t call it a long-blaster no one knew) was more fascinating. The trainees first received single hand-blasters altered to limit their power. A fully charged regular blaster could take out a wall and leave a deep crater, but the altered units could only leave scorch marks on the concrete targets. Delmar proved his accuracy to hit the target without undue power consumption.

The long-weapon was even more interesting. D.I. Buckner asked for two volunteers to step forward. He then lifted two long-weapons off the table, one in each hand and handed them to the volunteers. Unknown to the trainees, each weapon had a small built-in antigravity unit controlled by a simple switch. As he released the weapons, Buckner flicked off the switches. The weight of the weapons forced each trainee almost to the ground, much to the delight of the other trainees watching. D.I. Buckner then went to each and single-handedly picked the weapons back up, flicking the hidden switches again as he did. The two trainees looked at him in utter amazement. Then he laughed and showed them the trick. He explained that it was one way to make it harder for an enemy to take it away from you and use it against you.

The firepower of the long-weapon was many-fold that of the hand-blaster, and at a much greater range. It was most effective against fortified positions and low flying ships. Delmar enjoyed the feel of the long-weapon. It reminded him of a good game rifle but without serious kick. The targets on the range started at one hundred yards and went up from there. Delmar was able to master it quickly and qualified as marksman.

The weapons training was at the end of their fourth month of training. As he started writing an answer to the letter, Delmar found it hard to believe that it had been so long.

Chapter Nineteen

This training exercise was different from any of the others Delmar’s training flight had been on before. They were well past the basic portion or their training, the part where they learned to march, make their beds, and fold their clothes. Now their training had moved to where they were actively using live, full-strength weapons with the possibility of facing their actual enemy, the Red-tails. And although their instructors had taken every precaution to avoid contact with their enemy, anything was possible in space, thus the service’s policy that the only good weapon was a loaded one.

Delmar remembered his one and only encounter with a Red-tail, an experience he was in no hurry to repeat. He had told his friends in his training flight about the incident on the
Malibu
when they had come under attack while on their way to Mica. Only a few of the other men had ever seen a Red-tail and they all agreed they’d rather not encounter any ever again.

Although Delmar’s flight had been on several training missions since starting their advanced training, this trip was a live-fire exercise that would carry the Alpha squad of Delmar’s training flight 775 of the 3703 Training Squadron to a moon base only a day from Freewater. Beta, Delta and Gamma squads were also on the exercise, but Alpha would be the aggressor this time. Their instructions were to think of and refer to the other squads as the enemy. Their mission, to seek out and destroy an enemy communications relay station on the second moon of the planet Melanor. Beta, Delta and Gamma would defend under the command of D.I. Buckner.

D.I.A. Stoddard led Alpha squad. Delmar believed Stoddard could handle himself in a combat situation. He knew his equipment and his men, and was technologically sound. Delmar had learned that Stoddard was actually a combat veteran, having served in almost a dozen Red-tail incursion campaigns before becoming a training instructor. Delmar felt safe in his hands.

The ship Alpha squad was on was ancient, which meant it was almost a hundred years old, well past retirement age for most military transports. Noise reduction dampeners were never installed on this ship because it was originally used as a cargo transport, so the whine of the ship’s drive could be heard even through the ship’s repulsion field. The seating on the ship was nothing more than canvas web strapping attached to the bulkheads, not the comfortable seating enjoyed by the other squads in their ship.

It didn’t take long for Delmar to realize that service with the troopers didn’t always promise comfort. The most uncomfortable aspect of the seating arrangement was the shoulder strap that chafed unmercifully at his neck.

Another aspect of irritation for Delmar was the fact that his friend, Stan Shane, had been transferred to the Gamma squad and assigned the task of systems analyst, which meant he would be monitoring the enemy squad’s communications network. Delmar cringed at the thought of having to try to get past Stan. He knew Stan was an expert computer analyst and had even been called on at the training school to debug the school’s computer system and workbenches. Getting past him was going to be very difficult, if not impossible.

The ancient transport made its way into the Melanor system. The pilot set his directional controls toward the second moon. Their landing zone would be in the northern hemisphere where they would set up camp. The communications array being protected by the enemy squads was in the southern hemisphere, which meant Alpha would have to fly shuttlecraft or low-gravity flitters to reach their target.
That’s one thing about being the aggressor
, Delmar thought.
Someone is always watching out for you.

After the pilot made his announcement for all trainees to remain strapped in, he started his decent into the moon’s limited atmosphere. Delmar could hear the rush of the atmosphere against the outer hull of the large transport. He knew the ship’s repulsion field would keep them from overheating, but just the thought that only a layer of hull plating separated them from two thousand degrees of friction heat was unsettling to Delmar and the Alpha squad.

After what seemed forever, the friction noise ended and everything became silent. With exception to the firing of the retro rockets, the great transport settled down onto the moon’s soft surface.

In the southern hemisphere, Stan Shane monitored the communications array the Gamma squad was tasked to defend. Beta through Gamma had already been on the surface for two days. And although the moon had limited gravity and atmosphere, Stan was growing tired of the supplemental oxygen mask he was required to wear.

Well,
he thought,
at least they didn’t make us wear the whole suit.

When Stan had taken over the duties of communications analyst, he was amazed at the condition of the comm equipment. He doubted if any of the systems had undergone any kind of an upgrade for a least a decade, maybe two. The monitors were still green screen, not even color, and the keyboards were the heavy strike-key models instead of the easy-touch pads common in any elementary school. What was worse, none of the systems had voice responsive command functions, which greatly limited their usefulness in case of an enemy attack.

Stan went to work upgrading the systems. First, he installed voice responsive command functions, which required replacing the motherboards on over a dozen systems. This upgrade did not set well with their supply officer since it required requisitioning every motherboard except one out of their War Readiness Spares Kits (WRSK).

Next came the upgrade on the incoming tracking arrays. Stan discovered the arrays were completely out of alignment. He figured in their present condition he couldn’t have monitored a fleet of invading Red-tail ships if he could have seen them out the window. And if he knew Delmar and the other guys in Alpha squad, especially D.I.A. Stoddard, they would be working on some way to counter any precautions he would set up to ward them off.

Stan pried open the panel on one of the ancient consoles and looked inside.
How could Axia equipment have gotten into this kind of shape?
He ran his fingers along the solid-state circuitry and could feel gaps in the circuits and components removed. He doubted if this equipment could intercept a clear signal from any kind of enemy transmission in this condition.

Next came the antenna array itself. The first thing Stan noticed was that it listed sharply to one side, completely out of alignment with the poles of the planet.
It’s a good thing this is just an exercise
, he thought.
I wouldn’t want to depend on this thing in an actual combat situation.

Using the equipment available to him from their transport ship, and calling on every member of Beta, Delta, and Gamma squads, Stan was able to realign the communications array. At the objections of the transport captain and the supply officer, Stan even requisitioned every spare bedsprings rod from the limited WRSK to create an amplified transponder array. This, he hoped, would give them a fifteen-minute warning in case of enemy attack. D.I. Buckner didn’t understand Shane’s theory, but he assumed it would work. After all, he had saved several workbenches at the school from the salvage after systems crashes.
Improvise, adapt, overcome,
he thought.

Stan looked at the chronometer on the console and realized that he had been working for fifteen straight hours without a break. He stood up, stretched his aching back, and tried to rub the soreness out of his hips and legs.
This is going to be a long exercise,
he thought.

“Another hour ought to do it,” he muttered to himself. “Then it’s chow and some shut-eye.” Two hours later, he crawled back out from under the communications console.

“Give it a try,” he instructed Trooper Trainee Thomas Bigga. Bigga, or Big’un as everyone called him, was the largest man in Flight 775. Buckner had assigned Big’un to work with Stan on the communications array, but the truth was, Big’un wasn’t very technically adept. Stan figured Big’un would end up in the infantry where he would carry large weapons into combat against the Red-tails.

Big’un pressed a series of buttons on the console. Lights on the panel began to blink and Big’un heard a fan rumble and begin to whirl. He stepped back away from the console. Stan stood up and examined the console.

“Looks good,” he said. “Now if you’d be kind enough to call us a taxi, we’ll go get something to eat,” he kidded Big’un.

Big’un suddenly reached out, grabbed Stan around his waist, hefted him up over his head, and laid him across his shoulders.

“You wanna ride, hotshot?” he said. “You got it!”

With absolutely no effort at all, Big’un ran with Stan on his shoulders across the compound. The limited gravity of the moon created extra long strides for the large man, allowing him to leap twenty feet at a time through the air with Stan laughing and yelling all the way. In only a moment, the two men were in line at the mess tent. Stan didn’t realize how hungry he really was. Big’un had no misconceptions whatsoever.

Back at Alpha camp, Delmar and several of the other members of the aggressor squad were busy preparing for their attack on the communications array.

“You don’t understand,” Delmar emphasized to the group. “I know the report says that relay station is defunct, but Stan Shane has been there for two days. I promise you he’s had time to fix it.”