Valkyrie Part 2

 

Bob Cole

 Sometimes a plan works, preparation helps. The Tuyani had 128 ships in their typical orbit, and our Frigates made quick work of them. They truly had no defence, I almost felt bad, but they were trying to slow Humanity down, and we can’t have that.

 I wanted to head to the cloud and finish the job, but Kit would have none of it. Not enough payoff, he says, but if the Tuyani get their way, we will be trapped in the Sol system for good, and I wasn’t ready to let that happen.

 We spent the next several weeks lassoing rocks and slinging them inward, a quite uneventful time, crews happy, bonuses on the way, there was a bit to do yet, but we would be back at L5 in a few weeks. That was when the sideband alert woke us up, it was Seamus, calling for a meeting with Kit and I, great, what now?

Seamus

 “Gentlemen, thank you for your time, I’m happy for your fortune, and wish you continued success. Now, I’ll knock off the B.S. and come to the question, what about them space buggers in the Cloud? We know they can be killed, we know their Weapon doesn’t work, let’s just be rid of them and take the cloud back, it belongs to humans, not some robotic space trash.”

 As Bob and I sat on my bridge, bemused, as we listened while Seamus went to work immediately on attack plans against the Tuyani, very unorthodox, but it would work well, if it worked at all.

The mining ships left immediately, with 2 cruisers in stealth, high speed direct, toward our claims in the cloud, as we prepped for something new. 

The Dark

The Dark

 It’s said that no one who enters the Dark ever returns, but I’m not superstitious, why can’t we fly below the plane of the ecliptic? 

Seamus hit the nail on the head, “it’s because no one ever looks down lad”  I was reminded of an ancient map of the first world Earth, and on it was a great Sea and that read, “Here Be Monsters”, was that our fate? 

 The JR and Valkyrie spun up and set off, down below,we should beat the miners by several weeks, and do a bit of recon when we arrive.

 As we anhyzered below and dropped up towards T prime, I called for a meeting, I had an idea.

  It was time for Seamus on the sideband, “Good God Kit! Is that a Persian whorehouse?” 

I had some time to decorate my Stateroom a bit, all 24 karat gold plate and mirrors everywhere, Blue carpet, very classy, he was unimpressed.

 “Get on with it KIt” Uncle Bob wasn’t happy with me right about now, but I had an idea.

Bob, do you think you can lasso one or 2 of the Tuyani ships and bring them on board? I want to examine one of their ships and see what makes them tick, there’s way more to this than they are telling us.

Arrival

Son of the Cat, why are you here? We see your Miners are busy with their claims, and that is by contract, but why You,here,Now?

“I presume I am speaking to #1 And I say this, we came to erase you from our System, give me a reason not to,”

 What I got was more than I could ask for.

You see that we are defenseless before your power, our Weapon has failed us, and we are at your mercy, what do you require of us?  “ I want one of you to come with us for further consultation” That was the best way I could put it, “the option is obliteration, you have 5 minutes”

 Bob, you got this? “ Aye Kit, targets are locked, for some reason they can’t sense beyond the plane of the ecliptic, odd that” So we opened up our cargo bay doors as not one but two Tuyani vessels landed inside, rather unexpectedly, but we hatched the doors and pressurized.

Greys

 A small hatch appeared on the Tuyani craft, I certainly wouldn’t call them ships, and an orb came from each, and they resolved into what we might call beings. Thin and grey, with oversized heads, Bob immediately remembered from our history books, Greys! They were a 20c phenomena that they never figured out, and now we have. “ We were right!” Bob yelled and then carried on like a howler monkey, “You watched us, you abducted us, experimented with our entire PLANET!”

Enough! As you were Mr. Cole!  Bob was a bit shaken and the greys looked a bit greyer than at first, fear? I asked them to sit at our conference table, and they nervously obliged. To use an old expression, our minds were about to be blown.

Conversation

I am Whan, this is XO zhou, and you are a spawn of the great Cat are you not? Greetings!

If I may, I will have my XO show you around our ships, and we offer our entire database to you, and yes you will understand it, after all you speak Our Language. Zhou was escorted to the ships by Patton from engineering and Baby Tresmoine, a tech guy with an enormous head, and we began.

  “Wait, we speak Your Language? What does that even mean? We all speak Binary,”

True, however it was the Tuyani that helped form what you call the English language, we noticed that you weren’t very efficient at communications, so we hurried you along, you call it a kick in the seat. Prior to that, we developed your species to be hardier, more intelligent and prepared you for your journey to the stars. So Bob was correct, they had been here all along, nudging us onward, I was reminded of Jon Titor and his early time travels, the world laughed when they learned he was real, but I digress.

We bought your contract some 1200 earth cycles ago, with the understanding we would bring you to the stars without issue. At this point in time it seems our experiment has failed, with all that that entails.

 Bought a Contract? What the hell does that mean!? It’s quite simple Kit, we own your System. Because of our failure, we are forced to sell the rights to a salvage company, the Kel-Ven group. They specialize in system cleanup, they will arrive within 6 months, your system is doomed, you have time to escape, use it wisely. They much prefer the easy way, with minimal loss of life, but they will only wait so long.

It was then that not only were our guests gone, but the entire Yutani force was just, gone.

 The anomalies  were all still on station, but the Yutani had completely bugged out. Kel-Ven eh? I guess we have six months to prepare, but for what? I asked Mr. Cole to finish up the mining here, and we burned for Mars, we had work to do.

To be continued

 

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