STAR BLAZERS: A VOYAGE TO REMEMBER
A fanfic recapitulation of Series One “The Quest for Iscandar” by
Frederick P. Kopetz
EPISODE THIRTEEN: IN THE REALM OF PLUTO
October 13, 2199
(Big Thanks to “Bells of Nevermore” and “DTill359” for some beta-reading and some ideas and rough writing for this chapter)
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Two of her nurses and two medics were with her; namely, Ensign Jalissa Garvey and Ensign Zhang Li Cheng, along with Father Likanski, manning his battle station as a medic along with a Chief Philip Garland.
“How’s Sergeant Rosstowski doing?” asked Zhang.
Paul, who had been on station in one of the nearby gun houses, moaned as he lay on the deck on a mat while Denise worked a piece of shrapnel from out of his arm. “He’ll be okay!” snapped Carroway, wiping her brow under her helmet with exhaustion as she closed up some blood vessels and gave Rosstowski another local shot of Demerol to reduce the pain. “I’m closing up now and putting some plastiskin over the wound. Father, get him to the walking wounded area.”
“Yes, Doctor,” said Father Likanski.
“What about Harajima over there?” said Jalissa as she came up.
“Make him comfortable. I can’t do a lot for him…both his legs are messed up and he’s bleeding out too fast,” whispered Denise.
“Yes, Doctor,” sighed Jalissa.
“What about the battle?” said Ensign Li Cheng. “Doctor, I could swear we’re upside down.”
“We are,” said Carroway sadly.
Then, on the ship’s 1MC, a voice came over the system. “Attention, all hands, attention, all hands! Control of the ship has been transferred to Bridge Number Three! I have the conn for now, and I am awaiting the arrival of the rest of the bridge crew. Stand fast and continue to work on repairing damage!”
“Damn, that sounds like Nova,” moaned Rosstowski.
“It is,” said Carroway. “She’s a smart kid. One of these days, she might even make a good Captain in her own right. If we survive this mission, that is…”
“We’re going to make it,” said Father Likanski.
“Not all of us,” sighed Doctor Carroway.
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On Pluto, Colonel Ganz laughed. “What a lovely sight, that ship helpless and upside down.”
“Congratulations, Colonel Ganz. You have completed our objective,” Bane said with a smile on his face.
“Almost,” he said. “The Star Force is helpless. Now send in the submarines! They will destroy the Argo forever!”
“Aye, aye, sir,” said Bane.
The submarines left their pens and began to roar through the cold liquid nitrogen sea towards the Argo.
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TEN MINUTES LATER…
Bridge Number Three, the Argo’s Auxiliary CIC (Combat Information Center) at the keel of the ship, was usually an auxiliary station lightly manned; one reserve weapons officer, one reserve helmsman, and one Second Officer of the Deck, in command. They were usually at the ready down here during exercises or watch-standing.
This time, it was for real. Pending the arrival of the rest of the bridge crew, for the moment, Tactical was under the command of a young brown-haired Combat Group Ensign with a crewcut named Robert Turner. At the helm, Ensign Natalie Fisher.
At the Command station, scanning the area while standing and looking through a periscope, was Nova, the actual Officer of the Deck, and acting commander of the whole ship until Avatar and his crew arrived.
“What are you picking up, ma’am?” said Turner.
“A diffuse image; I don’t know yet if it’s a thermal in the sea, or an actual set of bandits,” Nova said. “This tachyon periscope doesn’t have the resolution of our Cosmo Radar.” Nova threw on a set of headphones. “Picking up some kind of sound on sonar…I think something artificial is approaching.”
“Keep your eyes peeled, Natalie,” Robert said.
“I would if you’d get your hand off my leg,” Natalie teased.
“You didn’t mind when I had my hand on your leg last night in your cabin,” Robert said with a wink.
“This is duty. It’s different,” Natalie said.
“Ladies and gentlemen, you’re supposed to be on watch!” Nova warned.
“What if you were down here with your good friend Derek?” Robert teased.
“Immaterial…” Nova said. “And that blip is dividing. Something is coming! I don’t know yet if they’re torpedoes or submarines! Down Periscope! I need a good look at this on main plot; hope this works,” Nova said as she closed the periscope and sat down after sending sensor input to the main screen.
“The Gamilons ruin everything,” grunted Turner.
Then, the bridge doors whizzed open. Captain Avatar and the rest of the bridge crew arrived as Nova tore off her headset.
“Speak of the devil,” Robert muttered. “Mister Wildstar, I stand relieved!” he barked as Derek took over.
“Stay there, Turner, I have an idea,” Derek said. “Nova, what’s coming?” he barked.
Nova had put the blips up on the main screen in the meantime. “Wildstar! Captain Avatar! Objects approaching the ship! Twelve bandits!”
“Are they submarines or torpedoes, Lieutenant?” Avatar said.
“They look like submarines, sir. Sonar signature is consistent with large engines!”
“Miss
Smarty Pants does it again,” Natalie whispered as Venture relieved her at the
helm.
“Is this a warship or a high school?” said Venture.
Captain Avatar cleared his throat.
Derek said, “Captain, we can’t sit and wait like this! Requesting permission to assemble a special attack group to find and attack the Gamilon base.”
“Permission granted, Wildstar,” Avatar said.
“I need backup!” Derek barked. He spoke into a comm unit. “Conroy, IQ-9, Lance, Kato. Meet me at the forward lower bay for the recon boat.”
Nova ran off a printout. “Derek, here’s a map of Pluto. The probable location of the base is within the red circle.”
“Thank you,” he said. He saluted Avatar and left.
Avatar spoke into an intercom. “Sandor, how’s the repair work going?”
“We will need about seven or eight hours before it’ll be safe to get underway again,” he said.
“Right now, Wildstar needs you,” Avatar said. “He’s going out to attack the Gamilon Base and Reflex Gun.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll join the attack party,” Sandor replied.
A few minutes passed. “Jet recon boat ready to launch,” said Homer.
“Tell them to launch,” Avatar said.
“Yessir.”
The boat launched.
“Gamilon submarines in attack range!” said Eager.
“Dash, fire a spread of torpedoes!”
“Torpedoes…FIRE!” he snapped.
“Venture, return the ship to normal position.”
“Yessir,” he said. “Blowing main tanks, gyro activated…”
The Argo began to turn about as the bridge crew on Bridge Number Three changed position to their opposite stations, which had been on the overhead a moment ago. Homer grunted a little as he grabbed a hand-hold, but Nova assisted him, handling the change in position well.
“All hands, prepare for undersea battle!” barked Captain Avatar.
The first and second spread of torpedoes from the Argo hit the Gamilon subs.
The Argo was smoking from a hit, but was no longer playing possum.
“WHAT?” barked Colonel Ganz. “The Star Force still lives?!? That’s impossible! We already told Leader Desslok we destroyed them!” Ganz took a pointer and broke it in half. “Bane, hit them hard! Finish them off. Smash the Argo!” he snapped.
The battle continued. Two more Gamilon torpedoes smashed into the Argo even as her third wave of torpedoes demolished more Gamilon subs.
Royster had taken Sandor’s place at science after he had left. “Uh…we’re…we’re in deep trouble. The main life support catalyzer and tanks were just hit! Until we can get them back on line, we have to use the reserve units.”
Nova looked stricken. “Captain, do we need to get into environmental suits?”
“Not yet,” said Avatar. “We have three hours’ worth of reserve oxygen, and we can generate just enough submerged to maintain combat readiness for three hours at a major power drain.”
“It would be easier if we could surface and catalyze the methane and grab free…oxygen from the atmosphere,” Royster said. He was sweating and shaking…close to losing it…but he ground his teeth and kept going…for now…
“Homer, contact Wildstar,” said Avatar. “Advise him we have a time factor; he has three hours to locate and destroy the Gamilon base.”
“Yessir,” he said.
“All hands…we will return to Bridge Number One in ten minutes. Nova, you will again have the conn for that time period. Meet us up there.”
“Yessir,” she said as Avatar and the others left.
She took a deep breath and said, “Reserve crew, back to the Third Bridge.”
She then shut her eyes and thought, Lord, You need to be with us now. Please protect us. And protect Derek and the party. I think I’m starting to like him…
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In
the Jet Recon Boat, which was now skimming across the ice on Pluto, Sandor
said, “The Reflex Gun must be under the ice since we haven’t seen anything on
our radar.”
Up front, Conroy said, “Yeah! We copy. Over.”
“What’s going on?” said Wildstar.
“The Argo reports damage to the main life support catalyzer. Running on reserve. Oxygen supply is running out.”
“What…the?” said Lance.
“We’re in a mess,” Kato said.
“Captain Avatar reported if we don’t find and attack the Reflex Gun in three hours, they will have to surface and make a full last-ditch attempt to attack while trying to regenerate atmosphere with the reserve units!” Conroy snapped.
“Sandor, we have got to find that gun!” Derek said.
“If the reflex gun is under the ice, it has to have a ventilation system,” Sandor mused. “If we can find that, we can find the gun. Are we on course?”
“I think we’re off course,” Derek said.
“Say WHAT?” snapped Lance.
“He’s right. The compass isn’t working right, and there’s no visual cues on this ice field,” Conroy said. “That circle Nova marked off still covers a lot of territory, and we’re right in the middle of it…”
On the Argo, the whole primary bridge crew was back on the First Bridge, Nova being the last arrival.
Homer received a hail. “Message from the landing party, Captain. Searching for the Reflex Gun but the land surface of Pluto is confusing. We’re lost!”
Lord, please aid us now, Avatar thought as he said, “Venture, surface the ship!”
“Captain…that’s…” Venture said.
“Let’s allow the Gamilons to fire that gun again. They will if we make ourselves a target. Then the landing party can see it!” Captain Avatar said.
“That’s dangerous, sir,” said Hollingsworth from Sandor’s post. “We’re trying to repair the main life support systems. If they hit the reserve units…”
“I agree with him, sir,” Nova said. “If they hit us again with that weapon…we’re finished.”
“Listen, Nova,” said Avatar. “I want you to carefully note the position of the reflex satellite wings before they fire. We can triangulate the gun’s position from that, and it’ll let us know when to submerge.”
“Yessir,” Nova said.
The Argo thus began to surface.
Colonel Ganz was thinking of his daughter and the past when Bane yelled, “Sir! The Argo just surfaced!”
“They’re insane!” he barked. “They must want us to attack them!”
“Colonel, should we fire the Reflex Gun?”
“Of course, you idiot!” snapped Ganz.
At her radar, Nova watched a scan of the nearby reflector satellite. “Captain! The Reflection plates are opening! Seventy-degree angle!”
“SUBMERGE!” barked Captain Avatar.
Venture worked the controls and the Argo submerged right before the beam hit the liquid methane and its energy dissipated in the cold liquid.
Nova ran some trig calculations at her post. “Side C leg distance, 159.26 kilometers. The location of the reflex gun is in a 1 square kilometer block at AF3-102 true on the grid!”
“Homer, notify Wildstar! Dash, fire missiles at AF3-102!”
“Roger,” said both men.
The
ship’s smokestack missiles fired.
They hit true near the Gamilon Base.
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Inside the base, there was chaos.
“Location Five Crew’s Barracks hit!” said a voice over the PA system in the Command Center.
“Enlisted Mess hit! Estimate thirty-two dead!”
“Radiation Levels Past Tolerance Limit! The Terron ship just used tactical nuclear weapons on us! ARRRRRGH!” yelled a voice as there was an explosion.
“They’re aiming right at this station!” squeaked Bane.
Ganz took a glass in his hand and threw it against a bulkhead. “Send the bombers! Order them to use enough mines to blow the Argo out of the damned water!”
“First hangar hit!” said a voice over the PA “Launching from Hangar Number Two. Liquid Methane pouring in…we…”
The devastation continued and then stopped.
As the Jet Recon Boat cruised along, IQ-9 said, “Look at those bright flashes of light!”
Sandor looked out. “Those are missiles from the Argo hitting over that ridge. Now we know where the reflex gun is. Conroy, steer in that direction!”
“Roger,” he said.
The Jet Recon boat finally had a star to steer by as it made a turn and began to go around the ice ridge.
The boat finally stopped.
The landing party got out to look around.
Derek said, “That reflex gun has to be around here somewhere!”
“We need to find it soon,” Sandor said. “If we don’t…we’ll never get away from Pluto.”
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The Gamilon planes Ganz had launched flew over the Argo’s location and dropped their depth charges.
The Argo’s First bridge shook from the depth charges.
Dash grabbed his console to keep from taking a header into it.
Nova did likewise, crying out as she grabbed the footplates under her post hard with her booted feet.
Homer said, “Captain, report from the landing party. They report that they have landed near the general area of the reflex gun…and they are searching for it. Sandor suggests…”
“I think I know what he’s thinking,” Avatar said, cutting Homer off. “Venture, let’s surface and make ourselves a target again.”
“Yessir,” he said.
The Argo again surfaced in this deadly game of hide and seek.
In the Base Command Center, Bane said, “Sir! They’ve surfaced again.”
“Recall the bombers; and prepare the satellites for another firing of the reflex gun, Bane,” said Ganz. “I want that ship destroyed and I want to collect Terron corpses!”
“Yessir,” said Bane.
The reflection satellites received new commands, and the reflex gun fired yet again.
A moment later, the landing party saw a blast of energy roaring up from the ice.
“Look at that!” said Kato.
“That’s where the reflex gun is,” Sandor said.
“Four klicks away, Sandor,” said Wildstar. “We can be there in no time!”
“Let’s do it,” Conroy said.
The landing party hopped back into the Jet Recon Boat.
Derek patted the side of the fuselage of the Jet Recon Boat before getting back in. “You’ve done a good job, old girl,” he said. “You just need to get us a little further.”
Unknown to him, he would be making use of the same Jet Recon Boat almost two years and two months later, flying her himself with a crew of one on a December day…on the way to a honeymoon on Earth in a much warmer place than Pluto; a Caribbean Island, as a matter of fact.
At that, the Jet Recon Boat cruised on.
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On the Argo, Nova needed a few minutes alone to attend to some personal needs in the women’s head two decks below the First Bridge.
She was slightly tired, and she splashed her face with lukewarm water at the sink. I look pale, she thought as she looked at herself in the mirror. The air must be getting less oxygenated.
The young woman stretched, and then noticed the ring on her hand was growing warm.
“Hullo? What’s this?” she said out loud.
She looked at the ring on her finger and gasped. It was glowing slightly.
“I know your situation,” said a gentle woman’s voice from the ring. “You cannot lose heart. Trust in the Almighty, and trust in me and in your mission…”
“Who
are you?” Nova said softly, convinced she would be forced to go to Sickbay as a
psych case if anyone caught her…talking to a ring?
“You heard my voice before, honored lady. I am Starsha, of Iscandar,” replied the voice from the ring.
“You’re Queen Starsha? My name is…”
“Your name is not important now, Miss. Your aura is unique. You shine almost as brightly as Captain Avatar, but you are so much younger. You are indeed uniquely blessed.”
“Queen Starsha, do you have any foresight? Do we make it?”
“Like so many of the young, I see you are very impatient and impetuous, little one, just like your dear young angry male friend aboard ship,” Starsha said. “The future is always in motion. Foretelling is difficult unless we receive prophecy from He Who is above all. Yet I foresee if you and yours survive this quest, you shall one day have far more knowledge of foretelling than I. Be cautious, and do not lose heart. Trust in Him. Return to your duties now, Miss. I am Starsha of Iscandar. I look forward to meeting you.”
“Starsha…” Nova said quietly. She smiled, and thanked God in silent prayer, and then returned to her post, reflecting a little on how weird this was.
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In the Operations Room of the Gamilon Base, an officer snapped, “The Argo is submerging again!”
“The Argo is maneuvering very strangely,” said Colonel Ganz. “It looks as if they are deliberately drawing our fire!”
“Are they suicidal?” said Bane. “Maybe they know they’re beaten and they want us to kill them?”
“I don’t think that’s it, Bane!” Ganz snapped. “That Avatar must be smarter than that. Why is he deliberately making his ship into a target?”
_________________________
The landing party stopped near an ice cliff on Pluto.
There were three huge vents of Gamilon design sticking out of the ice.
The men and robot stepped out.
Then, Wildstar saw movement at the bottom of the vents.
A
group of purple creatures with glowing orange eyes slithered out.
“What the heck are those?” whispered Lance.
Sandor looked.
Derek drew his sidearm. “Let’s blast those things!”
Sandor hit his arm. “Wait! Protozoans of Pluto. Indigenous lifeforms discovered decades ago. Those are why Captain Avatar didn’t want to use the wave motion gun here. Don’t kill them. Put them to sleep with gas.”
Lance and Kato ran back to the landing craft and got two small rifles with gas grenades.
They fired. The creatures were stunned and fell asleep.
Wildstar climbed up into one of the vents and was halfway covered by one of the creatures. “KATO!” he yelled.
Kato fired and stunned the creature.
“Ewww…” Derek said. “They feel like slippery grape gelatin!”
Lance quipped, “Remind your future wife never to make you grape Jell-O, Wildstar!”
“Point taken, Lance,” Derek said.
The landing party went down the tubes a few minutes later. The way was led by IQ-9 with a light glowing in his dome.
“They need these huge pipes because the Reflex Gun generates so much heat,” Sandor said.
“They’d better not fire it while we’re in here,” Conroy said. “We’ll go out faster than we came in.”
Then Wildstar slipped. “WHOOOA!”
He caught Conroy and Lance who slid down, too, yelling.
IQ-9 extended an arm. “Be careful. The traction coefficient is less than ten percent.”
“Now you tell us!” snorted Wildstar as they got up.
“Funny smell down here,” said Lance.
“Yeah, Fred, you’re telling me,” Derek said.
“Maybe Gamilon cooking smells weird,” Lance said. “Don’t those guys have big heads?”
“Nova and I saw one on Titan,” Derek said. “He had this mirrored visor on so we didn’t see his face, but their heads look the same size as ours.”
“He coulda been a robot,” said Kato.
“He didn’t sound like a robot,” Wildstar insisted.
Sandor banged on the bulkhead. “Sounds hollow here. IQ-9, can you cut through this metal?”
“I’ll use my laser cutter,” said the robot.
IQ-9 cut a hole through the bulkhead. The metal piece fell down into a room.
“What’s this place?” Derek said as they climbed down onto a platform and saw a lot of humming machinery.
“Must be a generator room,” Sandor replied.
They went down a ladder. “I’m getting that weird smell again,” said Lance.
“You and your nose,” said Conroy.
“Shut up, Pete,” said Lance.
“Be quiet and be careful, people!” said Sandor. “This place is a powder keg! They might hear us!”
“But we have to find the control room for that gun,” Wildstar commented. “We’d better keep an eye out. There might be guards.”
“Or surveillance cameras,” said IQ-9.
“Both, probably,” grunted Kato.
“Which way do we go?” Derek said.
“My gut tells me to go this way…” Sandor commented.
“Thanks, Steve,” Derek whispered.
“Anytime,” he replied.
They ran down a corridor two minutes later and ran into a door.
“What’s this, a dead end?” Derek said.
“Let’s break in,” Sandor said.
Derek fired with his sidearm.
The doors blew open and they saw a huge room.
“What’s this…a big empty space?” said Derek. He started to go ahead.
“Wait, Wildstar!” Sandor said.
“What?”
“A hunch,” said Sandor.
“You’re almost reminding me of Nova with her hunches,” said IQ-9.
“This is more than a hunch,” said Sandor.
He took his sidearm off his belt, drew it, and threw the holster into the room.
It sparked as it hit the floor and dissolved in flames.
“Booby-trap!” Derek snapped.
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On the Argo, in the meantime, Venture put his head down. “I feel weird.”
Nova said, “Captain Avatar, the oxygenation level of the air is getting low.”
Down in Sickbay, Doctor Sane had a number of patients with hypoxia. “What these fellows need is a month in the country. What I need is Denise or Nova to give me a hand down here. All the nurses are busy.” He called the First Bridge, “Captain, send some fresh air down here. Make it cool: about Twenty degrees Celsius or Sixty-Eight Fahrenheit!”
“Captain!” Nova cried. “We need to surface and suck in some methane to catalyze!”
“Hang on…we have thirty minutes,” Avatar said as he looked at his stopwatch.
After looking at his watch, Captain Avatar began to feel woozy. He saw double for a moment.
Then, he moved his wounded arm.
There was pain…severe pain.
“My God,” he whispered. He coughed loudly. “Nova, come aft for a moment.”
“Yessir,” she said, biting back more of the impatience she had betrayed a few minutes ago.
When she looked at the Captain…she gasped. She ran up to his post and said, “Sir, you look like death warmed over.”
“I need some Demerol and a glucose tablet,” he whispered. “You know where they are.”
Nova nodded, opening an access locker at his post. Trying not to let the others, who were very curious, see what was going on, she fed him two glucose tablets and gave him a shot in the arm through his peacoat, with her skills as a nurse-practitioner. She thought, If only we didn’t have this war and this crisis, I would be in my first year at Tokyo Imperial Medical School now with Doctor Denise Carroway as one of my professors, I think. They just sent me an acceptance a month before we cast off; had to decline since I was already part of the Yamato Project. Oh, well…maybe, someday…if we live through this, and save Earth…
Nova didn’t know it yet, but she would eventually enter Medical School nine years in the future in 2208 as part of the Class of 2212…after far more adventure and danger than she bargained for, of course.
“Are you going to be all right?” Nova whispered.
“I think so…in a few minutes,” Avatar said. “I’m heading to my cabin. The Lodge is in your charge for fifteen minutes. You know what I mean!”
“Shouldn’t Venture be doing that?”
“I need him at that helm,” Avatar gasped as he sat back in his chair. “Pull out the jump seat and use it.”
“Yessir. Let us know if you’ll be back on duty,” Nova said.
“I promise you I will be back,” Avatar said as he pushed the button on his chair and ascended up to his cabin. Nova set up a timer, undid the jump seat and said, “Guys, he’ll be fine. He’s just suffering a little from the lack of oxygen. He’ll be back in fifteen minutes. I have the conn. His orders.”
“Do you know what you’re doing?” said Dash.
“Dash, can it!” Nova snapped as she looked nervously at Avatar’s stopwatch. Twenty-eight minutes left. “I knew what I was doing three hours ago on the third bridge,” Nova said as she ate a glucose tablet herself.
“So, what are we doing, Nova?” said Mark.
“Hanging tight until the Captain gets back. If they attack us again, I’ve got this. Eager, take my radar until he’s back.”
“What if we have to abandon Wildstar and the party to get away?” Homer said.
Nova gritted her teeth. “I have faith Derek and Steve will pull through down there. They know what they’re doing.”
Probably way better than I do, Nova thought to herself.
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IQ-9 had extended his arm over the electrified floor, and hooked it to the opposite hatchway.
Wildstar was going hand over hand along the metallic flex cable over the electrified floor as the others watched. His boots tapped the floor twice, and there were sparks.
Then, Lance crossed, followed by Kato, and then by Conroy.
“Okay, looks like I’m the last,” Sandor said.
He crossed over, his boots tapping the floor three times, including a major touch. For some reason, the shock didn’t affect him, even though the others had momentarily-numbed legs when they crossed.
Finally, there was a long green corridor…and they could see the breech of the Reflex Gun.
The weapon was HUGE, maybe a little longer than one of the Argo’s main cannons, and it was fatter and shaped in a weird organic pattern.
“Let me get there first, Wildstar!” snapped Lance.
“Fred,
watch it!” Derek yelled.
Lance ran in…there was another booby-trap.
He was not only electrocuted with a scream, but burned to carbon.
His body fell smoking to the deck.
IQ-9 trundled in. “He’s dead, Sandor. No life signs.” Then, he put his arms and legs out and began to ground the current. “Everyone crawl under me fast!”
“IQ-9, it’s a good thing you are able to ground this with your circuits!” Derek said.
“Where the hell are the guards?” said Harold Kato as they ran into the room.
Then, laser fire skipped all around them.
“There’s the guards…YAAH!”
yelled Kato as he was hit and killed by enemy fire after he shot at some of the
guards. 
Conroy took cover behind a console covered with buttons with Sandor. “What does this Gamilon writing say?” he whispered.
“Local Defense System,” said Sandor as he flicked some switches as he fired at the enemy and Wildstar dropped and rolled after he fired three shots, helping Steve and Peter kill the remaining Gamilon guards. From the amount of blood coming from Kato’s body, he could tell that his shipmate was dead. “There,” Steve said. “I think I shut down those booby traps so we can get out. Wildstar, set your charges for twelve minutes!”
“Right,” he said as he assisted Sandor and Conroy in setting timed demolition charges.
“Wow! This is sure some big gun! Are you allowing enough time to bug out, sir?” said Conroy.
“Just enough,” Steve said. “Last one! Let’s get out of here, fellas! FAST!”
As they began to go back the way they had come, hoping the booby traps were turned off (they were), they could see and hear the Reflex Gun beginning to charge up for another firing.
They ran.
Fast.
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On the Argo, Avatar was back at his post and his stopwatch was ticking towards thirty minutes.
“Venture, surface the ship! Make ready to attack!”
“Captain, are we just writing Derek and Steve and the party off?” Nova cried.
“We may have to,” Avatar said. “Our time is running out along with our oxygen!”
“Bringing up auxiliary catalyzers,” said Hollingsworth from Science. “Trying to suck in all the gas we can!”
“Captain, we have many oxygen casualties on the aft decks below the guns!” Doctor Denise Carroway said over the 1MC. “We need air or we’re all dead! Father Likanski and Mister Cross are out cold!”
“I feel so…sick,” said Sparks in the engine room.
He
collapsed. Ensign Cory Ainsley picked him up. “Get me an air pack for
this guy! Fast! I have to get the engines running!” he said as he watched
Sparks, keeping mind of his EMT training while he began to power up controls.
The Argo came up from the sea again.
“Make ready to attack in three minutes!” said Captain Avatar.
“Yessir,” said Venture.
Nova put her face in her hands. And we’re allowing the whole party to die! Nova thought in grief. I’ll never see Steven again! He was my best physics professor and we went out together once and once only. Nor you, Derek…I was really starting to like you! You were a great friend! she thought as she brushed tears off her cheeks.
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In the Operations room of the Gamilon Base on Pluto, Bane reported, “Colonel Ganz; the Argo has surfaced, and she’s advancing at battle speed! Twenty-seven surface knots and picking up speed!”
“The Reflex Gun is charging: energy level ninety!” said another officer.
“Set satellite Number Two, Five Degrees!” said Bane.
“Wait, Bane,” said Ganz. “The Argo submerges every time they see a satellite opening up! Let’s finish them unawares! Use a different set of satellites!”
“YESSIR!”
Ganz pulled up a display on a large round floor screen. “Use Number One and Three and do a pattern around them! Make use of their blind side! This time, we will finish the Argo and their so-called Star Force! They’ll never get out of this star system! At least they gave us a good fight; Terra’s death-struggle!” said Ganz as he thumbed the firing pickle for the Reflex Gun.
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The Reflex Gun fired yet again.
The energy surge blasted about the satellites, and slammed into the Argo’s aft section without warning.
Rosstowski, Father Likanski, and Jalissa were out of that part of the ship along with Cross when the Reflex Gun beam hit.
Ensign Cheng, one of the two medical personnel left there, was blown to bits without even any time to scream. Her blood sprayed the aft fire control compartment.
Doctor Denise Carroway tried to get behind a console as the blast hit. Fire blew over her and burned most of her uniform off and shrapnel blasted into her chest.
She still got to her feet, nearly naked, in pain and bleeding in the smoky compartment.
Denise still had enough presence of mind to hit an intercom switch.
“Bridge…Mister…Hollingsworth…aft fire control abaft of the smokestack hit…heavy fires…I…”
Then, she collapsed, blacking out mercifully for a moment.
On the Argo’s First Bridge, Hollingsworth said, “Aft missile fire control room hit! It’s on fire! Damage control parties aft! Medics aft!”
“Deploy wings, Venture! Ascend and attack the Gamilon base!” snapped Avatar.
Venture looked back.
Then, on Pluto, the landing party’s charges went off just as they tumbled out of the ventilation shafts, still hot and stinking from the previous firing.
The Reflex Gun blew apart.
“Captain!” Nova said. “Major explosion on Pluto!”
Then, Homer said, “Captain! Word from Wildstar. Mission accomplished! Base demolished!”
“That’s the end of the Reflex Gun!” said Venture as Nova looked at the explosion on screen in awe, and some fear for the landing party. “I hope they escape that!” she cried with her hands to her head.
“On our way away from the base in the Jet Recon Boat,” said Sandor a moment later. “Wildstar, Conroy, IQ-9 and myself made it out. Lance and Kato were killed in action in there! OVER!”
Thank You, Lord, Nova thought. We fight on for another day…the base is finished…and Derek is fine!
-----------------------------------------------------
On Pluto, in the meantime, things were not going so well in the Gamilon Base.
Sirens were going off.
Smoke filled the Command Center.
The Bas-Relief of Desslok below the screen was shaken from its mounts by a tremor. It fell to the deck and smashed into many pieces.
“What’s happening, Bane???” Ganz yelled as he picked himself up off the deck and coughed.
“THE REFLEX GUN EXPLODED!” Bane cried.
“What?” snapped Ganz.
“I think an infiltration team from the Argo might have planted charges and got out!” Bane cried.
“So, all their moves were to trick us!” yelled Ganz. “And we fell for it!”
“Sir, liquid methane is pouring in from five locations! The base is drowning! We’d better get out before it’s too LATE!” Bane cried.
Ganz gritted his teeth, took a microphone and said, “General evacuation! General Evacuation! We are retreating from this base…all ships! Do not attempt to engage the Argo-Avatar may use that wave motion gun on us! He is a wily bastard! We will counterattack Argo at another time of our choosing!”
Men began to run for the ships as more explosions filled the base.
Ganz had just enough time to sweep up his hologram of his daughter Hilde in its case as he ran from the base to his flagship, the Gamilon space battleship Medurada.
Soon, Medurada and her surviving escort destroyers and frigates just cleared the base in time as the sea claimed it.
-------------------------------------------------
On the Argo, the Gamilons’ retreat was noticed.
“Captain!” Nova said from her radar. “Twenty-eight Gamilon vessels, pulling away from Pluto at full battle speed! I read a huge mushroom cloud over the base. Our Jet Recon Boat is forty clicks away, heading for a peninsula out of range of the radiation plume! Video panel on!”
“They’re in space already…looks like they’re retreating!” said Venture.
“And they just got out of attack range,” said Dash as he banged his panel. “I can’t even get them with the wave motion gun now! They’re fleeing like rats!”
“Cowards,” snarled Homer. “We could have gotten them all!”
“Can we launch the Black Tigers, sir?” said Dash.
“Let them be for now,” said Avatar. “We can and probably will meet them another day. We’re damaged, but we made our first objective. There will be no more Gamilon planet bombs hitting Earth…at least from Pluto…and our home can begin to heal and when we get back from Iscandar, we can make her as green and growing as she once was.”
“If we do that, we can go camping in the mountains again,” said Mark.
“Or we can go to a real beach and play volleyball, or I can go surfing,” said Nova.
“Or we can just smell wildflowers,” said Homer.
“Or go horseback ridin’ again,” said Eager with a smile.
--------------------------------------------------
On Gamilon, things were not so happy an hour later.
“Leader Desslok,” said Krypt as he reported to his Leader. “We have a report from Ganz.”
“That
man. He told me he destroyed that Terron ship,” Desslok said. “What does
that idiot want to report now? That he gift-wrapped the Terrons’ ashes?”
“No, sir,” said Krypt. “He reports he was defeated. The base on Pluto was annihilated.”
“What was that?” hissed Desslok. “Annihilated, you say? HOW?”
“He reports that he thought the Argo was finished, but she made repairs and counterattacked and destroyed our base on Pluto. Ganz…just barely escaped with half of his fleet.”
“So, that fool doesn’t even check to make sure his objective was smashed to pieces?” purred Desslok. “Tell him to defeat that accursed ship, or die trying, and to never return to Gamilon. I never want to see his face or Bane’s. If he dies honorably and redeems his stinking, tattered honor, their families will at least be treated accordingly. Dismissed,” said Desslok.
Krypt stalked away.
-------------------------------------------------
ON THE ARGO, FORTY MINUTES LATER…
The Argo was now in orbit around Pluto, the main life support unit catalyzer repaired and drawing and converting enough molecules so that the ship’s atmosphere was now fully replenished.
“I would like to thank all hands for our defeat of the Gamilons today,” said Captain Avatar from his post into the 1MC microphone as the bridge crew faced him. “We have stopped the Gamilon bombing of Earth…at least for the foreseeable future. We will be back on course for Iscandar as soon as we retrieve the surviving landing party. I would like to make sure the following are commended: Steven Sandor, Derek Wildstar, and Peter Conroy, for successfully carrying out the raid. Mark Venture, for his skill at the helm. Nova Forrester, for her skill at the radar and sensors and keeping her head in command in a battle situation. Doctor Sane, for his Medical Group’s efforts, and Cory Ainsley, for taking charge in the Engine Room. Nice job.”
“Captain, can we take a plane out to meet Wildstar and the others?” Venture said.
“Yes. I’d like to thank them all for doing such a great job,” Nova said with a wide smile that the crew had come to love when the usually serious woman smiled.
“Permission granted; Venture, greet the landing party! Take Miss Forrester with you!”
“Yessir,” they said.
--------------------------------------------------
On Pluto, Derek looked at the sea and a group of Protozoans milling about.
“Hey, you…you’re going to have it quiet here on Pluto for a while. No more Gamilon bases!”
“We got commendations back on the ship,” said Conroy.
Sandor laughed and pointed at the sky. “A Type 100 is coming in! It’s a landing party from the ship!”
“Party? I LOVE parties!” burbled IQ-9.
They looked up and saw the plane coming in. They could see Venture smiling at them as the plane came in, and Nova waving merrily from the rear place.
Derek looked up at them and smiled. Why do I get the feeling I’m impressing them both? Especially her? I’ve never seen her so happy before!
The plane landed. Mark and Nova ran out.
Mark gave handshakes and a slap on the back to Derek.
Nova, being a bit bubblier, gave everyone hugs.
As she hugged Steve, she whispered, “You sure you don’t want to give us another chance, Steve? I mean…you never called back for out of class stuff after you took off that time from our one date.”
“No,” he said. “You know the story with me now, Nova. The accident. And I know you want a family. I’m sorry. I can’t give you that, even though you’ll always be a favorite little sister to me…”
“Always the bridesmaid, never the bride,” Nova sighed.
“Wildstar can’t wait to see you, Nova…he’s champing at the bit like a horse…nice kid.”
“He is,” Nova said. She patted Steve on the arm and ran to Derek and hugged him so hard she almost bowled him over. “Don’t you dare tell me you don’t want children from the woman you marry, Derek, or I will disembowel you with a rusty scalpel! Seriously, I’m so glad to see you!”
“What brought this on, Nova?” Derek said, swearing to himself he would never understand women in a thousand years. Especially not this smart, quirky one. “Okay…yeah…when I get married, if we make it through this, I’d love to give the lucky lady kids. Lots of ‘em!” he chuckled.
“Good job,” Nova said. “For that…and the mission. I’m riding back with him in the recon boat, Mark. This young man and I need to talk. And I need to get him two crullers and coffee back on the ship.”
------------------------------------------------------
In the Argo’s mess hall, a noisy party was under way as the space battleship left Pluto behind.
Andrew on his guitar, and Cory, on his synthdrum pad, were finishing up another song. “Any requests?” Andrew yelled.
“Metallica!” yelled Natalie Fisher, who was laughing like crazy as she and Robert Turner passed a bottle of sake’ back and forth.
“Not Metallica!” Nova laughed as she and Derek were sitting at their table with Venture, Conroy, Hardy, and Starion.
“YES, Metallica!” yelled Natalie. She sounded a little…tipsy.
“Okay, we’ll do Enter Sandman!” said Cory. “One, Two, Three…”
The two brothers began to play loudly as Robert Turner dragged Natalie Fisher up to dance.
“Crullers are nice, Derek,” Nova said. “A guilty pleasure, but…”
“Your coffee is…interesting,” Derek said.
“It’s horrible!” Mark said, spitting it on the table. “I’ve never had such crud in my life! Nova, who made this?”
“I did, Mark,” she said, tapping her fingers on the table to Enter Sandman even though she had just said she didn’t like the song.
“That stinks!” said Conroy.
“Nova, I see you wiggling your butt,” smirked Dana Starion. “We know you want to get up and dance…” She slapped Nova on the behind and said, “Dance, ma’am!”
Nova got up, blushing, and she got into the music and began to freeform-dance a little.
Across from her, Mark grabbed Derek. “Get up and dance with Nova!”
“What?” Derek said.
“C’mon, we don’t have to close-dance!” she laughed. “It’s fun!”
Derek Wildstar, feeling like an idiot, got up to dance the frug with Nova, basically, a modified twist.
That was the first time these two would ever dance together, blushing as their nearby shipmates laughed and banged out the beat on the table. They felt so embarrassed.
Nova had to admit, however, that it felt nice to see Derek smiling and having a good time for once, and even though he was a clumsy dancer, he made up for it with enthusiasm.
Derek smiled at Nova, watching her slender form move, and watching how graceful she was on her gold-booted feet, and the way her hair flew around looked…adorable. And she was smiling, laughing, and shorter than he was and as bright-eyed as a puppy when she wasn’t pissed about something! The Ice Queen he had disliked at first was actually cute!
Then, she began to jump up and down, and he followed suit.
“Hey, Wildstah!” laughed Hardy. “Are you guys in a mosh pit?”
“Find a girl and join us, Jeff!” Nova said with a laugh.
The song ended. There was a lot of applause and yelling, typical aboard a military command.
Natalie and Robert quickly took off…together.
There were lots of yells and cries of “WOOOOOO!” as the two of them took off and vanished from view for the rest of the evening.
A quieter ballad was played by Dexter and Cody as Wildstar and Forrester sat down. “I see you’re wearing that ring we found on Pandora, Nova.”
“Captain Avatar let me keep it,” Nova said. “So, your life. What were you planning to do before this cruise?”
“Fly a fighter and avenge my brother Alex,” Derek said. “You?”
“Before I was picked for this crew…I had just been accepted to Medical School,” Nova said softly. “Had things been…normal…which they weren’t, I would have been getting ready for quizzes right now and staying up late with the books. Which I do anyway. I have to learn so much to assist in this command, Derek. It’s like…a Trauma Room from Hell…Sane can’t handle it all…it’s…”
Then, a nurse in bloody scrubs ran into the messhall at full tilt! “Nova! Damnit, the Doc needs you in Sickbay Stat!”
“What is it, Michelle?” Nova sighed. “Can’t the Doc and Doctor Carroway handle it?”
“It is Doctor Carroway, ma’am!” cried Michelle Sakamoto. “They just got her out of the aft section under debris! It’s bad!”
“Have to go,” Nova said, slurping down her coffee. “Later.”
-------------------------------------------------
Nova got down to Sickbay, changed into a scrub dress, sandals and gear, scrubbed, got her gloves on, and she was masked in ninety seconds flat.
Michelle and she ran up to Denise Carroway.
Denise was under a sheet, badly burned, much of her hair burnt off, body covered by a sheet covered with blood and body fluids.
Nova immediately scanned her. Then, she took a deep breath. And prayed.
“Denise, does it hurt?”
“No,” she whispered. “I’m in shock, aren’t I?”
“They got that splinter out of you, but there is massive internal bleeding,” Nova said. “I’m going to be blunt, Doc. You have maybe a twelve percent chance of making it through this alive. Even if you do, the plastiskin grafts…”
“I know…I’ll be in a lot of pain…and it’ll be hard to get around,” said Denise as Nova and Michelle prepared to put her under. “But I need to tell you something, Nova.”
“Yes?”
“If I don’t make it, the medical texts are yours, along with my clothes, other books, spare glasses, and my guitar,” Denise said.
“Stop talking like that,” Nova said as tears filled her eyes. “Michelle, injection, 40 mg Diprivan, prepare to intubate. Where’s Doctor Sane?”
“In the main theatre trying to put a young man back together again, ma’am,” she said.
“Looks like this is on me,” Nova said as Natalie began to go under.
“You’ve…got this….” Natalie said. “God Bless you, Nova…”
---------------------------------------------------------------
TWO HOURS LATER…
Things had quieted down a little.
Nova was in a private office of Doctor Sane’s crying. Captain Avatar was there, too, patting her back.
Denise hadn’t made it. The operation had almost been complete when her heart had stopped.
Nova and Michelle had not been able to resuscitate her despite their best efforts.
Denise Carroway was dead, under a bloody sheet in the morgue…and her body had undergone a quick post-mortem by Doctor Sane.
“Drink this, Nova,” said Sane as he handed Nova a glass of sake’.
“Doctor…you know I do not drink on duty…” Nova said through sobs.
“You’re off duty for the rest of the night, Nova,” Avatar said, not unkindly. “Drink that. Don’t make me make it an order, please…”
Nova took the bittersweet drink and gulped it down. Her head swam. But at least her sobs subsided a little. “Sir, I tried to save Doctor Carroway…she was one of my best friends…I only had Miss Sakamoto with me.”
“You two did admirably,” Captain Avatar said softly. “Doctor Sane did a post-mortem on Denise. You did your absolute best.”
“Nova, doctors, like space battleship Captains, do not win every battle,” Sane said.
“I’m not licensed,” Nova said. “I didn’t even get to go med school…I….”
“Well, as of now,” said Doctor Sane, “Your medical training has begun. On-the-job training. We lost Doctor Carroway. We can’t turn around and go back to Earth and get a second doctor. Nova, you are it. The smartest of all my nurses. I wouldn’t have recommended you to the captain if I didn’t think you could handle it.”
“And I still have to perform all of my other duties, sir?” Nova said.
“Can you handle them?” Avatar said.
“I’ll do it to the best of my ability, sir,” Nova said.
“Good. I’m fine here for tonight. Get to your cabin, talk with your friends if you feel up to it…rest…” said Doctor Sane. “I already spoke with the captain. You need Denise’s space for textbooks and manuals. You will not get another cabinmate.”
Nova nodded.
Then, she saluted Captain Avatar and said, “By God’s Grace…I will do this….”
“Good,” Avatar said, shaking her hand. “Thank you, Nova.”
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nova dealt with the business of arranging Denise’s effects alone in her cabin.
Nova had changed into some of Denise’s casual clothes; jeans, a cable-knit pullover, and sandals.
She sat alone for a while with Denise’s guitar, one she would own for the rest of her long life; a blonde Gibson acoustic trimmed in mahogany and maple. She carefully tuned it with a pipe, and then, unable to sleep, she took the guitar and went out into the corridors of the Argo.
Nova sat in a chair on the aft observation deck looking out at what was now a sea of stars. Pluto was just a bright little dot. She could not even see where Earth was now. She could place Sol, just a little bigger than the other stars as they neared the Oort Cloud which had merged with the graveyard of the Solar System’s Tenth Planet; Minerva.
Nova softly played her favorite hymn “The Lord is My Light”, followed by “Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus” singing softly to the latter.
Derek came in, wanting to look out. For a moment, he thought it was Dexter playing, although the style was not his heavy-metal style…it was lighter, almost folk or classical.
He looked around, and saw that it was Nova sitting there in civvies, quietly playing and singing.
“I didn’t know you played guitar, Nova. Did you have that all along? And…nice outfit…”
“It all belonged to Denise…Doctor Carroway,” Nova said. “You must have heard what happened by now…”
“I did. And we have seven dead in total. The funeral is tomorrow morning, Nova.”
“I want to help carry Denise, Derek,” Nova said.
“Mind if I help?” Derek asked.
Nova nodded. “I’m carrying a heavy burden now, Derek. I have to take up all the slack for Denise and do her job. I think I can handle it…but I’m scared. I tried to save Denise. I failed.”
“We can’t win them all, Nova,” Derek sighed. “I had a hard time with that Gamilon fighter at the Floating Continent.”
“Doctor Sane told me that. So did Captain Avatar. I also had command of the whole ship for a bit today; you saw me on Bridge Three. That should have been Steve’s job, but he was up with you…and then when your party left…I was so worried…the captain got sick for a bit…and I was in charge of the Lodge again, so to speak. We are both in the ship’s Military Lodge. You know how it goes…”
Derek nodded. “I’m up because I needed a friend tonight. I have my harmonica. Would you like to try and play something?”
“What song do you know?” Nova said.
“Scarlet Scarf”.
“Sure,” Nova said. She got her fingers on the frets, played the first chord, and began to strum and to sing as Derek played his harmonica.
See the Girl, she’s Waving to You
A Scarf So Bright and Red
As you race into the Blue
She is waving, waving to you…
As you travel on your way
And Night Turns into Day
You will carry in your heart
Memories of that Bright Red Scarf….
They stopped there and looked in each other’s eyes.
“Nova, you’ll always be my friend?” Derek stammered.
“I already am,” she said quietly. She gave his hand a pat. “I look forward to sailing onwards with you.”
“As do I,” Derek said.
Both of them stood, and then decorously went their separate ways for the night.
They were friends for now…and just that.
Even though they had danced together.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Down below, though, in Natalie’s cabin, not all was as decorous.
Clothes and bedsheets were everywhere on the deck. There had been one drink of sake’. Followed by a second.
And that is how Natalie Fisher and Robert Turner became a couple in a far more intimate and illicit dance than the Frug.
“You make me feel like a natural woman,” sang Natalie, laughing a little, still tipsy.
“That was good, Natalie. Wow!” Robert said.
They shared a French kiss.
“So, what’s next, babe?” Robert said.
“We get together and do it again,” Natalie said. “We have to find a better spot, though. Nova billets next door, and she told me she heard my music once. You know how it is aboard ship when you’re trying to do something like this…no privacy…”
“Yeah…I’ll find us a place,” Robert said. “Keep the light on for me,” he said as he got dressed.
“Good night,” Natalie said, kissing him. She made her bunk and threw on a sleepshirt fast and was back in her rack, half-asleep as she heard Nova padding back into her cabin next door, singing.
It’s cute when she sings, Natalie thought, falling asleep. Tomorrow is a new day.
TO BE CONTINUED….