“I can talk to all dem PJ’s. And I can talk to those on earth.” He smiled widely and was rewarded with slaps on the back. His English had improved though now he had a slight British accent with English idioms.
He had been one of the few who did not mind being in the stasis pod so during the diurnal periods he had English shows piped in as he slept. It really seemed to work. “It will rewolutionize language classes,” he would tell everyone.
“Well what are we waiting for? Let’s crank it up,” Hawk said bursting at the seams. He desperately wanted to talk to Beth. Sasha didn’t know the slang but understood the intent. He flipped a couple of switches and turned a dial. He watched the screen and continued to push buttons.
“Ah, dat is da one. I’m not sure which of the PJ’s down dare it is but it is one of dem.”
“Jonathan,” said Bob. “Why don’t you do the honors. Jonathan briefly thought of Watson but, “hello. Can anyone hear me? This is Jonathan on the mother ship in outer space. Can anyone hear me?”
Nothing. “Hmm. Okay. Hello again. We will broadcast…”
And static erupted from there end. “Ah, Dey do not know what to do. I will tell dem.”
After a few agonizing minutes, “hello Jonathan. Is Hawk there? This is Beth.”
Hawk got closer to the mouthpiece, “Hi honey. I’ve missed you. We’re coming home soon.”
The one nice thing about the Peeds communications it was two way and could go multi ways if need be. No over and out.
The communication from the mother ship went directly into puddle jumper 3. One other thing Sasha had found out was how to use the ship wide intercom and so all those on the lettered teams could come to the com room and talk with someone down on earth.
This was a lot of fun and Jonathan was loathe to end it but they also had to talk about what their plans were and the sooner they did then the sooner they could take the mother ship out of orbit and land her at North Vancouver.
>
Jonathan felt a little bad having Tony in a puddle jumper and not at the helm of the mother ship. At least as a matter of seniority. However Tony had not been up in the commander’s room as Bob and Terry had and Jonathan definitely needed all the pilots he could get.
After communicating with the North Vancouver base camp Tony flew up in puddle jumper 3. Sasha was in complete communication with Schollander and Tony was able to find the correct mother ship fly into and dock. He brought with him the five former slave pilots, the two police pilots with their copilots and twenty of the former slaves who had their chips removed from the implants to swell the numbered teams to 12. A surgical team also came up.
Captain Schollander told informed everyone he spotted two other alien ships in orbit on the way to rendezvous with the pirated mother ship.
“Everyone ready?” Jonathan asked.
Everyone with the exception of Bob Ferguson was in the docking bay. They would board two of the puddle jumpers and seek out the nearest mother ship. They now were able to have a fix on the orbit of several of those not on the other side of the planet. They still weren’t exactly certain how many mother ships were in orbit but if the known spacing held true than there would be seven of them.
Bob was to wait until the two puddle jumpers were in the docking bay of the third mother ship before descending to earth. They figured once the mother ship commanders saw the pirated mother ship break orbit with the obvious intention to land on Earth they would probably do the same thing.
This had to be a fast operation. They would try to take complete control of the mother ship and see if they could get off as many of the slaves as possible. There seemed to be some slaves in the alien ships who had been taught to fly the puddle jumpers and if they could find those pilots then they could save even more of the slaves.
The hope was if they timed it right then Terry could program the mother ship to collide with the next. They really didn’t worry too much about the Peeds. They had seen first hand what they were capable of and Jonathan could find no pity in his heart for them.
“Okay. Everyone to their assigned PJ’s.” All the alphabet teams with the Xer teams but two boarded the two puddle jumpers. the 11thXer was left to guard the science labs and the technicians working in there and the 12th Xer was left in the control room to guard Bob. It was a tight fit but they wanted to keep as many of the transport ships as possible. Once the puddle jumpers were completely boarded Tony and Terry headed out the docking bay after talking to Bob.
Bob was in communication with the police puddle jumper back on earth and a police escort would be waiting for the mother ship once it landed.
>
“Well, there it is. Sasha are you sure that a mother ship cannot listen in on another?”
Sasha nodded, “Yes. It makes complede sense. Dese Peeds are wery paranoid of each other.” Jonathan thought this had a down side for the future but a good thing for this mission.
McNeill was piloting puddle jumper 1 and led the way into this mother ship’s docking bay with Tony following.
Docking was not difficult as fewer transport ships were there. They counted only seven. That might mean most of the Peeds and the slaves were on earth.
They assumed nothing.
>
“Sonovabitch,” McNeill exclaimed.
“What’s that Terry?” Jonathan asked.
Terry, Sasha and the rest of the A team were in the com and commander’s room. It hardly took them much more than a half hour before they secured the mother ship. They had only to kill twelve Peeds and two slaves. And the commander.
This mother ship was Spanish and Portuguese speaking so they understood it was earmarked for South America. Most of the five thousand slaves had already been relocated somewhere on that continent.
They found ten slavers and around five hundred slaves still in pods. Sasha and Terry disrupted the communications and the slaves were no longer connected or controlled.
Once they had control of the other ship the next phase in their plans would be put into motion: to get as many slaves off as they could, infiltrate and take over another mother ship.
“We’ve got a problem.”
Jonathan turned to the console Sasha and Terry were working at. “Yes.”
“Tell me if I’m wrong Sasha,” Terry said, “but I think the next mother ship is breaking orbit.”
“Da, you are correct.”
“Damn, there goes our chance to take over any others. At least in space,” said Jonathan. “Can we track them from here and see where they go?”
Sasha and Terry nodded.
“Well, we can’t do too much now so let’s go into plan B.
“We have a plan B?” asked Hawk. He turned to Keoni, “Why wasn’t I told? Since when did we have plan B?”
“Since now.”
“Oh. Is it a good plan?”
“Umm, not too bad under the circumstances. We now can get all the slaves down and even remove the chips from here. We’ll need the pilots and get them healthy and on our side.
The A team looked at each other.
The B team was entering the lounge, “what’s up?” asked Big John.
“We’re moving on to plan B,” said Hawk. “It’s supposed to be good. Though I’m not too convinced so far.”
“I guess that means that plan A is no longer applicable?” asked Tim.
Heads nodded.
“Do you think they’ve figured out there are earthmen who are fighting them?” Big John asked.
“I think we should assume that,” Jonathan replied. “And if not, they soon will know about us.”
“So, Plan B?” asked Tim.
“Yes, Plan B.”
PART V
CHAPTER ONE
The next ten days had been more hectic than before. There was much to do and much to organize. The Earthland security command center was now the mother ship flown to North Vancouver but much of the most important work was done in the mother ship still in orbit.
The lounge lo
oked like one of the old WWII command centers. It had tall maps of the world and placements and pins where the other four mother ships had landed.
They had found in Vancouver translators for Portuguese to Spanish and Spanish to English. Other teams translated Romanian to French and French to English. However, they had no way as yet to translate the Chinese languages but they had been assured that Chinese speakers would be found. They assumed both Mandarin and Cantonese were being used by the Peeds.
Jonathan was pretty sure he also heard Korean but wasn’t sure it was part of the mother ship colonizing China or not. Another language they thought was Swahili but again they had no one to translate that. So they concentrated on the mother ship in South America and the slavers in Europe.
It was amazing the quality of reproduction of the conversations the communications systems on the mother ship could listen in on.
On the ground several of the puddle jumpers were being fitted with rockets they took from Ft. Lewis Army Base in the state of Washington. This would eliminate the PJs from being able to reach outer space but they needed to have an attack force if they went against the mother ships now on the planet’s surface.
It was hoped the attack PJs could knock out the communications room of the stationary mother ships from these missiles.
Making contact with Ft. Lewis put the Earthland Security Force in contact with the survivors on the army base. Many of the survivors were not military personnel but lived in the area and knew Ft. Lewis had bunkers which may keep them safe from the meteor swarms. None there knew of the invasion by aliens and an invasion by human aliens.
Flying south in the Peeds transport ships from Vancouver to Seattle then Ft. Lewis did help to explain this but Ferguson with confirmation from Jonathan flew the mother ship down to the army base.
No one was left unconvinced and the rockets somehow found their way into the mother ship.
The military personnel had no idea how to reestablish communications but knowing no more meteors would ravage earth they communicated with Ft, McChord. Ft. McChord was an Air Force Base and had a few planes still intact and some fuel.
The word was going to be passed along that Earth was under attack. This communication should allow the USA and Canada to concentrate to mobilize armed forces and avert any attack or in the case an attack was underway give assistance to earthborn fighters.
Most of the colonies the Peeds had already developed in the world and the areas under serious threat by the Peeds were not known. No satellites were in orbit anymore. The Peeds eliminated of all forms of communication therefore the most common forms of communication was not available to them. However, the older technology for telephone lines could be utilized once telephone poles and lines could be erected.
As more and more people learned the meteor swarms were past they shrugged off survival mode to rush out and reclaim a semblance of their former existence.
There was a domino effect in this as people could not only quit hiding because of the meteors but traveled to other areas bringing the news.
Making contact with Ft. Lewis also gave the ex-slaves and the Earthland Security Force valuable military training. This instilled a better attitude and gave the nascent guerrilla force more confidence in working together. They now knew exactly what was expected of each team and each team member within each team.
Teams had been realigned for maximum fire power into forty man teams, teams which could fit well in a puddle jumper.
There was also small arms weapons’ training although they had enough ray guns for their small army so far but the juice to power the Peeds’ weapons would eventually run out.
Enough soldiers had lived through these last two years to act as drill sergeants. Some even volunteered to lead the freed slaves into combat.
Time could be a problem since they didn’t know how capable the Peeds were in infiltrating and controlling the humans where they had landed. The question was either to wait for more training or strike now while they have the advantage of some surprise.
The Peeds did not know what the Earthland Security Force had learned and had developed although by now the Peeds certainly knew there was a serious resistance to their invasion.
Would attacking now prove more effective than waiting? A difficult decision and one that Jonathan felt all parties should be in on the debate.
It was decided after a fairly short discussion. They would go now. They would continue to train while planning strategy for the next mother ship. They were afraid to wait as it would only give the slavers more time to consolidate their position and potentially add numerous slaves to their force.
Jonathan stayed in the orbital mother ship, christened the Potemkin.
The command center and the com room were now well understood by several of the Earthland security people. The ability to communicate with all the transport ships and the other mother ship, christened the Enterprise, was very advanced and those in charge of it could keep the information going and the communication uninterrupted.
They had no way to speak from one forty man unit to another but these units could speak with puddle jumper 1 with walkie talkies when in range. The puddle jumpers could speak to the mother ships. The mother ships could track the puddle jumpers and the puddle jumpers could track all those who had active implants.
The first step of Plan B? Disable the communication center of the mother ship. It was hoped the slaves would become disconnected as before and they could search inside or outside the mother ship for the Peeds.
>
“Enterprise here. This is Bob. Are you there Jonathan?”
“I hear you Bob. How’s it going?” Jonathan had a desire to say ‘out’ but knew it was unnecessary.
“Good from here. Everything is going according to plan so far. Are you reading what the target mother ship is doing?”
“Yes Bob, many eyes are watching in the control room. The moment the Peeds do anything different we will let you know.”
“Bob, how far from touchdown?”
“Being low in altitude is harder for me to say but I’d guess an hour more and then we’ll be right on top of it.”
It had been decided that since the slavers would know one mother ship was still in orbit they would be less likely to notice another flying under the radar so to speak.
The Enterprise had taken a full day at the low altitude in arriving at the jump off point. They would depart the Falkland Islands, the current jump off point, for the South American Peed mother ship. They were only two thousand miles from the slavers’ mother ship which was parked in Paraguay near the borders of Brazil and Argentina. It was thought that an attack from the south would be less noticeable.
From North Vancouver the Enterprise had gone down the west coast to the tip of South America. Flying at low altitude to avoid detection they could see nothing was left of the South American coast. Certainly people had survived in the mountains just as the ancient people of Tiahuanaco had after they completed their megalithic building program. But the coast was desolate.
The Enterprise swing around the tip of South America and skipped over the waves to the Falklands.
The full day of traveling also allowed everyone to get well rested and mentally prepared. As they flew out of the Falklands for the mainland they were primed for combat. There were ten puddle jumpers each commanded by the A, B and C teams and several of the army sergeants who had enlisted in the Earthland Security Force.
At first the soldiers wanted to take command but the Earthland forces unequivocally said no. If the professional soldiers wanted to participate they would have to join the Earthland Security Force and take orders from Jonathan. This actually made Jonathan very uneasy but he also didn’t like the idea to ceding authority to these newcomers.
At one hundred miles from the mother ship Bob got in touch with Jonathan.
“Jonathan. We’re in position and ready for part two.”
“Okay Bob, send out the PJ’s and we’ll keep watch on them.”
> Bob radioed down to Puddle Jumper 1 and relayed the orders to head out.
Terry was flying Puddle Jumper 1 and Tony had number 2. Only these two PJs had the mounted rockets. The rockets had been taken off attack helicopters and jerry-rigged to the PJ’s. They were mounted on the roof of the PJ and needed manual operation. Keoni had the honor in Puddle Jumper 1 while Hawk had control of the rockets of number 2.
The other eight puddle jumpers would follow behind in the flying goose formation. This way they could visually see one anther. Each of them had different orders but much relied on how effective the missiles could be in knocking out the communication center for the orders to remain current.
“Jonathan, how we’re doing so far?”
“Everything looks good from here Bob. Nothing new to report on the mother ship. It seems they are not able to see you or are otherwise occupied.” The puddle jumpers and the Enterprise were only thirty miles from their target.
Twenty miles to the mother ship. “Jonathan. I hear from the PJ’s that nothing exists as far as civilization. No towns of any kind survived the catastrophe.” Bob was quiet for a while. “I’m with Turk on this.”
Ten miles. “Potemkin, Tony just talked to me. He flew over a puddle jumper and there were no signs of implants.”
“Well, by the time any slavers get to that transport ship we’ll be hitting their mother ship.”
Four miles. Three miles. “Here we go.”
Terry and Tony flew right up to the mother ship. They had no way of knowing who and how many might be inside though there had to be Peeds in the com room and presumably a commander in his room. They got into position as Bob brought up the Enterprise. He placed it directly above the mother ship.
Once Bob was in position Terry and Tony ordered the rockets to be launched. The missiles slammed into the area where the com room should be. They could see damage and ordered another battery to be fired.
The mother ship tried to lift off. Bob could feel the weight of the lifting slaver ship from his seat in the commander’s chair. He kept the Enterprise in place by commanding it to land.
Bob felt the missiles slam into the mother ship beneath him with the second salvo. The Enterprise was rocked. Bob kept the ship steady and on top of the slavers’ ship. The other eight puddle jumpers hovered awaiting to carry out orders or to receive new orders.