Space- Book One: The Attack

Chapter four

Jake Starson followed General Zow out of the War Hall and down a hallway towards the hanger.
"Um, General Zow?" Jake asked timidly .
"Yes, what is it?" General Zow asked, not even slowing down his pace.
"Can...can I ask you something?"
General Zow stopped and turned to face him.
"Yes, although I think I already know what you want to ask me."
"I just wanted to know why you picked me for this mission, " Jake said. "I'm not the most talented student here, not by far. I mean, you said yourself that I was impossible to reach me."
General Zow frowned.
"I never said that you were impossible to train," he corrected . "I said you were the most difficult to train. Which is precisely why I picked you."
Jake gave him a confused look.
"What?"
" Jake, some people are born soldiers. Others become soldiers through rigorous training. Then there are people like you. "
Jake bit his lip.
"People who just don't have what it takes?" he guessed.
" No, " General Zow said. "People who learn it as they go. I realized during your last training session that your problem was, perhaps, that you need to get out on the field in order to advance in your training."
Jake looked at him in surprise.
"Really?"
"Yes," General Zow said.  "Now, is there anything else?"
Jake shook his head, a little sheepishly.
"Good," said General Zow, and with that, he turned on his heal and started marching down the hallway.  Jake hurried after him, running to keep up.

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Kelthor Pazzle maneuver his ship into the open hanger of the warship he and his passenger had found flouting above the planet Kyphis.  He did not think that flying into the belly of a huge ominous warship was a good idea, but that was the danger of being a taxi pilot.  You sometimes  had to fly people into dangerous places.

He thought back, for a moment to the last time he had flown into danger, during the war against the demented ones.  The galaxy had been in grave peril and the galactic council of royals had had to band together in order to stop the demented ones and save the galaxy.

Kelthor couldn't help but wonder if there was need for the council's intervention again.  There was no denying that there were some pretty strange happening going on.

Kelthor also wondered why Kyphis was letting this war ship just camp out in their front yard? Kyphis had a very strong military. He couldn't imagine why they hadn't blown this ship out of the sky?  Something was not right here.

Kelthor thought back to the charred remains of the planet Girgit and wondered if the people on this ship were behind what had happened on Girgit.

All he knew is that he wanted to drop off his passenger and get the heck out of here.

He brought the ship low and landed gently in the hanger.

"Well, here we are," he said, swiveling his chair around to face the assassin.

The Belcan got to her feet.

"Wait here," she said, turning and opening the hatch to leave.  "I will be back with your payment shortly." 

Kelthor watched her go, then turned back around and slumped down in his chair.  He did not want to wait here in this strange, creepy war ship a second longer.

He put his elbows on the dash of his ship and buried his face in his hands.  He was not equipped to handle this kind of stress.

When he finally lifted his face and looked up he was quite surprised by what he saw.  There were several crew members busily at work, fixing up a small fighter ship nearby.

This was not at all abnormal, but what was abnormal was that every single one of the crew members was wear an ugly, brown, carved mask.

Kelthor had never seen anything like that, and the only reason Kelthor could think of as to why the crew would be wearing mask was to conceal their identity.