Star Fields

Chapter No.18 Surprise

Chapter No.18 Surprise

Nothing stays the same.

We continued our search for humans. We knew that the reptilian alien list of intelligent species would not reveal the location of their food farms. Our only hope was to search habitable systems near the reptilian alien home world.

"I've detected a habitable planet around a K0 class dwarf star with a M5 dwarf companion. It's 1.5 times the mass of Earth, but it appears to have a stable atmosphere."

I looked at Molly's screen at a blurry image of the planet. "Sounds like a possibility." I turned to Judy. "Plot a course to that system."

"Yes, Jason."

We accelerated into warp and arrived at two million kilometers from the planet in twenty minutes, but when we came out of warp, we were in for a surprise.

Molly's voice rose at least a scale. "There's a reptilian vessel in combat with four unidentified vessels."

"The reptilians are not doing so well," I said. "I think we should help them out. Maybe they would be more willing to help us."

Molly gave me a look that indicated she was on board. I turned to Judy. "Go to Red Alert and prepare to engage the ships attacking the reptilian vessel."

Suddenly, an android hurried out of the elevator and sat in a seat next to Judy. Her nametag indicated that she was Madison. I assumed that Judy would fly the ship into combat and Madison would work the weapons.

Molly and I held on to our seats as our ship bobbed and jerked around violently to avoid weapon blasts. Madison poured plasma balls at near light speed into the enemy ships causing them to break from attacking the reptilian and start blasting at us. I was surprised by how easily our huge vessel could be maneuvered in close quarters. I thought that I knew everything about the ship, but it appeared that I was in error.

Our ship shook and vibrated from enemy fire, but Judy and Madison managed to blow up one enemy vessel and disable two more. The reptilian ship jumped on the chance to destroy the other enemy ship while we destroyed the two disabled vessels.

"I have a video signal request, Jason," Judy said.

"Allow it," I replied.

An image of a reptilian appeared on our main screen. "We meet again," he said in a growling voice. "Why did you assist us?"

"We didn't like the odds against you and we wanted to thank you for the information you provided us."

"Why are you here?" he asked without any indication of emotion.

"We're out here trying to determine if humans are still in existence. We know that you have taken humans to breed them as food stock."

"I will send you the location of one of our breeding farms. It's the only one that contains humans. You may take them. We have many other sources of food stock."

"We appreciate that," I said, trying like hell not to look excited, but I wasn't finished.

"Who are these attackers?"

"We call them Scath, which means 'Mad' in our language. We believe they are from a system on the other side of the galaxy. They come here to raid, but we have managed to repulse them. We have not been able to understand why they are so violent."

"Maybe they have been attacked by others and want to stop the attacks."

"We know little about them. We will send an image of them."

The signal link was broken, and the reptilian vessel moved away and went to warp.

"That farm planet is 752 light years away," Molly revealed. "It orbits a K1 class dwarf star. There are other planets in that system, but they appear to be gas and ice giants much further from the star."