Chapter 6: Aggressions

Disclaimer: This is the rough draft of “The Terra Project”, a novel in progress. The story, characters, and events are subject to change during the editing process.

Please keep in mind that as a rough draft, the writing style and organization is expected to be poor and or lacking. As quoted by Ernest Hemingway, “The first draft of anything is shit.”

Comments and critique are greatly appreciated, though it is preferred that advanced critiquing be held off until later drafts. Anyone interested in the story or the novel project is encouraged to email me at fishbowlery@gmail.com.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy.

“See anything yet?” Dr. Tro asked.

“Still nothing,” Chase answered back.

“There has to be something interesting here somewhere,” she said.

Up ahead of them the forests below cleared to reveal a herd of animals. They looked somewhat similar to the herbivore they had run into the day before, but they were a fair bit larger and seemed to have slightly thicker coats.

“Hmmm, the change here is analogous to considerable difference in latitude on Earth,” Dr. Tro said. “The transition parallels that of deer to moose.”

“Really? Moose?” Chase asked, staring at the herd. “Naw, those are still too small.”

“Maybe not as drastic as that, then,” Dr. Tro said quickly. “But it's the same steps. Larger body size, thicker fur. We've probably gone a fair distance from the equator, where's the odometer?”

“A moose bit my sister once,” Chase said idly as he indicated the indicator to Dr. Tro. “Mind you, moose bites can be pretty nasty.”

“My God, we've traveled over a thousand one hundred miles,” Dr. Tro said with amazement. “At a south-southeast bearing. No wonder. We've travelled about seven degrees of latitude away from the equator. That's roughly the difference between Tennessee and New York.”

“Still not enough for moose,” Chase shrugged. “Put the ship in stealth anyway and we can fly down and get some pictures.”

Dr. Tro complied, mashing the quieting button and easing the ship nearby. The animals didn't even take notice as it loomed only a few stories above them. When the ship had come to a stop, the door opened and Chase set up his camera, snapping shots wildly.

“I'd still like us to get onto the ground to take some closer pictures,” he said.

Dr. Tro turned to the back of the ship. “Buck! Hey Buck, what do you...”

Buck was fast asleep, still sitting up in his bunk.

“I don't think he has any objections,” she said cheerfully. “Besides, I would love to stretch my legs. I used to do a lot of studies with the assistance of photographers back on Earth, would be fun to get back to doing that.”

The Aften Stjerne drifted quietly off to the side until it found an opening in the forest just wide enough to admit it and slid under the canopy. It had only just touched down when Dr. Tro and Chase hopped out, cameras in hand.

Not wanting to expose Buck to insects, Dr. Tro closed the door and ran off while adjusting her camera's settings with Chase close behind her, making similar adjustments.

“Herd's this way,” she whispered as the two of them made their way through undergrowth and dead tree limbs until they came to the clearing.

“Gorgeous, aren't they?” Dr. Tro said admiringly.

“Very,” Chase replied, already looking through the viewfinder.

Dr. Tro leveled her camera and looked at the herd. They were in a perfect formation to show several unobstructed in their full glory and the rest of the herd visible behind them to show their sheer numbers. It was truly a perfect shot of the animals, something that she knew without a doubt Chase was appreciating at the time.

As she moved her finger to the shutter button, however, something didn't quite feel right. She lowered her face to look through the viewfinder, but as she did she felt her neck tense involuntarily, a sensation that in some odd manner coursed through her whole body that wouldn't let her click the shutter and seemed to be pulling at her to straighten up.

“Do you feel that?” she whispered.

Chase did not reply, but his shutter was silent.

Dr. Tro looked back to the herd. They were all tense, as if they'd spotted a predator, and they were all focused in her direction.

She spun around just in time to see the arrow whiz past her and lodge itself in Chase's back.

“No!”

Chase fell over with a cry of pain as Dr. Tro was quickly swarmed. She felt herself being blindfolded and bound and thrown over a shoulder.

She screamed but her captors hit her head to quiet her and everything went dark.

Buck stirred in his sleep, causing him to fall over from his sitting up position. When this happened he blinked blearily and looked around. The bunks were all empty.

“Zant!” he shouted, getting to his feet. “Zant, you there?”

A few seconds later Zant materialized into his vision, lying on his bunk.

“Is something the matter?” he asked dryly.

“Where's Dr. Tro? And the camera guy?”

“They're your problem, you're the one that's supposed to be blowing up anything that tries to hurt either of them,” Zant replied harshly.

“Shit,” Buck muttered. He ran up and down the ship, then pushed the door open and dashed out, looking for footprints. Luckily, Dr. Tro and Chase had left a faint pattern in the grass, which he was able to follow. He dashed along it until he noticed something odd. The grass seemed to have been disturbed far by more than just two people.

That's when he heard a muffled groan, looked up, and spotted Chase crumpled up with an arrow sticking out of him.

“Chase!” He yelled, diving for his fallen shipmate. He got close, examining the arrow. It had punctured his lung and he would likely not last much longer. He quickly hefted Chase over his shoulder and sprinted back to the ship.

“Jack!” he called as he clambered into the ship, then carefully lowering Chase into his bunk. “Activate medical bots, heal patient!”

Zant stared in horror at what had become of Chase and hefted the cube from the far corner over to next to Chase's bunk.

Buck ripped the arrow out of Chase, causing a gurgled cry of anguish. “I found him but I didn't see Dr. Tro anywhere.”

Zant stooped down and looked at Chase as the cube began to glow brightly. “Where's Dr. Tro?”

“Who'r you?!” Chase yelled through a mouthful of blood.

“I'm Zant, I'm part of the crew of this ship, just like you,” he said calmly. “Where's Dr. Tro?”

“How come I haven't seen you?” Chase demanded.

“Because I'm a sneaky little bastard, but that's not the point. Where's Dr. Tro?”

“She's gone,” he groaned, then coughed up a mouthful of blood. “They carried her off after they shot me. They knocked her unconscious. The wolves...”

Buck and Zant looked at each other grimly as Chase began sobbing, blood dripping thickly through the corners of his mouth.

“Am I going to die?” he choked.

Buck looked at the cube. It had stopped glowing completely and now looked quite dormant.

“No, you're fine now.”

Chase reached around to his back to feel the wound. His hand found a spot completely soaked and warm, but felt no spot of tenderness beneath it.

“How...” he whispered in disbelief.

“Jack here used medical bots. He patched up the hole the arrow made in you.”

Chase nodded, then lapsed into a coughing fit that caused him to double over. It continued until he was splattering red onto the metal floor beneath his feet.

“Sadly, Jack isn't smart enough to have cleared your lungs, but you'll survive that. You should be fine after a few days, and Jack will be able to fix you up again if it gets infected.”

“It didn't even touch me....” Chase said in disbelief.

“Medical bots,” Buck replied. “But now we have to find Dr. Tro, which way did they take her?”

Chase shook his head. “I don't know. All I know is they shot me and knocked her out. They left me, they probably thought I was a goner. I did too...”

Buck walked to the controls and sat down, lifting the Aften Stjerne into the air.

“Dr. Harrow, Dr. Kaddix, come in,” he said to the comms.

Thousands of miles away, Dr. Harrow heard the comms of the Lovable Dictator come on.

“This is Dr. Harrow, who may I be speaking to?”

“This is Buck on the Aften Stjerne.”

“Why isn't Dr. Tro talking, then?” he asked.

“She and the cameraman were attacked.”

“Mauled?”

“Shot,” Buck corrected. “Chase was, and Dr. Tro's been kidnapped.”

“He alright?” Dr. Harrow asked.

“We fixed him up. We're beginning to look for Dr. Tro now.”

“Would you like me to head over and assist?” Dr. Tro asked. “Or relay this to Dr. Kaddix when he wakes up?”

“We'll let you know,” Buck replied. “So far, just giving a status report.

“Dr. Kaddix, it looks like they're talking over the comms,” Kyme reminded pressingly.

“I'm sure they're talking about something trivial,” he said dismissively. “Now, the uplink with the terrain-scanning satellites?”

“We've just landed near a town that a big glowing wisp guided us to, shouldn't we go in and see why we were lead here?” Kiono asked.

“They'll all be asleep, it's dead of night. We'll say hello in the morning. Now Kyme, the map?”

Kyme gave a short sigh and pressed a few buttons. On the computer in the back, the monitor flashed on. Dr. Kaddix trudged over to it and sat down.

“It's scanned most of the planet already, it's in a changing orbit so it will have scanned the whole planet in a day or so.”

Dr. Kaddix looked at the image. He could see the outline of the continents on Mercator projection.

“That there's Euria, that there must be Astica, and that must be Aesis,” he began. “No other continents, lucky us. Kyme, could we download this map to a hard drive?”

Kyme shrugged. “I guess we could download the current files, but the satellite will already send out the complete files once it has scanned the entire surface.”

“I'd like to download the file as is right now.”

“Alright, captain,” Kyme shrugged. She reached over and pressed a few buttons deftly, then stood up and watched as a file transfer box opened on the screen.

Several miles above the atmosphere, the scanner satellite beeped a few times as it began to transmit the data. It continued its transmission without complaint or pause as a great ship glided silently past it towards the planet down below, approximately five hundred yards away, yet as large as a cruise ship.

It did not even pause as the ship began to deploy countless satellites, all spewing fire from their thrusters as they began to spread out and head to their orbit.

It was only when one of those hundreds of car-sized satellites rocketed straight through it that the satellite stopped sending the data and its pieces began to drift silently back down towards the planet.

“Error?!” Dr. Kaddix boomed furiously. “Stupid goddamned technology!”

Kyme looked up, clearly confused. “Dusty, you better take a look at this.”

Dusty looked at the message on the screen and frowned. “That's not good. Try it again.”

“Look at the error code!” Kyme said, a slight hint of panic in her voice.

Dusty squinted and looked closer. After a few seconds the series of numbers recalled their meaning in his memory and he straightened up, looking perplexed. “Hardware error?”

Kyme closed the error message and opened up a program on the computer, then entered the port number of the scanner satellite. Another error message popped up, reading 'Invalid port or unit not responding'.

“It can't have run out of power,” she said to herself. “It has a very large battery, and anyways it was right over Astica, it's mid-afternoon over there, so it would have had lots of light for the solar panels.”

“What else could have gone wrong, then?” Dr. Kaddix asked. “Assuming you people set up the satellites correctly and all that good stuff.”

“Either it got hit by a meteor and destroyed or....” she paused, but couldn't think of anything.

“Should we go outside and look for shooting stars, then?” Dr. Kaddix suggested.

Kyme shook her head and entered a few commands into the program. A screen opened up, showing an array of buttons and names next to them, all of them flashing green except for one.

“Here, this is a list of all the satellites we deployed en route to Terros,” she said. “All of them are responding and working properly, except this red one here, that's the scanner one.”

She paused as another button turned from green to red.

“What the devil...”

All over the board green lights began to flash to Red until only the leftmost row of lights remained green.

“The bloody fucking hell?!” she shouted. “All our satellites just went offline except our GPS satellites! Our photographic satellites, our thermal scanners.... fucking everything!”

Dr. Kaddix gawked.

“What the hell happened?” Dusty asked incredulously.

“I don't know!” Kyme shouted. She clicked a few of the red lights, each resulting in the same error message as when she had tried to reconnect with the scanner satellite.

“One hell of a meteor shower, sounds like,” Dr. Kaddix said.

Kyme pushed out of her chair hurriedly and ran to the door, shoving it open and hopping out onto the ground. She looked up to see the sky dotted with several faint stars that were moving across the sky too fast to be stars.

She knew right away that they were satellites, but that they weren't hers.

Dan knocked on the giant doors to the TimeSpace building.

After nearly a minute, they opened, showing one of the many employees.

“I'm here for the candlelight vigil,” Dan said quietly. “I've brought a candle if you need me to supply my own.”

“You, you're the president, right?” he growled. “Do you even know who this is for?”

“Samuel,” Dan replied solemnly.

“And how do we know you're not just here for publicity?”

“I've pulled strings to ensure nobody has followed me, I'm probably going to get slammed on where I was,” Dan answered.

The employee mulled this over and then pulled the doors open the rest of the way to admit him.

“Sorry sir, just that in my experience, politicians are all the same, just trying to buy votes and sell them selves out for the rest and not givin' a shit about the actual people that look up to 'em.”

“I'd like to think that the people elected me because I was different.”

“The masses only elect pretty faces and people that claim to be in the same party as they are,” the employee grumbled.

“I'd like to think the shallowness that is party politics was not a part of my status, and I find it quite elitist that you refer to everyone else in one blob known as 'the masses'.”

The employee chuckled. “I'm actually starting to like you. I stopped paying attention to politics a while back because it seemed so hopeless. The system had been set up to ensure that those who would best grace the important offices of our government would never get near them. I'd like to think that they didn't do so on purpose. It seemed, however, that every four years it would be two more people that nobody wanted in office, all simply because they would best fit the party.”

“That would have happened this year, I ran as an independent as soon as the nominees for the republicans and democrats were announced. Nobody wanted to vote for either of them, so I won by a landslide.”

“Figures. I'm really starting to like you as a politician, and that's a damn rare thing, you know?”

“I know better than anyone else would,” Dan replied. “I need to speak with Alonso, though.”

“He's busy trying to establish communication with the ships on Terros.”

“He really needs to establish communication with the rest of the world.”

The employee paused. “Please understand, what he does not tell he keeps silent for a reason. Such as keeping the project a secret in the first place in order to prevent a land rush.”

“He said something about having one anyway.”

“Which is what he needs to talk to the ships over there about.”

“Which is probably also something he should be talking to me about,” Dan repeated. “Or to the American people about. Or to the world as a whole about.”

“I'll ask him to talk to you, but again, you must understand that what he does not tell, he keeps quiet for a good reason.”

“He thinks that I would abuse this knowledge or that I would be unable to handle it?” Dan demanded.

“Maybe not you, good sir. Someone else.”

“It looks like someone else has anyway, and it looks like it would be a good idea for him to get us on board now.”

The employee remained silent for a few moments, then turned to Dan. “I'll talk with him. I'll have to ask you to leave for now, and to remain outside. We will contact you when it is time for the vigil.”

“If he won't let me be his friend, I can still be the enemy of his enemy for him. Ask him if he can give us a few of those ships that he sent over, or at least give us plans to build a few.”

“That, I think he might consider, pending on the situation,” the employee replied, and vanished into the elevator.

Dr. Harrow watched as the landscape passed by underneath the Lovable Dictator. He could simply see the heat rising off the planet's surface. But suddenly something began to feel off. He was getting a nagging feeling that something was wrong, and he couldn't put his finger on it. Being in a completely new and odd situation though, he shrugged it off as an odd quirk of the current events.

“Senor,” Taco said, interrupting the silence as Alex continued to fly the ship with Raj's (Nebbs's) guidance.

“Yes?” Dr. Harrow asked. “What is it?”

“Parece usted a mi....” he began.

“You're using the formal form to refer to me now, I'm flattered. I'd prefer if you called me doctor instead of mister, though.”

Taco rolled his eyes. “Bueno. Lo que querria decir es que...”

“Just say it,” Dr. Harrow said quickly. “I won't hold anything against you or anything.”

“Haya usted tenido una templanza que represente poco suspicion y eso ha crecido recentemente y ahora me da miedo...”

Dr. Harrow's eyes suddenly went wide with horror.

“Si, esto!” Taco said. “No lo haga, por serio! Me asusta-”

“Look!” he shouted.

Alex turned hir head from looking at the landscape below and looked up, instantly seeing the enormous ship as it eased slowly down through the planet's atmosphere.

“Shit!”

Dr. Harrow reached over and slammed the comms button. “Dr. Kaddix! Buck! Come in! This is Dr. Harrow, come in now!”

“Hello Dr. Harrow,” replied a thickly accented voice on the other end. “This is Iro Kastan, captain of the ship you see, the Eye of the Storm.”

“Who are you?” Dr. Harrow asked. “Did Alonso send you?”

“No, I am not with TimeSpace technologies.”

“Who are you?” Dr. Harrow asked.

“I am the commander in chief of the U.I.F.F.,” Iro replied coolly. “I'm going to have to ask you to surrender now or we will have to deploy interception forces to neutralize you.”

“Are you threatening us?” Dr. Harrow asked incredulously.

“I'm putting a gun to your head and telling you to do the smart thing. Comply and nobody needs to get hurt.”

“Excuse me?” Dr. Harrow replied. “But to what will would I be complying?”

“All will be explained once you make your choice. I trust that you will be smart and that I will have the honor of informing you of what is going on instead of your maker telling you. I'm deploying attack ships right now, they've been ordered to fire heavily upon you if you do not land your ship immediately, and they will escort you and your crew back to us once you are on the ground.”

Dr. Harrow slammed the comms button off.

“How fast can this ship go?” he asked Alex.

“It can safely cruise at an airspeed of mach five, but it would probably give away where we were unless we kept our speed below mach three,” shi replied. “After mach three we have to use particle accelerators that leave trails to certain sensors.”

“Is there anything we can do to keep us from being detected by their fighter planes?” Dr. Harrow asked.

“Radar mask, but the main ship is probably tracking us.”

“Set us down, somewhere in the jungle below,” Dr. Harrow ordered.

“Why not a clearing?” asked Raj.

“In the jungle, somewhere covered from view from above,” Dr. Harrow repeated. “Do it, now.”

Alex complied and quickly lowered the Lovable Dictator slowly beneath the jungle canopy and onto the overgrown jungle floor. Dr. Harrow turned the comms back on.

“Iro, I've landed,” he said loud and clear.

“Good, my ships are on their way, they should be there in a matter of minutes.”

Dr. Harrow turned the comms back off. “Taco, how many languages do you know?”

“Espanol, ingles, aleman,”

“Number,” Dr. Harrow said.

“Seis,” Taco replied, somewhat perplexedly.

Dr. Harrow quickly led Raj to the back of the ship. “You've absolutely no problem with the jungle, do you?”

“I don't know these parts, we're well over a thousand miles from my home,” Raj replied. “I honestly wouldn't know what they're like here.”

“I only need you outside for a small while,” he replied. He picked up the assault rifle from the weapons locker. “This here is called a gun, what you do is you point this end at whatever you want to kill and you press this thing here back. Don't shoot it in here, and I don't expect you to hit anything with it this time, just shoot in their general direction when I shout for you and run back here.”

Raj nodded, staring at the weapon.

“Don't pull the trigger while you're in here, even I don't know what it's like when it fires, just trust me,” Dr. Harrow stated sternly. He walked over to the door and opened it. “Hide in a bush or something until they come to pick us up, do everything you can to avoid being seen.”

Roj gave a nod of understanding and ran off. Dr. Harrow closed the door behind him, then checked to make sure his pistol was still in his coat pocket.

“Taco, establish communication when they're all around, touch your hat when you've got it, and teach them the most obscure language you know when I give the word.”

Taco nodded. After several minutes there came a knocking at the ship's door.

Dr. Harrow opened it, revealing a small troop of soldiers in red and blue uniforms, each of them armed with some sort of rifle or machine gun that happened to be pointed right at him.

“Greetings, Dr. Harrow,” greeted a thickly Russian accented voice. “I am General Savnokov. Iro has been quite pleased to have already found one of the three ships that Alonso has no doubt sent here, no?”

“Four, actually,” Dr. Harrow answered. “The Lemon Drop is a bit under the radar, but I trust that if I'm surrendering, I might as well give up that too.”

“The Lemon Drop?” General Savnokov asked.

“It's mostly in the air anyway. It's studying weather patterns and currents.”

“I'll send word for Iro to look for it, then. I see Alonso has not changed in his most odd taste for naming his ships.”

Dr. Harrow passed a casual glance at the undergrowth behind them. He caught the faint glint of Raj's assault rifle.

“You've done the right thing, Dr. Harrow,” General Savnokov commended. “In the end, all will be clear. About what you've done here. About what you've facilitated in creating.”

Taco idly brushed sweat from his brow, tapping the underside of his sombrero gently as he did.

“Do you know what the initials U.I.F.F. Stand for?” General Savnokov asked.

“No, do tell,” Dr. Harrow replied.

“United International Freedom Force,” Savnokov replied coolly. “You shall see. Iro Kastan has planned for complete global peace. More than global peace, global unity as well.”

Something seemed to be offsetting and foreboding to Dr. Harrow about what Savnokov was saying. The alleged goal seemed positive, but nothing else about the blue and red uniformed soldiers did.

“Alonso seems to have inadvertently helped us, inadvertently helped everyone,” Savnokov added. “Now, not only is Iro's vision closer at hand than ever before, but now there shall be world peace and unity in two worlds.”

“NOW!”

The soldiers all suddenly reeled in pain, most of them dropping their weapons to clutch instead at their heads. When Raj charged out of the jungle shooting wildly they scattered in confusion and horror.

As Raj was running towards the Lovable Dictator again Dr. Harrow saw one of the UIFF soldiers had managed to hold onto his gun and was shouldering it while facing in Raj's direction.

Dr. Harrow's reaction was automatic. Time began to stand still to him as he reached into his coat pocket and drew his pistol, leveling it almost mechanically at the soldier, whose eyes drifted toward the threat.

He fired.

As soon as he felt the trigger click and saw the flash of light his insides froze and turned to stone. Raj managed to get past the rest of the soldiers without problem and had stopped shooting before any of them were in any real danger of being hit. The four of them had managed to climb into the ship and close the door while most of the soldiers were still staggering around in shock and confusion. Taco was at the controls soon afterward and the ship bolted up through the canopy.

“Taco, head southwest, accelerate as fast as the ship can and fly as fast as possible without turning on the particle accelerators. We're going to meet up with the Aften Stjerne. It should take them some time to get out of the shock of what just happened and get back in the air themselves, so we've got time to put some distance between us.”

“¡El sí del sí, capitán!” Taco replied and the ship turned and roared off into the sky.

Within minutes the ship the Eye of the Storm had vanished from view.

After several more minutes past Dr. Harrow felt his mental hardening slowly peeling back. He remembered the UIFF soldier that had nearly shot at Raj and how he had killed him. He was sure of it in his mind, though in his heart he didn't want to accept it, and with every bit that what he had done sunk in, he felt his throat clench harder and harder and his eyes grow hotter and more watery.

“Is there any way to reestablish communications with the other TimeSpace ships that the UIFF won't be able to intercept?”

“The ships were originally on a global broadcast type system, except we were the only people listening, or so we thought. We can create a specific channel and that should be safe, and we're out of the range of the jammer they had on their flagship.”

Dr. Harrow nodded. “Do what you have to do to set them up.” He then walked down to the back of the ship and collapsed into his bunk, but he wasn't tired in the least.