“Admiral, a Goultaran destroyer has just entered the system through the wormhole.”

“Establish communications with it. Use one of the mines as a comm relay.”

“Aye.”

“The cruiser Fregtar just launched four courier ships,” said the tactical officer. “They entered hyperspace immediately.”

“Get Captain Tret on the line,” said Admiral Stoblank. “Route him to my console.”

“What was that?” said the admiral after Tret’s face appeared on his screen.

“You mean the couriers? I sent for reinforcements.”

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“No, Sir,” replied his Communication Officer, Lieutenant Stan Cranston. Cranston, the only officer remaining from Griswald’s original bridge crew when he was just a ship captain, had carried him, bleeding, from the destroyed bridge of the San Diego at the Battle of Wormhole #308.

“Order them to disengage and fall back to the rendezvous point, Stan. Find four destroyers that haven’t been boarded yet to go with them. Get me General Mayfield.”

“Mayfield here,” said the face on the viewscreen. Columns of smoke partially obscured the mountains behind him.

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“Someone should have responded by now,” he said to Commander Trishret, who led the group of Eridani observers he’d brought with him from Stanstesia Station.

“Yes,” replied Trishret. “They have receivers on both the planet and the shipyard. They can not only clearly see and identify your hyperdrive signatures, but also hear your hyper-comm attempts. They also should have sent ships out here by now to challenge us.”

“What ships do you have deployed here?” said Griswald.

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“Contact Admiral Stennis, please,” he said, struggling to keep his voice calm.

He waited a minute while the necessary contact sequence came together, and then the face of Admiral Stennis on the forward display.

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“Agreed,” said Sam, pulling a chair up to the front of the desk and sitting in it.

“What do you want me to do with him?” said Stoblank. “I could turn him over to you.”

The Earth Space Force already had more Dr. Thadfields than Sam could stomach, and there were scientists on Earth who would be too interested in studying a genetically enhanced version of him.

“No, Admiral, you keep him,” said Sam. “You have an outbreak of those super soldiers to contain, and Thadfield knows things that can help you. If you get your hands on any more of them, though, you should keep them separate and unaware of each other; they are pompous, slippery, duplicitous snakes. Make them think they are the center of your world. They like that.”

Admiral Stoblank laughed.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Mr. Grant,” he said. “However, he is human…”

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Helona sat now beside Carl in a conference room full of Eridani, Goultarans, and humans. She pressed the hand of her favorite human tighter against her thigh under the table.

“With respect, Mr. Anderson,” the admiral replied. “Mr. Smith here said that he and his security team were ambushed and captured by humans. Eridani could not have operated on that human planet without being noticed.”

Carol Holbrook stood up.

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A knock sounded at the door.

“Come in,” she said with a sniff, wiping away a tear. She clenched her fists, the only weapon or hope she had left, and backed up against the far wall.

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“Jump to the wormhole,” he said after pushing the button to activate voice commands. “Evade all contact with all ships on station at the wormhole, using the new evasion protocols. Objective: Wormhole jump to the Human Sector.”

The translator relayed the command, the control console beeped in acknowledgement, and they jumped to hyperspace. As the long seconds marched slowly by, Helona’s adrenaline increased like the coiling of a spring. She hoped for the best from the work that the Marine Corporal had done, but her eyes wandered over to the pile of weapons in the corner. She walked over and took her spear.

“I don’t think you’re going to need that,” said Gary.

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The insufferable Director Brickart’s mouth snapped shut almost with a click. The admiral sighed in relief.

“Your complaints about the humans will concern many back home, but not me,” said the admiral, “I have other, more urgent concerns here, including several pieces of news that arrived ahead of you.”

“The human space station commander delaying me on a silly pretext is a new affront.”

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Helona could see on the control console hundreds of dots, some of which began moving toward them as soon as they’d arrived. Other dots lit up also.

“Yeah, we knew,” said Gary. “From what you all told me, they’re probably at war with the Goultarans, so it makes sense that they’d be guarding their wormhole.”

“That’s a lot of ships,” said Helona. “If we can’t see what’s at the destination, how did we avoid a collision with them when we dropped out?”

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She looked up from her work and saw Admiral Pace standing in the doorway of her office. He wasn’t even in uniform.

“Admiral Pace,” she said, surprised. “What are you doing here?”

“I flew a courier ship from Earth,” he said. “I left so quickly, I didn’t even have time to find a pilot. Now, listen, there isn’t much time…perhaps even just minutes.”

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“It’s not as simple as that,” said Admiral Stonid. “It was a government agency, but with a lot of autonomy. The government knew what they were doing while shielding itself from the messy and controversial details.”

“When other forces in the galaxy, not just the Eridani, started to figure it out, things got dangerous, the public found out about it and revolted,” said Director Zenad.

That still didn’t explain all the secrecy. When Elizabeth had first met the Goultarans, they didn’t tell her any of that. Several times, these two seemed to know things that they refused to say, even while insisting on a degree of ignorance of their ancestors’ behavior.

“How old are you two really?” Sam Grant blurted out. “Were you members of the Science Directorate?”

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“Just for today,” said Steven Holbrook without looking up from his computer screen. “If you have a complaint, take it up with the front desk. I’m no longer involved in the day-to-day operations here.”

“Then why is your name still on the building, Steve?”

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“Let’s just keep going,” someone spoke up. “What can happen?”

“I explained it already,” said the Marine with a sigh. “Every one of these scientists carries a device that can trigger the Containment Protocol. Until Corporal Gifford and those two Goultarans disable the transmission station that relays the signal to the detonators, every room we cross risks someone seeing us, pushing a button, and blowing a hole in the dome and killing everyone!”

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“You’ve been gone for weeks,” he said, returning to the slop that they had learned to call breakfast.

She closed the door behind her, then walked over to the cupboards and opened one of them.

“You moved the bowls,” she said.

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He pushed the comm button to send the preprogrammed greeting and waited a minute for the reply.

“Leave the area,” came the response from the nearest Goultran destroyer.

Spivy swallowed hard and activated his mic. If they decided to fire on his little courier ship, at least he would die quickly.

“I’m looking for a lost cruiser,” he lied. “The Mayfield.”

As he waited for their reply, he continued to analyze the visual sensor images of the targets in front of him as he tried to match them with the dreadnaught, picket cruisers, and destroyers that had attempted to intercept Griswald’s cargo run. He needed to be sure before reporting back. He focused the main camera on the dreadnaught’s bow and commanded the computer to find its identification markings.

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“Me too, Carl,” said Sam. “We knew even before Ambassador Trunketh arranged these inspections that these planets were internal to the Goultaran sector, and that it would take us a week or so in hyperspace to get to them.”

Carl Anderson, Samuel Grant, and Carol Holbrook sat inside the Eridani Seed Ship preparing to depart.

“Sam,” said Carol. “The ship has dropped from hyperspace and scanned the system. There’s a Goultaran shipyard in orbit around the planet, and they’re inviting Mayfield to dock and have a meeting with him. The captain wants to know what you want to do.”

“Sounds like a distraction,” said Carl. “They don’t want us to go down to the planet.”

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Gary had gone to the elevator as soon as he heard the door open. He already knew what it was about.

“You mean Helona?”

“Don’t be coy with me, Gary,” said Doctor Thadfield. “You’re not good at it.”

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“Excuse me?” Zenad replied, pouring Elizabeth a cup of sare tea, the Goultaran equivalent of coffee.

“I just thought you folks wanted to avoid annoying Commodore Griswald.”

Zenad shook her head.

“Elizabeth, you’re three jumps ahead of me.”

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Episode 24: Griswald’s Dilemma

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Commodore Griswald pulled up the display on his command chair. The “problem” came in the form of a Goultaran dreadnaught, two medium cruisers, and eight destroyers, all in a defensive formation guarding the wormhole as if waiting to ambush someone.

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