Read Online SODIUM:6 Defiance by Stephen Arseneault - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Stephen Arseneault
Tags: Sci Fi & Fantasy
Ads: Link
permeated the space surrounding the Meche worlds.
We again placed the static field in front of the Saxon and pushed the throttle forward. We shot through light speed and then drifted towards the planet. After passing we would slingshot around its sun back to a safe distance. The maneuver would bring us to within 250 million kilometers of the smaller planet where our sensors would be able to detect an object on the planet's surface the size of a Meche.
As we neared the planet, Harris spoke up with an excited voice. He had a language translator ready and had also broken the encryption on their military channels. If we were spotted, we would soon know.
Science Officer Brett Miller doubled as our radio frequency specialist. He was able to fine tune our receiver to single out signals coming from the Meche cruiser we had followed. They reported the incident at the mining colony as an anomaly. The sensor they had left behind triggered but nothing was recorded.
They also reported returning 212 new Geffel prisoners. The response from their commander was that it was hardly worth the effort. The next time they had better not return until their holding cells were full. The captain responded with a submissive reply.
We soon had mountains of data from televised signals giving us our first look at the Meche. They were bipeds with a copper colored leathery skin and a head that looked as though it had been chopped down the middle with a meat cleaver. Their slanted red eyes set deep into the base of each cleaved stump. Droopy dog ears hung from each side and a small mouth with sharp teeth lay in the center between the eyes.
The Meche were a small species at only a meter tall. They had twin elbow joints, a bulbous midsection and spindly legs. There was nothing about them that could be counted as attractive. Images of their offspring were always of a large crowd sitting before an instructor. After a day of images it seemed the species was one with no sense of humor, no sense of adventure and nothing any of them did could be construed as entertainment.
We scanned all of the ships in flight to see if any stood out from the rest. We hoped to be able to see something that told us of interaction with any other species. The ships were all of the same sleek black appearance with four antennae protruding from the bottom of their fuselage. I wondered if the Meche also lacked an imagination.
Once we had completed our recon run and moved to a safe distance we decided to make a run to the nearest stars. All had planets in the habitable zone that were burnt out hulks. I wondered if the Ogle had visited them in the past, subjecting every living creature on them to a fiery CME death. The systems surrounding the Meche were lifeless.
Chapter 6
We set our next destination to be Alnilam, the center star of Orion's belt. As we accelerated on our way to Alnilam one of the team, science officer Chaz Humphrey, made mention of the age of the stars we had been visiting. They were each only eight to ten million years old. Hardly enough time for a habitable planet to coalesce, cool and spring forth with life. He reasoned that each of the planets we had visited had been moved from elsewhere, or heavily terraformed with the indigenous life introduced afterward.
It was an interesting insight that the other team members had not picked up on. I wondered if the mountain site at DaCuban held the key as to how these worlds had come about. It was easy to see the progress of life on Earth through fossil records, but that had taken place over the course of the last billion years, three billion years after the Earth was first formed. These planets were out of place amongst such young stars. We logged the idea as a point of discussion for the scientists back home.
When we arrived at Alnilam it was again a system teeming with activity. There were no planets in orbit around the young blue super-giant star. But there was a space station like none we had seen before. It's long
We again placed the static field in front of the Saxon and pushed the throttle forward. We shot through light speed and then drifted towards the planet. After passing we would slingshot around its sun back to a safe distance. The maneuver would bring us to within 250 million kilometers of the smaller planet where our sensors would be able to detect an object on the planet's surface the size of a Meche.
As we neared the planet, Harris spoke up with an excited voice. He had a language translator ready and had also broken the encryption on their military channels. If we were spotted, we would soon know.
Science Officer Brett Miller doubled as our radio frequency specialist. He was able to fine tune our receiver to single out signals coming from the Meche cruiser we had followed. They reported the incident at the mining colony as an anomaly. The sensor they had left behind triggered but nothing was recorded.
They also reported returning 212 new Geffel prisoners. The response from their commander was that it was hardly worth the effort. The next time they had better not return until their holding cells were full. The captain responded with a submissive reply.
We soon had mountains of data from televised signals giving us our first look at the Meche. They were bipeds with a copper colored leathery skin and a head that looked as though it had been chopped down the middle with a meat cleaver. Their slanted red eyes set deep into the base of each cleaved stump. Droopy dog ears hung from each side and a small mouth with sharp teeth lay in the center between the eyes.
The Meche were a small species at only a meter tall. They had twin elbow joints, a bulbous midsection and spindly legs. There was nothing about them that could be counted as attractive. Images of their offspring were always of a large crowd sitting before an instructor. After a day of images it seemed the species was one with no sense of humor, no sense of adventure and nothing any of them did could be construed as entertainment.
We scanned all of the ships in flight to see if any stood out from the rest. We hoped to be able to see something that told us of interaction with any other species. The ships were all of the same sleek black appearance with four antennae protruding from the bottom of their fuselage. I wondered if the Meche also lacked an imagination.
Once we had completed our recon run and moved to a safe distance we decided to make a run to the nearest stars. All had planets in the habitable zone that were burnt out hulks. I wondered if the Ogle had visited them in the past, subjecting every living creature on them to a fiery CME death. The systems surrounding the Meche were lifeless.
Chapter 6
We set our next destination to be Alnilam, the center star of Orion's belt. As we accelerated on our way to Alnilam one of the team, science officer Chaz Humphrey, made mention of the age of the stars we had been visiting. They were each only eight to ten million years old. Hardly enough time for a habitable planet to coalesce, cool and spring forth with life. He reasoned that each of the planets we had visited had been moved from elsewhere, or heavily terraformed with the indigenous life introduced afterward.
It was an interesting insight that the other team members had not picked up on. I wondered if the mountain site at DaCuban held the key as to how these worlds had come about. It was easy to see the progress of life on Earth through fossil records, but that had taken place over the course of the last billion years, three billion years after the Earth was first formed. These planets were out of place amongst such young stars. We logged the idea as a point of discussion for the scientists back home.
When we arrived at Alnilam it was again a system teeming with activity. There were no planets in orbit around the young blue super-giant star. But there was a space station like none we had seen before. It's long
Similar Books
