Disclaimers: This story and its characters are mine. Do not reproduce or copy without permission of AJ Marks.
Additional disclaimers: Chapter 3 deals with 9/11. If you do not want to read it skip to the next chapter
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Legacy of the Guardians
by
AJ Marks
Chapter 3
Ahmed sat at his station when the new orders came in. He quickly read them and went over to his captain and showed him the orders.
"Well, it appears that the council has finally decided to do something about the Skartian threat." The captain said out loud.
Ahmed was intrigued by the captain's statement but knew that he would tell them in time. Instead Ahmed asked if the captain had any orders for them to carry out.
"Have the scanners report when they have an Ilderian military fleet on their screens, otherwise maintain status quo." The captain said and he knew that he had a confused bridge crew, but it was not the first time and he knew that they would continue to do their jobs.
"Is there something wrong captain?" Ahmed asked what everyone on the bridge was asking themselves.
"No." The captain replied knowing that Ahmed would asked the question that everyone was asking themselves and was waiting for him to ask the question. "It seems that we are to be relieved by them, our orders are to leave the neutral zone when the Ilderian fleet gets here and to inform them about Gasica."
"Oh, well at least there will be a presence that isn't friendly to the Skartians here." Ahmed said breathing a sigh of relief. He had been feeling some tension in the air with their orders and it almost felt like when they were at war. A nervous tension that filled the air and you breathed it in and if you allowed it to it would consume you. Ahmed did not think that the Skartians would be bold enough to try anything with another military presence in the neutral zone.
"That's true, although I'm not sure that even matters to them anymore." The captain said in a hushed voice that only Ahmed could hear and he gave the captain a questioning glance. The captain noticed the glance and just shook his head and glanced around at the others on the bridge and Ahmed knew that this was a conversation to be continued at a later point when they were alone.
Ahmed continued to watch his control panel for anything unusual or the coming Ilder fleet to relieve them from their patrol. He was interrupted out of his thoughts by the captain announcing that he was going down to the mess hall to grab a cup of coffee, and then asked Ahmed to join him and gave the bridge to the next ranking person on the bridge.
They walked in silence down the corridor past other crewmen and women who were going about their tasks like usual. The captain then stopped next to an empty room and motioned Ahmed inside.
"I thought we were headed to the mess hall?" Ahmed asked with a little bit of confusion.
"I need to talk to you alone and the mess hall isn't the place for that." The captain explained. "I need to let you know what's been going on the past couple of months, and seeing that you're my second in command you need to know." Ahmed was not sure what to make of this statement but walked into the room and watched as the captain closed and locked the door.
"For the past couple of months high command has been intercepting several highly encrypted messages going to earth." The captain said watching his second in command's face closely. "Just recently we were able to determine that the signals are Skartian in source, we however have not been able to translate the messages."
"Is there a possibility of a surprise attack by the Skartians?" Ahmed asked with some worry in his voice.
"No one really knows, but the messages have been increasing lately and in the past week there has been five such messages."
"Do they know where the signal is being received?"
"They have an idea. They think that the signal is being received somewhere in the Middle East area, they can't pinpoint the area in closer. This is the reason I didn't want to tell you."
"So there could be someone from my homeland under the control of some Skartian?"
"No, we closely monitor the leaders of earth. But we both know that the area is unstable still."
"You're right, thanks for telling me, does anyone else know?"
"No, this is very highly sensitive material Ahmed, and until the high command has real proof they are trying to keep as quiet as possible."
"Sounds like good advice captain, I'll keep it quiet. Now some of your recent orders make since."
"Good, I knew I could count on you." The captain said giving Ahmed a hearty slap on the back. "Now, let's go get some coffee." And they walked out of the room and to the mess hall.
A short while later the two men stepped back on to the bridge. "Anything new to report?" The captain asked.
"No sir." The young man who had been left in charge replied.
"That's good news." The captain replied as he sat down in the captain's chair. "Well we'll just wait for now."
"Sir, I've got a contact." The scanner operator said a couple of hours later. "Its the Ilder fleet."
"At last." The captain said. "Get me their commander as soon as you can."
"Yes sir."
A couple of minutes later the Moscow and her escorts left the neutral zone headed back to Independence Station.
Jack sat back in his desk and rubbed the top of his head. So far today had been relatively peaceful, and although Jack loved days like this he really disliked it when the peace was broken. He often wanted to do space exploration, but this was a close, as he would ever get to that. He had achieved his goal of getting into space.
He was just about to buzz his secretary when the door opened and in walked a dazed Steve.
"I think you need to see this." Steve said in a rush turning on his TV in the corner.
"What is so important that it can't wait until morning Steve?" Jack asked, all he wanted to do was go home and go to sleep.
Steve turned On the TV so Jack could see the picture and Jack used every curse word in the dictionary, and some that Steve had ever heard before.
Jack sat there and stared at the TV screen. He had just seen a replay of a plane hitting one of the world trade center twin towers in New York City. Jack saw that both buildings had smoke coming out of them and he could also see fire coming from the holes in buildings. The reporters were saying that it was the result of a terrorist attack on the United States.
"My God! What's going on down there?" Jack asked not really expecting an answer from Steve. "Here I thought that mankind was close to a new age!"
"I've already contacted our agents to see what's going on." Steve said, and then added. "Should we contact Randall?"
"Yes." Jack said without his usual objecting over bringing up Randall's name.
Steve picked up the phone only to have Jack take it away from him and dialed the phone number and put it on speakerphone. Steve was now really shocked, both by what the TV was showing and by Jack's actions.
"Hello, Randall here." He said answering the phone.
"Randall, do you have your TV on?" Jack asked in an anxious voice.
"What, wait, just a second." They heard Randall say. Randall at first thought Jack was calling him for something else, but the tone in his voice was something Randall had not heard in a long time. He quickly turned on the TV and saw the smoking twin towers of the world trade center. Then he heard the newscasters talking about terrorist attacks on the towers and the pentagon. "Holy shit!?" Randall exclaimed.
"Yeah!" Steve said.
"The twin towers and the pentagon hit by suicide terrorist attacks." Randall said.
"The pentagon too?" Jack said with surprise.
"Yeah, they just said it on the station I'm on." Randall said.
"They haven't, oh wait here it is." Steve said as the newscasters started to report on the pentagon being hit. "Damn, what else are they going to hit?" Steve asked the rhetorical question going though their minds.
"I'm not sure." Jack said thinking about what was going on. "Get me General Ginal." Jack said to his secretary who was also standing in a bit of shock. She nodded her head and left toward her desk to do her duty. It was just a few minutes later that she replied that he was on line two.
"Randall, hold on a minute, I'm going to conference this call." Jack told him and did not wait for his reply. It took just a few seconds before he was able to get all the calls on one line.
"General, what's going on down there?" Jack asked the general.
"We're not really sure, just that earlier this morning at least three planes were hijacked and have crashed into the twin towers and the pentagon." The general replied to the question. "We have reports of another hijacked plane, but so far the reports are sketchy at best. All we know is that it is not responding to calls by the air traffic controllers."
"This is crazy." Randall said.
"Ah, I see we're all here, is Steve there also?" The general asked to which he got Steve's voice saying that he was there.
The captain of the Moscow sat back in his chair. The fleet had left the neutral zone and his Ilderian counterpart had already gotten the message to investigate Gasica by his own commander. The captain felt better, but he wished that his fleet could remain in the neutral zone.
"So what do you think Ahmed?" He asked his second in command about the Ilder fleet.
"I'm glad that its an honorable race that's going to be in the neutral zone, at least if they find something it will be more likely something is done about it." Ahmed said.
"That's what I thought also."
"Captain, high powered signal detected." An officer said getting the captain's and Ahmed's attention.
"Source?" Ahmed said.
"Earth?!" The officer said almost not believing it.
"Can you get a destination?" The captain asked hoping that the answer would not be what he thought.
"Just a second." The officer said working on the control panel. A few minutes later she looked up with a sudden afraid face. "Gasica!" She whispered.
Her whisper sounded like a shout across the bridge as the name seemed to echo off the bridge walls. Ahmed looked at the captain and knew that the captain was not surprised at the location.
"Notify Independence Station and the Ilder fleet at once." The captain said and several officers went about their tasks. He then turned toward Ahmed and asked him. "Are we out of the neutral zone?"
"Ah, yes we cleared it about fifteen minutes ago." Ahmed said looking at his insterment panel.
"Order the fleet to stop and start patrolling this side of the neutral zone, in specific see if we can scan Gasica." The captain ordered and again people went about carrying out his orders.
"Sir, incoming message from Independence Station." The communication officer said. "The world trade center has been attacked by a terrorist attack about twenty-five minutes ago." There was silence on board the bridge as they heard the news.
"By Allah!" Ahmed said knowing that this was not good news.
"No kidding!" A person whispered next to him echoing Ahmed's statement.
"Admiral Cave!" An aide said as he walked into his office where Jack and Steve sat watching the TV, and still had the general and Randall on the phone.
"Yes?" Jack said, as he tore his eyes away from the TV to put his attention on the aide.
"Report from the Battlecruiser Moscow sir!" The aide said handing Jack a piece of paper and was dismissed.
Jack scanned through the piece of paper and suddenly had a sickening feeling in his stomach. "Gentlemen, it appears that the battlecruiser Moscow has intercepted a high powered message from earth to the area of Gasica."
Silence met his statement as Jack continued. "The captain of the Moscow has started to patrol the neutral zone border without entering the zone, and has alerted the Ilder fleet of the situation."
"Do we know what the message said?" The general asked.
"Unfortunately we haven't been able to translate any of the messages yet." Steve said wishing they had been able to crack the code.
"Well..." Jack started to say when the newscasters on the TV caught his attention. "Holy...!" Jack started to whisper, but the words died on his tongue as he watched one of the towers fall.
No one said anything for several minutes as they tried to comprehend what they had just saw.
"I can't believe I just saw that!" Randall said, being the first one to recover his voice. Then everyone started talking at once.
"Hold it everyone." Jack said waiting for silence on the phone, then continuing when everyone had quieted down. "I think we should put the Saratoga carrier group on level one alert and sent it to the neutral zone border."
"Do it!" The general said.
They quickly sent for a courier to deliver the message. A few minutes later the courier arrived and Jack barely noticed that it was Greg.
Greg had been watching the news and was glad to get out of the room. He had been getting depressed. The room that Greg had been in had four other people and their shock when the first tower had fallen made him want to do something. He was really glad when the call came in for a courier for the admiral.
"Yes sir!" Greg asked when arrived in the room.
"I need you to take this over to the control room." Jack said handing over a paper to Greg.
"Do you think that the Saratoga carrier group will be enough?" General Ginal asked over the phone having heard the entire conversation.
"Good point!" Jack said. "Greg, go on ahead and take those orders to the control room and come right back.
"The general is right." Jack said. "I've been thinking about it and I don't like what I'm thinking. What's the fastest battle group we have on alert?"
"That would be the Fifth battlecruiser fleet under Vice Admiral Dinen." Steve replied.
Greg walked back into the room just as the other tower was collapsing and everyone's attention turned to the TV again. Again they watched, sickingly, as the other tower fell.
"Send the Fifth battlecruiser group along with the Saratoga carrier group at once." Jack told Greg as he took one last look at the TV and then rushed off to carry out his orders.
"Do you think there's a connection between these terrorist attacks and the Skartians?" Steve asked.
"Well, it wouldn't surprise me." The general said. "I think we should gather all of our resources to finding who did this, and when we have them, we will have our answer."
"Good idea!" Randall said. "Is there anything I should tell the council?"
"Yes, state that Earth space is temporally off limits, any ship entering our space will be met with warships." The general said.
"I'll put the fleet on war alert two." Jack said which meant that the fleet was almost at war, and the individual commanders had authority to open fire, if they felt it was necessary.
"Good, I think we should get back to work now, we have a lot to do." The general said. "Jack, I may need you to come down here and talk with some of the others."
"I'll be ready, just let me know." Jack said as Randall then the general hung up the phone. "Well Steve, looks like we got a job to do."
"Right!" Steve said nodding his head. "I'll send out the war alert and get the message to the Moscow right away."
"Thanks Steve." Jack said as Steve was walking out the door.
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