Chapter 6

Jake

After we picked up Cassie, Dron started the Messenger on the rendevous with Red Feathers. I'd sent Marco and Rachel ahead because Admiral Silas had contacted me earlier saying the fighter squadrons would be deployed soon, and Marco needed to be in on the action from the beginning. If you ask me, Silas was putting way too much faith in Marco. Not that I doubted his abilities, but come on – these fighter squads were composed of the world's top pilots. Being good at video games was one thing, but leading people into combat…well, that was never really Marco's forte.

Cassie and I sat in the cockpit of the Messenger as we left atmosphere. I was half watching Dron pilot the ship and half watching Cassie. Dron was quiet, but seemed competent enough as he took the ship up through the stratosphere. Cassie held my hand as she watched the stars grow closer and brighter. She leaned forward and tapped a couple of buttons on the control panel, and some of the viewport projected an image of Earth from a rear-mounted camera. She sighed and said quietly, "I don't know if that's ever going to stop being amazing."

"I know what you mean," I said, but my attention was on the battleship that was growing in the forward viewport. I prepared to send my clearance codes, but no inquiry ever came. "Admiral Silas must be in some kind of rush if he's going to break protocol and not query us."

Dron did the Andalite version of a snort. (No matter what the hurry, no Andalite ship would ever let another craft approach without communications.)

I ignored the barb and said, "Well, we'll find out why soon enough. Aim for the bay right under the bridge, there at the nose of the ship." Dron did so, and a man waved us in to land beside two starfighters with his glow sticks. Dron set her down with a shudder, but I figured it wasn't my place to reprimand him. "Let's go see what this is about," I said, lowering the ramp and walking out with Cassie. Dron and Tobias followed closely behind us.

A tall man with lieutenant's bars on his uniform saluted me, and I threw him an informal salute in return. "Follow me, please," he said, and turned sharply on his heel and began to march deeper into the ship. I exchanged a look with Tobias who shrugged, and we all did as he said. Five minutes later, he led us into what looked like a war room. Admiral Silas rose as we entered, then resumed his place at the head of the table, motioning us to sit, which we did. Well, except for Dron, who stood easily behind me.

"Mr. Berenson, thanks for joining us," Silas said. He tapped some buttons on the arm of his chair, and a hologram sprung to life over the center of the table. A few buttons later, he'd isolated and enlarged a sector of space I wasn't familiar with. "This is the Balustrad sector. We received a distress call from the Ranger-class scouting ship Vigilance here about four hours ago. I'll play it now."

The starfield was replaced with a scared-looking, young captain. "Earth Starfleet, this is the Vigilance. We've encountered a light Kelbrid cruiser, and it's somehow manipulating space to create a gravity well. We can't run, so we're about to detonate our emergency EMP. Please respond quickly. We'll let the Kelbrid cruiser get close enough to knock it out with our EMP. Message over." It began to repeat itself, and Silas swapped it for the starfield, but this time two small, glowing ships were present.

"If the Vigilance's plan worked, they've only got about thirty-one more hours of canned air on the ship. The EMP will have knocked out their own air recyclers. We're twenty-eight and a half hours away at flank speed. Mr. Berenson, your suggestions?" All the four-star generals and military tacticians turned to look at me. I waited for the feeling of fear or nervousness to hit, but it never did. I guess I'd had enough of making impressions and figured out what really mattered – saving lives and winning battles.

"Flank speed to the Vigilance," I shrugged. "We've got a ship full of men to save. On top of that, there's a helpless Kelbrid cruiser, relatively undamaged, floating in a known location waiting for us to scoop it up. This could be the edge we need, gentlemen."

"How is the cruiser an 'edge?'" a general asked me as he chewed on a pen. "It only fields twenty Kelbrid, and ten of those are warriors. Hardly the sort of weapon that's going to turn the tide."

I smiled. "It's not the ship itself that's the weapon, it's what we can do with it. Me, Marco, Rachel, Tobias, Dron, and Cassie are morph-capable. We can get a few more people involved in this project and have an entrance to Kelbrid secrets, plans, you name it."

Silas slapped his chair and grinned, making the holo display go fuzzy for a minute. "Hot dog! You're gonna pretend to be a Kelbrid picket ship? You got some brass ones, Jake. I like that! Flank speed to the Vigilance!" he yelled into his intercom. He settled down a little. "You know you're going to have to actually turn into these buggers to pull this off, right?"

I shrugged again. "Can't be any worse than a flea or a termite," I said. "Now that our morphing time limit is gone, as long as we can stand it, we can pretend to be Kelbrid."

Marco and Rachel walked in, and the admiral grinned. "Marco, Rachel. You guys may be seeing some action in a little over a day, so I want you to go ahead and meet the members of Voodoo as soon as possible. After that, grab something to eat and meet me so we can set up a briefing for your pilots. Dismissed."

"Dismissed?" Rachel asked incredulously, her face turning beet red. Before she could explode, Marco sketched an informal salute and led Rachel out of the Admiral's conference room. He looked at me questioningly.

"Rachel's not really known for her ability to take orders," I explained a little sheepishly. "Add that to the fact that she's not technically in the military, and she tends to get a little upset when people boss her around. I know you're just being efficient and don't mean anything by it, but she doesn't."

Silas stared at me for a second, and shook his head. "I'll try to keep that in mind next time I talk to the young lady. Anyway, we got work to do. Let's get to it," he said, clapping his hands once and calling up more maps, eager to plan his attack. I sat down and watched him, but on the inside I was wondering if impersonating a Kelbrid was going to work at all.