p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center"III/p
p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;" align="center" /p
p class="MsoNormal"Buck watched helpless as the explosion happened. It was surreal to watch the missiles fired, hit their marks and the entire side of the mountain explode with no sound. He saw Wilma's skid flung upward from the force of the blast and then hit by the falling debris. But he lost sight of her in the immense cloud of dust, dirt, and debris. He wasn't sure where she landed if she was able to land. He didn't dare active the tracking system for fear of alerting the locals. He was fairly sure there would soon be plenty of locals as well as any Draconians that were around buzzing the area. Buck took the Tulsa back down into the atmosphere of Afra. He went as low as he dared and once he was near the last spot he saw the skid he flipped on the tracking system. He was having a difficult time seeing much, the ash and dust cloud was settling on everything. He went as slow as he could. Soon the tracking device latched on the skid and Buck spotted it, crashed and lying on its side against a hill. But as he was watching for the sktd, he didn't see the trees in front of the Tulsa. This wasn't his fighter; it wasn't as maneuverable or responsive. Next thing he knew he had crashed. The good news was he was fine the bad, the ship wasn't going anywhere./p
p class="MsoNormal"Buck climbed out of the Tulsa and ran to the skid./p
p class="MsoNormal""Wilma, Wilma can you hear me?" he called/p
p class="MsoNormal""Yes, no need to shout. But what are you doing here, you should be on the way home. No need for both of us to be captured." Replied Wilma/p
p class="MsoNormal""Tulsa isn't going anywhere right now, and besides I told you we were both going back to New Chicago. Are you hurt? Can you get out the skid?"/p
p class="MsoNormal""I'm not bad, hurt a shoulder and my left ankle. I can't get out of the skid no." she replied/p
p class="MsoNormal""What if I can lift the skid up off the ground can you crawl out?"br /"Don't be ridiculous Buck you can't lift the skid!"/p
p class="MsoNormal""I can with some help from my buddy Archimedes. How much room do you need?" he asked again/p
p class="MsoNormal""Who is Archimedes?"br /"A friend of mine you might say, how much room do you need." He asked again with more urgency as they could both hear the sounds of the Afra ships overhead. They were covered for the time being by the ash cloud but that would dissipate soon./p
p class="MsoNormal"Wilma wasn't sure what Buck was planning but she replied "not much, a half a foot maybe" she replied./p
p class="MsoNormal"Buck started back to the Tulsa at a jog. He soon returned with a long rod, and he stopped and picked up a fairly large flat rock. When he got back to skid, he put these items down and walked around quickly picking up some other larger rocks./p
p class="MsoNormal""Okay tell me when you can slide out" he said. He took the flat rock and used it as a fulcrum for the rod. Using the rod as a lever he was able move the ship up and as he did so, he slipped in another of the larger rocks to hold it and readjusted his fulcrum until skid was high enough, and Wilma slipped out./p
p class="MsoNormal""Wow, that was pretty slick" she said as she dusted herself off. "I see what you mean about the Tulsa"/p
p class="MsoNormal"The two terrains moved over to the big ship, Wilma limping somewhat, and checked it out./p
p class="MsoNormal""No, I don't think it's an option. Not sure what our next move is. This spot is quite a distance from any place on the planet that would be able to support us and get us off planet" Wilma said as she looked around./p
p class="MsoNormal"The two ships were in a low area surrounded by mounds covered in dense vegetation. In front of them was a ridge that was bare of trees./p
p class="MsoNormal""Let's make for that ridge up there, it will give us a better vantage point and we need to get away from the ships, the locals will find them shortly." Buck said/p
p class="MsoNormal""I guess that's our best option at the moment. But first see if there any supplies on the Tulsa we can use."span style="mso-spacerun: yes;" /spanReplied Wilma/p
p class="MsoNormal""Okay" and Buck disappeared into the ship to rummage around. The smoke and ash cloud was getting thinner and thinner and the sound of ships overhead louder and more numerous all the time./p
p class="MsoNormal"Buck emerged from the Tulsa with a small pack slung over his back. "I got some food disks and defense weapons, along with the small position locator. Not sure what help this will all be besides the food"/p
p class="MsoNormal"And with that the two headed towards the side of the clearing and started to make their way up the mound under the cover of the trees. There were a couple of spots where Buck had to help Wilma along because of her bad ankle but generally they made good progress. The only stopped once about 2 thirds of the way up to rest./p
p class="MsoNormal""You know Dr Huer didn't mention the skid getting caught in the explosion when he was listing all the things that could have gone wrong" Buck said/p
p class="MsoNormal""I guess he thought that was a given" she replied./p
p class="MsoNormal" /p
p class="MsoNormal"As they were about to reach the clearing along the ridge a small ship that had been circling overhead landed in the clearing and two soldiers climbed out./p
p class="MsoNormal""I bet they spotted the Tulsa and are going to have a closer look. Wonder how many more guys are in there," said Buck/p
p class="MsoNormal""No more, that type of ship only holds two and it is intergalactic" replied Wilma as the two came out of the trees and into the clearing. "And would you look at that!"/p