Part 22
Mine eyes have seen the glory
Of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage
Where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning
Of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.
-- Julia Ward Howe, 1861
When Richard, or "Dick" as his friends kept calling him, told Chandria he had a plan for them to contact Gareth, at first she couldn't understand why it had to be so elaborate. Surely Dick didn't think Gareth would betray her? Or was it that he still didn't trust her?
When she voiced these concerns, Dick had said, "Chandria, if I didn't trust you and Terga, I wouldn't even be trying to contact your friend Gareth! I'm not even that distrustful of him, but if your uncle felt the need to exile him way out here, I doubt he sent Gareth out here alone."
"You think Gareth has someone spying on him?"
"I certainly have to allow for that. Vic can jam any transmissions from Gareth's ship, but it would be even better not to arouse any suspicions until you've had a chance to speak with him. And while I'm hoping we can contain Gareth and however many people he brings down with him, I don't want to risk having you down there if it turns into a firefight."
"That's why the ruse with the lifeboat," she replied, beginning to understand.
Dick's plan called for Terga to occupy Jericho's lifeboat, which Garth or Donna would land on a small planet near the current position of Gareth's ship. Chandria would remain aboard Jericho along with Vic and Raven while the rest of the Titans waited on the planet surface. Vic would beam a Ch'ton distress signal at the other ship, making it appear to have come from the lifeboat. He had to aim the signal carefully because they certainly didn't want anyone else showing up.
Assuming the ship took the bait, Gareth and his people would see the lifeboat with a Ch'ton female on board. Jericho would be shielded, and Vic would ensure that Chandria's conversations with the other Ch'ton appeared to come from the lifeboat. Chandria knew that her presence would insure that Gareth personally accompanied the "rescue" team. The Titans would ambush the Ch'ton team on the planet and bring Gareth up to the Jericho to talk to her.
The preparations for Dick's plan found Chandria exploring the tiny lifeboat while it was still docked to the ship. Chandria looked up at the expectant faces around her. Dick and Donna were in the small space with her, while the others hovered in the ship's corridor around the lifeboat's open entrance hatch.
"I'm sorry, Dick," Chandria sighed. "I might be able to figure out how to send one of your emergency signals, but I certainly don't know how to use your equipment to send a message that my people would pay any attention to."
Dick sighed as well and nodded. "That's what I thought. Okay, we'll use Plan B -- Donna will be in the lifeboat with Terga. Supposedly you will have overpowered Donna and forced her to send a signal on a Ch'ton wavelength."
Roy spoke up, asking the question Chandria had privately wondered, "Why does it matter whether Chandria can actually send the message? They certainly don't know what the controls on our lifeboat look like!"
Dick replied, "You've done undercover work before Roy, so you know as well as I do that the best deceptions are the ones that have some truth behind them. Sure, the Ch'ton don't know what we've got, but they're also going to have a preconceived idea of Chandria's technical ability. I don't want to raise any questions in their minds if I can help it."
Hours later, Chandria watched Gareth's ship, Moravi, on Jericho's monitors, and she couldn't help but be impressed by how well Dick's plan was working. Gareth had responded to her distress call, and he had appeared truly thankful that she was alive. As she saw a shuttle leave the Ch'ton ship, she could only hope that he would forgive her for deceiving him. She sighed.
Vic smiled, "Not too much longer now, Chandria." He pressed some buttons, and the monitor shifted from showing the tactical positions of the Ch'ton ships to a bird's-eye view of the waiting lifeboat. At her gasp of surprise, he chuckled and explained.
"Roy took along a video transmitter and placed it next to his position so we could watch what happens." He pressed a button on the instrument panel. "Yo, Dick!"
"Yeah, Vic?" came the reply, sounding slightly tinny through the ship's speakers, but cheerful.
"The Ch'ton just launched a shuttle. ETA your position eighteen minutes."
"Thanks, Vic."
Even though Chandria had been at the briefing when Dick had laid out each team member's position, she could still see no trace of them on the screen. Dick had selected a medium-sized clearing between a forest and the beginning of a large rock formation for their ambush. Roy was in a cave near the top of the rocks. Wally was in another cave closer to the ground. Dick and Toni were hiding in the trees in the forest, and Garth, to Chandria's astonishment, was concealed in a nearby river.
When the shuttle landed, Chandria unconsciously held her breath as she watched Gareth descend the steps from the main entrance and look around the clearing. Four additional warriors followed him, each with his weapon drawn and ready. She was so entranced by watching Gareth that she started when Victor quietly spoke.
"Dick, I show two more Ch'ton still aboard the shuttle; probably the pilot and copilot."
"Copy that, Vic. Wally, those two are yours. Don't let them get that shuttle back in the air!"
"Got it!"
"Vic, can you ask Chandria to give me a positive ID on which one's our boy Gareth?"
Chandria pointed to the lead warrior.
"Sure thing, Dick. Chandria says it's the guy in front."
"Copy that. Thanks, guys!"
Chandria bit her lip as the group of warriors got closer and closer to the lifeboat, but still Dick didn't give the signal. She glanced over at Vic who was watching her sympathetically.
"I know," he said, "I hate waiting too. But Dick knows what he's doin'."
Suddenly, she heard Dick's command of "Now!" and the clearing erupted into action. A strange projectile, that she realized must have been fired by Roy, struck Gareth in the chest and almost magically turned into bands that held him captive. Meanwhile, Toni and Garth subdued the other warriors, enclosing them in translucent blocks up to their necks. Donna had rushed out of the lifeboat to help Wally secure the shuttle, and they soon came out leading the pilots. Dick escorted Terga from the lifeboat and stood in front of Gareth.
"If you'll tell your men to stand down and come along with me, I promise none of you will be hurt," declared Dick.
Vic had instructed the camera to zoom in on the two men, so Chandria could see the confusion on Gareth's face.
"You...you speak our language? Wait, that's not Queen Chandria!"
Terga bowed slightly. "No, my lord, I am but a servant of the queen. She is waiting to talk to you."
"What is this?" Gareth exclaimed.
Dick replied, "I'll give you an explanation, but not here. Please, stand down your men."
Gareth waved his hand, and the imprisoned warriors stopped struggling. Toni then erected a shoulder-high fence around the four warriors and two pilots, and she and Garth removed the blocks that had imprisoned the warriors. In a matter of seconds, Wally had gathered their weapons and stacked them outside the "corral."
"Okay, Donna, Roy, keep an eye on things. Vic, pull us up," Dick ordered as he released the bonds that held Gareth.
Chandria watched in wonder as Dick and Gareth disappeared from the planet surface. She had first seen the transporter in action when the team had gone down to the planet, but it still amazed her. She looked up as Vic touched her shoulder.
"Chandria, I assume you'll want to welcome Gareth?"
"Oh! Of course," she replied, following Vic to the transporter. Both Raven and Vic flanked her as she watched the two figures rematerialize on the receiving station. Dick had told her he believed this would be one of the riskiest parts of the mission. He was fairly certain he and Vic could handle Gareth should the warrior become violent, but Chandria heard what he wasn't saying -- fighting in the confined space of the ship could cause damage that would be hard to repair while they were right on top of a Ch'ton warship.
When Gareth had completely materialized, Chandria rushed over to him and clasped both of his hands in hers. "Gareth! My dear friend, I'm so glad to see you!"
"Alani! I ... mean, Your Majesty!" he stuttered. "You really are here, and it wasn't just a ruse that they captured you?"
Chandria smiled at the old nickname. "Yes, they captured me, but they saved my life in the process. Come with me, and Dick will explain." Chandria led him to the briefing room while Dick followed behind. She gently pushed Gareth down into one of the chairs at the table and walked around to sit across from him.
Dick took a position in between and said, "Gareth, I am Lt. Commander Richard Grayson of the United States Navy of Earth, although my friends," he nodded to Chandria, "call me Dick. How my friends and I came to be here with your queen is a long story, so I'll just give you a synopsis of the situation. Your Warlord, along with a powerful man on my planet, instigated this war as a means of taking power away from their leaders and grabbing it for themselves. Not knowing this, my team abducted Chandria, hoping to use her to persuade your people to begin peace talks. Instead, we learned that the Warlord would just use her absence as a way of furthering his hold on your government. With me so far?"
Gareth looked at Chandria almost helplessly. She smiled at him and nodded in encouragement. "Everything he's saying is true, Gareth. I found the evidence in Tongear's files myself. These people should not be our enemies. My uncle is the true enemy of our people."
Gareth glanced back at Dick and nodded slightly in acknowledgement. Dick smiled and continued.
"Okay, I don't like carrying out missions whose objectives help my opponents! So Chandria and I have made a deal -- my friends and I will help her get her throne back, and she will then sue for peace and end this war. Now in order to make that happen, she's going to need someone she can trust to replace her uncle as Warlord. You're the guy she picked. Now I'll leave you two alone to talk it over." Dick got up and walked toward the door. He then turned around and said with a smirk, "And at least try to talk about the topic at hand before I come back!"
Chandria made a face at him, and he laughed and walked out the door, closing it behind him. She turned and looked at Gareth, but she suddenly couldn't think of anything to say. She let her gaze rest on his face. He had always been one of the handsomest men she had ever known -- was he thinner now than he had been? His face seemed drawn as if in weariness or pain. With a start, she realized he had been studying her as well. What did he see, she wondered.
"So the queen has decided she still has need for the tool she so casually discarded," he said in a mocking, bitter tone. "Should I be thankful you remembered me at all?"
Chandria felt as if he had slapped her. Her mouth opened, but nothing came out. Finally, she looked away from Gareth to stare at the far wall. Swallowing hard, she managed to whisper, "I looked for you at my coronation ceremony. The high priest even had to prompt me once because I was so focused on locating your face in the crowd. I kept telling myself that you wouldn't have missed it, that you must have been there somewhere, but I never could find you. I finally asked one of my councilors if he had seen you."
She turned back to look at Gareth, where shock had taken the place of anger. She continued, "He told me 'Lord Gareth had requested an assignment at the front lines as he felt his continued presence at my side might cause comment.' What sort of 'comment' you might have meant, he didn't say, and I didn't care. All I knew was that you had left me."
"What?! I never ... you were the one who sent me away!"
She shook her head. "That was Tongear's doing. When I realized that he was isolating me and that he wanted the power for himself, I looked up your personnel records and saw his authorization on your new assignment."
"But why?" he asked plaintively.
"Because you were a threat to him," she said simply. "In order for his plan to work, he had to keep me from forming my own power base. By removing you from the picture, especially the way he did it, he kept me from having any contact with the military except on his terms. I also found hints that he was planning to sell his support of any potential candidate for prince consort to the highest bidder. Obviously, if you had still been there, he wouldn't ..." she broke off, blushing, as she realized what she was implying.
A hint of a smile on his face, Gareth rose from his seat and stood in front of her. He then gracefully knelt on both knees before her, his head bowed in the traditional form of a warrior's oathtaking.
"I am your servant, my lady and my queen. I pledge you my life and my honor. Command me and use me as you will."
Chandria placed her hands on either side of the bent head and tilted it back until she could see Gareth's eyes while she gave him the traditional reply.
"You are not my servant, but my trusty and well-beloved warrior. I pledge to hold your honor as my own." She stopped and took a deep breath.
Thinking the small ceremony was over, Gareth gathered himself to stand. He stopped when she didn't let go of his face. Obviously puzzled, he waited for her to continue.
"And if my warrior should someday wish to be ... more than my warrior, I would pledge my heart to him as well."
He smiled and took her hands in his and kissed them. Standing again, he drew her up from her chair and into his arms. "My heart has always been yours, my lady. Even when my mind said I was crazy for continuing to love someone who wanted nothing to do with me."
"Then, I'll be blunt," Chandria said with a smile of her own. "Will you be my prince consort?"
He laughed. "First, dear heart, we have this small matter of getting your throne back. But yes, I would be proud and honored to be your consort."
He leaned down to kiss her. Just then, Dick came back in the room, and they drew back from each other, slightly embarrassed.
"Sorry for the interruption, guys, but we're on a short clock here," he said, smiling. "Gareth, I'm going to assume that you've agreed to help us on this, so first off, I need to know how trustworthy your people are."
One of the traits Chandria most admired about Gareth (aside from his body) was his quick intelligence. Even though he was still holding her in his arms, he immediately began thinking about Dick's question, and the reasoning behind it. Chandria slipped out of his arms and lightly pushed him back into his seat at the table. He grinned at her and then turned to Dick.
"I take it you're asking if any of my crew could be spying for Tongear?"
"Exactly!"
"Maybe. Recently, I've become suspicious that my chief communications officer was trying to advance himself by threatening to inform on any crew members who didn't seem sufficiently zealous towards the war effort. I have complete faith in the rest of my officers, though. There are certainly some malcontents among the workers in my crew, but I doubt Tongear would make use of any of them as spies."
"Maybe, maybe not. I think I'd rather err on the side of caution."
"I'll take care of them. What exactly did you have in mind for taking down Tongear?"
"First, I need you to let your ship know you're all right, without giving away just what you're up to."
Dick led them from the briefing room to the ship's bridge, where Vic was waiting. He turned to Gareth. "All right, Vic here will make it seem as if you're broadcasting from your shuttle on the planet. Remember, say nothing about us!"
Gareth complied, assuring his somewhat anxious first officer that everything was fine, but there were a few matters they had to straighten out before they could return to the ship. When he had finished, Dick led them back to the briefing room.
"Now then -- Chandria, I remember you said that you doubted your uncle would try very hard to find you. Do you think he would still inform everyone you were missing?" Dick asked after they had taken their seats.
"Oh, yes. In order for the deception to work, he has to at least appear anxious to find me."
"All right. Gareth, if you were to take your ship back to Ch'ton, I'm sure you'd be challenged along the way, correct?"
"Yes, several times, as a matter of fact."
"Would they believe that you had been recalled to help in the search efforts?"
Gareth thought for a few moments. "Probably. I might even be able to persuade my commander to detach my ship to join the search effort. Either way, it should work, at least until we get to the home system."
"And I have some ideas about that, but they can wait. Just a couple more things," Dick said, his cheerful expression growing serious as he spoke directly to Gareth. "Until Tongear is overthrown, my team and I still consider Chandria our prisoner. I don't really have a problem with her and Terga going back on your ship, but four of us will be accompanying them, and our ship will be flying escort. Should you or one of your crew threaten us or attempt to keep us from carrying out our mission, Raven will remove Chandria from your ship." He pointed to the translucent woman who had slipped into the room undetected.
He continued, "It was due to Raven's abilities that we were able to kidnap Chandria and Terga in the first place. There's nowhere you could hide Chandria that she couldn't follow. Furthermore, once she's brought Chandria aboard, my crew has orders to take her straight back to Earth. And seeing as your people couldn't find this ship when it was parked in orbit around your planet, I seriously doubt you'd be able to find it out here."
Dick smiled again, "Now I'd like to think that all these precautions are unnecessary, but I figured it was best if you knew about them ahead of time so you could inform your crew."
Gareth, who had grown dangerously quiet, gradually relaxed after he considered what Dick had said. "It's a fair warning," he replied. "Our peoples are still at war, and emotions can run high. You have your duty to perform, just as we do. I understand and accept your terms."
Dick's smile became a grin. "You just don't want to run the risk of losing her before you get to kiss her!" He ducked just in time to avoid the playful smack Chandria tried to level against his head. "Well, let's get this show on the road!"
** End Part 22 **