Chapter 6: Conscripts and Recruits

Dr. Jones woke up to a bright light, He clamped his eyes closed, took a deep breath and was suddenly consumed in coughing fits as a grey fluid was expelled from his lungs. At first he thought he was in the hospital, but he quickly realized that it was too quiet. After a few seconds a feminine voice spoke, as a small hand began to pat on his back. “The Cryogenic fluids should clear your lungs shortly. Try and take deep breaths as it will help expel them faster.”

Soon his fits began to subside and he was able to actually do as the voice suggested. He could hear that several other people were coughing as well. Dr. Jones opened his eyes once again then sat up and looked around. “What the hell is going on?!” He exclaimed as he saw his patient, Mr. Jenkins, standing by another man and the young teen he had seen in the hospital, all wearing some kind of military uniform.

Behind them he could see Nurse Dale, Debbin and Jimenez laying on beds similar to the one he was on, all three were naked and coughing like he was. Mr. Jenkins walked closer to his bed looking concerned. “Dr. Jones, I am David Jenkins and there is a reasonable explanation for everything. Please come with me.” Mr. Jenkins said while holding up a small grey stone.

...

David watched as Dr. Jones and the three Nurses absorbed everything that he had told them. The four were sitting on crates in the cargo area of one of the Querithons wearing robes supplied by the Remote Interface Unit. Karen looked up at him with tears in her eyes and shook her head as she rubbed her arms. “You have got to be kidding me. This is insane, you kidnap up us, do lord knows what with us while we are unconscious and then tell us this insane story. This is too much.”

The Remote Interface Unit turned around and headed into the cockpit of the Querithon, after a few seconds the entire craft shook slightly. Spaz followed the Unit out and a few seconds later his voice could be heard coming from the cockpit area. “Holy ... guys you HAVE to come see this!”

David and the others stuck their heads into the cockpit of the Querithon to see the craft flying out of the Lanvy’s Bay and out into space. The craft flew out for a few seconds and then banked to the left bringing both Earth and the Lanvy into view. “Oh My!” Karen exclaimed at what she saw. “You were serious.”

David looked back at Karen with a grin. “Yes I was. Welcome to the E.D.S. Lanvy.”

Karen backed away from the cockpit until her legs ran up against the crate she had been previously sitting on. “Ok, so you were serious about us being in space in some gigantic ship. But why us? Why have you kidnapped us?”

David frowned in concern “Actually I did not kidnap anyone.” Dr. Jones and Nurse Debbin were taken while I was still in a coma, and you and Nurse Jimenez were abducted by my pilot’s twin sister. My pilot rescued you and brought you to the Lanvy for your safety until we could figure out why you were abducted.”

“And why were we abducted?” asked Dr. Jones. “And don’t tell me that it was your pilot’s twin...”

David ginned as he turned towards Dr. Jones. “No, actually you were abducted by my pilot. Again it was for your safety. You remember the creatures that attacked the hospital?”

Dr. Jones paled as he recalled the attack. “Yes, I remember.”

“Well it was determined that you and Nurse Debbin may have been influenced in some way by those creatures. They are called Morgalons, and they are very, very bad creatures. Everyone that was on that floor but you and me were killed by the Morgalons.”

Dr. Jones looked as if he was going to throw up. “Everyone?”

Karen walked up to Dr. Jones and placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “That part is true Dr. The feds called it an explosion, you and Nurse Debbin were believed to have been caught in the explosion and are also presumed dead. Officially only David survived and he was still in a coma. The police and feds kept a close eye on him after that.”

“According to my pilot, it was believed that the Morgalons left you two alive for a reason and so she had you taken to the Lanvy to determine if you were under Morgalon influence. By the time they determined you were not. It had already been announced by the feds that you had died in the explosion. My pilot was worried about returning you to the hospital under such unusual circumstances, so she waited until I had been briefed on the situation, and so here we are.”

Nurse Jimenez walked quickly up to David her face contorted in anger. “So what do you expect us ta do, just bow down at your feet and say thank you. You kidnapped us and brought us here. Fo’ what, kicks?” She exclaimed poking her index finger into David’s chest.

David put up his hands and slowly pushed Nurse Jimenez away from him. “Like I said, nurse, I want nothing from any of you. I had you awakened so I could apprise you of the situation and of your options and allow each of you to make an informed decision. I wanted you to know your options so you could decide what, YOU, want to do.”

Nurse Debbin sat down on one of the crates, looking at David with watery eyes. “I still can not believe all those people are all dead.” She whispered as she looked down at her feet. After a few seconds she looked up at David shyly. “What are our options?”

“As far as I can see you have three options. Return to the Stasis chamber and you will remain in stasis until it is safe for you to return to Earth. How long that will be I cannot tell you. You can return to Earth right now, but unfortunately we do not have the resources to protect you from whoever was trying to kidnap you, or from the Morgalons...”

Nurse Jimenez turned on David with a scornful look her arms folded over her chest. “And our last choice?” She asked as she tapped her foot in agitation.

“Join us. It will be dangerous, just as dangerous as the other two. Maybe even more so, but it will give you control over your own fate. You won’t have to be looking over your shoulder all the time waiting for an unknown enemy to attack. You also won’t be putting more innocents in danger. If you go back, there is no way anyone will allow you to just go back to your own lives.”

Nurse Jimenez threw her arms into the air. “Join you, join you? You have got to be crazy if you think...”

“It’s our only option Julia,” Nurse Debbin stated quietly once again looking at her feet. “I for one do not want to return to those stasis beds with the hope that one day they will be able to wake me up. As for going back, do you honestly think the government is going to let us just go back to our lives, after all this? There is no reason to think the hospital will just let us come back like nothing happened, especially since we cannot tell them what happened. The government and their cronies, not to mention every nut job and conspiracy theorist in the country, would be all over us. No, I am in. What do I need to do?”

David nodded and looked at Karen and Dr. Jones. “I’m in David.” Karen mumbled.

“Me too. What do you need?” Dr. Jones replied.

Julia Jimenez could not believe what she was hearing, after staring daggers at David for a few minutes, she finally tossed her hands in the air. “Fine, I guess I am out voted. I am in too.”

David smiled at his four newest recruits into the Earth Defense Force as the Querithon docked with the Lanvy and was locked into its moorings. “I think our first order of business is to get all of you some clothes and then we need to talk about what it is exactly each of you wants to do.”

Dr. Jones looked at David with confusion. “What do you mean, what we WANT to do?”

The Remote Interface Unit entered the cargo area and looked at Dr. Jones with a curious expression “Well Dr. Jones, there are over ten thousand possible positions on this ship alone, and we have three vessels. The training methods of the Kreg’ar are quick and very thorough. You are not limited to being Dr.’s and Nurses, though we do need them. Right now any position you could want is open to you. So we need to sit down and go over your options and figure out what exactly you want to do with the rest of your career as a member of the Earth Defense Forces.” the Remote Interface Unit stated and then looked over to David. “Sir, we have docked with the Lanvy and we can teleport to the bridge if you like. I will have one of the drones bring up uniforms for our newest recruits.”

“That will be perfect, thank you.” David replied as the Remote Interface Unit activated the teleporters, and with a flash everyone disappeared from the Querithon’s cargo hold.

...

Eleric Drakehold woke form his meditations with a start. He quickly glanced to his right at his sister Elise. She to appeared to have been startled awake “Elise something is wrong.”

“I know brother I too felt it. Gather the circle, whatever it is; it’s more than we can handle alone. We need to find allies and we need to find them now.”

As Eleric rose from his meditation mat his cell phone began to ring, looking down at its caller ID he shook his head “No need to call them sister dear they are already calling us.” Then his sister’s phone and the house phone began ringing. It was going to be a long morning.

...

David and company appeared on the bridge, to the accompaniment of red lights and blaring sirens. David quickly covered his ears with his hands and yelled. “Somebody turn that blasted thing off.”

The room grew quiet as the alarms shut down. David, Spaz and the Remote Interface Unit immediately headed over to the tactical console display. It showed a flashing red light somewhere in Southern Australia and bright red letters were flashing across the display. “Morgalon presence detected Class three event, spatial gateway detected class three event.” Spaz looked at the Unit, who had gone pale. “What the hell is a class three event?”

The Remote Interface Unit began bringing up displays. “Not good, that’s what it is.” It responded as it continued to enter commands on the tactical display. “Lanvy, do we have visual on the Morgalon?”

“Negative, attempting uplink with closest satellites.”

The Remote Interface Unit jumped from the console it was working on and motioned for Spaz to move out of its way. “Pardon me sir, but I need to get in there. I apologize but there is no time to explain,” it stated as it continued to bring up screens and displays. “Activate combat drones. Fifteen should be sufficient. Armaments level five, stealth level zero. Prepare them for immediate transport to the surface with orders to kill all Morgalons present.”

“Unable to comply, power levels are insufficient to transport anything to the planet’s surface. Maintenance required on main power transfer modulator in order to bring back up generators on line.”

“No, this can not be happening!” The Remote Interface Unit exclaimed as it brought its hands down hard on the console in front of it. “Not now, we were so close. Lanvy bring us over the location of the Morgalon presence and bring all available weapon systems online.” The Remote Interface Unit ordered, as it continued to manipulate displays “I am routing all available power from decks twelve through sixteen to main weapon systems.”

“This course of action is not advisable, firing weapon batteries onto the planet would enable the governments of Earth to detect our presence. By my calculations the response would be catastrophic to this vessel and those aboard.”

“If we do not do something, the results will be catastrophic to the people down there. That is a class three Morgalon! The Remote Interface yelled, turning to David. “Sir Please, we have no choice. This thing must be destroyed at all costs.”

David stared at the Remote interface Unit in shock. “What the hell is a class three Morgalon?”

The Remote Interface Unit tossed its arms into the air in exasperation. “It is hard to explain ... The closest thing in the lore of your planet would be an Arch Demon. Or a Demon Lord...”

The Unit’s explanation was interrupted by the Lanvy. “Class three spatial gateway detected, Morgalon presence no longer detected on planets surface. Visual of location established.

“Show us the visual on the forward viewing screen.” David stated as he turned towards the front of the bridge.

The view on the screen changed from the space-scape to a top view of earth from space, the view then zoomed down onto a section of Southern Australia. As the view zoomed in a noticeably darker patch of earth could be seen, it was perfectly circular and covered a large swath of the surface. “What the hell is that? “Spaz exclaimed.

“What you are seeing General Walker is a section of the planets surface twenty miles in diameter that has been affected by the Morgalon presence. According to my scans everything in the area of effect is dead.”

Karen stepped towards the view screen, her hand coming to her mouth in shock “Oh my God...”

Everyone stared in horror at the dark patch. “Can you zoom into the center of that?” David asked quietly.

The display continued to zoom closer to the planet until a small town and an old dirt airfield came into view. Several buildings in the center of town appeared to be damaged, but otherwise the town was intact. Cars could be seen on the roads both in the town and leading into and out of the town. Nothing appeared to be moving, many of the vehicles appeared to have driven off the roads and crashed. “Sir, I detect no life signs anywhere within the area effected by the Morgalon.” The Lanvy informed them.

“How many people lived in that town?” Dr. Jones asked with tears in his eyes over the loss of life.

“Checking ... According to the Australian government’s last survey approximately two hundred and seventy seven people lived in the town of Oodnadatta.”

“My God!” Exclaimed Spaz. How long was that thing down there?”