(no subject)

32.

The clearing was ablaze with fire, there were energy blasts that knit across the air in every direction.

Jeremy couldn’t reach any of the other ships, and it was now obvious that the robots were jamming all the radio signals no matter the origin.

Mickey was sending power to every hero he could make out, and they were actually making headway against the enemy.

Doctor Thursday was in the vanguard of the charge, and was demolishing dozens of the metal agents of Shastan. They were repeatedly vanquished after besieging a woman who could not be harmed. Then her aides would barrage the crippled ships as they attempted to rebound from their loss to the Doctor.

Soon, a saucer emanated from the interior of base and joined his abettors in the on going carnage. The ship and its occupants may have been daunted by the ruin of their coconspirators
cluttering the ground below.

They had seen no defeat in any previous attacks. The momentum may have gone out of the campaign.

Somehow the Inheritors were in sync, even without radio contact. What they didn’t know was that these were 8 ships, each with its own psi on board. Colonel Stonedragon had brought one as his pilot and the other seven and he were directing strategy that was far in advance of anything Shastan had encountered up to this point.

When that lead saucer returned to the hanger, it was as though the fight went out of the others. There seemed to be a regrouping, and a bit of rethinking among their forces.

The entirety of the robot and saucer forces took off into the east. The main saucer rose again to follow.

At that instant the base itself seemed to come to life. Like a mother slapping a disrespectful child, the base flipped the saucer end over end flying away.

After an unsteady second the thing took off like a bullet after its comrades.

The Colonel’s allies didn’t follow, but rather went quickly to the base hanger.

When the pilot landed in the bay, Mickey was distressed to see his mother trussed up to a beam.

He ran to exit the plane and rescue her, and was even more distressed to see her disappear as he drew near.

“Mom!” He screamed.

The crew exited the plane and no one knew what to say to the boy.

Then, from the far end of the bay, he heard a voice that he had always known.

“Dear boy!” It came.

He looked up and saw his mother running to him from the hall.

He ran to her and the two of them seemed to become a single being for a moment.

“Mom,” He said, like a thirsty man who had just been given a drink of ice cold water.

“Mickey,” She said like a woman who had just been reunited with a beloved child.

© 2005 by C. Wayne Owens

(no subject)

33.

There had been a lot of tears, and much joy following the return to Thunderbase.

Stonedragon reminded Maria that her husband was an Immorti and, therefore, was not gone, just in limbo for a decade or so.

No, it didn’t help any more than you might think it would.

Mickey did spend enough time comforting his mother and his brother that it did help him get out of himself just a bit.

Hank and Jeremy were helpful also. They were good friends. Mickey couldn’t thank Hank enough for saving his mother and brother. Hank was just happy to help.

That night, after everyone else had fallen into fitful sleep, Mickey found himself up and watching television. Not because there was anything he wanted to see, but because he was going to be up and he didn’t want the silence to be sitting there with him.

There was something else bothering him.

Why had Shastan given up so easily? He’d seen too many movies not to understand that, though it seemed hard at the time, this was not the fever-pitched “final battle” the evil Immorti had
promised.

There was something more.

What it was would come to him, even if he had to watch all of “The Three Stooges Meet Hercules” to figure it out.

Even after that he was close to an answer, but it still refused to stop banging around on the inside of his head and come forward and identify itself.

He went to the mini-fridge and got out a root beer (They had some sort of generic brand that was okay, but he couldn’t wait until he could have some Barq’s again).

He sat down, popped the top and flipped to the house channel, but it still wasn’t up. Too many security circuits had been cut during the time the base was being occupied. It would be days until all the systems were back on line.

Days until the house security systems were back on line!

Then he realized, it had all been to get them out of Thunderbase! The Groom Lake incident would get them fired up, and then the world capitol attacks would get them out of the way. That’s when Shatan would take over the base and do something that was not to come on line till later.

That time he had been right there in the tower, he must have done something.

Mickey picked up the phone and dialed Hank.

The groggy psychic agreed to come over to the apartment as soon as he could get dressed.

That was when his mother came in the room, “You concerned too?” She asked him.

“It was too easy,” The boy told her.

“That’s your father talking,” She said with a proud smile.

The boy felt a touch of pride too.

© 2005 by C. Wayne Owens

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(no subject)

A general notice: If you or anyone you know tapes "Battlestar Galactica" and has last weeks premiere I would love to dupe a copy, as I missed it. Also missed about the last 5 minutes of Stargate Atlantis, BTW. Anybody have 'em, I got lots to trade if you want. Ask anybody who knows my collection. 8,000 features and dozens of complete series episodes. Thanks in advance.

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(no subject)

34.

Hank stumbled into the apartment like a man who had recently imbibed more than his fair share of happy hour. In his case it was a condition that came from being awakened in the midst of a dream where he was young and swimming in a lake of mint jelly, accompanied by fair maidens and dolphins who all adored him.

Not something one is usually happy about abandoning.

But, this was for a friend, and for that he could give up anything.

He was singularly alone here, being older than even most staff members. He had lived a non-report worthy life so far. He had been a computer programmer who lived with his mother and
rarely did anything that could even raise a sweat. And as you know, super-powers in the Inheritors are only brought to fruition by a traumatic event.

Most of his life had been, let’s face it, dull. Until, that it, he transferred to work for the intelligence agency, doing processing for them. Within a twenty four hour period he saw things that would have turned his hair white, had he had much hair to begin with.

He saw people he knew shown up to be spies, he saw people he worked with tortured, he had been involved with stopping a nuclear accident and finally, when he thought things might be going
to slow down, his mother died.

When he went home and went to bed, it happened for the first time. He jumped from his body and leapt to the future. He had thought it was only a dream.

The next morning, during coffee, he did it again. He saw the end of a horse race, one that wouldn’t happen until later that day. He got to work and told a friend about it, and that friend, who knew a bookie, took five dollars from him and they put down a bet. They won $250. It was a fifty to one longshot.

The next morning a representative of the Inheritors was at his door. Within five hours he was on his way to Thunderbase.

© 2005 by C. Wayne Owens

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