Alien Alliance (45 page)

*

At first, it was like practice. Bella looked
around carefully for several minutes. No guards. She located the
ground scanners, sneaked between two of them to about the centre
where Az had told her the signal would be weakest and scuttled
past. No alarm! She scooted up to the door that Mathew told her
would be the door to the barracks. She listened carefully as she
had practiced. All quiet. She opened the door, slid inside and into
a shadow. She froze in panic. They were all on the floor on bags!
She had envisioned beds and hiding under the beds. There was
nowhere to hide! One was only two feet away from her. If he opened
his eyes he would see her.

Her heart was pounding so hard she was
terrified he would hear it. Minutes passed. She stayed in her
shadow. She shut her eyes. Then she started to think. She was in a
shadow. They were unlikely to see her. How could she get the bugs
onto all of them. She looked around. The best idea would be to put
one of the blobs (the bugs were all inside little gooey blobs to
keep them alive), on each bag/bed. She carefully unscrewed the
container and picked up a blob. She threw it onto the nearest bag.
One done. She threw a few more. Seven done. But the rest were too
far away. She thought again. Carefully, she crawled down the row of
sleeping creatures to another shadow where some equipment was. She
stopped and threw again. Again she moved to a shadow. Again she
threw blobs, careful to hit the bags not the occupant. She reached
the end of the barracks. There was an open door and she looked
inside. The Cleaner. Again she froze and thought. Would the Cleaner
kill the bugs? Az thought it wouldn’t. He said he thought they
would just be cleaner bugs. She stifled a giggle.

She sneaked into the Cleaner and through it.
On the other side was equipment. All hanging on hook things on the
wall. She was pretty sure all the Aliens would go through the
Cleaner to pick up their stuff. It looked like flying stuff.
Helmets and clothing. She scooted through in a rush scooping globs
out as fast as she could and putting them inside every helmet she
could reach. Then she carefully opened the door at this end, slid
around and headed for a shadow. She froze and looked around.
Nothing. At the end of her nerves, she scrunched and ran back to
where the Cat should be and collapsed behind a bush. She shuddered.
She startled as she heard a faint sound. It was the Cat. She hugged
it in fright and buried her face in its coat. She wanted so badly
to cry but she had to be quiet. She got onto the Cat and it padded
softly away. The Cat told her how brave she was and how proud her
mother was of her.

Several minutes later she reached her mother
and then they both cried. But Bella was jubilant.

“I did it,” she said, “they’ll all be buggy.
I threw some on their bed/bags and put the rest in their helmets.
No one saw me. I stayed in the shadows.” She started to giggle in
relief. “They’ll all be scratching!”

Mathew had told the children the bugs would
make the pilots so bad tempered they wouldn’t be able to fly. It
would make some of them think they had flu. He had been lectured by
Kelly not to let the children realise it would kill some of them
and make the rest too sick to fight. At least that was their hope.
Kelly had told the children,

“All these bugs in the globs will get
married and have lots of baby bugs and they have hundreds of
babies. It’ll be like being bitten by hundreds of fleas or
mosquitoes. You can’t fly a plane and scratch at the same time.”
The children had all giggled at the thought.

*

Across the planet in another city, Bea had
had a similar experience until she got into the barracks. She also
froze when she saw no beds to hide under. But thanks to Mathew, she
had followed his instructions to the letter, got into the room and
scuttled straight for a shadow. Mathew had perfectly anticipated
the paralysing fear and when it was most likely to occur.

Bea shivered with terror. Remembering his
instructions, she closed her eyes and tried to think. It didn’t
work. She stayed paralysed with fear. She thought she could never
be more terrified but just then one of them got up and went down
the corridor. At his movement, others stirred. Bea tried to become
part of the wall. Several minutes passed. The Alien came back and
sank onto its bag. It tossed and turned for a while. All this time,
Bea quivered in the corner.

Bea couldn’t think. Too frightened to cry
even, she couldn’t function at all. More minutes passed. Finally
Bea just got desperate. She refused to leave without completing her
mission. She unscrewed the top of the container and simply hurled
the blobs into the room as far as she could. Then, she slipped out
the door and ran. She later realised she had forgotten to look
around, check and didn’t know where the Cat was. She just wanted to
get away. The Cat found her and took her to her tearful mother.

Back in the barracks, the blobs opened with
the force of being thrown just as Helkmid had planned. They were
little but mobile. They went in all directions. By the time the
Aliens awoke, most were infested. Within the day, almost all. By
the next day, all were infested as the bugged and the unbugged
shared facilities and occupied planes together.

In yet another city, Ali completed his
mission. The next night, Alia and Harsha completed their missions.
None were caught. None were seen. The parasites prospered. They
laid their live babies who matured in two days on the Bidifix and
three days on the Sasgys. When these laid in turn, the
concentration would become virulent on the Bidifix and toxic for
the Sasgys. They were, as yet, unaware of their happy passengers,
who were copulating busily and feeding on their dead skin cells and
their blood.

*

Meanwhile, the Keulfyd were becoming sick.
The spies, in the water and on the land, watched and reported back.
On day 26, before Helkmid expected, the Keulfyd started to become
ill. Most kept working, but were miserable. On the night of day 26,
the Priskya reported that the Cats had observed the sickest of the
Keulfyd being transported up to the spaceships. Helkmid was
jubilant.

“Idiots! Stupid! Fools! The infection is now
on the ships! This is wonderful! We can win this! I can’t believe
it! They’ve broken all their containment procedure!”

“But wont they isolate them on board?” asked
Sarah.

“I’d bet not. The infection’s airborne.
Their techniques are sloppy. They don’t follow accepted procedure
and I’ll bet they are convinced it’s something they ate. Mathew,
ask the Priskya to ask the Cats if any sick Keulfyd are bleeding.
Also did all the cities transport sick Keulfyd up or just some of
them. It would be helpful to know if all the ships are infected. If
not, how many. And are the Keulfyd medical staff using any
precautions?

Mathew found his spying network was getting
more and more efficient and fast as more and more cities were
emptied of conquered and conquerors and his spies were
concentrating on fewer cities. By day 27, only five cities were
occupied. But unfortunately, the survivors in other cities refused
to fight or combine. Mathew had had Az and Kaz visit these cities
to determine if they would unite and fight. The answers were all
no. Each time, when they found this out, Kaz and Az were instructed
to end the conversation by agreeing it was hopeless, “but I just
thought I’d ask.” Never did they say there was a planned
resistance. Never, did they say they were fighting back.

Sarah and Kelly were also closely following
all signs of the illnesses and getting the Cats and the Priskya to
report directly to them and Helkmid.

“Would they have taken the sick to separate
ships or would they isolate them on just one ship?” Sarah asked
Helkmid.

“I would guess if they have been this
stupid, they don’t see a risk. My guess would be that they are all
on board their own ships. The ships work almost independently. They
compete a lot. The Keulfyd belong to their individual ships. I
can’t see them co-operating on this. It is not their way.”

The next night, the Priskya reported back.
It seemed that all but one city had transported the sickest up to
the ships. The exception had sent someone, probably a doctor, down.
The doctor had then returned to the ship. The Cats had been unable
to determine if the doctor had used any barrier technique as they
couldn’t get close enough to see inside the buildings. The Cats
noted that no precautions had been used when transporting the sick
up; no masks, nothing covering the sick.

Helkmid was very happy. “The Keulfyd now
running the cities are sharing facilities with the sick. The
increasing virulence means that the new shift should be getting
sick on day 29. The course of their illness should be faster and
more deadly.”

By day 28, the infestation teams had been
picked up and flown back to a heroes welcome. On day 29, the
Priskya reported that during the previous two days, the slaves had
begun to be dumped in the ocean deeps. The Cats reported all the
cities were now emptied of the dead. Also that wholesale looting
had gone on and that the slaves had been used to move the heavier
objects, but that now the mercenaries were carrying out the looting
while the pilots were dumping the slaves. The horrified Priskya
reported that the slaves were dumped alive and fell screaming down
to the water and into the ocean deeps. The planes were designed so
that much of the bottom of the plane, minus the cockpit, could open
up and dump the contents.

Per the schedule described by Az and Kaz,
the next phase was that the survivors were now due to be attacked.
The Cats noted that no preparations for that attack were evident.
Mathew surmised that due to the Keulfyd being sick, a delay was
likely. The Keulfyd were still well within their timetable.

Mathew declared a rest day at breakfast. All
was ready. There was as yet no sign that the other diseases were
working. Mathew declared it was best to wait now until the enemy
were further compromised. The less People they had to fight, the
better their chances and the less casualties.

They delayed over breakfast, in their usual
groups. Li, Stella, Kaz, Az, Mahmoud and Donny together and not
knowing what to do about the day off. A picnic sounded like a good
idea. Donny had found out about some hot springs. Li and Stella
laughed.

“Hot springs and two Wookies? I don’t think
so,” said Stella. “When I organised that bath for Kaz I had to
threaten to supervise before he’d get in. He was bloody quick too.
Talk about grizzle. There was only three inches of water in the
bath. And he didn’t know how to use a towel. How did Az cope?” she
looked at Li.

“He took some persuading,” said Li with a
bland face.

“Well we could throw them in. They could do
with another bath,” Mahmoud sniffed the air.

“There’s not enough of you to throw us in,”
said Az threateningly.

“Want a bet?” asked Stella.

“What’s a bet? The Translator doesn’t know,”
replied Az and they all laughed except for two puzzled Wookies.

At that point, predictably, Kelly came over
to see what they were up to for the day. To Az’s astonishment, when
told, she sniffed the air in his vicinity and said, “Good
idea.”

“Kelly? I expected your support in this,”
said Kaz.

“I’m going too,” she answered.

In the end, they all went plus a lot of
others. Two very reluctant Wookies were given some very pointed
comments from the others, which they ignored. Kelly finally just
ordered them to strip to their underpants and get into the shallow
pool and they were thrown some soap. Az and Kaz were getting used
to the different dress code and were becoming very appreciative of
swimming clothes, especially on the women.

They noted that there did not appear to be
any embarrassment between the scantily clad males and females.
Kelly came over. She looked pretty good in her clothing too. Stella
was with her and slid in too, Li followed. Kelly was in doctor
mode.

“What happens if your people drown? Do you
get water in your lungs?”

“I suppose so. Never tried it,” answered
Kaz.

“Do your people know how to restart the
heart and lungs of someone who has drowned.”

“Yes. If they’re got to quick enough.”

Kelly smiled, “Thought so,” she went
away.

Az moved clumsily over to Li, “What was that
about?”

“Mum thinks your race are closer to us than
you think. She’s been talking to Helkmid. He says genetically we
are all one Race. She thinks you have a mechanism that shuts your
air pipe off to prevent inhaling water,” answered Stella. Az and
Kaz were puzzled but Stella could see Li and Donny had got it. Both
were grinning.

“Can we get out now?” asked Kaz
plaintively.

Stella and Li got out with them and
demonstrated how to use a towel. Once all were dressed they headed
off to explore. Az and Kaz just wore shorts until they dried enough
to put their shirts and trousers on. But it had taken a lot of
nagging and persuading to stop them dressing. Finally, Kelly had
just said, “Look you idiots. Adapt! No Cleaners! It is not
acceptable to us or to you to be dirty or to put dirty clothes back
on! You must adapt. Use water to clean your clothes and go without
your clothes until those thick pelts are thoroughly dry,” and she
had grabbed their clothes off them to be washed, leaving them in
their underpants (or rather the underpants of the American
Political Team whose clothes they had helped themselves to). They
were not happy.

The afternoon went on with time for people
to stop, think, relax and talk. Plans B, C and D were gone through
with the children. Rani, Julia Helkmid and Julia had nutted it all
out. All the children were ordered to report to Rani.

“Once the adults start fighting,” she said,
“you are all to hide your weapons, scrunch up in your camouflage
suits, stay silent and still. No matter what happens. If we win, we
will come for you. If we lose you stay put. You must survive and
complete your next mission. You all know what to do. Ali? Plan
B.”