In the City of Tomorrow: Chapter 24

Amanda Stryker returned to the Infinite Room, where she found her sister hard at work. Amy had found a way to create a version of the Starfire III in the Infinite Room and she was standing beside it, studying it. The giant starship looked quite different from the original Starfire – all of its exterior damage had been repaired and it was a sleek, silver color.

“What do you think?” Amy asked.

“It looks nice,” Amanda commented. “What have you done to it?”

“Let me show you,” Amy replied. She connected to her sister’s mind and brought up a wireframe model of the Starfire III. She showed Amanda the ship’s massive weapons systems, its powerful shields, and the futuristic energy plant she had installed.

“Most of the interior is now taken up by power production,” Amanda explained. “That ship can produce orders-of-magnitude more than the Ranger’s best zero-point-energy plant. It should have no trouble maintaining the shields or powering the weapons. Plus, the ship is run by an advance AI so it should be able to find and attack the Poneri without any manual intervention on our part.”

Amanda nodded. “Looks great! You did a good job, Tiger. How many of these were you planning on bringing?”

“Thousands,” Amy said enthusiastically. “If you like this design then I’ll go start making them.”

“How are you going to do that?” Amanda asked.

“I’ve found an empty planet thousands of light-years away from Ranger territory. What I’m going to do is go there, create a planetwide network of nanites, and use it to turn the whole world into programmable matter. Once that’s done I’ll have the nanites turn that matter into lots and lots of Starfire III-class starships. That way I don’t have to stand there and create them all myself. When the army is ready we’ll zip into place and begin the attack.”

“How long will this take?”

“We’ll have hundreds of ships ready by tomorrow morning and thousands more by the next day. I’m going to keep making them until we spot the Starfire. Then we’ll jump on the flagship and bring the whole army to Sol.”

“Ok,” Amanda replied. “I guess that will work. I wish we could attack before the Starfire got that close to the Wall but I just can’t find it. I’ve tried looking where I thought it should be, based on its course and speed, but haven’t had any luck.”

“That’s fine,” Amy said. “That gives us the time we need to build our armada. Were you able to talk with Governor Nicholas?”

“I did. I told him what was going on and he said he’d have the stations evacuated tonight. You can upgrade them in the morning.”

“Great!” Amy replied enthusiastically. “This is all coming together.”

“Is it?” Amanda asked. “What, exactly, are you going to do when you find the Starfire?”

“I’m really not sure. My plan was to just launch the attack and see what came up. What was your idea?”

“Here’s what I think. As soon as we surround the Starfire the Poneri are going to attack us, just like before – but this time your armada will wipe them out. They’ll retreat back into the portal just like they did when Steve disappeared. After they’re gone we’ll evacuate the Starfire and collapse the portal, and that will be that.”

“But what about Steve? Won’t that kill him?”

“Not if there’s a portal on Earth,” Amanda pointed out. “Maybe in the future we can find a way to rescue him that way.”

“But you don’t know that! We have no idea why the Poneri want to go to Sol. It could be anything. Besides, if you’re right won’t that mean that the only place the Poneri will be able to reach is Earth? Do we really want that?”

“At least they’ll be trapped inside the Wall,” Amanda argued. “That’s better than letting them roam the entire galaxy. And after you upgrade the Wall they’ll have no way to get out. They’ll be trapped there forever.”

“But there are people on Earth,” Amy replied. “And on Mars! Millions and millions of people. Aren’t you worried about what the Poneri are going to do to them?”

Amanda sighed. “Look. Right now the Poneri can go anywhere. After this is over, if everything works, they’ll be trapped in just one star system. That seems a lot better than the current situation. At least only one system is in danger instead of all of them.”

“But even having one system in danger is unacceptable,” Amy argued.

“Fine. I agree. It’s bad. So what’s your solution? How are you going to fix that?”

“Couldn’t we go inside Sol, find the portal, and destroy it?” Amy asked. “I mean, that should be possible, right?”

“The only way I know of to destroy a portal is to suspend it in time and then collapse that field. If we did that on Earth we’d destroy the entire planet. Is that really going to make their life better?”

“But there has to be something we can do,” Amy said.

“There is – we can leave it alone and let the Artilect deal with it. I don’t mind fighting the Poneri on a single starship; if that gets destroyed in battle then no harm is done. But I don’t want to fight them on a planet, and especially not on Earth. That needs to be left to people who know what they’re doing. It would be really easy for us to make the problem a lot worse.”

“I guess,” Amy replied reluctantly. “I just don’t like it.”

* * * * *

The rest of the day was uneventful. Amanda continued to search for the Starfire while her sister created her armada. Amy left the next day for Sol and spent the morning upgrading the equipment on the four hidden space stations that maintained the Wall. Within a few hours she had a new system in place that reflected the very best that the 73rd century had to offer. Not only was the Wall immensely stronger but the equipment was designed to last forever. The Rangers no longer had to worry about the Empire getting out – they were trapped and there was no way to escape.

After letting Governor Nicholas know that she had finished her work Amy returned to manage her armada. She was very pleased with both the Starfire III ships and the rate at which the nanites were able to produce them.

It wasn’t until two days later that Amanda finally found what she had been looking for. As soon as she saw it she transported herself to the construction world that Amy had been using. “It’s there!” she exclaimed. “The Starfire‘s at Sol and is firing on the Wall!”

“Then let’s go!” Amy shouted. With a single thought she shut down the nanite network that had saturated the construction planet and turned the rest of the programmable matter back into soil. The two girls then transported themselves onto the flagship of the Starfire III vessels that were orbiting the planet. A moment later the entire armada leaped into hyperspace and headed for Earth.

“How many did you manage to make?” Amanda asked.

“43,961,” Amy replied. “This is the flagship Stryker.”

“Do you think that will be enough?”

“I think one would have been enough,” Amy replied confidently. “The rest are just insurance.”

A moment later the entire fleet dropped out of hyperspace. There, just where Amanda had said, was the Starfire. It was surrounded by an entire cloud of Poneri that were firing at the Wall. Their weapons were having no effect.

“That’s odd,” Amy commented. “I only see a few dozen there. I kind of expected more.”

“Maybe they thought this would be a lot easier,” Amanda replied.

While they were talking the rest of the fleet had already engaged the Poneri. The automated weaponry of thousands of starships blasted the energy beings into vapor in a matter of seconds. A moment later hundreds of Poneri poured out of the Starfire, only to be effortlessly vaporized as soon as they appeared. This continued for about thirty seconds and then the Poneri stopped coming.

The two girls waited for a while but nothing happened. “Is that it?” Amanda asked.

“Looks like it,” Amy said.

A light started blinking on the console. “Hey, we’ve got a message!” Amy remarked. “Looks like the Starfire is trying to contact us.”

“Well, don’t just sit there – answer it!”

Amy pressed a button and a voice filled the cockpit. The voice was unearthly – it was deep and unnatural, like something that might come from a grave. It was like nothing they had ever heard before. The mere sound of it was enough to send chills up their spine.

You are not welcome here, sons of Adam, the voice said. Depart from us and allow us to reclaim our home, or else we will end the frail lives of those aboard this vessel.

“Hey, we’re not men!” Amy exclaimed. “We’re women. There are no sons on board this ship.”

You have thirty seconds to bring the Wall down, the voice continued.

The two girls looked at each other. Rather than speaking aloud they decided to use their nanites to communicate telepathically.

What do we do? Amanda asked. This was your idea!

We could freeze them in time, Amy replied. Then we could go to the future and let the Artilect fix this.

That’s crazy! We don’t want to transport those people 5000 years into the future! Are you insane?

We don’t have time for this discussion! Amy replied, frustrated. If we don’t act now they’re all going to die. At least if we freeze them we’ve got a chance at saving them!

They were interrupted by the sound of gunshots. As they listened to the audio stream that was being transmitted by the Starfire they head more gunshots, followed by a horrible scream.

“That’s it!” Amy shouted. “We’ve got to go save them now!”

“But–” Amanda protested. It was too late – her sister had disappeared.