The Quarry

[Rage Menelas]

[font=Lucida Sans Unicode]The adrenaline of combat was such that it took a moment for the man to realize where he was. One minute Ryan had been giving the command to charge, the next he was on the bridge of Saar'floe with a bird's eye view of the battlefield. And he was furious about it!

"Get me back down there!" he roared at Charlie, who just gazed up at him stupidly. So he repeated the order, "I said put me back down there!" This time he advanced menacingly on the little old man.

Charlie would have none of that. He extended his arm out toward Ryan, palm outward as if straight-arming a tackler in football. The effects were immediate, completely debilitating; it was as if all of the bones in Ryan's body had turned to Jell-O. He slumped quietly to the deck and lie there, immobile.

Charlie quietly returned to his console, flying the ship. Soon Saar'floe had entered one of Pella'agre's lakes, as indicated by the sharp impact of entry, the subsequently dimmed lighting. The glow of searchlights followed, verifying his suspicions: Charlie was fishing! Ryan had been rudely yanked from a battlefield where his people were fighting a battle for their lives, and this little snot had the temerity to go fishing? As much as that fact infuriated Ryan, he still could not move. So, he just lie there seething...

It took the prone man several hours to simmer down... he was that mad! But it happened gradually. As it did, he could feel motor capacity coming back to his limbs. Before long he was able to function as normal. He sat up on the deck, looked over at the figure of the silver-haired gent sitting placidly before the console.

"Want to tell me why you jerked me up out of the battle like that?"

"Ah... Ryan, I see you have come back to your senses."

"Yeah... sorry about that, but can you give me an explanation please?" Ryan stood, being careful not to appear menacing. "And just where the hell have you been anyway?"

"Why, I was here on the ship. I might ask you the same question. Rule number one: always stay with the ship unless I give you instructions to the contrary. I could mark you as a fugitive."

"The ship was wrecked. There was nothing on it but some weird little alien who looked dead, or near enough. Why on earth would I stay on the ship?"

"Calm down please. I was that alien... and, thank you very much... I was not near enough to death for you saved my life by wrapping me in the webbing. Secondly, you should know that Saar'floe is self-repairing. As long as she is still intact, never leave her. And last, but certainly not least, you were operating illegally down there. As I explained earlier... this is a class two world..."

"And just exactly what the hell does that mean?"

"Class one worlds are devoid of sentient life," he said, holding up a single finger in illustration, adding to it as he ticked off the classifications. "Class two worlds have sentient life with a rudimentary civilization. Class three worlds are capable of flight. Class four worlds are capable of space flight. And class five worlds are starflyers."

"And who says these people are not worthy of help simply because they can't fly?"

Charlie once again looked at Ryan in confusion. "Why, the Federation Council, of course."

Ryan was starting to get upset again. Then he recalled what happened last time he had and worked internally to control it. "Can we petition the council for a permit to help them?"

"Why would we want to do that? Where is our advantage there...?"

"Is that all you're about?" Now it was Ryan's turn to be amazed. "These are people. They are the survivors of a starflyer culture. They are like castaways on a desert island. Don't you feel any responsibility to help them out?"

"None." Charlie admitted with not the slightest hint of sympathy in his voice. "They are developing quite nicely on their own technology-tree. We would only intervene to keep another starflyer race from taking advantage of them. It would not be fair to them to interfere otherwise... which you have already done, by-the-way."

"And if I had not that entire village would have been slaughtered!"

"It is the way of life, Ryan. You know this..." and he raised a hand, indicating a conclusion of the topic.

His apprentice, fuming silently, stomped off the bridge, looking for his cabin. He needed a drink badly, concurrent with a good, long soak in his hot tub. But the discussion was far from over in his mind.