Chapter 18
The friends took their positions in a line facing the Romarie ship. Donen went down the line and showed each person how to use their weapons, and just in time. A humming noise sounded from the crashed ship.
“If anyone’s alive in there,” Donen murmured, “they’ll be working to get out. We have to be ready for them.”
No one moved. No one breathed. Then an almighty clang echoed across the plain. The ship shuddered, and one gleaming black panel slid back. Aimee clenched her teeth, and her hand tightened around her weapon. Could all their peace efforts end like this, with the Angondran factions fighting together to repel the Romarie?
She steadied her hand and aimed her reciprocator at the ship. Another panel slid aside to reveal a bright metal door. Faded memories fluttered through Aimee’s mind of her time on board the Romarie ship that brought her to Angondra. She hadn’t seen much of the ship at the time, but she recognized the door latch. What would come through it? Would this moment spell the end of her hopes for a happy life on this planet?
Donen raised his reciprocator. “Get ready.”
Another crash reverberated through the stricken ship, and the door latch snapped. Another metal panel slid out from under the door and formed a ramp to the ground. Then, with a hiss of rushing air, the panel shot back to reveal a shadowy cavern inside. Before anyone could react, five Romarie rushed through the opening. Aimee recognized their purple coloring, and they had no arms. They ran down the ramp, over the rim of the crater, onto the plain.
They ran with their mouths gaping open, and a feral shriek set the hair on Aimee’s neck on end. The Romarie ran in wild panic from their own ship. They cast their eyes one way and then the other, and when they spotted the group nearby, they headed straight for them.
“What’s wrong with them?” Carmen asked. “Are they hurt?”
Renier charged his reciprocator and pointed it at the oncoming Romarie. “Shoot them all down. Don’t let them come near us.”
“They may be hurt,” Marissa suggested. “They certainly aren’t armed.”
“Don’t be fooled,” Penelope Ann replied. “They have telekinetic powers, remember? They can attack us and kill us without weapons.”
Donen raised his weapon, too. “Fire.”
He squeezed his reciprocator, but before it could go off, another group of figures appeared in the ship’s open doorway. Aimee gasped in surprise when she recognized human women. They rushed down the ramp and planted their feet on the ground. Each woman carried a huge gun. The weapons were so heavy they used both arms and all their strength to support them.
Donen lowered his weapon, but only slightly. Seven women stood arrayed across the plain, and he brought his weapon back up in a hurry when they leveled their guns across the crater. He opened his mouth to call an order to his friends, but he never got the words out.
The woman in the center of the group said something to her companions, and every one of them fired. The blasts streaked across the crater toward Aimee and her friends. Aimee aimed her reciprocator to return fire, but the blasts struck the Romarie instead. In an instant, all of them lay motionless on the plain. Puffs of smoke rose from their charred bodies.
The friends stood open-mouthed. The strange women held their weapons ready to fire again, but the Romarie didn’t move. The woman in the center said something else to her comrades, and they advanced on the fallen Romarie.
The woman surveyed the friends with flashing eyes. She and her compatriots poked the Romarie with their guns, but they were dead. Only then did the strange women lower their weapons.
The woman in the center nodded to the group. “Who’s in charge here?”
Donen looked around. His own mate, Aria, Renier, and Carmen stood on one side of him. Caleb and Marissa, Turk and Chris stood on the other side. Piwaka, Penelope Ann, Aimee and the others completed the ground. Donen swallowed. “None of us is in charge. We’re all friends here.”
“Who are you?” Aria asked. “How did you get onto that ship?”
“I’m Sophie Dean, from Oshkosh, Ohio.” She arched her eyebrows at the women. “You’re human, aren’t you? How did you get here?”
The women exchanged glances. Who should answer? Marissa broke the silence. “We were all abducted by the Romarie. Most of us crashed here on the way to the slave markets. We’ve been here ever since. You are welcome here, too. This planet is inhabited by peaceful people who have made us welcome.”
Sophie nodded. “Thanks, but we won’t stay. The Romarie abducted us, too, but we mounted a revolt on board and seized control of the ship. We were planning to execute the Romarie and fly the ship back to Earth when they managed to land here. I guess it was their last chance to escape. Now that they’re all dead, we’ll go ahead with our plan to ride the ship home to Earth.”
“How will you do that?” Emily asked. “The ship must be disabled.”
Sophie shrugged. “I don’t think so. When it crashed, I only had time to run a check on the electrical system before the Romarie tried to break away. It was fully operational. Samantha over there is an aircraft mechanic with Boeing back in San Antonio. She’ll take a look and fix anything that’s wrong. I’m sure we can get the old boat to fly.”
Marissa blinked. “I always thought the Romarie operated their ships by telepathy.”
“We all thought the same thing,” Sophie replied. “But after we got control of the ship, Samantha found out it isn’t true. They just have different controls for everything. She learned how to fly the ship.”
“How did the Romarie manage to land here?” Chris asked.
“We had them locked in a storage compartment,” Sophie replied. “We planned to kill them as soon as we figured out how to fly the ship, but they must have hacked the computer system through the wall. We couldn’t stop them before they entered orbit around this planet.”
Carmen shook her head. “This is amazing. And now you’re flying back to Earth, just like that. It doesn’t seem possible.”
Sophie looked from one face to another. “You could come with us if you like. There’s plenty of room and plenty of supplies now that the Romarie are all dead. You don’t have to stay here.”
The women looked at each other, but no one answered.
“How long have you been here, anyway?” Sophie asked.
Carmen looked at the ground, and Penelope Ann gazed toward the trees. Marissa answered. “We have been here for years. We have families and children here. We’ve been very happy here.”
“That’s lucky for you,” Sophie replied. “I hate to think of the other women the Romarie must have taken from Earth. Who knows where they ended up? But you all must have families and friends back on Earth. They’ll be wondering where you are. They’ll be happy to get you back.”
Marissa glanced at Chris and Aimee. Carmen stole a glance at Renier, and Emily took Faruk’s hand. “I don’t know about my friends, but I’m staying here. I’ve got all I need here. Thanks for the offer, though.”
Sophie turned to the others. “What about the rest of you? Does any of you want to come back to Earth? This could be your last chance.”
No one moved. In the end, Aria took a step forward. “We’re all happy here. We’ve made lives for ourselves here, and we’ve worked hard to make this planet our home. We’ll stay here.”
Sophie let a puff of breath out through her lips. “I don’t understand it, but I won’t try to argue with you. I never expected to find humans out here in space, but I can see your minds are made up.”
Aria shook her hand. “Thank you. I hope you have a quick and easy journey home.”
Sophie shot her a grin over her shoulder. “I don’t suppose it would do any good to tell anybody back on Earth where you are or that we’d seen you.”
Aria smiled back. “I don’t think so. If I was you, I would find a way to get back so no one knows you were gone. The fewer questions asked the better.”
Sophie nodded and hefted her gun onto her shoulders. She kicked the nearest Romarie corpse. “You don’t mind if we leave them here, do you?”
Marissa waved her hand. “Leave them. They’ll be dust in a few days, and no one will know they were here.”
Sophie and her friends strode back to the ship. They waved to the friends, and the door slid down in front of them. The black outer panels slammed into place and sealed them inside. A whine of machinery burst out of the hull, and the ground quaked. In a moment, the whole hulking vessel lifted out of its crater and levitated into the air. It hovered overhead for a long moment, turned, and sailed away over the eastern horizon.
The friends watched until the ship faded to a speck in the sky and finally disappeared. Anna sighed. “They’ll be having pizza for dinner in a few weeks.”
“They’ll be shopping for bikinis and talking to their friends on their cellphones,” Marissa added.
“And they’ll be spending Christmas with their families,” Aria put in. “That’s the part I miss the most.”
Donen eyed her. “You could have Christmas with your family here—whatever that is.”
She smiled up at him. Her eyes glistened. “You’re right. There’s nothing stopping us.”
“What about the cellphones?” Chris asked. “None of us will ever see one again.”
Aimee tore her gaze away from the patch of sky where the Romarie ship disappeared. “We all chose to stay here. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m happier here than I ever could have been on Earth. I won’t regret the decision I made today.”
Anna took her hand. “None of us will. I just never expected to have the chance to go back, and now I’ve turned it down, just like that.”
One by one, they turned away. “We’ve got the future in front of us. We’ve got homes to go to and people who love us waiting there. None of us has anything to complain about.”
They hugged each other all over again. All the pain of past flew away with those women and left them glad and bright. They laughed and kissed and chattered about the future. The unexpected visit lifted the pall of tension from the men, too. They talked freely about the future and made their plans. In the end, they clasped hands.
“Good-bye!” Emily and Faruk led the way east, with Anna and Menlo behind them.
Donen and Aria followed. “Come to us soon, Aimee. We’ll have a team ready to trace the border and draw up new maps. Then we’ll send copies of the maps to all the other factions.”
Renier and Carmen set off after their own column toward the west. “Good-bye! See you in a few weeks.”
Caleb and Turk set off running south toward their own territory. Chris watched them out of sight. Then she turned to Marissa. “We better go, too. Are you ready?”
Marissa nodded. “Let’s go.”
Chris clasped Aimee’s hand. “I sure wish you were coming with us.”
Aimee laughed. “I don’t.”
Chris waved her hand. “You know what I mean.”
“Yeah, I do,” Aimee replied. “See you later.”
Chris and Marissa set off on the trail along the canyon toward Lycaon territory. Aimee turned northwest and found Piwaka waiting for her. “Where’s Penelope Ann?”
“She went on ahead,” he replied. “She’s meeting Aquilla, and they’ll be gone from the village when we get back.”
Aimee sighed. “Do they really have to leave? She’s the only person I know among the Avitras.”
“You know me,” he pointed out.
She took his hand. “You’re right. I know you. I know all I really need to know.”
They passed into the forest shadows, on the road home.
THE END