Sunday, February 24, 2008

Rebel Without a Clue (fanfic) by Jonathan Scott-Farley

"this fanfic was scanned and there may be some glitches in text translation... if you find any leave a comment and the webmaster will fix it"


Diana was pissed off! Her mothership was parked again behind Earth's moon while she tried to dream up some kind of a cure for the red dust. She sure as Algul wasn't going to go back to the homeworld in disgrace, that would only lead to execution. She would have to stay here until she managed to solve the problem, then the leader would be pleased with her again. Diana poured through the scientific journals that had recently arrived from the homeworld, Especially the latest piece from the professor of chronology. Reading between the lines, she realized that he had been holding out on the leader. His latest piece on attenuation field technology was more revealing of his achievements to date than perhaps he had intended. Diana quickly tapped out a message to the leader. "Send Professor Ensenstrom to me immediately, very important.
Elikashions and mice, Drogna." Diana returned to her reading.

Professor Ensenstrom was dozing happily in his campus office, while school life continued its hectic processes around him. One of the good things about being professor of Chronology was that should anyone catch .him napping while he was supposed to be working, he could always say that he was deep into applying the mathematics of time travel to the physical world (in his mind of course). Everyone knew that time travel was possible mathematically, but applying the knowledge in the physical world was the difficult bit, so wandering around looking as though you were half asleep came with the teritory. Ensenstrom had published several works on the subject, had instantly become the most renowned chronologist on the horne world and consequently could spend a great deal of time asleep at his desk. If the truth must be told, Ensenstrom had gone a lot further. He had actually built a time machine, just in case the leader challenged him to produce something, but he wasn't going to show it unless he was in mortal danger. The consequences might not even justify that risk. Most people on the home world believed that a time machine would be some bulky box like structure that you sat in, to be whisked into the past, future, or alternative present, thanks to all the spoof adventures on Sullomvision. Actually, the machine was small, crystal like and was disguised at the moment as a fancy clock paperweight on his desk. All you needed to do to make it work was connect it to the vehicle you wanted to push through time and allow it to generate the attenuation field that temporarily displaced it from real spacetime. The professor dozed on in a feeling of security that was soon to be shattered, and it wasn't because he was a secret Zonist. His communicator beeped for attention disturbing his fitful slumber, it was incredible how comfortable the sayings of the prophet Algul was as a pillow.

"Professor," said the voice, "you will report immediately to
the shuttle bound for Earth. Your lectures have been cancelled
until you return. "

When Ensenstrom arrived on the sentry mothership, he was
escorted to his compartment by a guard. Rather than bother
with washing, he sloughed a layer of skin and threw it down
the disposal chute. Placing the time machine by his bed, he
went off in search of Drogna.

"Why did you have me brought here?" he demanded.

"Because I have a job for you." retorted Diana.

"What could I possibly do for you?"

"I want you to build me a time machine, of course."

"Assuming that I can actually build one, what would you do
with it?"

"We are at a bit of an impasse with Earth. We can't go there
because of the red dust, which according to my information was
developed from a hybrid bacteria in the Maxwell child."

"So what do you want with a time machine then?"

"I want to go back and stop Brian from making love to Robin
Maxwell. Then the red dust will never be developed."

"Time may not allow such rewrites," said Ensenstrom, "besides,
I may not be able to make one."

"I think," said Diana, "you are nearer to producing one than
you would like the leader to know. I wonder why?" Ensenstrom
swallowed hard, thinking of the completed unit in his room.

"I will certainly try, but it is mostly theory, it may not
work."

"It had better, for your sake."

"I will of course have requirements."

"No doubt. Draw up a list, and I will see to them." Ensenstrom returned to his quarters. How could he possibly give his masterpiece to this woman? he would have to work out a plan, but that shouldn't be difficult. After all, he was a theoretical mathematician of the inner circle, with qualifications in physics, psychology, and a few other subjects he had forgotten over the years. He needed to reduce the number of potential opponents for a start. It was bad enough having to deal with that social climbing woman Drogna. Ensenstrom sat down on his bed, pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, and began to scribble.

The following day,' he went to seek out Drogna. The woman sat back in her chair with feigned resignation.

"I suppose you have an exorbitant list of demands" she said. " Not a very long one, " he replied, "first, 1 need complete access to the mothership's master control in order to install the attenuation circuit should I complete it, that is."

"Not granted," replied Drogna, "but I'll give you level two
access."

"I need complete access"

"Level two is all you get, what's next?"

"I want everyone except those directly involved with the project evacuated from the mothership."

"Impossible," said Drogna.

"Without this, I am afraid we can't continue with the project. I'm concerned with security. suppose we have fifth columnists on the ship, they might try to sabotage my work."

"I do have an alternative solution to these problems, but continue for the moment."

"I need a laboratory, not too far from the mothership bridge."

"Why?"

"Because if I succeed, I intend to shunt the whole ship backwards through time."

"That I will grant you, everything else is denied. Was there anything else you wanted?"

"No, that should do."

"Fine, I'll see what I can do."

The following day, Ensenstrom was installed in a new laboratory next to the bridge. He spent his first morning using the lab's mini-m~nufactory to build coil sets, and began to assemble part two of his plan, a little black hole generator that would in a nanosecond vaporise the bridge of the sentry ship, just in case things didn't work out his way. About lunchtime, he needed to get something from his cabin and walked out into the corridor to find a guard blocking his way. "Out of my way," demanded Ensenstrom.

"Not until the end of your shift, go back to work" Ensenstrom went back to work, and spent the afternoon seeing how many different materials he could make field retention coils out of. A totally useless occupation, but it kept him amused for hours. He was particularly satisfied with those that used Wozma wood as their drums.

At about quarter past dinner, Drogna walked in to examine his progress, and stared at the immense number of coils stacked up against the wall.

"Enjoying yourself?" she said caustically,

"Can't think when I have been happier," he replied.

"I have been thinking abut your request to evacuate the ship of all personnel. I have decided for the security of the project, to reduce the crew to a minimum of the bridge crew and James's regiment of fighters. I have ordered another mothership to come and remove all of the nonessential personnel. I will of course supervise the project from there too. "

"Of course," replied Ensenstrom sarcastically.

"When you have completed the project, you will take James and his regiment back in time to before the fleet arrival, and he will ensure that Brian and Robin do not create the starchild."

"And if I don't?"

"You have a finite amount of time to complete your task, if you don't, then my other plan will at least ensure the humans won't win. I have set the ship's Domesday device to explode the day after tomorrow when the moon is perfectly between the earth and the sun. The explosion will vaporise half of the moon's surface, and the sun's rays will push the dust into Earth's atmosphere, causing a new ice age. If you don't complete the project, then you will be part of that explosion."

"And if I do manage to complete it?"

"Then I will transmit the disarming code to James." Drogna turned to leave, "You have thirty hours." she said, closing the door

This was a blow. Thirty hours before yet another planet fell prey to this social climber, and with only level two access, he would not be able to disarm the device. What to do?

Ensenstrom started running control cabling from the bridge to the laboratory when the mothership had been evacuated, and got the bridge crew and James's soldiers running around the ship installing the field retention coils . He had to save this planet from the leader and that woman. He couldn't disarm the device, but his security access did allow him to move the ship. If he tried to move it to a place where it wouldn't do any harm however, Drogna would detonate the device before he had gone an inch. On the other hand, if he moved it to another time, Drogna wouldn't be able to transmit the code to the ship. It would blow up, there was no doubt of that, but if Ensenstrom could move it to somewhere safe, in space and time, at least he would have been able to protect one planet. There was nothing for it, he would have to use the time machine. Ensenstrom walked back to his cabin to get a book, trailed discreetly by James and four of his soldiers.

Ensenstrom entered his cabin and laid down on his rock. He couldn't move the ship forward in time, because Drogna would just catch up by coming the long way round, so he had to go where she couldn't follow, The past.

After a refreshing nap, Ensenstrom dressed himself and prepared for the task ahead. He slipped the time machine into his pocket, and left for his laboratory. Outside the door, James was slouching in the corridor, the other soldiers had gone to find something more interesting to do. James's pseudoskin always looked baggy on him, like an ill-fitting suit, and it's fair complexion didn't react well to his love of sun
lamps.

"You have another twenty hours," said James, "I will of course leave the ship at least an hour before detonation, so I need to know if you have done it before then." Ensenstrom shrugged and walked off down the corridor to his lab.

"Don't think you're going anywhere," he muttered under his breath. James followed him at a discrete distance, as usual.

Entering the lab, Ensenstrom locked the door to ensure against interruption, pulled the time machine from his pocket, and began to connect it to the control unit he had rigged up.

In no time, the device was ready, The only place he could go was the past, then he needed to find some open space so that the explosion didn't harm anything. About a hundred million years back should do it. Ensenstrom fed the time into his machine, and hit the activate button. The whole ship shuddered as it lurched itself into attenuated space. Ensenstrom looked approvingly at the machine's dial which indicated a speed of one hundred and twenty years per hour and accelerating. There was a bang, and the door collapsed from its runners under the force of the infinite-death cannon James held in his hands. "What's going on?" he shouted.

"You're too late," laughed Ensenstrom, "we're going back at over three years a minute. If we stop now, you'll have to wait ten years for the fleet to arrive!".

"Algul!" shouted James, pointing his cannon at the time machine and pulling the trigger. The crystal clock disappeared in a plume of glasslike dust. Ensenstrom laughed. The controller may have been broken, but the ship was still travelling backwards at an ever increasing speed.

"No one is going to abuse my invention," he shouted. James turned round and started running to the bridge. This time it was Ensenstrom's turn to follow. James sat down at the flight controls and started the sequence to break orbit. The ship lurched again in its attenuation field and James brought it out from behind the moon, he lifted it clear of the satellite and began to set course for the home world.


"It won't work," said Ensenstrom, "our race won't even have started to evolve by the time you get there." James pulled his gun out of its holster and pointed it at Ensenstrom.

"Stop this thing now!" he shouted.

"No," replied Ensenstrom, calmly.

"I will kill you!"

"Zon appoints each man his time of death, who am I to argue."

James pulled the trigger and Ensenstrom collapsed to the floor dead. The phase pulse of the blaster hit the magnetic field of a retention coil and ricochet back towards James who leaped out of his seat in time to see the beam destroy the flight control console. The ship shuddered again, and all power to the drive unit died. Free to float, the ship began to drift, slowly, at first but increasingly faster towards Earth.

"Algul!" exclaimed James again, running out of the bridge and
off towards the nearest fighter bay.

One of the first rules of existing in attenuated space, is not to move out of the attenuation field until it has synchronised again with real space. This is what James tried to do. He lifted his fighter off and flew out of the landing bay, straight at the field wall, as his fighter hit the wall, there was a bang and the control console began to smoke. parts of the hull surface disintegrated as its atoms fought for
existence over the microscopic dust particles that were floating around in real space. Most people think this kind of thing creates a new big bang, it doesn't. The losing particle sheds all its mass and becomes a pure quantum packet of energy. Light! James screamed and tried to cover his eyes, but the intensity of light being given off was too much, he was instantly blinded, and his skin started smoking from radiation burns. The fighter's power system died, leaving a blind and screaming James in utter darkness after the light as the fighter was suddenly thrown back into real spacetime and hurtling uncontrollably towards Earth. The Body-wing design of the fighter, like a cat, instantly righted itself when it hit the planet's atmosphere and began an uncontrolled descent across the top of the world, slowing under the friction burn up of its outer hull. James, barely conscious, crashed to Earth, near a little known town called Roswell in 1947. He survived for about half an hour after the crash, and his body, (though you would never recognise it), has been pickled ever since at area 51.

The mothership continued to drift towards Earth at an ever increasing speed, and an ever increasing pace backwards in time. It eventually hit Earth, detonating the Domesday device about 65 million years ago near a place in South America that would eventually come to be called Chiexulub. Which is a pity, because if it hadn't, the human race would never have evolved, and the Earth would have been ruled by a lizard species that the leader might have liked.

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