We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
The Declaration of Independence – July 4, 1776
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"Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same."
Ronald Reagan
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I was unable to sleep. It was awful. I tossed and turned all night and it seemed like the sun would never rise over the Divide. I don't know how Liz put up with it, but she was quiet and, I assumed, sleeping, while I rolled around like I was lying in a bed of fleas. First it was too hot and then too cool. The cabin window was open and I could hear the mountain stream gurgling along with an occasional chuckle and splash. That sound always helped me get to sleep, but tonight, the energy field just seemed to conflict with mine. I knew what the problem was, but I didn't want to face it.
That damned falling star last night – I knew it wasn't a meteor. It fit everything I had learned on Titan from the Ancient-One, the old alien mastermind of the Pug-bears' invasion, prior to killing him. I was certain that it was some kind of shuttle, bearing – and I knew this for a certainty because it was what the aliens had done the first time – a matter transporter. I remembered the Ancient-One's memories that I'd inadvertently hijacked from him as he tried to dominate my mind. The original transporter had been sent down with programmed instructions to locate a radio-active ore deposit. There had been one, far underground, in Rocky Mountain National Park.
The deposit was still there and the Pug-bears and Pugs knew where it was. It only made sense that they set their shuttle to return to the same location. I figured that the transporter network blowing up hadn't damaged the ore deposit. After all, it was deep in the rocks under the ridge where we'd found the transporter link to Titan.
If the falling star Liz and I had seen late last evening was a spacecraft, then the Pug-bears had made very good time in returning to Earth. I had been certain that they would need several more years to return. It hadn't been long enough to suit me. NASA’s Cassini spacecraft had taken approximately seven years to make the journey. It hadn't even been four full years since we'd blown the Titan base and destroyed the transporter network. Yet, here the invaders came again!
The worst thing was that humanity hadn't even slightly begun to recover from the damage that the aliens' high-altitude nuclear blast had done. If anything, our society was still going down. The resulting electromagnetic pulse had destroyed all of the unshielded electronics on the face of the globe and most of the electrical grid also. It had resulted in a massive die-off of the human species. Oh, sure, primitive people across the globe hadn't been affected that much. They didn't rely on just-in-time inventory supply or any of the other “modern” conveniences that our culture had burdened itself with. They just got up the next day and went out and caught some more fish or went hunting or picked some...
Damn it! My mind was wandering. I kicked off the covers and when I opened my eyes, I realized that I'd actually been sleeping lightly. There was a faint suggestion of daylight coming in our bedroom window and the breeze coming through the window screen carried the wet lumber smell caused by the morning dew on the sides of our log home.
I took a deep breath and prepared myself to face the day, then stretched and rolled over to find Liz staring at me with her eyes open. Her face was ten inches from mine and I thought again – for about the ten-thousandth time – how lucky I was that she had fallen in love with me.
She smiled and my mood lightened up in response.
“You didn't sleep at all, did you, Dec?” It was more of an observation than a question.
“Not very well. I kept worrying about that falling star,” I responded reluctantly. I knew from her slight frown and the little wrinkling between her eyebrows that she'd made up her mind about the thing. I didn't want to start talking about it, because I knew what her decision would be. It would be the same as mine and I didn't like my decision one little bit.
“You and I both know that wasn't a falling star,” she said, frowning. “It was the Pug-bears returning to Earth. They have to be stopped quickly and permanently, Dec. If they aren't, well, we won't have a future.”
She looked over at the window and then turned her face back to me to speak. “We've got to plan for Michael. He needs a world that's safe to grow up in,” she said.
As usual, her face softened when she said his name. For such an independent woman, and Liz was as tough as they come and a good fighter, she had fallen completely for her little son. It must have been catching, because I, too, would do absolutely anything to protect him.
It's amazing what having your own child will do to your attitude. I can remember that I used to think that other people's kids were just a nuisance, crying in restaurants and ruining the atmosphere just when I was trying to have a nice meal. These days, I've got an incredible amount of patience for what the little ones go through now that I've put up with some major crying bouts myself. You get used to it and it becomes natural to give comfort and try to make things better. When they're happy, it's like the whole world is aglow.
My mind was wandering again. With a mental jolt, I returned to the source of my worry. I knew what I was going to do and I didn't want to do it, but there wasn't any option. I was the only one who knew enough about fighting the aliens to be able to make a difference. I'd proven deadly to them in the past and I was now even more prepared. The mental changes that had started under the Ancient-One's attack had continued and I was better at both mental communication and remote sensing.
Liz and I were always in a low-level mental-linkage. You'd probably call it telepathy, but it wasn't really like that. It was as if her thoughts were just part of my own thought-stream. I didn't have to pay attention to them, but they were always there in the background. This continuous communication made us very close and we each seemed to know what the other needed. Right now, I needed some encouragement and she knew it.
“Look, Dec, we both know that was the Pug-bears coming back. It was obviously some kind of space ship or lander. Now, it may not have brought any aliens. It might be only a robotic ship, but you can be sure that it has a working matter transporter in it. They'll be back as soon as they can get their transporter link re-established,” she was speaking softly as her eyes locked with mine. “You know that something has to be done to disrupt their plans again.”
“Yeah, but why couldn't someone else do it?” I was arguing a lost cause and had already made up my mind, but I still wanted to have her convince me.
“You know you're the only one with the experience and ability to seriously screw them up. They took a beating the last time and they're going to be more ready this time, but so are you,” she was referring to my maturing psychic abilities.
I knew she was right. My ability to insert thoughts and emotions into another mind had greatly increased since the time when I resisted the Ancient-One's control. So had my remote-sensing ability. It was handy, since it made me a better hunter. In the post-electronics world caused by the alien's EMP, being able to put food on the table consistently was a blessing.
“I don't want to leave you and Michael!” I complained, “And – and, I know that you can't come with me. There's too much danger on the eastern side of the Divide from humans, let alone aliens!”
At this, she sort of kicked her feet to untangle them from the bedclothes and to get them clear of our cat, Jefferson.
He'd been lying between her feet. It's a bad habit he has. He was a street cat, used to hardship and unused to human contact. However, he'd decided that living with us was the greatest thing that ever happened to him. He just adored sleeping in the bed with us. He would sometimes try to get between my feet, but I was a little too restless and would usually kick him off. Liz, on the other hand, seemed to tolerate the heavy, hot lump that he made.
Now, she kicked and he got up and stretched, then jumped down and went into the other room. After a minute I heard the cat flap rattle and knew he'd gone outside to do his morning duty and check the homestead. He was at least as good a guardian as a dog. He'd alert me to anything amiss even if I had forgotten to check things out myself by mentally extending my perception.
I did and there was nothing dangerous in the vicinity. I judged that Jefferson would be fine. He'd learned to steer clear of coyotes and cougars. There were also a few wolves and bears that had found their way into the area and he left them strictly alone.
I was pushing my mind out a little farther into the aether, searching the general energy level for problems, when I was suddenly interrupted. Liz slid closer to me and put her arm around my shoulder. Her other hand was between us and it suddenly found a sensitive part of my anatomy, and... Well, it's not necessary to tell everything.
A few minutes later, Michael started crying from the other room and we got up, arranged our clothes and began the morning routine.
During breakfast, we discussed what needed to be done. Liz and Michael would have to stay in Grand Lake at our homestead. Jefferson, for all his alien fighting ability, would have to stay with them. I couldn't see trying to carry him over the mountains on horseback. The whole task was going to be up to me.
I needed to get the place prepared for Liz to run. We had a lot of wood already cut, although not enough to last through the entire winter. The chickens and rabbits were usually her task to care for. The fowl created enough eggs that we used the extras for barter. The rabbits were just about self-sustaining now that it was moving into summer. I was satisfied that the livestock wouldn't be too much of a chore for her to handle by herself.
We'd rigged some movable hutches with wire cages attached and all you had to do was pull them along on their small wheels. The rabbits moved along inside without panic. They'd been through the process often and knew that after the brief movement, they'd have access to a fresh batch of grass. As soon as the hutch and cage was in place, they hopped eagerly around and began to graze on the untouched grass.
Rabbits are great. They produce more meat per acre than cattle and they produce more rabbits at a rapid rate. Just look up Fibonacci's formula and you'll see how fast they can reproduce.
The chickens were almost as easy. The only problem with the animals that required much care was the lesser predators that were attracted to them. Coyotes, foxes, raccoons, weasels, the odd Fisher-cat and, once, a wolverine had all fallen to my .22 rifle. The darned things were always optimistically thinking that they could get an easy lunch at our place.
I had finally figured out how to place a mental barrier around the farmyard that would generally keep them out. It was an area of gradually increasing unease. As they approached, they would begin to sense fear and it would increase. Few of them came on in after I set that up. The ones that did found there was an actual justification for the fear.
I'd taught Liz how to do the barrier and she was working on it, but not really facile as yet. She made up her short-falling by being at least as good a shot with the little pump rifle as me.
We took inventory of the supplies we had on hand and concluded that she was well set. It wasn't as if she would be totally alone either. We did live out of town a few miles, but we had many friends in the area that would be happy to help out if she needed anything in my absence.
During the entire time we'd lived in Grand Lake, there had only been a few intrusions from the outside world. We knew that the Denver area and most of the front range was under the control of some warlord who mostly ensured peace as long as he got his way. His gang or tribe or whatever you want to call it had never come over the mountains. From what we heard, he had his hands full ruling the people that were left on the eastern slope.
Starvation had come quickly to the cities when the trucks stopped bringing food. Denver had lost almost all of its population in the big die-off. As a result, the warlord's land was sparsely populated and that meant that he had frequent problems with wandering tribes or migrants who raided his villages.
Despite the massive death count, lots of humans had survived the EMP. The few radios we managed to get going again told us that. People were gradually beginning to rebuild in various enclaves around the country and across the world. Kansas City seemed to be doing pretty well. The Kansas wheat farms were still producing, although at a level comparable to that of the nineteenth century. They had begun to build steam engines and lately had managed to get some oil wells producing again. I judged that things would be back to normal in about forty or fifty years, provided that the Pug-bears left us alone.
As for the monstrous Pug-bears, we understood that they'd all been killed. The ones left on Earth after the transporter network blew were strictly feral. They had shipped cases of the symbiont eggs to Earth, but the Pug-bears wouldn't eat them unless they were caged and forced to eat the things. The few intelligent Pug-bears had supervised the Pugs in that activity. The symbiont life-form eggs were not very viable. They would infect the Pug-bear only once out of several thousand eggs eaten. When an infection occurred, it resulted in the Pug-bear developing a large cranium to house the symbiont. The minds of the two creatures merged and the conjoined organism became capable of rational thought. Capable enough that they'd now completely dominated fourteen planets and were giving signs of trying to dominate ours once again.
The Pugs, the humanoids that I'd thought were the only aliens for a long time, were a warrior race that the Pug-bears dominated mentally. They had all died off soon after we'd destroyed their transporter network. They were biologically incompatible with our atmosphere and needed breathing masks and protection for their skin. When their respirators failed, they died. We hadn't been bothered by them for several years.
There was something that still puzzled me. I had searched the memories I'd accidentally ripped out of the Ancient-One as thoroughly as I could and I still only understood a smattering of its knowledge. I knew the Pugs weren't capable of creating technology. They were used mostly as slaves and soldiers by the Pug-bears. The Pug-bears didn't have the physical capability to manipulate things. They were all teeth and claws combined with a tough carapace, but they had no hands.
What puzzled me about the aliens was that I didn't know where they got their high level of technology. They had space-flight capability that was far better than man's. Their transporter network utilized quantum entanglement and torsion waves – things which we'd only just begun to understand – and their weapons included the anti-matter “eraser” gun and anti-matter bombs along with the poisoned glass splinter shooting gun, two of which we still had.
The splinter-shooters held what seemed to be an incredible number of shots, but we'd still been carefully preserving ours. Both magazines were down to about ten percent at this point and we kept them back, just in case a Pug-bear showed up. They were the only weapons, short of a fifty-caliber sniper rifle that would lay a Pug-bear out with one shot, as long as the poison splinter was placed right down the alien's gullet.
I decided that I'd have to go into town to let the Sheriff and some others know what I was going to do. After breakfast, Liz and I saddled my horse, “Paint.” Not a very original or creative name, but it described him. He was about as colorful a pinto as there was in the area.
Waving goodbye to Liz and Michael, who was too busy pulling Jefferson's tail to respond, I set out for town.
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