The Sunnys worked rapidly, but it still took around one hundred hours for them to detach the damaged FTL vane from our ship, pull an entire vane off of the most nearly complete FTL ship, maneuver it over to our ship, and gently shove it into place with small one-person tug vehicles. We watched closely from the station's hub. The video screens in the command center were capable of magnifying the view and we could easily zoom in to watch details as fine as a Sunny working on bolts alongside the main mounting bracket. The whole operation reminded me of some sort of futuristic ballet. The small tugs flying around, sometimes working in pairs and sometimes working at seemingly cross-purposes, seemed an apt counterpoint to individual Sunnys jetting around with their EVA packs and belts of hand-held tools. It was intricate and confusing to the four of us humans, although I was the only one who was really interested enough to watch most of the time.
The two big men had somehow come up with a pack of cards, and they spent much of their time playing Gin Rummy for stakes that were unknown to me. Erin spent time watching me watching the Sunny operation, but she also spent a lot of time apparently sleeping in her cabin on the station.
The Sunnys had hospitably given each of us a private cabin in an exterior wall of the station hub. That way, we were close to the action for our convenience and, probably, more easily observable for the Sunnys' convenience. They still hadn't developed the degree of trust that Whistle and Frazzle exhibited.
About halfway into the repair process, I got nervous about being separated from our ship and decided that we'd be better off if we left the station and camped out on board. Some of the ship's power was shut down for repairs, but the habitat area was still warm, and the atmospheric recycling was chugging along. It would have made no sense to vent the ship or let it cool down. A lot of the work had to happen inside service access corridors and tubes, so the Sunnys kept things running. Accordingly, we moved back into our usual cabins on board. It might have been a little premature, but the move made me feel much better. At least I could shoot at any attacking vessels that might show up, even if we couldn't run until the repairs were done.
Another situation was developing as time passed. The contingent of Sunnys that had left the FTL and transported to the planet's surface had somehow set off a perfect storm of resistance against the Pug-bears' rule. They were greatly aided by the comet strike. Rain fell all over the planet for days as the excess water cycled through the atmosphere.
The desert area was ruined for the Pug-bears' egg-hatching purposes. There were rivers and shallow seas in the inter-mountain region, and the Pug-bears were rampaging around like feral animals in total disregard of their grafted-on intelligence. They'd initially all dashed up to the breeding grounds, but now they were filtering out, coming down the mountains to decimate the Sunny cities, killing any Sunny unfortunate enough to be caught outside the protective shields and water barriers.
The Sunnys from our ship had spread out to various locations on the planet and were coordinating the setting up of motion-sensing auto-cannons. None of them were very happy about the process, but they'd somehow gathered up enough fortitude to carry out the task. I thought that their feelings were somewhat shielded by the fact that they weren't actually pulling the triggers themselves. The Pug-bears were doing a good job of that. They'd rush a cannon installation repeatedly until they'd figured out a way to get by its defensive fire, and then they'd rip it apart, a task that they were easily strong enough to accomplish. The best part was that they often lost several individuals to the gun before they were able to swamp it. The numbers seemed to be rapidly working out in favor of the Sunnys and I was pleased, as were Frazzle and Whistle.
The two of them kept busy talking to their former shipmates, making suggestions about devious ways to install the auto-cannon traps. When it came to raw brainpower, the Sunnys were more than a match for the Pug Bears. Their only failing was their extreme vulnerability to mental control.
Once I recognized that, I resolved to try and do something about it. I spent a couple of hours working with both of them, trying to see if I could somehow set up a barrier in their minds that would protect them from Pug-bear control methods. It was not much use. Frazzle did develop a small amount of resistance that was facilitated by his ability to do higher math in his head. When he focused intently on working out an equation, he was able to simply ignore my attempts at low-intensity mental control. However, if I put a bit more effort into it, he would lose the ability to focus and then rapidly succumb.
He was eager to learn, though. “You keep trying on me, please! Me wants to be free of their mind controls. I learn some resistance and maybe with practice, I learn more. Dec, you keep trying on me, please, please!” was the way he put it.
We continued to work at it, spacing our efforts out over time so as to not become over-tired. I didn't have much hope of him mastering the process, but I figured that any improvement was a hundred percent better than what he'd started with. Erin was a frequent observer of our efforts. She had developed the somewhat disconcerting habit of watching me when I was busy. Without looking, I'd sense her attention when I was observing the repairs through the video display and also when I was working with Frazzle.
Eventually, she asked me if I thought that she could learn to defend against mental control. The idea of working closely with her gave me pause. I had, of course, worked with Liz and my son. Also, with Rudy, I had an emotional bond with all of them. Frazzle was no problem for me. His very alienness kept me from becoming too involved. I'd had little success with my friends in Grand Lake, though. Working with other humans was best facilitated by strong empathy, and, for me, that meant I had to love them at some level. I didn't want to feel that way about Erin. Somehow it felt like I'd be cheating on Liz.
On the other hand, I really needed all of my allies to have as much strength as possible. Erin wasn't too bad in a gunfight, but she really didn't have the killer instinct that Liz or the two football players had. I eventually came to the conclusion that we'd be better off if I were able to train her to some degree.
She was all for me training her and wanted to start the instant I suggested it, but I wanted to wait until the next wake period. I thought that it would go better and more smoothly if we were both rested and fresh. In a way, I was right, but the whole training thing didn't work out the way I'd hoped.
We met in the cafeteria the next morning. The Sunnys were still working on attaching the vane to our FTL ship. By now, they'd reached the point where most of the work was internal, connecting the sub-systems to the main power supply along with all of the control systems. Whistle informed me that it would take at least another twenty-four hours for them to finalize the adjustments, reprogram the ship's computer to take account of the slightly more efficient vane and its modified control subset, and then to test the connections. After that we'd be free to take the ship into FTL when needed. I thought that I'd better do what I could with Erin now since there didn't seem to be any foreseeable free time in the near future.
She sat down cross-legged on the floor directly in front of me. I rested my back against one of the food machines and began to take her into the trance state that I'd found worked best for this kind of thing. As I mentioned, I'd never really had great success with this sort of training except with Liz, Michael, and Rudy. Things started getting out of control immediately. Despite my prior manipulation of Erin's mind, when I briefly implanted the control mechanism to overcome her objections to my leadership, I hadn't connected with her on a deep level. It was like jumping into a whirlwind. Her mind was quick and didn't focus on any one thought for long before moving on to any of a number of possible conclusions. This level of activity was different to me, and it gave me a problem for a while until I was able to get more deeply in touch with her.
Somewhere in the process, I became aware that she was gazing into my eyes with her lips parted slightly. She had deep green eyes and I hadn't really noticed them before. She was – I paused, startled. She was hijacking my mental flow in some way. I tried to redirect the mental relationship, but no matter what way I attempted, she somehow managed to start the whole thing sliding into a sexual mode. The woman was more adept at psychic seduction than I was prepared to handle.
I had to continually back up and try to get us on a more business-like basis. In the process, I managed to give her some degree of resistance to the most common Pug-Bear control thoughts. I'm not sure how I did it, but I could tell that she was learning how to resist them. The main problem was that she was more or less simultaneously learning how to get around my defenses against being seduced. I finally broke out of contact and realized that I was sweating and breathing rapidly. She was in no better condition.
She stretched and looked at me with eyes that spoke volumes. Her gaze was of a “come hither” variety, and I felt the urge to comply, but suddenly, my conscience spoke up, and I got a bad case of guilty feelings. I was committed to Liz and wasn't going to change anything, no matter how much she pleaded or how attractive she made herself.
As if sensing my change, and I guess that we were in rapport enough that she did, she let out a disappointed sigh and smiled, half-embarrassed. “I'm sorry, Dec. I've never known anyone like you before. You're just so straightforward and trustworthy, and I...” she paused. “I want that in my life. I know that you're committed to your wife, and that's what I want for myself. Maybe – no, I guess I'll just have to try and live with myself. Things could change.”
She added this last thought somewhat hopefully, but I wasn't sure if she meant that she'd find someone else or I might change my mind. “Well, this session was informative for both of us. I guess we're more in tune with each other now,” I said somewhat inanely. “What I mean is that I'm sure that you picked up at least some techniques that will help you resist mental control in the future.”
I wanted to back out of the situation gracefully. I started to stand up and realized that I was still breathing heavily. I turned away quickly and headed for the door. As I walked, I added, over my shoulder, “I've got to go check on progress with the repairs.” I felt like a complete fool in any of a number of ways.
She just smiled knowingly and answered, “I'll see you later.”
I was really glad to see the furry, alien countenance of Frazzle as he glanced my way when I entered the bridge. At least with him there was only an open friendliness with no other possible complications. I felt a lot more at ease with the operational and strategic problems at hand.
“How long do we have before the ship will be finished?”
“Bouts done now, Dec,” he chirped.
I was mostly used to his patois by now and it was starting to sound natural to me. I hadn't been noticing his odd use of our language for days. I'd developed a sort of mental translation program that simply filled in the blanks and smoothed over the mistakes in his speech.
“OK! That's good news,” I answered.
“We can goes quick,” he said. “Where do you want to go?”
That was the question. The situation on the planet below was gradually calming down and we couldn't help there anyhow. We just didn't have enough force to make a difference.
Now, that was a thought! Force! That was what I'd been lacking during the entire invasion period on Earth. Despite having the armed FTL, as good as it was, I felt like I desperately needed more warm and (hopefully) fighting-ready bodies on our side. How was I going to get them?