Epilogue

August 20, 2010 the Perseid meteor shower began its annual display in the night sky. Included in with the thousands of small meteors were hundreds of small probes which quickly covered the Earth sampling the air, water, population and Internet. No one on the planet was aware of their presence, nor heard the information transmitted back into space.

A flagship of a fleet of several hundred ships hiding behind Jupiter received the transmission, and many hours were spent reading and interpreting the information. This was the fleet of the Kragen, an ancient race of warriors who had spent many cycles to find a new home planet. The males were generally over seven feet tall, while the females were usually four to six inches shorter. The fine fur that covered their body was red, except for black on their hands and feet. Their face had some fox like features, but was flatter, and their fangs were more like that of a tiger.

Mecrgor, the Emperor, was pleased at what the study showed. The first time they’d looked at the planet they’d turned away, because it was too much of a mess to make a worthy home for their people. At the request of one of his scientists things had been done to change the environment. Now, not only was this a pleasant environment, but the people were totally unprepared for the overpowering they were to experience. They had lived in peace for so long they’d forgotten there were people in the universe who’d want what they had.

“Osgar, you have done an outstanding job. This planet will make a perfect home for us for a million cycles and the people will make excellent, peaceful slaves. From here we can increase the size of our fleet and conquer this entire section of the galaxy. What’s more, we’re far enough away from our old home that we won’t have to deal with our ancient enemies the Zaxdor or the Wbprng any longer.”

Osgar responded, “Someday, My Emperor, I’d like to pay a return visit to the Zaxdor and repay them for the death of my family. Of course, we’ve got a lot of work to do to find out how to counter their new weapons and shields.”

“If we were able to do that,” replied Mecrgor, “we could conquer the Galaxy.”

Suddenly alarms were going off all over the ships and a fleet many times their size materialized around them. These were unknown ships from an unknown people and Mecrgor feared the Kragen were doomed.

Their communication screen mysteriously activated, and there stood Grant Maxwell, who announced, “Welcome to Earth, Osgar. By the way, you don’t have to fear the Zaxdor any longer. We’ve already defeated them.”

“But how?”

“When you were removing and updating our computer system one of my people was pulling all sorts of valuable information off your own computers. With this, and the time and resources we had, we were able to prepare for your visit as well as set up several colonies around the universe. We sought out your enemy to seek aid, but they were such an unpleasant people. A common earth virus was able to devastate their population and we were able to study their ships and weapons to learn both their weaknesses and strengths. The results are many times worse than anything you’ve ever seen.”

“And now you’re going to conquer the Universe?”

“No, just you, and anyone else who plans to destroy our peaceful way of life. You know what’s sad is if you’d peacefully sought a place here on Earth we would’ve worked with people to find you a home. Instead, I’m afraid you’ll have to die.”

Grant pushed a button on the control panel and a beam with the power of a small sun cut through the largest Kragen ship like a blowtorch through a pat of butter. A second later the other ships in the Earth Fleet fired their beams and then the Kragen were no more.

Sabrina and Beth moved to each side of their husband and hugged him tightly as they said, “Let’s go home.”