Chapter 11 - Destruction

We left our room and are making our way to our ships, but it seems we are not the only ones running, there are crew running in all directions, the ship has become total chaos.

There are red lights flashing everywhere, and alarms buzzing. Chloe is wearing her pilot suit and well I don't need one for my ship, I've got my controls on my arm.

As we are running we see Azaria.

Chloe."mom, what's going on?

Azaria. "The dark empire found us, we are tracking a fleet of over 100 ships coming through a wormhole.

Azaria. Looks at me," let me take the crystal, It will be safe on our core worlds. "

I hand her the crystal and she hugs Chloe. "Leave your ship, take his, use the slip space drive and go to the Acturions home world, you will be safe there till the baby is born, then I will come fetch you both. "

Chloe. Tears in her eyes. "I love you mom."

Azaria. "I love you too."

Azaria gives me a hug as well. "Please look after my little girl."

Me. "I will, I promise."

Azaria leaves heading for the bridge. And we finally get to my ship, it already started powering up. We enter the ship and head for the bridge.

Chloe. "Let me take the controls, I've got more experience in battle scenarios and this is going to get rough. "

Me. "You won't hear any arguments from me, I will man the weapons systems" I remove the controller from my arm and place it on hers, she just smiles. "Thank you for trusting me. "

She takes the controls and we leave the hanger on Azaria's ship immediately. As we are leaving we can see that the ship has decloaked and is starting to light up.

Chloe. "Oh no, that's not good."

Me. "What's wrong?"

Chloe. "If the ship is decloaked its an easy target, and it becomes vulnerable during the jump. If any energy weapon hits it now it will create a chain reaction in the dark matter and anti matter which will..."

But she got cut short as a bunch of strange black ships appeared and immediately started blasting the ship with energy weapons.

Chloe. "Mom, noooo!!!!'"

And just like that as we look on the entire ship starts to pull apart as random explosions erupt all around it, and then it collapses in on itself.

Chloe turns the ship around and flies towards Earth.

Me. "What are you doing?"

Chloe. "Getting help."

Me. "We were ordered to..,"

Chloe. "To run? My mother is dead."

I don't know how to react and decide to keep quiet. As we are flying towards earth we see a bunch of nukes been fired off from earths orbital defence satellites towards the enemy. We expect the enemy to fire at the nukes, but instead the nukes hit multiple targets and in white flashes half their fleet gets destroyed.

Me. "Why didn't they destroy the nukes."

Chloe. "They couldn't see them, it's a mix of our technology and draconian technology."

Me. "Draconian? I thought they were a myth."

Chloe. "No. Please I need to focus."

She flies us through the atmosphere and redirects us towards one of the mountains where the Space Force has a secure base. But before we know it we are surrounded by enemy fighters.

Me, "I think we flew into a swarm, why don't you activate the shields?"

Chloe. "They are only armed with energy weapons, this ships hull is covered in a crystalline layer, so it will absorb their blasts, but I do suggest you get on the weapons."

Me. "On it, no need to tell me twice."

I activate our targeting system and set all weapon systems to active. "Let's see what this baby can do."

Chloe. "That's so cliche, maybe cut down on the movie quotes and fire."

My targeting system immediately locks onto 10 different enemy fighters and in a flash they disintegrate. But as fast as we destroyed them the rest decided to fire at us, the ships power systems immediately lights up and a new icon appear on my weapons network screen, stating Alpha cannon at full charge. "Uhm love, alpha cannon?"

Chloe. "Hold off, let me get us to the middle of the swarm. For now keep firing."

Not that I even stopped, but the more fighters I destroy the more they come at us, they just seem to be pouring through the atmosphere like rain drops.

Chloe takes us up towards the thickest part of the swarm. "Get ready in 3...2....1...fire now."

A grin form on my face as I press the flashing button which I've been itching to press for the last 45 minutes.

Within seconds the entire ship is engulfed by light and all the screens in the room gives a bright flash and then all the enemy fighters starts to vanish in thin air as if they never existed.

Me. "What the hell just happened?"

Chloe. "A little gift from your mother, it's a secret weapon that's usually only fitted to flag ships. But that should take care of the fighters, I doubt we will see any more of them any time soon. "

She turns the ship and speeds towards the space force base. As we get closer she sends only one line in her communication message. "Please open my landing hanger, it's princess, no queen Chloe."

Voice. "Affirmative, your landing spot is ready."

As we land Zoe runs up to us and hugs Chloe, "I'm so sorry, are you okay?"

Chloe just looks at her, "I will be fine."

She then walks off and Zoe comes up to me and then looks at the ship. "Woaw, where did you guys get this beaut from?"

Me. "It was a gift from my mother and the Acturion Emperor."

I start to follow Chloe who is wasting no time walking towards the base command center.

Zoe. "Wait, your mother? Who is your mother?"

Me. "It turns out I'm not a hybrid, my mother is also a queen."

Zoe. "Does that mean I should bow in your presence now?"

Me. "Please don't. And we need to focus, Chloe just lost her mother."

As we enter the command Center we stop as all the screens are showing different parts of Earth, most cities are already completely destroyed, others are been bombarded from orbit, some shows tired soldiers and cops trying to evacuate civilians, fire fighter's rescuing trapped people from collapsed buildings, paramedics trying to keep up with the wounded, hospitals destroyed...

Chloe gasped as she looks at the screens, she looks at the tired general and speaks to him. "Have they tried to communicate with any of the governments?"

General. "No, we tried to communicate, we even surrendered without any conditions, some presidents even begged them to have mercy on the public. But no response."

Chloe. "They are monsters. Where is the air-force? The military?"

General. "They were all deployed as soon as we detected the incoming fighters, but they took our planes out like they were nothing. And after the first wave of nukes took out some of their ships they started to target our nukes as soon as we try to launch. We are defenseless, But you guys did well out there, what kind of weapon was that?"

Chloe. "It's an Acturion ship, the weapon was developed by my people, it destabilizes the gravity holding particles together. Basically, but I'm not even sure how it works. Unfortunately our ship can't go up against a whole fleet. "

General. "I'm sorry about Azaria."

Chloe. "Do you have a place for us to stay? We need some time to think and come up with a plan."

General. "Zoe, please show them to the quarters next to yours."

Zoe. "On it, follow me."

After a few minutes the 3 of us are sitting in our room. Zoe hands is each a glass of wine. "I think you guys need this."

We both thank her and that's when Chloe finally breaks down, she bursts out crying, "my mother, all the people on that ship, all gone." She looks at me with tears streaming down her face, "did you know when gravity collapses time basically slows down to almost a standstill, to us it was mere seconds, but to my mother it would have felt like an eternity, can you imagine her pain with the ship collapsing in on itself, crushing everyone, her fear?"

I look at her, feeling powerless to say or do anything, but she continues, "we have lost, my mother is gone, the crystal is gone, there is nothing stopping the void from destroying all of existence now, and soon Earth will be completely destroyed and be left uninhabitable."

I finally decide to try and comfort her. "What if it doesn't have to be like this?"

Chloe. "You can't change the past."

Me. "What if we can?

Chloe looks at me. "You know the rules, you can't exist in the same time as yourself. "

Me. "You said to me that when we were in the digital prison our conscious is uploaded and that our bodies are technically brain dead, am I right?"

Chloe. "That is correct." She finally stopped crying and looks at me with a flicker of hope.

Zoe. "Wait, you guys were in prison?"

Chloe. "Long story. " she then looks back at me, "you've done this before, so do you think you can take us back to the exact moment when we entered the prison?"

Me. "I can, I've already got the anchor set. "

Chloe. "Not yet, we first need information."

She then looks at Zoe, if we succeed, then none of this would ever have happened."

Zoe. "What are you guys planning? I know that look, you are going to do something crazy." Looking Chloe straight in the eyes.

Chloe. "We need information on the enemy, the only way to get it is to get onto their ship before we time jump back. "

Zoe. "You are planning to get captured, aren't you?"

Chloe. "Yes, that's the only way to get information."

She then explains the plan to us and we go over it a few times. And since this time line will be erased "if" we succeed she decided that Zoe can come with.

She informs the general of her plan who tries to talk us out of it, but she wouldn't even hear him out, he even refused to open the hanger doors for us, which she eventually just blasts out of existence and our ship shoots up into the sky heading towards the enemy main fleet.

Chloe opens an channel and send a signal, "this is high queen Sarine from the Seleons, I would like to meet with your leader to discuss our surrender."

There is a few minutes of silence, then a signal comes back in. "We acknowledge receiving your message, take your weapons off line and land in the capital ship, you will be escorted to the fleet commander from there. "

Chloe. "There are 3 of us, we are here to negotiate. Please confirm that no harm will come to any of us."

Voice. "No harm will come to you or your crew, you have the fleet commanders promise. "

As we get closer Chloe starts to activate the self destruct system on the ship.

Zoe. "What are you doing? How will we escape?"

Chloe. "Let's just say we won't need the ship."