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"This doesn't seem real, even now." Captain Knight seemed doubtful, even as she relayed the details she had learned to Admiral Seward. "Apparently, they're refugees. The question is, is this some kind of hoax or are they for real?"
"Why do you think it's a hoax?" asked the Admiral. He was sitting at his desk, Captain Graves and Captain Knight were seated across from him. "That ship didn't look like a hoax to Captain Graves."
"Me either, sir. But that one lady, she spoke perfect Japanese. It was almost like she had been speaking it for years. The only thing off was her accent," Captain Knight replied. She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. "The others seem to recognize it, but they don't understand it. According to Lin, that's the blonde, it's only spoken by elite members of the Royal Guard."
Admiral Seward nodded slightly. "Then that would mean the first one you brought in, StarMaker, she would be a member of this Royal Guard?" he asked. "Any word on where they're from?"
Captain Knight shook her head. "She won't say. After we got back to the ship, all she did was ask about her friend, StarMaker. She seemed more concerned about her than anything else," she replied. "Whoever this woman is, she must be pretty damn important."
"It would seem wherever they're from, it's a matriarchal society," Captain Graves replied. "Most of the higher ranking officials appear to be women from what I can tell. Most of the people actually seem rather ... uncomfortable around men. StarMaker is either their leader or the highest ranking officer in the group. We don't know what to do with the bodies, though."
"Lin won't say anything about that, except that she wants to wait until StarMaker wakes up, but we don't know if or when that will be," Knight replied. "We know she is the most critical, internal injuries, concussion, head trauma, everyone else got off with no more than broken bones."
Admiral Seward sighed. "For now, we leave the bodies where they had them. Their storage system seems to be working pretty well and it keeps us from having to reroute them," he replied. He sighed and handed the two Captains a file marked 'Top Secret'. "We have orders to turn them over to the Feds anyway. All of them, including your friend, StarMaker. From this point on, we are quarantined. No one comes near us and we can't go back to the port. We are on lockdown. Nothing leaves this ship without my approval."
"Do they think the aliens pose a threat to the planet, sir?" Captain Graves asked.
"We don't know. Captain Graves, you are free to go. Tell no one what we have discussed," the Admiral replied. As soon as she was gone, he turned to the other woman. "I've spoken with the joint chiefs. General Thysson wants to speak with you, Captain Knight about what this 'Lin' said to you. He thinks it could be important."
Captain Knight nodded. "Very well, sir. Should she be present when we talk with the General?"
"Not we, Captain. Just you." Admiral Seward picked up the phone in his office and spoke quietly for a moment before looking back to the Captain. "Find her. She should be able to help us shed some light on this situation."
Captain Knight nodded and left the Admiral's office. She knew exactly where she would find Lin. In the 24 hours since the last of the refugees were brought on board, the blonde hadn't left StarMaker's side. Neither had the four kids. The Captain headed straight for the infirmary and found the blonde asleep in a chair beside the redhead, the children curled up together in the next bed. She waved the guards off and woke the blonde. "Lin-san, I need your help," she replied in Japanese.
Lin nodded slightly and glanced at the sleeping redhead. "What's going on?" she asked as the Captain led her out of the room. "Is something wrong?"
Captain Knight shook her head. "No. We just need you to talk with someone. I have to be there to translate for you," she replied. She smiled slightly at the nervous blonde. "Don't worry. He just wants to ask you a few questions." As she walked back to the Admiral's office, she noticed the door open and a guard standing outside. "Where's the Admiral?"
The guard shrugged. "Said he had to take care of something. The General is waiting for you," he replied in English. He saluted the Captain and closed the door behind the two women.
Captain Knight glanced around the office for a moment before motioning Lin to one of the chairs. "Sit down. I'm not sure--"
"Captain Knight?" a voice asked from the speaker phone.
Lin jumped slightly and then looked at the other woman. "Who was that?" she whispered.
"The General," Knight replied. She smiled at the younger looking woman and motioned for her to sit. She turned toward the phone and spoke in English, "Yes sir. I am Captain Knight."
"Is our friend with you?"
"Yes sir. Lin is here," the Captain replied. She repeated the information in Japanese and waited for the General to continue.
"Ask her where they are from."
"Very far away. She won't say the name of the planet."
"Why not?"
"They have many enemies. Enemies that would follow them if they knew where they had gone."
There was a brief pause as the General discussed this information with the Joint Chiefs. Lin started getting nervous. She looked at Captain Knight and started speaking softly.
"What did she say, Captain?"
"She said she wanted to check on her friend. I told her that her friend would be fine."
"Knight-san, Senshi don't heal like others. We have to find--"
"Did she just say 'Senshi'?" asked a new voice over the phone. This voice was a woman's and one that the Captain had become familiar with over the past couple of years.
"Yes, Madame President. She did. Her friend, StarMaker. She is the one she called a Senshi," the Captain replied. Even though the President couldn't see her, the officer stood at attention when she spoke. Lin looked at her curiously and she mouthed 'habit'.
"Captain Knight, I need you to do me a personal favor. From this moment on, you are in charge of making sure nothing happens to either of your friends," the President replied. She cut off the speaker and looked at the small group gathered in her office. "Thysson, I need you to make a phone call to our friends. Ask them if they have any knowledge of other Senshi on the planet. Do not mention the name StarMaker yet. We may be dealing with one of their enemies."
Thysson nodded and left the office. The Secretary of Defense looked at the President. "Ma'am, what do we do now? We have a confirmed First Contact situation. The doctors on that vessel have told us that while some of them are nearly human, there are others that are completely different," she replied. "How do we know we can trust these friends of yours to keep this a secret?"
The President sighed. "They have more to lose by telling the world than we do. And as far as the world knows, it was an airliner that crashed into the Pacific yesterday afternoon. This past year has been hell for our country. I do not intend to start the new one by saying there are aliens falling from our skies," she replied. She motioned for them to be quiet and unmuted the phone. "Captain?"
"Yes, Madame President?"
"I am entrusting their care to you. You have final say on this situation until further notice. Is that understood?"
Captain Knight nodded silently for a moment before replying, "Yes, Ma'am. I will ensure that our friends are taken care of," she replied. The phone went silent and she explained everything to Lin.
Lin asked if they could go back and see StarMaker and the Captain nodded. As she left the office, she was stopped by the Admiral. He spoke to her quietly for several minutes, then smiled slightly at Lin. "I don't believe in life from other planets, Captain. Even when it's standing in front of me."
Captain Knight nodded slightly. She saluted the Admiral and returned to the infirmary. Lin resumed her spot next to the unconscious woman and asked the Captain to stay. "Why did they put you in charge?"
"I don't know. The Admiral said he asked them too. This is still so surreal, I guess he feels he's living in some sci-fi novel," the older woman replied. She pulled another chair to the other side of the redhead and sat down. She looked at the Senshi for the first time as more than just another rescued patient. "You really do respect her, don't you?"
Lin nodded. "Yes. The StarLights are the most respected people on Kinmoku. Besides the Princess, of course."
"That's the first time you've ever said where you were from," Knight replied. "Who are the StarLights?"
"The Princess' personal Guards. They defend her and our planet, even if it means their lives," Lin replied. She smiled sadly and looked at the older woman. "I know it sounds strange to you. But on Kinmoku, our lives were different. We had no need for a large military, just these four women."
Knight stared at her in shock. "Four?" she asked in English. She shook her head and repeated it in Japanese. "How in the world could four women protect an entire planet?"
Lin became sad for a moment. "Well, it turns out they couldn't. At least not against the invaders," she replied. "We came here to seek help, but I don't think we'll be able to find it."
February, 2009
After two months in a Military hospital somewhere in Nevada, the group of Aliens were starting to become restless. A few of the more nervous members of the group had tried to escape and ended up restrained. Lin had managed to convince the people keeping them locked up to allow her to stay with the still unconscious StarMaker, but the children were not allowed to stay. The Captain that had brought them in had been reassigned to the base and still kept in regular contact with the blonde. A pair of FBI agents, neither of whom spoke Japanese, were also assigned to keep an eye on her.
This is why, upon waking in a strange place, StarMaker found herself face to face with three vaguely unfamiliar faces. It took her several moments to realize that the woman was speaking to her in Japanese. "Wh-what?"
Captain Cristyne Knight smiled slightly. "I asked how you were feeling."
StarMaker sat up slowly, groaning when she felt muscles aching that hadn't been used in quite a while. "I ... like I've been hit by a meteor. What happened?"
The Captain glanced at the two FBI agents then looked back at the alien woman. "Your ship. It crashed ... into the Pacific Ocean."
StarMaker's eyes opened wide as she remembered the crash. 'Oh shit. Why do I get the feeling that this is a BAD thing ...' "Last thing I remember was being pulled out of the ship. When ... when was that?"
"Two months ago," Captain Knight replied. She spoke to the two agents for a moment then motioned to a bed on the other side of the room. "Do you remember her?"
StarMaker glanced over to the blonde on the bed and nodded. "She was one of the officers that pulled me from the ship. You said it was two months ago? Have I ... have I been sleeping this whole time?"
"Yes," Captain Knight handed the redhead a mirror and forced back a chuckle at her reaction. "You've been in a coma. You had a head wound from the crash." One of the agents whispered something in her ear and she frowned, switching to English. "Enough. I don't care who you are, I'm in charge of their well-being. You've pestered the poor blonde until she passed out, I won't let you do that to this one. You'll get your answers later."
FBI Agent Mulrooney frowned at the military officer, then glanced at his partner. "This is a First Contact situation, Captain. We have to know if there are any more of her kind on our planet or if we should be expecting an invasion."
"You're paranoid. It was one ship, damaged. It crashed into the Pacific. You should just be glad that it didn't land on any major cities." Captain Knight escorted the two agents out of the room. "Until I say so, no one else is allowed into this room. If I have to, I WILL have guards placed on this floor AND have you thrown off the base, is that clear? The FBI may want answers, but for the moment, the Air Force is running this show."
The two agents glared at the Captain before turning and walking away. Cristyne sighed and walked back into the room. "Sorry about that. They have a tendency to think they run the planet," she replied. She had continued to talk in English, partly to judge a theory.
"Sounds like the people we left behind." StarMaker was standing next to the window, trying to stretch out her overly tired muscles. She turned to the Captain and smiled. "What happened to the blonde?"
Cristyne grinned, crossing the room. "Don't know. They had me translate for them as they asked her every stupid question from every stupid sci-fi novel ever written." She sat in the chair by the blonde's bed and frowned when she felt her forehead. "She's really sick. But they can't figure out what it is. Of course, they've never seen anything like her. Or you, for that matter."
"I am Kinmokunai. She ... is Hrrrrunai." StarMaker walked over to the other woman's bed and lifted her left hand. She saw a needle lying on a nearby tray and used it to prick the younger woman's finger. Black blood oozed out of the hole. "She had a cut on her arm when she pulled me from the ship. That was the first time I noticed it."
"Wait a minute. She said that you were fighting the Hrrrrunai. So, then that means that she's a ..."
"Spy? Probably." StarMaker dropped the other woman's hand back to the bed and sat down in an empty chair. She sighed, glancing back to the window. "That will have to be dealt with later on. I just do not have the strength to do it at the moment."
Cristyne watched the redhead for several moments before glancing to the blonde. Since the crash, she had come to think of the blonde as a friend. Finding out that she was a possible spy was disturbing. "I'll arrange for some food for you. My advice ... don't let them know you speak English." She left the room quickly, glad to see that the Federal Agents were staying away. She pulled the phone from her hip pocket and hit speed dial. "This is Knight. Tell the President that our friend is awake."
StarMaker soon learned what the Captain meant when she said 'every stupid question'. She glanced at Agent Mulrooney, forcing herself not to roll her eyes at his dopey expression.
"Are your people planning to take over our world?"
"No. We were damaged and came out of the portal too close to the planet. We had no control over what happened next." Captain Knight also had to force herself not to roll her eyes at the Fed. Thankfully, they had yet to learn that StarMaker spoke English, so she was still needed to translate.
"Do you know of any other alien races that are planning to take over our world?"
"There aren't many races that even know this planet exists. Besides, what good would it do them to take over a planet that can't even travel to it's own moon anymore?"
Agent Mulrooney frowned. He was getting the same answers to his questions that he had gotten from the blonde, all except for "Have you ever been to Earth before?"
"You already asked me that."
"But you didn't give me an answer."
"Because no answer that I can give you would satisfy you. You only want to prove that this whole thing is faked so you can throw us into some prison and hide us from the world."
"You're still not answering my question."
"No, I'm not."
Mulrooney's partner, Agent Dannyell Kulwicki, a tall woman with reddish-blonde hair, sighed and closed the file in her partner's hands. "I think that's enough for today," she replied. She brushed off her partner's glare then stood, stretching. "Why don't you go call this in while I go check with the doctor about the blonde?"
The dark-haired man frowned and gathered up his things. Once he was gone, Kulwicki turned to Captain Knight. "Sorry about him. He can be a real stick in the mud," she replied. She then glanced over to StarMaker. "So, why did you come to Earth, really? Don't worry, it's off the record."
StarMaker listened as the Captain translated the question, throwing in her opinion as to the parentage of the male agent. "To look for a friend," she replied, in English.
The other redhead just smiled and nodded, then left the room to check on Lin. The blonde had been moved shortly after StarMaker woke, but while the redhead seemed to show no signs of ill-effect, the blonde appeared to be slowly dying. StarMaker had been relieved to learn that none of the others seemed to be affected by whatever it was she had. Dannyell was beginning to suspect there was a lot more to the whole 'refugee' story than what they had found out so far, but with her partner being suspicious from the onset, she had been reluctant to pursue the line of questioning she was dying to ask.
Cristyne waited until the fed was gone, then turned to StarMaker. "Why did you do that? She'll tell her superiors that you speak English and they'll harass you until they get the answers they want."
"No, she won't." StarMaker turned her attention back to the window and frowned at the bars blocking her view of the desert. "If she wanted them to know, she would have said something to her partner. Since she didn't, I assume she's just curious."
Captain Knight sighed, rolling her eyes at the redhead. "Your assumptions could get you and your friends killed."
