okay I started this story about a year and a half ago, stopped a year ago as you can see but I can promise that I'm going to pick this back where I left off, and it's going to be good! please leave your commets and feedback. I'd love to hear what you guys think about this story so far!





Galaxy Adventures
( revised 12/8/2011)
Prologue

I’m in the cockpit of a space fighter looking out at the vast darkness of space. The pilot’s so concentrated on the battle at hand that he dodges projectiles without even looking. He has medium length dark hair and looks too young to be a pilot but he’s in a Terrisa Special space fighter so he has to be good. There’s six other star fighters too, and there all Terrisa specials. Only the Earth Colony Space Marines have been seen using them. It is an intense battle, he’s come so close to so many explosions that it’s nerve racking. Their fighting a group of ten or so Gardaulan destroyers along with a couple cruisers with a couple dozen drone fighters on them.
All of a sudden a red haired woman appears on screen and she looks like she’s saying something but I can’t hear anything, all I can hear are explosions. It looks like she’s in trouble and she’s giving up.
The pilot, concentrated on the battle at hand, starts yelling something at her but I can still only hear explosions. She says something but I can’t hear it, and then she disappears in white static as one of the fighter’s gets shot down and explodes. The pilot must have really cared about her because he threw off his sunglasses and looks at the screen that’s full of static now. I can see Tears starting to form in his blue eyes looking at the static and I think he’s yelling her name. I still can’t hear anything.
He then shakes his tears away and becomes enraged. He starts yelling and engages the Gardaulan destroyers, which are ten times bigger than a Terrisa special. He takes them out one by one with the gattling guns on his ship, alternating between live ammo and energy blasts. It’s an amazing sight, and I can start to hear better now…………
Then he wakes up to find himself in his bed. “Man, why can’t I ever finish that dream. “


Chapter one

James has always wondered why he keeps having that dream. It might be a link to my past but it’s unlikely that I’m an Earth Colony Space Marine, he thought. He was found on a small ship floating in space in a cryogenic sleep by the Space Guardian ship Aries a year ago today.
Their an intergalactic organization that helps out planets in need, but lately they’ve had to form armed attack forces because the Gardaulans have become more active in there galactic conquest. They’ve taken over countless planets just to strip them of their resources and take that planets tech, if it’s advanced enough. They must have captured a bunch of scientists or engineers recently, since their ships and tech have getting way better. Half of this ship’s been turned into a home to a couple of those forces.
They took me in, he thinks as he’s getting ready for work. I can’t remember why I was in that ship, where I was from, and I didn’t know who I was. If it wasn’t for my brilliant mind I would probably be on some planet doing something else. He walks out of his quarters and heads for his work area.
On his way down, he runs into Lisa, one of the crew members that works in research. She smiles at him. “Hey James, how are you this morning?”
“Eh, good I guess. Had that dream again last night.”
“The same one you’ve been having since we found you?” Lisa asks.
“Well not exactly. This time I was hearing explosions and I almost heard the pilot, but I woke up.” Thinks for a little bit, “I think that it has something to do with my past but it can’t be because I’m not the space marine type.”
Lisa looks at him and laughs. “Yeah that is a ridiculous idea James. You’re more of an engineer type. Oh and by the way Admiral Hawkins wants to see you on the bridge, and he isn’t happy this morning so be careful.”
He laughs “when is he ever in a good mood. I’m glad he’s retiring soon.” James starts to walk again. “Well I better get going then before he gets mad at me.” Lisa laughs and waves at James. “Yeah I hope you’re not in trouble. See ya then!” she smiles and heads to the research labs. “I hope it’s nothing serious.” James says to himself. The only reason I’m still on this ship is because I’m the only person that understands all the systems and the schematics that are on this ship, James thinks to himself. It’s amazing that Hawkins put me in charge of a small engineering department on the ship a month ago, and I’m only 25, I think. Damn amnesia; wish I could remember something from my past.
As he walked toward the bridge, after picking up his tool bag, he runs into some of the other engineers that work on the ship. Their part of one of the bigger engineering departments and are older. One of them starts talking to James.
“So how does it feel to be in charge of the worst bunch of engineers on the ship? Heard they screwed up another AC system somewhere on the ship.”
James groans and does a facepalm. “Those guys screw up a lot for some strange reason! I’m starting to think that Hawkins is punishing me for some strange reason.”
He Laughs, “Maybe he is! But I’m sure you’ll figure out a way to straighten them out eventually!” James laughs too. “Yeah, you might have a point there Mack! Well, I better go up to the bridge to see what my crew’s done this time.” An elevator door opens and James walks into it.
“Yeah good luck kid, he’s in a bad mood for some reason today.” Mack says as the door closes. What has my crew done this time, he thought on his way up to the bridge.










Chapter 2


As James got off the elevator, he saw that everyone on the bridge where busy running around.
“That’s strange; I thought the ship was in maintenance mode.” He said to himself. “I thought it only took a couple people monitoring the systems.” He was about to ask someone what was going on when Admiral Hawkins saw him.
“James! Just the person I wanted to see. We need to talk.” He said as he walked towards James. “Your team did an excellent job fixing the AC for my quarters. It works a little bit too well now.” He said in a sarcastic tone.
“Well that’s good to know.” James said with a smile.
Hawkins suddenly looks at James and says with a stern voice, “I could have shaved with my underwear if I wanted to this morning!”
“Oh, that well. I will get right on that.”
“It better not have been one of your guys pulling a prank on me. I’m in no mood to deal with it right now” James rolls his eyes. “I swear if it turns out to be a prank, then I’ll think of something for them to do.” He then notices that something’s up. “That’s not all isn’t it?” all of a sudden the Admiral looked worried. “Yes, there’s more you need to know. Let’s continue this in the briefing room.” As they walked to the briefing room James couldn’t help but to think that something bad was about to happen.

When James entered the room, it was dark and there were already radar images on the screens. Hawkins signals for James to sit down by him.
“Last night at 2200 hours we picked up on our long range radar system a small Gardaulan fleet containing a couple cargo ships and two cruisers about 300 clicks strait west of us. Our calculations show that this fleet won’t come near us,”
“So we have nothing to worry about then, right?” James asks.
“Well yes, but when our drone spies came into visual contact range a couple of the ships vanished. Both out of sight and off radar.” Major Valdez says, walking in front of the screens to be seen.
“Ah there you are. James do you remember Major Valdez?” Hawkins asks James.
“Why yes, I do remember him. How can I forget?” Major Valdez was the one that interrogated me to death for a month strait when I was found, James thinks to himself. He thought I was some spy.
Valdez then speaks after a couple seconds of silence. “I was only doing my job kid. But anyways after some of the ships disappeared we counted that only two or three cargo ships went missing. All the others where accounted for including the two cruisers.” He clicks a remote moving to another time where the missing ships re appeared. “Then they show back up on radar at 0200 for only thirty seconds. And by our calculations they would be passing within less than fifty clicks away from us. And for some weapons that’s well within attacking range.”

“But how many weapons can you launch from a cargo ship with the tech they have? James asks. “Well not even one without us noticing. But,” Valdez then gets interrupted by James.
“Then why are we even worried about this then?” James asks while he sits back in his seat.
“Well we wouldn’t worry about it if it wasn’t for some info we got from intelligence.” Valdez then opens a video player on screen. “We received this from Central Intelligence about three hours ago. Do you remember the ships that where annihilated and we had no witnesses?
James thinks for a little bit. “Yeah I heard about those attacks. We couldn’t figure out who or what did it right?”
“Yes, those ones,” Valdez continues, “they’ve been getting closer to our current location over the last couple weeks and we finally found some video from a research vessel that was on its way to a star. No one survived unfortunately.” He shows a thirty second clip and James watches as he sees a ship fade in and out before the video cuts out.
“Can you slow that clip down frame by frame, I would like to get a look at that ship.” Valdez looks confused. “Uh sure.”

As the clip is played frame by frame, a ship can be seen appearing out of nowhere, firing its guns, and then disappears. Before the camera’s taken out, a shell can be seen. Valdez then goes back a couple frames to get a look at the ship.
“Could this ship be with that fleet?” the admiral asks Valdez. “No, it can’t be. The Gardaulan’s don’t have that kind of technology.”
“So why does it have the markings of a Gardaulan ship and firing alloy-based shells when they could be using an energy blast instead?” James asks as he watches the video again.
Valdez just stands there with a confused look on his face. Then he watches the whole video in slow motion again. When he sees the shell about to hit the camera a shocked expression appears on his face.
Admiral Hawkins the turns to James and asks, “How can you be sure about this James?”
“I can because conventional weapons can’t be concealed by a cloaking or an invisible shielding device,” James then gets up and stands in front. “And the shield itself can be destroyed too. That’s why this ship had to reveal itself before attacking. If I would have designed this kind of ship I would have used an energy based weapons system so you wouldn’t have to uncloak in order to attack an enemy.”
Then the Major all of a sudden says, “Then why do the Gardaulan’s have this kind of technology then? Where did they get it?”
“It’s in their nature to take any tech from planets that they’ve conquered. Who’s to say that they captured a planet with a lot of scientists and engineers?” James pauses for a second then continues. “If what we saw on the radar isn’t a glitch then they could have the tech.”
It takes the major a little bit of time to process what James had just said but the admiral sat there in thought for a couple minutes. Then the Admiral spoke.
“Major?”
“Yes Admiral Hawkins?” as he snaps out of a trance-like concentration.
“How much time do we have until this “ghost” fleet crosses our path?