It was so silent, a silence that, under different circumstances, would be calming and peaceful to the pilots mind. The dozens of flashing red warning indicators illuminating his face in the pitch-blackness redefined the silence.

ENGINES: Inoperable
FUEL: none left
POWER: Failing, ETTF (estimated time to failure): unknown
COMMUNICATIONS: All communications down
LIFE SUPPORT: Marginal- falling rapidly to critical

Many other lights blinked red and amber, but they didn’t matter now- WEAPONS: All 4 were down, SCANNERS: useless, COUNTERMEASURES: Exhausted…. All subsystems and their subsystems blinked red or amber… except one, the main computer was still functional.

Death had always seemed to be an abstract concept, even during the two years he spent addicted to Trance, he had known in a detached way that Trance would probably kill him, but probably not just that day. The forced rehab after his arrest and conscription had almost certainly added years to his life. He would never have lived to see this manner of certain death.

He looked out the cockpit window… the stars seemed so bright, he shivered and noticed frost forming at the edges of the cockpit windows, at the same time he noticed the Life support indicator blinking red and amber… when it went red he would pull on the helmet and maybe live a few hours longer.

He felt a moments despair, but then steeled himself against it- he would die proud, he had scored the death blow against the first of the gargantuan R’lanti mining ships sent to Ganymede. Part of him knew that it had been an easy kill against an opponent that honestly didn’t seem to comprehend that an intelligence would kill another intelligence over a barren sphere of ice, but he needed some victory to cling to

The R’lanti had come as a surprise to the human race- they were first detected as a new moon of Pluto… detected only by their huge heat signature. Orbital telescopes soon revealed the object to be the result of an alien intelligence. The fact soon was leaked to the world- fascination and panic spread. For 6 months signals were sent to the 500 km diameter sphere, and for 6 months silence answered, then Pluto’s new moon brightened a thousand fold, and an answer came… a 2 month long confused conversation ensued. The intention of the visitors eventually became clear- they were a population of a few hundred million that had abandoned their dying sun in a moon sized ship… they needed to mine a few of our solar system’s icy moons for fuel, and water. Few details of the aliens had been learned- they were technologically advanced, and had mastery of the fundamental forces that humanity was just beginning to see as a possibility. Their engineering skills seemed nearly godlike; And, as the pilot had noted with surprise their understanding of weapons and tactics was nil.

The aliens had six limbs, two pairs of arms and two ‘legs’ the lower pair of arms sported hands that had long curved dull claws that resembled a sloth’s. - Their faces had a canine look, and their bodies were covered with feathery brown green ‘fur’, with the exception of their bare pink ears- oversized bare pink cups of heavily veined skin and cartilage. By analyzing the video sent by the R’lanti, scientists determined that their ‘Heart’ beat at a rate of 230 beats per second.

On Earth hundreds of millions that couldn’t name all of our planets reacted with fear and rage that ‘others’ would come here and extract resources from minor moons of planets they couldn’t even identify in the sky.

So far humans had sent only a few robotic missions to the moons of the outer planets, and public interest was tepid at best. When it was learned that these balls of ice might be taken from them, the ‘rightful owners’, the nationalism sweeping the globe was rechannelled and turned to resentment of those that would dare steal that which was useless to humans…

Like most wars, it was all so pointless. Humans decided to meet the intruders in space- to stop them… the aliens were oblivious to tactics…

In a morbid exercise the pilot used the computer, he extrapolated his orbit for the next few millennia… he laughed, a loud noise in the silence- he would return to earth in 998 years… a steep re-entry a quick burn up.

Of course he would be dead in a few hours, but at least he killed a few of those bastards…

It was so cold…. Just need a short nap…. We will kill them all, I am a hero…. I deserve a nap…

-------------------------

The children ran and played in the twilight, The Ranties had the advantage they could leap into the parasol trees and stay out of reach… the humans formed living towers to ‘tag’ the furry ranties in the trees.

Allie was tired, so was Kneert… she declared time out, and hugged Kneert… he had been her friend for all her 9 years. They just sat on the hill, talking to each other- how the new kid at school wasn’t fitting in… how the new teacher was a loser… Allie painted the long curved nails… the sun set…

They both knew it was time to go home, as they said good-nite a shooting star split the twilight-

“ My great great grand daddy says you should make a wish when you see a shooting star- make a wish!”

Allie closed her eyes and made a scene of wishing. Kneert played along- he knew Allie’s great great grand daddy was a very old and wise man…. He wished for a few more hours of hide and seek- wishes didn’t make reality though. He let Allie comb his fur and then hugged her- they both went home…

The pilot rejoined Earth – not a planet of his imaginings or his desires- but two children noted his homecoming. The children played....