"I've had enough of this. Communication officer, get me the Cabal ship now."

She waited while the communication officer tried to reach the Cabal ship. On her screen she watched the firefights play out. She knew little about the Cabal ship and wondered if the firepower of the Arwen could destroy it. They were so strange, willing to give up their technology yet still keeping their motives a secret. They had played the entire Corps, waiting for the right moment when they could exact their revenge on the Handler's.

"Captain, they're willing to talk," her communication officer said.

On her screen the same face she had talked to before appeared. "Get your people off my ship."

"Give us a Strangelet bullet and we will."

"You know I won't do that."

"Then we have nothing to talk about."

"I think we do." Captain Cook replied leaning toward the screen, "I've been reluctant to open fire on you but the more crew you kill the less reluctant I am."

"We can destroy your ship, we have superior firepower."

"True, but I bet you don't want to. This is too good a chance for you. If you destroy us you won't have any chance of using a Strangelet to destroy the world."

"And if you destroy us you will make several species extinct. Don't try to threaten me, Captain, I know how you humans think."

"I don't think you do," She shut the communications down. "Weapons, aim at the Cabal ship and open fire. Full missile spread, full laser bombardment."

Nanobots, it was the miracle of the nanobot which saved Juliet's life. They sealed the wound quickly and helped her body reproduce the blood she had lost. They pumped painkillers into her body making her more focused and alert, while also taking away any pain she might have felt. Juliet wondered if they could regrow her leg, she had a feeling they couldn't but wouldn't be surprised if she woke up with a new leg one morning.

After regaining her thoughts she was able to hear the yelling of the people around her. She looked up and saw she was surrounded by the remaining engineers inside the control room. They were leaning out the window and firing at the ground. The control room sat above the floor which made it a perfect position to mount a defense.

She sat up on her elbow and found her rifle next to her. She grabbed it and used it a crutch to lift herself off the ground. She felt as if she still had two legs and nearly fell over when she tried to place her missing one on the ground.

"You shouldn't be standing," one of the engineers said.

"I know. Give me a report."

"We're holding them off and we have about half the bullets disarmed."

"How long was I out?"

"Only a few minutes."

"Thanks keep fighting." Juliet hobbled over to the window and squeezed between two people who were firing. She leaned forward, made sure she had good balance, and grabbed her gun. She didn't feel as if she were going to fall over so she took the rifle, aimed and started blasting any Cabal aliens she spotted.

The full firepower of the Arwen was unleashed on the Cabal ship. Thousands of missiles fired by various silos from every section and flew across the gulf of space. Within seconds they were exploding on the shields of the ship. Energy cannons zipped across at the speed of light and vaporized the rest of the force field.

Captain Cook watched all this. Grimm determination passed across her face. "Hold off on the second attack," she said and thought, they would either contact us, attack us, or do something else.

"Captain, they want to talk." The communication officer said.

"Send them through." Captain Cook replied trying to hide the smile which she felt forming on her lips. When her alien counterpart appeared she didn't give him a chance to say anything. "Get your people off my ship or I will destroy you. I don't want to but peace between us and the Handler's is more important right now."

"You would be executed if you killed us all."

"No, I don't think I will. Probably dismissed of duty but that's okay, I was going to retire anyway." She cut the communications off, sat back in her chair and waited.

Juliet watched in surprise as the remaining invaders simply stopped fighting and laid their weapons down. They raised their various appendages into the air in surrender. She was even more shocked since it seemed the Cabal forces were actually winning.

She slowly slide down the wall using the butt of her gun and her good leg to gently sit on the ground. Juliet wondered if they could reattach her leg. She wondered if the nanobots could repair the damage if she placed the two ends together. She was relaxed now listening around her as her men ran toward the surrendering Cabal. It was nice to rest, nice to let the events she had just survive wash over her. Her life was going to change after today. She'd killed a lot of aliens, lost her leg and had several dozen men die under her leadership. Yet, through all that she was determined to see this mission completed.

An army of medical personal ran into the control booth. One of the doctors saw her and knelt down next to her. "I guess that's your leg we found by door," he said trying to make it sound less ghoulish than it was.

"Yeah, I guess so." She replied and was suddenly aware of the sweat forming on her brow. She hadn't sweated in a very long time, a sign of her nanobots working overtime. "Can we save it? I'd like to keep it as a trophy."

"I wouldn't worry about it too much. We'll put it into hibernation and reattach it when we return to Earth." He pulled out a needle and was about the stab her with it.

She stopped him. "No, don't, I need to get back to the bridge to help the Captain. I don't need to be drugged right now. Help me up."

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"I know it's not a good idea," she replied placing her hand on his shoulder almost forcing him to help her. "But it's what's going to happen. Now, get me to the bridge."

"We have surrendered our forces," The alien said. "What would you like from us now?"

"Go back to Earth and wait. When we return we'll tell everyone what happened here. I have all the proof, all the recordings, everything that we need. I don't know what they'll do to you, don't know how they'll deal with it but I don't care at this point. Go, leave us alone."

"What of our soldiers?"

"They're our prisoners now. Don't worry, we'll take good care of them." She shut the communications off and let the display change to that of the Cabal ship.

"Captain," Arwen said. "They're leaving and heading toward the Beta Wormhole they arrived in."

Captain Cook let out a long sigh of relief. "Good, that was close."

"Would you have destroyed their ship?" Arwen asked.

"Yes, I would have." She replied without hesitation. "Keep me informed on-"

From the Beta wormhole a blast of intense heat and radiation slammed into the Cabal ship. A flame, unlike anything the Captain has ever seen, jetted out from the hole as if originated in hell.

The Cabal ship was vaporized in a wave of plasma leaving nothing behind except the flair which had destroyed it.

The Beta wormhole behind the Handler slab blew out a ball of intense flame and plasma a few second later, also engulfing the ship. It moved away from the blast but not before suffering damage. The back end was melted away crippling the craft. It drifted, nearly dead in space.

Captain Cook looked in horror at what she had witnessed. It all took place so fast she hadn't time to think or react. "What just happened?" She finally asked.

"There is some intense flairs coming from the wormholes," Arwen said. "I have no explanation for it."

"A new weapon?" Captain Cook asked.

"Unknown," Arwen replied. "Captain, the Handlers are asking for our help. They say their ship is damaged beyond repair."

"Send a crew over to get them out of there. Are there any survivors from the Cabal ship?"

"None," Arwen replied. "Seems we have the last remaining members of the Cabal on board."

Chapter fifty-four.

The ice planet broke up and fed the Alpha Wormhole. The outer edges of the wormholes glowed bright white as more of the planet touched it. It grew large, but not large enough to encompass the entire planet. Melting ice and large pools of water evaporated instantly as they were turned into Strangelets. It wasn't long before the only thing that remained was the Earth size sphere which was the core of the planet.

The exposed Beta wormhole then passed through the Alpha wormhole and, for a moment, Professor Ricter wondered what might happen. Two wormholes, each one opening to different dimensions or universes, it was never really clear exactly what, crossed paths so rarely he wondered if perhaps this was the first time it had ever happened.

The journey from orbit to the sun was a quick one. So quick, in fact, it seemed that the wormhole beta opening entered real space almost as soon as left it. Material blasted off from the sun would keep the Alpha Wormhole open for years. The wormhole that the core entered was now fading from existence; it had no more material to feed its hunger.

As the Beta Wormhole entered real space its gravity affected the sun. The core was small, a simply grey dot barely visible past the glare of the sun. Small but not insubstantial it still had enough gravity to effect local areas of the sun.

A long plume of nuclear fire flew into the opening and disappeared. The wormhole continued to suck the energy from the sun as it approached. This caused Professor Ricter to sit up and observe very carefully.

He thought the Beta Wormhole would simply fade away but that wasn't the case. It was small but the effects were dramatic. It pulled in more material as it approached the sun's surface. Huge flares, each one larger than the wormholes itself, were absorbed.

The Beta wormhole touched the surface of the sun and sent a ripple across the surface like someone dropping a stone into an ocean. The sun took the collision in stride and slowly ate the wormhole until it was gone. Nothing more than a memory to a universe the easily forgot.

What was going to happen now? Professor Ricter thought. Would it continue to draw in all the sun's energy until there was nothing left? A drain connected to the ocean would eventually empty the ocean if the basin was infinite.

Thousands of light years away the effects of Professor Ricter's experiment were devastating. Every Beta Wormhole opening seemed as if it was affected at the exact same time. Dyson Spheres all over the universe had to deal with the sudden onslaught of hard radiation, heat, fire and sun material as it poured out between the universes. Within the first few minutes trillions of Handlers died. It was a catastrophe unlike anything they had experienced and none of them knew what had happened or how to stop it.

In center of all the chaos sat the Arwen. She had docked with the badly damaged slab and was working to unload the Handlers. The slab was larger than most she had encountered and held more Handlers than she would have guessed. The brig was going to be crowded but Marjorie was sure they were used to crowded conditions.

Karla and Hans walked in front of Captain Cook as she explored the interior of the ship. It was featureless to her but from what Karla had told her the Handlers could sense things humans couldn't and to them this place was work of art.

"What now?" Captain Cook asked.

"We don't know," Karla translated while Hans continued to tap on the ground. "The reports from the home world are not good. They had hundreds of thousands of Wormholes opened all around the planet to help transfer Handlers from home back to their ships or back to their spheres. Whatever is happening to the Wormholes has trapped them on the planet."

"We have our teams working on it," Captain Cook replied stepping aside to let a group of Handlers skitter by her. "Their best guess is some sort or natural phenomenon with the Wormholes."

"If you could share that information with our scientist we would be grateful." Karla looked at the Captain and said. "You don't think this is some sort of new weapon you have deployed on us?"

"I don't know," She replied. "If it is I wasn't aware of it."

"Surely you can see how this works to your advantage. If we can't use Wormhole space we're stranded."

"Until you figure out how to open an Alpha Wormhole, which I'm sure you'll figure out soon enough."

Hans tapped on the ground loudly. "Sorry," Karla said then tapped a reply. "He was upset we were talking without him. I told him what we were talking about."

"And, what does he think?"

"He agrees, they'll find a way to create Strangelets and they will continue to grow through your wormholes instead. It's only a matter of time."

"Captain," The Arwen said over the communicator. "We've picked up the last of the Handlers, we're ready to go."

"Okay, I'll be over in a bit." She turned to Karla, "Are you going to take us to the Home World now?"

"Yes, we will do as we promised."

"Should I drop you off there or will you be coming back with me?"

Karla asked the question and Hans quickly replied. "We'll stay here. Without access to the Beta Wormholes he sees no point in leaving."

Captain Cook sat on the bridge and looked around. Everyone was ready for the next phase, heading toward the Handler's Home world to get some data. "How are we going to do this?" She asked Hans, who was standing on his back legs making him tall enough where they could look at each other eye to stalk.

"They'll detect any Wormholes you use," Karla said as Hans tapped. "We need to get there though normal power."

"Helm, how long will it take a full power?"

"About six weeks," her helmsmen replied.

"We can cut that time down. Tell him we're going to use our wormhole to get within five light minutes of the planet. They won't know we're there for at least five minutes and by then we'll be moving toward the planet."

Karla translated and Hans' stalk twitched, he let out some sort of scent with smelled like peppermint. "He said that will work. He suspects they might not even notice since they're so busy dealing with the Wormhole issue."

"That's really what I'm hoping for," Captain Cook replied. "Okay, Chief. . ."She paused and remembered the Chief McFerren's body was on the morgue right now and she would never hear his voice again. He'd been with her since their first visit to Regal ten years ago. Not having him on the Arwen would take a lot of getting used to. "Engineering, do we have any bullet's ready?"

"Yes, Captain. One is in the chamber."

"Good, get another one ready, this is going to be a short trip."