Scratch

Chapter 5

Into Space
The next day, a selection of teachers were in the conference room, watching the security tape of the attack, and it was very clear that it was William who had attacked the robot. Despite being as angry about it as he was, the Headmaster couldn’t help but be very impressed. But when it got to the part where William took out his laser, he began to get rather infuriated. After seeing what is did to the robot he was horrified that a student had brought something that powerful and dangerous to the school.

“See that?” the Headmaster said, turning to the other teachers. “That boy should be expelled!”
“For saving someone’s life?” Mr Bradley replied, with a slight hint of sarcasm.
“No,” the Headmaster sternly answered, glaring at Mr Bradley. “For bringing a weapon to school.”
“But he did save someone’s life,” Mr Bradley argued. “That’s got to count for something.”
“True, but this school is looking for more than just bravery.”
“And what William did was more than just brave. He risked his life to save someone. That’s an incredibly selfless, noble thing to do.”

The Headmaster still wasn’t convinced. All the other teachers were staying quiet, not wanting to anger him. Suddenly, Mrs Finley received a phone call. She looked to the Headmaster for conformation that she could answer it, to which the Headmaster nodded.

“This is Mrs Finley speaking, how may I help you?” she greeted in her usual manner, after answering the call. “Oh, that’s… a shame,” she said with a slight smile on her face, after being given some news about something so far unknown to the other teachers in the room. “I’ll see if I can sort it out. Goodbye.”
“What was that all about?” the Headmaster asked.
“I’m afraid one of the graduates in Section 1 has had second thoughts about joining the Space Defence Operations. Apparently it because of the attack yesterday; it scared him too much. So now there is an open spot that needs to be filled.”

Mr Bradley turned to the Headmaster.

“Listen, William, is one of my top students. I have no idea why he didn’t graduate. Someone must have messed with the results. But whatever happened, that kid deserves to graduate and join the Space Defence Operations.”

After a few moments of silence, the Headmaster finally admitted defeat.

“Fine,” he snarled. “But confiscate that weapon of his!”


Meanwhile, William had invited several of his friends round for the day, as a much smaller scale graduation party than Peter’s one. He’d invited Jacob of course, as he was his best friend, as well as Peter and Ryan. Just for the fun of it, he’d even invited Adam, knowing full well that he wouldn’t come.

Peter was the first to arrive. He, as had pretty much all the students in Section 1, had been very concerned about William after the attack. Peter had of course been one of the students on the stage, but he hadn’t actually seen William jump onto the stage, as he had been taken down in one of the escape pods before then. Mrs Finley had told the students about it afterwards, though.

“William, how are you?!” Peter said in a very concerned manner, as he walked through the door. “I heard you took on a massive killer robot and won!” he continued, half joking.
“Err… yeah, I suppose I did,” William replied, grinning. “And I’m fine, thanks. Just a few bruises.”
“That’s good; I was worried.”
“So how are you?” William asked, changing the subject.
“I’m fine thanks. So how did you do it?”
“Do what?”
“Defeat the robot. I mean, how could you possibly have done that?”
“Oh, I haven’t told you about my laser, have I?”
“You have a laser?!”
“Yep,” answered William, grinning again. “I built it myself.”
“And what makes it so special? How was it able to defeat that robot?”
“Let me show you,” replied William, heading towards his room.

Peter followed him into his room, and was amazed at how tidy it was, considering all the things William made in there. William took the laser off the wall where he had hung it, and showed it to Peter.

“Now explain,” Peter said, looking at the laser.
“Well, you see this button?” William replied, showing Peter the button on the hilt. “This fires an ion gun, which ionises the air from the gun to whatever you’re shooting at. So the longer you leave that going before you fire, the more powerful the actual shot will be, as the ionised air makes it much easier for the plasma to shoot through… which is actually rather clever,” he added, noticing how blank Peter looked.
“Interesting.”

A second later, there was a knock at the door. William walked out of his room, after placing the laser on a table, and went over to the door. Looking at the screen on the door, he saw that it was Jacob, this time without his robot dog.

“Hello,” William greeted, after opening the door.
“William, how are you?!” he asked, in an even more concerned manner than Peter.
“You mean because of the attack on the school?”
“Yeah, I heard that a robot attacked the graduation ceremony, and you fought it off.”
“Err… kind of, yeah,” William replied, as they both walked into his room.
“Hello Peter,” said Jacob, seeing him sitting on a chair, examining William’s laser.
“Jacob! How are you doing, mate?”
“I’m fine, thanks. You?”
“I’m good, thanks.”

Then Jacob turned to William, with plenty of questions he was dying to ask him.

“So how did you beat it?” he inquired.
“My laser I built, remember?”
“Oh yeah, that. But how on earth was that powerful enough to beat a massive robot?”
“I told you how it works, remember? With the ion gun and everything?”
“Yeah, you did, didn’t you? And that was powerful enough, was it?”
“Evidently,” William shrugged.
“Could you show us?” Peter asked.
“You mean you want me to fire the laser?”
“Yeah!” Jacob answered, grinning. “Show us, please! Fire it at a wall or something.

After a while, William reluctantly agreed.

“Fine, fine,” he mumbled, picking up the laser.

Just as they were all about to head outside, through the other door in William’s room, they heard a knock on the front door. William sighed, and then turned around.

“Mum!” he yelled at the top of his voice. “Could you get that please?!”
“Hang on a minute,” she called back from upstairs.
“We’ll be outside,” William informed her, walking out the door.

All three of them walked out the door and into the fairly large garden, with William’s mum left to attend to the person at the door. As she approached the door, she recognised William’s friend, Ryan, on the screen on the door. She opened it, with a warm, friendly smile.

“Hello… Ryan, isn’t it?”
“Yes, that’s right,” he replied, smiling back. “How are you, Mrs Page?”
“I’m fine, thank you. How are you?”
“I’m fine too, thanks.”
“The others are outside in the garden,” she said, gesturing in the direction of William’s room.
“Thanks,” Ryan replied, before walking into William’s room.

Outside, William had positioned one of the several tables on its side at one end of the garden, while he, Jacob and Peter were standing at the opposite end. William had his laser ready, and was about to fire, when they heard someone behind them. It was Ryan, coming out of the door from William’s room.

“Oh, hello Ryan,” began William. “I was wondering when you were going to show up.”
“Sorry, I had a late lunch,” Ryan shrugged. “Don’t shoot me,” he added, jokingly, noticing the laser in William’s hand.
“I was just about to demonstrate my laser… that I build myself, by the way.”
“Oh yes, that reminds me!” exclaimed Ryan, almost kicking himself for forgetting. “How are you? I mean, after the attack on the school by that robot thing. We were later told that after we all went down in the escape pods, with Emily trapped up there with the robot, might I add, that you jumped down onto the stage and fought it off. How on earth did you do it?”

Not wanting to explain again for a 3rd time, William decided to just show him.

“Just watch,” he said, pointing his laser at the table.

Without pressing the button on the hilt, William simply pulled back on the trigger, firing a small bolt of plasma into the table. The table was only lightly damaged. William then held down the button on the hilt, and kept it held down for about ten seconds before firing. A small bolt of plasma once again blasted into the table, but this time, the table exploded into shards of half melted metal.

Jacob, Ryan and Peter almost leapt back in shock. In fact, William himself was almost as surprised as they were. It was Peter who finally broke the stunned silence.

“That is one powerful laser you have there.”
“Yes it is,” Ryan quietly said to himself. “So what was different that time?” he asked William.

Again, William explained to him about the ion gun, and how that helps the plasma keep its power.

“And also,” he continued, “it charges up the actual blast for longer, meaning that that itself is more powerful.”
“That is very cool,” Peter remarked.

Ryan and Jacob agreed, as did the admittedly biased William.


A month later, all the graduates, and now William included, were walking towards the queue to get into the space ship. It wasn’t like the original space ships of old; this one was more like a plane. It fact, it pretty much was a plane, except it was able to go into space. It looked quite similar to an old fighter jet, but it was vastly bigger. It was able to seat about 350 people; a very comfortable amount for the number of students that graduated per section of the school.

William, in amongst the several hundred other students, had made his way towards the back of the queue. Much to his pleasant surprise, he found that the student waiting in line in front of him was Emily. He tapped her on the shoulder. She turned around, and after seeing who it was, was also pleasantly surprised.

“Hello William,” she said, smiling warmly.
“Hi,” he replied, smiling back. “How are you?”

They hadn’t seen each other since the incident with the robot, neither had any of the other students; apart from outside of school, of course, as the graduates were allowed time off school for a month before they went into space.

“I’m feeling ok, thanks,” Emily answered. “I suppose you’re the one who we should all be worried about, though. That was amazingly brave of you to do what you did. So how are you?”
“I’m fine now. I wasn’t too badly hurt in the first place, actually.”
“Good,” she quietly said, almost to herself.


They were standing on a runway just outside the school, with the space ship a few hundred feet away from them, at the end of the queue. It was a surprisingly orderly queue, considering how many graduates were there. The space ship had steps leading from the ground up to the entrance, which was where the queue started from.

After a while of waiting for all the graduates to join the queue, and for the crew on the ship to get everything prepared, the graduates began boarding it. William, next to Emily, walked up the fairly shallow, black steps and entered the ship. The immediate impression that William got was that it wasn’t particularly spacious. He had only been into space once before, a few years ago on holiday. He had been in First Class, which was considerably more impressive than this.

William followed the flow of teenagers, before spotting his chair. He just about managed to shuffle out of the crowd and landed in his seat. It was surprisingly comfy. There were two other seats in the row, so William moved into the middle one, giving him plenty of room to himself. He looked over at the bevy of teenagers, hoping that none of them would come and sit down in that row. Unfortunately, though, someone did. And of all the people it could have been, it was Adam.

After seeing William sitting there, a strong look of disgust and surprise formed on his face. He knew that William hadn’t graduated. He was there when he opened the results. He had made sure of it. How could William possibly be on this space ship right now? He was perplexed, to say the least.

William moved over to the inner chair, nearest the window, so that Adam could sit on the end of the row, with a chair in between them. Adam could hardly stand the thought of sitting next to him for 5 minutes, let alone the entire journey to a space station the other side of the moon. William, however, was rather amused of Adam’s dislike of him.

“You didn’t come to my party,” he remarked, in an annoyingly innocent tone.

Adam, who was at this point facing away from William, slowly turned to face him, glaring.

“Why did you even invite me? Do you have some stupid idea that we’re friends?”

William just shrugged, with a cheeky smile on his face, and turned round to face the window. He stared out across the field, where he could see the school in the not so far off distance. He zoned out of the chaotic noise of teenagers shuffling down the corridor, conversing amongst themselves. He was so zoned out, that he hadn’t even heard the announcement that they were about to take off. It was the sensation of being pushed back into his seat, and the sight of everything outside the window moving, that alerted him to the fact that they were taking off.

He watched as the ground seemed to rush past, getting further and further away as the ship ascended. It was flying much steeper than a normal plane would, which William quite enjoyed, as it reminded him of a rollercoaster. Before long, he could make out the curvature of the Earth. It was stunning.


Chapter 6

The Space Defence Operations
“Boy and girls,” began a voice coming from speakers hidden in the walls, “we are now in space.”

Many of the graduates cheered and clapped enthusiastically, while William just smiled, still starring out the window. He had been doing so for virtually the entire trip so far, and had suspected that he might get a sore neck. He could see the amazingly beautiful Earth through the window, surrounded by deep blackness, with tiny glimmers of white light dotted around it. It was easily one of the most stunning things he’d ever seen.

For the first time in ages, he turned away from the window. His neck did feel rather sore, which turned into pain the more he moved it. It wasn’t too bad, however, so he continued turning around, to have a look at everything else. He could see all the many graduates sitting in their seats, noisily talking amongst themselves, playing on the phones, even texting each other from across the ship.

William reached down into his pocket and pulled out his phone, to check for any messages. He had several from Peter, who was wondering why William wasn’t replying. So he eventually did reply, explaining that he was starring at the wonders of the Earth, and told Peter that he should be doing the same.

After putting his phone away, he turned back to the window. By this time, the Earth was only barely visible, as it was behind the space ship by this point. And while space itself was also nice to look at, he could still see through the window well enough while sitting back in his seat, giving his neck some comfort.

“You may now leave your seats if you wish,” the pilot spoke into his microphone.

From this point, it would take them about 8 hours to get to their destination, so the graduates were allowed to wonder around the space ship. They weren’t allowed out of their seats before they escaped Earth’s atmosphere, however, as that could be quite a steep, bumpy journey. On the space ship, there were sorts of things to do. There were game rooms, a cinema, even a swimming pool!

Immediately, loads teenagers began rising from their seats, eager to escape from the strangely tiring act of sitting down. William also stood up, hoping to exercise his neck muscles if nothing else. He stepped past a glaring Adam, and looked around for any of his friends. He spotted Peter, who likewise noticed William. William held up a hand in greeting, and began walking over to him.

“Good afternoon,” he began, in a jokingly formal tone. “How are you on this fine day?”
“I’m very well, thank you,” Peter replied. “So you spent all that time looking out the window, did you?”
“Yes, and I have to say, it was utterly stunning.”
“Was it now?” replied Peter, unconvinced.
“Yes, it was. Didn’t you have a look?”

Peter just shook his head, and beckoned for him to follow as he turned around and began walking down the corridor. They both hurried to the swimming pool, as they had planned the day before. William had suggested to the others that they go to the swimming pool first, as it would probably be less busy at the start of the trip.

On the way there, William took out his phone and texted Emily. He explained that they were going to the swimming pool then, and asked if she wanted to come as well. He also encouraged her to bring some friends if she wanted to; just not too many.


Just over 7 hours later, the graduates were instructed to return to their seats. They would be arriving at their destination very soon, so everyone had to be in their seats before landing. If nothing else, it was simply to make sure the crew knew where everyone was, without having to search the ship for them. William and his friends had stayed in the swimming pool for a full three hours, before finally getting bored of it. Emily had come as well, with her best friend Amy.

William, Jacob and Peter raced each other back to their seats, pushing past the many teenagers blocking the corridors. Adam was hovering to the side of one of the corridors, chatting to his friends, when he saw the others sprinting in his direction. Just before William ran past, he subtly stretched out his foot to try and trip him up, but William had guessed that he’d do something like that. He quickly side-stepped Adam’s foot, and continued on his way. Jacob, however, was less observant. He tripped over and was sent flying head over heels.

Hearing the crash behind him, William skidded to a halt and turned around. Peter and Adam had already started fighting, with Jacob left to pick himself up off the floor.

“You ok?” William asked, rushing over to him.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” he assured William, standing up.

They both looked over to Peter and Adam, who were currently engaged in combat. Adam clearly had anger issues, and Peter was also quite volatile. Jacob couldn’t stop them, as he wasn’t nearly as good as hand to hand combat as those two. William, however, was better than Adam, but not Peter.

“Hey, stop it!” he yelled, calmly walking towards them both.

Peter, grabbing hold of Adam by the shirt, flung him over to William. William briefly caught him as he slammed into him, then immediately pushed him to the side. At this point, Peter had his back turned to Adam’s friends, who until this point were willing to let the two have a fair fight. But now that Adam was down on the floor, and William had come over, they abandoned that preposterous thought.

One of them, Henry, jumped at Peter’s back, hoping to knock him over. This plan failed drastically, as Peter just flipped him over his back. One of the two remaining comrades grabbed his shoulder, pulled him round to face him, and threw a punch. Peter jerked backwards, dodging the fist, and threw the person backwards down the corridor. He landed at the feet of one of the many other graduates watching from afar, hoping to not get included in the fight.

The one remaining troublesome teen charged at William. As he punched, William leant back, grabbing the person’s wrist as he did so, and spun round. This caused the teenager to essentially do a side flip over William’s back, and much to both their surprise, he landed on his feet. The teenager stood there for a moment, shocked at his own achievement and also trying not to lose his balance, before he was knocked over by his adversary.

Adam got up by this point, and decided that this probably wasn’t a good idea. He quietly left, hurriedly returning to his seat. His friends, who were wondering whether or not to attack again, noticed Adam, and decided to follow. Slowly, they walked past Peter and William, making it clear they weren’t looking for a fight.

“No hard feelings, eh?” Henry said to Peter, with a blatantly fake smile.
“Yeah, sure,” he sarcastically replied.

A minute later, as the trio had decided to wait a bit before going to their seats, Emily and Amy had finally caught up with them.

“Didn’t you finish your race?” Emily asked, wondering why they weren’t at their seats.
“Well,” began William, “there was a bit of an incident.”
“An incident? What sort of incident?”
“Err… a violent one,” William vaguely explained.
“Oh, you mean you got into another fight with Adam?”

William solemnly nodded.

“Yes Miss. So sorry about it Miss,” he joked, causing everyone to laugh.

After joking about for a bit, they went their separate ways, to their seats. When William got to his, he saw Adam sitting in the chair nearest the window, where William was sitting earlier. He presumed that this was an attempt to annoy him, so he tried not to show any displeasure. He just sat down in the seat furthest away from the window, where Adam was sitting earlier.


A while later, the space ship was approaching the space station. By this time, Adam and William had swapped seats again, allowing William to look out the window again properly. He watched as the space station got closer and closer with every passing moment. It looked very reminiscent of an aircraft carrier, as that was essentially what it was, but for space ships. It had different coloured lights all over it, creating quite a spectacle to look at.

“We will be entering Station 3 shortly,” came a familiar voice from the speakers.

The space ship drifted rapidly towards Station 3 in the frictionless space. The autopilot activated the reverse thrusters, gently slowing the ship down as it approached the station. A relatively small hatch on the underneath of Station 3 slid open, creating an entrance for the school’s space ship.

Slowly and carefully, the space ship rose up through the entrance, and then drifted forward so it was no longer over the hatch. It lowered down to the floor, as the hatch closed back up again. After a moment, as the ship’s engines shut down, there was silence. Comparatively, at least. There was still the faint hum of the station itself, as well as the chatter of workers in the hangar bay.

“You may now leave you seats. Please leave the craft in an orderly fashion.”

Adam immediately leapt from his seat, pushing and shoving through the hoard of teenagers. William also quickly slotted himself in the queue, eager to get out and explore the station. Fortunately, the mass of graduates was moving quite rapidly, as the overly excited teenagers clattered through the corridors towards the nearest exits.

Funnily enough, William found that his legs always felt very tired after sitting down for a while, especially when the only thing to keep his interest during the time was watching a space station. He’d often wondered whether anyone else got that, but had never asked.

William had finally made it to the exit, shuffling through the door amongst the crowd of teenagers, and onto the steps leading down to the floor. The air outside the ship was noticeably fresher. In fact, William dared to consider that it was possibly even nicer than on Earth. The station had all sorts of devices and machines to cleanse the air, meaning it was, in fact, cleaner than Earth’s.

Outside the ship, all the students were being gathered round in the hangar bay. William reached the bottom of the steps from the ship, and looked around to see if he could find any of his friends. While he was searching, every one of the graduates from the ship had finally come down the steps. There was a man standing in front of the crowd, waiting for everyone to arrive. When they had, the man clapped several times to get everyone’s attention.

“Good evening, everyone,” he greeted in a loud, booming voice, echoing around the enormous room. “My name is Craig. Welcome to Station 3 of the Space Defence Operations. As you will likely know, your initial stay here will only last 6 months, before you’ll get the chance to go home and visit your family for a while. And to be brutally honest, it could probably be quite boring here for most of you. Well then, let’s take you to your rooms. Just follow the line on the floor that you can see. It will take you straight to your room.”

The station had a very clever system which created a glowing line on the floor, which only select persons could see. This was, of course, used to lead the graduates to their individual rooms in quite an easy, efficient way. William spotted the glowing, red line on the floor, which obviously no one but him could see, and began following it. He turned around, while still walking in the same direction, and saw that the line disappeared behind him, meaning he shouldn’t be able to get confused as to which way along the line he’s supposed to be going.

After looking around at everyone else, he noticed that quite a lot of people were doing similar things, checking out this very interesting feature of the station.

“Good thing you lot are easily amused,” Craig muttered under his breath.

As William was following the line to his room, he reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. As soon as he picked it up, it detected who he wanted to call, and called them immediately. It was Jacob who he’d called.

“Hi William,” Jacob said after he answered the phone.
“Hello Jacob. These glowing lines are brilliant, aren’t they?”
“Yeah, they’re great! Do you know what room you’re staying in?”
“No,” William answered. “But we were both in the same section of the Academy and we’re both soldiers, so we should hopefully be staying near each other.”
“Good,” replied Jacob.


Chapter 7

Second Strike
The next day, they were awoken by a very loud alarm, coupled with the walls flashing red. William stirred, and looked around the room to the others. The room was a reasonable size, with three beds lined up in a row against one of the walls. His roommates were Peter and Jacob. Peter was evidently already awake, as he was no longer in the room, while Jacob was also just waking up. They both looked at each other with a confused, worried look, wondering what on Earth was going on.

“What’s going on?!” Jacob asked, saying what they were both thinking.
“I don’t know!” William yelled, trying to be heard over the alarm.

They both hurriedly got out of their beds and rushed towards the door. The clothes they were wearing were designed to be worn almost all day long, without needing to be washed, so people kept them on while they slept.

The door opened automatically, sensing the two teenagers’ thoughts. In the corridor, there were people everywhere. Some seemed to know what they were doing, while others were just standing around, confused. Suddenly, a voice came from the hidden speakers in the walls. It was Craig’s voice.

“Everyone, stay calm! We’re currently under attack from a single space craft. Get to your battle stations immediately! The line you can see on the floor will take you where you need to go.”

William and Jacob, while being trained mostly just as foot soldiers, were prepared for this sort of thing. They still had a use in space craft combat. There were laser turrets placed at certain points along the outer edge of the station. They looked more like sniper rifles, though, attached to a rig designed to make them move as smoothly and steadily as possible.

As quickly as he could, William sprinted down the corridor, following the line on the floor. Jacob did the same, though he was lead in the other direction. Everyone else burst into life as well, running to their battle positions as told.

Outside Station 3, the robot was back. The robot that had attacked the Academy a few months ago. It was now speeding through empty space, circling the station, preparing to attack again. It had already fired several missiles at the structure, but hadn’t caused more than slight damage. All the stations were, naturally, designed for battle, so it wasn’t supposed to be easy to attack. The robot searched for a weaker point, constantly scanning the structure.

William arrived at his sniper position, sitting down in the metallic chair directly behind the turret. Back at the Academy, laser combat was the thing he was best at. He once scored 93 out of 100 in one of the training games, which was better than any one else in his section of the school.

Watching carefully, he kept his eyes peeled for the attacker. Moments later, he saw it, and recognised it instantly. It was quite far away, but he could see it was the same robot that he’d fought several months ago. He was briefly too surprised to do anything, but was forced into action when it fired a missile directly at him.

The turret was in a glass dome, sticking out of the side of the station, allowing the snipers to see as much as possible. The glass was extremely strong, but William guessed it probably wouldn’t take a direct hit from a missile. And even if it could, he didn’t want to risk it. Rapidly pointing the turret at the incoming object, he pulled back on the trigger and shot a single blast of plasma.

Less than twenty meters away from William, it smashed into the tip of the missile. The missile exploded; the shockwave smashing into the glass. William was knocked back slightly, but he was more concerned about the fact that the glass had cracked quite badly.

A second later, the robot fired another missile, but William was prepared for it this time. He fire another shot almost at the same time as the robot, meaning that this time the explosion was much closer to it. William still felt the blast slightly, but fortunately it barely damaged the glass any more. He kept his finger pulled back on the trigger, firing a continuous jet of lasers.

“It’s here!” William shouted into his intercom. “It’s that robot from the school! It’s attacking me! I need help!”

Before he spoke, he mentally selected who he wanted to talk to, which his intercom recognised and automatically did. He had selected to speak to Craig.

“Where are you?” Craig asked.
“Err...”

William quickly looked around for something that would tell him where exactly he was.

“There’s a number on the turret you’re using!” Craig told him, getting impatient. “At least, you should be using a turret.”

William saw the indented numbers on the handle of the gun. 27.

“Number 27!” he said urgently, still firing at the robot.

Only a few corridors away, Craig immediately sprinted in the direction of turret number 27. He didn’t need a map or anything. He knew this place like the back of his hand.

While the lasers themselves barely did any damage to it, the robot couldn’t shoot any more missiles without them being blown up right in front of it, so it quickly strafed left, switched its current weapon system to lasers, and fired again. The laser smashed into the glass, instantly vaporising the middle of it. The rest was broken to pieces by the sudden gush of air being sucked out of the space station.

William was blown forward as well, hitting his stomach against the handle of the turret before being flipped over it. He scrambled for something to grab onto, and just about managed to get a grip on the barrel of the turret. He was only holding on with one hand, and he was slipping. 

In the corridor only a few meters away from where William was, Craig tumbled forwards and was bashed against the wall, rolling along it until he fell sideways into the glass dome. Though now, the glass wasn’t there anymore, having been destroyed by the robot’s laser and the air itself. Reacting quickly, Craig shot out his hand for the edge of the dome, and stopped himself flying out into space.

The robot, seeing the completely vulnerable and unarmed boy hanging out of the space station, shot a missile directly at him. Seeing this, Craig instantly reached for the turret, letting go of the edge of the dome. He was slammed against the handle, but ignoring the pain, he swiftly moved it to point at the rapidly incoming missile, and fired.

William couldn’t hold on much longer anyway, but the sudden movement of the barrel quickened the result. He glided away from Station 3 and out into space. But within a second, Craig had fired the laser, which instantly flashed past William, very nearly hitting him. It shot into the tip of the missile, causing it to detonate. The shockwave slammed into him, catapulting him back towards the station.

By this time, the section of the corridor with turret number 27 in it had been automatically sealed by two large, metal doors. In an instant, all the air in that part of the corridor was gone; dispersing through space. William flew through the gaping hole in the side of Station 3 and hit the wall of the corridor at great speed. The missile explosion had rendered him unconscious and temporarily deaf.

Craig leapt backwards out of the metallic chair, back into the corridor, and jabbed at the button on the wall just above where the glass dome used to be. It activated another of the large metal doors, sealing the hole in the structure. It also activated the re-pressurising system. Several vents opened up in the ceiling and air flooded into the corridor.

Deciding to move away from that one part of the station, the robot came up with a new plan of attack. It had already scanned the entire structure when it flew around it earlier, so it knew where the thrusters were. There were four; one at each corner. The robot began flying towards the nearest one.

Just outside the other end of the Station 3, Jacob was in a small, one seater space ship. It had taken him this long to launch because he had to put a space suit on, just in case he needed to eject from the ship. His seat would come with him, of course, which had miniature jets built in so that he could move around in space. But as he was still comfortably inside his space ship, he piloted it away from the station to get a good look over everything.

After he’d gone some distance away, he stopped, turned the ship around, and looked. The helmet he was wearing had a heads-up display, showing him exactly where and what everything was much more clearly than with his own eyes. He couldn’t see any damage, or the attacker. But then he heard someone talking to him through his intercom.

“Everyone!” began Craig. “The attacker is on side 4! It has missiles and possibly other weapons, so approach with caution.”

Jacob immediately began flying the ship towards side 4 of the station. Suddenly, he saw a flash of light coming from a corner on the far side of the station! Only a moment later there was an explosion from another of the corners, and then the one closest to him! Even with the helmet, he couldn’t see the source of the explosions, but he guessed that whatever was attacking the station would probably be on the other side of it, going by the order of where the explosions happened.

The robot had fired homing missiles at each of the four thrusters positioned on the corners of Station 3. It had used its most powerful missiles for that, of which it had five, leaving one left. There was no use for it currently, so the robot didn’t fire it. Instead, it flew over to the side of Station 3 furthest away from the Earth. At the ends of its arms, large claws folded out, attaching themselves onto the hull. The robot rotated upwards so it was perpendicular to the station. Once it had positioned itself, it set its thrusters to maximum power.

Nearer to it than he had been, Jacob examined the damage to the station. He could see the lumps of twisted metal that used to be the thrusters. There was debris everywhere.

“The engines are destroyed!” he shouted into his intercom in horror.
“What?!” Craig exclaimed. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, definitely,” he said. “There’s hardly anything left of them.”

Craig punched the wall in anger.

“If we can’t move then the station will just drift out into space!”

Jacob began getting more worried than ever. His first day here and he was already facing a deadly threat.

“What do you want me to do?”
“Well I’m going to the bridge to try and see if I can work out what it’s doing and what we can do to stop it. You find the robot and keep it busy. Inform me of any significant updates.”
“Got it,” Jacob replied.

Craig selected to talk to the chief medic.

“There’s a boy here who needs medical assistance as soon as possible.”
“Where are you?” the medic asked.
“Corridor 16. Send someone there as fast as you can.”
“Doing it now.”

The chief medic quickly contacted one of the medics who was nearer corridor 16 and told them to go there. In the corridor, both walls that had sealed it raised back up again, as the room was now fully pressurized. Within a minute, help arrived. Craig briefly explained what happened to William, before heading off to the bridge.

Jacob had finally found the robot. To his horror, he saw that the robot was actually pushing the entire space station! And then he saw what it was pushing it towards. The Earth. He knew he had to do something, and fast! Positioning the robot in his crosshairs, Jacob opened fire.

The robot’s arms were blasted out from in front of it, causing it to fly headfirst into the structure. As it turned to look at Jacob, several more fighter jets appeared from round the corner behind it. The robot pointed its arm cannon at Jacob, and fired the last missile. He instantly jerked the controls to the side, spinning the ship away just before the missile hit it. Jacob and the other fighter jets began firing at the robot again.

Suddenly, there was an electronic voice from Jacob’s ear piece.

“Incoming missile! Incoming missile!”

The RADAR screen in the cockpit showed the missile rapidly approaching the space ship from behind. Since it was a homing missile, it wasn’t going to be easy to lose. Jacob pulled back on the controls, sending both his ship and the pursuing weapon in a tight backwards loop. He levelled out at the top of the loop and sped off parallel to the space station.

Suddenly, the missile turned and slammed into the side of the enormous structure. Hundreds of tiny shards of metal shot in all directions. Several of them smashed straight through Jacob’s space ship, tearing the entire right wing off. With the only power coming from the left side of the craft, it veered sharply to the right and crashed into the station. Within a millisecond it disintegrated into a flash of light and debris.

The robot was receiving a shower of lasers from the two other one-manned fighter jets, when five more appeared from around the sides of the station. The robot seemed to be vibrating because of being knocked back and forward so rapidly. In an instant, it blasted upwards and out of the field of attack. With only a small delay, the attacking ships tilted upwards, following its path.

A second after the robot flew away, it released 5 small bombs. Two of them hit a couple of the space ships directly, while the rest exploded as the others flew past, severely damaging them. The robot, still blasting away at tremendous speed, pointed its arm back at the 3 remaining attackers and fired a rapid succession of lasers. The pilots tried to shoot back, but their weapons had been damaged beyond use by the bombs.

Inside the station, Craig paced around the bridge, looking at all the computer screens. He could see the dots signifying their ships disappearing at an alarming rate.

“How is that thing so powerful?!” he screamed to everyone in the room.
“Sir, I’m afraid to tell you that the robot has sent us on a collision course with the Earth, and since our thrusters are destroyed, we can’t get out of it.”

Craig breathed out heavily.

“We need to get everyone off this ship as soon as possible, and we also need to alert the government so they can evacuate everyone on the ground.”
“Doing it now.”
“Sir, I’ve called the US Space military for backup. They’ll be here within 20 minutes.”

“Good,” said Craig. “Keep me informed on everything that’s happening. I’m going to go in the Star Jet and take care of that robot.”
“Ok, I’ll tell you where it is when you get to the Jet.”

Craig turned and ran back into the corridors, heading for the Star Jet.

Jacob glided through space on his seat, heading back towards the station as quickly as he could. It had launched out of his ship just before he’d crashed. Using the jets on the seat, he positioned himself directly above one of the airlocks on the roof of the station. He pressed a button on the seat, sending a signal to the nearest airlock, which then opened.

Craig, in the Star Jet, came speeding round the corner and soared towards the metal beast.

“Everyone, draw back!”

The fighter jets attacking the robot instantly spun round and headed back to the station. They flashed past the Star Jet, hoping that that, of all things, would be able to handle the situation. It was by far the most powerful ship available to the Space Defence Operations. It was called the Star Jet because it looked like a star when viewed directly from the front.

Craig launched a missile at the robot, which had now turned to face him. The robot immediately fired a laser at the missile. In a fraction of a second, the missile darted to the left, out of the path of the laser. 

The large, powerful missile first made contact with the robot’s hand, completely obliterating it as it continued on its flight. It then smashed into what would be the chest of the attacker. There was an enormous explosion as the missile detonated, sending debris everywhere. The majority of the robot was blasted backwards, while the unrecognisable remains of its arm were thrown sideways.

Craig could see the robot flying backwards, and it appeared to be severely damaged. But he didn’t quite know if it would continue fighting. His finger itched to pull on the trigger once more. He wasn’t quite sure whether he should destroy it or take it in for the scientists to examine. He sighed, making up his mind. He moved his hand over to the dozens of buttons to his side, and pressed one of them.

A fairly large beam shone out of the front of the ship and hit the robot. After only a second, it slowed and began drifting back towards the Star Jet.

“I’ve got it,” Craig said, as the robot eventually reached the space ship and was grabbed by several small claws. “I’m taking it back now.”


Chapter 8

Examination
Craig, along with three other men and two women, stood around a table. On the table, there was the robot. It was mostly intact, though its right arm was missing and there was an enormous dent in its chest.

They were in an average sized room, with spotless white walls and glass tables. Though the glass wasn’t very visible, since there was equipment everywhere, all over the tables. The tables themselves were even part of the equipment, able to perform all different types of scans.

“Tell me everything,” Craig said to one of the scientists in the room.
“As might have guessed,” she began, “it’s alien. The materials aren’t terrestrial, and the layout, design, and everything else about it are completely different to technology we’re familiar with. But we can still understand it. It has high powered lasers and the explosive charges in its biggest missiles could easily penetrate the hull of this station. We also found an amazing nanobot regeneration pack deep inside, which means that in theory, as long as you didn’t destroy the regeneration pack, it could recover from even the worst damage.”
“You haven’t left it in there, have you?” Craig asked.
“No no, of course not. It’s been removed and is currently undergoing separate analysis.”
“Good.”
“There’s one more thing, though. Something very, very odd about the robot.”
“What is it?”

The scientist turned to one of her colleagues; a relatively old man with light blond hair, though there wasn’t much of it left.

“It’s old,” the man said. “And I don’t just mean a few years old, I mean really old.”

An intrigued look spread across Craig’s face.

“How old?” he asked.
“According to our dating system, about 9 thousand years old.”

Craig’s eyebrows shot up.

“9 thousand years old?”
“Yes.”
“This exact robot?” he asked again, tapping its chest a couple of times.
“This very one,” the scientist replied, nodding.

Taking a few steps back from the table, Craig stared at the robot and tried to think.

“Why is a 9 thousand year old alien robot trying to kill us?” he wondered out loud.
“We’ll most definitely gain some more information once we’ve had a look through its computer,” said one of the other scientists.
“Good. Get to work on that right away.”
“But sir, we’ll need to evacuate in 15 minutes. We won’t have enough time.”

Craig sighed. He glanced at the robot, lying on the table, battered and destroyed. The robot that had caused so much destruction and put so many lives at risk. The robot that had sent his own station on a collision course with the Earth. He wouldn’t be able to think about anything else until he finally understood it. But he knew that the scientist was right. They needed to evacuate.

“Alright,” he finally said. “I’ll call some people down here to load the robot and everything else onto one of the ships.”


William was standing in the middle of a long line in one of the hallways, with his luggage by his feet. Everyone was being taken to the escape ships now, and William was so nervous. He was fidgeting constantly, mentally urging the crowd to get a move on. While he was sure that everything was going to be fine, he couldn’t help but feel that there wasn’t going to be enough time for everyone to board a ship and get out of here.

Someone placed a hand on his shoulder. He turned around and saw a middle-aged woman with dark hair standing behind him, who smiled sincerely at him.

“Don’t be so worried,” she said to him in a comforting tone. “This sort of thing has happened to me before. We’ll be fine.”
“Thanks,” William replied with an attempt at a smile.
“My name’s Catherine, by the way.” She extended a hand, which William shock. “What’s yours?”
“William.”

He turned back around and took out his phone. He hadn’t had the chance to check on any of his friends yet, so he had no idea whether they were injured... or maybe worse. He phoned Emily, his heart pounding as he waited for her to answer. He had no idea where she was during the attack. For all he knew, she could have been killed. But William tried not to think about that. He just waited anxiously for her to answer her phone.

After a few seconds, she did. William breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

“Hello?” said Emily.

William could hear the slight panic in her voice. It was subtle, but definitely there.

“It’s me, William,” he replied. “Are you ok?”
“Yes, I’m fine. Are you? You didn’t get hurt, did you?”
“Well, I did, but I’m ok now.”
“What happened?” Emily asked, concerned.
“I... well, I got sucked out of the station and then blasted back by a missile... kind of.”
“What?!” exclaimed Emily. “Are you ok?!”
“Yes, really, I’m fine. Don’t worry.”
“Ok, good,” she said after a few seconds of calming down. “Where are you now?”
“I’m in one of the queues for the escape ships. I take it you are too?”
“Actually, I’m already in one of the ships.”
“Oh, good.”

There was a silence for a moment, as William decided to check on his other friends.

“I’m going call Jacob now,” he said.
“Ok, see you later.”
“Bye.”

William hung up. He looked at his phone for a few seconds, smiling, and then rang Jacob.

“William!” Jacob greeted him, with a surprisingly cheerful tone. “Are you alright?”
“I’m very well under the circumstances,” William replied. “What about you?”
“Same. That stupid robot made me crash into the side of the station, but I’m ok.”
“Ah, good. How long did you last?”
“Um... just more than a minute, I think,” Jacob replied, laughing slightly. “You?”
“A bit less than that.”
“Wait a minute,” said Jacob, confused. “You weren’t in a space ship, were you?”
“No, I was at turret. Why?”
“But if you were already inside the station, then how could you, you know...”

He struggled to find the words to describe what he meant.

“How could you last a certain amount of time? I mean, for me, it’s because my space ship got destroyed. But if you were already inside the station, then why did you stop fighting it? Did it destroy your turret or something?”
“Not exactly,” William began. “It smashed the glass, which sent me flying out into space.”
“What?!”

William realised that this was probably going to be the reaction to everyone he told that to.

“But I got blasted back inside by a missile.”
“What?!” Jacob yet again exclaimed, with a slightly amused tone this time due to the absurdity of what William was saying.
“It sounds a bit ridiculous, I’ll admit.”
“You think?!”
“It made sense at the time. Well, not really, since I was very much in shock, but apparently that’s what happened.”
“...Right... And you’re ok?”
“Apparently. Anyway, have you heard from Peter or Ryan?”
“Ryan phoned me a few minutes ago, and he’s fine. But I haven’t heard from Peter. I’ll phone him now.”
“Ok, good,” said William. “Goodbye.”
“Bye.”


Craig stood with several workers outside one of the escape ships, discussing the robot. They had the robot and its broken off arm in one box, and the regeneration pack in another.

“Now remember,” Craig began. “Take these two boxes in separate ships. We can’t take any chances.”
“Yes sir,” said the workers in unison.

Within a minute, the boxes were loaded onto the ships and they were ready to depart. After boarding one of the ships himself, Craig contacted all the groups of people coordinating the evacuation, and checked whether everyone was ready. After a few minutes, they finally were. Everything was ready, and they could now evacuate Station 3.

Twenty large ships blasted out of the station, one by one, and travelled in an arc around the back of it, so as not to get in its path. By now, the enormous structure had picked up a lot of speed. It was approaching 1000 miles an hour, and picking up speed with every second. But the escape ships were faster, and flew right past it towards the Earth at tremendous speed.

William peered out the window and looked back at the station. It looked quite different to what he remembered it looking like on the journey there. The robot had damaged it so much. It had left hundreds of black marks all over the structure, where it had shot it with missiles and lasers.

The engines were gone as well. Just twisted lumps of metal at the base of where they used to be.

William couldn’t examine the station for long, though, as it became just a speck behind them as they rocketed away from it. He turned and looked in the direction they were going.

The Earth looked absolutely magnificent. He would never get tired of seeing it from outer space. He had been looking forward so, so much to being able to get up every morning, look out of the windows, and marvel at the sight of the Earth. But it wasn’t going to happen. Not now, at least.


They approached the atmosphere at a shallow angle, slicing through the air in the best possible way. There seemed to be a red aura around the ship, due to the intense friction caused by the ship travelling thousands of miles an hour through the atmosphere. William could see several of the other ships ahead, though they looked more like giant fireballs right now. He looked back to see if he could see the station coming through the atmosphere as well. He couldn’t, of course. It was much too far behind them, and was heading towards a different part of the Earth anyway.


Down in America, a missile launcher aimed up into the sky, targeting Station 3 as it crashed towards the Earth. It fired a single missile, holding a nuclear explosive. It blasted away at astonishing speed, reaching the clouds within seconds.

The station didn’t reach the atmosphere. Before it could, the nuclear missile had shot out into space and was heading directly towards it. The giant, abandoned structure was travelling at about 6 thousand miles an hour now, and the missile was travelling over 50. A split second before they smashed into each other, the nuclear explosive detonated.

Station 3 was completely obliterated.
------------------------------------------------------------
And that's all I'm going to post online.    But I am definitely going to finish it, so if you want to read the rest then you can buy it at some point in the near-ish future! 

Anyone?

soupoftomato wrote:

19008 words

I don't like reading one a computer if the piece is too long, so I may transfer it onto my nook sometime and read it then.

Oh, ok. Well I do hope you read it at some point, as I look forward to hearing what you think of it. 

soupoftomato wrote:

Okay so, I've read about half the first chapter out of boredom
and
Honestly, you aren't very good at action.
There's not emotion shown in the middle of the fights. It's just "then he did this, then this happened."
There's not even like
tension
It's not exciting, it's like a play by play of a sports game being broadcast in a monotone

Perhaps you should wait until you've read the actual action scenes later in the story. This one is a training mission. There's not meant to be much of a sense of drama and threat, since there isn't any. Because it's a training mission. No one's life is in danger in the slightest.

soupoftomato wrote:

calebxy wrote:

soupoftomato wrote:

Okay so, I've read about half the first chapter out of boredom
and
Honestly, you aren't very good at action.
There's not emotion shown in the middle of the fights. It's just "then he did this, then this happened."
There's not even like
tension
It's not exciting, it's like a play by play of a sports game being broadcast in a monotone

Perhaps you should wait until you've read the actual action scenes later in the story. This one is a training mission. There's not meant to be much of a sense of drama and threat, since there isn't any. Because it's a training mission. No one's life is in danger in the slightest.

Ever read Ender's Game?

HECK
ever played a video game online?
It's like in an FPS when all that rests on winning is absolutely nothing but you still feel tension and drama.

I still think you should finish reading it before you make a final judgement.

calebxy wrote:

soupoftomato wrote:

calebxy wrote:

Perhaps you should wait until you've read the actual action scenes later in the story. This one is a training mission. There's not meant to be much of a sense of drama and threat, since there isn't any. Because it's a training mission. No one's life is in danger in the slightest.

Ever read Ender's Game?

HECK
ever played a video game online?
It's like in an FPS when all that rests on winning is absolutely nothing but you still feel tension and drama.

I still think you should finish reading it before you make a final judgement.

I'm making a judgement on the first chapter, not the whole thing, and it's perfectly valid.

banana500 wrote:

Well...um...

This story LOOKS like it has potential. The plot sounds strikingly similar to Ender's Game, but I'm sure you'll add your own twist to this kind of story. The action scenes, I'd say, you should try and improve on. Even if it IS just a "game", you should still have it so that it's engaging, especially if its your opening scene. Without a good opening scene, people won't be hooked on the story.

But I am still reading it, however, and the rest seems nice enough. But be sure to work on the opening, because that is most probably the most important part of any story.

I haven't read Ender's Game, but from what I've heard, it's not really that similar at all (apart from the laser training fights or whatever).

Well I look forward to finding out what you think of the whole thing so far. 

BirdByte wrote:

Wow. That's really nice.

Thanks.    So did you read all of it?

calebxy wrote:

soupoftomato wrote:

calebxy wrote:

I still think you should finish reading it before you make a final judgement.

I'm making a judgement on the first chapter, not the whole thing, and it's perfectly valid.

But you said you read only the first half, though.

I since finished the chapter, and my opinion hasn't changed.

BirdByte wrote:

calebxy wrote:

BirdByte wrote:

Wow. That's really nice.

Thanks.    So did you read all of it?

I read the first few paragraphs. It's like, 10pm, so I can't read much more.

Ah, alright.    Well I'm looking forward to seeing what you think of the rest of it. 

calebxy wrote:

soupoftomato wrote:

Okay so, I've read about half the first chapter out of boredom
and
Honestly, you aren't very good at action.
There's not emotion shown in the middle of the fights. It's just "then he did this, then this happened."
There's not even like
tension
It's not exciting, it's like a play by play of a sports game being broadcast in a monotone

Perhaps you should wait until you've read the actual action scenes later in the story. This one is a training mission. There's not meant to be much of a sense of drama and threat, since there isn't any. Because it's a training mission. No one's life is in danger in the slightest.

Okay, I'm not trying to be rude but honestly.
You seem to keep disregarding the critiques in this manner. If you post on a forum with several people who like writing, expect some advice or opinions that aren't just "Nice!"

Have you ever watched or played sports? Played a video game? Played a game like airsoft or paintball? None of these things cause danger, but they are all pretty intense to watch or do and certainly have drama.

Emulate that feeling. You don't have to have an "OH SNAP I HOPE I DON'T DIE" but maybe a "OH SNAP THIS WILL RUIN MY REPUTATION/RUIN MY RANKING IN THE GRADES/BE EMBARASSING IF I LOSE" feeling. There's also just a human desire to WIN in us, which could easily add drama in itself. No one wants the shame of being the loser. Your word choice is rather bland and has no emotional connotation in that chapter. Instead of 'ran away' try 'fleed' or make "jumped" into "launched".

Last edited by soupoftomato (2012-09-16 17:33:45)

bananaman114 wrote:

hrmph! okay lets do this
I'm not going to nitpick because seriously? Shiznat I don't have that much free time
but I can give you tips
and hopefully this time you will acknowledge them
you need EMOTION
like soupoftomato said
and he seemed to have gone enough into it for me

secondly you need to SHOW, DON'T TELL
I feel like whenever I read your writing
I feel like I'm reading writing
not like i'm 'watching' what you wrote you know?
like if you're reading something you can pretty much make a mental image of it
but i can't do that with you! not to be rude but your writing
you just say things
in sometimes a very blunt manner like
'getting the hint'
I'm SURE there is a million and a half better ways to say that
but you seem to have picked one of the most blunt ones

and if that came out harsh i'm kind of sorry but seriously? i've given uh hints kind of on a good few of your writing threads and i haven't gotten a reply once. D:

as a side note you seem to be reacting rather unfortunately to criticism and rather happily to someone who says they like it
i mean cool like it's great that someone said they like your work
I remember one of the happiest moments i ever had on scratch was when PlutoisHades complimented on one thing i wrote and she was
really nice!
but an artist should ASPIRE for criticism, and take the compliments as they come
an artist should want to know how they can improve!
that's why i'm always getting * at Wickimen when she can't critique my writing 

I'm sorry okay!