The talking between the members of the Callack organisation and other senior leaders went on for hours. Terry Horowitz sat at the head of the table next to Talia, who had held his hand ever since they sat down. He frankly had no idea what to say, but seemed to be nodding in the right places. The tactics of 4-D space-time conflict were not Terry's speciality, but he had come to conclude that he was far better as a symbol and a figurehead (and, apparently, a speech-maker) than as a military tactician.

'We'll use the CMV Firestorm,' said Revo Recma. 'She's still in storage and safe.'

'But she's never been tested,' said Talia, suddenly looking worried.

'Well, now is as good a time as any,' insisted Revo Recma. 'The Firestorm has all the manoeuvrability of the smaller time-travel vehicles that we picked up, but can house two-and-a-half thousand troops and is loaded with an arsenal that is the match of anything they could throw at us,' Recma proudly proclaimed. The rest of the group nodded and agreed with the large alien. 'Now, enough talking. Let's get into the positions, as we've laid them out.'

Terry seemed relieved that finally something was beginning to happen.

'We're moving, lads. Get ready with your weapons,' said a senior commander to the British infantry regiment.

'This is stupid,' said Corporal Karl Boach. 'I know we've got these new fancy weapons, but how the hell are we going to beat these creatures from the future?'

'Just get on with it, Boach,' said the 19th-century officer. He got into the troop-transport vehicle and they started moving towards the larger ship. After a surprisingly short journey, a larger ship came in to view. When Terry saw it, he almost fell over and was lucky to have Talia next to him to stop him from falling over and making him look a bit foolish.

'My God,' said Terry.

'Actually, some people think you're their God,' grinned Beiphlat, who had been keeping a low profile.

'And I was worried about how we were going to transport Amanda Hall...' said Terry.

Talia smirked. She was not sure what to make of Terry's former girlfriend, who had turned into a large ball of human flesh. She knew she shouldn't find it amusing, but she couldn't help notice the irony that Amanda had dumped Terry... 'Yes. The woman will probably be slightly more comfortable until we can deal with her... problem.'

The ship itself was a leviathan, incomparable with anything Terry had seen before. From the side it had a large, thin central elongated sphere. But a lot of the other trimmings were not so clear to Terry, apart from what appeared to be a large engine on one side, with assumably one on the other side.

'Let's go aboard, eh?' said Recma. 'Some more of the Callack organisation should be there.'

In space, the universe was in flux, shaking to its very core, struggling to keep itself together, the laws that bound it being pushed to their very limits. So much had been interfered with, and looked likely to be interfered with again.... An entity a guiding force, tried to communicate with another reality Universe to stabilise it. It tried to pull in the one thing that could stabilise it....

The Legacy of Terry Horowitz Archive

Terran

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