He turned on his small suit light, looked at his air indicator, and saw that he only had six hours remaining. He gazed out at the moons surface, which was ragged where it had been pulverized over the eons by all sizes of meteorites. The crater he was currently hiding in had been made by a huge impact. The ships had been searching overhead for over two hours since two of their missiles had killed his ship, forcing him to jump to the surface. He saw no evidence of them leaving anytime soon. I guess they dont have a sense of humor about ship theft, he chuckled to himself. He had always been able to cheat death or capture, capture being the same thing as death, by being resourceful and always attentive of his surroundings, using the psychic field, and just being plain lucky. Looks like lady luck has deserted me, he thought. He toyed with the idea of stepping out of the shadow and using his suit radio to contact one of the ships overhead; there was a chance they would come down and take him aboard, which would only extend the time until they put him to death. What would probably happen is that they would not waste their time picking him up but just shoot him with one of the ships main beams. If he could be certain that they would use the beam, it might be a good idea to step out. At least that would be a quick death instead of suffocating. But there was also the chance that they would want to interrogate him, particularly about how he managed to steal the ship that got him as far as the moon. How could he have known they placed remote-controlled transponders on civilian ships? Once their signal turned it on, their sensors could see him no matter how he tried to avoid them. Even with his special talents, there was no hiding from the ships tracking that transponder. He just couldnt run the risk of being captured and interrogated. Then they would find out about Leila, and that was one risk he was unwilling to take. He had ejected from the ship just before two missiles exploded it. Fortunately, he was close enough to the moon to reach the surface before his chair ran out of fuel. He could always slowly turn down the heat of his suit and wait until he fell asleep and froze to death. Ah, Leila, except for you and your test I would still be on Earth playing hide and seek.
So he sat on the moon, looking out at its ragged surface with the Earth glowing overhead, and thought about his history classes where he learned all that his planet had endured. He could see Mexico and the depressions where six fusion bombs exploded in the last global war. Mankind had come a long way after that last war, from living in caves to interstellar space travel. He reminisced about life and how he had spent most of it being a pain in the grump to the Directorate. He decided that they werent such bad people; its just that their fear for Earths safety led them to control every aspect of existence. Where you work, what job you do, how much you make in credits, where you live, who you marry, how many children youre allowed, what color clothing you wear, what things are acceptable recreation, and a thousand other details in living ones life. And anyone questioning these decisions somehow disappeared. It was easy to understand after the final world war when over twelve billion people lost their lives in the nuclear holocaust; those fusion bombs in Mexico put the whole planet into nuclear winter. In the eight hundred years since then, the planet had been rebuilt, wildlife had come back, the population had grown to over nine billion, space travel was developed, and the Douglas Star Drive took mankind out to explore the galaxy. It was one of mankinds most peaceful periods. All weapons of destruction were eradicated after the last dictator and his fleet of pirates had been overthrown. This led to three hundred years of peace and prosperity for the planet. But that ended abruptly two hundred years ago when one of those interstellar trips out toward the Andromeda Galaxy brought Earth head to head with the Cainth Empire.
Oh, what a wonderful race the Cainth were! They looked like a cross between a four-armed kangaroo and a gorilla. They stood about five feet tall and their legs were short and highly muscled, which made them walk stiffly. They had a very light covering of light tan hair and narrow, totally black eyes above a protruding snout. Their ears were small on each side of their head instead of the long ears of Earths kangaroos. They were equally adept with both pairs of arms and could perform four tasks simultaneously. They also had the temperament of a tiger and were just as territorial. As soon as the unarmed Earth exploration ship entered their system, they determined its home planets location and then destroyed the defenseless ship. A war fleet was then readied and dispatched to destroy Earth.
Earth had learned its lesson about the consequences of aggression and hostility during six world wars, so the planet was basically unarmed and defenseless, having done away with all weapons of war. Fortunately for Earth, the Cainth were a member of the Alliance of Worlds, which discovered their intentions to destroy a peaceful civilization just in time. There were a number of races in the Alliance that actively disliked the Cainth because of past wrongs, and several of the ambassadors on Cainth notified their home worlds about what was happening. Earth was barely saved by three fleets from other members of the Alliance, but not before settlements on Mars and the moons of Jupiter had been totally obliterated. The Alliance then told Earth that they could have twenty light-years around Earths solar system to settle, but that if humans stepped out of line then Earth would see the business end of those fleets again. Since the Cainth Empire was the closest member of the Alliance, they were given the job of watching over Earth
The Alliance ruled its members with a heavy fist, and major violations usually led to the offender facing orbital bombardment. It was at that point that the Directorate was formed by all nations as Earths central government to make sure that no one would violate the many rules imposed by the Alliance, which included the twenty-light-year limit, or do anything to antagonize any member of the Alliance when they were on Earth. Weapon development immediately took a high priority, and the government vowed that Earth would not be caught defenseless again. The three hundred years of peace ended abruptly.
One would think that it would be easy to avoid stepping out of line as long as Earth stayed inside the twenty-light-year limit. The problem was that members of the Alliance would come to visit Earth to see its young civilization. Earths very existence depended upon no one doing anything that would cause an incident with these visitors. There also had to be central control of all Earths space ships to make sure no one violated the twenty-light-year limit. Thats why such tight controls were placed on peoples behavior. A hundred years ago a Cainth noble had the misfortune to die while visiting Earth. Within one week a Cainth war fleet arrived to investigate and take action. Thank the creator that he had died from natural causes and there was a Spejk doctor from the Alliance visiting Earth to confirm it prior to the war fleets arrival. The Cainth admiral actually slammed his four arm pads on his ships control board because he wasnt going to be able to eradicate the planet.
On their way out of the Earths system, the Cainth encountered one of Earths new battle cruisers returning from the Virgo cluster and proceeded to attack it. Unlike the first encounter, this Earth ship had new weapons and was able to hold off its attackers for an hour. It had more than two hundred ships chasing and firing at it, but it still managed to destroy two Cainth destroyers and disable a cruiser and battleship before it perished. The Cainth suddenly realized that in the future it might not be so easy to destroy this young civilization. The final message from the admiral was, Next time well bring four fleets.