Massacre at Alpha Centauri

What if the Battle of Endor went terribly wrong?

Massacre at Alpha Centauri

by Luther Allen

“Oh my God. These is going to be a long mission,” thought Capt. Wilson Mars, pilot of 12^th Squad Company. He was already getting space sick. Then again he always got space sick in these intergalactic battles. He wonder way he ever became a pilot. He could not stand the blackness of space and the way you always had to maneuver your fighter to dodge asteroids. But here he is again, defending the Milky Way galaxy against the evil Sadies. They were, of course, the enemy. They were also extremely ugly. They looked like peach colored lizards. Col. Petterson said he saw one during his last scouting mission and almost made him puke his ever loving brains out.

At least it was the squad's last mission. The last of 402 space missions. Of those 402 space missions there was only one casualty. It was Gigi, the space monkey. “May you rest in peace you stupid primate,” thought Mars. He respected Gigi for her ability to blow up Sadie's space stations but she always cheated in poker. One thing that Mars hated was a monkey with an extra ace under her flight suit sleeve.

Capt. Pete McHara had his fighter stereo full blast so everyone in the Squad can listen to his infamous playlist through their communications systems. Before the war, he was a disc jockey at a senior citizen's retirement home. Then there is Capt. Rachel Shaw. Capt. Shaw always was talking about how she suspects her husband is cheating on her while she is doing her tour. “I know that b*****d is screwing around with that skant of a secretary of his.” And then there is Capt. Robert Dupree, who was busy tripping on a new space club drug called “Insanity”. The drug basically makes you hallucinate in black and white, drives you to uncontrollable mad fits and makes you misquote famous phrases from 20^th century pop culture films. “I smell Napalm in the evening!”

While everybody was getting ready to battle the Sadies for the 403^rd time , Capt. Mars turn his thoughts to his six-year-old daughter, Jamie. He had his 3-D picture of her at New Coney Island posted on the dashboard. By stars, how he missed her. The last time he saw her was before he left for flight school on Neptune. She hugged him and told Mars: “Don't be brave, Daddy. Come home safely. Promise me you won't be brave.” Mars was touched. So he made her that promise. At 402 missions Capt. Wilson Mars was the prefect coward. He retreated when he was supposed to retreat. He retreated when he supposed to advance. He even retreated when the enemy retreated. And because luck and supreme acts of cowardice, he had one more mission left. One more mission and he can see his Jamie.

“Here looking at you, Sid,” spoke Capt. Dupree in his surprising good Humphrey Bogart impression. The whole Squad was jamming to Kool and the Gang's “Celebration” when Capt. Shaw was telling how she thought she saw her husband had lipstick on his collar on the video relay from Earth. “This piece of dirt has a girl on the side and I am fighting an intergalactic war. Where's the justice?” complained Capt. Shaw as she spotted and shot down the first Sadie. “Ruth! You can handle a Baby Ruth!” shouted Dupree as he shot down another Sadie.

Pretty soon there was a whole fleet of Sadies. About 10,000 new model fighter ships. The 12^th Squad Company only consists of 30 fighters and a half-broken down space drone named Harry. Mars moaned, “This is going to be a lonnng battle.” Capt. McHara commence playing Paul Simon's “50 Ways To Leave Your Lover” for just this particular occasion.

After 10 minutes, 20 fighters perished including the half-broken space drone, Harry (who also cheated in poker). “Will someone please call for reinforcements?” asked Mars in a polite but seemingly sarcastic tone. “There are no reinforcements coming,” replied Shaw soberly. “What do you mean there are no freaking reinforcements! We are a galactic army! We should have reinforcements!” screamed Mars. “It's Labor Day. Everyone has the day off. Including my piss ant of a husband,” replied Shaw as she was stabbing photos of her spouse with her service knife in her cockpit. “How come we did not get the day off?” asked Mars. “Because we went into that wormhole to get to Alpha Centauri and got here a day early. So we go grandfathered out of the holiday,” explained Shaw.

“You telling me the reason why we not getting reinforcements and are getting wipe out by these pink salamanders with aggression issues cause we got grandfathered out by time traveling before a holiday”.

“You got it, Honcho.”

“I knew I should have been an accountant.”

“Why you join up the first place?”

“It had a decent health care package.”

“Yeah, that's why I join up too. So my ever loving life partner can have his Viagra to screw his w***e!”

Pretty soon Sadies knock off five more fighter's from the human fleet. “You had me at jello,” Dupree spoke sadly as he saw his fellow fighter pilot and lover, Capt. Trager get blown up by a Sadie ship. Mars' thoughts formulated like all his thoughts when he faced situations like these. That was to get the heck out of here and do not look back. Retreating was the only option for him. Now everyone was listening to ”Another One Bites the Dust” on the communications system.

Then the song was interrupted by a message by the enemy. Everyone who was still alive in the squad was disappointed by this because they wanted to finish hearing Queen.“Attention useless humans. This is the Sadie Federation Fleet. We have you surrounded. Please surrender and we will only mildly torture you.”

“Define 'mildly'.” said Capt Hill, one of the surviving pilots.

“We will tickle you until you puke. Then we will kill you.”

“Okay, I am just checking.”

Mars did not know what to do. The last mission in his pusillanimous flight career and he could not fly away to safety. Mars did what use usually do in stressful situations and he started to hyperventilate. Shaw heard Mars wheezing through the communications systems and abruptly shouted: ”Mars, get a hold of yourself! It is only a intergalactic massacre.”

“I can't died. I promised Jamie!” Now the fighter pilot began to weep.

“Badgers! I don't need no stinkin' badgers!” said Capt. Dupree in a keen Mexican accent.

At that moment, knowing of their imminent deaths will be near, all the human pilots agreed that Capt. McNara should play “Do You Wanna Get Funky?” by C+C Music Factory. The Sadies was getting ready to tractor beam all the pilots to their nice new mothership that was pay by booty from other planets and Sadie tax dollars. Capt. Shaw cracked, “Great! I going to get torture and killed while my husband is sharing a condo at Boca with a bimbo who can only type 20 words a minute.”

While the fighter pilots were getting beam to the mothership, Mars stopped weeping. And in the middle of space the dogged space pilot, the committed father and coward had an epiphany. He had this instant yet powerful revelation which sparked when he took a look at his little's girl picture at New Coney Island. He then spoke these words: “Sometimes tragedy is the most perfect comedy.”

And after saying this phrase, Mars' fighter ship broke from the tractor beam and flew into the flight path of 10,000 Sadie ships and it started blindly firing rapidly with it's laser cannons. The other ships, either inspire by Capt. Mars unexpected bravery or did not have nothing else better to do, followed the pilot's lead. The last memory of Captain Wilson Mars life was a flash of light and Capt. Dupree speaking like a shaman full of wisdom: “May the Porche be with you. Always.”

Reviews

[Rovy1]

I like

[Cake Box]

Can I just say that I adore your humor? My favorite part is your character development. It can be hard to write a character that is really "fleshed out" but I found that they all had quirks that made them instantly endearing and really funny. My favorite was definitely Capt Dupree. I loved the song references and movie quotes too. Sci-fi can be so iffy to write because it can be too distant and overwhelming to read because of the futuristic jumble, but because you used some familiar references, I was really drawn in. It reminded me a bit of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

[Jack Isaac]

{first impression} I love this line "pay by booty from other planets" Your story is well structured and clearly unique. It flows well despite certain broken English, which is quite a feat, and says much to your credit. I would hate to ask if this is supposed to have certain a humor, or spoof-like quality --ooops I just did ask that! Oh well. May the Porche be with you my friend --And a very good write!

[Roary]

I liked it you went by sci fi protocol to a degree and you had a odd sense of dry humor that i found amusing. It is well written and i liked the military personalities you picked for your characters. Also i liked that you picked the actual star Alpha Centauri as it allows the reader to have a distance scale of the situation.

[Shep]

Great story even though I really don’t like space stories as a book in general, but as a movie. Found a few things for you to fix and have emailed them to you.

[Corey]

First, I think you are a better writer than you give yourself credit for in your profile. You should invent new technology for your story. I think this would give it more authenticity. For example, you say "He had his 3-D picture of her at New Coney Island posted on the dashboard." What other technology would people have in the future? I say be creative and come up with something that we have never seen before. This would create a new world for your reader.

Also, I am both a sci-fi fan and a Porschephyle so I love the last line!!!