Below we present the complete text of “New Allies, New Goals”, episode 5 (and final) of our new Space Opera; Graduation Day. This is a brand new (unpublished) series (and introduces two brand new characters; Sarah Tanner and Jeff Chase). If you would like to see these new stories advance from being drafts into polished publications then please consider supporting us by purchasing one or more of our previously published titles. Every sale directly funds the production of new stories.
SCENE 23 – INT – BEFORE THE HUB – LATER
(JEFF, SARAH, VULGE, TERG, VASH, EXTRA)
- MUSIC: OPENING THEME – LET IT FINISH.
- NARRATOR: Having escaped the zoo on board the alien planetoid that serves as home base to the space pirates that have been raiding Earth ships, Sarah and Jeff join with their newfound alien allies to fight there way free…
- SOUND: LASER FIRE BACK AND FORTH – ESTABLISH AND UNDER
- EXTRA: SCREAMS NEARBY – LET IT FINISH.
- SARAH: (BEEP) Damn it, Jeff, you need to take out that turret. We’re getting torn to ribbons out here.
- JEFF: (BEEP – ON THE COMMS) We’ll have it down in a minute. We’ve just run into some extra opposition trying to get around to where we can get a clear shot.
- SARAH: (BEEP) Alright, but hurry it up will you.
- JEFF: (BEEP) Will do. I’ve got it in my sights… oh, hell.
- SARAH: (BEEP) Jeff? Jeff, are you there?
- JEFF: (STATIC THEN BEEP) I’m still here, boss. Selfridge just climbed up on the turret. He’s got a controller attached to him.
- SOUND: NEARBY EXPLOSION – LET IT FINISH.
- SARAH: (BEEP) Damn it. Jeff, he’s not Selfridge anymore. I read the reports on the agents that tried to blow up the Patrol Brass on Graduation Day. They were, to all intents and purposes, just husks. There was nothing left of the people they were except a physical body and the programming provided by the implant. You have to take the shot.
- JEFF: (BEEP) Damn it, boss! Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!
- SOUND: ARCING MISSILE NOISE – LET IT FINISH.
- SOUND: EXPLOSION – LET IT FINISH – LASER FIRE ENDS.
- SARAH: That’s it. The turret’s down. (BEEP) Everyone move up.
- SOUND: LASER BLAST – LET IT FINISH.
- VULGE: Ugh!
- SARAH: Hey Vulge, you okay?
- VULGE: Just a flesh wound. We heal quickly.
- SOUND: SQUELCH OF FLESH KNITTING TOGETHER – LET IT FINISH.
- VULGE: See.
- SARAH: Holy Cats, that’s incredible. (BEAT) And you two back there, Terg? Vash?
- TERG: Still here. Though I think I’d rather be anywhere else.
- VASH: Hey, this was your idea you know, Terg.
- SARAH: Enough! Let’s go. We’ve got to get up to that control room door. Bring the cutter with you.
- MUSIC: SCENE ENDER – LET IT FINISH.
SCENE 24: INT – OUTSIDE CONTROL ROOM DOOR
(VASH, TERG, VULGE, JEFF, SARAH, ROBOT OVERLORD)
- SOUND: TORCH CUTTING THROUGH DOOR – ESTABLISH AND UNDER
- SARAH: How much longer?
- VULGE: To cut through the door takes as long as it takes.
- VASH: Yeah, what she said.
- TERG: Would you all mind keeping quiet, please? This isn’t anywhere near as easy as it looks.
- VULGE: Looks like your puny friend with the scars is coming back.
- SARAH: Jeff, over here. How many do we still have with us?
- JEFF: We lost about half the prisoners. Of course, a good number ran away once the fighting got fierce. The rest are mopping up the few robots and minions that remain. The controlled human prisoners all fought to the death. Surprising how few robots there are given the size of this place.
- SARAH: Yeah, well, maybe they’ve deployed their forces elsewhere for now. It’s about time we caught a break.
- JEFF: Any idea what’s waiting for us behind this door?
- SARAH: In terms of armament? Your guess is as good as mine. But I’m hoping we’ve found the station’s bridge. If this turns out not to be the control center then I’m not sure what our next move will need to be.
- JEFF: Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it.
- TERG: Miss Sarah, I believe we’ve cut through.
- SOUND: SCREECHING METAL AND LOUD CLANG – LET IT FINISH.
- SARAH: (BEAT) Nothing seems to be shooting at us just yet.
- JEFF: After you?
- SARAH: (SARCASTIC) Thanks. What say we both go? I’ll go high and you go low.
- VULGE: No. I’ll go high and you both go low.
- SARAH: Alright. On three. One… Two…
- VULGE: Three already.
- SOUND: TWO LASER BLASTS – LET THEM FINISH.
- VULGE: Bah! There is nothing here.
- SARAH: (ANNOYED) Then what were you shooting at?
- VULGE: I just get carried away sometimes. I don’t often get to use a gun.
- JEFF: Aren’t you some kind of soldier?
- VULGE: No. I’m a navigator.
- SARAH: Good grief. (BEAT) Alright, let me take a look around in here. There don’t appear to be many controls. These look like they probably open the hangar doors.
- JEFF: Good, open them for our friends.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: You will put down your weapons and surrender to me now.
- SARAH: What was that?
- ROBOT OVERLORD: You will put down your weapons and surrender to me now.
- JEFF: Sounds like it came from the speakers in that control array over there.
- SARAH: Who are you? Identify yourself!
- ROBOT OVERLORD: I am Overlord Klimz, the commander of the space station in which you now stand. You are my prisoners.
- SARAH: I’m not sure you completely understand your situation, commander.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: I understand it fully. If you force me to, I will vent all the oxygen within this construct into space.
- SARAH: Really? I would have thought that if you could do that, then you would already have done so.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: I am programmed to preserve specimens for as long as is practical. I am also programmed to protect this station.
- SARAH: You’re a machine. Some kind of thinking machine.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: I am the commander of this station. You will put down your weapons and surrender to me now.
- JEFF: I’m interfacing with the station to collect as much data as possible now.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: No. You are not authorized. You are not…
- TERG: Over here. Miss Sarah, I think you should see this.
- SARAH: What is it, Terg? Some kind of tank?
- TERG: Yes, it appears to be some kind of life support tank.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: Do not interfere with the workings of the tank. Do not touch…
- SARAH: Here, help me get this open.
- SOUND: LATCHES BEING BROKEN. LID OF TANK CREAKS OPEN – LET IT FINISH.
- SOUND: BUBBLING NOISE – ESTABLISH AND UNDER.
- SARAH: I don’t believe it.
- TERG: Incredible.
- JEFF: What’s up? What have you found?
- SARAH: How’s that data-capture going?
- JEFF: Almost there.
- SARAH: Good, because, I think we just found the station’s brain.
- ROBOT OVERLORD: (SOUNDING PITIFUL) Please don’t kill me… Please…
- TERG: It’s not a machine after all. It’s biological.
- SARAH: A brain in the most literal sense of the word.
- JEFF: That explains why there are so few controls in here. The station is run entirely by the mind in that tank.
- SARAH: If there aren’t any controls, at least none we are familiar with, then there’s no way to pilot the station except by gaining this things cooperation.
- OVERLORD: Don’t… kill… me…
- SOUND: MASSIVE CREAKING JOLT – LET IT FINISH.
- VASH: I don’t like the sound of that.
- JEFF: No, me either.
- TERG: I think that by opening the tank we may have inadvertently killed the brain.
- JEFF: Meaning what exactly?
- SOUND: SIRENS BEGIN BLARING – ESTABLISH AND UNDER.
- SARAH: Meaning, I think the only thing keeping this station from destroying itself was the brain’s will to live. (BEAT) Have you got the data, Jeff? Because we really need to go, now.
- TERG: I think you had better come with us.
- JEFF: Why is that?
- VASH: Your ship is still in pieces. The station takes ships apart when they are first captured. For study. They eventually put them back together again after taking anything they need, but yours is pretty much scrap metal right now.
- JEFF: Just great.
- VULGE: I will come too. My ship was destroyed by the station. I was picked up in a life pod. Not much good to me now.
- SARAH: Can you take us all?
- TERG: It’ll be tight, but yes.
- SARAH: Then let’s go.
- SOUND: RUNNING FOOTSTEPS – LET IT FINISH.
- MUSIC: SCENE ENDER – LET IT FINISH.
SCENE 25 INT – VASH AND TERG’S SHIP – LATER
(VASH, TERG, VULGE, SARAH, JEFF)
- SOUND: RUMBLES, CRASHES, THINGS BREAKING AND SPARKING – ESTABLISH AND UNDER.
- SARAH: You’ve got to be kidding me.
- VASH: (DEFENSIVE) What?
- JEFF: That doesn’t even look like a ship.
- VULGE: Obviously you haven’t seen a Thrilexian freighter before.
- JEFF: It looks like a garbage truck with wings.
- VULGE: Yup, pretty much.
- VASH: Yeah, well, right now it’s the best option we’ve got (even if YOU don’t think it’s the prettiest). (TO SHIP) Easy girl, they just don’t know you. I still know you’ve got it where it counts.
- SARAH: Alright. I guess beggars can’t be choosers. Get us on board.
- TERG: Right you are.
- SOUND: CODED SERIES OF BEEPS THEN HYDRAULICS OF RAMP COMING DOWN – LET IT FINISH.
- VASH: Vulge, you’ve got navigator experience, right?
- VULGE: Ahuh.
- VASH: Then I want you up front with me. The rest of you, strap yourselves in. This could get a little bumpy.
- SOUND: SCRAMBLE ON BOARD. BELTS BEING CLICKED INTO PLACE.
- SOUND: TAKE OFF AND FLY – LET IT FINISH.
- SOUND: FLIGHT DODGING BACK AND FORTH OVER CREAKING METAL, CRASHES, AND SPARKS – CONTINUE THEN SILENCE – ESTABLISH.
- SARAH: We’re out. Terg, Vash, well done.
- TERG: Don’t thank me, Miss Sarah. Vash is the head for the technical stuff. I’m just the diplomat.
- JEFF: Well, thanks both of you. (BEAT) Hey! Check out what’s happening to the station.
- SOUND: SHOOP NOISE OF STATION COMPACTING DOWN INTO NOTHINGNESS – LET IT FINISH.
- JEFF: Did I even just see that?
- VULGE: That was a shielded anti-matter explosion. It sucked the whole station in on itself and annihilated all the matter that was there. There won’t be so much as a molecule of it left to salvage.
- SARAH: How much data were you able to retrieve before we had to run for it, Jeff?
- JEFF: Oh, I got plenty. Full schematics on the station and its defenses, and even a reasonable chunk of info about that brain-thing that was running it all. Do you think that’s what the members of this council of six are, an entire species of brain-in-a-jar?
- VULGE: No. That was just one of their made to order minions. They like to keep things at arm’s length. I’d say the brain is a fairly new development. They’ve finally started to figure how to manage some biotech.
- SARAH: Speaking of biotech. Did our friend the Plennum, and the other prisoners, get out okay?
- TERG: According to the instruments, everyone who didn’t die is accounted for.
- SARAH: Then I guess its time to set a course for earth. Where are we?
- JEFF: Just inside the orbit of Neptune, by the look.
- SARAH: Vulge, lay in a course for the third planet from the sun… and let me talk with the other ships. We’ll have to convoy in if we don’t want to get blown out of space by the Patrol’s fleet.
- MUSIC: SCENE ENDER – LET IT FINISH.
SCENE 26 – INT – OFFICE OF ADMIRAL FERRIS
(FERRIS, SARAH, JEFF)
- SOUND: CLASSICAL MUSIC PLAYS SOFTLY IN BACKGROUND – LET IT FINISH.
- FERRIS: That was some excellent work you two did getting this intelligence home to us. We now know far more than we ever suspected about the origins of the pirates and their plans. By bringing us the surviving prisoners you’ve even made it possible for us to begin gathering the intelligence necessary to create a diplomatic mission to other worlds. The Thrilexian, in particular, has been a mine of useful information.
- JEFF: A lot of good it’ll do us if we’re still bound to our own solar system. Were any of the races represented able to help us develop engines that will make deep space travel possible?
- FERRIS: Not so much. Most were passengers and pilots. Very few technicians and scientists. None of the ships that have been recovered are equipped for travel between stars.
- JEFF: Damn.
- FERRIS: But… the information you were able to get from the space station is another matter. It looks like the station used some kind of wormhole technology to allow it to travel from star to star. Our scientists haven’t got it figured yet. Some of the mathematics appears to be incomplete.
- JEFF: Yeah, we weren’t able to get everything in the time we had.
- FERRIS: Well, it’s a start… and far more than we had before.
- SARAH: And what about the aliens? Have they been granted sanctuary?
- FERRIS: Yes. We’ve honored your word to them. It’s going to be tricky looking after them all, and a special habitat is being built for them in orbit around Mars but things are progressing nicely.
- SARAH: That’s a relief, Admiral.
- FERRIS: In fact, I’ve had requests from two, or perhaps three depending on how you count, of the visitors to join the patrol.
- JEFF: Seriously? Who?
- SARAH: Let me guess? Vash, Terg, and Vulge.
- FERRIS: You got it in one. I’m seriously considering signing them on. As well as being a formidable combatant, Vulge has amazing astro-navigation abilities, and Vash and Terg’s capacity to act as a liaison between us and other species is uniquely valuable.
- SARAH: So what now Admiral?
- FERRIS: I would have thought that would be obvious, my dear.
- (BEAT) We have an invasion to plan our defense against.
- MUSIC: ENDING THEME AND CREDITS – LET IT FINISH.
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Graduation Day
- Graduation Day – Episode 1 – Disgraced
- Graduation Day – Episode 2 – The Mission Begins
- Graduation Day – Episode 3 – Trapped in the Zoo
- Graduation Day – Episode 4 – Break Out
- Graduation Day – Episode 5 – New Allies, New Goals
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