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Tralla of Torlog

By

Shaun McGrath

** ** Princess Tralla was getting nervous that her Prince had not yet arrived. She had had a very hard time arranging this dinner with just her, her father and her prince.

"Well, we might as well go ahead and eat. This prince of yours can join us when he gets here."

The king had sat patiently for almost an hour, staring at the food. He was starting to drool.

Tralla wanted to get up and pace but knew that her father would wonder if she was making the right choice for a mate. In front of her was a long table, normally used for banquets. The one end of the table was covered with all sorts of foods, from steamed vegies to a well prepared Gargodon. The roast beast was still steaming and the smell was making her want to eat.

The guards by the door were getting more nervous by the minute.

There was knock on the door and a large fellow in flowing robes entered and bowed.

"Yes, what is it?" Asked the king.

"Sire, we have received word from our agents. Prince Steve will not be attending tonight.

The reports say that he has been captured by a terrorist group." He looked ready to duck.

"What?" The princess was on her feet and reaching for where her sword would have been.

"I thought this might happen! What is the ransom?" The king waved for his daughter to sit down. He sighed and waved for the aid to bring him the papers. The large male went around the table on the opposite side from the princess. At this point the stress was too much for the princess and she started to cry. The king had never seen this type of reaction from his youngest and most aggressive child. He almost dropped the papers at the sound.

"Daughter? I assumed that this private dinner was for him to ask for your hand in marriage!

You are aware that because of your position as princess, this young man was in danger from the start." He wanted to give her a hug and dry her tears but Tralla was not a child.

"I don't see any ransom demands!" The king set his napkin on the table beside his unused plate and rose to his feet. He stepped over to the princess and put his hand on her shoulder.

"Sire, they have stated that the prince was to be an example to all royalty, an example of what happens to those who do not give up their birthright." The man bowed and then stayed silent.

"Did they kill him?" The king held Tralla's shoulder tightly.

"No sire, they took him to the forbidden planet!" Tralla felt his hand tighten when he heard the words. She could tell that he wanted to call out the army but not even he could send people to that planet. He let go of her and patted her shoulder.

"I will speak to my brother about this but do not hold out too much hope my daughter.

There is a good reason that they made it a forbidden world." He gave the other male a look.

The two started for the door. He turned and looked at his daughter and could see by the look on her face, Tralla would never just sit still and do nothing. He sighed and motioned for the other male to follow him. Once they had gone to the king's private den, he closed the door and turned to the man.

"She will never leave this alone. She is my daughter and even if I cannot send in troops, there is something I can do! The law allows for a rescue mission, if a ship sends a distress call from that world, is that right?" The other male's eyes opened wide as he listened to the king's plan.

"It will be done, sire!" The male smiled at how well this king, even with all his other responsibilities, knew his daughter.

Tralla was sitting looking at the open door and then staring at the food on the table.

"No! I will not accept this!" She got to her feet and walked straight out to her chambers.

She headed down the long cold halls that led to the royal apartments and with each step she began to form a plan. She knew that she could not take anyone with her, this she would have to do alone. Drak, prince Steve's older brother was one person she trusted. He had on several occasions helped her and Steve in their quest to be together. She had to get to her ship without being seen. At the changing of the guard for the midnight watch she was able to sneak aboard the small space craft without the guards seeing her. She did not turn on the lights as that would let the guards know that someone was aboard. She made her way to the flight deck and found the communications panel. She punched in her personal code and opened a secure channel on ship to ship frequencies.

"Prince Drak sir, there is a request for a secure link. It has Princess Tralla's personal code sir."

The Prince Knew that by now she was aware that his brother was missing.

"To my station!" He picked up the ear piece and put it in his ear.

"Drak here, what can I do for you princess?" He tried not to sound worried.

"I need your help! I am going after Steve!" The silence lasted for what she thought was an eternity. She looked at the console and waited.

"How can I help you?" He was breaking the law just by talking to her about this and he knew it.

"Not over the coms, where can we meet?" She knew that even the secure channels could be monitored. He thought for a minute and then knew of a good place.

"Do you remember the fountain, in the garden?" She knew exactly where he meant.

"I will see you there at the same time as last time!" She closed the channel.

Princess Tralla waited in the ship for the changing of the guard at 03:00 am.

She made her way from the ship over to the patrol shuttle bay. She silently went into the prep room without being noticed. She put on the gear normally worn by the patrol and then pulled over the large poncho used to keep the gear from getting wet. She only made one mistake.

The captain of the guard called the patrol to muster and the princess stood in the back row.

Captain Rillious counted the troops and knew that there was one too many. His eyebrows furrowed as he inspected the troops. He walked down the back row and stopped in front of one of the troopers. He sighed and gave the trooper a look. Then he leaned in and whispered.

"Next time princess, don't forget the boots! I take it you are going to the usual place, so I will arrange for the thrusters to need realignment. It should take, say, half an hour?" He then straightened up and the trooper nodded.

"Very well, looks good men, get aboard and we will get underway!" The captain looked around discreetly to make sure that none of the palace guards had noticed.

Captain Rillious sat in his seat behind the pilot and did his job as if the princess was not on board. The patrol shuttle lifted off on its usual rounds and flew towards the Urgan swamp, then veered North to the Great forest. Half an hour in the captain turned to the troops sitting in the back. He took off the headset and clicked off the monitors.

"Princess, it is not usual for you to meet the prince at this hour, what is going on?"

Princess Tralla took off the large helmet and set it on the bench next to the gun rack.

"How do you guys breath in those things?" She sighed and looked at the Captain.

She heard the chuckles from the troops at her last comment and smiled.

"Captain, if I explain to you what is happening can I trust all of your men to say nothing?"

The Captain thought that she was going to elope with her prince.

"Of course princess! We have never said a word to anyone and for you we never will!"

"Prince Steve has been kidnapped! I am going to save him!" The captain was now very nervous.

"We are sworn to protect and serve. How may we help?" The captain was on his feet and had visions of a secret rescue mission.

"I must do this alone. They have taken him to the one planet I cannot take anyone else.

I am going to meet with his brother and arrange for a diversion."

"Princess Tralla, that is one request we will not obey! You are the youngest member of the royal family and the only one who has ever bothered to get to know any of the royal guard. We would follow you into the Nebula of Pergatory itself to keep you safe."

All of the guards stood and saluted her.

"I appreciate that captain, Marcus, I know that you want to help but I must go to the forbidden world, to Earth!" The captain stepped back at the very sound of the planets name.

"It does not matter! I will go with you!" The first guard stepped forward.

"I will as well!" Several of the others also stepped forward. The princess was stunned.

"You see princess, we would give our lives to keep you safe. Now you will have no choice, we won't let you go alone!" He looked her in the eyes and saw her determination.

"What is your plan?" Tralla put her hand over her mouth and thought for a moment.

"I am going to schedule a practice run in my fighter shuttle. I was going to ask Prince Drak to arrange a diversion, a sort of unplanned inspection of the Garradon outpost. That would give me a couple of days before anyone knew I was missing."

"Princess, my sister, looks a lot like you, she could take your place on the tour and help keep suspicions away?" The pilot had turned to face the princess.

"Now that is a good idea. Can you arrange for her to be at my shuttle at 06:00 hours?"

"Yes, princess!" The pilot then turned around and faced forward.

The captain then sat back in his chair and started giving orders for the approach to the Oasis.

After landing the princess headed directly for the meeting point.

The captain waited for the princess to be out of sight.

"Men, here is what we need to do!" He gave orders to the troops and knew by the way they all acted that they could be trusted.

"Drak?" Princess Tralla was hoping that the prince was already there.

"Lookout!" Drak shouted as he grabbed the princess and pulled her down behind the fountain.

The top half of the fountain exploded with a load boom. The water splashed over the two and they could hear the sound of shooting. There was another explosion and part of a body landed near them. Instead of screaming like a princess might, Tralla reached for her side arm and tried to assess what was going on.

"Who is on our side?" She looked at Drak and chambered a round.

"WOAW! There Princess. I was just checking to see if you could handle anything that might come up. My brother would never forgive me if I let you go there without being sure that you could handle it." Tralla looked at the arm on the ground and saw that it did not bleed.

Drak stood up and then walked over and picked up the arm.

"Rubber! We use them in training exercises. You would be surprised at how many of the troops come unglued at the sight of this thing." He smiled at her.

"You might want to take the round out of that thing!" He pointed at her side arm.

She gave him a very annoyed look. Then took out the clip and pulled the slide back letting the round fall into her hand.

He turned just in time to see the royal guards run into the area with their guns drawn and the red lights on their laser weapons glowing. He put his hands up and stood still.

"Princess, we heard the explosion, are you alright?" The captain was holding a non-standard issue form of machine pistol leveled at the prince.

Tralla, put her hand on the barrel and made him lower the muzzle.

"Fine! Just a little test. She turned to the prince and put her hands on her hips.

"I would never plan to go into something like this if I was not prepared!" She huffed.

"Forgive me, but for his sake I had to be sure! Now what is this plan of yours?"

"I was able to get the records, the real records of the encounter that made that planet off limits. I found that we were the ones who caused it! The emperor had sent a team to try and make peaceful contact at some place called Ross-Well but they were attacked during the landing cycle by a Forley ship.

Apparently they destroyed the Forley ship but the residents found the remains of it.

The leaders of the planet at the time decided that maybe contact with other worlds was not a good idea. They tried to cover it up, something about a weather balloon, but too many of the locals had seen the events. So now they are all paranoid about alien races and being abducted." She sighed.

"Can we just avoid that area and land in another place?" No, we have tried that.

According to the information I have the emperor has a secret base on that planet, one that the locals don't know is there. He has it hidden under a lake in the middle of the continent.

It is suspected that since he has not heard from them in almost a year the rebels may have taken the base."

"How do you know of all this?" The prince narrowed his eyes and his wings fluttered once.

"I have sources! My sources tell me that the Emperor is planning on looking the other way while this rescue mission is taking place. He has no knowledge of it, so it is not his fault if things go wrong!"

"Figures, that emperor is a pretty shrewd guy!" The princess gave Drak a serious look.

"Yes, just don't piss him off or you might end up like the Forley!" She shook her head.

"I thought that the Forley were still just a stone age race." The Captain shifted and holstered his weapon.

"They are now." Prince Drak did not expand on his comment.