And now the final section: “Medical has cleared Doctor Jackson,” Foster told Straker the next day. “No evidence of alien interference, although how they can tell is beyond me.” “Good, good,” Straker commented absently. “We’ve been over the debris. Nothing.” “That doesn’t surprise me,” Straker admitted. “Something scared them out of their minds.” “A dragon?” Foster chuckled. “Don’t laugh, Paul,” Straker warned. “What would you do if you discovered that dragons weren’t a myth?” “Run like hell and hope it wasn't hungry?” “Seriously, Paul.” “I am being serious. A hungry dragon could ruin your whole day.” He was grinning. Then his expression turned more serious. “But if they only thought they saw a dragon, then what was it and why didn’t Sky-one see it?” “I don’t know.” “Do you think Jackson knows?” “He says no.” Straker sat back in his chair, hands steepled in front of his face. “Paul, it’s occurred to me that there is one factor that may not have been included in the analysis of the last few Ufo attacks, the ones the interceptors took care of. The astronauts involved.” “They didn’t even make contact,” Foster reminded him. “Do it anyway, and then check what the gamers were doing at the time of the attacks.” “You have an idea.” “Let’s call it a hunch.” -o-o-o- Foster came back within an hour with the results. They were exactly as Straker had expected even though it made absolutely no sense for it to be true. One astronaut had flown all three missions. And that one astronaut had been within firing rang of the Ufo that flew into the Moon’s surface - Mark Bradley. And Gay Ellis had taken over the center seat for each of those missions and in each instance the game had been interrupted so they could go on duty. It made no sense, but it was nonetheless true. “Get me copies of all the communications between Astronaut Bradley and Moonbase during those missions,” Straker ordered. Then he headed out of his office to locate Doctor Jackson. There was still a missing piece to the puzzle and he was certain that Jackson had that piece. “Commander,” Jackson greeted him when he walked in to the doctor’s cluttered office in the medical center. “Doctor, you told me you thought the aliens thought they saw a dragon and that’s why they self-destructed,” Straker began without preamble. “Yes, I said that.” “But you had no idea what I saw in the clouds.” “Yes,” Jackson said slowly. Straker nodded, arms crossed in front of his chest. “Doctor, what were you doing just before the Ufo started shooting at things on the ground?” Jackson’s forehead creased in puzzlement. “I was speaking with Lieutenant Masters. He had a concern about the side channel we were using, something about signal leakage.” Straker nodded. That was one of the reasons SHADO had stopped using the communications system the gamers were now utilizing. “Did you and he talk about the game at all, use your player character names, maybe?” “Before he rung off, he mentioned something about having Tsigi watch my back. I assume he was making a joke about you taking the character. I said something to the effect that Tsigi should be watching your back.” “Masters knows about Tsigi being a dragon?” Jackson nodded. “And Bradley?” “Naturally.” Jackson gave him a speculative look. “You have a theory about what’s been happening.” Straker managed a chuckle. “It’s crazy.” “Commander, we’re in a bunker eighty-feet below the surface engaged in a war against aliens from outer space. Now, what is crazy?” “I have one more thing to check before I say anything,” Straker said. “But if I’m right…” -o-o-o- It all fit. The puzzle picture was utterly mad, but the pieces fit. Now all SHADO had to do was wait for another attack to test Straker’s theory. “We have reason to believe the aliens are at least partially telepathic,” Straker had explained to Lake, Foster, and Jackson. “At least they don’t communicate with one another in any way we can detect and they seem to be able to control some humans that way, correct?” There were nods all around. “What if they don’t understand us as well as we think?” Straker asked. “What if they don’t understand us as well as they think?” He saw Jackson’s eyes widen in understanding. “They are like computers, logical, orderly. They don’t understand imagination. They don’t understand games.” “They don’t understand make-believe,” Straker said. Suddenly Space Intruder Detector’s electronic voice range out: "Have five U.F.O.s on positive track, Course, four-two-six, one-five-eight; green. Speed, zero-Sol -eight, Range, Thirty two million miles. Red Alert." Straker and the others hurried into the Control room. Now to test his theory. In his mind’s eye he could see Mark Bradley’s interceptor speeding out to stop the aliens. He could see Gay Ellis, Lady Elvietta, wishing Lord Straker, undead cleric of Corellon Larethian, god-speed and good hunting, just as she had done the previous times. Interceptor two got one of the Ufos. Interceptor one, Mark, got the second. One alien ship veered away, back the way it had come, barely missing colliding with one of its fellows. That one was taken out by Interceptor three. “And the fifth one?” Straker asked. “It’s through,” Ford said. He rattled off the predicted trajectory termination. Southern England. Straker took one of the headsets and slipped it on. Ford set the frequency, as he’d been briefed, to the one the gamers had been using. Straker watched the radar blip on the screen, burning it into his mind’s eye. Then summoning all the venom and disdain he could muster he said: “Commander Straker condemns you to die.” The blip seemed to waver. Then it vanished from the screen. “Confirm U.F.O. destroyed,” SID announced. “But Sky-one can’t have gotten anywhere close,” Lake said, wonderment in her voice. “Just like Sunday,” Foster murmured. “They saw a dragon?” Straker pulled off the headset and unplugged it from the console. “No, they just met Commander Straker, Lord Straker’s half-elf heir, twentieth level wizard and sworn defender of the Great Wood.” He gave Jackson a sidelong look. “The aliens don’t understand make-believe. When Jackson and Masters put all the data on the player characters into the computer and sent a copy of the data to Moonbase, the aliens picked it up and thought it was real. Masters and I fed Commander Straker’s stats into the system last night and they believed that, too.” “So, all we have to do is tell them to die and they will?” Foster asked. Straker shook his head. “I wish it was that simple. At some point they’ll realize our magic isn’t as powerful as they thought. But in the meantime, we have a pretty good weapon. And so long as they keep believing that ‘here be dragons’, we have a better chance than we had before.” Foster just shook his head. Lake looked bemused as she walked away to do the analysis on this most recent battle. “Your theory was most interesting,” Jackson murmured. Straker chuckled, relieved. It could have gone terribly wrong. But there was one more thing he needed to test before he was satisfied. “I don’t think I can convince Foster that there really are dragons hiding in plain sight, but you really need to learn greater invisibility. Regular invisibility doesn’t work when you’re fighting.” Jackson’s eyes widened in surprise, or consternation – Straker couldn’t be sure which. But he was sure that his suspicions had just been confirmed. “Tsigi,” he murmured before heading back to his office.
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