Free Deep Space Endeavor 3 Death Match by Ron Francis

were not afraid of a fight. They were the most dangerous cluster of humanity in the galaxy, even if they didn’t know it. It would be prudent for the alliance to come together to rid the galaxy of this distant threat before it found them. After Earth had been taken care of, they would be free to eliminate the rest of humanity at their leisure. As long as there were humans in the galaxy, they would always be a threat simply because they multiplied faster than any of the other races in the galaxy.
    According to the historians of Jarlevia, it had been almost twenty thousand years since they had arrived in the Milky Way Galaxy from the Kalephi galaxy. Twenty-seven known sentient species had been encountered since space travel had been invented on their planet almost two thousand years before the exodus. The Jarlevians were surprised to see how many human worlds were in the galaxy. There were literally hundreds of them. Several of the other sentient species did not like the threat the humans represented and banded together to eradicate them. After destroying nearly fifty human worlds, the rest of the humans began to band together and went on the attack. Within a hundred years of the first attack on a human world, the numerous powerful human armies controlled two full sectors of the galaxy and were well on their way to controlling a third. The humans had subjugated any non-human species that they found. It was as if the ill-advised tactics of alien species long since defeated had given them license to go on a centuries-long crusade. Eventually, they would have subjugated the galaxy. Any sentient species that wasn’t human was in danger. Non-humans had started the war, but humanity had vowed to finish it.
    The fighting between humans and non-humans in the third sector went on for hundreds of years. The rulers of Jarlevia predicted the humans would eventually rule that sector as well. They had a choice, they could go to the last sector that was not yet ruled by humanity, or they could leave the Kalephi Galaxy altogether. They devised a plan to leave the Kalephi Galaxy that would eventually settle them in the largely uninhabited Milky Way Galaxy. The trip would take over a year to make. Once they arrived, they would be the dominant race technologically, and they wouldn’t have to worry about war for a long time. Unfortunately, humanity was losing the war in the last sector and some of the humans had the same idea the Jarlevians did. Ten years after arriving in the Milky Way, the Jarlevian long-range sensors picked up ships entering the galaxy. The Jarlevians were shocked to discover they were ships filled with humans. They did everything they could to find and destroy as many of the human ships as possible. It was just too big a galaxy to search, and they knew they would one day have to deal with the threat of humanity again.
    Even though they arrived at roughly the same time, humanity had multiplied much faster and currently outnumbered the Jarlevians almost twenty to one. Fortunately, most of these human worlds were technologically inferior and could be easily destroyed or subjugated, but not Earth, they had carved out quite a powerful little cluster for themselves. In less than two hundred years, they had expanded from one world to thirty-two worlds with all of their colonies. They also had several resource worlds, not to mention moon-based colonies on eight of those worlds. Research did indicate they had not displaced any sentient species on those worlds, but seeing their expansion was still distressing. They needed to be stopped and the Jarlevian High Council was going to vote to join the alliance only if they promised to help put an end to the threat Earth posed to the rest of the galaxy.
     
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    On Telos, the emergency response vehicle carrying Captain Ariel Marcos had just arrived at the med-center. Manny leapt out of the back followed by his men, and were joined by the rest of his detail as their shuttle