Asteroid Crisis: Star Challengers Book 3 Read Online Free PDF Page A

knew those Kylarn words you’ve been teaching us for the past couple of weeks,” JJ said.
    Zota gave a somber nod. “While I fixed machinery for the Kylarn, I met another man who sometimes translated for them—a man I got to know very well. He was also professor at the university, teaching linguistics and philosophy. Like me, he had lost his family and fervently wished to prevent further human suffering. We talked long into the night, while we shivered in our tattered tents, trying to imagine scenarios of how the war might end. Neither of us believed humans could defeat the Kylarn—not with what we had. Time and again I wished I could go back and change the short-sighted thinking that had left the human race incapable of defending itself.”
    “Who was this other man?” King asked.
    “His name was Toowun. Professor Toowun.” Zota looked up. JJ’s surprise was reflected on her friends’ faces. “He theorized that if human beings could show the Kylarn that we were no threat to them, they would leave more of us alive.”
    Commander Zota lowered his gaze, looking down at his desk. His eyes were drawn to the Challenger model. “Others, though, didn’t give up the fight. Some military commanders gained access to old nuclear missiles and launched them, destroying a Kylarn outpost. They took the aliens by surprise.”
    “Good for them!” Dyl said.
    Zota didn’t smile. “Because of that resistance, the Kylarn queen retaliated by massacring more than four hundred million humans.” He stopped, letting the words hang in the air. As the very idea sank in, JJ tried to grasp the magnitude of so many deaths.
    “Then one night Professor Toowun and I were taken to the experi-mental building. There were chambers dedicated to medical experiments, psychological experiments, even some high-tech physics experiments … one of which was a time machine.” Zota sat up straight. JJ’s pulse raced as they waited to hear what he would say next.
    “It’s a long story. I don’t know what they intended to do with Toowun and me that night. We heard enough of what they were saying to be convinced they intended to kill more humans, either quickly or by inches. And they expected us to help them.
    “Maybe because we seemed so docile, or because Professor Toowun acted completely submissive and helpless, the Kylarn let down their guard. I surprised them by fighting. It’s amazing how strong you can be once you make up your mind to act. When you take bold action, you must commit to it. I got one of the laser shredders away from the guards and killed them. Toowun was astonished. We tried to escape, but the laboratory building was crawling with other Kylarn. Alarms began to sound. They were going to find us soon.
    “We locked ourselves into a room with two time machines, each the size of a refrigerator. The controls were quite complex, but by this point I understood Kylarn controls and their written language. We could both have fled in the same machine, but we didn’t want to leave one for the Kylarn to come after us with. So, Toowun and I each activated one of the devices, set a destination back in time—and adjusted the field so it would encompass ourselves and the machines. I ended up here. I knew I had work to do.” He drew a deep breath and visibly slumped in the chair, as if merely telling the tale had exhausted him.
    “What about Toowun?” JJ asked. “We know he’s here.”
    “I do now,” Zota sighed. “You reported that he’s been training Cadet Mira—and who knows how many others? I thought Toowun and I were on the same side, but evidently we came to different conclusions. I never heard from him again. I thought he’d been lost in the transport process, or maybe he had his time set to a slightly different destination.”
    “We never thought this mission was going to be easy,” JJ said. “But it looks like Mentor Toowun and Mira are going to make it harder for us.”
    “As if fighting the Kylarn invasion wasn’t