I could not recall entering the room. One moment I was standing in front of the doorway. The next moment I was inside a white room. BUT! For a split second, before I was somehow transported into this room, I saw something. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to remember what I saw. Suddenly, a flash of pain struck my brains. Oww! I tried again to recall the image. And again I was wracked with pain. Okay, apparently something was blocking my mind from recalling the image, whatever it was that I saw. When I opened my eyes, I was not surprised to find two pop-up messages awaiting me. Each announced a loss one point of health.

It took my eyes several seconds to adjust to the white light. My eyes began to distinguish important characteristics of the room. To my surprise, it was a futuristic looking room straight out of a science fiction show. There was a control panel full of dials and buttons on the wall. There was constant clicking and whirling sounds that I had no clue where the noise was coming from. But what caught my attention the most was a window on the wall. And beyond the window was Earth! In other words, I was in outer space! I looked down at my clothes, half-expecting to be wearing an astronaut space suit. But nope, I was still wearing my medieval traveling outfit.

Suddenly, I realized I forgot something important! Where were Kalistra and Alsaj? I looked around and saw that I was alone. Inside a spaceship? A moonbase? Space station? I rejected the possibility of a spaceship because it did not feel like I was moving. Nor did the position of Planet Earth change. I could see the left part of my home planet, taking up a third of the right side of the window.

Well, I won't get anything done by gawking at my home planet. And so, I began to inspect every inch of the room. I discovered that it was circular, perhaps some six feet in diameter. Aside from the panel on the continuous wall, the room was otherwise empty. Considering that the average American prison cell was six feet by nine feet, this place, if it was meant to be my prison cell, was tiny by those standards.

The ambient light was a soft white color which reminded me of the light from eco-friendly light bulbs. If I was stuck inside this room for any length of time, I could see myself sleeping under this constant light. The window on the wall was two feet wide and four feet tall. The control panel with the dials and buttons was directly opposite from the window. I also noticed that there were different color lights on the wall, but they remained dark.

When I looked up, I saw a cone-like spire. At the very top, there was some kind of a nozzle dangling from the spire. When I looked down, I saw a "nub" on the floor and it was protruding from the center of the room. As a test, I decided to stand over the nub to see if anything will happen. When there was no reaction, I purposed stomped the heel of my left foot on the protrusion. However, it was hard metal and did not budge in the slightest.

Suddenly, I felt my body lifted off the ground. My body continued to rise until it was at the midpoint between the nozzle on top and the nub on the bottom. Once my body was set in proper place, a beam of white light hit me from the top while a beam of black light hit me from the bottom. The two lights combined and created a field of energy that surrounded me. Enveloped in this gray force field, I began to see things: "Neural link connecting. . . Connecting. . . Established. Access to Starship Z-Delta-5 confirmed. Command access granted. Command level: captain. Current ship status: stand-by mode. Status report: hull integrity 100%, engineering 100%, life support 100%, weapons offline, thrusters offline, warp engines offline, inertia dampeners offline, shields offline, cloaking online."

When I turned my head left, I saw a holographic projection of my ship. When I saw it, I was very disappointed. Was it a big, mean battle cruiser? No. Was it a ship from Star Wars? No. Was it anything like an Enterprise from Star Trek? Not even close. The small, circular dimension of my "room" should have offered a huge clue if I had bothered to pay attention. My ship was one of those flying saucers that Uncle Sam insisted for many decades was a hoax.

Suddenly, a klaxon sounded and the white light in the room turned red. A holograph projection appeared to my right, showing the solar system in 3-D. Beyond the Kuiper Belt, there was a row of white dots that were stationary. They were being systematically destroyed by a huge swarm of red dots, at least two dozen enemy fighters. The next line of defense was in front of Saturn. After that . . . there was only my ship! As I suspected, I was stationed on the far side of the moon.

I watched the enemy planes to get a sense of their fighting tactics. They seemed to work individually rather than as groups or teams. I pointed a finger at one of the enemy ships, and another holographic projection appeared over the map. The enemy ship was cigar shaped! I resisted the temptation to facepalm at the sight. Over the years, there were claims from eyewitnesses of seeing saucer-shaped UFOs fighting cigar-shaped UFOs. I should have expected to see an invasion from cigar shaped fighters.

I pointed at one of our remaining stationary defensive units. The holographic projection showed a simple orb which fired a powerful laser beam from its center. There were no wings or engines attached to the orb. All it could do was turn in 360-degree angle to track enemy fighters and fire at them. The laser was certainly powerful, as a single blast was enough to destroy a cigar fighter. The problem, though, was that the orb could only fire one laser at a time and track one target. The enemy ships outnumbered the defensive orbs and simply took advantage of their superior number to swarm and destroy these units. By the time the last orb was destroyed, there were fifteen cigar fighters remaining.

I pointed at the white dots stationed in front of Saturn. The holographic projection showed clusters of mines. Information regarding the properties of these space mines was feed directly into my brain via my neural link. Inside each mine was a small thermonuclear bomb. When an unknown ship flew within a hundred feet of a mine, the mine will attach to the ship magnetically. After a five second countdown, the bomb inside will detonate. There were ten clusters of six mines each. I confirmed, via my neural link, that if my saucer flew near these mines, they would not activate and attach to my ship.

Okay. While I wasn't a strategist like Napoleon, it was obvious that the best thing to do was to charge into the cigar-swarm and draw them into the space mines. To do that, I needed to know if I can make it to Saturn before they do. I started making inquiries via my neural link. What was the distance between my current position and the space mines?

A semi-transparent screen appeared in front of me. "~9 AU."

From my introductory Astronomy course back in college, an "AU" was shorthand for "Astronomical Unit" and referred to the distance between the Earth and the Sun. And the field of astronomy used AU as a point of reference. I asked my next question: what was the distance between my current position and the destroyed laser orbs?

"~43 AU."

The distance definitely worked in my favor. I will reach the space mines in front of Saturn before the bogeys arrive. I quickly gave the command to head to Saturn at maximum speed.

My neural interface started processing my command: "Stand-by mode disengaged. Warp mode engaged. Warp engines online. Shields online. Inertial dampeners online. Hull plates reinforced by 100%. Launch sequence in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Launched!"

The flying saucer shook slightly as my ship began to travel at an unimaginable speed. I was held in place by the force field that surrounded me. I kept my eye on the map, which showed my current position as a white dot and the enemies' positions as red dots. I had no idea how long the flight lasted and I didn't care. I was just happy that when my ship disengaged the warp drive, my body didn't go "splat." In the back of my mind, I knew there was a possibility that the inertial dampeners could malfunction. If so, my fragile, unprotected human body will slam against the force field akin to an egg thrown against the hard pavement.

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I looked at the map again. My white dot was in front of Saturn and the clusters of space mines were spread out in front of my ship. The red dots were already half-way to Uranus. I asked the interface: how far was Uranus from Earth?

"~20 AU."

Ouch. The defensive units were originally 43 AUs from Earth. And that was where the space invaders were when my saucer left the moon. They were almost half-way to Uranus, say 31 AUs away. If the cigar-shaped ships could travel 12 AUs in the time it took my ship to travel 8 AUs, then obviously their ships were faster than mine. This meant that, while I could fly out to engage the bogeys, I couldn't fly too far away from the space mines. To be on the safe side, I won't engage with the enemy until they were 4 or 5 AUs from Saturn.

I waited nervously inside my force field as the red dots flew past Uranus without stopping to survey the planet. It gave a clue as to the intention of these space invaders. If they wanted to take our planets for resources, then they could have stopped at Uranus and spent some time to survey the planet to study its resources. Instead, these ships kept moving. My great fear was that their goal was Earth, and I was the only Earthman in a position to protect my planet.

When I made that realization, I started shaking. I was experiencing an anxiety attack. "Oh no! Not now!" I closed my eyes and balled my hands into fists. Suddenly, a light appeared in my mind and expanded until it enveloped every cell in my body. I felt tranquility and slowly the anxiety faded away. "Thank you," I said aloud.

However, the neural interface remained silent.

My eyes remained closed as I took deep breaths and meditated while hovering inside the field. When the klaxon blared again as I expected, I opened my eyes and looked at the holographic map. The red dots were half-way between Uranus and Saturn. It was time for me to engage them in combat! I chose a spot in front of the space mines and pointed a finger at it. "Let's fly to this location," I ordered.

The flying saucer began to move and responded via the neural link: "Thrusters engaged. Moving at full impulse."

"What weapons are on this ship?" I asked.

The response via the link: "Antimatter torpedoes x20. Pulsating lasers x2."

"Pulsating?" I asked and the interface sent me a quick summary. The lasers pulsated at changing frequencies in order to break through enemy shields. The lasers took five seconds to recharge. "How do I target the lasers?"

In response, the neural interface created a smaller virtual screen at chest level and a joystick in front of the screen, which had a crosshair at the center of the screen. The joystick had a red button on top and a red trigger on the side.

I learned that the top button was to launch a set of torpedoes, while the trigger was to fire the double laser. The joystick will allow me to move the targeting cursor until I locked onto an enemy vessel.

The alarm sounded again. "Enemy engaged," the ship warned via the interface.

My ship shuddered twice. "Shields at 95%."

Damn. I had been hit twice already! "Time to dance! Engage in evasive maneuvers," I ordered.

The flying saucer weaved its way into the swarm of cigar fighters. It turned out that these ships had less maneuverability than my saucer. More importantly, a few bogeys were taken out by friendly fire.

I moved my joystick around, still waiting to pull the trigger. Suddenly, a bogey was squarely in my cross hair and I quickly pressed the top button to launch torpedoes. Boom! The explosion took out my target and damaged a second ship caught in the blast. I finished off the other ship with laser fire.

However, my ship shuddered again a few times. "Shields at 80%."

"Damn!" I checked the holographic map. There were still too many enemy ships. "How many enemies remaining?" I asked.

"13." The digits appeared above my targeting screen.

"We're going to continue engagement until our shields drop to 50%. When that happens, we will turn tail and lure them to the space mines," I ordered.

The flying saucer continued its deadly dance in outer space.

I launched my antimatter torpedos as soon as my crosshair flashed green. I managed to launch three more sets of torpedos. However, the cigar fighters apparently learned to spread out because no more untargeted ships were caught in the blasts. I managed to snuff out another cigar with my lasers. And that was all I could do when my shields dropped to 48%.

When that happened, the flying saucer lifted upward and kept bobbing and weaving while the ship was upside down.

I, too, was upside down on the ship but the force field held me in place.

The ship rocked again from another hit. "Shields at 43%." It flew as close as possible to the nearest set of space mines.

BOOOOOMM! The first set of mines latched onto their target and exploded.

I looked at the holographic map and saw that the mines had taken out two bogeys.

Two more ships triggered the space mines and exploded before the rest stopped following me. Instead, they started targeting the remaining space mines with laser fire and triggered the remaining two sets of mines to explode.

"Turn around and engage them," I ordered.

The saucer lifted again and inverted. It dove straight for the enemy ships while they were taking out the mines.

I fired my last remaining set of torpedos and took out three more cigar ships. "How many enemies remaining?" I asked.

"4." The number appeared above my targeting screen.

I kicked at the air with my left foot. On one hand, it was a miracle that my flying saucer took out so many bogeys. The onboard AI was definitely a flying ace. I doubted that I had the skills or the bravery to engage in this kind of dogfight in outer space. On the other hand, I was out of antimatter torpedos and shields were down to 33%. With a 4-to-1 disadvantage, I had to do something desperate because, at 33% shields, a direct dog fight was out of the question.

My flying saucer had one distinct advantage over the cigar ships: maneuverability. To exploit this edge, I had to lure them into the asteroid belt and make my last stand there. Even if I end up losing my shields, I could still play a game of hide-and-seek amongst the asteroids. "I want to lure the enemy ships into the asteroid belt," I said while pointing at the region between Jupiter and Mars.

Following my order, my ship purposely buzzed past the enemy ships and they gave chase.

While my vessel weaved its deadly dance again, I fired several shots at the bogeys. Somehow, I landed a lucky shot and hit one chaser dead center, causing it to explode! "Thank you, Lady Luck!" I yelled, even though it was unlikely that her powers extended to outer space.

The cigar fighters returned fire, knocking my shields down to 27%.

Suddenly, one of the ships appeared directly in our path! Its intention was obvious: for us to crash into it and destroy our ship.

My onboard AI tilted the saucer dish at a steep angle and cut all power to the impulse engines. The ship dove right under the suicidal enemy ship and then re-engaged impulse engines. My ship pushed at top speed and continued until we finally reached the asteroid belt.

"Can our sensors detect the locations of the asteroids and put them on the map?" I asked.

A reply was sent via the neural link: "Extended scanning engaged. Estimated completion time: 30 seconds." The flying saucer flew into the asteroid belt and cut its impulse engines to 10% power.

Soon, the remaining 3 enemy ships arrived. They started blasting at the asteroids randomly.

My ship delved further into the asteroids field, avoiding the laser blasts entirely.

The cigar ships slowly flew into the asteroid field.

"Extended scanning completed," the AI announced via the interface. Asteroids started populating the holographic map.

"Can we ram an asteroid into an enemy ship?" I asked.

"Proposed action may exceed hull integrity," the AI warned.

"That's a risk we may have to take," I replied as I watched the map intently.

The red dots were moving slowly among the asteroids, cutting some with lasers to remove obstacles in their path.

My intention was to wait for the perfect cut shot, pushing the asteroid that we ram to hit nearby asteroids and cause them to smash into the bogeys. Any ship that remained, I will snuff it out. It took a good twenty minutes for the perfect shot to line up, and I immediately took it. The chain reaction caused the asteroids to smash into all three ships. Two were destroyed outright and I took out the survivor in an intense exchange of laser fire. While I emerged victoriously, my shields were down to 2%.

A new screen appeared over the targeting screen, and it read from top to bottom as follows: "SCORECARD: 15 enemy ships engaged. 15 ships destroyed. 200 points earned per ship destroyed = 3,000 points. Starship Z-Delta-5 survived engagement = 1,000 bonus points. Zero damage to Home Planet = 1,000 bonus points. Total score = 5,000 points."

When I finished reading my scorecard, the gray-colored force field surrounding me disengaged, leaving my body floating in zero gravity. I could no longer access the neural link to command the ship. The red colored lights were replaced with white lights. Suddenly, a beam hit me from the nozzle high above me. My body became digitalized a la the main character in "Tron" movie. My digital form was then sucked into the nozzle and I lost consciousness.