Buck Rogers reboot movie treatment

Two people frozen in time are thawed out on Earth of the 25th Century to help rally the peoples of the Solar System's colonies against an oppressive dictator. Along the way, they discover allies of their own and an intergalactic empire that is supplying the dictator's resources.

GEORGE "BUDDY" WADE - In the year 1939, fourteen-year-old Buddy tried to escape his parents' looming divorce by forcing the crew of his dad's experimental zeppelin to take off without their captain and pilot a course for the North Pole. Steering right into the middle of a fierce blizzard around the Arctic Circle, the zeppelin USS Chandril (ZRS-6) crashed around the area of the North Pole. By what would be considered a miracle, the experimental "Nirvano" freezing gas kept Buddy and his reluctant hostages in a state of suspended animation for a period stretching from 1939 all the way to 2491 - a period of 552 Earth years. He is seen with Buck in trying to figure out his place.

CAPTAIN WILLIAM ANTHONY LUCAS "BUCK" ROGERS - 34 years of age by the year 1984, the cool-headed and humble Buck Rogers was tasked by President Reagan to infiltrate and blow the whistle on a conspiracy by a cabal of military officials to launch a nuclear first strike against all of the Soviet Union's own missile silos in Siberia, Antarctica and the Arctic. Confident that he prevented the end of the world, he joined NASA as the astronaut to pilot their secret one-man exploration starship Olympus IX on a five-month mission of astronavigation. Buck is heartbroken that all he has loved is gone and his infiltration mission was all for naught. But he wishes to save the Earth anyway.

COLONEL WILMA DEERING - In her 30s, Wilma is the Solar Defense Directorate's top agent and captain of the Solar Defense Directorate's Thunder-class Starfighter Mecha squadrons. She is a potential partner and (maybe) love interest for Buck Rogers who is often the one to help Buck and Buddy find their way through the 25th Century. Both her parents were killed by the Consortium that runs the corrupt Earth government. Having been imprisoned for attacking Consortium bases, she escaped later while surviving on her own. After many months, Wilma returned to Earth to officially join the Defense Directorate, and resumed her effort to free her home star system from Killer Kane.

DOCTOR ELIAS HUER - 65, Huer is the appointed head of the Solar Defense Directorate, the paramilitary defense and space exploration arm of the United Galactic Commonwealth. As the Directorate's Scientist General, he worked with Admiral Asimov in developing many of the technologies used in their guerrilla wars on the forces which forced the Commonwealth out of control of Earth in effort to reclaim their home planet. A wise and knowledgeable fellow, he is amazed that Captain Rogers and Buddy could survive for five hundred years. He is one of the first to want to meet them and acclimate them into the 25th Century. He may serve as the M and Q to Rogers' James Bond.

ADMIRAL NADIA ASIMOV - 57, Commanding officer of the Commonwealth Star Ship Searcher and a distant descendant of Isaac Asimov, Nadia is the one who introduces Buck and Buddy to Twiki and Dr. Theopolis. From the very beginning, she saw in Wilma something that would remind Nadia of herself at a younger age. It was she who offered Wilma a place in the Solar Defense Directorate, and who trained her in both electro-sword and laser blaster combat, as well as piloting starfighters and other spacecraft. Even in middle age, Nadia has a great deal of drive for her work; having become protector of many in the Solar System, even earning some male admirers for her age.

"BLACK" BARNEY SMITH - 47, notorious galactic gunrunner, the Solar Defense Directorate hopes that "Black Barney" as he is called in this part of the galaxy will be convinced to take a higher price for shipping arms to the Commonwealth armies so to take back Earth and most of the Solar System from Killer Kane's Consortium. Barney is reluctant to get into any major political and or military operations due to his own commitment to proving himself worthy of the League of Interstellar Mercenaries headed by Seton Kellogg - who secretly have ties to Killer Kane and the Draconian Empire. Little does he know that the League is planning to double cross him and turn him over to Tigerman.

PRINCE HAWK THE BIRDMAN - 25, an associate of Black Barney Smith; the strong but logical, honorable but the silent type Prince Hawk is the deposed leader of the Bird People of the planet Throm. Once a proud home of flight-capable avian-based humanoids, Throm has fallen under attack and the forces of the Morning Star Consortium have conquered it. The heroes of the Solar Defense Directorate now fear that Black Barney may try to convince Hawk to side with power and send his last remaining military forces to join Killer Kane's Consortium instead of the Commonwealth, but Hawk is instead committed to seeking justice for his late wife KOORI, who sacrificed herself for him. 

DOCTOR THEOPOLIS - Also known as "Theo", Theopolis is a sentient computer in the shape of a disk, measuring about 9 inches wide and 1 1/2 inches deep with an illuminated face. He is capable of understanding the ambuquad drone Twiki's binary electronic language, and is often carried around by him. Theo is a member of the Directorate's "computer council" and one of the Solar System's scientific leaders. In his travels, he often goes alongside Twiki to bail our heroes out of a life-threatening jam. He sometimes comes off as fussy, eager to get results and please, and overbearing at worst; but has a deep fascination with learning about the Earth language of old in helping out Buck.

TWIKI THE AMBUQUAD - The name, "Twiki", is derived from the robot's alphanumeric designation TWKE-4, serial number N22-23-T. He is a humanoid robot about 1/2 the size of an ordinary human - sometimes referred to as an "ambuquad" which, refers to a specialized series of robots made for work in space mines, and used as Ambulatory Transportation for their Quad superiors and partners. Due to Buck's 20th Century terminologies and references, and his treatment of Twiki as a true friend rather than servant, Twiki begins to emulate and join in Buck's sense of humor. In keeping with the double act with Dr. Theopolis, they serve as a Greek chorus to commentate on the action.

This movie is more than just a simple adaptation of all incarnations of the classic character of Buck Rogers, but is the science fiction love child of Peter Jackson's Hobbit Trilogy and Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai/The Magnificent Seven with a little Midway, 633 Squadron or The Dam Busters thrown in for good measure. A runaway kid is frozen when the experimental zeppelin he has taken control of crashes at the North Pole in 1939; while in 1984, a US Air Force captain is launched aboard a one-man exploration starship Olympus IX and is frozen as well by a freak mishap running into a frozen meteorite storm. The two are thawed out by Earth people hundreds of years later in 2491.

The two are introduced to life on Earth and across the Solar System of the 25th Century. A secret government conspiracy that the captain tried to infiltrate and blow the whistle on initiated a nuclear first strike against Soviet missile silos in Siberia, Antarctica and the Arctic. In repentance for their actions, the nations of the world banded together to make the future better in all aspects. While they were setting out to colonize other worlds and parts of the Solar System and beyond, the criminal element waited in the shadows and sought the help of the dominant galactic powers to challenge and usurp the power their enemies had. Now the race is on to see which side shall rule the galaxy.

Among the enemies to the Solar Defense Directorate are KILLER KANE the Super-Racketeer who has gained control of the Earth's current capitol of New Chicago. His war for control of the Universe and the Solar System is being supported by his allegiance with the Draconian Empire ruled by EMPEROR DRACO and enforced by Draco's youngest daughter PRINCESS ARDALA VALMAR. While Black Barney owes a big debt to SETON KELLOGG of the League of Interstellar Mercenaries and is being chased by Ardala's bounty hunter TIGERMAN, neither one is prepared for a certain attitude Ardala takes towards Captain Rogers. Ardala sees Rogers as her chance to overthrow her father and Kane.

Operating from the United Galactic Commonwealth's cruiser Searcher, New Chicago on Earth, and from Sky City on Saturn and its largest moons, the heroes of the Commonwealth's Solar Defense Directorate (Buddy, Buck, Wilma, Theo, Twiki, Huer and Asimov) now have to attempt to secure the help of the BIRD PEOPLE of THROM and their leader PRINCE HAWK in driving off Killer Kane's CONSORTIUM OF THE MORNING STAR armed forces and expose its dealings with the DRACONIAN EMPIRE. Little do they know is that HAWK has his own grudge against the Consortium and the Draconians for the capture of his wife KOORI, but his people want a strong government under Killer Kane.

    1) We open in the year 1939, at Westmore Observatory near the currently closed Albany Airport in New York where an experimental zeppelin for the U.S. Navy, the USS Chandril (ZRS-6); sits ready for takeoff on a mission to circumnavigate the globe from the North Pole to the South Pole and back again. Hearing news that his parents are potentially getting a divorce, George "Buddy" Wade runs away to the airport where the Chandril lies parked. Knowing his father was going to captain the zeppelin, Buddy sneaks in and disarms the guards. He takes their guns and orders his father's crew to take him up and off - using the Chandril to run away from home and escape the divorce.

    2) Hearing and reliving in his mind the back and forth of the fights his parents and their attorneys were having, Buddy has steered the Chandril right into the path of an oncoming blizzard circling the North Pole. Buddy's father Captain Wade was made aware by his scientist friend Professor Raiden that there was good supply of Raiden's experimental Nirvano gas for cryogenic suspension. If by some chance the Chandril was to crash, Nirvano gas would activate automatically and freeze the Chandril's occupants until a rescue team arrives. By sheer coincidence, the zeppelin was taking on ice and being forced down by the wind as Buddy and the crew saw the ground approaching them.

    3) The Chandril comes comes crashing down onto the North Pole just as the Nirvano gas begins to take effect among the occupants of the zeppelin. Time jumps forward to the year 1983, when tensions between the United States of America (USA) and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) or "Soviet Union" were rising further. In a darkened room, one man secretly records his sitting in on a meeting of top US Military commanders conspiring as a cabal to launch a nuclear first strike against the Soviets. Confident that he has helped to prevent a holocaust of nuclear armageddon, he leaves to deliver his recording of the meeting to the sitting President Ronald W. Reagan.

    4) Later, in the year 1984; a Saturn V rocket lifts off from Pad 39A at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s own John F. Kennedy Space Center on Florida's Merritt Island. The payload being carried in the Saturn V's third stage (S-IVB) Spacecraft Lunar Module Adapter (SLA) is a one-man spaceplane-type exploration vessel - Olympus IX. Aboard this compact starship, the lone astronaut Captain Buck Rogers is to experience "cosmic forces beyond all comprehension" - in an awesome brush with death. During a freak mishap happening in the blink of an eye, his life support systems froze the occupant in perfect hibernation with temperatures beyond imagination.

    5) While the crew of the USS Chandril sleeps around the North Pole, Olympus IX is blown out of its planned trajectory into an orbit 1000 times more vast. An orbit which is to return the ship and Buck Rogers full circle to their point of origin, their mother Earth, not in five months, but over 500 years later. While the time asleep is longer for Buddy, the same could be said for Buck. For 500 years, Buck Rogers drifts through a world in which reality and fantasy merge into a timeless dream - miraculously preserved, until in Earth year 2491, he is about to be rudely awakened by the sinister forces of the Draconian Empire, supporting what is a "Consortium of the Morning Star".

    6) While a Thunder-class starfighter patrol of two from the Commonwealth Star Ship Searcher is scouting out the anti-aircraft defenses around the fallen Earth city of New Chicago, a strange life sign is detected at the North Pole. The two fighter pilots manage to slip away without being detected by Consortium scanners. In the meantime, out in space, Olympus IX is found by and brought aboard the flagship Draconia of the Draconian Empire. It is here that Buck Rogers is awoken from his slumber, and he is sent back towards the Solar System to find out what that kind of ship would want. As Buck begins his approach towards Florida, Consortium scanners detect his arriving ship.

    7) Having recovered Buddy from the crashed Chandril, the starfighter patrol notices some of the Consortium's Scorpion-class fighters are attempting to attack and destroy Olympus IX. Buck tries to outfly and outrun his attackers until the Thunder fighters destroy the two Scorpion fighters and rescue him. The lead starfighter carrying Buddy is piloted by the one and only Colonel Wilma Deering of the Solar Defense Directorate. She takes Buck and Buddy back to her superiors stationed in the floating Sky City on Saturn. Here, she introduces Buck and Buddy to her superiors Doctor Elias Huer and Admiral Nadia Asimov, along with their machine cohorts Twiki and Dr. Theopolis.

    8) Whilst being studied by Huer and Asimov, Buck and Buddy are told of what has happened. In the years following the holocaust of a nuclear armageddon towards the close of the 20th Century as the result of a conspiracy that Buck both tried to unravel and prevent from happening; the people of Earth had begun to rebuild their civilization both on Earth and the other planets, moons, asteroids and gas giants of the Solar System. Resolving not to let petty differences get in the way of a peaceful and just government of their peoples, the humans have founded the United Galactic Commonwealth. But there are some who have broken away to try and establish a more dangerous state.

    9) These criminals and raging militants sought to overthrow the Commonwealth and conquer the galaxies. Their leader is Killer Kane, the Super-Racketeer who is the Supreme Leader of the Consortium of the Morning Star. The Directorate wants proof that the corrupt and cruel Kane is engaged with the Draconian Empire. Buck seeks further proof that over five hundred years have passed and the Earth of their times suffered a holocaust of nuclear armageddon at the close of the 20th Century. Wilma offers to let them use a freighter they managed to snag from the Consortium to sneak into the Consortium's capital of New Chicago, once the capitol of the United Galactic Commonwealth.

    10) Sneaking in under disguise as a Consortium freighter, Twiki and Theopolis travel with Buck and Buddy through the ruins of what is Old Chicago. The ruined city is called the Anarchia Badlands, because the radiation-mutated humanoids who live there have been reduced to primitive, savage barbarians by the toxic effects on the human brain by what is left of the radioactive fallout. As night falls, Buck walks through the ruined Union Station to see a cemetery outside. In the cemetery, the four find a grave marking the burial of Buck's mother Edna and father James, his older brother Franklin and older sister Marilyn. Twiki and Theopolis warn Buck and Buddy they must escape.


    11) Just as a patrol of laser tanks from Killer Kane arrive to arrest the four, the Anarchians corner and battle with the Consortium Star Troopers who drive the tanks. In the ensuing chaos, our four heroes manage to commandeer one of the tanks and destroy the other while sneaking back to the freighter. Arriving back aboard the Searcher, Buck is now convinced and wants to help retake the Earth from forces as crooked as Kane's Consortium. Knowing that Kane would not be acting alone, Asimov purports that the Draconian Empire is supplying and financing his war on the peoples of the Commonwealth - and yet they haven't been able to get the proof of such traitorous dealings.

    12) Back at Kane's palace base in New Chicago, he communicates over hyperspace with Princess Ardala, the youngest princess of the Draconian Empire and daughter of Emperor Draco the Conqueror. Kane demands to know whether their ultimate weapon the Morning Star Probe is ready. As the Supreme Commander of the Draconian Military, Ardala reports that the weapon is ready. This mobile laser probe is an old mining satellite turned experimental heavy weapons platform with a mega laser/pulsar cannon that can obliterate entire cities and even planets. Within a week, Ardala shall deliver the weapon to Kane personally to test on the numerous planets of the Commonwealth. 

    13) Asimov and Huer note that there is one hope - the mighty Bird People of Throm. If their planet is freed from the Consortium, they might be willing to aid the Commonwealth's Directorate in the war against Kane and the Draconians. They will also need proof that Kane is dealing with the Draconians subjugating the Bird People in order to supply ships, weapons and warriors to have any chance. Wilma will have to take Buck, Buddy, Twiki and Theopolis with her to Sutter's World in the Vega System to meet with a gunrunner and his Bird Man partner who could be most helpful. At the luxurious yet seedy hotel, Buck and Wilma seek the services of Black Barney Smith and his man Hawk.

    14) Buddy gets into trouble with some locals but they are frightened off by Wilma's electro-sword. As Buck negotiates with Barney and Hawk for him to informally join the Directorate and supply them, Barney tells him that he's secretly hoping to prove himself to the League of Interstellar Mercenaries who own and operate his Astro Sled-class Freighter-Bomber the Aurora. Knowing the League is in cahoots with Kane and the Draconians, Buck offers Barney and Hawk protection and independence from the Consortium and Empire. With that, Barney and Hawk head off to find the Aurora guarded by the League's Seton Kellogg and his mercenaries. He promises to pay them back his debt.

    15) As our heroes now joined by Barney and Hawk (now revealed to be Prince Hawk, the deposed leader of the Bird People of Throm) return to their Thunder Fighters, they soon notice that some of Killer Kane's Star Troopers and some Draconian Spartan Troopers are now rampaging across the city. Most assuredly, Kellogg's League had tipped off Ardala and she has now arrived aboard the flagship Draconia to stop our heroes from reaching Throm. Needing to clear a way through the blockade of Kane-aligned Scorpion Fighters for the Aurora to reach the Stargate that can take them past light speed to Throm, our heroes take off to clear a path for the Aurora to flee Sutter's World.


    16) With the siege of Sutter's World underway; aboard the Draconia, Ardala reports to Kane that the "foolish" Earth heroes are going to be led right into their trap at Throm. She then remembers a presence when a starship from Earth was captured and then set free by them - Olympus IX, piloted by Buck Rogers. As Ardala ends the transmission between her ship and Kane's palace base, she now finds herself in a bind: should she continue to enforce her father's will and aid Kane in conquering the Universe, or could she defy her father and Kane for this new man who fights for the common people? She has no time for this, as the Draconia is now being tailed by the Directorate heroes.

    17) Our heroes in their fighters take off into the Stargate. In a Draconian control room over planet Throm, the numerous Bird People are being held prisoner by forces of the Consortium and the Empire, under the watch of Ardala's bodyguard Tigerman. From this control room, the Bird People watch in horror as the Morning Star fires upon the planets numerous reservations, villages and cities; reducing Throm to a ball of molten liquid rock and gas. Coming out of the Stargate, our heroes find Throm is no more - leaving Hawk upset that he wasn't able to protect his people. They have no time to grieve however as they soon find themselves being pulled in by the Draconia's tractor beam.

    18) The fighters arrive aboard the Draconia which is docking with a Draconian Star Palace orbiting the devastated planet Throm. Being labeled traitors against the Consortium, Ardala orders Buddy, Wilma, Twiki, Theopolis, Hawk and Barney to be put into the brig while she takes Buck away to her private quarters. The Draconians' youngest princess tries to appeal to Buck's sense of justice and wish for power to set things right in the universe, all while stimulating his masculine and her feminine wiles as she strips out of her outfit. Attempting to make love to Buck while he's under a drug, she lets on that she wishes for him to help overthrow both her father and Killer Kane as well.

    19) Inciting a prison riot, Hawk helps Wilma and the others break prisoners from Throm and the Directorate out of the brig and arming them to escape. Knowing that their fighters cannot break out of the Star Palace with the tractor beams still on, Wilma heads for the Star Palace's Utility Control Chamber (UCC) to disconnect the tractor beam. Barney asks Hawk why he would even consider helping humanity with driving off the Consortium and Empire in such a foolhardy and fruitless war. Hawk asserts that every one of them has lost something precious to time and the forces of evil - this is their chance to force the Consortium and Draconians to come to witness this point of view.

    20) Hawk makes his way through the Palace breaking Buck and his wife Koori, who had been captured by the Draconians before their Star Palace razed Throm, out of Ardala's quarters and the brig. Koori gives Hawk a pendant with a data disc - loaded with information on Draconian fleet movements and the ways the Draconia operates the Morning Star probe to blast entire cities and planets to rubble. Just as they embrace, a Palace-wide alert orders the Draconians' Spartan Troopers to battle and end their opposition - using full power on their laser blaster guns. Reaching a service chasm, Hawk pulls out a utility belt's grappling rope hook so he and Koori can swing across to flee.


    21) Conferring with her father the Emperor Draco the Conqueror, Ardala offers to deliver Buck to them so they can make him into one of their own mighty warriors. Draco orders her to do just that before they receive a report of riots breaking out across the Palace. After receiving this order, Ardala charges off to do away with the rabble rousers attempting to escape. Spotting Wilma as she approaches the Star Palace's hangar bay, the two engage in a electro-sword duel that has them equally matched opponents. Even so, they keep the battle conversation civilized, as Wilma implores Ardala to renounce the Empire. Ardala states that in light of its actions, she is considering such.

    22) Our heroes soon make their way to the hangar bay where the Aurora, Thunder Fighters and shuttles lie parked next to and around a fleet of Throm Warhawk-class Fighters, obviously taken by Ardala as spoils of war. The Spartan Troopers standing guard are diverted by the duel happening between Ardala and Wilma, and Tigerman soon drags Barney away in secret to have it out with him. As the others are making their way to the ships and getting ready to make their escape, Koori leaps between Barney and Tigerman, taking the killing blow meant for Barney. Hawk screams in horror, diverting the attention of Tigerman and Ardala towards the escapees preparing to depart.

    23) Breaking off her duel with Ardala, Wilma hurries back to the fighters as they prepare to escape. Reversing out of the hangar of the Draconian Star Palace, the Earth Thunder Fighters under Wilma now have to protect the Throm Warhawk Fighters from a wing of Hatchet-class Draconian Marauder Fighters sent to destroy them. Telling them to not use their combat computers to fight, Buck and his Thunder squadmates destroy the Hatchets threatening the convoy. Making the jump through the Stargate, the fighters arrive in orbit of Saturn to be greeted by the Searcher. Knowing the Directorate has the proof they need, the convoy the Draconia is leading will have to leave early.

    24) Aboard the Searcher, our heroes head down to the surface of Enceladus where a Commonwealth and Directorate base is currently posted. Compiling reports from the various sources, Asimov tells her pilots and soldiers of how they plan to attack the Draconian convoys and the Morning Star probe carried aboard the flagship Draconia. Ardala will be moving her flagship through Greenland's Grand Canyon to provide aerial support for Killer Kane's palace base in New Chicago. If the Warhawk fighters can distract or destroy the convoys that are supplying Kane's military, the Thunder fighters can swoop down and distract the Draconia from firing the Morning Star on their own base.

    25) As Barney decides to not participate and leave on the Aurora, the rest of our heroes take to the skies to battle for the future of Earth and the galaxies as a whole. Having counted on an aerial offensive, Kane decides to take off as squadron leader for his own fleet of Consortium Scorpion Fighters to join the Draconian Hatchet Fighters being commanded by Ardala from her private shuttle. Buck and Hawk are the first to leave the Searcher and Enceladus Base to destroy the supply ships. Wilma and Buddy then veer off to lead the attack on the flagship Draconia which is parking the Morning Star probe in orbit, ready to destroy the Earth city by city or fire right at the Searcher.


    26) Just as the attack is going well, stray shots from the Draconia's pulsar cannons force Buddy's Thunder fighter into a crash landing right in the hangar bay of the mighty flagship. In a burst of inspiration, Buddy heads with Dr. Theopolis to the Morning Star's Fire Control Center to shut down the evil probe. They are successful in getting the probe to turn on Killer Kane's palace base, but they are cut off from entering the hangar bay due to the interference of Tigerman. Engaging him one on one, Buddy manages to overpower and eject Tigerman out into the air. Ardala contacts her father Emperor Draco to report of the failed operation, pinning the sole blame on Kane's arrogance.

    27) Draco orders her daughter to bring Kane in to answer to him, so she disregards Buddy and Theo trapped aboard her ship as she departs to join the dogfight in her shuttle so as to sneak away to Kane's base. Just as it seems that more Hatchet and Scorpion fighters of both Ardala and Kane are coming to overwhelm them, a Warhawk and the Aurora come out of the skies to assist. It is none other than Black Barney, who has been convinced by Hawk to return and help in the fight. Wilma orders her squadrons to disengage the last of the fighters and finish off the Draconia. Pulsar cannon fire rocks the flagship when Hawk reports the Morning Star is falling out of control.

    28) Sure enough; thanks to Buddy's sabotage, the Morning Star is falling out of orbit, on a direct collision course with Killer Kane's base palace - with the flagship Draconia being caught between the two. The resulting explosion will only be enough to destroy the ship, Killer Kane's palace base, and the Morning Star probe. Killer Kane arrives back at his base to find it in chaos - enraged by the incompetence of his disciples and his reliance on aid from the Draconians. He determines to make an example of the galaxy and Rogers as he fires pulsar cannon blasts at Buck's fighter. They do not destroy it, but Twiki is hit by the blast trying to protect Buck, much to Buck's horrified shock.

    29) The Hatchet and Scorpion fighters all begin to scatter, abandoning Kane and Ardala to escape out into space. Knowing it was Buddy who helped sabotage the Morning Star; Buck, Hawk and Barney run interference for Wilma to land aboard the Draconia to save Buddy and Theo before the probe comes back down on them. Buck manages to avenge Twiki for now by shooting down Kane's Scorpion fighter that was in the process of tailing Wilma's fighter, but the mighty Kane ejects with a gravity pack to look at his plans crashing into ruin. Just as the Morning Star comes crashing back onto the great flagship, Wilma's Thunder fighter gets them out of the Draconia in the nick of time. 

    30) As Killer Kane's palace and base collapse around him and the Morning Star weapon drags the flagship Draconia down with it toward the base, Ardala arrives in her shuttle to rescue Kane and depart back for the Draconian Homeworld. Witnessing a massive explosion that ends the remains of the base; our heroes return to the Searcher to recover from the shock. Theopolis is extremely distressed when Twiki is recovered from Buck's fighter and offers to donate circuits to get him back. In an award ceremony taking place in the Commonwealth's Earth capitol of New Chicago; Buck, Wilma, Buddy, Hawk, Barney, Asimov, Huer, Twiki and Theopolis are given medals for freeing Earth.


    31) The Earth has begun restoring itself with technology that harnesses the fallout from the holocaust to power ecological renewal over the planet. With the Earth and the United Galactic Commonwealth becoming stronger than ever due to the collapse of the Consortium, it would seem things are looking up for our heroes. But when a new offensive on the part of the Draconians and Consortium is poised to be on a collision course with the dual worlds of Chronus and Calico II, our heroes set off to aid Prince Tallen of Chronus and King Grallo of the Calican Cat People. A laser tank and starfighter battle ensues as they attempt to drive off the Draconian Kraken Mecha Leviathans.

    32) In the meantime, Hawk and Buddy have their hands full with Barney being on the run from the League of Interstellar Mercenaries or "Legion of Death" as they are colloquially referred to. Barney owes a huge debt to Seton Kellogg; who employs empath SHARESE, the telekinetic JOLEN QUINCE, strongman MARCOS, RAPHAEL ARGUS a master combatant, and the mutant VAREK who can phase through any solid matter. After a major blow is struck against Chronus, the Commonwealth forces have to retreat back into friendly space to regroup and recover. In the destruction of Prince Tallen's castle, Tallen escapes with Wilma and Buck aboard the Aurora into the deep of space.

    33) Over the next couple of days in space, Buck and Wilma begin to gingerly open themselves up more to each other and beginning a steady relationship. This leads them to start learning the physical act of love, and preparing to conceive a child in the process. Arriving at Theta Station over the gas giant Aldebaran Beta, the two soon discover the station is under the control of a vampire named the Vorvon and an electrically charged tyrant the Trebor - both agents of Ardala. Once again, Ardala and Wilma square off in sword and laser blaster combat. This time, however, Ardala is carrying a data disc of cataclysmic significance - "evidence" of Buck's historic treasonous activities.

    34) Hawk and Buddy help Barney evade and outrun the combined Consortium-Imperial starfleet to the planet Mykos, where the 2492 Interstellar Olympic Games are taking place. Hoping to lose the fleet, they meet athletes Lara Tizian (Astrosled) and Jorex Leet (Vertical Leap), as Jorex wants to defect from his planets Lozira to Earth. The Satrap of Lozira so happens to be one of Kane's governors who soon requests aid from Killer Kane and Seton Kellogg themselves. Barney decides to sacrifice himself so Hawk and Buddy can smuggle Jorex and Lara through the Stargate to freedom. There is nowhere left to run for the great galactic gunrunner known as Black Barney Smith.

    35) As Huer, Asimov, Theopolis and Twiki try to keep the Commonwealth together and prepare for another strike by their enemies, the word gets out of our heroes in trouble. Barney is ordered by Kane to be frozen, petrified and returned to the League as a war trophy. In dueling with Ardala, Wilma tries to get to the bottom of this conspiracy that Buck was seemingly a part of. If what is on Ardala's data disc is correct, then Buck may have been the traitor who helped make the holocaust happen in the first place. Can our heroes simply survive and escape to fight another day? Will Wilma be able to prove Buck's innocence and save her burgeoning relationship with him if at all?