He sneered and walked away, but one of the others approached me and bowed repeatedly.
“You fought well,” he said.
“Thanks, but if you want an autograph you’re going to have to give me a hand.” I laughed drunkenly and shook my dangling left arm. “Get it?”
Once the friendly Argellian twisted the cylinder onto my metal cap, I set the bone as well as I could and told Jules I was ready.
It’s going to take a few minutes. Hold it as steady as you can.
Copy that.
“That was one of the best finishes I have ever seen,” Malagag said, his hologram floating over to me.
“Wait until you see my encore,” I said, not bothering to mask the threat.
He only grinned.
How’s the hacking coming along? I asked Jules.
I need a few more minutes.
“You have done well, Sheriff.”
“Thanks, now get me the fuck out of here before these big bastards decide to avenge their chieftain.”
“They won’t. You won fairly. Now stand and bow to the crowd.”
My ankle was already healed, and I held my broken forearm carefully in my nanohand as I rose to my feet. I bowed, and they chanted my name with renewed vigor.
“There,” I said and faced Malagag. “I’ve done my part. Now you do yours.”
He offered me a nod, then winked out. I left the coliseum and the adoring fans and loaded onto the transport ship, amazed I was still alive.
Now all I had to do was free my women, kill Malagag, steal the artifact, kill Orcag, and we could fly off into the starlight.
Piece of cake, right?
When the doors to the transport ship opened, I saw about fifty drones waiting for me with guns drawn.
“What the hell is this?” I asked Malagag, who was once again standing safely behind an energy shield at the end of the cargo bay.
“Insurance.”
The girls were where he had left them, and they looked relieved to see me in one piece as they stood in the tight enclosure created by the shields around them.
“Haven’t I proven myself to you by now? You’re a business man, Malagag. Let’s make a deal.”
“Hmm.” He laced his fingers and considered it. “If you wish to prove to me that you are not beholden to Orcag, bring me his head, and we shall strike a deal.”
I’m ready, Harry, Jules’s said wonderfully in my mind.
Can you do something about these drones?
Like this? she asked playfully, and a moment later, the drones powered down.
I glanced back in time to see the energy shield surrounding the girls disappear.
“I’ve got a better idea, Malagag,” I said as they joined me.
He was about fifty feet away, but I could still see his face drop.
I engaged my laser gun, and the women activated theirs, and together we stalked toward the reptilian bastard. Malagag tried to do something on the control panel, but Jules must have thwarted his efforts. He finally gave up, turned around, and disappeared.
“Keep an eye on him, Jules,” I said.
“Oh, he won’t be getting far.”
“Jules?” said Purshia.
“Yes?”
“Thank you for freeing us. I can’t wait to finally meet you once this is all over.”
“I feel the same way.”
“If you two are done flirting,” Val said dryly, “Can we finish off this scaly dreg?”
“I wasn’t flirting.” Despite her words, Purshia was blushing.
I could have asked Jules to open the door leading into the gambling house, but I wanted to get everyone’s attention, so I blew it down with a well-placed nanobomb.
We walked through the smoke like four of the baddest motherfuckers in the galaxy, and when the guests saw us coming, they lost their shit. Aliens screamed and ran away from us, but I didn’t care about them. There was a shitload of security on the ship—not only drones but armed guards—and they were my only concern.
Make sure the escape pods are functioning for the civilians, I instructed Jules.
“Sheriff, now is the time.” Orcag’s voice rang in my ear.
“We’re headed toward the artifact as we speak.”
“You might want to do it faster.” He sounded distracted. “Five Class-A ships have just come out of hyperspace.”
“The grays?” I asked and glanced at the girls with concern.
“Them, or someone working for them. Hurry up.”
“Look out!” Val blasted two armed guards as they rushed out of the elevator.
“You there, stop!” another yelled behind us.
Four more guards raced toward us from the gambling floor, firing with automatic laser guns. The rounds ripped holes in the floor and walls, and I urged the girls into the elevator and launched a nanobomb into the closest guard’s chest. He exploded into a shower of blood and bone, and I hurried into the car as the doors were closing.
“Everyone all right?” I asked as we ascended.
“No injuries to report,” said Val.
“What happened to you down there on that planet?” Purshia asked.
“I’ll tell you later. Shields ready.”
They summoned energy shields in their left hands and aimed at the door with their laser guns.
“I’m enhancing your speed, strength, mental focus, and agility, and for good measure, the nanobots are standing by to heal any injuries,” Jules reported to the four of us. “You’ve got to move fast!”
The doors opened, and we came face to face with over twenty of Malagag’s security guards.
“Listen to me!” I said from behind my shield. “There are a bunch of battleships approaching, and this cruiser is going to be destroyed in a matter of minutes. Get out while you can. You don’t have to die here.”
They opened fire. The walls of the elevator car were turned into Swiss cheese by the red-hot rounds. We crouched behind our shields and moved slowly into the hall.
“Cover me!” I charged right as I conjured my laser sword, and it emerged as I punched one of the hairy guards in the face. The sword burst through his head and sprayed the wall behind him. I spun and severed the head of another guard.
Bullets slapped my left shoulder, but the nanosuit stopped the rounds. The shooter’s head exploded from the girls’ cover fire, but there were still dozens of guards in the hall. They had taken up defensive positions on each side of the corridor, and some of them had their own energy shields.
“Incoming!” Val screamed and unloaded on a metal orb sailing toward us.
The thing exploded halfway between us and the guards, and I was blown back into Ella. Val charged by me, with Purshia right behind her, and the two women wreaked havoc on the guards. Ella and I joined them in their charge down the corridor, and when we finally reached Malagag’s quarters, two dozen chopped up aliens lay dead behind us.
“This door looks like a damned bank vault. Jules, can you give us a—”
The door slid open, and we braced ourselves for an attack, but none came.
“Clear!” I moved into the room and swept my gun left and right.
Val moved to the left side of the lavish room while Ella went right. I gestured to Purshia, and we marched to the far end of the room, where a hallway led into darkness.
An explosion suddenly rocked the ship, then another.
“Is that Orcag?” I asked Jules.
“It’s the enemy ships. They’re surrounding the cruiser and the Ardominus. You need to get the artifact and get the hell out of there!”
“Malagag!” I yelled into the hall. “We know you’re there somewhere. Give us the artifact, and we’ll give you safe passage out of here.”
“He’s headed toward an escape pod,” said Jules.
Val and Ella joined me and Purshia, and we raced after the reptilian bastard.
“I’m afraid this is goodbye,” Malagag said from the end of the hall. A big metal barrier rose from the floor in front of me an
d cut us off. Another rose behind us. We were trapped, and Malagag was getting away. Worse yet, dozens of turrets folded out of the walls and began spewing rounds.
“Shields!” I screamed, and we huddled back to back behind the safety of our energy shields.
“He’s getting away!” Jules reported.
The gunfire was so loud, I could barely hear myself think, and the rounds hit our shields steadily, pinning us down in the hall.
“Shut the goddamn turrets off!” I yelled over the gunfire.
“Systems are malfunctioning throughout the ship,” said Jules, and to accentuate the point, another explosion rocked the cruise ship.
“Does Malagag have the artifact?”
“Yes, and his escape pod is almost ready for a hyperjump. You’ve got exactly one minute, Harry. We’ll hold off the grays as long as we can, but you’ve got to get to that pod.”
I enabled my laser sword, told the girls to give me a little room, then I stabbed it into the metal floor. Plasma erupted. I cut a wide hole in the floor, and a circular piece fell into darkness.
“Go, go, go!” I yelled.
Purshia slipped into the hole first, then Ella. Laser rounds slammed into my back, and I prayed the nanosuit would hold up.
“Get in there!” I screamed at Val as she blasted turrets.
“You first. You must stop Malagag!”
I didn’t have time to argue, and although I was loath to do it, I left her in the hall and slipped into the hole. The crawlspace was tight, but Purshia and Ella were crawling toward the bulkhead. I hurried after them as fast as the confined space allowed.
“The only way out of here is through the bulkhead!” Ella called back. She enabled her laser sword. “Brace yourselves.”
Val dropped down behind me; it looked like her nanosuit had taken a beating.
“You okay?” I craned to see her face.
“A little banged up, but I’ll be fine. Why have we stopped?”
“Ella’s going to cut through the—”
My words were lost to a massive sucking sound, and we were plucked out of the crawlspace like a fly into a vacuum hose. The stuffy corridor was replaced by the vast expanse of space, and I finally got a firsthand view of the battle raging around us.
Five big V-shaped ships were zipping around Malagag’s cruiser and firing at will. A squadron of smaller craft were trying to fend them off. The Ardominus hovered in the distance, but it had gained the attention of two more enemy fighters.
Another small craft was speeding away from the battle, and had it not been for the reflection of the sun off its shiny exterior, I wouldn’t have seen it.
“Twenty seconds until the pod achieves hyperspeed,” Jules warned.
I shot toward the craft, urging every last ounce of speed from my jetpack. The girls followed closely, and we began firing at the pod.
“Careful!” Jules cried. “Do not damage the artifact. It is more important than its retrieval.”
I enabled my laser sword and raced toward the orb, intent on cutting my way through the damn thing.
“Ten seconds!”
I willed the jetpack faster, but it was maxed out.
“Five seconds!”
The escape pod was less than fifty feet away, and I saw Malagag through the circular window. He grinned at me, then the son of a bitch gave me the finger.
The craft began to glow, and I quickly enabled my grappling hook, took aim, and made contact. I reeled myself in and found a handhold, then the escape pod shot through space like the U.S.S. Enterprise.
I must have been inside the pod’s gravity well. I glanced back in search of the girls, but they must not have made it in time. Malagag stared at me in amazement through the window, and I grinned.
“Surprise, motherfucker!” I ripped my laser sword across the hull, and Malagag burst out of the two-inch-wide slit like bloody puss from a massive zit. I cut a hole in the hull and climbed inside in search of the artifact. “Jules, you still with me?”
Nothing.
The little pod was the size of one of those Gravitron rides they have at fairs, but there was nothing in it but a circular row of seats and a navigation control module.
Thanks to the nanobots in my brain, I could read the controls. I hit the icon to take it out of hyperspace. The engine wound down, and I glanced out the window to confirm that the pod had stopped moving. The stars that had been zipping by were now stationary, and there was a green planet far in the distance.
I studied the controls and found an icon labeled Storage. I tapped on it, and a rectangular piece of wall slid outward. It was about the size of a sarcophagus, and when the front suddenly slid open, I crouched behind my shield and aimed my laser gun at it.
White fog rolled out of the compartment. I held my ground, waiting for something to spring out at me. But rather than a drone or turret gun, I saw a tall female cyborg.
“What the….”
The cyborg had metallic skin with blue accents around the joints. She had no hair, but her face was startlingly beautiful. Whoever designed her was a fan of perky tits, and I wondered if little gun barrels would emerge from her big nipples. The cyborg was completely naked, and I was surprised to see a slit between her legs.
“Did I just find the artifact or Malagag’s sex doll?”
The eyes shot open, and glowing blue orbs considered me with interest. “Hello, Harry,” the cyborg said in a familiar voice.
“Jules?” I said in astonishment. “Is that you?”
I stared at the naked cyborg as she emerged from the storage unit. Her eyes fluttered like she was receiving downloaded information, then they stilled and focused on me.
“I have linked to the host,” she said with a smile.
“Host? Who’s the host? Why do you sound like Jules?”
“It’s me, Harry,” she said.
“You’re the artifact?”
“My body is the artifact. I remain on the Ardominus, but that will soon change.”
“What do you mean, you remain on the Ardominus?”
“I am a Binarian, one of the last,” said the cyborg. “When Orcag and Malagag were partners, they kidnapped me. But they double-crossed each other, and one stole my brain while the other stole my body. I have not been whole in quite some time. When you released me, you enabled me to link back up with my body. But until I am returned to it, I will only have limited function.”
“I don’t know where the hell we are.” I studied the controls. “Or how to get back. Are the grays still attacking? What happened to the girls?”
“Your wives were picked up by the Ardominus.”
“Are they all right?”
“They are in a holding chamber and have been stripped of their nanoarms. I’m sorry Harry, but I had to maintain the farce and take over their bodies through the nanobots when Orcag picked them up. But I assure you, they felt no pain. I have the pod’s coordinates, and Orcag has set a course. Let’s just hope he gets to us before the grays do.”
“We’re sitting ducks in this thing.” I nervously glanced out the window. “What about that planet?”
“What about it?”
“I think we’d be better off there than floating in a tin can, waiting for the grays to find us. Is it habitable?”
“Yes, as long as you remain in your nanosuit.”
“Can you land this thing?”
“Of course,” she said and moved to the control module.
The engines fired up despite the warning of a hull breach, and we started toward the green planet.
“I can’t believe you’re the artifact,” I said with a small laugh and tried not to stare at her ass. “This is nuts.”
“Nuts?”
“Crazy, extraordinary, mind-blowing.”
“I am one of the last Binarians, as I told you. My body and mind are worth more than all the money in the galaxy.”
“Did the grays create you?”
She frowned at me. “My mother created me.”
�
�You mean you were born?”
“I am as real as you and your wives.” She sounded a little offended.
“But, I mean, you look like a cyborg. Your skin is metal, and you have robotic joints.”
She turned from the control module. “My skin may be as strong as metal, but it is as soft as yours. Would you like to touch it?”
I stared at her beautiful chrome tits.
She touched my nanohand. It might not have been my real hand, but it reported sensations just like the real thing, and I could feel the softness of her skin.
“That’s amazing, you feel so real.”
Again she frowned.
“Sorry, sorry, you are real. My bad.”
“I am as real as your women.” She stared into my eyes and put the other hand on my cheek. “I have longed to meet you in person. If it wasn’t for your need of the nanosuit right now, I would show you just how real a woman I can be.”
That gave me a chubby, and I thanked God that the nanobots knew enough to create room around my erection to allow its growth.
“Maybe when all this is over you can show me,” I replied.
She looked me up and down and grinned. “I’ve seen you with the women. I watched through your eyes as you made love to them.”
Pervert.
“Oh yeah? Did you like what you saw?”
She smirked and turned back to the control module.
We landed fifteen minutes later, and when the hatched opened, I told Jules to stay back while I enabled my nanogun and walked outside. The first thing I noticed was the green sky. We’d landed in a desert where gooey cactus-like plants grew well over fifteen feet high. I caught movement in the corner of my eye and swung my gun toward it, but it was just a mouse-like creature, rushing toward its burrow.
“All clear,” I reported.
“I knew that,” she said as she emerged. “But I knew you would have to check for yourself.”
“Stroking my ego, eh?”
“If I was going to stroke something, it wouldn’t be your ego.”
Damn, she was a horny little cyborg.
“I’m not a cyborg,” she said with an arched brow. “I told you, I am a Binarian.”
“Shit, sorry. Hey, that’s not fair. You’re still reading my thoughts.”
Warwick: Episode 2: Galactic Fugitives Page 9
