Pursuit of the Bold

by Jamie McFarlane

  "Show range of blasters and lances," I said, expecting my AI to pick it up.

  "Range undetermined. Unable to calibrate foreign crystal," the AI answered, displaying a flickering holographic image of the two ships speeding toward each other. Gaylon Brighton's untested blaster had an unknown range and I had no idea how many shots we would get.

  "This might hurt," I warned. "Sendrei, don't take the shot until I tell you. We might only get one."

  "Copy that," Sendrei answered.

  "What are you doing, Liam?" Tabby asked. "Even a frigate has lance weapons, they'll tear us apart."

  "Aye," I answered, straining against the controls as I rolled starboard, trying to sail under the frigate and give Sendrei a view of its heavily armored belly.

  "Lance weapons away," Tabby announced.

  "Frak!" I knew they were coming, but that didn't change the fact that I had no solution to keep us from being struck by the deadly wave. "Hang on!"

  I reversed my pull on the yolk and when Gaylon Brighton didn't respond, I slammed the controls back to the starboard and pulled up. The maneuver was only partially respected by the beleaguered ship's control surfaces, but at least I would protect the turret.

  "Impact!" Tabby said as the Kroerak's simple but deadly weapons impaled the port side of the ship, sheering off a portion of the wing.

  I grimaced, recognizing the problem before it became a reality. I'd sacrificed most of the remaining control I had of the ship. To gain proximity, I'd given up maneuverability, something Gaylon Brighton didn't have in abundance. Our attitude to the frigate was perpendicular, but we would pass only fifty meters directly below the ship.

  "Get ready," I said. I knew our turret wasn't aligned, but I had one final trick up my sleeve as I popped open the starboard fuel panels on the port wing and overrode the AI's dislike of the maneuver while in flight. While not pretty, nor elegant, the additional drag below the heavily damaged wing caused Gaylon Brighton to slowly start to roll.

  "He doesn't have it!" Tabby cried as we passed beneath the ship and started separating.

  "Almost there," I said, instructing the AI to dump the small amount of solid fuel stored within the wing.

  "We're almost out of time," Tabby said. "The frigate will have lance weapons recharged in ten seconds."

  "Target acquired," Sendrei said, his voice steady.

  "Fire!" I answered, wishing I could be as cool under fire.

  A moment later a blue beam stretched out from Gaylon Brighton and cut through the frigate as a mining laser would a bucket of grease. The pulsing beam carved off an entire third of the starboard side of the frigate. Just like that, it turned from powered ship to tumbling debris.

  "Hot shite! What in the frak! Did you see that?" Tabby exclaimed, excitedly. "You just cut that thing in half! Like it wasn't even there."

  "We're going down," I said, ignoring Tabby's outburst. "Buckle up, this is going to suck."

  Epilogue

  For the second time in as many ten-days, I crash landed Gaylon Brighton into the ancient ruins of the city. It is said that any landing you can walk away from is a successful one, however, I felt we were stretching the credible definition of success. Let’s just say I was happy to be walking upright. Before exiting the ship, I made my way back to the engine room and extracted the Iskstar from the blaster weapon. It was clear we'd turned one more ship from viable to scrap, but at least we'd won the day and there was reason for hope.

  "You have killed the Kroo Ack?" Sklisk and the remaining Piscivoru guard had run over to our new crash site.

  "We saw it destroyed, Sklisk," Jaelisk said. "There is no question of Liam Hoffen's victory."

  "It was the Iskstar," Tabby said. "The Kroerak were right to fear your people. You have a weapon they cannot defeat."

  "It is more than a weapon," Jaelisk said simply. "It is a part of the people."

  I nodded, fingering the crystal where it sat nestled in a pouch next to the quantum comm crystal that would connect us to Petersburg Station.

  "What will you do now?" Sklisk asked.

  "We have to take the fight to the Kroerak. With the Iskstar, we finally have a chance."

  "In what?" Tabby asked. "One crystal isn't going to do it. Kroerak will just send a thousand ships and take us out by sheer force of numbers."

  "Is not the same true for Picis?" Jaelisk asked. "When you leave, why would the Kroerak not return and destroy us."

  "That is not a conversation for today," Sklisk said. "Never in our histories have the Piscivoru had success against Kroerak. We will bring news to our elders and we will celebrate the bond between Piscivoru and humanity."

  "How?" Tabby asked. "It took us a ten-day to exit the mountain."

  "The people do not require such large tunnels and are able to move more quickly," Jaelisk said. "Indeed, the elders have watched our victory from the cover of the forest and will arrive in only a few hours."

  "Do you suppose we should let Marny know we're not dead?" Tabby asked. "We've been radio silent for quite a while."

  "Oh, frak," I said. "I'll do that. Why don't you see if you can find something worth eating. I'm dying."

  "Strawberry or raspberry?" Tabby quipped, with a wry grin. It was an old joke that assumed the taste of the flavored meal bars we carried could be distinguished.

  "Surprise me," I answered, crawling back into the ship. I didn’t bother to use the airlock as there were now several holes of sufficient size to gain entry.

  Back on the ship, I entered the captain's quarters for the first time since we'd reached Picis. Even though everything was well secured for turbulence, it was a complete mess. The mattress and bedding had been dislodged and lay against the forward bulkhead. Ultimately, every item that was ordinarily held down by small gravity generators had been thrown free. A single Kroerak lance had pierced the room and was sticking through the mattress at an angle.

  Compartmentalizing how I felt about a lance in my quarters, I took a moment to straighten out the desk and set the chair back in place. Sitting down, I pulled out the quantum communication crystal. Before placing it in its cradle, I considered it. The comm crystal felt like a piece of glass in my hands, much different from how I felt when holding the Iskstar. Shrugging, I set it in place.

  "Petersburg Station, this is Gaylon Brighton, come in," I said and waited for thirty seconds before repeating it.

  "Liam? Thank Jupiter you're alive," Katherine LeGrande said. "We've all been so worried."

  "We had some trouble with a Kasumi bounty hunter," I said. "We got taken down in hostile territory, but we're all up. I repeat, we're all up."

  "Best news. I'll relay it to Silver," she said. "Marny just arrived. She needs to talk with you."

  "Thank you, Katherine," I said.

  "Godspeed, Liam."

  I narrowed my eyes. It was an unusual comment for her.

  "Liam?" Marny asked, picking up the comms.

  "Heya, Momma," I said, grinning. "How's baby Liam doing?"

  "Baby Liam – that's rich," she laughed. "Little Pete is right on schedule and starting to kick a little. Is everyone okay? Katherine said everyone is up."

  "That's right," I said. "We ran into some problems, but we survived. Ship is pretty toasted though and Sendrei has a few cracked ribs that are finally getting the benefit of a med-patch."

  "What about the Piscivoru," she asked. "Did you find them?" Her voice was filled with urgent concern.

  "We did," I said. "I'm not sure we should talk over comms about it though. What's going on, Marny?" Even though the quantum crystals were supposed to be point-to-point, we'd long suspected Belirand, the company that had originally owned the crystals, might have figured out a way to intercept the comms. If that was the case, I still didn't trust Belirand not to somehow pass information along to the Kroerak.

  "No good way to say it. There have been multiple sightings of a Kroerak fleet toward the edge of Pogona-controlled space. House Mshindi is concerned enough that they've put a fleet in orbi
t around Zuri," she said. "Tell me you found something good."

  "Game changer, Marny, but there's bad news," I said. "Without more machinery than we have, Gaylon Brighton is down for the foreseeable future. We'll get to work on her, but she's in bad shape."

  "Copy that, Cap," she said. "You'd be better off to concentrate on hunkering down. Can you defend your position?"

  "Not currently," I said.

  "Focus on that," she said. "We're coming for you."

  "Are you sure? Aren't the Kroerak coming?"

  "The entire Abasi fleet can't stand against the Kroerak. House Mshindi doesn't stand a chance with or without us," she answered. "Now get dug in. We're coming."

  "We will, Marny. Tell everyone we miss 'em," I said.

  "Copy that. Bertrand out."

  I grabbed the comm crystal and pushed it into the pouch. Taking a few more minutes, I straightened up the cabin while I pondered what Marny had told me. It felt good to do something physical and I cracked off the lance, leaving a hole that would most certainly allow rain to enter. I exited the cabin, intent on grabbing the repair tools I’d need to finish sealing in our cabin. For some reason, even in the face of the perfect storm that was coming at us, I wanted some semblance of order. Plus, the idea of sleeping one more night in a cramped tunnel was too much to take.

  "You get a hold of Nick or Marny?" Tabby asked, catching me as I exited the cabin.

  "Marny," I said. "She thinks we might be in trouble …"

  But of course, that's another story entirely.

  Fury of the Bold - Preview

  Chapter 1 – Cowboy Up

  Bright sunlight warmed my back as I stood on a hillock overlooking a lush green field. At the edge of the field, nestled against a thick forest of broad-trunked trees, stood a primitive village of animal-skin tents. Movement caught my eye and I crouched, not wanting to be discovered.

  A flap of hide was thrown back as a figure exited one of the tents. I squinted, not recognizing the species. The male with his smooth hairless chest and thick brown hair along his arms and back wore nothing but tanned leather leggings and shoes. He had an impressive and powerful build. As if sensing my presence, the figure looked in my direction. I didn't move, fearing discovery. To my relief, he turned back toward the tent and spoke calmly in a language I couldn't understand, his voice carrying further than I'd have expected.

  Two smaller figures exited the tent, their profiles obviously female. One was roughly the male's height, although less broad through the chest, the other a juvenile. For a moment, the three spoke. The wind was favorable, allowing me to catch snippets of their strange speech.

  A loud noise from the sky startled me and as I watched, a burning object fell to the earth. On the tail of that shuttle-sized hunk of rock, hundreds, if not thousands more plummeted toward the village. Fearing for my safety, I turned to run, but my feet were frozen in place. I raised my arms protectively as the first object struck. Surprisingly, I felt nothing as the blast wave crested over my position.

  A scream from the village caught my attention and I turned back. The juvenile female pointed to the sky and suddenly the village boiled to life as the tents disgorged their inhabitants. The male grabbed a long, wooden bow from where it rested against his tent. The juvenile, no doubt his daughter, wrapped her arms around his waist and cried. I didn't need a translator to understand her fear.

  A great cracking sound pulled my attention back to the field where the first of many objects had landed. Through the dirt and smoke that hung in the air, fifteen Kroerak warriors pushed up between the smoldering rocks, emerging like chicks from an egg. They stood up straight on hind legs and sniffed the air. The first to emerge froze and turned toward me.

  I awoke with a start.

  Rolling over, my hip fell into the hole in the mattress caused by a Kroerak lance – for the millionth time it seemed. The steady drumbeat of heavy rain on the skin of Gaylon Brighton's hull froze me in place as I avoided waking fully. I'd successfully sealed the captain's quarters of the ruined ship from rain infiltration, but I could hear water running nearby, in places it had no business being. It was only a matter of time before the ship’s salvageable systems would become unusable and I suddenly found I was unable to rest.

  "Stay in bed," Tabby murmured sleepily, dragging a hand across my stomach and pulling close to me. Even with the grav-suit and suit-liner's capacities for self-cleaning, I felt grubby, having missed anything resembling a shower for the better part of two ten-days.

  Only a few hours ago the elders of Piscivoru had arrived in the ruins of the ancient city of Dskirnss on their home planet of Picis. We'd been met with a mixture of emotions. As a group, they experienced a sense of awe at the scale of the once-great civilization of their ancestors. For some, that awe was soon replaced by an overwhelming feeling of loss. That sense of loss was further compounded by their one remaining technologically-savvy Piscivoru. Engirisk, who'd used an engineering pad as a sort of virtual window, showed those assembled an overlay of the city in all its previous glory.

  Perhaps the Piscivoru who took the cultural disintegration the hardest was Tskir, the exile we'd rescued from the planet Jarwain. While she was thrilled to be reunited with the remnant of her species, she had lived her whole life with the technology of their ancestors and had little in common with the primitive people.

  Unexpectedly, the elders had insisted on a feast to celebrate a victory over the Kroerak. Even if this freedom were to be short-lived, it was something to be rejoiced over. There had never been a time when these Piscivoru had been allowed to walk unmolested on 'the above' as they called it. As it turned out, the feast was mostly ceremonial for Sendrei, Tabby and me. We'd run out of fresh food on Gaylon Brighton and the small lizards considered Kroerak shell a delicacy.

  But for a short period, agendas were set aside and we simply existed together, Piscivoru and human, quietly celebrating one of the few successful campaigns ever recorded against the Kroerak. The victory, while significant, was also fragile. The Iskstar-charged weapon sat atop a ruined ship, which in turn sat atop a pile of rubble. At that moment, if the Kroerak returned with any sizeable force, they would easily destroy us.

  It was these thoughts that pulled me from the warm, albeit pocked mattress.

  "Coffee?" Sendrei Buhari asked.

  I'd wandered back to the galley, dodging the rain streaming through Gaylon Brighton's many holes.

  I perked up. I'd thought the ship's coffee station had been among the many casualties. Gratefully, I accepted a dented cup, the cup's micro grav-generator beneath still working. Pouring some of the dark liquid into my mouth, I wasn't even disappointed by its grainy texture.

  "What's in this?" The coffee also tasted slightly burned. Don’t get me wrong; my taste buds recognized it and rejoiced – having been without the necessities too many times to count.

  "Sorry," Sendrei Buhari answered. "We call this cowboy coffee. Brewer is broken. I had to improvise." He nodded to a blackened spot on the floor where a cooking pot sat. When I'd first seen the area, I'd mistaken the carbon as damage from our latest fight. The smell of wood smoke and the brown liquid Sendrei was pointing to inside the pot made me think otherwise.

  "We're cowboys?"

  "We sure are where coffee is concerned," he answered, tipping back his own cup. "I created an electrical arc to ignite flammable debris which boiled the water. I’m not sure where I went wrong; I added grounds and boiled until the granules floated to the top. I poured more water in, which the AI indicated would cause the grounds to drop. That didn’t happen. I suppose we could find some filtration fabric to remove the grounds, but then we wouldn't be camping."

  Sendrei had a quiet sense of humor that belied his warrior physique. "Well, if drinking coffee in a ruined ship is camping, I'm all in." I pulled a meal bar from a pouch lying next to the cabinets and peeled it open.

  "What's on deck for today?" he asked. He’d already thought through the top priorities, but would give me the courtesy of s
peaking first.

  "I was thinking. We lost five Piscivoru in the fight with that Kasumi. That means there are ten Iskstar crystals available from their staves," I said, pulling the crystal I'd retrieved from the pouch on my waist. Once again, I felt a connection to the crystal as I turned it over in my hand. "I know the staff crystals aren't the same shape, but I was wondering if we could make them work."

  "Work with what?" Sendrei asked. "We only have one blaster turret and your crystal does the job pretty well."

  Movement at the corner of my eye caught my attention. Jonathan, or at least the holo projection of their common physical form, approached from beneath the ship.

  "Where have you been, Jonathan?" I asked, momentarily ignoring Sendrei's question.

  "We have discovered reference to a planetary defensive weapon," he answered.

  "That's perfect," I said. "Where is it and what will it take to get it fired up?"

  "We have perhaps oversimplified," Jonathan answered. "We have only just learned of its existence. The status and even the location of the weapon is yet unknown."

  "You didn't answer where you've been," Sendrei said. "As far as I can tell, you were gone all night."

  "That is true," Jonathan said. "We returned to the underground city of the Piscivoru. In that our corporeal form is close in diameter to that of our guests and our speed over ground can be quite fast, we took it upon ourselves to establish communications between the two locations by placing repeaters within the tunnel."

  "A planet-wide defensive array sounds like a great long-term answer," I said, "but if the Kroerak return before it’s working, they could wipe us out. We need something now. We don't even have our Popeyes. A band of twenty warriors would likely take us out."

  "Your concern is legitimate," Jonathan said. "According to Noelisk, five Kroerak were discovered within the city throughout the evening and were dispatched. There could be good news on the Mechanized Infantry suits, however. We have calculated that if the suits were sufficiently dismantled, they could be carried by Piscivoru through the lower tunnels."