by Drew Avera
They watched on the monitor as the transport came closer, further solidifying the idea that Crase was planning to breach the Replicade. “I can go and guard the airlock; make sure the guys are ready,” Anki said.
The transport fired again from cannons, but the shield deflected the projectiles. “This guy isn’t giving up, but he’s wasting his ammunition. Surely he knows those weapons are useless against this ship. Go down there and get ready to blast this asshole with everything we’ve got,” Brendle ordered. “I don’t care if we have to mop up his remains for the next week. This guy is not boarding our ship and living to talk about it.” He felt guilty for ordering this man to die, but the alternative was that this monster would kill them all without batting an eye.
“I’m on it,” Anki replied, turning and running from the bridge, leaving Brendle alone with his thoughts. Worrying was making things worse, and he knew it. He had to trust his crew and know that they could handle Crase if he came onboard. Trust, he thought, not an easy concept for a guy framed for being a traitor. That was then, this is now.
“All right, let’s see what your plan is now,” Brendle whispered as the Replicade slowed.
“Why are you slowing down?” Pilot asked.
“I need you to do me a favor, Pilot. Let him engage with the airlock. Once the airlock is opened, I want you to disengage the drive on the transport so we can jettison it when I give the order. Can you do that?”
“I am able to comply with that order, but I don’t understand why you would willingly allow this man to enter the ship.”
Brendle stood tall, “Sometimes you have to look the devil in the eye before you send him back to hell.”
26
Crase
The transport grew silent, at least to Crase’s ears, as he readied himself for taking on the waiting crew of the Replicade. There was no way they were not expecting him, and that was exactly what he was counting on. That expectation could be used as a weapon against them. Fear drove people into corners, those corners catapulted people into action, and most times those actions could be planned for. Docking with the Replicade and forcing the airlock to open while in atmosphere created just the kind of corner he wanted to pin them into.
The last time he seized control of a ship, he had seven men with him; none of them lost their lives that day, but cleanup on that particularly fated ship took two days to accomplish and resulted in a severe decrease in profits. It did not come without its learning experiences, most importantly who you could trust when shit went south. He could count on one hand how many of that original crew lived to see the following year. Most of those he killed in those days still floated in obscure systems, rotating around a star like a celestial body overlooking the lifecycle of the star.
Ah, the victories of youth, and my revenge always had a sense of poetic justice, he thought as he settled into position, weapon ready, a thirst for blood heavy on his tongue. The small space between the bulkhead and aft row of seating was cramped, but he managed well enough to fit his large frame semi-comfortably. He just needed to wait a few more seconds and then all hell would break loose. Thinking about it was exhilarating.
Crase watched the airlock turn green and depressed a switch on his wrist as the door cycled open. As the airlock cycled open, a holographic image in his likeness stood in the center of the tight passageway. The image held in its hands a weapon poised to fire, but the decoy was immediately riddled with projectiles disappearing through the projection and striking the bulkhead of the transport. He used the trajectory of those projectiles to calculate where his enemies were on the Replicade. This was not his first time using this technology, and it had saved his life more than once. Usually he reserved it for the boarding parties when he could not outrun the authorities, later casting their lifeless bodies into the dark and carrying on about his business, but even that hadn’t happened in several years.
Before he could make his move, the transport’s power shut off, casting him in darkness. That’s odd— it’s not supposed to do that, he thought, but he quickly pushed away the thought before he lost his focus on what was important. Taking back his ship.
Crase lunged forward, rolling with his weapon drawn as he fired at one of the Lechun men hiding behind a crate. He narrowly missed, but now he had a better layout in his mind of where the others were positioned and what their condition was. Within just a second or two he determined that the Lechun with the tattoo on his head was using a crate to hide behind; Malikea was next to the ladder well leading to the mid-level of the ship, hiding more than defending his ship; and the woman was unseen. The safest bet was that she was using the outboard bulkhead to hide behind, hoping to flank him. It’s what I would do. But which side is she on? He canted his head and tried to peer down the skin of the ship. He couldn’t make anything out, but there was a small gap between the transport and Replicade since they were unable to mate hull-to-hull. Those precious few inches could easily hide someone who did not wish to be seen.
“Give up now and I’ll make this painless,” Crase shouted, hoping to distract them with a response. He hoped he could elicit a response, get into their heads a bit and capitalize on the distraction by blasting one of them in the face. Nothing takes the will to fight away like seeing your friend die before your eyes, he thought. Surprisingly, they remained quiet. Maybe these people aren’t amateurs like I thought. “I just want what’s mine; the ship and Neular. The rest of you can go on about your lives. Hell, you can take the transport if you want. Just hand over the Replicade and this will all be over.”
“Not likely,” came a muttering response. It did not seem to be intentionally said to him, but more like an utterance of dissention. He might not have heard it if not for the implants in his ears.
It was the woman’s voice, and it sounded to Crase as if it was coming from the other side of the bulkhead where he stooped. It was perfect, he thought. Just when you think you’re losing your touch for these things, you show up and prove you still have it. She was exactly where he anticipated her to be. Crase fought back a grin and spoke again, coaxing her to reveal herself again. “You have my word.”
“Ha! Your word means—” Her lapse in judgement was going to cost the woman her life. The shock in her eyes said everything as Crase’s grip tightened around her throat, the tips of his fingers wrapping most of the way around her neck as he lifted her body off the deck. He doubted they expected a man his age to move so quickly, or to use the woman as a shield between them. It is their fault for underestimating me, he thought. Victory goes to the one willing to do whatever it takes. Chivalry and rules of engagement mean nothing. He drew his weapon and pointed it in the direction of the Lechun man he had seen in Pera, the one with the tattoo on his head that looked like a bird. The priest named Deis. He seems to be the bigger threat of the two.
“I tried to be civil, but it’s really not working out. Drop your weapons or I’ll blow this bitch’s brains all over the bulkhead.” He watched the Lechun men as they stared at him nervously. He could tell they were not experienced with situations like this. They weren’t accustomed to death, to murder the way Crase was. He made eye contact with Neular, the man’s hands bound in front of him like an animal. Maybe there’s hope for him yet, Crase thought. “Put them down!”
The tattooed man refused to place his weapon on the deck and instead held it shakily as he looked at Malikea. Their yellow eyes stared at each other before looking back at Crase. He could see the fear, the hatred, the contempt. Their eyes would not stare with such an indignant tone after today. He would kill them, yes, but he wanted to do so on his terms, with all of them watching as he pulled the trigger on each victim one-by-one. He much preferred to kill them where the cleanup would be easiest as well. It’s hard to sell a bloody warship.
Using the woman as a shield he scanned the cargo bay. “Where is the Greshian?” Crase asked, leveling his weapon against the woman’s head, the barrel disappearing beneath her long dark hair. She whimpered until he tightened his gr
ip, silencing her as he deprived her of air.
“He’s on the bridge,” Malikea answered, his voice shaking. The man’s face was bruised and swollen by Neular’s hand; a fitting consolation to Crase for Malikea’s making this more difficult than it needed to be.
“Well,” Crase said. “You might want to get him down here before I blow this one’s head off.” The woman grunted as he tapped the heavy barrel against the side of her head, his fingers tight against her throat, choking the sound from escaping. “Don’t worry. I’ll wait, but I think her time might be running out.”
27
Anki
Panic threatened to consume Anki’s mind, but it slowly receded despite the tight grip of Crase’s hand against her throat. She fought to swallow, to gasp for the expensive air as it escaped her, to survive—all of the involuntary reactions the mind forced through rapid succession with no input from a logical thought process. All of her attempts to sustain her life failed, but that was when her training kicked in and she stopped fighting.
“You will give me this ship or the female dies, and I’ll follow that up by killing the rest of you,” Crase spat. Somewhere in the scuffle his lip started to bleed, the crimson life force oozing from the wound splitting the upper portion of his lip, Anki noticed from the corner of her eye. They were in the middle of a standoff as tension filled the room, holding its collective breath before the bullets would surely begin to fly. Crase used Anki as a shield while Malikea and Deis aimed their weapons squarely in her and Crase’s direction. Despite the oxygen deprivation, she noticed how their barrels constantly shifted. She knew it was because they were trying to keep her out of the line of fire. Deis looked more confident behind the weapon, while Malikea looked as though he wanted to pass out, probably from the exhaustion of whatever he had endured under Crase’s control.
It was all talk, and Crase had yet to pull the trigger. She couldn’t be sure as to why, but she knew this was her opportunity. It’s now or never, she thought, relaxing her body, forcing Crase to do all the work of holding her up, deliberately weakening him for what was about to happen next.
Using her heels, she engaged the magnets in her boots and felt the magnetic force clasping her to the steel deck as her body sagged under Crase’s tight grip. Fortunately, the bulkhead was relatively bare and made of magnetic material. Her eyes shifted side to side while Crase adjusted his stance, and she saw that her legs were within reach of the bulkhead, but only if she acted quickly and before what oxygen was in her brain ran out.
Anki kicked to the side and her boots found purchase on the steel bulkhead. The force of movement also caused Crase to lose his grip on her throat, and she watched his eyes widen as she broke free from his snare. She also felt a sneer forming on her lips as she leapt from her perch on the bulkhead and cradled the man’s head and neck in her arms, spinning around his body, canting his neck past ninety-degrees and latching magnetically to the airlock’s door behind him. Her forearm tightened against his throat, choking him while also trying to snap the man’s neck, but despite her strength and agility, the man was stronger and faster.
Before Malikea or Deis had the opportunity to fire, Crase spun around, snatching her through the air as her hold on the airlock vanished from under her boots. She was once again between the pirate and her crew’s weapons, hovering helplessly before he snatched her by the hair and slammed her down. The force of the blow knocked the air from her lungs and she sucked, gasping for something but being denied oxygen once again as the monstrous man hovered above her.
“Get off me, bitch,” he yelled, lifting her and spinning wildly, knocking her body around the small confines of the passageway. She felt her hair pulled by his massive grip, the feeling of her head possibly being torn from her shoulders as this savage of a man wrenched heavily.
Overpowered, she felt a scream forming before it escaped her lips, the blood-curdling shriek of torturous pain. But she clawed at his face and refused to let go. She would not be a victim and left to be subject to Crase’s mercy. Better to die in the fight than to surrender and die anyway. Her fingers squeezed, pinching and tearing flesh, but he still did not let go.
Somewhere between jolts of pain her perspective shifted. She found her body racked against the bulkhead, Crases’ grip on her gone, but the full weight of his body crushing her ribs as he fell backwards. Anki dared to open her eyes to witness the chaos erupting around her, and found not Malikea or Deis battling the enraged lunatic, but another gray-skinned Lechun.
It was Neular.
A flurry of punches and jabs from the gray man found Crase’s jaw, knocking him back into the bulkhead. There was fury in his eyes, and his blows thundered with each strike. She felt the jolts in her own body from each punch while Crase anchored himself, pushing against her body where she was pinned, lashing out at Neular.
Anki groaned from the pressure, but also the relief of oxygen filling her lungs once more. She wanted to help in the fight, to hold Crase back and allow Neular to destroy the pirate, but all her strength was gone, lost from a lack of oxygen and replaced with a significant amount of pain from the abuse at Crase’s hand. He’s receiving that abuse now, she thought as her body fell from the bulkhead and she moved away, holding her side where some ribs felt as though they might be broken.
Neular’s voice modulator was distorted, but she could make out the string of words in sporadic bursts. “You did this to me. You made me think I was alone. You made me kill. What have I done?” His words did nothing to illicit a response from Crase, but the blade Neular produced and stabbed into Crase’s chest did incite blood to spill from his chest. Neular pulled out the blade and stabbed again and again.
Anki watched as Brendle finally arrived, running over and grabbing her hands, pulling her into an embrace as Crase slid to the deck. His dark blood pooled beneath him, his sneer and hateful eyes looking at them all, but pausing on Neular. Silent rage screamed from his stare, but Neular did not back down, did not look sorry, and she imagined he was far from it.
Anki imagined the profiteer felt betrayed, but she was sure Neular felt the same. Somewhere in their relationship, Neular had fallen for the ruse that Crase was his friend. She knew that could never have been the case. She noticed that his hands were free, no longer bound by the ties Deis had placed on him. Either he had been freed or had escaped his bonds. She was thankful for it, regardless of which.
“You dare try to kill me?” Crase said as blood spilled from his mouth and chest. “Do you know who I am, what I have done to people like you? This isn’t the end.”
Neular rose to his feet, his face pale. “It is this time,” he said as his finger pressed the airlock door and he kicked Crase into it. The large man crawled into the transport, cursing Neular, cursing the world. “You can take your hate with you.” Neular’s words accented the closing of the airlock and the ejection of the transport from the Replicade.
Anki watched the man collapse as the transport fell away in lifeless silence. They were in the dark now, the frigid vacuum outside Faraxian airspace. Neular lay motionless on the deck as Deis and Malikea fell next to him, panic in their yellow eyes.
She and Brendle looked on as the three of them whispered to one another, but loud enough to be heard nonetheless.
“Neular,” Malikea said, pulling his bloody hands from Neular’s stomach where a visible gunshot wound was evident. For the life of her, Anki could not remember hearing the sound of a weapon firing, but there was no mistaking the charred flesh surrounding the wound and the spring of blood flowing from it.
Neular looked up at them, his lips quivering. “I’m sorry for what I’ve done. I’m sorry for ever thinking you left me. And I’m sorry for ever hating you.” His words sounded mechanical as they emanated from the voice modulator, but they still sounded personal. Within moments, Neular’s eyes closed and Deis prayed silently over the fallen man.
Silence filled the passageway, though Deis lips still moved, uttering whatever words would send Neular to their co
ncept of god. Anki knew enough to observe the silence. After all, the ritual of death was universal regardless of what religion those people followed.
Deis kissed the tips of his fingers and set them on Neular’s forehead. Anki gripped Brendle’s hand in hers as Malikea followed suit. Such a beautiful way of saying goodbye, she thought as they brought Neular’s hands to his chest and laid him out in a burial position.
“Is he…” Brendle started to ask, but the question and answer was evident in the horror-stricken cries of the Lechun men.
They lamented the loss of a brother from their world. Neular was someone they once knew, fallen from their faith, used to commit evil, but he was one of them anyway. Anki witnessed Deis and Malikea extend forgiveness for the horror that could have come at the hands of their fallen comrade. Lechun are peculiar in that way, she thought, but there is something other civilizations could learn from that kind of thinking. Sadness tore at her heart by how they accepted the man despite what he had become. If only other societies treated their people with such kindness, then there would be no war, no threat from a looming empire.
Anki watched until she could no longer bear to see the devastation, the death. She may have survived the fight with Crase, but it cost another’s life in the process. It was another price paid in love in the constant war that was the backdrop of what her life was becoming. She never would have thought Neular would have intervened. She was concerned that her rescue did not come from the hands of Deis and Malikea, but fear had a way of paralyzing a person. Maybe living in that world had desensitized Neular to the point he no longer experienced that kind of fear. It made her contemplate fate.
Anki knelt next to them and Brendle joined them. She looked at Neular’s face, the peace of death seeking refuge in the absence of a hellish, tormented life. She pitied him for what he had to endure, but she knew he would resent that notion, as all Lechun would. They embraced death because they longed to return to the dust of the stars from whence they came. He was there now, she realized.
