“Well, we won’t solve this mystery by standing still, and our lords and masters outside will be getting twitchy fingers on the collar controls again soon. Sal, this is where you take over. I reckon the flight deck must be beyond that door and we don’t want Jess setting off anything that wrecks it. You’re up.”
Grumbling under her breath Sal pushed past Jess, walked to the end of the corridor and studied the door before pressing the wall to the side. Nothing happened. She pressed again, harder, then several times in succession.
“Nothing,” she called back over her shoulder. “Dead. Or locked. Doesn’t want to open either way.”
“Let me look,” said Matt moving past Jess into the corridor.
He reached out to press the door control, again nothing happened. Jess moved a little closer and the door from the main room slid shut behind him.
“Shit!” Sal shoved past Jess, reached out to palm the door control and let out a shuddering breath as the door opened again.
“You OK?” asked Matt.
“Yeah.” Sal nodded shakily, though to Jess she looked anything but OK. “Getting shut into small spaces once too often!”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have volunteered for this job then,” Matt said, then chuckled.
Sal snorted but didn’t bother to reply. Jess had been studying the door and panel while they spoke. Now he reached out and gently touched the door control. The door slid smoothly open, revealing a small flight deck.
“How the hell did you do that?” Matt asked, startled.
Before Jess could reply, red flashing lights came on around them and a siren started to blare. Bolts of electricity arced out from the walls, grounding through them. Sal let out a brief scream that ended with her choking. Jess was choking too. He wasn’t getting burned as he’d expected, but he couldn’t breathe. He scrabbled at his throat, trying to break free, to get some breath. His fingers found purchase and he pulled as hard as he could, collapsing to the floor and drawing in a deep breath. After a few seconds he heard the other two also dragging breath rapidly into their lungs. The siren stopped and the flashing red lights were replaced by the soft white light.
Jess stared at what lay on the floor, then tentatively reached up and touched his neck. He felt skin, nothing else. The control collar lay on the floor in front of him. That shouldn’t be possible; once fitted any attempt to remove a collar led to it activating, and all collars within fifty metres doing the same.
Jess turned to look at the other two. Sal had both hands against her neck, staring eyes wide at her collar on the ground with a smile on her face. Matt had a face like thunder. He looked up, catching both their gazes before speaking.
“We’re dead,” he said flatly.
“What?” spluttered Sal. “Why?”
“That’s why.” Matt gestured at the collars. “We’ve found a way to get them removed. The guards won’t allow that story to get out. The moment they see us, we’re dead. If we step outside so the rest of the prisoners can see then they’re all dead too.”
Sal and Jess sat shocked, the truth of his words sinking in. Matt looked up and around at the ship.
“Not even like we can make a run for it in this thing. We’d have to find a way out of these hangars and dodge everything they can throw at us. If we got out they’d hunt us down like dogs. Though…” a grin spread across his face. “If we’re dead anyway, we might as well have some fun.”
He pushed himself to his feet, kicked his collar aside and made his way into the flight deck. Jess and Sal followed.
The flight deck was simple, one seat set at the front with two banks of two behind it. The seats were padded, comfortable looking. The front seat was clearly for the pilot, a joystick and a totally blank display board showed that. There were no windows. The walls looked like they might be screens, though they were dead now.
Matt sank into the pilot’s chair, grasped the joystick and tried tapping the blank area in front of him.
“Nothing. Totally dead.”
His shoulders sank. A few seconds later the radio burst into life.
“Get back to the airlock and open it now. It won’t open for us. You have sixty seconds before we activate the collars.”
“On our way,” Matt answered. He flicked off the radio and continued. “Well, that’s good news, at least. Now we can starve in here, or die of thirst, or open the airlock and get shot by the guards.” He thumped the blank panel in front of him.
“Matt,” Sal said softly, resting a hand on his shoulder. “Let Jess have a try.”
“What? Why?”
“Because the ship seems to be responding to him. He opened the outer airlock. We couldn’t open the door to get in here, but it opened first time for him. What have we got to lose?”
Matt sat thinking for a moment then stood, smiling lopsidedly at Jess.
“All yours kid. No pressure.”
Jess looked from one to the other, thoughts tumbling over each other. What did they think he was? He wasn’t anything special, just one more prisoner.
He slipped into the pilot’s chair carefully. Nothing happened. He grasped the joystick. Again nothing. He reached out, touched the blank panel in front of him. Still nothing. He tried resting both hands flat on the panel. The controls remained dead.
“I was so sure,” muttered Sal.
“Never mind. It was worth a try,” said Matt. He clapped Jess on the shoulder. “Don’t blame yourself kid, it was always a long shot. Now we need to decide whether to open the airlock or not.”
Jess slumped back in the chair, arms resting on the arm rests. As his hands touched the black material a shock ran through them, almost like they’d been bitten. Before he could say anything the ship started to come to life around him.
First the walls, screens flickering into life. Images appeared showing the hangar, the other ships, even the guards and prisoners outside. Then the board in front of him lit up. Most of what he saw made no sense, but an outline of the ship from the side and above drew his eyes. It was mostly red, with some yellow. The only green section was the front, the flight deck. That was changing. Areas flickered from red to yellow to green.
“She’s powering up,” said Matt, disbelief in his voice. He grabbed Sal in a bear hug. “You were right! You were right! The ship is reacting to the kid.”
Jess sat staring at the displays in front of him, mind reeling. Feeling dizzy. Outside he could see the guards starting to rush around, pointing towards the ship. Something was happening. The radio crackled into life.
“Where are you? What are you doing?” the voice sounded worried, panicked even. “Get down here and open the airlock now. The ship has just started to vibrate. Get down here now or else!”
With a grin Matt replied. “You sound a little concerned out there. I’m afraid we’re quite happy in here, and it’ll be a cold day in hell before we let you in. Oh… and don’t bother with the collars. We’ve taken ours off.”
They heard splutters of disbelief at the other end, before Matt turned the radio off.
“Boring bunch,” he said with a grin.
He sat down in the left hand seat behind Jess, gestured for Sal to sit to his right.
“Right kid, get us out of here.”
Jess was still sitting stunned, barely aware of his surroundings. He felt dizzy and… strange. Heavy. He couldn’t put his finger on it exactly but he felt… well, wrong. He jumped as Matt’s hand rested on his shoulder.
“Sorry to hurry you kid, but they’re shooting at us, and they’re bringing up some serious firepower. I can see a plasma cannon and heavy-duty laser cutter already.”
Jess grabbed the joystick, tried pulling it back. Nothing. Forwards, sideways. Still nothing. He started to panic. The other two were depending on him and he couldn’t do it. Looking at the screens he could see a heavy-duty wagon being turned so that the device on its back pointed towards them, towards the flight deck he guessed.
“I can’t do it!” Jess wailed. “It won’t respond. I’m sorry.”
Matt tightened his grip on Jess’s shoulder.
“It’s OK kid. It’s OK. You’ve already done wonders. At the least we’ve given them a good scare, and when they fire that thing they’ll wreck this ship. Not bad for three lowly prisoners.”
“He’s right,” said Sal softly. “It’s not your fault Jess.”
She leant forward, kissed him on the cheek. Jess felt his heart skip a beat, surprised to receive kindness from his two fellow prisoners rather than condemnation. He gritted his teeth. He wanted to save them. He wanted them to survive. Watching the screen he saw the weapon powering up, preparing to fire. He wanted to protect the other two, wanted to throw himself in front of the blast and shield them. The weapon fired.
Jess felt the blow as if it had struck the side of his head, a mild stinging sensation which quickly faded. Looking at the display showing the ship there was now a glowing outline showing green around most of the ship but yellow around the flight deck. As the stinging subsided the glow around the flight deck faded back from yellow to green. He decided the display was showing the status of the shields.
“What is this ship?” Matt shouted. “That was a plasma blast! A combat ship ten times this size wouldn’t be able to deflect a blast from that close. Damn! Look!”
Sal and Jess looked where he pointed. Several large ships were flying down the hangar towards them.
“Raptors. The weaponry on those things makes the plasma cannon look like a pinprick. It’ll probably vaporise everyone outside the ship too. Even the guards. Shame.”
Jess stared at the approaching ships as Matt’s words sank in. He wanted to get away, get his new friends away. The closer the ships came, the more he wanted to get away. Suddenly the floor lurched, Jess was pressed down into his seat by acceleration, and the view on the front screen swivelled around. Another surge of acceleration and they were moving.
“Well done, kid!” yelled Matt. “I think I’ve figured out what this display is,” he continued, pointing at a cluster of moving points near the left side. “It seems to be showing other ships. The smaller dots are the Raptors. God, there’s at least another twenty closing in. And those larger dots… what the?”
Jess glanced over his shoulder. Part of the cabin had flowed out in front of Matt to form a board, and displays were coming on across it. Matt’s puzzled expression was replaced by a huge grin.
“I like this ship,” the old man muttered. “Let me see… that’s the scanner, this looks like a viewer. If I do this… yes… oh… oh no. That’s bad.”
“What?” Jess asked, focus back on the screens in front of him. Several of the Raptors had opened fire and he was jinking the ship to avoid giving them an easy target. He was using the joystick, but was getting the definite impression the ship was responding to his thoughts rather than the physical action. He wasn’t going to start experimenting whilst being shot at, though.
“There’s much heavier ships moving in, some of them barely fit in here. They’re really serious about stopping us. We’re caught in a ring of ships. If we try to break out they’ll chop us to pieces.”
“This thing got any weapons?” asked Sal.
“No use,” said Matt. “There’s way too many of them, and some of those ships are monsters. I can see hundreds of ships closing already. Shame. This has been one hell of a ride. Still, better to die free than live a prisoner.”
Jess wasn’t so sure about that. Matt was an old man, Jess still had a lot of life left. Prisoner or not, he’d been counting on a lot more years. He felt a sharp pain in his leg as a Raptor’s blast caught the rear of the ship, felt a tingle as another blast just missed. He shouted as two more blasts struck the ship’s shields.
Almost without his realising, more and more knowledge of the ship had been filtering into his mind. Now he became aware of the flow he realised it was the cause of his dizziness, of his not quite feeling right. Something new came through. A way out. An exit. Four or five more shots struck the ship despite his best efforts, twenty or thirty passed nearby. Jess didn’t hesitate. He reached out and grabbed the exit, dragging the ship through.
The screens went blank for a few moments then flickered back into life. All showed the same thing, a deep blue mist with wispy strands of a lighter blue all lit by a soft internal glow. Every few seconds a crackle of lightning discharged.
“Holy shit!” Matt swore. “We’re in jump space. It’s just not possible. You can’t jump from inside a gravity field or inside a station. It’s impossible.”
“Then we’ve done the impossible,” laughed Sal. “Don’t you understand? We’ve made it! We’re free!”
“Not yet. I spent most of my life on ships. They’ll have tracked our entry vector. Ships will soon be following us, not the ones that were chasing us but they must have more outside of that place. Their sensors won’t work here but the moment we punch through to real space we’ll leave behind a huge disturbance which they can detect. They’ll drop into real space right behind us.”
“So? We’ll just change direction.”
“Not possible. The jump engines shove us through into this… I don’t know, whatever this is. I just know it as jump space. I never learnt the theory behind it. As well as breaking through they give us a kick in the right direction. Once the ship is in jump space the thrusters are useless. The jump drive too, its only purpose is to break us back to real space when needed.”
“Can’t we drop out and quickly jump again, before they can turn up to track us?”
“No. Sorry. It won’t work. Each jump damages the skin of real space, it can take days for the damage to vanish. Until it does it’s like a signpost, pointing the direction we took. It’s like a fingerprint too. Each ship’s drive leaves a different pattern. On top of that, it takes time for the jump engines to charge again. We’d be sitting ducks while we waited.”
“But we can stay here? They won’t find us?”
Matt smiled sadly.
“Yes. For the moment. But with no food and water we can’t stay for long. Also we don’t know which direction we jumped in, the longer we stay the further we go and the harder it will be to work out where we emerge. We might end up stranded in the void between the stars. We’ve got no star charts, no idea where to go.”
Several quiet minutes passed, each of them sunk in thought. It was Matt who broke the silence.
“That’s odd. The scanner is still working. Look.”
Jess glanced at his version of the scanner. Matt was right, he could see the dots representing ships. Thirty or forty at least. All following behind them. Some of the dots were immense.
“Well, aren’t we the popular ones?” joked Sal. “They really want us back.”
“Or this ship,” muttered Matt. “Or more likely both.”
Jess studied the scanner. Matt was right, all the ships were following. They all seemed to be travelling at the same speed, too. If Matt was right and the sensors on the other ships didn’t work here then it would be so simple to lose them, if only the ship could change direction. A ninety degree turn to the left would do it, would leave the ships heading completely the wrong way.
As soon as the thought formed, Jess was pressed into the right side of the seat as the ship’s nose swung left. A few seconds later the pressure eased off. A glance at the scanner confirmed what he’d felt. The pursuing ships were now shown to their left, but they were dropping behind. He could sense Matt and Sal tensely studying the display too. Neither said a word for the next few minutes as the chasing ships moved further and further away without deviating from their original heading. Finally, as they started to disappear off the scanner, Matt let out a whoop of delight.
“We’ve done it! My God, we’ve done it. Do you understand? We’re free. Free!”
He broke down, tears running down his face, sobs racking his body. Sal moved to comfort him, while Jess sat dazed. He couldn’t really take it in. When very young he’d dreamed of escaping, of getting free. As he grew older those dreams had been crushed out of hi
m. Now it had happened and all he felt was numb. It was too much. He couldn’t take it in yet.
After a few minutes Matt regained his composure.
“Sorry kids. I dreamt of getting free, being able to live again, every night since they took me prisoner. Actually achieving it is almost too much to bear. Come on, the ship will be fine for a while. Let’s go explore, see if there’s any food or water on this thing. Then we can decide what to do.”
Jess went to stand up, to lean forward, found that he couldn’t. His back and head were stuck to the chair.
“I’m caught on something. Can you see what?” he asked.
Sal leaned forward to look, then let out a cry.
“My God! Matt, look!”
“What?” Jess asked, scared. “What is it. Why can’t I move.”
Matt let out a curse. Jess started to try to pull free, but Matt quickly took hold of his shoulders to hold him in place.
“Don’t move boy. Please. Hold still for a moment. There’s some sort of web between you and the seat. Now don’t panic, but it looks like some strands are going into your head. Like you’re being linked to the ship. How do you feel?”
Jess took a ragged breath, trying to slow his hammering heart. “A bit dizzy. My head has been tingling. I’ve been feeling pain when the ship was hit. And I seemed to just know things about the ship. What’s happening to me?” He started to struggle again, but his head was locked firm. He could turn to the sides a little, but not move forwards.
“Steady. Steady!” Matt’s hands pressed down on his shoulders again. “If those are connected into your brain then ripping them out could kill you. Take it easy.”
Jess felt himself relaxing, but not at Matt’s words. A warm feeling was spreading through his body, easing the tension from his muscles as it went. He felt an image, a feeling, pushing into his mind. It wasn’t his thought, wasn’t trying to disguise itself as coming from him. It came from the ship, he was sure. The image was of him being held safely. Being cared for. What was happening was to help protect him. He relaxed some more.
“It’s OK, I think,” he said. “Really. It’s a bit scary, but I’m sure the ship doesn’t want to hurt me. It’s doing this for me, to help me somehow.”
Wanderer's Odyssey - Books 1 to 3: The Epic Space Opera Series Begins Page 2
