by M. D. Cooper
The usual.
Regardless of whether or not some mercs were running around liberating systems, Kershaw would still be king of the heap in Morres, and Rajiz looked forward to paying him off. Then he could finally fix those annoying issues on the Talon and get his girl in tip-top condition.
Maybe he could finally find courier commissions that would get him out of Old Genevia, and he could leave this mess behind. Find greener pastures in Septhia, or perhaps even the ASN Coalition.
“I’m going for a walk,” he said, rising from his chair. “Let me know when you’re going to alter course.”
“You got it, Boss.” Avi nodded without turning, and Rachella didn’t even give that much of an acknowledgment.
A tour of the ship—which took him past the galley were Betty had challenged Jim and Jerry to a drinking contest, and then past the engineering bay where Gero floated immersed in a VR field, his arms flapping awkwardly—did little to quell Rajiz’s angst, and before long, he found himself back on the bridge shortly after Avi had brought the ship onto their outsystem vector.
“I did what I could, you know,” he said to Rachella, walking around her console to stand before the woman. “I fought. I fought for ten years in the war, and four afterward. I lost—” his voice cut out.
“Everyone,” Rachella said quietly. “I know…I did too. Stars, everyone lost pretty much everyone. We’re all still putting it together again after that shitshow of a war.”
“Fuuuuck.” Rajiz leant back against the bulkhead.
“You got new people, Boss,” Avi said. “We all lost, too. You know that. Now we have a new family.”
“I know,” he replied, drawing in a slow breath. “Still miss the old one—though it hurts less, having you dorks around.”
“Wow, can you feel the—shit, now what?”
Rajiz folded his arms across his chest, fingers drumming on a forearm as he waited for Avi to elaborate.
“Niets changed their minds,” she said after a minute. “They’re denying our slingshot passage around Jujell and are ordering us back onto our prior vector.”
Rachella’s eyebrows lifted as she regarded him, but the PLI woman didn’t speak, only watched intently as he pushed himself away from the bulkhead and ran a hand through his hair.
“Send them an acknowledgment, Avi. Tell them we’re plotting a burn to get us on the other vector without pissing away a ton of fuel.”
“Will do. I assume we’re just buying time?”
“Yeah, as much as we can before they send someone after us.”
“Do you think they will?” Rachella asked.
Rajiz brought up a holodisplay showing one AU of space around the ViperTalon. Chad and its smattering of space stations were near the bottom of the holo, and a few dozen freighters were dotted throughout the area. Other than a few cruisers in low orbit around Chad, the only other Nietzschean ships in the area were a pair of small patrol boats, both roughly the same size as the Talon, though more heavily armed.
One was seven light minutes away, but the other’s patrol route had brought it much closer than expected, only three light minutes distant. They were Kalier Class ships, which theoretically could catch up to the Talon, but only if they burned antimatter to do it.
“You look worried,” Rachella said. “I thought that none of the Niet ships could catch the ViperTalon.”
“That’s not exactly what I said. I didn’t think they’d be in range to do it.” He pointed at the closer of the two patrol craft. “That one could, if they really pour it on. Normally I’d wager against them bothering, they’d just have a ship in the outer system intercept us, but with the attack on Genevia, they might be feeling twitchy.”
“Great,” Avi muttered. “Twitchy Niets, my favorite.”
Rajiz flagged the jump point on the holo. “We just have to make it here. That’s twenty-eight light minutes as the photon flies.” He glanced at Avi. “The second that Nietzschean jalopy shifts vector toward us, you spin out the AP drive and go max burn. I don’t care how suspicious it’s gonna look, I don’t want them getting close.”
“So, depending on if and when they do that, we’re about eleven hours to jump,” Rachella said.
“ ‘Bout that.” Rajiz nodded. “Time for the best part of spaceflight. Waiting.”
* * * * *
“T-minus fifteen!” Avi called out. “Those bastards are closing, though.”
There was a momentary pause, then the engineer responded.
“Wow, those Niets are getting really mad.” Rachella was monitoring comms while Avi focused on jinking the ship to avoid incoming beamfire. “I bet there’s foam and spittle flying everywhere.”
“Niets tend to be more calm and cocksure, in my experience,” Rajiz responded absently, keeping his focus on the jump point. “You’re sure this route is good?”
“I’m on the ship, aren’t I?” Rachella asked. “If I wasn’t sure, I wouldn’t be here, praying that we make it there before that ship back there carves a hole in our engines.”
“They’re good,” Avi said. “I’ll give them that. It’s like they have our patterns.”
“Just keep changing it up.” Rajiz gave her an encouraging smile. “You’re doing great.”
“I’m not doing great,” Avi muttered. “They’ve tagged our port engine cowling twice. One more, and they’ll burn through and hit the bell."
“I’ve got a weird reading.” Rachella highlighted a burst of static that was growing in intensity on a high band. “It’s like another ship is out there. Niets don’t have stealthed ships in Burroughs, though….do they?” She turned in her seat to look at Rajiz, and he pursed his lips.
“No. No they don’t. That’s an RM.”
“Faaaaaawwwk!” Avi moaned. “We’re still ten minutes from the point.”
“The minute that missile is one light second out, you jink onto our final vector and dump to the dark layer,” Rajiz ordered his first mate.
“What?! We’ll still be at least three light seconds from dumping!”
Rajiz nodded. “Sure, but they always have some wiggle room on jump points.”
“Yeah, sure, wiggle room on official ones. These shady-ass smuggler markers aren’t on the official charts for a reason—no one wants to meet the long night in the DL!”
Rachella gestured to the marker showing the estimated position of the relativistic missile. “Yeah, well, we can either be sure about dying from that thing, or take a chance on the DL.”
“Or we stop and surrender,” Rajiz muttered, catching dark looks from the two women. “What? I had to say it.”
“You know that at this point, the Niets will probably just let the RM do its job no matter what,” Avi said.
“No,” Rachella shook her head. “If they’re willing to spend one of those on us, they’ll want intel if we surrender. So…chalk that up as the worst possible outcome.”
The ship lurched as she spoke, and Rajiz felt himself pressed back into his seat for a moment as the a-grav systems compensated for increased thrust.
Rajiz groaned.
“I wonder if anyone’s ever made an RM that works in the dark layer,” Rachella mused. “That would be really useful at times like this.”
“Core, woman!” Avi grunted. “Don’t say things like that. Going to give me waking nightmares or something.”
“Too hard to control entry vector,” Rajiz said calmly. “It would overshoot it
s target, and then take forever to slow down with a-grav…as much as that works in the DL.”
“Yeah,” Avi sounded like she was grasping for serenity. “They’ll probably bring it back around for recovery, if they don’t get to….”
“Blow us to bits?” Rachella asked.
“Fuck!” Avi swore. “Seriously, woman, do you want me to have a panic attack and crash the ship?”
“Crash it into what?” Rachella gestured at the holo. “Other than the Niets and their missile, there’s nothing out here.”
Avi shot the PLI woman a dark look. “I’ll find something.”
“We’re picking up speed,” Rajiz turned the conversation to a new topic. “Looks like we’ll reach the point in seven minutes now.”
“Yeah, well, I think they figured out our intended vector,” Rachella said. “Look at the RM’s jink pattern. It’s stabilized, like they’re focusing in.”
Rajiz looked at the missile’s most recent jinks and saw that, while it appeared to be matching the ship’s vector, it was doing so from within a narrow cone, one that was centered on the jump point.
“Think they know about it?” he asked. “Or did we give it away?”
“We’ve never vectored in alignment with the marker,” Avi said. “I’m not stupid.”
“Yeah,” Rachella agreed. “But you almost drew a circle around it with your jinking. They’ve got a good NSAI in that missile to pick up on it.”
“Faaaaawk,” Avi moaned again. “I did do that, shit. I practically drew a bullseye around the jump point.”
The RM was tailing the ViperTalon by only three light seconds, and the ship was still several more from transition.
“Stay a quarter-degree off target,” he said. “No more jinking. Then, when it gets to the one-second threshold, get on vector and dump.”
“What about the patrol boat?” Avi asked.
“We pulled ahead with the AP burn. Their beams are only gonna tickle at this distance. Keep us spinning a touch, but nothing more.”
Avi nodded and brought the ship onto a vector that was very nearly aligned with the jump point.
A tense minute passed on the bridge, all eyes on the scan data that gave the RM’s position. It was as though the weapon was clawing its way through space, hungry and ready to devour its prey.
“You know,” Rajiz said as the missile closed to within one-and-a-half light seconds. “This is not the first time this has happened to me, and it still sucks. I—”
An EM flare lit up on scan, and the Talon’s aft shields weakened, hammered by radiation from the explosion.
“They blew it so far away,” Rachella muttered. “Why—”
“Avi! Get on course, dump now!”
“Aye!” the first mate called out, while Rachella turned and frowned at Rajiz.
“Why? They blew their load.”
“The patrol boat,” he stabbed a finger toward the craft. “Our shields are weak, it can punch through.”
His words were emphasized by the deck bucking beneath their feet as the ship lurched, slewing to the side.
Then scan went dark.
SALVAGE
STELLAR DATE: 06.04.8950 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: GMS Pinnacle, Babylon
REGION: Genevia System, New Genevian Alliance
Rika considered the news, chewing on her lip as she watched Chief Ona and Heather coordinate with a salvage team from Hanging Gardens Station.
Piper made a hmmming sound for a few seconds.
Niki said in a smug voice.
Bondo coughed.
the chief engineer said.
Rika ran a hand through her hair, jaw set, as she paced across the Marauders’ Lance’s bridge.
Bondo snorted.
Rika had to admit that it sounded like something Garza would do. She’d only interacted with him briefly, but the man was a grade-A asshole, even if he was just a cloned asshole.
The conversation shifted to the timeline for the final collection of salvage—the oversight of which Rika planned to turn over to the pair of destroyers that would arrive in a few hours. She needed to get back to Belgium and organize the fleets that would head to Burroughs, Oran, and Morres.
Plus, she had to rescue Tremon from the snares of office. Though he was probably more capable than she at the civilian aspects of leadership, she knew that he didn’t want to have the responsibility, and foisting it on him levied a feeling of guilt on her already-burdened conscience.
Rika let out a nervous laugh, earning her a look from Heather that she waved off.
The statement caused a nervous flutter in Rika’s stomach.
Neither spoke for a moment, and Rika distracted herself with listening to Heather berate one of the tug pilots from Hanging Garden for nea
rly sending a section of the Lance that they believed to contain an armory down into Babylon’s depths.
Garth was laughing as he listened to the exchange, but at a stern look from the captain, he turned back to his console, appearing to focus, though his shoulders were still lifting sporadically.
It was Niki’s turn to snort.
Rika considered a few options.
Niki said.
It was the first time that Piper had spoken about the events at Epsilon—where he’d lost the other segments of his multinodal mind—as a death.
