by GARY DARBY
Their eyes met and Nase stated, “The other ship.”
Dason pounded a fist on his thigh. “Of course! They did the bulk of the piloting."
“And,” Nase observed, “they’ve kept us at one-gee boost, we still have normal gravity, which means they have the ship-to-ship link already established.”
Dason keyed his communicator. “Sami, Shanon, meet us at the main passageway where it joins the airlock corridor. We need to rethink this; they’ve thrown us out of orbit.”
“On our way,” Shanon answered.
“Sami and Shanon can use the conduit,” Dason pointed out to Nase. “But that’s too slow for us. We need to chance the passageway, try to head off the poachers before they take TJ across.”
“Agreed,” Nase replied.
“Let’s move,” Dason ordered and broke into a sprint.
Minutes later, Dason and Nase crouched in an empty and silent corridor. A slight rustling of clothing announced the arrival of Shanon and Sami.
Dason gathered them into a huddle and gave a hurried explanation of finding the Torther Ape. “I think they may have already carried TJ over to the other ship. So, the way I see it, we have two options.
“We jump the poachers, take this ship and try to notify the authorities. It means we leave TJ and hope the Imperium can intercept the other ship at some point and rescue her.”
He paused and went on, “Or we sneak across and hit’em there. But we could be dealing with at least double the number of poachers.”
The novice scouts exchanged glances before Nase commented, “Our chances against armed opponents are pretty slim.”
“Between zero and none, I’d say,” Sami muttered to no one in particular.
“Yes,” replied Shanon, “but that’s our teammate over there, in the hands of outlaws.”
Sami had his head down, looking at the metal floor. In an awkward and stumbling voice, he mumbled, “Look, if the poachers had me, I’d, well . . . I’d want you guys to bug out. Get away and alert the authorities, pronto like.
“But, umm, since I’m not over there, my vote is to go get TJ. I don’t like the idea of bustin’ up the gang.”
“Why, Sami,” Shanon murmured with a surprised expression, “what a noble speech.”
“And,” Sami groused, “the first and the last you get from me, too.”
Dason eyed Nase and Shanon. “The same?” he asked. They nodded at him. “Okay, it’s unanimous. Another charge of the Light Brigade. Let’s go.”
“Light brigade?” Sami asked with a puzzled expression. “Dolkien’s Brigade, Mouftasa’s Conger Brigade I know, but what’s a light brigade?”
“Later Sami, I’ll explain later,” Shanon replied.
With a rush, Dason sprinted up the passageway and skidded to a stop in the middle of the juncture, his knife out in a high attack stance.
He stood in an empty corridor.
Shanon stopped next to him, her hands and knife out in the same position. She placed her spine to Dason’s back, forming a two-person defensive box. Nase and Sami joined in a four-person protective posture, their knives out and ready.
The unguarded hatchway opened to the transship shaft, a long, gray, airtight and ribbed tube, which linked the two ships.
Shanon surveyed the scene and asked in a hushed tone, “Almost too easy, don’t you think?”
Dason agreed. He hadn’t expected the gate to be open and unguarded. Dason motioned for Sami and Nase to stay put and gestured for Shanon to follow.
They raced through the rigid, adult-sized cylinder to the other ship. Coming to a sharp stop, they scanned the empty passageway.
Dason leaned over to Shanon. “Bigger corridors.”
“Much, much larger ship,” she replied. “And quiet, too.”
Dason keyed his communicator, “Sami, Nase. It’s clear.”
Seconds later, the two burst through the tubing’s open end and skidded to a halt. “What now?” Sami asked.
“Stick together,” Dason directed, “and keep an eye out for overhead vents, we might need another place to hide.”
With Dason leading, the four edged down the passageway towards a T-intersection with another corridor. They froze in place when the sound of pounding footsteps and loud shouts echoed down the trans-tube.
Dason spun around trying to find a hatch that might lead to an empty compartment. There was none. However, just a short distance away, he spotted a cutout in the passageway that contained bulky machinery sitting on the deck plates.
“There!” he whispered, pointing to the chromium-plated implements.
With a quick dash, the four dove behind the machinery and flattened themselves on the dull-gray metallic floor. Dason scooted forward just enough to peek around the corner.
From the other ship, a poacher half-dragged, half-carried, a bloodied and hurt man into the corridor. Just then, Bianca and two others came running into the intersection.
“What happened?” Bianca demanded of the poacher who supported the injured outlaw.
“The ape’s out! We opened the hatch to re-stun it, but it was waiting for us. Ripped Mitch up and . . .”
He took a breath before saying, “It carried Mula off. Mula screamed the whole time, the awfullest blood-curdling shrieks I’ve ever heard.”
“Get him to sick bay,” Bianca commanded and turned to the other poachers. “Stunners on max, let’s go.”
“Wait,” interjected a new voice, “what’re you planning?”
“To capture the ape, of course.”
The crewman hesitated before saying, “Bianca, you know what it takes to stun one of these things. You were fortunate the first time. Let’s cut our losses and just d-gun it before it kills someone else.”
“Are you out of your mind?” Bianca snapped. “Do you know what that thing is worth? One T-Ape on the Artron market is worth a thousand times what we can get for the rest of our flea-bitten cargo. I’m not giving it up.”
Before the man could reply, another poacher yelled, “It’s coming across!”
The group erupted in wild scrambling to get away from the shaft’s portal. Amidst the shouting came the characteristic priing-priing of stun guns. But it seemed the poachers were too busy getting away from the creature to actually stun the beast.
Dason drew his head back, listening. It grew quiet, and Dason extended his head just past the bulkhead’s corner. One quick glance and he jerked back.
The ape squatted in the corridor, its head pitched forward with ears cupped open. If the stun-gun emissions had hit the creature, it didn’t seem to have any effect.
Dason signed to his companions for absolute silence. They gripped their long-knives tight and pulled their legs underneath them in case they had to spring up to attack.
Dason didn’t dare poke his head out, but his desperation mounted; he needed to know if the ape moved their way.
In the silence, Dason strained with every ounce of his being to shut out everything else and listen just for the ape.
He glanced at his teammates and caught Shanon’s eyes. A little fear, but more determination than anything else shown there. She gave him a quick little nod of encouragement.
To Dason, the intense silence pressed down, and it seemed like the whole ship watched and waited. He wondered why the poachers hadn’t come back with their stunners to take on the beast.
Dason closed his eyes, trying to hear any sound, however slight, the beast made. Something told him that the thing just sat and listened. He thought of TJ’s description of the ape’s super sensitivity to noise and its huge ears.
He licked his lips and wondered if the thing could hear a heartbeat. If so, Dason thought, the star beast must hear his thudding heart.
Dason wrenched his head to the right. In faint sounds, a claw tapped on metal, once, twice. Nearer and nearer to the huddled novices it came.
Had it heard them? Was it creeping closer before attacking?
The tap — tap tap — tap came again, just meters away.
<
br /> Dason turned his field knife over to grasp the blade end. Many practice hours of hand-throwing might pay off now.
He signed to his teammates to get ready. He would leap up and throw the knife, aiming for the beast’s eyes. If he hit the animal, then the others would join in and finish the ape off with their knives.
Dason took a deep breath, gathered his legs under him and leaped out into the corridor. He drew back his arm to throw—and stopped.
The corridor was empty, the beast gone!
Chapter Eighteen
Star Date 2433.056
The Poacher’s Ship
Dropping into a fighting stance, Dason crouched low while his teammates slipped out from behind the machinery. “Where did it go?” Shanon whispered while she turned in a quick circle.
“Don’t know,” Dason replied. “I’m just glad it’s gone.”
“Amen to that, brother,” Sami muttered.
“Next step?” Shanon asked.
Dason jerked his head toward the other ship. “It could be empty, or maybe only has a few poachers left aboard. We can still try for it.”
Shanon shook her head and planted her feet. “Not happening. I’m for finding TJ.”
Nase observed in a reflective tone, “The poachers still don’t know we’re aboard, and will be distracted by the ape.”
“Good,” Sami responded. “Let it distract them so that we don’t get distracted and forget what we’re doing because we got distracted.”
The others stared at Sami before he mumbled, “Well, you know what I mean.”
“Okay,” Dason said. “We find TJ and worry about getting away later. And we avoid that beast and the poachers. Besides, they were made for each other.”
“Which way do you think it headed?” Shanon asked.
“Not sure,” Dason replied. “It didn’t go across the ship-to-ship tunnel; we would have heard that. So, it either went up the main corridor or that lateral passageway over there. Check around, see if you can find anything that points to which way it went.”
Dason and the others paced the deck but couldn’t find any real evidence of which way the animal had traveled. Shanon gestured at the bloodstains on the metal floor. “Do you think it would follow those?”
“It’s possible,” Dason responded. “Where do they lead?”
“Forward,” Sami answered.
“If that’s where they took TJ,” Shanon remarked tight-lipped, “and if she’s still asleep, then she’s—”
“Defenseless,” Dason stated.
“If that’s where they took her,” Nase offered. “This ship’s sick bay might be aft.”
“Maybe,” Dason replied, “but most hyper light craft have their living and support spaces up forward.”
Dason wrestled with his dilemma; find TJ, escape from the outlaws, and stay away from the fearsome Torther Ape.
With some reluctance, he instructed, “Our best chance to find TJ is to split up. Shanon, you and Sami go forward on the main passageway. Nase, you go forward on the secondary. On the chance that Nase might be right, I’ll go aft.”
He directed, “First priority, find TJ, second priority, stay away from those renegades and by all means, keep away from that ape.
“I think you three will have the best chance of finding TJ. But don’t take on the bad guys alone. Call for help.”
Pulling out his Life Sensor, Dason studied it for a moment before saying, “Probably useless with all this metal around, but try anyway. Might get lucky.”
He took a breath. “Everyone set?”
Sami grumbled, “No, but let’s get on with it.”
Nase and Sami padded off, leaving Shanon and Dason alone. He gave her a hesitant smile. “Be careful, okay?”
“I will,” she replied. “You too.”
She started to speak, but Dason gave her a gentle push on her arm. “Scouts Out.” He turned and trotted off.
Dason hated the thought of splitting up, but felt it gave them the best chance of finding their missing teammate. And he had the utmost faith in his teammates to stay out of trouble and do the right thing.
Turning down the passageway and with soft footsteps, Dason made his way down the quiet corridor. He again wondered why the poachers hadn’t come back. After all, Bianca had made it clear how much she wanted the ape because of its value.
Dason passed several closed hatches but kept going. He doubted the star beast had the ability to open a sealed door, and none led to the ship’s medical bay.
From his studies at school, he knew that the main cargo holds and engineering spaces of conventional spaceships would have lots of nooks and crannies where the creature could hide.
Coming to an intersection, Dason stopped and poked his head around the corner. At the corridor’s far end, the ship’s turbo-elevator caught his eye.
That gave him one answer. This vessel had several levels, and in typical spacer fashion, the lowest would contain the engineering spaces, and this level would have the cargo holds.
For an instant, Dason fought the temptation to turn around and go back. If the ape had come this way but the outlaw crew had all gone forward, he’d be alone with the thing.
And he doubted that his knives were going to do much against the creature.
But if he did find the ape, he could alert his teammates, and that would relieve them of worrying about that particular threat.
Dason doubted that the beast had gone below to engineering. That left the cargo spaces, which began just ahead.
He eased his way forward, listening for anything that didn’t belong here, watching for the tiniest of movements that might give the T-Ape’s position away.
A distinct scratching, like claws sliding across metal, caused him to stop and crouch against the wall. It came from farther down the corridor, but the passageway was empty for a long stretch. There must be a hatch somewhere ahead that opened to a side compartment.
Dason brought out his Life Sensor. The display showed the right frequency level, but the dark indicator panel held no data. The ship’s super hard metals scrambled the creature’s signature frequency, rendering the LS useless.
Easing forward, Dason came to an open hatch. He knelt low and peeked around the corner into the cubicle. From its large size, unrecognizable pieces of machinery and stacked plas-containers, he guessed it was a storage area.
Dason considered his next move. He could reach up and close the hatch door, trapping the star creature inside. But without having seen the animal, and with the LS still silent, Dason didn’t know for sure that the predator was inside.
If he waited outside, he placed himself in a very vulnerable position—discovery by the poachers, or worse, the thing could charge through the door and catch him unaware.
Dason remembered very well how rapid the ape moved and how quiet it was in the ship’s corridor.
Leaning against the smooth bulkhead, beads of sweat dotted his forehead. He wiped his brow with his sleeve and crept around the hatch’s edge and into the cargo hold.
Dason left the compartment door open since he didn’t want his escape route blocked. Sidestepping next to the bulkhead, he used several stacks of shipping containers to mask his movement.
He had only gone just a few meters when two sounds made him stop.
Behind him came a muted clank, from the hatchway sliding shut. And right after, from the cargo hold’s center, came the unmistakable scraping of sharp talons on metal.
Dason bit his lower lip and swallowed, he knew that sound, and knew what made it, too.
He had found the Torther Ape.
Glancing at his LS, Dason hoped to see an active indicator window that would show him the beast’s location. But as before, the bulkhead’s metallic content caused the bio signals to fragment into several parts, making the device ineffective.
Slipping his LS into his torso vest, Dason retraced his steps to the cargo hold entry. Hunkering down next to the access-way, he reached up and pressed the control pad.
Nothing happened.
Dason tried again, but the door wouldn’t budge. He waved his hand across the pad, even pressing down hard several times, but the hatch stayed closed tight. Dason looked at the metal doorway in consternation. He couldn’t kick it out. You didn’t kick or punch out 5 centimeters of trimodenium alloy.
He was trapped in the hold with the Torther Ape!
The grating came again. It was coming his way. He took several deep breaths to control his initial urge to burst into headlong flight. Backing away from the hatch, he moved towards the closest corner.
Desperate thoughts raced in his head as he tried to find a way out of his dire straits.
He latched onto a thought from the Scoutmaster. “Each creature has inborn strengths and weaknesses. Consider both to understand how to deal with it. A strength or weakness may be the key. Even a supposed strength may be used against the creature and turned to your advantage.”
Dason’s mind whirled trying to find a solution, a counter to the creature’s power, but short of a stunner or disruptor nothing came to mind.
Near the compartment’s hatchway came a rustling, like something alive moved. Dason grabbed on to the thought that although the Chameleon Coug’s pursuit on Alistar had been terrifying, he had at least found a way to escape.
Here, it looked impossible, and no adversary of this predator would show up at the last second to save him. He took grim pleasure in thinking that it couldn’t get any worse.
He was wrong. It got worse.
The lights in the cargo hold went dark.
Dason drew his knife and reached out to find the wall. He eased his back against the bulkhead, the only two things he had to protect himself.
Hoping that maybe, just maybe, the poachers would mount an armed search and get the lethal creature before it got him, Dason pushed his back to the bulkhead.
Right now, he would welcome seeing even the interstellar renegades.
Dason thought about communicating with his team and tell them the beast’s location. He wouldn’t inform them of his situation, of course. No doubt, they would come charging into the cargo hold in some silly rescue operation that could get them all killed.
