Planet Breaker: A Supernatural Space Opera (Witching on a Starship Book 2)

by J. A. Cipriano

  “Mall—bzzt, what’s—” the rest of Oliver’s voice was cut off in a burst of static that hit my brain like an anvil. My feet went out from under me as I crashed on my back. The ship rocked again, and little bits of debris rained down around me.

  “You know, this isn’t cool,” I muttered, trying to push down the alarm in my brain. The best possible scenario was that someone was interfering with Oliver. The worst? Well, I didn’t want to think about that.

  One thing was certain though, we had to get moving, or we were going to be turned into space junk. Once they slotted a new AI, I had no idea how long it would take to get the system up and running once again. Our thrusters were not revved up, and our shield was down. We were already taking fire, and from the way the sirens were squealing, I knew we didn’t have that kind of time.

  “God, I’m going to regret this,” I muttered, taking a deep breath and inhaling. As I did, I felt what little magic was left in the pulsar crystals. They’d recover given time, but that was a resource we did not have.

  I, on the other hand, did have it. I exhaled, and as I did, I laced my breath with the words of a spell I’d used so many times, I barely had to speak it into being. Time turned to a standstill as I stood there, fueling as much magic as I could into the spell, then instead of trying to maintain it on my own, I tied it to what remained in the pulsar crystals.

  The whole of reality trembled as the seconds inside the ship stretched into eternity. It wouldn’t last long, maybe half a minute at best, but that half a minute would feel like a lifetime. Well, a very short lifetime. Enough time for them to slot a new AI at least.

  “Step one complete,” I muttered, shutting my eyes and envisioning the weapons bay. Power wreathed around me as I teleported from the crystal room to the armory. Lights were flashing here too, but I ignored them as I reached out and grabbed one of the spacesuits. As I touched the oily black fabric, it writhed over my body, covering me in the span of a second and giving me a bunch of readouts on the HUD across my face.

  Perfect.

  “I dunno if anyone can hear me,” I said, keying the space suit’s comm. “But I tied the pulsar crystals to a spell to slow down time. You’ll have a few minutes that way, but I’m going to try to buy you a bit more time. If it doesn’t work, well, tell Marty I love him, okay?”

  Then I teleported outside the ship and found myself staring down a bolt of blue plasma.

  As the attack inched closer, the heat of it scalded my flesh even within my suit. My readouts started to go crazy as I focused on the firing ship.

  It looked sort of like a giant bird with a big double-canopy, only a giant gun extended from its maw instead of a tongue. Thankfully, it wasn’t moving terribly fast since time was my bitch and all.

  As it pulled up from its strafing run at the speed of my ex getting ready when we were late for dinner, I focused my power and teleported again.

  My body phased through space and time, and an eye blink later, I slammed into the canopy. I laid one hand across the armored cockpit and called upon my power. As I did, I felt the spark of sentience within the machine. Just like I’d thought, this had an AI. Just like the Planet Breaker and just like the Endeavor.

  As we came into contact with each other, it recoiled for a second. Then the image of a Corim appeared in my mind, and I realized exactly what was going on. This wasn’t an AI. No, it was a sentient being in there.

  “Did someone stick you in there?” I murmured, so shocked by what I’d found, I couldn’t think past it. It was a good thing my spell was being powered and maintained by the Endeavor because otherwise, my control would have slipped away then and there.

  “Kill me,” the ship spoke back, its voice a snarl of hatred, pain, and loathing.

  “Kill you?” I asked, surprise shaking me, only as my question left my lips, a million images flashed through my brain. I saw a lone Corim pulled from its parents by a man who looked like the one I’d encountered in the cyberverse.

  What happened next nearly made me throw up because I saw the girl’s soul rent from her body before being shoved into a glowing orb, an orb that sat within the center of this ship.

  “I can do you one better,” I snarled, rage and anger leaking into my voice. “I can give you vengeance.”

  “Vengeance before death,” the machine affirmed, and this time the whole of the ship lay out before me, and I realized that while I couldn’t control it, I could feel the link between this ship and whoever was.

  The image of the link, like a mass of spiked ants scurrying to and fro burned into my brain. Only that was all it was, a bunch of links hop, skipping, and jumping from ship to ship. Too much to pay attention to in the swarm of ships out here.

  I reached out toward the link with an overwhelming burst of power, and my magic struck it like a shotgun blast to the face.

  The link exploded into ethereal light, and the entire ship rocked violently, suddenly out of control. But that was fine because I had a friend in it.

  “I can only slow time for another few seconds, make the most of it,” I said, patting the ship lightly on the canopy, and as its affirmation hit my ear and the ship sped up to real-time, I craned my head toward the next ship and teleported.

  15

  Icy talons wrapped around my skull, jerking me from the space-time continuum mid-jump. As my body tore free of the magic, I felt myself starting to fall. Pain exploded down the length of my body as a mouth the size of the Grand Canyon loomed in front of me.

  “I see what you’re doing, witch,” it snarled, and its words were bolts of lightning searing my brain. I struggled to move as its fingers wrapped around me, trying to pop my head from my neck like a champagne cork. “I will not allow you to interfere. I will have my vengeance, and you will have death.”

  The thing flung me, and I sailed backward through the air as the starships all around me fired on one another. I’d lost count of how many I’d freed, but I knew it was a lot less, and with each one that erupted into bursts of neon flame, a little part of me died at the fruitlessness of it. Those were people, and they were sacrificing themselves for me.

  “I dunno who the fuck you are, but if you don’t back down, I will straight up blow your personality out the back of your skull!” I snarled, calling upon my power and stopping myself in midair. It took nearly everything in me to do it because I couldn’t fly, and pretty much the only reason I’d managed was because I was in space and therefore was weightless, so all I’d had to do was apply appropriate thrust.

  Laughter boomed across the battlefield as bolts of lightning arced from the face. Below me, the Endeavor was starting to rev to life, but it might already be too late. The ships around me were moving too quickly for there to be much juice left in the crystals back aboard, and what’s more, I wasn’t sure I had it in me to teleport the beast away. Those engines had to get up to speed.

  “It’s sort of refreshing that you do not know who I am,” the face said, and as it spoke, it coalesced into a form that reminded me of Dr. Manhattan from Watchmen. Electricity arced across his red skin, and as he raised a perfect hand toward me, I realized who he was. The guy from the AI battle, only now he was manifest above the ship like a fucking Greek God.

  “Yeah, well send me a friend request. I mean, I wouldn’t respond because you’re probably a creeper, but it would allow you to see all the pictures of my cat.” I smirked at him as I reached out into the ether and grabbed hold of all the magic I could.

  “Is that a joke because you’re a witch?” he asked, raising a yellow eyebrow at me as he waved a hand, causing all the rebellious ships I’d turned to explode into fireballs. Silence descended across the battlefield as the vacuum of space took the heat and flame of the wreckage, leaving me to stand there mouth agape.

  “Oh, that’s fucking it. Those were my friends!” I snarled as bits of debris spread out in ever expanding clouds. “Kame!”

  “Kame?” he asked, arching an eyebrow at me as he flicked his wrist like a conductor, sending
the rest of the alien armada toward the Endeavor.

  “Hame!” I replied as the Endeavor’s thrusters fired, spewing ionic propulsion energy out in a blast wave of heat and sound that ripped into the dragon’s roost and sent it arcing up into the air.

  “I do not understand,” the man said, coming forward in a flash of light and sound that was nearly blinding. There was so much power coming toward me that it made my eyes bleed, but that was fine. I could use that.

  As his hand reached out toward my throat like finality itself, I let loose.

  “Ha!” Blue energy exploded from my hands as I thrust them outward, driving them into the Dr. Freakazoid’s chest. For a second nothing happened, and then his entire body erupted into flame like a geyser as energy tore through his stomach and blew his back out across the stars.

  The force of it launched me backward, inertia being the bitch that it was, and as I realized I was going to be lost into the void of space, I slammed into the hull of the Endeavor with enough force for my teeth to clamp together.

  Little birdies flapped around my dizzying brain as a hatch next to me opened, and Chloe popped out clad in a spacesuit.

  I tried to reach out toward her, but as my arm flopped uselessly, she grabbed my wrist, hauling me toward the hatch as the armada above opened fire. Plasma rained down upon us as she dragged me inside, and the heat and sound of it reflecting off the ship’s shield was such that we were thrown down the hatchway. I crashed to the ground moments before she landed on my chest with nearly bone-breaking force.

  My breath whooshed out of me in a spray, and as I lay there, Chloe hopped to her feet and cast a wary glance upward.

  “Grab something,” she said, grabbing hold of the handles right before the ship rocketed forward, throwing me against the wall.

  My hip screamed in pain, and stars erupted in my vision as I heard Morg’s voice come over the loud speakers. “Alien starships approaching, Jeffry Hodges. Want me to take care of them?”

  “What?” I mumbled, getting to my feet as the ship juked and jived, causing laser fire to ripple past, which was also when I realized we’d been rendered completely invisible. Fairy magic.

  “No,” Jeffry’s voice said as the thrusters at the back of the ship blazed with flame, spitting us forward. “I know it doesn’t seem like it, but we’re invisible to their sensors, they won’t be able to see us.”

  “Oh, I’m not so sure of that,” the tomato-skinned jackass said, his voice booming in my ears as he stepped through the wall of the starship like it wasn’t even there. Electricity crackled off his Adonis six pack as he turned his eyes on Chloe. “Be gone, mutt.” He flicked his wrist, slamming her into the wall with the force of his mind.

  As she struck with a wet thwack, the starships that had been chasing us, resumed firing, their fire slamming into our shields. As the shields darkened and cracked under the pressure, Chloe’s body slid emptily to the floor.

  “What the actual fuck?” I snarled, getting to my feet and fixing the guy with my best death glare. Power swarmed around me, coming to my call. “I hit you with a Kamehameha, and you don’t even have the decency to stay the fuck down?”

  “No.” He moved forward, one hand casually trailing along the wall. Sparks erupted from his fingertips, leaving molten trails in the metal as he moved. Only it was weird because as he did it, something about the movement struck me as odd. For one, he seemed like a god, able to wield power as easily as I avoided chores, but at the same time, he wasn’t using it in a way I would have expected him too.

  Because in his position, I’d have blown the ship up with my mind, not directed starfighters at us. No, I’d have ended this charade a long time ago. Which meant, he couldn’t or wouldn’t.

  “You can’t kill us, can you?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at him as I let my power dissipate. “Why is that?”

  “What do you call those starships if not your demise, witch?” he asked, gesturing toward the armada trying to blast through the Endeavor’s shields.

  “Not you killing us,” I pointed my fingers at him. “You seem strong enough to do it, so do it.” I spread my arms giving him a free shot. “Go on.”

  “Do not test me, witch,” he snarled, raising one hand. Blue fire spread out from his palm, hovering just above it, and a wash of heat filled the room like someone had turned on a sauna. “I am Admiral Vah, Lord of the Mages Court of Astromir, and scion to the gods themselves. I hold more power in my finger than you do in your whole body.”

  “You’re Vah?” I asked, looking him up and down and finding myself unimpressed. “Call me crazy, but I expected someone, well, taller.”

  “You impudent fool,” he snarled, and as he launched his hand forward to fling the fireball at me, he stopped mid-motion. His skin cracked, and for a second I saw the captain’s face beneath Vah’s features. Could it be?

  I threw myself at Vah and tackling him to the ground. My body collided with his in a swarm of sparks that made my brain numb, but as I closed my hand around his wrist, I knew it was true. Somehow, someway, Vah was inside the captain’s body, and what’s more, I could feel my honorable leader fighting Vah with all he had. And he was losing.

  “Fuck,” I murmured right before Vah decked me in the chin. My body lifted from the background and flew across the room, and as I slammed into the far wall with enough force for me to almost forget my name, Vah stood.

  “Odd how with all the power of the universe at my fingertips, I still choose to hit you. It’s so very satisfying.” He smiled right before the airlock behind him blew out, sucking him outward into the depths of space. My body tumbled forward through the ship, wind whipping around me, but right as I was about to be jettisoned like space garbage, Chloe hit the button on the wall beside her, closing the airlock.

  “Man, was that satisfying,” she said, grinning at me before glancing up at the shield. They were glowing purple and violently roiling. “Now come on, let’s get us out of here.”

  “How? There’s no power in the pulsar crystals,” I said because it was true, and with no way of charging them quickly. That was one of the major problems with the earth ships, they required both magic and a witch to make the leap through space. Since we had no magical energy for me to tap into, we were fucked.

  “That may be, but you can do it anyway if you really want to do it. Sure, it might hurt a lot, but what other choice do we have?” Chloe reached out, touching my arm. “The Mallory fucking Quinn I know could move this fucking ship.”

  Her words hit me like a sledgehammer. If they were true, I could save us, and if I could save us, I would.

  “Really?” I asked, calling upon my magic with every ounce of my being. And it came in a rush, washing over me like a cool summer’s wave, soaking me to the bone and washing me away as I visualized the Endeavor, fixing it in my mind. The amulet around my chest began to glow, burning me up, and as it did, I felt myself slipping and straining. I tasted blood and realized I couldn’t even feel myself.

  “Really,” Chloe said, putting a hand on my shoulder. Even though I knew she was lying, that I could never move this ship on my own, her confidence in me warmed me in a way I couldn’t quite explain. “Besides, if you don’t, we’re going to get blown up. Do you want that to happen?”

  “You make an excellent point,” I whispered, throwing everything I had into the spell.

  16

  I felt the claws of Vah’s power tear against the Endeavor as we surged through space and time. Only something was wrong, very wrong.

  My vision fractured, and my insides screamed in agony. Pain unlike anything I’d ever felt, filled up the inside my brain like I was being jammed full with red-hot pokers. I collapsed to my knees, blood gushing from my lips and spraying across the floor in front of me as the ship dropped out of my spell and came crashing back into the vacuum of space somewhere between “fuck all” and “I have no fucking idea.”

  Torturous little tremors of fire rippled through my body. I threw up more blood onto the steel. I co
uld feel my brain pulsing in my skull, banging around like a goddamned ping pong ball as I retched so hard, it hurt.

  I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think as my arms gave out, and I flopped forward into my own sickness. More pain hit me as I felt Chloe’s hand on my arm, but even that brief contact felt like an icepick through the eyes.

  “Mallory, are you okay?” she cried, gathering me up in her arms, and as she moved to carry me somewhere I couldn’t see because my vision was too blurry for me to tell an asshole from a hole in the ground, she stopped.

  “What the fuck just happened!” Niko screamed, her shrill fairy cry shattering my eardrums and causing me to instinctively curl away. Chloe seemed to buckle under the force of it.

  “Um… I got Mallory to teleport us away.” Chloe swallowed hard, suddenly uncertain. Then she took a step back as the diminutive fairy fluttered up into the air and hovered over me, horror plastered across her face.

  “Why the fuck did you do that?” Niko cried, reaching down to brush the hair out of my face. Only as she did, I realized doing so was causing her clothing to get splattered with blood. Was that from me?

  “I didn’t want us all to die?” Chloe said, steel filling her voice as she pushed past the fairy and stepped into the corridor. The bright light of the hallway hit my eyes, nearly blinding me, and I screamed, trying to curl away. The smell, like burning flesh, hit me.

  “Stop!” Niko cried, fluttering after Chloe as the werewolf sprinted down the corridor at impossible speeds. It was weird because I could feel the wind buffeting against me, rubbing my flesh raw. Only, that should have been impossible.

  I swallowed a mouthful of blood and reached out toward Chloe’s face to get her attention. It was impossible. I couldn’t quite explain it other than to say my arm was made of lead, and no amount of mental force would make it move. Instead, I just managed to lay in her arms as she kicked a door switch with her boot, causing the door to open in a whoosh.