by Kal Spriggs
“It might,” Pixel said. “But the Ghornath have a very different technology base. The same frequencies should cause minimal damage at most.”
“Alright, well, I’m seeing a lot of ships in trouble out there,” Mike said gleefully. “And a couple that look to have some nasty collisions if they don’t get things fixed soon. I think we’re the least of anyone’s worries right now.”
“You can say that again,” Ariadne said. “You guys realize that the boat will start its sprint mode in the middle of all this chaos, right?”
Mike gave her a smirk, “I was just thinking that. Maybe our little gift will make it to the Chxor after all.”
Ariadne felt a sudden sweat break out on her forehead. She might well be responsible for thousands of deaths, if not tens or hundreds of thousands. A part of her wondered if her own life and those of her friends might be worth such a scale of destruction.
Yet the Chxor would exterminate her race. How to balance that calculus, I really don’t know… but I know which side I want to win.
She wanted to bury her head in her hands and maybe cry a bit. Instead she focused on her job and nursed the damaged shuttle towards the Ghornath ship that awaited them.
* * *
“Okay, final approach,” Ariadne said a few moments later.
She brought the shuttle up and around to the midships airlock. She felt the shuttle lag a bit as they came in the last bit, but she managed to adjust as it came down to the last few meters. She felt a slight impact as the shuttle struck against the side of the ship.
“Hey, watch the paint,” Mike said with a chuckle, “We want to keep this ship.”
“Right,” Ariadne said. She stood from the seat, “Let’s go.”
She followed the others out of the cockpit. The majority of the passengers still waited in the compartment, but she saw the airlock hatch open and caught a glimpse of Simon as he followed the others into the other ship.
Mike paused to draw his pistol, “Ready?”
Ariadne gave him a slight smile, “Sure.”
Mike led the way off the shuttle. They entered the airlock, which had both doors wide open for rapid access. Mike glanced back at Pixel, “Get everyone to move the gear over. If they’re not going to help fight they can help carry. Oh, and take whoever you need to get the engine up, you should find Anubus and Simon down there somewhere.”
Pixel gave him a nod, and Mike and Ariadne continued deeper in.
The size of the corridor made Ariadne pause. The ceiling stood over three meters above the deck. The wide corridors also made Ariadne feel like a small child. The control panel for the airlock sat at head height for her. She shook her head, “Right, well, at least Rastar will be comfortable here.”
Mike gave her a nod, “Seems roomy enough.”
They continued down the corridor until they came to an intersection. Ariadne looked away from a green mess that looked to have run into Anubus. “Aft to the bridge?”
Mike nodded. They walked down the corridor a short distance, “I’m really surprised we haven’t seen any Chxor guards, I mean, I figured there would be at least a few aboard the ship.” Ariadne said
Mike nodded, but before he could answer, a hatch in front of them opened and a pair of Chxor stepped out into the corridor. The two Chxor wore brown uniforms with unfamiliar symbols embroidered on their shoulders. Each also wore a holstered pistol.
“Oh, right,” Mike said. He brought his pistol up and fired, and the lead Chxor gave a shout of pain. The other one drew his pistol and returned fire.
A dozen more Chxor seemed to boil out of that room and another further down the hallway. Ariadne dove for cover and she saw Mike dive into an open hatchway to the side. “Sorry,” she shouted, “I’m pretty sure this one is my fault.”
“Yeah,” Mike said, as he leaned around the doorway and fired a single shot. “You really need to watch what you say.”
Ariadne felt her control start to slip. Yet so soon after the killing on the shuttle, her stomach turned at the thought that she must kill once again.
Mike gave a shout of pain, and Ariadne saw him drop his pistol and clutch at his shoulder. Ariadne felt a spike of rage boil up inside. Hurt my friends will they? she thought. She did not bother to peek around the hatch frame. She reached out with her mind, found the largest cluster of Chxor, and she unleashed her inner monster.
The hallway flared bright with the explosion of flame. She heard Chxor scream in pain. She tasted the sharp burn of bile in the back of her throat as she smelled Chxor burning. Yet she had missed some, for she heard bullets continue down the hallway.
Ariadne shook her head, suddenly weakened by the exertion. As she shook her head to clear it, a pair of Chxor surged into the hatchway, pistols drawn. She tried to focus, to push some energy at them, but her mind felt too sluggish. She had used too much over the past few hours.
As their guns came up, Ariadne closed her eyes. Where have my friends gone, she thought desperately, surely they won’t not fail me? Just as she thought that, she heard two loud shots as someone fired a pair of riot guns. Ariadne opened her eyes to see the two Chxor guards down. Rastar stood over them, “Hey guys, sorry if I’m late.”
“No, you have perfect timing,” Mike said.
“Agreed,” Ariadne said.
“Oh good. Thanks for saving some for me,” Rastar said. “Oh, we secured the bridge. There’s some bigwig female Chxor up there, that Crowe suggested we could use as a hostage or something. Eric and I both voted to kill her, but we agreed to leave her alive until everyone else weighs in.”
“Great,” Mike said. “Lead the way, big guy.”
Rastar turned around and led the way forward. Ariadne picked up a pistol, as they passed one of the fallen guards, and then a second one. Rastar led the way up a steep set of stairs and then up a second set to an armored hatch. He tapped a button on the panel next to it, and the hatch slid open. “Lots of automation on this thing,” Rastar said.
“So it appears,” Mike said.
The bridge impressed Ariadne. After the Chxor ships, the bridge looked open and spacious. Also the consoles looked light and compact, the screens seemed larger and she could see a high detailed sensor scan of the area up on the main display.
Eric stood near a Chxor female. She wore a brown uniform with five white pips on her collar. She also had her hands in the air, though she did not seem nervous. Then again, she didn’t seem to display any emotion. Ariadne considered reaching out to read the Chxor’s mind, but she felt too tired and worn out from use of her powers for the day. Best to save the energy I’ve got for something we really need, she thought.
“I booted up the navigation computer,” Eric said, “But that’s about all I could manage.”
“Okay, I’ll take a look at it,” Ariadne said.
“Eric, take a look at the weapons, let me know what we have,” Mike said.
“You tell me the nicest things sometimes,” Eric responded. Ariadne saw him move over to another console. She tuned him out though as she brought up the navigation computer’s star map. It took her a few minutes to make sense of what she saw.
“We have a couple problems,” Ariadne said, even as she started to reach out with her senses.
“Oh?” Mike asked.
“Someone erased the original star map on here. The Chxor put a basic one in, but it only seems to list Chxor worlds for the most part,” Ariadne frowned as she concentrated.
“Can you read it?” Mike asked.
“They use some of the human numbers and names for some systems,” Ariadne answered, “Also they use the same coordinate system for Shadow Space. So no problem there. It’s just that we’ve only got a limited selection of destinations. Our first option is to head south towards Ghornath Prime and try to work our way towards Tannis.”
“Not recommended,” Mike said. “That’s a long way to a friendly port, and there’re plenty of human pirates to worry about down that way.”
“And that’s where the
Chxor captured the ship I was on, so we’d have to worry about them as well,” Ariadne responded. “Our second choice is to try for the closest human system: Malta.” She tapped a command and brought the system up on the main screen, even as she continued with her jump calculations. “Problem with that is that it’s a heavily fortified system. Even the basic Chxor markers annotate it as a large military presence. And the Chxor and Nova Roma are at war… we could wind up right in the middle of a battle.”
“Yeah, let’s avoid that,” Mike said.
“I dunno, it sounds like fun,” Eric said. He looked up with an eager grin, “Now that we have a way to shoot back, anyway.”
“Get the weapons up and we can see about that,” Mike answered. “So what other options do we have?”
“There’s a system called 443C98 that’s to our galactic north,” Ariadne said. “The Chxor map shows they have claimed it, but it also notes two jumps to nearby systems they don’t claim, both headed towards Nova Roma space. If I remember right, there’s a couple of independent colonies up that way too. We might come across a freighter or even a military patrol, maybe get some help.”
“That sounds like our best option, get on it,” Mike said. “How long will it take?”
“I’ve already done the rough calculations for entry, I’ll have our course plotted soon,” Ariadne said. After his approval of her chosen course, she reached deeper and felt for Shadow Space. After her previous experience, it seemed ridiculously easy to reach out and sense it. For a moment, she let the currents and flow of it sweep her away. She found something hypnotic about it, now that she consciously sensed it.
She focused on the coordinates from the computer. That gave her a destination in Shadow Space, a place where her universe and the other one lined up. As she sent her mind into that other place, she felt a shock as she sensed depths she had never before seen. Her previous navigation had gone by sense and instinct as much as by any real skill. Now that she focused, she could see other paths that would lead to that destination, some of them might well shave hours or even days off the jump.
Yet she also sensed other destinations, places that normal navigators could never reach, places that normal people could never see. She suddenly realized how the Shadow Lords, the infamous psychic pirates who lived in Shadow Space, had become so powerful. With a psychic navigator, they could hide wherever they wanted, or they could pounce on ships as they transited through Shadow Space. The possibilities stunned her, and for a moment, Ariadne forgot her purpose.
She regained it a moment later, and she pulled back from her suddenly expanded senses long enough to type commands into the navigation computer. She went with the simplest of the routes, but even so, the computer spat angry lines of warnings, many highlighted in red or purple. Ariadne tapped the ignore button a few times. Her work done, she slowly, carefully, drew her consciousness away from Shadow Space. As she did, she felt something, almost an echo of her own mind, react to her presence. But she pulled back too quickly to get more than a glimpse of that other mind.
Ariadne shook her head, completely exhausted. “We’re good. As soon as the engines come up we can go.”
“Weapons look good,” Eric said at almost the same time. “We’ve got five twin pulse laser turrets for missile or fighter interception and a chase mounted ‘pulse cannon,’ whatever that is, for a main gun. There’s some lockouts that I’ll be around in a second and I’ll bring them online.
Mike looked over at Rastar, “Intercom?”
Rastar tapped at a console near the central couch. Mike nodded in thanks, “Pixel, how we looking as far as engines?”
“Good. I’ve got the fusion plant coming on line, drive will be up in around a minute after that. Plant is mostly automated, I’m just flipping switches. Luckily everything is on standby.”
“Hey, Pixel, weapons are going live,” Eric said.
Pixel sounded nervous when he spoke. “Wait, you probably don’t want to do that, there’s some kind of warning down here, and I noticed some damage…”
“Nah, I don’t see anything up here,” Eric said. “Going to full power on the main gun, then we can take a few shots and see what happens!”
Ariadne felt the deck hum beneath her feet. A moment later the ship shuddered and Ariadne heard a muffled explosion. The lights on the bridge flickered for a moment. Everyone in the room looked over at Eric. He looked at the red lights that flashed on his console. “Uh, Pixel, what was that?”
They received no response.
“Pixel, you alright?” Mike asked.
A moment later, they heard someone cough over the intercom, “Yeah, but the engine room is a mess. The capacitors for the mount must have taken some damage sometime. I think they all just exploded. I can’t believe no one had them locked out, that’s a huge safety risk.”
Mike looked at Eric. When he spoke, Ariadne could hear the anger masked behind his words, “They did have them locked out. Eric worked around them. Are we still good to go?”
“Yeah… let me check. I don’t think it damaged anything else.”
They sat in silence for a long moment. Ariadne glanced at the chrono. It showed Ghornath time, though, so she didn’t know how much time had passed, “How long for the cargo boat to do its maneuver, anyone know?”
Mike looked over at her. He frowned, “I’m not sure.” He looked over at Rastar, “Can you open a channel to the shuttle?”
Rastar nodded, “I think so…” He flipped another switch.
“Hello?” Mike asked.
“This is Simon, we’re getting everyone off the shuttle, not much time to talk,” Simon sounded either angry or impatient, Ariadne thought. Or possibly both.
“Hey, just check the chrono in the cockpit and-” Mike broke off as a bright flare lit up on the sensors. “Never mind.”
Crowe brought up the cargo boat on the main screen. It juked ‘up’ towards the planet and its orbital ring. Ariadne followed its course, and she bit her lip as she saw no reaction to its maneuver.
Had no one seen it?
A moment after she wondered that she saw fire erupt from one of the orbital defense platforms. She had expected direct hits, yet it seemed that Pixel’s earlier distraction seemed to have degraded the platform’s sensors, both shots went wide, and one smashed a parked freighter into splinters.
“That’s some heavy firepower,” Eric said soberly. “I’d rather that not be aimed at us.”
“Me too,” Mike said.
Ariadne bit her lip as the cargo boat went into final maneuvers. She winced as it missed a drifting freighter by what seemed like a hair.
And then it went into final burn, right before it struck the orbital ring.
The flash of the impact darkened the screen for a moment. As it cleared, Ariadne gave a gasp of shock. A wave of debris poured out from a massive wound in the ring. As she watched, the cloud of shrapnel smashed into a chain of parked ships, and pinpricks of explosions flashed out of the center of the cloud.
“There’s some big chunks headed our way,” Crowe said nervously. “And I think the ring just… wobbled.”
“What do you mean, ‘wobbled’?” Mike asked.
Crowe pulled up a broader view of the ring. And Ariadne saw it, a shudder that seemed to pass all along the ring… and she also saw several of the spokes snap off from the ring. “Oh my god,” Ariadne said softly, “The whole thing might come down.”
“Surely they designed this thing to take damage… right?” Crowe asked.
“I don’t know,” Mike said. “But we won’t be here to see it, one way or another.” Mike tapped at his screen and brought the focus over to the cloud of debris headed their way. “Pixel, we need to go now. Are we ready?”
Pixel sounded nervous, “I think so. But there’s some weird messages that keep flashing here. I’m almost certain we can make the jump, I’m just not sure what will happen if we can’t.”
“We’ll be dead,” Mike said. “We good to hit the switch?”
Ari
adne’s hand went to the navigation console even as she watched the tidal wave of debris sweep down towards them. I caused that, she thought, not someone else… I did it. A part of her thought that it would only be fair if she died here as a result. Yet she had her friends to think about, people like Rastar and Mike who had risked their lives for her.
“Simon, everyone off the shuttle?”
“We’re clear, and I cut the Chxor pilot loose and told him to fly if he wanted to survive.”
“You let him go?” Eric asked.
“Yep, and we can talk about it later,” Simon said.
Ariadne saw the light come up on her panel. Mike turned and she saw his mouth open but she hit the switch to activate the Shadow Space drive before he could say anything.
The ship’s engines rose into a sharp whine, and the ship seemed to lurch.
The wave of destruction vanished.
They hung suspended in a gray emptiness. For just a moment, Ariadne felt her hands tremble with reaction. She wondered how close she had come to killing them all.
“Good job,” Mike said.
Ariadne gave a slight sigh, and she pushed all her doubts and worries and guilt to the back of her mind. She would have to face them, she knew, but for now, she would do what she always did. For now, she would take pleasure in the little things. She gave Mike a cheerful smile, “Well, I told you we’d get out of it alright.”
Runner
The Renegades (Short Story)
“Senior Scientist Rhxun, you are allowed three juhn to explain your failures,” Tier Three Investigator Ghren said to the diminutive Chxor who stood across from his desk. Ghren had risen through the military police force of the Chxor Empire, and his squat, muscular body showed it, particularly in the livid scar that ran down the side of his face. The other Chxor’s gray skin and yellow eyes looked healthy and fit, and his perfectly trimmed dull tan hair suggested a dogmatic dedication to regulations, as any Tier Three Investigator should. His heavy frame showed his genetic heritage as one of the Ruhl line. Ghren’s genetic forebears had probably served as muscular enforcers for the Benevolence Council for generations, Rhxun knew. Clearly, Ghren saw little threat in Rhxun’s own slight frame and scientific disposition. This meant that Rhxun stood in his pale green lab suit and had been allowed to continue his research without constant oversight. It also meant that Ghren had dispensed with the optional guards, due both to Rhxun’s rank, as well as the relative inequity between them should Rhxun be so crass as to resort to physical altercation. The very idea seemed preposterous, even to Rhxun. “You are afforded this only due to your previous contributions to the Chxor Empire. You may begin.”
