Renegades: Origins

by Kal Spriggs

  Eric sneered, “No, she was a bitch who destroyed my life.” He slammed the rifle down into the rack with a bit more force than strictly necessary. Well, maybe I don’t envy him after all, Pixel thought.

  “Oh, well that’s nice,” Rastar said. “Anyway, we’d just finished the weapons inventory and started on an inventory of ammunition while my pizza cooked and Eric’s - what is it you’re making again, man?”

  “Pork loin medallions in a rosette sauce,” Eric said. “With some mushrooms stuffed with cheese.” He shrugged, “The mushrooms are flash frozen, so they will be a little chewy, but beggars can’t be choosers.” He went over to the camp stove, and opened the lid. “I didn’t realize anyone else would come down or I would have prepared more.”

  Pixel looked over at Simon and whispered sotto voce, “Maybe you should ask him if he would mind kitchen duties?”

  Simon scowled at Pixel. A moment later Pixel heard him mutter, “Maybe I should.”

  * * *

  Pixel left the others in conversation and wandered over to look at the Ghornath power armor. He almost tripped over something else that lay at its feet. When he looked down he jumped back with a shout of surprise.

  “Oh, he found Randy,” Eric said.

  “Who the hell is Randy, and why’s he hiding in the armory?” Simon asked.

  Pixel took a calming breath and shook his head. “Randy is a suit of human power armor.” He looked down at the mangled suit. The human power armor looked, at first glance, like a metal man, though the torso, arms, and legs looked thicker - mostly from the extra armor and the requirement to put someone’s body inside, Pixel would guess. Someone, presumably the previous crew, had scrawled ‘Randy’ across the suit’s chest in red paint. An explosion or some other damage had completely mangled the legs of the suit. They ended in a tangle of wires and pieces of metal that hung from the frame. Most disturbingly was the smiley face painted on the front of the helmet where a human’s face would be.. and the rather large hole blasted through its forehead.

  “I looked it over when I checked out my Power Armor,” Rastar said. “It looks like they cannibalized it pretty thoroughly already. It would take a lot of work to get it up, I think.”

  “That’s a Nova Roma Marines unit symbol painted on the shoulder,” Eric said. “I think it’s one of their recon units, but I’m not sure.”

  “Well, this guy didn’t make it home,” Pixel said. “Maybe we can turn it over to the Nova Romans if we hit one of their systems. There might be a reward for turning it in.” And with how mangled it is, they probably wouldn’t notice if I took it apart and put it back together before we turn it in, he thought.

  “As long as they don’t think we did it,” Eric said.

  “Yeah, I’m sure they track where they send their people,” Simon said. “I mean, what kind of military doesn’t know where they send several hundred thousand dollars of equipment and a soldier?”

  “Marine,” Eric corrected automatically. “But yeah, they should.”

  Pixel frowned, “Well, I totally forgot, but meant to drop this off earlier,” he pulled the pistol out of his pocket. “Where do you want it?”

  “We’ve piled up all the Chxor stuff in the corner there,” Rastar said. “Most of it’s pretty crappy quality, but we can use some of it, like the riot guns, until we run out of ammo.”

  “I’d like to teach a firearms safety class to the team members who need it,” Simon said as he set his pistol down in the pile. “We can use the Chxor stuff for that.” He looked at the bench, “I wanted to get a better pistol. Any recommendations?”

  Eric waved his hand down the table, “You’re a former cop, so you probably want a black powder muzzle loader or a revolver. But we’ve got a bunch of nine millimeter human stuff, that looks like it was made by Liberty Arms out of Tau Ceti.”

  “What’s that?” Pixel asked, and pointed up at a plaque above the hatch.

  Everyone except Rastar looked up. The Ghornath spoke in a low voice, “It is a trophy, taken from a Nova Roman officer that the crew captured. The writing on the plaque says where they executed him and lists his crimes against my people.”

  “It looks like a replica of a forty five automatic. Maybe a nineteen eleven,” Simon said. “Chrome plated and pearl handle grips… a bit flashy for my tastes… does it work?”

  “I do not know,” Rastar said. He reached up without a look and then passed the weapon to Simon. “But you may keep it.” His hide had shaded faintly blue.

  “You sure?” Simon asked. “I mean, I know you like guns and all…”

  “I would not use it, even if I had not found weapons more to my liking,” Rastar said. Pixel saw his hide turn a deep shade of blue, almost purple. “Among the crimes listed, the plaque notes that Colonel Cassius executed the child Emperor of Ghornath Prime with the weapon, as well as his younger sister Princess Hycar. The weapon is bad luck, cursed by the blood of the royals whose lives it took.”

  “Oh,” Simon said. “Well, I don’t believe in luck. But if it bothers you, I’ll leave the weapon here.”

  “No,” Rastar said. He patted Simon on the shoulder, “I consider you a friend, like the others. And as a friend to me, I think you could also be a friend to my people. I would be honored if you could redeem this weapon, especially as it is a nineteen eleven. This is the weapon that your cowboys back on Earth used, before you went to space, right?”

  “Thanks, Rastar,” Simon said. “I don’t have any cowboys in my lineage, but I appreciate the gift.

  Pixel frowned, his grasp on history wasn’t the best, but he thought Rastar might have his times mixed up. But it didn’t matter that much, so he let it pass. “Well, I suppose I’ll just take one of the pistols.”

  The others went quiet.

  Rastar shaded back towards a mellow brown, “Hey, Pixel, um, man, I hate to say this…”

  “What?” Pixel asked.

  “You really don’t know how to use a firearm,” Simon said bluntly.

  “No clue, whatsoever,” Eric nodded.

  “Yeah, man, that one time you shot, you managed to wing me,” Rastar said.

  “That was an accident on the station, that guy was going to attack Mike,” Pixel looked around at the others, who didn’t seem swayed by his logic, “Well, how do I get better if I don’t practice?”

  “We’ll get to that, in the meantime, I think we’re all safer if you leave it here, for now,” Simon said. “I promise we’ll do a class sometime soon.”

  “What if I need a weapon?” Pixel asked. “In case you haven’t noticed, I seem to be the only one on the team who can’t either shoot, rip people apart with my bare hands, light people on fire with my brain, or some mixture of the three,” Pixel said. “I really feel like I’m the soft chewy center on this team.”

  “Right., right…” Rastar nodded. “Don’t worry, man, we’ll protect you.”

  Who protects me from you guys? Pixel thought, with the recent memory of when Rastar lost his temper and started a riot. “Yeah, fine. But I want that class soon.”

  “Right after we have the election,” Simon said.

  “Who are you planning on voting for, anyway?” Eric asked.

  “Someone who can manage to bring some order to the chaos,” Simon answered. “What about you?” He looked around at the others, as if to show that his question applied to them all.

  Eric shrugged, “Rastar and I both have the same guy in mind, actually, now that we’ve talked about it.” He glanced over at Pixel, “What do you think, Pixel?”

  Pixel shrugged, “Honestly… I still think a captain is a bad idea. The last thing we need is someone to micromanage us or get in the way of good ideas.”

  “I got to agree with you there,” Eric said. “But at the same time, I think we need someone to give us a goal to work towards, especially now that we’re looking good on escape.”

  “I guess,” Pixel shrugged, “Well, now that I got rid of that pistol and I know what the power drain came from, I ne
ed to go check out some other systems.”

  “Why the worry about power?” Simon asked.

  “Well,” Pixel rubbed at his chin as he thought about how much to say without inducing a panic over the whole matter. He really needed to grow out a goatee, he decided. It would probably make him look more authoritative. “The reactor took some damage during either the capture by the Chxor or before that. It’s nothing major, we just get about two thirds the power from the reactor that we should.”

  “Oh,” Eric said. “But will that affect weapons or guns?”

  “Yeah,” Pixel nodded. “One or the other. Its something we can work around, but I’d rather do the repairs sooner than later. I don’t want to go into details,” mostly because you three wouldn’t understand them and I’d waste the rest of the day explaining them, he mentally added. “But the repairs should only take three or four days if I can get together the supplies and the labor to help.”

  “Alright,” Simon nodded, “Well, keep us informed, would you? And any help you need, just let us know.” Pixel gave him a smile as he walked out of the armory, even as he remembered the last time someone said those words to him.

  And he tried not to think of how many people had died in the aftermath.

  * * *

  “My man, Kev-O! How’s it going?” Travis asked. Though he worked as a graduate student in applied wave theory, he still looked and sounded like a jock to Kevin. Loud and with a braying laugh that grated on his nerves. Luckily they had the whole floor to themselves, the week after finals, the lab might as well be a graveyard. No one would hear the big blonde man’s laugh and come to see what they had going on so late at night.

  “Almost done here,” Kevin said. “Where’s Jack? I’ll need those codes he acquired to finish this.”

  “Right here, Kevin,” Jack said as he stepped into the lab. His friend might serve as Kevin’s polar opposite. Where Kevin had long brown hair in a ponytail, Jack had his hair shaved down to his scalp. Where Kevin stood over two meters in height, Jack barely topped a meter and a half. Where as Kevin wore his patched coveralls and had a pair of glasses perched on his nose, Jack wore a pair of steel toed leather combat boots and a metal studded leather jacket. “How goes the hard work?”

  “Not all that hard, just compiling the commands and checking the whole thing over. This last bit is real tricky, you know?”

  “Yeah, one wrong bit of commands and the whole reactor could go up, that’s why we needed you for this little prank,” Jack said. “But keep us informed, would you? And any help you need, just let us know.”

  “Sure thing. Truth to tell, I finished the last bit of my work on it a few minutes ago. I just had to double check everything and I needed those access codes from you,” Kevin said. “If you don’t mind, I’d actually like you to look it over before we go down to set up. I just want to be sure it’s perfect, you know? I’d hate to have an accident with a fusion reactor downtown.”

  Travis looked shocked, his eyes went wide and he looked over at Jack. “You think-” Something about his expression made Kevin feel suddenly uncertain. He almost looked surprised that Kevin had suggested the possibility…

  Jack gave a giggle, “Yeah, that would look pretty bad right when you go up to defend your PhD thesis, ‘Oh, I kind of blew up the whole city.’ No worries, Kevin, I got your back. And I’ll take it down there, I know you got a bunch of work to do still on your thesis, I don’t mind taking it down there, you’ve done enough already.”

  Kevin nodded slowly, “Yeah, well, I kind of want to see this through, and just make sure about the commands and the parameters on the reactor…”

  “Kevin, you know me,” Jack gave him a broad smile, “This was my idea, don’t worry about it, I’ll double check everything.” Jack held out his hand.

  Kevin hesitated, “You promise you’ll double check?” Not that he didn’t trust Jack. After all, the whole thing came from one of their discussions; a prank that would outdo anything anyone else had ever done in the history of the campus. To hijack an entire fusion reactor for a light show… well, that would sure as heck impress anyone who had the eyes to see it.

  And if it also highlighted the idiocy of certain government officials who had nominal responsibility for the reactor’s security… well, all to the better. After all, those same government officials had just cut the research budget by over fifty million drachma.

  “Alright,” Kevin passed over the terminal he had spent the past ten hours on. “But I need this back, afterward. I’ve got some of my thesis stuff on it.”

  “I promise, you don’t need to worry about that,” Jack said. “This is the big time, buddy, go to work, but be sure you get outside to watch the light show… I think even you will be impressed.”

  * * *

  Pixel snapped out of his memories as he stopped in front of the lounge door. He waved his hand to open it and stepped into the room. He froze a step inside the door. The plush carpets, leather couches, and the huge aquarium that occupied the forward bulkhead all surprised him. What caught his immediate attention, however, was the woman he nearly ran over.

  She stood much shorter than him, shorter even than Ariadne, he thought. Yet she had more mass than the slender psychic. Quite a bit more mass, he estimated. Most of it in two places that drew his eyes like magnets. Pixel realized that his mouth had dropped open. He managed to mumble, “Excuse me,” and step to the side. Way to be smooth, he thought to himself.

  He felt himself flush, but it took a lot of effort to drag his gaze off her chest and to her face. “Uh, hi?”

  She sighed. Now that he looked at her face, he saw that she had red hair, blue eyes, and freckles. She also had a look of resignation on her face. “Hello, I’m Mandy. You’re Pixel, right, the engineer?”

  “Yeah…” Pixel nodded. He tried to think of something smart or scientific to say, but the only words that came to mind included disproportionate, buoyancy, and floatation. He figured he should keep those thoughts to himself.

  “We meant to talk to you earlier,” another woman spoke. “I’m Miranda, by the way. Mike said you were occupied.”

  Pixel pulled his eyes away from Mandy. The raven-haired woman stood behind Mandy, and slightly to the side. She stood at least fifteen centimeters taller than her companion. She had a considerably more proportionate figure than her companion as well, which Pixel thought a good thing, if only for his sanity. “Yeah…” Pixel shook his head, “Yeah, I mean, I was down in the engine room, checking out the systems. I just took a break for food, and then I got side-tracked at the armory…” He held out his box of cereal bars, “Want some?”

  They both looked over their shoulder. Pixel recognized the two platters with the charred ‘food’ that Run had produced. “Uh, the little Chxor said that anyone who didn’t eat his cooking would get volunteered for experimentation.”

  “He’s joking,” Pixel said, “I think. He doesn’t have the authority to make that call, anyway.”

  “Chxor don’t joke,” Mandy said, and the sharp hatred in her voice made Pixel wince. “Ever. And I still don’t know why you’ve kept that pet one around.”

  “He’s useful,” Pixel said. “He’s saved a couple people’s lives, at least.” Well, two if you count tranquilizing Rastar before the Chxor guards would have shot him in that riot, he amended. Granted, Eric seemed more angry than grateful over his medical treatment, but he’d come through alright. “Plus he translated for Mike and Ariadne to pilot us out of there.”

  “Well, don’t expect any gratitude from me,” Miranda snapped. “His entire race shares responsibility for the atrocities they’ve committed on a dozen worlds.”

  Pixel made a mistake and looked back at Mandy after she spoke. His gaze dropped somewhere south of her face. He couldn’t help it, and he desperately wondered if they had become large enough to have their own gravity well… He pulled his gaze up and met her eyes finally, “Yeah, did you just want to talk to me about Run? I’ve got a lot of stuff to do.”


  “I’m sure,” Mandy scowled. “But no, that’s not all. I understand that Elena has signed on with your team.”

  “Who?” Pixel asked.

  “Elena Ludmilla Lakar,” Mandy said patiently. “Bounty hunter, blonde, blue-eyed, two meters tall, we called her the ice queen because, well, never mind.” She sighed again. Pixel wished she would stop with the sighing, it made his gaze drop again. She seemed to have very healthy lungs, among other things. “Anyway, I wanted to talk with you because you seem like a decent enough sort, and Ariadne’s busy.”

  “Busy?” Pixel asked. He forced his brain to work, “Oh, yeah, she’s interviewing the other passengers.”

  “Yeah, and there’s a long line. We wanted to offer our services,” Mandy said.

  Pixel suddenly wondered if it were possible to die of embarrassment. “Yeah… services?”

  “What she meant,” Miranda said sharply, “Is that we both have skills that would help you. We fought the Chxor before both on Saragossa and other worlds. We’ve worked as revolutionaries and insurgents. But your team seems to have done more damage to the Chxor in the past few days than entire planets have over the past ten years. So we want to sign on.”

  Pixel forced himself to focus, “What skills do you bring?”

  “Well, I’m mostly combat oriented,” Mandy said. “And I’ve got pretty good people skills. Most people just can’t say no to me. Miranda is a mechanic and she’s pretty good with thread and needle for sewing people up. I’ve got a scar on my chest…”

  Pixel closed his eyes. He ran through his calculations on the reactor power output and hoped that she did not lift up her shirt to show the scar. Well, actually, he hoped she did. I really need to get out more, he thought. “Yeah… well, I’ll let the others know you’re interested.”

  “We’d really like to talk with Ariadne,” Mandy said. “Could you get her to swing by and talk with us? We’re staying down in the cargo hold, right now.”