by A A Warren
Gritting his teeth, Talon stood his ground and raised the rifle. From this position, he had a clear shot at the chains that hung down from the crane’s loading arms.
He squeezed the trigger, sending a blast of pulse fire towards one of the cranes. Sparks erupted from the chains. One of the mag-hook units exploded from the strain. The cargo container plummeted down, tearing through the links of the remaining chains as it fell.
The Kujita ceased their firing and looked up, startled by the groaning and screaming of torn metal rushing toward them.
Talon heard a brief series of shouts echoing through the dim room. The thundering crash of the container drowned out the men's cries as it struck the floor of the cargo bay. The enormous metal box buckled and skidded across the deck-plates. Then it lurched to a stop.
The Kujita were gone, crushed beneath its massive weight. The only noise in the bay was the clanking of the loose chains above, and the groaning of the ship's mangled hull.
Talon hurried over to Vaki. She stepped out from behind her battered container.
“Nice shot. Thanks for not abandoning me.”
Talon nodded. “Thank you for the cover fire. You fight well for a stowaway.”
She looked down and checked the power cell of her pistol. "I grew up in a rough neighborhood.”
Together, they advanced towards the mangled cargo container, keeping an eye out for any Kujita that might have dodged the falling slab of metal. As they moved closer, Talon noticed the container’s door had torn loose from the hinges. The container’s contents had spilled across the floor of the cargo bay. Dozens of large translucent bags were scattered in every direction. Talon stepped over the nearest bag, and knelt down to inspect it.
The opaque sack was about the size of a human being. Tiny black cylinders of pressurized gas hung from the bag, and an array of tubes and valves snaked inside.
“These are stasis bags,” Vaki whispered. “For transporting organic material.”
Talon slid a curved cryolite blade from his belt. He slashed open the plastic shroud. A burst of freezing gas hissed out, covering the skin of his arm with a layer of stinging white frost.
A pale, gaunt face stared up at him through the torn plastic. It was a human corpse.
“Body bags.” Talon looked at Vaki. “This container was full of them.” He looked up, hearing the creak of swaying metal above them. Dozens of identical containers still hung from the ceiling. “Are all of them the same? Why would Kujita warriors be guarding a ship full of corpses?”
Vaki shook her head. “I don’t know.” She glanced at the other bags laying around them on the floor. “But unless we want to join them, we’d better get moving.”
A shuddering moan echoed through the hull of the ship. Loose chains shook and rattled above their heads, and the deck-plates vibrated. Vaki surveyed the room, a concerned look on her face. “That’s not good.”
“What is it?” Talon asked, rising to his feet.
“The portal drive is powering up. Someone must have set it on an automatic sequence. There’s no way the ship will survive entering a star-path in this condition.”
The vessel spun sideways, and the two of them slid across the floor. Vaki grabbed Talon’s arm. “We have to get off this wreck! Come on, there’s a transport this way.”
Talon followed her as she led them deeper into the dark shadows of the cargo bay.
Chapter Five
Vaki led Talon through another security door and into the corridor beyond. The lights were flashing on and off, flooding the narrow passageway with a harsh, strobing glow. Talon squinted, as his eyes adjusted to the brighter surroundings. Vaki swept her pistol left and right, glancing down the darker corridors that branched off from their position.
“Looks clear,” she whispered as she advanced forward.
“Anyone with an ounce of sense abandoned ship long ago,” Talon replied.
“So what are you still doing here?” she said, as they rounded a bend in the passageway.
“A friend of mine was in one of the clean up squads. He got cut off, couldn’t find his way back to our ship. I was looking for him.”
“I take it you didn’t find him?”
Talon glared at her. “I found him. He didn’t make it.”
Vaki glanced over at him and blinked. “I’m sorry.”
Talon nodded, and looked away. “So am I. How much farther to the lifeboat?”
Vaki glanced down the corridor. “Not far, should be just around—”
Before she could finish her sentence, a brilliant blue glow flooded the windows. The light was blinding, and Talon threw up an arm to cover his eyes. The groaning of the ship’s strained hull grew louder.
“Orion’s blazing bow! What was that?” he shouted.
Vaki rushed to the window, squinting as the beams of light cast a dazzling glow across her face. She pointed to a brilliant circle, shimmering beyond the transparent panel. “Look, I was right! Star-path, opening on the port side!”
The hull groaned louder, and Talon felt the deck shift under his feet. The ship was rolling, spinning through space towards the glowing portal. “You said that was bad,” he growled.
“It is. This ship is barely holding together. There’s no way it can survive entering a star-path. The gravi—”
“Tear the ship apart, understood,” Talon said, cutting her off as he shifted his legs across the moving floor. The deck continued to spin, rolling them towards the swirling hole of light. He grabbed her hand and together they hopped onto what was previously the side wall of the corridor. “It’s pulling us in,” he shouted. “We have to get to that lifeboat and launch, before we fall in.”
They raced along the side wall. A series of glow tubes exploded in their path. Talon spun Vaki behind him, shielding her body from the white-hot sparks erupting into the air. The ship continued its whirling, spinning movement, forcing them to leap onto the opposite wall. “Keep moving,” he shouted. “That portal is getting closer!”
The ship’s hull shrieked in protest as the distortion field of the star-path took hold. Out the window, he saw glowing shards of wreckage dislodge and fly away from the ship, leaving trails of glowing plasma gas in their wake.
Finally, they came to a T-shaped intersection. They paused, panting for breath. “Which way?” Talon asked.
Vaki pointed ahead of them to a spinning red light, mounted next to a security door in the next section of corridor. “That way… straight ahead.”
Due to the inverted angle of the ship, the airlock doors seemed to be on the floor, just past the intersection of corridors. The passageway between them and the airlock pointed straight down; a dark chasm lit by sporadic flashes of light and venting plumes of gas. Vaki took a step forward, and glanced down the long narrow corridor. Another step would lead to a long fall into the bowls of the fractured ship.
Talon yanked her back from the edge, as a hissing metal pipe plummeted from the corridor above them. The debris plunged down the shaft, clanging and bouncing along the sides of the inverted corridor.
Vaki shuddered. “Long way down. Maybe we should wait for the ship to right itself?”
A series of distant explosion rumbled through the air. The sections of wall they were standing on buckled and cracked.
Talon took several steps back. “No time. I can make the jump. Then I’ll catch you.”
She cocked her head and looked up at him with wide eyes. “Are you crazy?” She brushed her purple braid behind her ear as she glanced down the chasm before them. “That’s at least eight meters wide!”
Talon nodded. “Nine meters is my guess.” He took another few steps back. “I’ve made similar jumps in the arena. Of course, the gravity there was lighter…”
“Talon, wait, I think—”
The ship buckled again, and more debris fell down into the shaft from above.
“No time to think. Victory or death!”
Talon raced forward, and leapt off the edge of the corridor. Vaki watched
as he sailed over the flickering chasm. She gasped as his body dropped through the air… the gap between the corridors was too wide. He wasn’t going to make it…
He struck the other side, and his body thudded into the wall. His arms reached over the edge, flailing for purchase on the smooth wall opposite the gap. He slid backwards, falling a few inches down into the dark corridor. A cloud of plasma gas vented near his feet, and he winced in pain as the burning vapor struck his skin.
His fingertips dug into a raised access panel, mounted on the wall. The panel flipped open, revealing a row of sparking power conduits. His body dropped another few inches. Then his clawing fingers grasped the edge of the conduit box. The muscles in his shoulders and arms heaved as he pulled himself up over the edge. He scrambled to his feet. The ship lurched again. He spun around and faced the terrified woman on the far edge of the gap.
“Your turn.” He held out his arms. “Jump, I’ll catch you and pull you up.”
She took several steps back, shaking her head. “Talon, I don’t think I can make—”
The ship groaned again. Talon felt himself sliding backwards, away from the edge. The vessel’s bow was tilting down now. He flexed his knees and planted his feet, fighting against the changing angle of the ship.
Vaki looked down… her feet were skidding towards the edge of the corridor.
“Run,” Talon shouted. “Now!”
Vaki launched forward, sprinting towards the dark chasm as the front of the ship continued dipping down. Talon could hear her panting for breath, as she planted her foot and prepared to leap.
The rear of the ship rose higher as she jumped, catapulting her into the air. She crossed the gap and overshot the edge, flying over Talon before she slammed into the ground. Her body rolled forward as the ship continued to tilt. She screamed, and her arms flailed across the smooth plastic wall as she bounced over the airlock doors. Talon dropped to the floor and let himself slide with her. He managed to grab the edge of the airlock door. He reached for the woman with his free hand, but she slid past him too fast.
He felt her fingers dig into his ankle. Vaki was holding on for dear life. Grunting with exertion, he reached up with his free hand, and slammed his fist onto the blinking red access button.
Nothing happened.
Security door, he thought.
He glanced down at the flailing girl. The ship had spun almost vertical, and she dangled below him, her legs kicking in the air.
“Vaki, the door won’t open. I need the security badge!”
She glanced up at him with wide, terrified eyes. They continued to spin… soon they would be upside down, and it would be impossible for him to maintain his grip on the door. His crimson eye peered down at her, reflecting the sparking plasma and emergency lights in the corridor.
“Vaki, look at me. You can do this, just take it slow.”
She nodded, grit her teeth, and let go of his leg with one arm. Reaching down, she unclipped the badge from her belt. It shook and trembled in her hand as she reached up to him.
Talon let go of the ledge with one hand. He reached down and grabbed Vaki's wrist, grunting as he lifted her into the air. She gasped, and flailed for the doorway. When she finally had a firm grip, she slapped the badge onto the blinking red panel.
“ACCESS GRANTED,” an electronic voice replied. The door hissed open. Talon pulled himself up and fell inside. As soon as his feet touched the deck, he grabbed Vaki’s arm and pulled her in after him. The door closed behind them with a dull thud.
Talon glanced around… they were in the narrow, claustrophobic cabin of a lifeboat. A row of padded seats ran along either side. Ahead of him, the tiny domed cockpit looked out over the glowing blue portal. The star-path shimmered in the black void.
“Well done,” he said between breaths. “We made it.”
“I almost didn’t… you saved me.” She panted, gazing into his eyes with a curious expression on her face. “Whoever you are, it looks like we’re in this together.”
The ship lurched sideways. Talon planted his arm on the low ceiling of the lifeboat to steady himself, as the girl fell forward. He grabbed her waist with his free arm, stopping her from colliding with the wall.
“We can talk later,” he grunted. “Time to leave this wreck before it drags us into hell.”
He climbed into the cockpit, which now hung sideways over the swirling portal. A rush of debris and shattered escort vessels flew past the transparent dome, shooting toward the maw of the portal.
“It’s pretty rough out there,” Vaki said as she climbed into the chair next to him. “You sure you can fly this thing?”
Talon grinned. “I’ve flown in worse.”
He flipped a row of switches on the console, and the navigation holo-display glowed to life. Reaching up, he grabbed the docking clamp release mounted to the ceiling and yanked down. With a loud clank, the lifeboat disconnected and drifted away from the ship, just as a series of explosions erupted on the ventral side of the freighter’s hull.
Grabbing the controls, Talon darted the tiny craft forward, maneuvering between the debris floating around them.
Vaki called up a navigation reading on her holo-display. “You’re getting close to the portal’s event horizon. It’s unstable, probably a malfunction in the dark energy cells on the—”
A violent shockwave erupted behind them, tossing the lifeboat forward. The cockpit lit up with an orange glow, as the remains of the cargo ship broke in half. A massive fireball ballooned from the wreckage. Seconds later, the cold vacuum of space snuffed out the explosion.
“Iberon’s harem,” Talon cursed. A loud clang sounded from the top of the lifeboat. Sparks erupted from the console as the tiny craft’s inertia compensators blew out. A damage alert wailed through the cramped cockpit. The ship dipped down, then flew into a tight corkscrew, spiraling towards the edge of the star-path.
The glowing symbols that formed the perimeter of the dark energy portal dimmed and wavered. Flaming wreckage streaked past them through space, plummeting towards the glowing blue hole.
“Something hit us,” Vaki shouted. “Navigation thrusters offline. Shields failing!”
“Can we open our own portal?” Talon asked. The muscles in his arms vibrated as he struggled to pull the lifeboat out of the spinning dive.
Vaki tapped her controls. “I'm activating the dark energy power cell. But you have to keep us out of that star-path! It’s too dangerous to open a second path inside, the interference will—”
Another chunk of debris slammed into the side of the ship, knocking them off the course Talon had plotted. They plunged into the glowing vortex.
A computer's electronic voice called out. "DARK ENERGY LEVELS AT FULL POWER. STAR-PATH OPENING IN 5… 4… 3…"
Talon grit his teeth as he rolled the ship straight. He pulled out of the power dive and swooped back towards the lip of the portal. He grimaced as he watched the thruster level bar drop… the portal was sapping them of their speed.
“I can’t get us clear!” he shouted.
“The distortion from this star-path is interfering with our drive… the readings are all wrong, I don't—”
“STAR-PATH OPEN. PREPARE FOR JUMP,” the computerized voice alerted them. It spoke with no trace of emotion, as the space in front of them spun into another glowing vortex.
“I thought we couldn’t open a star-path inside a star-path?” Talon shouted.
“We can,” she said, grabbing the arms of her chair. “There’s just no telling where it will take us. Or if we’ll make it out the other end!”
A swirl of red light spiraled before them, ringed with glowing mystic symbols. In the center of the red circle, the blue energy from the larger, collapsing portal seemed to tear through. Jagged bolts of purple lightning littered the path before them.
Talon swung the ship left and right, evading the powerful blasts of rampant energy as best he could. As they plunged into the glowing red portal, he saw the space outside the cockpit str
etch and distort. He blinked… his vision was a cloudy haze. He turned to Vaki and tried to speak, but his words came out as a muted jumble of sounds.
The ship threaded the intersection between the two glowing star-paths, and he felt his body tingle, then go numb. He struggled to keep his eyes open. His thoughts slowed, as if the neurons in his brain had to fight through a thick, noxious sludge to make contact. He slumped over in the chair, and succumbed to the warm, liquid oblivion that drowned his senses.
As they disappeared from normal space, everything outside the cockpit stretched into a blur of color and sound. Then that too disappeared, and there was only cold, silent darkness left in their wake.
Chapter Six
UNKNOWN PLANETARY BODY
Consortium of Free Worlds
A few days later…
Hello, my warrior… did you miss me?
The words rang through the dark clouds of his mind. He heard them as faint whispers, hovering just beyond the veil of consciousness. Like the echoes of a half-remembered dream, the tendrils of memory tugged and pulled him from oblivion’s warm embrace.
Talon, wake up! You must wake up, quickly!
His eyes fluttered… brief flashes of light interrupted the darkness that engulfed him. “Salena?” he mumbled.
“Talon, wake up!” Vaki screamed. An alarm wailed through the cockpit, and Talon felt the shock of sudden motion as his stomach lurched upwards. A series of thuds and bangs sounded from the hull. The lifeboat was falling, plunging down into a dark abyss.
His eyes snapped open… Instead of darkness, a blinding kaleidoscope of colors greeted him. He shook his head, but the blurred streaks continued to fill his vision. He turned towards Vaki, and felt a sickening yawn of vertigo overpower his senses. The streaks of color bent and shifted around him. He felt as though he were falling in a hundred different directions at once. He couldn’t focus on any one point.
