“Bakersfield in position. Welcome to the Ishuss system Captain Valance,” she said as the ship came out of hyperspace.
“Nice flying Bakersfield. Just drop your cargo in the right direction and you can move on to your next destination,” replied Captain Valance. The Samson was hiding inside the old cargo container that stretched out behind the larger cargo hauler.
“Right away sir. It was a pleasure being in your service.”
“Good luck out there,” Jake replied.
The Bakersfield released the cargo container and moved off mere seconds later, accelerating straight into hyperspace. The abandoned cargo container drifted and rotated slowly just ahead of the empty area of space most often used by starships decelerating out of hyperspace and shedding the energized particles that enshrouded their ships. The Ishuss system had designated that area as the primary emergence point. There were several quickly orbiting planets with dozens of moons, so most Captains kept to the safe, clear area.
Ashley took the spare moment to stretch as her new navigator, a younger man with dusty blond hair, looked at her nervously. “Now what do we do?” He asked in a hushed whisper.
“We wait. Captain said this hauler we're after should be along soon.”
“I know. I read the brief and heard what he said. But what do we do while we're waiting?”
“You see that light?” She said, pointing to a red light on his console.
“Yeah.”
“Count how many times it blinks,” she teased with a grin.
Finn couldn't help but chuckle as Cynthia shook her head.
Captain Valance didn't show any amusement or irritation. His manner was calm and neutral. “Stay sharp everyone. We can't afford to commit to this action without being prepared.”
Several minutes passed in silence. Ashley was looking at her controls, calmly going through the flight checklist in her head. Finn was looking over the reports from engineering. The new tactical officer – Daryl Garretty was his name – was reviewing the instructions he had received for the maxjack and Cynthia was watching for any new transmission sources. Captain Valance sat calmly, resting his chin on his interwoven knuckles.
“I see wireless noise,” Cynthia reported.
“Gravity distortion off our starboard side,” reported navigation excitedly.
“How far out?” Captain Valance asked.
“Nine seconds.”
“Everyone get ready.”
For some the few seconds before the Lilla came out of hyperspace were too few. For the seasoned crew of the Samson there were just enough time to take one deep breath before everyone got a chance to play their part.
The deep space hauler, Lilla came out of hyperspace a few kilometres away from the point predicted. For several minutes they barely moved.
“What are our passive sensors picking up?” Asked Captain Valance.
“Twenty two aboard, all systems running except for weapons, no shield emitters. The cargo train is reading fully loaded. Just over two kilometres,” replied the new tactical officer.
“Their weaponry consists of rocket launchers, they don't need to be charged,” Finn corrected. “They have three launch turrets, two of which they can point at us if we approach from above.”
“All right, we'll give them a chance to start accelerating towards the system interior.”
“Sir, I'm picking up a thermal reading from inside our ship,” Finn reported. “It looks like someone's bringing our engines online early, trying to shut it down.”
“Too late, bring it all on line. Get us out of this storage container, there goes our surprise. Whoever did that is getting left behind at the nearest safe port. For now, let's just try to get this done.”
The rear end of the cargo container hiding the Samson blew apart in all directions, drifting away in small pieces. Ashley fired the engines, backing the ship out into the clear. She spun the Samson so the upper side faced the Lilla then began accelerating in the direction of the much larger vessel. “Beginning hard three second burn. Bring the shields up now please.”
The tactical officer nearly jumped and brought all the shields online as quickly as he could. “Sorry!” He replied. Alarms began going off, the power systems couldn't handle such a sudden drain. It was something he had been warned about more than once. Garretty floundered, near panic trying to figure out what he had done wrong.
Captain Valance stood up and tossed the young officer aside, taking the controls and sending more power to the dorsal shields, reducing power to the rest of the emitters. The sensors at the tactical station warned that missiles were firing. “Incoming!” Was all he had the chance to say.
The ship rattled only slightly, but everyone could hear the inertial dampener systems straining to compensate for the force of the impact. He checked the damage. “Flip us around Ash! We lost an emitter and we have a hull breach.”
Ashley flipped the ship end over end so the maxjack was aimed perfectly at the port side of the cargo hauler and began decelerating.
The tactical officer picked himself up off the deck and tried to take his station, butting right in beside Captain Valance, trying to step in front of him. Jake elbowed him in the chest so hard he was sent across the deck onto his back. “You touch my ship again and I'll strap you to the bow for the ride home!”
“Impact in three, two-” shouted the navigator.
Captain Valance barely had the maxjack ready in time, but the main heavy grappler claws compensated for the impact and grabbed hold of the other ship's hull like an eagle's talon around the neck of a fish. He looked over to Finn who was checking hull stress.
“We're good sir.” Finn said hurriedly. “With your permission I'd like to go help secure the breach and check damage.”
“Go, they need you more back there.”
The tactical officer looked at Finn helplessly; “What do I do?” he asked as he shrugged helplessly.
“Get off the bridge!” Captain Valance snapped. “Go putty that breach with your worthless ass for all I care!”
Finn shook his head and quickly left the bridge, hauling the tactical officer behind him. “Follow directions, watch everything, stay safe,” he informed the slightly younger fellow.
“Ramirez, how is your op going?” Captain Valance asked.
“We're just sailing the solar breeze sir, almost right where we want to be.”
“Be aware, the maxjack is firing.”
“We're clear. Don't worry about us,” reassured Ramirez.
“Cynthia, inform Lilla command; they are to shut down systems and abandon ship.”
“I'll send it, but I don't think they'll like it,” she said as she watched the engineering station for hull stress problems as Finn had instructed the day before and operated communications at the same time.
Captain Valance checked the maxjack's hold on the ship and manipulated the other, more fine sets of arms to reinforce their attachment.
“Samson, we are part of a convoy. The rest of our group is not far behind. Your capture will not succeed and our escort will fire on you,” came the reply over the bridge speaker system.
“Cut communications,” ordered Captain Valance. “Firing maxjack.”
The plasma cutters began making a hole in the Lilla's hull. At first the armour was resistant, but after he managed to focus the white hot jets of plasma the going went much easier. After less than a minute he was almost finished. “Stephanie, get set for boarding action.”
“All set down here.”
“Ramirez, are you ready?”
“Yes sir, the packages are in place and we're ready. The bridge staff are in for one hell of a light show.”
“Good. Patch in to our communications with the Lilla. You'll know when it's showtime.” Captain Valance looked to Cynthia and nodded. She opened a channel between the bridge and the Lilla. “This is Captain Valance operating under the authority of the Aucharian Government. Abandon your vessel in a quick and orderly fashion or we will take further action.�
��
“If you're sending a boarding party through that hole you're making, it'll take you hours to get to our command centre,” replied someone from the other ship.
“We're working on another entry point. Allow me to demonstrate.”
Ramirez took that as the signal, judging from the sounds over the communicator. There were several loud pops followed by the sound of cracking and creaking.
“Oh no,” Ashley said quietly, turning to face the captain.
The unmistakable sounds of atmosphere being pulled out of a hole and screaming came through the speaker system and then there was silence. Absolute dead silence.
“Ramirez, that was supposed to be a warning. The command crew were supposed to be scared, not spaced.”
“Oops,” was his only response.
“Get in there and check the bridge. See if you can patch into their internal comm system. Stephanie, start your boarding action as soon as the maxjack's airlock is secure.”
“Frost was our demolitions guy. I took an educated guess,” Ramirez tried to explain.
“Let's just hope some of them were smart enough to wear their vacsuits on the bridge,” Captain Valance replied.
“Hooking into the comm system now,” Ramirez said a moment later. “You can address the crew sir.”
“Crew of the Regent Galactic Cargo Hauler Lilla. We have decompressed the bridge of your ship and disposed of the command crew. We also have an armed party boarding your vessel. You are hereby ordered to abandon ship. Any resistance will be met with lethal force,” Captain Valance sealed the airlock of the maxjack onto the hole he had made and pressurized it. “You're clear to board Stephanie. Ramirez, see if your team can use internal sensors to tell Stephanie where to expect trouble.”
“Aye sir.”
They waited for several minutes. Stephanie got through the airlock with her mixed team of experienced boarding crew and members recruited from the Aucharian port. “There's no welcoming committee, moving inside,” she reported.
“We have three small craft leaving the cargo hauler,” reported navigation.
“Get a profile. Are they fighters or escape craft?” Asked Captain Valance.
“Here, let me show you,” Ashley said, leaning over to the navigator's station. “There, now your scanners are linked with our database.”
“They're escape craft sir,” the navigator reported. “Looks like five aboard each and a fourth just came up with three aboard.”
“Well, that's pretty much all of them, time to get the hell out of here,” Captain Valance said as much to himself as to anyone else as he double checked the maxjack's status. “Boarding crews; report secure when you've managed to get behind a bulkhead.”
“Meeting resistance further inside sir,” Stephanie shouted as she ducked behind the first corner after entering the airlock.
“They're not on internal sensors,” she heard Ramirez report through her subdermal communicator.
“Their vacsuits most likely block out any passive scans and conceal thermal profiles,” she replied, peeking around a corner using the electronic eye on the end of her rifle. It sent the images it was recording to a small semitransparent display in her faceplate. Their opponents were in military vacsuits. They weren't just crew members trying to keep boarders off the ship. A moment later they fired at the tip of her weapon, missing but making their point regardless. “Sir, they're in a better position than we are. I'll try to fix that.”
She pulled two round devices out of her thigh pocket, activated them both and rolled them around the corner. The soldiers behind her, four new recruits and one crew member from the Samson didn't even recognize the little machines. A moment later the hallway was filled with pulse weapon fire and after ten seconds an explosion rang out. Before the dust had settled Stephanie rolled out into the hallway and began firing. “Take the next corridor!” She shouted.
Only three of the enemy soldiers were down on the floor, two of them had been killed by the pulse grenades energy bolts, the third had been caught by the fragments when they exploded. Stephanie ordered two of the younger boarding crewmen ahead. “Fire on anything that moves.”
They rushed the next corridor and a grenade came sliding down the hallway at them. Stephanie reacted immediately. “Back!” She shouted as she was almost around the corner. The rear view display on her headpiece showed that one of the new recruits was just about to kick the grenade back down the hall. “No! Don't!” Just as she got around the corner the toe of his boot hit one of the detonation triggers dead on.
He and the crewman beside him were killed instantly. That left her with two new recruits and March, the only experienced boarding crewman she had brought along. She looked to him and nodded. “Grenades. We'll push them back and seal ourselves in.”
“Good idea.”
“Give us your grenades,” ordered the new boarding party members, they both looked terrified. After a moment one of them handed three standard fragmentation grenades to Stephanie and the other handed one to March, who looked at him in disbelief. “Really? One grenade?”
The corridor came to life with cover fire, making the corner impassable. March shrugged, set the grenade he had been given on a two second timer and tossed it with a flick of his wrist, leaving their opponents no time to react. The explosion put an end to the incoming pulse weapon fire.
“-unning out of time!” Stephanie heard through her communicator, it was the Captain.
“Working on it. We're almost safe!” Stephanie called back. She fired around the corner blindly with her rifle on full automatic, filling the hallway with energy rounds. March followed her lead and moved around the corner. When he started firing she moved in place beside him. They started walking down the hall slowly and stopped firing. One of the soldiers peeked around the corner. Stephanie and March both caught him in the forehead with a single shot.
Stephanie bounced a grenade against the far wall and around the corner. The sounds of shuffling ahead told her that it was a good shot and before two seconds had passed it went off. “Newbies! Move up!” She called out.
The new boarding crew members ran up behind them with rifles ready. Instead of peeking around the corner herself she tossed her last fragmentation grenade down the next hallway on a three second fuse.
“Everyone back!” They heard someone shout, but it was far too late. The abrupt explosion silenced all the shuffling in the next hallway and when they stepped around the corner they could see that the charge had taken out at least five soldiers.
Stephanie and March didn't let their guards down, but took the next hall in a rush. It was clear. She activated a basic control panel at the far end of the corridor and closed an emergency blast door. “You get the one at the other end, March.”
He nodded and hurried to close the blast door at the other end of the hallway, sealing them into the section so they would be safe in hyperspace to plan their next move.
“Secure!” Came Stephanie's report through the bridge sound system.
“We'll be a minute,” Ramirez said.
“Finn, how are we for entering hyperspace?” Asked the Captain.
“Fine, we lost three up here though. We'll be in cramped quarters as well. We lost the aft berth.”
“I have wireless noise incoming,” Cynthia reported. “Looks like several ships.”
“I don't see anything on gravitational sensors,” said Ashley's co-pilot.
“Well, something's coming in. Our intelligence might have been wrong about that ship being alone,” Captain Valance commented. “Anything yet, navigation?”
“Wait. Big gravity coming in!”
“Ramirez! We are out of time!”
“We're just getting secure now sir, give us ten seconds.”
“Ashley, fire it up, get ready to head into hyperspace,” Captain Valance ordered.
Just as he finished a much larger ship arrived from hyperspace right behind them. “Regent Galactic deep space destroyer, the Cray right behind us sir,” navigati
on reported.
“Ramirez?” Captain Valance asked impatiently.
“Secure!” He replied.
“Are you sure? Because we could just wait here to be boarded.”
“I'm sure sir.”
“Get us out of here.”
Ashley fired the engines and gradually brought them up to full power, turning the large hauler and her cargo train into their planned course.
“Incoming communication from the Cray. They're demanding we power down and prepare to be boarded or they'll be forced to destroy us.” Cynthia reported.
“You know, for once I wish they'd just call to say hello,” Ashley said as she made some fine adjustments. “Hyperspace in three, two, one.”
Rarities
The Clever Dream emerged from a wormhole at the edge of Euphoria Universal space. It was a solar system with twenty three terraforming operations under way and more bases than anyone could count.
Alice was at the controls and looked over the initial navigation data. “They're not very busy at this end. Strange.”
“The Hart News database says there is a trade embargo in place under the direction of one of the neighbouring systems,” Lewis replied. “Incoming transmission, I'll put it on a display.”
A blocky holographic head representing an artificial intelligence appeared at her right hand. “Welcome to Ara Enormis. Please state your purpose.”
The name of the largest base in the outer solar system always made her smile. It translated as 'large irregular rock' from Latin and if there was a better description she couldn't imagine what it was. It was also the oldest base in the system and had been hollowed out so much over the years that there wasn't much rock left.
The slowly turning base was difficult to measure, but there was enough room for six cities with millions of residents, thousands of private docking bays, two large ship construction yards, dozens of factories and harvesting stations. When the planets closer to the centre of the solar system were ready for colonization tens of thousands of colonists would move from Ara Enormis and start a new life. After the first wave of colonists were finished preparing the planet for settlement hundreds of thousands would invariably follow.
Spinward Fringe Broadcasts 1 and 2 Page 19
