“We need to talk to you,” Sal said firmly. “This is important.”
Unsettled Jess just nodded, studying them both for any clue as to what they wanted to talk about.
“You've been caught out twice now by being drugged. It's an easy way to get at you. You have to eat. Have to drink. You need some defences. Can the ship, or that stuff in your head, monitor all food and drink? Check it for drugs or even poisons and deal with them, or warn you to stop eating?”
Jess considered for a while, communing with the ship.
“Yes... I think so. It can't recognise every drug, though it will spot a lot, but it can also be set-up to monitor my body for signs that an agent of some form is affecting me.”
“Good. You should do it now then.”
“But it's going to be tricky telling it not to scan food you give me. I know I'm safe with you. If I start doubting that I don't think I could keep going. I can't doubt everyone.”
Ali leaned forwards. “Jess you mustn't trust us, not over that. Someone could get to us first. Look at when we first met. If someone does get to us you'll be our only hope of being rescued.”
“I don't like it. It's still me saying I don't trust you fully. I do trust you. I have to trust you. Please... don't betray me like Matt did. I need you. Both of you.”
“Glad to hear it. We aren't going anywhere Jess but you must protect yourself because that's the only protection we get.”
He studied both women, they clearly had their minds made up. Jess didn't feel up to arguing with them.
“All right. But I still don't like it.”
Jess linked into the ship fully and started to set up the monitoring. He widened the protection from food and drink to any form of administration, in case he was jabbed with a needle or dosed in a way he couldn't yet imagine.
“It's done,” he said tiredly.
“Good,” said Sal. “Maybe now you can accept a drink without trying to read my soul!”
“I didn't do that. Did I?”
“Relax Jess. No you didn't, well hardly. You were a little hesitant. And I don't blame you for that.”
Later, as the two women headed for bed again, Sal threw a parting comment over her shoulder about not spying on the sleeping Ali. As Jess spluttered his denials both women disappeared up the stairs laughing at his discomfort. Jess realised that he missed Matt, despite the terrible betrayal. Missed having an older man to balance things out. Now he was alone with two women who at times seemed decades ahead of him in self confidence and knowledge of the world.
During the flight Jess reconfigured the Wanderer again. The outside was returned to its original bright silver surface. Damaged shield generators were repaired and new weaponry was created for the battle in jump space. The engines were tweaked to provide more power and the thrusters were uprated to make the already agile ship even more manoeuvrable. He had the ship manufacture thirty very heavy duty missiles.
Once the pirate ships registered on the scanners the tension in the ship rose sharply. Jess took the pilot's seat. Sal and Ali took the two seats behind. No one spoke as they closed in on the fleeing ships. Time seemed to drag out for Jess but finally they drew close enough to use the new weaponry.
“We're close enough. Any last minute cold feet?”
Neither of the others spoke for a moment, then Ali rested her hand on his shoulder.
“No. Let's get it over with.”
Jess nodded. Reached out to the ship and fired the newly built weapons. No laser beam could exist in jump space, nor could plasma or ion bolts. The weapon he fired was something very different. It was a variation on jump technology. A focused beam, several metres across, shot out from the Wanderer lancing through the centre of the closest Corvette. The beam didn't inflict any direct damage. Everything it touched was ripped back into real space. The rest of the ship was left with a gaping hole torn though its centre for the few milliseconds before it imploded. The beam had dumped parts of the thrusters and engines into real space, what was left went into immediate meltdown. It was all over far too fast for anyone on board the corvette to know anything about it.
The section of the ship ripped back into real space fared no better. The abrupt transition wasn't cushioned by jump engines as normally happened when exiting jump space. The section hit real space at a significant proportion of light speed and was torn apart within seconds. Anyone somehow surviving the abrupt return and the destruction would then be exposed to hard vacuum. If, by some miraculous chance, someone was already suited up despite being in the middle of the ship and survived the translation then they would find themselves drifting in real space. Far from any planets or stars and with no hope of ever being found. Certainly no hope of being rescued in the hour or two before their oxygen ran out.
Grimly Jess lined the Wanderer up on the other corvette and repeated the process. The corvette went the way of its sister ship, both the parts in jump and real space ripped apart in milliseconds.
The freighter would be a tougher target. It was much larger and the damage the beam could do might not be enough to cripple it. Jess wanted a clean kill from within jump space. So far the freighter wouldn't even know it's escort ships had been destroyed. He brought the Wanderer alongside positioning her carefully. Once he was satisfied he triggered the weapon once more.
His positioning was perfect. The weapon sliced a hole through at least six of the freighter's engines. The explosion was massive, easily engulfing the whole of the freighter and billowing out towards the Wanderer. Only Jess's machine fast reactions saved them. He threw the ship down and to the side. The explosion smashed into the Wanderer, shaking it but doing no major damage. Once he was sure they were clear Jess settled back in his chair. Sweat was pouring down his face. No one spoke for some time, each lost in their private thoughts. While he still felt what they'd done was necessary Jess dwelt on the lives he'd just ended, feeling hollow inside. He'd given them no chance to defend themselves, no chance to surrender. No chance to even know there were in danger.
He didn't have long to think. All too soon they arrived at Stone Snake mining complex.
Jess brought the Wanderer out of jump space at point blank range. The first the station knew of the attack was the impact of weapon fire. Once again Jess aimed to keep casualties amongst the slaves to a minimum. It wasn't difficult. The complex was an incredibly target rich environment.
He'd brought the ship out in a processing area. Massive automated machines processed the raw ores from the mining operation, refining them and moving them into immense storage areas. It was the heart of the mining operation and Jess intended to rip that heart out. They couldn't kill the station but they could certainly inflict some heavy losses. Maybe enough for the leaders to be pulled down, replaced. Almost certainly by more of the same, but at least those responsible for the attack on Glory Falls would be gone.
First he hit the mining machinery. As well as firing the on board weapons at their maximum rate he launched fifteen of the super heavy missiles into the complex machines. Huge chunks simply vanished in the explosions, causing cascading collapses that spread through the machinery.
Then he flew over the precious metals storage area, once again skipping within the forcefield. This time the force field was dropped almost as soon as the Wanderer reappeared. He targeted the remaining rare, valuable stores. Gold, platinum, uranium, palladium and others. The lasers and plasma cannons were particularly effective against the massed stores of metals, while the remainder of the heavy missiles vaporised a fortune with each explosion. There was no doubt in Jess's mind that the raid had already achieved its purpose. They'd hurt the pirates. Hurt them really badly.
The defences were starting to come online now. Smaller weaponry had been attempting to target the Wanderer almost since she'd arrived but had been hampered by a desire to avoid damaging the mining complex. The heavy duty weapon towers had been completely silent. No more. Whoever was in charge had clearly decided the Wanderer needed to be stopped, and stopped quic
kly. Restrictions on targeting were removed. The lighter weapons started firing continuously while the heavy towers opened up too. Jinking the Wanderer rapidly to avoid taking too much damage Jess was happy to see the base's defensive weaponry inflicting massive damage to the nearby machinery and stores as shots went wide of the Wanderer.
Still, it was nearly time to leave. One heavy missile remained. Jess executed a tight turn which threw off the systems targeting them and started to pass a huge storage tank that had so far remained intact. At point blank range he launched the heavy missile.
The result was catastrophic. The tank didn't hold metals. It held fuel, refined fuel used for shuttles and other small craft. The explosion was so large it even shook the mighty mining complex. The Wanderer's shields had no chance of withstanding that powerful a blast – they were shredded immediately, and milliseconds later the Wanderer followed. Small chunks of debris rocketed out from the explosion, none larger than a few metres across. Mostly they came from the ship's silver hull, the reflective properties having deflected a little of the force of the explosion. Nothing remained of the inner compartments and anything organic, such as the bodies of those on board, were completely obliterated by the unleashed power. Slowly the base's defensive weaponry fell silent. Shuttles were launched to recover what was left of the amazing ship.
Chapter Eighteen
Jess cursed as he wrestled to stabilise the ship. Amber and red statuses were springing up everywhere, and through his connection to the ship each ached or stung. His skin felt as if it had been scalded. The immense explosion from the fuel tank had bled over into jump space making the ship buck and sway violently. Even with his thoughts massively accelerated by being linked to the ship he was struggling to stay on top of everything.
The extent to which the explosion would leak into jump space had surprised him. He'd known what the tank contained – in fact their plan depended on it. As the missile struck he'd thrown most of the Wanderer into jump space. Most but not all. The outer shell, together with enough other hull segments to make a convincing wreck, had been jettisoned and left behind. Proof of the ship's destruction. Though in fact everything left had been produced during flight for that express purpose. None of it contained any trace of the ship's advanced capabilities.
As they had planned the immense explosion bled over to jump space. In doing so it smeared both real and jump space enough to completely obliterate the tell tale scars on space indicating a jump. All the evidence would point to the Wanderer being destroyed and, for a while at least, they'd get some peace.
The explosion had been too powerful though. The ship bucked again. Hull stress warnings blossomed down the right side of the ship. Jess reinforced the shields on that side, using them to hold the ship together. The jump drives flashed warning then critical alarms as they frantically scrabbled against the rippling surface of jump space around the ship. Another shock wave crashed into them from behind shaking the flight deck.
And then it was over. The ship steadied and jump space around them returned to being smooth and undisturbed. Sensors showed a spreading wave of disruption behind the Wanderer, but they were outrunning it now. Jess felt as if he'd been wrestling the ship for hours. A quick check showed it to be nine point seven two seconds.
Running through the alerts he identified priority areas for repair, shifted shields to reinforce the worst damaged areas. He took offline those systems that weren't currently needed, reducing the strain on the engines which had taken a severe beating and badly needed to be overhauled. The powering down allowed rolling maintenance on the engines, starting with the most heavily damaged.
After reviewing and prioritising thousands of alerts he checked the time again. Twenty eight seconds since jump. Satisfied nothing needed his immediate attention he let his mind revert to normal speed and slumped down in his seat with a deep sigh.
Twenty eight seconds, he thought. Felt more like twenty-eight days.
“Are we clear?” asked Ali quietly.
“Yes. Just. That was closer than we planned for.”
“Well done. I got a bit worried there during the rough patch but luckily it was over so quickly I couldn't really get scared. Thank the stars it didn't last very long.”
Jess snorted at that then started to laugh hysterically. Turning and seeing her frowning at him in confusion just made it worse. All the worry, the fear and the excitement of recent events came flowing out. It was some time before he gained control of himself again. Ali was clearly not impressed. Even when he explained how long the ordeal had seemed for him she didn't see the funny side.
The Wanderer was headed for a planet called Washington. To avoid straining the damaged ship they were coasting along at the speed all normal ships managed in jump space, which meant a journey time of three and a half days.
They'd chosen Washington for its distance from Stone Snake and the details they could find on it. The planet had numerous large stations orbiting it, most of them active trade hubs. They hoped to pick up news and gossip on local events. Possibly some supplies.
Near the end of the first day Jess walked into the living area to find Ali sitting alone staring at a screen. As he moved closer he saw it was a map showing the orbital farm those kidnapped with her had been sold to. A location they were currently heading away from.
“I'm sorry,” he said softly. “I wish we could go rescue them right now, but Stone Snake showed that wouldn't work. This ship is powerful but it's not a fleet on its own.”
Ali blinked a few times before answering, tears visible in her eyes.
“I know. It's hard though. Knowing where they are and not being able to do anything about it. More than that though. It's happening everywhere isn't it? You and Sal were slaves. We know the kidnappers had carried out a lot of raids and sold to many places. That means those places needed slaves and probably got them from many suppliers. Even the great and glorious empire uses slaves. It's not right!”
“No it's not, but we can't fix everything. We can try to save a few people, but that's all we can do. Even doing that is so tricky. We can't march into those places. Hell, we can't even march into any station without risk. Wherever we go we're in danger. I wish there was some way of getting things done without us having to physically go in.”
“Robots!” Ali said excitedly.
“What?”
“Robots. We had a couple on the station. Pretty beat up. They were used for any jobs too dangerous to send a human on. You must have seen them used?”
“No. There wasn't a job in existence they thought was too dangerous to send a slave on,” he replied drily.
“Oh... oh my god... that's terrible!”
Jess shrugged his shoulders.
“We were used to it. It's how life was for us. But your idea is a good one. Let me check with the ship – see if we can make some.”
His eyes glazed for a moment. When his focus returned to Ali he wore a troubled frown.
“No,” he said. “The ship won't manufacture robots. Not can't – won't. It made it clear that's a hard block, that it's written throughout its systems. Not something we could get around.”
“Did it tell you why?”
“Kind of. More an image and a feeling. An image of a large area covered in robots, each marching in step, with the ship sitting behind them. Controlling them. And a feeling to go with it. A feeling of total horror at the situation. I think it means the ship could make near endless amounts of robots, and that would be terrible.”
“An immense number of robots all under one person's control? One person safely protected in the most advanced space ship I've ever heard of?” Ali shivered. “Yeah... I can see its point.”
“It's not all bad though. If we could get a few robots somehow the ship would be happy to change them. Upgrade them and link itself directly to them so they can be controlled. It will limit how many but the number is quite vague, I think it depends on what sort of robots we get and how powerful they are once upgraded.”
“It's not all bad news then. With some robots we have a chance at least. Maybe we could use them as bodyguards too if we're off the ship. I hope so. The thought of spending my life on this ship without ever leaving... it's too much. The station I grew up on was small but there were places to go, greenery to see, other people to talk to. We should get some entertainment when we reach Washington too. Some vids or books.”
Jess agreed enthusiastically. Books had been rare as he grew up. Tolerated and even supplied by their guards as slaves who could read orders or instructions were more useful. Prisoners who'd had a life before becoming slaves often talked about how limited the selection of books was, of far more interesting and thought provoking books they'd read. Now Jess was keen to explore that world. He'd never seen a vid but those same prisoners spoke of them in hushed tones. To those born into slavery vids were nearly mythical. The thought of actually getting some filled Jess with excitement.
“Damn!” Ali suddenly cursed. “We can't do it. We've no money. We might be able to scrape together enough for a vid and a few books but robots are expensive. Really expensive. Even ones that are ready for the scrap heap.”
“That won't be a problem. In all the excitement of getting away I didn't tell you or Sal. We vaporised a fortune in precious metals during the attack and at times we were almost flying through the blast zone afterwards. I had the ship use its fields to grab some of the particles. We've got a few hundred kilos of gold and smaller amounts of some of the other metals. We're kinda rich right now.”
“Really?” Ali's eyes lit up. “You mean it's possible? We might be able to get the robots?”
“Possible yes. We need to find out how much what we have is worth and how expensive robots are. And we need to find someone who will take some of our stockpile no questions asked.”
“Still... it's a chance. A way to move forwards. At least it means there's a chance to rescue my friends.”
Jess smiled at Ali, glad to see her looking happier. She was right. It was a chance – however small.
Wanderer's Escape Page 13
