by Chris Vaughn
“Sorley! Those are raiders come to steal the cattle,” Luke cried out as he worked to right the ship. As the ship came to and righted, blaster shots again hit the bottom of the hull of the ship.
“Sorley!” Luke yelled out. He turned to the co-pilots seat to find it empty. “Sorley!”
Sorley never answered.
Chapter 10
The ship hovered just centimeters above the ground as blasters from the rustlers bounced off the sides of the ship. Even though they were just blaster rifles, the repetition of shots caused the ship to shutter slightly. Dust and smoke from the ship's engines spooked the cattle away at a full stampede from the mouth of the cave.
Without a leader the cattle in one body darted away from the opening of the cave towards the open plains. Rustlers in the middle of the cattle focused on the ship were caught off guard and thrown from their horses, only to be trampled by the stampede.
Luke grabbed the binoculars out of his backpack and scanned the horizon. The cattle were running now towards the perimeters fences at a stampede pace, and to his shock the majority of the rustlers weren't following the fleeing cattle, but rode in force for the ship. The rustlers rode with one hand on their reins and one with their rifle blaster while riding at a full gallop shooting at the ship.
Blaster fire hit the windows of the cabin cracking the viewing window to Luke’s left. Luke looked around the control room for the shields to cover the windows but couldn’t find the switch.
“Sorley!” Luke yelled at the top of his lungs. His cry was unanswered. “Where are you Sorley!” Luke looked and realized he was alone in the pilots seat with no one to help him.
Moments later ropes with hooks were thrown towards the deck of the ship finding railing to grab onto.
Luke jumped from the pilot seat and locked the doors of the bridge to the deck. When he sat down in the pilot's seat his eyes noticed the starboard side of the bow of the ship. Hands of a rustler reached over the railing as he worked to climb aboard. Luke could see the head of a bearded rustler peak over.
Luke yelled again, “Sorley!”
Blaster shots bounced off the sides of the ship as the sounds of ropes and hooks were now heard by Luke on both sides of the ship.
Luke glanced at the port side and four sets of hands reached over the railing to climb on board. Each rustler jumped aboard looking around prepared to fire at the crew of the ship. One of the four rustlers aimed to fire at the first rustler on the far side of the ship’s deck, realizing he was about to shoot one of his own.
Luke watched through the windows at the now five rustlers motioned for more men to come on board. His eyes caught the eyes of the first rustler who climbed on board. His bearded and scarred face and worn clothes made his appearance even more menacing to the young boy behind the glass.
The bearded rustlers gave hand signals and the other rustlers spread out to face the bridge section of the ship. It was then the rest of the rustlers saw him through the windows and pulled grenades out to prepare to storm the bridge.
The bearded rustler pointed his rifles at him and motioned with his mouth to the young boy behind the glass, "Y. O. U."
Chapter 11
“Sorley!” Luke cried again.
With no answer Luke looked around for something in the controls to help him. Looking around, he knew there were no weapons on board.
“What’s the use. It’s five to one, and too many more that aren’t on the ship yet.”
Luke looked back towards the ion cannons only to realize they were not charged and even if they were he didn’t know yet how to fire them, or fire them accurately.
Grabbing the radio transmitter on the panel he wanted to power up the radio and call for help. He looked out the window as the rustlers fired at the bridge and prepared to throw their first grenades when he noticed the radio mast still in the air. He hit the transmit button, “Father! Father!” There was no answer.
“Let’s see if I can fly us out here.”
Luke grabbed the throttle and gave it a nudge forward tilting the ship so much the bow bounced against the ground. The men on the deck lurched and fired more at the bridge as the ship slowly built momentum. One rustler fell off the bridge and the grenade he had primed blew up on the ground beside him killing him and wounding the surrounding rustlers.
Luke scanned the controls and found what he wanted. Shields for the windows. Flipping the switch the windows went from transparent to translucent and the blasts from the rifles now bounced off the windows. Feeling some better, Luke let out a sigh of relief knowing that at least the blasts wouldn’t come through the windows.
Luke pressed the over power button on the radio and pressed the transmit button. The squeal from the radio echoed in the canyon and into the cave as the men beat on the door with their blasters and cursed and shouted for him to come out.
“Either get yourself out of there or we’ll blow you out!” yelled a rustler. “Put some grenades on the door now!”
“Oh God help me now,” Luke said.
He checked the throttles and gave the ship power to climb and the ship rose with the sound of men beating on the door of the bridge.
The first placement of grenades exploded, and the door jerked on its hinges. Smoked poured under the bent door of the bridge into the pilot’s station. The door leading out to the deck had held. Luke realized it hadn't given way but wasn’t sure if it would hold again.
Luke grabbed the transmit button again. The squeal echoed again, but this time his thoughts were clear and he switched the transmit button for continuous transmission. The echoes of the power and squeals of the radio bounced around the canyon and down the cave as he cried out, "Father! Father!"
Outside the door Luke could hear the men moving and pounding on the door, but it held.
A rustler shouted, “Get more grenades and put them on the door! It won’t hold another blast.”
Luke leveled the ship out and ran towards the back of the ship away from the bridge. He stood inside the Captain’s quarters and watched the door and heard a rustler’s shout off in the distance. Without a thought he jumped inside the quarters and double locked the door sliding down against it to give it one last ounce of protection. It was then he heard the rustler’s screams approach with the sound of pain and death.
Chapter 12
Screams of men and shots of blasters echoed outside the cabin Luke hid in. He could hear the sounds of men on the deck as they ran and banged on the door of the bridge, ten meters from the door of the Captain's quarters.
Gathering his courage, Luke panted and ran to the portholes of the cabin and scanned for the rustlers below, but the ship was hovering too high. Moving from one porthole to another he jumped and back to the door to listen for the men's footsteps and ten,and tenhe knew would come soon.
BOOM!
The sound of grenades exploding on the deck could be heard, but the explosion was distant and not as close as he expected. He put his ear to the door and looked as best he could. Running to the command station in the Captain's office, he found the monitor systems and powered them up. Video feeds from across the ship fuzzed through the old monitors, with only half of them showing anything. The kitchen, crews quarters, and storage holds. He checked them twice and still saw none of the rustlers inside the ship. He knew they must be nearby as their yelling and screaming came through the hull.
"There!"
Luke flipped the switch and an image of the bridge came through. The door was closed and locked but there wasn't the image of smoke and damage he expected to see. No rustlers on the bridge. He checked the portholes again and stood as tall as he could but he couldn't see anything. He pulled a table to the edge of the wall of the portholes and stood on it in hopes to get a better angle and still nothing but the open planes of Bethel 5.
"Oh, God!" he cried out and ran to the view screens again. "Nothing! No one! But I can hear them on the deck. I hope they aren't in the ship." He turned the two locks on the door and jarred it open ju
st enough to look through the crack.
"Nothing!"
Luke left the Captain's quarters and ran to the pilot's seat and adjusted the throttles and began the ship's descent to hover and land. He looked through the windows but the shielding was still on and the translucent windows showed nothing but a milky white view and the occasional shadow. The shadows flashed past the screen and the familiar sound of hums were heard as the ship blew dust all around as the engines came close to the ground.
Luke bolted from the seat and ran to the aft of the ship and peered out the windows. Thousands of hornets were flooding out of the cave and swarmed around the ship. The swarm engulfed the ship and Luke now saw what brought the rustler's screams as hornets stung the rustlers now viewable with the ship on the ground.
The ship settled on the ground and jolted Luke. Dust flew all around as the engines still powered blew sand and debris around like a sand storm. Running back to the pilot's station, he quickly powered down the engines and flipped the switch to off for the window's shielding. In a flash, the windows went from translucent to clear, and except for a few cracks from blaster shots, Luke watched as hornet's tore the meat and limbs off the bearded rustler and the four men who had been with him on the deck.
With the engines off and the dust settling, the moans of the rustlers grew louder, only to be drowned out by the swarm of hornets that surrounded the ship, and especially the radio mast. Turning to the radio controls he released the transmit button and lowed the radio mast.
The sight of the hornet's eating and tearing the rustlers and their horses apart was horrific but a sight the young Shepherd couldn't take his eyes off of, and sight he was glad to see. He bounced from window to window, and from one side of the ship to another, even going down into the holds of the ship to see if he could get a glimpse again of the hornet's as they ate.
With the radio off the hornet's anger subsided and the heat of the day of plains of Bethel 5 worked on the hornet's. The swarm that had engulfed the men, the horses, and the ship taped off as the hornet's sought the safety and cool of the Vespian Cave. Not knowing what to do and unsure of the safety of going outside he returned to pilot's station and sat down.
Beads of sweat ran down his back and his shirt was wet from the sweat of fear.
"If the hornets ate the rustler's horses, I bet my horse is dead too."
Not knowing anything else to do, Luke powered the engines up again, and the ship hovered over the ground near the entrance of the cave.
"Let's get away from this cave. Maybe then I can call my father."
Chapter 13
Sand and smoke spewed from the rear of the ship as Luke applied full throttle to the ship’s engines. The quick jolt of power to the ship caused everything on the floor and on the tables to vibrate.
The altimeter clocked off the distance as the ship rose. Luke looked out the windows to see the last remaining hornets flying off still holding onto parts of the dead bodies of the rustlers. The horizon in the windows went from a scene of the far plains of Bethel 5 to to just the deep blue of Bethel 5's afternoon hot sky. Only off in the far distance could Luke see the ground now.
Buzzers echoed through the ships and the lights switched to red.
“What now?” Luke cried out.
Panic now set into Luke as he scanned the instruments panels for something to tell him what was wrong, but he didn’t know the complete workings of the ship.
“Attitude looks normal. Pitch and yaw looks good. Altitude is still climbing. Vertical speed is slowing. Power is…,” Luke’s voice trailed off.
The power indicator read nine percent. The needle on the gauge was moving as Luke watched it and in ten seconds it read eight percent.
The realization of the ship stalling and falling to the surface shook his thoughts. He grabbed the throttles and powered them back to what he figured would be a minimum setting. At the touch of the throttles the bow of the ship bobbed twice in the atmosphere and pitched down towards the surface.
The controls were responsive and Luke worried would he have enough power to decelerate the ship before hitting the ground. Only when he checked the instruments again did he realize his error. His original push on the throttles was for vertical thrust, and the only distance from the hornets and the Vespian Cave he had accomplished was straight up; descending he would be right where he started.
“How high did I go?” he asked himself, but his panic didn’t let him notice.
Luke pitched the ship forward. It glided away from the cave towards the plains. He checked the gauges again and noticed the stall speed indicator on the airspeed gauge.
“If I can keep you right above that I can glide you down.”
The ship picked up speed and now instead of fright or panic, Luke was in heaven. With the increased speed he could feel the ship respond to his gentle push on the controls and the ship banked easily to the left and right.
The ground grew closer with buttes and valleys becoming visible to him in the viewer. Several thousand of kilometers past the cattle was the best possible landing site Luke figured he could glide the ship to. Checking the power controls he could see that at minimum thrust the ship was building its power back in the batteries but the gauge still only read nine percent.
“One mess after another, my father will say. Sorley said I had a way of falling into unexpected things.”
Luke buckled his seat belt and prepared himself for the last moments of the ship gliding towards the surface. He watched the altimeter more than the ground outside to brace himself for when to throw the thrusters to brake the ship for landing.
Seven hundred meters.
He glanced outside and could see the ground coming closer.
Four hundred meters the altimeter read.
Luke nudged the throttles forward just the least bit to reassure himself the engines were still there.
One hundred meters.
Luke pushed the throttles and pulled back on the controls as the bow of the ship pulled up. The hull of the ship bounced several times with the hull of the ship digging into the soft ground of the valley, eventually. He checked the power indicator once more. Two percent.
He unbuckled his seat belt and grabbed his backpack and ran onto the deck of the ship. With his binoculars in hand he scanned the plains and could his father’s cattle two thousand kilometers back towards the cave well out of his reach but they were at least safe from the hornets, and safe from the rustlers.
Off in the distance he could see the faint dust clouds from riders as they came from the north. They were riding at a full gallop, and his mind went back towards the cattle. Luke magnified the image as best he could but couldn’t make out who was visiblecoming towards the cattle, but as he watched, he noticed the riders pulled their horses and were galloping straight for the ship.
Riding straight for him.
The power indicator had charged itself back to thirteen percent, but Luke knew that wasn’t enough power to run from the riders. Realizing he would have to face his father and his help was need more than his pride, or the fear of being rogue, he grabbed the radio transmitter and powered up the radio.
The radio buzzed and hummed to life and the crackle voice of his father broke through the static.
“Luke!” his father’s voice came through the speaker in a pant.
“Father. Is that you?” Luke asked.
“Are you hurt?” he asked through hurried breaths.
“No sir. I’m fine. I’m safe.” He said.
Can I tell him where I am?
Luke asked a question, “Where are you, father?”
“I and some men were riding to the cattle, when we saw a ship land.”
At the first the thought of his father riding to him on the ship a grin came across his face. After a second thought, the grin turned into panic and fear.
“Father. I am in the ship.”
“I know son,” his father answered.
Chapter 14
Luke heard the knocks on the d
oor of the hull and he opened the door to see his father behind the men. His father running towards him. The two wrapped their arms around each other as they hugged.
“Are you sure you are okay son?” his father asked with a tender heartfelt tone wrapping his hands around Luke's face.
“Are you mad father?” Luke asked.
“Why should I be mad?”
Luke started blurting out the beginning of his adventure of going into the Vespian Cave only to have a loud voice from behind the men interrupt him.
“Luke,” the man called out.
Luke pulled his eyes back and the outline of a man with the sun behind him hid the man’s face. He held up his hand to hide the sun.
“Sorley!” Luke cried out running to the old man.
“I have told you father all about your bravery and how you helped me in my time of need.”
“But I…” Luke stammered.
“There will be other times for us to talk of those things son,” Sorley said.
“Yes, there will be other times. I’m just glad you are safe son,” Jefferson Shepherd said to his son.
“Then you aren’t made at me, father? I shouldn’t have gone into the cave.” Luke said.
“No, you shouldn’t have, but…”
“Will I be a rogue?” Luke asked with his voice cracking and his eyes welling with tears.
The question caused Jefferson and Sorley to both chuckle. Jefferson leaned down and looked into the eyes of his son.
“Luke being a rogue is something not from a onetime event, but a habit of choices to be disobedient, and dishonoring to your family and El-Gibhor. Sorley has told me how you helped him rescue his ship. And how you saved our cattle from the rustlers,” his father said.
