by Henry Vogel
“It’s only one ship,” Rupor scoffed.
“You wouldn’t say that if you had any idea what a single spaceship like that is capable of doing,” Martin growled.
“If it’s a simple matter of education, then by all means do enlighten me,” Rupor replied.
“Put simply, if that ship is fully crewed and functional, then whoever commands it rules this world,” Martin said.
“You must be joking!” Rupor looked back and forth between Martin and me. “He can’t be serious?”
“Do I look as if I’m joking, Rupor?” Martin’s gaze bored into the prince. “If this is a pirate ship, our only hope for stopping them is for at least one person to insinuate himself into their good graces, bide his time, and wait for the opportunity to strike.”
“Oh ho! Now the plot comes clear!” Rupor cried. “You wish this super ship for yourself! Well, I-”
I clapped a hand over Rupor’s mouth and an arm around his throat. “I’m sorry for the rough treatment, Your Highness, but we don’t have time for this bickering. For what it’s worth, I believe Martin’s suggestion has merit. Martin, what should our first move be?”
“Assuming there are survivors — and from your description of the partially controlled descent, I’m sure some of the crew is still alive — I’m going to try to make contact with them.” Martin shrugged. “If they’re not pirates, great. We help with their wounded and take it from there. If they are pirates, I’ll try to trade on my old reputation as a raider to join them.”
“Um, Martin, those on the ship are not going to know anything about your past activities on Aashla.”
“I know that, David, but I do have that experience to draw on. I’m confident I can convince them of my bona fides.”
“What about Rupor and me?” I asked.
“If these are pirates, they must not learn you’re an off-worlder, too, David. A military hero who can also fly their ship will be too much of a threat. They’d kill you without a second thought.”
“So I pretend to be a local?” I asked.
Martin nodded. “That includes pretending like you don’t speak their language.” At my nod, Martin turned to Rupor. “Prince, you must follow our plan or these men may kill us all!”
Rupor stared at Martin for a moment, then nodded. Relieved, I released Rupor.
“You two stay hidden,” Martin said, then picked his way to the ship’s airlock. He fiddled with the airlock controls. A minute later, the airlock door slid open and Martin stepped inside.
Immediately after entering the airlock, Martin dove back out and rolled to the left. A bright beam of red light lanced behind him, tracking too slowly to hit him before he was out of the line of fire. The beam cut deep, smoking lines into the broken trees piled up beside the spaceship. It sliced completely through smaller tree trunks, those only a few inches thick.
“By all that is holy, what was that?” Rupor stared, wide-eyed, at the damage left by the beam.
“It’s called a laser.” Since no language on Aashla had a word for ‘laser,’ I used the galactic basic word. “For simplicity, let’s just say it’s a highly focused beam of light.”
“Light? Is that all?” Rupor asked. “Why didn’t Bane just wear metal armor? Surely that would stop the light! Or he could have carried a mirror to reflect it.”
“The laser would burn through metal armor in a heartbeat. It would do the same to a mirror. I realize this is all new and strange to you, but you have to believe me.” I met the stare Rupor turned on me. “It gets worse, Your Highness. That is just a small laser, one a man could carry. The spaceship is armed with half a dozen much larger ones.” I searched for a way to help him understand. “Think of the laser we just saw as a single-handed target crossbow. In comparison, the ship’s lasers are ballistas.”
“And Bane thinks these people may be pirates?” Rupor turned back toward the ship and stared with apprehension. “God protect us! No nation could stand against such power.”
I placed a hand on Rupor’s shoulder. “That is why you must follow our instructions in this matter. If these are pirates, our best — perhaps our only — hope is to infiltrate the pirate gang and bring them down from within. That means you’re going to have to put aside your opinion of Martin and trust him to find a way to do just that.”
Rupor wrinkled his nose as if smelling something foul. “And what of you, Rice? Are you certain they are pirates?”
“Certain? No. But I trust Martin and will follow his lead until we can learn more about our visitors,” I said. “That means you must keep quiet about my background. If the pirates discover I am a crash-landed scout, they’ll kill me out of hand.”
“Why would pirates worry about a single scout? I’ve heard you’re a formidable fighter, but it’s obvious you can’t defeat these pirates single-handedly.”
“You’re right, I can’t. But the very nature of scouting brings us in contact with pirates far more often than any of the other military branches. We’re trained to deal with them and, at the risk of bragging, succeed more often than we fail.” I smiled grimly. “As you might guess, Your Highness, pirates tend to dislike us scouts.”
Rupor nodded. “I’ll do my best, Rice. And you might as well call me Rupor out here. It’s quicker and quick communication may save lives.”
Back at the airlock, Martin got to his feet and dusted himself off. The hiss of an opening airlock door came from the ship. Footsteps clanged in the airlock and a huge figure appeared at the outer door. Our situation had just gotten far worse. The figure wore military-grade powered armor!
CHAPTER EIGHT
Ignoring Martin standing next to him, the armored figure scanned the area. I pulled Rupor down behind a mound of dirt and broken trees. If we were lucky, the heat from the crash would mask us from infrared scanning. The armor whined faintly — the armored head swiveling to complete an infrared sweep, I assumed. I put a finger to my lips and motioned for Rupor to stay down. Eyes wide and his face deathly pale, Rupor nodded.
“Hey, you in the powered armor!” Martin spoke galactic basic. “Take me to your leader.”
The man in the armor took two clumping footsteps.
“Put me down!” Martin shouted. “I can walk on my own, you know. All you have to do is give me a chance!”
Footsteps clanged from the air lock.
“This is no way to treat a guest, you know!” Martin continued complaining until the airlock hissed closed and cut off his voice.
I risked a peek over our hiding place. As I’d expected, there was no sign of the armored figure or of Martin.
Ducking down again, I whispered, “Martin has been taken inside. I guess that counts as a successful start to Martin’s plan.”
“What was that thing?” The color still had not returned to Rupor’s face.
“It was a man wearing...you don’t really have a word for it.” I tried to think of something within Rupor’s experience. “The closest I can get is armor with an engine.”
“An engine?” Color slowly seeped back into Rupor’s face. “I know quite a bit about engineering and that armor gave off no smoke and had no place for a boiler!”
“The engine is based on science and engineering you don’t have on Aashla.” I started crawling away from the spaceship. “I’ll try to explain in more detail, but not until we’re far away from this spaceship.”
Staying low and keeping dirt mounds between us and the ship, Rupor and I scrambled through the debris from the crash. Ten minutes later, we broke free of the trees and picked up our pace, waving at the ships floating above us. Within seconds, the Pauline dropped down to meet us.
Milo was the first person to realize Martin wasn’t with us. By the time we reached the Pauline, he had alerted everyone else on board. Megan was among those waiting on the deck. Callan must have ordered her released.
Impatient Megan spoke first. “Where’s Martin? What have you done with him?”
“We haven’t done anything with him,” I said.
/> “He was captured,” Rupor added.
I gave a quick account of the events. Megan’s hand flew to her mouth when I described the powered armor and everyone else looked grim.
“I could say things have gone exactly according to Martin’s plan,” I said, “but not even someone as optimistic as I am can convince myself that’s true.”
“What are we going to do now?” Callan asked. “We can’t just abandon Martin inside that spaceship.”
“No, of course not, Callan. Fortunately, I know exactly what we’re going do to.”
Megan stared intently at me, then asked, “And what is that?”
“First, all of you are going to fly several miles away and wait for my signal,” I said. “That includes you, Rupor.”
“I can’t say as I approve of this plan, Rice. A Prince of Tarteg doesn’t run away from a fight.”
“This is a tactical withdrawal, nothing more. Until we know more about that ship, there’s no point putting you at risk.” Rupor opened his mouth — to protest, I assume — so I added, “You don’t send generals to scout enemy positions, do you Rupor?”
“Of course not.”
“Then we’re sure as hell not sending a crown prince to do the same job!”
Rupor sighed and nodded.
“And what are you planning on doing, David?” Callan asked.
I gave her my most confident smile. “I’m going back for Martin, of course!”
CHAPTER NINE
Callan looked into my eyes for a few seconds. At last she said, “Don’t get yourself killed, David.”
“Have I ever?”
“Well don’t start now.” Then she wrapped her arms around me and kissed me long and hard. When she released me, she wore her princess mask once again. “That signal you promised — I suppose we’ll know it when we see it?”
“You know me well, dear!” I unbuckled my sword and handed it to Callan. “I doubt whoever is on that ship, whether they’re pirates or not, will allow me to go armed on board. Keep this safe for me. Rob will come back to haunt me if I lose his sword!”
As Callan took the sword, Megan began humming a haunting melody. Eyes closed and head tilted back, she swayed slightly and her hands moved as if plucking guitar strings. Perhaps realizing silence had fallen around her, Megan opened her eyes.
“Sorry.” Megan’s face reddened.
“I’ve never heard that music before. What is it?” Callan asked.
“A theme for the ballad I’m composing about all of this. It’s the lovers parting.” Growing more self-conscious as we watched, Megan crossed her arms and her eyes flashed defiance. “Well, that is why you brought me!”
“It’s beautiful,” Callan said, disarming Megan’s defensiveness with two words. “I don’t know how you did it, but you captured my exact feelings in that theme. I can’t wait to hear the theme you compose for the lovers’ reunion.” Callan turned her gaze back to me. “Now you have two women awaiting your return, darling. That is something men dream about, isn’t it?”
“Only in their nightmares,” Rupor muttered.
“I shall strive mightily to avoid disappointing either my lover or the lyricist!” I proclaimed. I gave one last look at Callan then turned to leave.
“How will you get into that metal monstrosity?” Rupor asked, sucking all the romance out of the moment.
I shrugged. “I’ll knock on the door.”
Fifteen minutes later, I did just that. I knew the knock couldn’t be heard inside the ship, but the local I pretended to be would not. After a few seconds, I knocked again and called, “Hello? Is anyone there?”
I was on my third round of knocking and calling when the airlock slid open, revealing the same armored figure. I let my mouth go slack as a massive metal hand dragged me into the spaceship.
“Hey, let me go!” I cried in Mordanian. “I don’t want to be dragged like an animal.”
The armored man kept his grip, pulling me into the spaceship. I flailed about, acting frightened and out of my element. Under the cover of my flailing, I examined the ship and the members of the crew we passed.
The ship’s interior was impeccably maintained. The captain and crew took very good care of their ship. In the history vids we’d watched in high school, pirates were always depicted as slovenly and their ships in such a state of disrepair it was a wonder they didn’t simply fall apart in space. Even taking into account the Federation bias behind the vids, if Martin’s suspicions were correct and this was a pirate ship, it certainly was an atypical one.
None of the crewman I saw, including the man in the powered armor, did anything to dispel that notion. An unskilled or careless crewman wearing powered armor would crush my arm to pulp in his untrained grip. The armored man held my arm firmly, but did so without hurting me. That care didn’t strike me as very piratical and I dared to hope that Martin’s assessment was wrong.
The crewman dragged me to the bridge where I found Martin deep in conversation with another man. He was the captain. There was no doubt about that. The man stood almost as tall as Martin and me and had the look of a commander of men — confident, laser focused, missing little going on around him, and quite intimidating to those unused to dealing with such men. If it came to a fight, this captain would be a formidable enemy.
The captain turned my way and didn’t see Martin scratch his head right over his implant. Then he extended his arms as if stretching. The hand he’d scratched with ended up pointing at the ship’s computer. I nodded to Martin, as if in greeting, showing I understood. The captain obviously made Martin download his translation of local languages into the ship’s computer. Somewhere, a crewman listened to a translation of our conversation. We had no secrets while on board the ship.
“Welcome aboard, young man,” the captain said in galactic basic.
I shrugged, looked at Martin, and spoke Mordanian. “Captain Bane, what did he say?”
“This is Amaral Caudill, captain of this spaceship. He welcomes you aboard,” Martin translated.
At the sound of the man’s name, my blood ran cold. Mere feet from me stood one of the most vicious pirates ever to plague the Terran Federation!
CHAPTER TEN
Martin crashed on Aashla seventeen years ago. I couldn’t remember when Caudill first appeared in news reports, but it was about the same time. Even if Martin had heard the name, he couldn’t know of the death and destruction the pirate left in his wake. Caudill measured his legacy in thousands of butchered crew and passengers, vast fortunes in plundered riches, and a name that struck fear into the hearts of spacemen throughout Federation space and the frontier.
Struggling to block the horror Caudill’s name conjured, I turned what I hoped was a pleasant smile on Caudill. “Captain Bane, would you tell Captain Caudill that I’m pleased to meet him and am most impressed by his ship of space.”
As Martin relayed my greeting, I looked around the bridge. I kept my eyes wide and darting all around, as if I couldn’t decide which instrument panel was the most wonderful. As my eyes flicked around the bridge, I had my implant record everything. The picture formed from the images indicated a bridge crew who all looked the worse for wear after their crash. Even Caudill favored his right arm and propped his right leg on a stool.
At a break in the conversation, I said, “The crew and the captain look banged up, Captain Bane. Should we summon our doctor?”
The ship would certainly have a nano-tech med bay, but if I were in Caudill’s position I’d save it for true emergencies. With no way of knowing how long he’d be stuck here, I had no doubt Caudill would ration high tech medicine with extreme care — probably saving most of it for himself.
“In my experience, medical care on primitive lost colonies such as this one is dicey at best. Is your doctor as likely to kill my men as heal them?” Caudill asked after Martin completed translating my question.
Martin held out one of his hands, pointing to the scars left from a tammar slash to the hand. “Our doctor saved m
y hand after a tammar — that’s a damned big native predator — cut it to the bone in three places. The hand is a bit stiff, now, but otherwise as good as new. Tristan is good by most any standard — including what you’ll find on rim and frontier worlds — and is superb for a primitive planet like this one.”
Caudill peered at Martin’s hand with interest then turned to one of the crew. “Have you got a final casualty count?”
“Yes, Captain. We have one hundred and twenty-six dead and thirty-six injured.”
“Good God, you lost one hundred and twenty-six men in this crash?” Shock showed on Martin’s face. I was shocked, too, but didn’t dare show it since I wasn’t supposed to understand gal base.
“One of the inertial dampeners failed during our exit from the wormhole. Everyone in the aft half of the ship disintegrated. At least it was a quick death.” Caudill shook his head slowly. “The dampener shouldn’t have failed like that. We keep them in good repair. And, yeah, send your man to get your doctor.”
Martin, wincing at the thought of malfunctioning inertial dampeners, turned to me and switched languages. “That’s an excellent suggestion, David. Please do go and fetch the doctor.”
I nodded in acknowledgement, my mind already spinning through plans. Could Tristan find a way to drug or otherwise incapacitate most of Caudill’s remaining crew? If we couldn’t find some way to eliminate the pirate threat, everyone on the planet was in serious trouble!
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“Considering the number of wounded, your doctor may need to bring a lot of supplies.” Caudill spoke to the armored figure. “Orrons, go with the lad. Help carry the supplies if necessary and make sure nothing...unfortunate...happens to Captain Bane’s assistant.”
“That’s very...generous...of you, Captain Caudill,” Martin said.
“It’s nothing more than the courtesy due a fellow professional,” Caudill replied.
Of course, both of them spoke in galactic basic, so I just kept walking. I did stop at the first clumping footfall from Orrons, though. Casting an inquiring glance back at Martin, I asked, “Am I to have company on the trip to get the doctor?”
