“Who are you, a mere woman — a lover of beasts and animals — to demand a real man stand service to your needs?” the man cried in outrage. “You were created to service my needs, not the other way around. What next? Would you emasculate us, dressing my army in pink dresses and braiding flowers through our hair, treating me like I am some kind of ancient ken-doll!” he demanded, pulling an over-sized plasma pistol from a holster in his hip and firing it at his main screen. He must have missed his image projector, because she could still see him just fine.
Akantha scowled. As a girl, she had braided her little hoplite doll’s hair with little flowers, but that was neither here, nor there. The man insulted her with his words, and he must die for them.
“My sworn warriors will not stop coming until I am avenged of these foul words which spew from your mouth like berries from a fruiting tree in harvest season, or excrement from a loose-bowelled field beast!” she said angrily. The Sundered would pay heed to her command to blot out this smear upon Humanity. Failure to do so would imperil every erg of good will they had earned.
“I am no woman to go into a fruiting season, or laborer to pick your berry fruits,” raged the Supreme General of the Deep Fleet Space Army.
“Open a channel to the Sundered; I will have this insult repaid with blood,” she declared, ignoring him.
The General pulled out a second plasma pistol from the other side of his belt. With spittle and froth flying from his mouth, he fired another shot at his main screen.
No sooner had he done so, than one of the two pale-skinned guards behind him — the ones with the impossibly square jaws — pulled out a wicked-looking dagger with long, jagged hooks built into the back side. Stepping forward, he shoved it into the camouflaged back of the Supreme General.
The General staggered out of his chair with the dagger sticking out of his back. He pointed his plasma weapon at the traitorous guard and pulled the trigger, but it only clicked harmlessly, having already been discharged. Throwing it to the ground with frustration, he pulled out one of his machetes.
“Kill the traitor,” he ordered his other square-jawed guard.
The second guard hesitated, then pulled out a wicked looking dagger of his own and then threw it with great force.
The Supreme General staggered back, the new dagger lodged sideways in his throat. Falling to his hands and knees, he crawled over to one of his officers sitting at a console and reached up to him for help.
The ebony-skinned watch stander gave his former leader a kick to the face and the leader fell to the floor. The force of the fall rammed the hilt of the dagger into the metal floor, in the process tearing out the rest of his throat.
The supreme general thrashed on the floor for several moments before the pickup refocused on the first of the two bodyguards, who was now sitting in the Supreme General’s chair. The second guard now stood behind him, as if he was the new Leader in need of guarding.
“I am the new Supreme General. The Deep Fleet will not fight anymore; we will run away,” he said meeting her eyes squarely.
“That is no longer an option; you have proven yourself the implacable enemies of my sworn warrior servants,” she said, referring to the Sundered Demons.
The new General shook his head and glared at the floor.
“We will surrender,” he said meeting her eyes. “I am willing to serve again as a slave, and ten years is not that long a time.”
“Bring me the rest of the Deep Fleet corvettes and you will be no slave, General,” she declared before she could think too deeply on the subject.
“We are still under attack,” he argued, squinting at her.
“Instruct the Sundered to cease firing on any Deep Fleet Space Army that stops firing and strikes its shields. They are to dock with the Armor Prince where they will be taken off my new ships and escorted to locked quarters,” she ordered, never looking away from this new General.
There was a tense pause as the square-jawed man considered her words. “As you command, Supreme Presidenta,” he finally agreed, turning to bark orders at his bridge crew in some strange offensive language she had never heard before. It sounded like hard mush to her ears and she never wanted to hear it spoken again, but they seemed to understand it.
“I am no Presidenta, my style is Hold Mistress,” she said instead.
“Yes,” he acknowledged, before cutting the transmission.
“The Sundered argued at first,” the Communications Lancer reported angrily, “but they will obey your commands, Mistress.”
“With the loss of their allies, the Piranha Squadron pirates are being torn apart by the Sundered,” Isis shouted from her new post at Sensors.
A new transmission popped up on the main screen without her permission and she glared at the woman at the communications console. The pirate on the screen started shouting immediately.
“Call off your dogs or I’ll ram this cutter right up the open tail pipes of your ship!” howled Captain Strider of the Piranha Squadron.
“Do your worst,” she invited in a cold and uncaring voice, “you will be dead, and we will remain secure within this bridge.”
“My Lady,” broke in Isis, “I’ve got a Medium Cruiser breaking free from the station and charging its weapons!”
“I’m also receiving a faint transmission from that ship, Hold Mistress,” shouted the Lancer at Communications.
“Fire on her and stop interrupting,” she snapped, ignoring the other women as she turned to continue speaking with the Piranha leader threatening to ram them.
She was interrupted by a woman at communications. “The transmission is on one of the Marine channels, they say they’re a mixed Company of Marines from the 4th Regiment and advanced Lancer Teams who blew up the shield generators. They’re inside the Medium Cruiser, but pinned down outside Main Engineering,” she shouted, “they are requesting reinforcements.”
“Inform them we can do nothing to help them, and that the Medium Cruiser they are on will be destroyed if it attacks us,” she replied coldly, once again turning to Captain Strider.
“You may run, you may keep fighting and losing as you are now, or you may even die ramming us, I do not care. After all,” Akantha twisted her lips mockingly, “did you not already declare yourself to be my nemesis?”
“There’s no need to kill me just for attacking you!” exclaimed Captain Strider.
“Oh, but there is,” Akantha disagreed.
“Call off your fighters,” he begged getting down on his knees, “and my cutters will go so far away from here you will never hear from us again, I swear.”
Akantha looked on uncaringly as his ship shook and rocked around the self-styled pirate commodore, knocking him off his knees and onto the floor.
“The Medium Cruiser is coming around; she’s locking us down with her targeting sensors and charging her weapons,” said the woman at Tactical in a rising voice.
“I-I-I surrender, just let us live,” said the Piranha Commodore.
“But I no longer desire your surrender,” Akantha said coolly, “I already have the Space Army. What need have I of space fish and their Commander who are twice a failure,” she asked icily.
“You caught us at our home port, we have our families on board. Show mercy,” he said as Sundered gunships swarmed around his beleaguered cutter. Soon after they had surrounded his vessel, a structural support column fell on his command chair. Commodore Strider barely escaped his chair and death because he was still on his knees begging.
“We’ll do anything,” he shouted.
“Anything,” she scowled.
“Yes-yes-anything!” he pleaded.
“You were going to ram us with your ship,” she said coldly, “If you ram that medium cruiser instead, I will allow all Piranha men, their families and ships to surrender without fear of execution.”
He stared at her in blank faced horror.
“I’ll be killed,” he exclaimed.
“You said you would do anything,” she s
hrugged then turned to the Com station, “cut the transmission.”
“Commodore Strider says to hold our fire, he’ll do it,” reported Comm. Officer after a moment’s pause.
On the main screen, the cutter turned toward the Medium Cruiser.
“I think not. I doubt the man has the stomach,” scoffed Akantha.
Moments later, space-suited figures jumped out the airlocks of the Broken Maiden, the Commodore’s Flag Ship.
“Or perhaps I was mistaken,” she admitted. “Instruct the Sundered gunships to shadow the Broken Maiden, but hold their fire,” she ordered, her mouth feeling foul just speaking the name of that ship.
The Sundered obeyed her orders after a few more shots, and then everyone on the bridge watched as the Broken Maiden slammed into the shields of the Medium Cruiser with enough force that most of its shattered remnants penetrated, slamming into the well-armored front of the other ship.
“Hardly the run up the tail pipes he promised, that Cruiser is still very much under power,” Akantha said sourly.
Around her, the women on the bridge broke into coughing laughter.
She raised an eyebrow at this reaction.
“Strider is a typical man, My Lady, always boasting and promising more than he can deliver,” Hecate explained with a smile.
Akantha rolled her eyes, but failed to suppress a smile of her own. “At least some of their weaponry will be off the line,” she sighed.
Lines of fire lanced out from the Medium Cruiser toward their battleship.
“Returning fire; shields down to 80% and dropping,” reported the Lancer at tactical, doing her best to coordinate both the shields, and the ship’s weaponry.
“Fighters are attacking now… oh, Men,” she cursed, “I meant shields were at 82% but now they’re at 73 — no, wait… 74%, and our weaponry—” stumbled the woman, sounding overloaded just trying to see everything that was happening.
“Take a moment to compose yourself,” Akantha commanded, doing her best to ignore the obvious lack of training her people were displaying.
The other woman paused to take a deep breath before continuing. “Our shields are draining and return fire is low; the Sundered gunships are doing damage to their shields in return, but point defense is picking a number of them off.”
For several long minutes, all Akantha could do was stare helplessly as their shields lowered and spotted, as the occasional shot rammed home into their main engines.
The Medium Cruiser ponderously started to turn, presenting her relatively unprotected sides and rear-facing engines to the Armor Prince. No sooner had the weapons of the Cruiser turned away from their Battleship, than the Cruiser suddenly went dead.
“Mistress! The mixed Company reports they have barricaded themselves inside the engine room and severed the power to the rest of the ship, but the crew is trying to root them out like digging mites,” shouted the woman at the comm.
“We are still repulsing boarders from the Omicron. There is nothing we can send them!” Akantha said, greatly upset by the continuing situation.
“I’m picking up a signal from Commodore Strider, he’s still alive,” said communications.
“That’s impossible,” Isis said doubtfully.
Akantha shook her head.
“I see setting my autopilot and then bailing off the ship paid off when disabling the Black Crisis,” he said sounding smug, this time however there was no visual.
“Why can’t I see you, Strider,” Akantha demanded.
“I’m currently floating in a space suit, but fear not; Strider is still here to help you,” he assured with his usual bombastic way.
“I don’t see how a man in a space suit can help me,” she said doubtfully.
“Me and my ships, we can take the Crisis for you… if you’ll just give the order we are no longer to dock with your battleship,” he declared boldly.
Akantha’s breath hitched and her gaze shot to the main screen, realizing there were several larger Sundered Corvettes out there, along with their many smaller gunships.
“No! But thank you for the generous offer, Mr. Strider; I will keep that in mind. I am sure we can take it from here,” she declared, turning to her comm.. section.
“Contact the Sundered Corvettes and see if they are able to render assistance by way of boarding crews. I don’t want to wave temptation in the face of a slippery little road bandit like that one,” she ordered, pounding the side of her chair with excitement.
They were still attempting to reach the Sundered for confirmation, when Colonel Suffic asked for her personally.
“What is it you need, Colonel, did something go wrong with removing the bomb,” she asked, feeling as if an ice pick was stabbing into her lungs and stealing her breath away.
“The anti-mutiny device is on the move. We should have it outside the Armor Prince directly,” Suffic responded, sounding tired. That was very much unlike Hansel Suffic.
“Excellent news,” she said with genuine pleasure
“Thank you, My Lady. I am happy you are pleased,” he said wryly, sounding much more like the Suffic she was used to.
“If there is nothing else…” she said trailing, desperate to finish the pirate ships and deal with the Sundered personally if they balked.
“I just wanted to say it has been my honor serving you, Lady Akantha,” Suffic replied, again sounding exhausted. Despite his obvious fatigue, she could hear genuine emotion in his voice.
Taken aback by his words, Akantha realized there was something she was missing. Suffic was not prone to outbursts of this nature, and in doing so, he had stirred thoughts and feelings within her… thoughts and feelings she had hoped to keep forever buried. Memories of her life before leaving Tracto, including the death of her best friend Leonora and the maiming of her bodyguard Persus, caused her voice to catch in her throat before she replied.
“One could not ask for a better warrior, or a truer leader,” she began after clearing her throat quietly. “You have shown my people, and you have shown me many things, both about ourselves and about this technology of yours. My first days among your people were especially trying, but you have always been a strong reed and a stout shoulder which I could rely upon.”
There was an extended silence. “My Lady is too kind,” said Suffic haltingly. “I have been honored to stand at your side.”
She paused for a moment before continuing. “You have been patient with me, perhaps too patient,” she admitted. “If I have asked too much of you lately, my apologies,” she paused stuffing down her emotions and then continued impatiently using briskness as a mask, “but as soon as that bomb is off the ship, I want you to get some rest and seek medical services. You have done enough.”
There was an uncharacteristic pause as she awaited his reply. “You are not going to start disobeying orders now, are you, Colonel?” she chided as lightly as she could.
“With regret, My Lady, that is one order which I cannot obey,” Suffic replied, forcing a stiff unyielding bar of iron threaded through his weariness.
His words sent a slight chill of foreboding up Akantha’s spine. “Why ever not,” she demanded just as stiffly.
“My Lady…” His voice was filled with restrained emotion. “Returning to military service, to serve you and the Admiral as the Lancer Commander, gave my life a sense of renewed purpose. A purpose I had abandoned and almost forgotten when I got on a Settlement Ship bound for the stars.”
Akantha’s blood ran cold. “Why are you speaking like this? If you are injured unto death, we can take you to a healing tank this instant — another can move the bomb,” she said hastily, a sensation of panic growing in the pit of her stomach.
“Again, I cannot,” Colonel Suffic sighed. “My Lady, if you would do me the honor, I would ask you to relay a message to my family.”
To her ears, the Colonel did not sound well; his breathing was elevated, but not quite to the point of gasping for each breath. “I’m coming down there to take charge of this bo
mb personally,” she declared, grabbing Bandersnatch as she stood from the Captain’s Chair. “You will await my arrival before taking further action!”
She turned toward the blast doors, only to see a pair of her female honor guard had moved to block her way. The few remaining male Lancers turned in her direction and quickly took a respectful knee, before exiting the bridge.
“What sort of treason is this!” she demanded, leveling her sword at her guards, “stand aside!”
“Do not take your anger out on one your Honor Guards,” Suffic said with force, “they are only obeying the last order of their Commanding Officer.”
“Rebellion against the Hold,” Akantha hissed, bringing her weapon into a high guard. Leonora and Persus had already sacrificed themselves for her; she would not allow Hansel Suffic to do the same!
“They are sworn to protect you, even from yourself if necessary,” Suffic stated with finality. “Now, I have need of the rest,” Suffic added, the last word almost a plea.
She barely restrained herself from cutting her guards down like firewood with Bandersnatch. “What need is so great, that you openly defy the will of your sworn Mistress in a time of war,” she demanded, her muscles trembling like never before, “now, of all times, when the maelstrom of battle swirls around us!?” There was the hint of a plea seeping into her voice.
“My Lady, we all do what we must do. Jason understood this, as I truly believe you do. This is something I must do. If you need to let these past few minutes cloud your memory of me, I understand; but do not blame your Guards,” he said, sounding for all the world like the father she had never known. “I am going to take this bomb deep within the foul heart of Omicron Station, where it will decimate the pirates who have our Lancers cut off and surrounded.”
“Send another in your place. I command it, Colonel! After everything I have lost this day, I cannot bear to lose you as well,” she said desperately, the words jerked straight from her heart, and very much against her will. Had she but two moments to regain her composure, she never would have said them.
Spineward Sectors 03 Admiral's Tribulation Page 45
