Meteor Mags: Omnibus Edition

by Matthew Howard

  “As long as they think that will happen, then.” Cragg leered, clenching and unclenching his talons. “The simpletons. So easy to manipulate. What do they think will happen once we have unimpeded access to Mars and the Belt?”

  Dekarna enjoyed a rare chuckle. “Money, most likely. More money and power for those who already have money and power. Such is the concern of these primates.”

  “Fools.” He pulled another lifeless mammal from his bowl, gesturing for her to do the same. His teeth leisurely tore chunks of dead meat from its face and neck. “And what of our collection missions from Earth?”

  “They continue without any interference from Earth’s military forces. The clearance codes from our political contacts remain intact. We expect to have viable breeding populations established in a matter of months.” Dekarna shook her head in disgust. “Tell me, Commander. What sort of lifeform willingly sells its own kind into slavery and death? It seems almost beneath us to make these arrangements with them.”

  “Ah, Major.” He reared back and laughed with a sound like children dying in a fire. The noise chilled even Dekarna’s calloused soul. “The kind we made, damn it!” Cragg slapped his meal on the table. He walked over to the window slits. Moonlight fell upon his face and wished to die there. “Listen to me, Major, and I will tell you a piece of history they omitted from your training at the academy.”

  She had accepted the offer of food, as was the dragons’ custom. But now she set the quadruped’s remains on the table to fix her attention on her commander.

  “Many millions of years ago,” he began, “our tribe was the only one to escape the great dying on Earth. This much is known to any cadet. We boarded our ships and escaped the meteoric death which forever brought an end to the reign of reptiles on that green, delicious planet.

  “And so we took to the stars, and we found a new home. But no system in the nearby universe could match the abundance of food and perfect weather of our birth planet. In time, though its atmosphere cooled, it also cleansed itself of poisons, and the climate began to stabilize.

  “We watched as the mammals evolved, coming out of the trees, walking upright, discovering tools. Eventually, they dared what we had dared: to free themselves from the bonds of gravity and explore the surrounding planets. This happened before we would have liked, for it came at the same time their planet’s ice age began to recede and the climate once again began to warm to something better suited for our species.”

  This much, Dekarna knew from textbooks.

  “But what they decline to teach in the academy is this. Many centuries ago, the council sent an advance team to steer the course of human evolution in a direction more suited to our return. That team determined a simple extermination of the primates would gain us nothing. It would be far better to train them, to make them accomplices in their own enslavement at our hands. This plan, you see, would guarantee us an endless supply of food, not only upon our arrival in this system, but in our eventual reclamation of our birth planet.”

  Cragg turned away from the window to face his second-in-command. “I was on that team, Major. And it took only the slightest manipulation to turn the primates into their own worst enemies. Through our agencies, we taught them slavery on a massive scale. It may seem inconceivable to you now, but they crossed entire oceans in primitive, wooden ships for the express purpose of making their own kindred into chattel. Their willingness to disregard their own species would have been disgusting had it not served our plan so undeniably well. But then, Dekarna, my team confronted an unexpected complication.

  “We encountered a pirate, a truly despicable villain of the sea. And, as her kind was known for the capture and sale of human lives as well as trade goods, we thought nothing of enlisting her services to carry human cargo. This one, however, steadfastly refused to do business with the agencies we had established through the humans.

  “My team located her in her island fortress with the intent to slay her and remove her as an obstacle. The force I sent to deal with her nearly succeeded. In the night, as she and her mate lay together, they took his life. But I am ashamed to admit, she outwitted my force, and the soldiers dispatched to end her life instead met with death themselves.

  “That was not satisfaction enough for this pirate. Not even close. In her lust for vengeance, she pursued the rest of us. Even with a cub gestating in her belly, she dared to fight us all. And she destroyed my entire team. All of them, save me. Sorely wounded, I retired from that planet. But I vowed to return. And I tell you this, Major. I will not rest until she is in her grave.”

  Dekarna could feel the blood pulsing in her temples. Her pupils had grown wide as the commander relayed this tale to her. She sat in shock, a mere statue of herself. Then she found her voice. “Do you mean to tell me, sir, that this pirate is still alive?”

  “No, my loyal Major. But her blood lives on. The descendant of her cub is none other than the smuggler, Meteor Mags. This is why we will destroy her, without mercy.”

  Then Cragg laid out his plan for the attack on Vesta 4.

  ★ ○•♥•○ ★

  “Okay, I plotted their trajectories,” said Meteor Mags. “Now we pull way out of radar range and wait.” Her fingers moved over the console as she programmed a new flight path.

  “Why don’t we just intercept them and blast them out of the sky right now?”

  “And kill whoever is on there singing? I don’t think so. We’ll swoop down on their rendezvous, come out shooting, and force them to board the main ship. We can take them in the landing bay.”

  “You want to board the bigger ship? Are you nuts?”

  “It’s been said before. You handle the flying, and I’ll handle the cannons. We’ll drive them right into the belly of the beast.”

  Tarzi touched his fingertips to his temple, shaking his head. “You’re bloody serious. At least tell me how we ‘swoop down’ on a ship when we aren’t even in radar range.”

  “We still don’t know what kind of propulsion system the lizards use, but how do you think we get around the System so fast?” Mags picked up a pack of cigarettes and offered one to him. “You see, within any inertial frame of reference, it’s impossible to tell if the acceleration is caused by motion or by gravitational force, got it?”

  He took the cigarette. “If we have one more science lesson today, my head is gonna explode.”

  “Let’s just stick with the short answer then, dear. It’s a side-effect of the GravGens. By pumping out our own gravity, we trick the fabric of space-time into letting us go faster than we could ever go by just burning fuel. I wouldn’t call the speed ‘relativistic’, but it’s a damn sight faster than any jet plane.”

  “So instead of taking years to get from planet to planet, we can zip around on weekends.”

  “Precisely. Here, trade seats with me.”

  Tarzi took her place at the console. “Okay. Top ten drum fills of all time.”

  “Easy. The end of Slayer’s Gemini.”

  “Bringing out the big guns first. I’ll go with John Bonham in Good Times, Bad Times.”

  “Yeah, but which fill?”

  “All of them!”

  “Agreed. And those tasty bass fills by John Paul Jones. That whole song is genius.”

  “Top that!”

  “Hmmm… The end of Burning from Inside from Revolution Mother’s 2023 concert at the first moon base.”

  “Best reunion show of all time!” Tarzi held up his palm.

  Mags slapped it with a hearty high-five. “I was there, you know.”

  “What?”

  “Yeah, me and Celina danced at that one. Low-grav pole dancing, you gotta love it. And you wouldn’t believe the after-party.”

  “How come you never told me?”

  Patches made a raspy mew at Mags’ feet.

  “Awww, kitty. What’s wrong? Come on up.” Mags patted her lap, but Patches whined. Mags scooped her up and pet her. They rubbed their cheeks alongside each other. “I know, baby. I know.”


  “What’s wrong with Patches? Did we leave out her favorite drum fill?”

  “She does love that one at the end of Window Paine by Smashing Pumpkins. But that’s not it.” She sighed. “I know it sounds weird, but I can sense Patches in a different way right now. I can, like, feel her thinking. Not read her mind or anything. But ever since that octopus set us down, I can tell she’s been having some heavy thoughts. Tarzi, did you ever think about what it means for her to be indestructible?”

  “Not really. I mean, it’s pretty awesome, isn’t it? She can’t get hurt. She doesn’t have to worry about getting shot or blown up or blasted into space. Hell, for all I know, she can’t even die. It’s like a dream come true.”

  Mags rubbed Patches’ ears. “Yeah, but think about that for a minute. I’ve lived a long-ass time, and I can tell you outliving all your friends and family is no special treat. It’s kind of depressing, actually. But that’s nothing. I’ll die, someday, just like everybody else. But if Patches really is immortal, she’ll outlive the whole bloody universe!”

  Tarzi took a drag on his cigarette and frowned. “Whoa. That is heavy.”

  “We’re having the time of our lives now, but what about when all the stars burn out in billions of years? She’s just going to float around in a void all by herself?” Mags wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. “It’s all my fault, too.”

  “Oh, Auntie. It’s not your fault the stars won’t last forever.”

  “No.” She sniffed. “But if she hadn’t been exposed to everything I know about astronomy and physics, it probably wouldn’t have crossed her mind. Not yet, at least. Poor little kitten.”

  They sat in silence for a minute. Tarzi leaned over to scratch the side of Patches’ face. “Don’t you worry, Patches. We’ll figure something out. You know we love you.” She purred softly, rubbing on his hand. “And until then, we can take out our goddamn frustrations by exterminating these sodding reptiles. Coming up on the coordinates now, Mags!”

  “Good. Let’s focus on something happy.” A grim smile formed on the smuggler’s lips. “Something like absolute vengeance.”

  ★ ○•♥•○ ★

  The Queen Anne easily outweighed the dragon’s jump ship, doubling both its size and cannons. As it approached the coordinates she had programmed, Mags reached over to turn on the radio.

  “—are now tuned in to the Puma Broadcasting Network,” came the DJ’s voice. “That was Joe Bonamassa with Oh, Beautiful. Up next, Rebel Girl by Bikini Kill, L7 with Fast and Frightening, and a whole lot more sonic anarchy for your earholes. Long live the resistance!”

  Mags turned it up. “Tarzi,” she said. “This is just between you and me, but if I were ever going to hook up with some dude, this DJ would be at the top of my list.”

  “He’s got great fucking taste in music.” He gripped the ship’s control wheel. “There they are!”

  “Pull back on the speed!”

  Tarzi decelerated. The stars around them slowed from blurs into crystal-clear pinpoints of light.

  “I’ve got a lock! Pull to starboard!” Mags ran her fingers over the touch-screen controlling the cannons.

  “Auntie, will you please shit-can the nautical terms?!”

  “Pull right, goddamnit!”

  The dragons’ small jump ship came into the center of the window on the Queen Anne. Then Mags and Tarzi set eyes on the larger ship it intended to rendezvous with.

  “Jesus sodding christ,” he exclaimed. “That thing’s huge!”

  She fired the cannons. The music pummeled her ears. “Bring her around!”

  Tarzi steered the Queen Anne to face both the ships. The dragon’s jump ship attempted to evade the cannon blasts by pulling away from the larger one. Bright lights from the larger ship’s open landing bay glowed in the dark void of space. Mags fired the cannons into the smaller ship’s path.

  Hundreds of years ago, her great-grandmother Mad Dog had commanded ships with similar cannons. But those were only iron and gunpowder. Now, Mags’ cannons ripped through the void with lasers powerful enough to eviscerate a battleship.

  The jump ship pulled away from the barrage and back toward the larger ship.

  “Get us behind the jump ship, Tarzi! Come on!”

  He pulled the wheel, cranked it around, and pushed it forward. the Queen Anne swooped into position on the opposite side of the jump ship from the larger one. Mags fired again and again.

  “Nice flying, ace! Now the big ship can’t fire on us without killing their own.” She adjusted the guns and began a fresh cannonade. The jump ship returned fire.

  Tarzi pressed the wheel forward. the Queen Anne dove below the laser blasts. Their light blazed only meters away through the void. Mags blasted away, taking care to miss the jump ship but leave it no escape route.

  “There they go, little man! Right into the bay! Pour it on!”

  He accelerated, swinging the ship into position after its target. Mags punched laser blast after laser blast into a web around the smaller ship.

  “They’re taking it in,” she cried out. “Get up on them right fucking now!”

  Tarzi forced the Queen Anne into a dive. “Right behind them!”

  As the smaller ship entered the landing bay, the Queen Anne came up right on its tail.

  “Ram the bastards!”

  “What?!”

  “Ram them! Drive them to the wall!”

  Tarzi pressed the wheel forward again. The Queen Anne smashed into the jump ship. Their hulls sparked against each other. The force drove the smaller ship forward, crunching its nose into the deck. It scraped along the floor of the landing bay, tearing up strips of metal as it went.

  He whipped the wheel around and pulled back on the speed. The Queen Anne turned to the side and skidded. It followed the jump ship and pounded against it.

  The door to the landing bay slammed shut behind them. Mags and Tarzi shook violently in their seats as the two ships crashed against each other, pinning the smaller ship to the far wall.

  Mags tore off her safety belts and bolted for the door. “Tarzi! Open her up!” She grabbed the shotgun and bandolier she had set by the door. She already had her pair of Desert Eagles holstered and ready to go with clips full of hollow-point shells. “If anything reptilian comes through this door, kill the fuck out of it!”

  Mags leapt through the open door, and Patches followed right behind her. Their feet slammed onto the deck of the landing bay together. Mags ran for the jump ship, chambering a round.

  Things might have gone differently that day if the dragons had stayed locked in their ship and waited for reinforcements. But they simply could not pass up a fight with this troublesome mammal. They flung open the jump ship’s door, ready to kill their attackers.

  Mags swung the shotgun up to her shoulder. Patches sped by her. The little calico jumped onto the open ramp of the door to the dragons’ ship. Mags fired. A three-inch slug ripped into the first dragon at the doorway. Another round entered his chest, and he fell backward into the soldier behind him. Mags swept her shotgun to the dragon beside him and fired again. Three slugs punched fatal holes in his torso.

  Patches ran forward to the console. Her legs propelled her into the air, where she landed on the pilot’s neck.

  The pilot roared, reaching up to grab the cat. Patches’ teeth pierced the glove of her body armor. They went all the way to the bone. The pilot flung her arm forward, smashing Patches into the console. The force of the blow dislodged the angry cat, but she took chunks of the pilot’s skin with her.

  Mags stormed the doorway. With no idea how many awaited her inside, she jumped onto the door.

  A dragon kicked her in the stomach and sent her flying backwards. He aimed the gun which had fired nets to capture the girls earlier.

  Mags twisted in mid-air like a cat and landed on her feet. Her tail sliced the air angrily. She ducked, and the net passed over her head. “Come on, then, bastards!” She brought the shotgun up again and put two slugs i
nto him. Now she could hear screaming from inside the ship.

  Patches shook her head to clear it. Howling, she assaulted the co-pilot. Claws raked his face. The pilot swung her fist to strike Patches but punched the co-pilot in the snout instead.

  The co-pilot roared. His talons snapped shut around Patches. He pulled her to his mouth. His jaws clamped down. But instead of releasing mammalian blood into his mouth, his teeth cracked and splintered.

  Patches sank her teeth into his tongue. He screamed. Patches whipped her head to the side, tore his tongue out, and dug her claws into his soft tissues.

  The pilot had never seen such a demonic mammal in her life. It would be the last thing she ever saw. Flinging herself through the doorway and into the ship, Mags drew one of her Desert Eagles and pumped five hollow-point rounds into the pilot’s back. The dragon’s head bludgeoned the console.

  Mags swung the pistol towards the co-pilot, but a fist caught her in the side of her head. The blow sent her flying into the pen of captive girls, where she fell to the floor.

  The dragon who had punched her swung his electric staff at her like a hatchet. She rolled to the side, and the staff sparked as it smacked into the floor. Lying on her back, Mags fired into his center of mass. As he lunged at her, the bullets ripped through his body armor to spray his blood and pieces of his organs across the cabin.

  But his momentum carried him forward. Bright, electric arcs from his rod cast angular shadows on the cabin’s walls. Mags pushed herself up to meet his charge. She rammed into him from underneath, and flung him to the side.

  His rod, still active, wedged itself into the bars of the animal cages beside the girls’ pen. The electricity leapt into the cages. The mammals thrashed behind bars, their flesh cooking, their hair catching fire. The animals’ cries pierced Mags’ soul.

  She aimed her pistol at the dragon and pumped round after round into it until the clip was empty. At last, its hand released the controls on the rod, and the electricity faded away.

  “Motherfucker!” Mags yelled at the lifeless beast.

  The remaining dragon had his hands full with Patches. She tore at his eyes. Blinded, he grabbed at her.