Refusing Excalibur

by Zachary Jones

  “Good.” Quill smiled. “I’ll have the base’s location uploaded to your map as well as a warhead large enough to do the job delivered to your ship. All complimentary of course.”

  ***

  After the convoy from Mustang departed, Warwick got to work preparing for the very lucrative, and also very dangerous, mission Holace Quill had hired him and his crew for.

  The base was located inside the Goethe 32 system. A system so unremarkable it still bore the designation the First Civilization gave it when it was first surveyed.

  The dull red star only had one true planet orbiting it—a small, frigid gas giant in a long, distant orbit. The rest of the system was made up of asteroids and dwarf planets.

  Located on the innermost of the dwarf planets was the pirate base known as Lucille’s Bay.

  High Councilor Quill had given Captain Hyde everything he knew about Lucille’s Bay. The base was essentially a domed-over impact crater on the dark side of the tidal-locked dwarf planet. Photovoltaic collectors on the other side of the planet provided power, connected to the base by a series of power lines laid out on the planet’s surface.

  The first step was to outfit the captured pirate vessel, which had been named Lucky Corsair—a rather ironic name, given the fate of her crew.

  It was to no great surprise that Victor, along with the other boarding specialists, would be a part of the Corsair's crew for the infiltration mission.

  The other members of the insertion crew were Cormac, who was to keep the pirate ship running. Fara, who was to pilot. And Fowler, who had overall command.

  More than a bit of grumbling ensued among the boarding specialists about how they would be put at risk while Captain Hyde remained aboard the Fortune, but the presence of Fowler, Hyde’s second-in-command, and the promise of a larger share of the reward, kept the complaints to a minimum.

  Once ready, the Corsair set course for the Garland system with the Fortune. Because Cormac couldn’t completely repair the damage to the pirate vessel’s engines, the ship could only safely maintain half her designed acceleration. Thus, it would take over three days for the ship to reach the Goethe 32 system. During the trip, Fowler had tasked Gaz with “cleaning up his mess.” Which meant he wanted Gaz to clean up the dried blood splatters left over from the gunfight to take the ship.

  Gaz proceeded to give Victor a mop and bucket and told him to “take care of it.”

  No easy task for one man. The ships didn’t have gravity during the butcher’s work, so blood splatters covered everything—the decks, the bulkheads, on screens, even the ceilings.

  At least Victor didn’t have to worry about the bridge. Cormac and his crew had cleaned it up while repairing the warship. Victor just had to clean up the forward airlock and the galley, where the fighting had taken place.

  It was slow, boring work, but at least Victor had no real aversion to the sight of blood, even large quantities of it. More than a decade of war had left him thoroughly desensitized to it.

  By the end of the first day of travel, he had cleaned the corridor adjacent to the forward airlock. He took his bucket full of soapy, bloodstained water to the ship’s water recycling unit and poured the mix directly into it.

  “You are an efficient worker, Victor.”

  Victor turned and saw the starchild, Cormac, standing at the hatch, stooped over slightly to keep his head from hitting the bulkhead above. As Victor emptied the bucket’s contents into the recycler, he said, “Thanks. The galley’s next. I may actually get it clean enough to eat in before we reach the Goethe 32 system.”

  Cormac tilted his long head to one side. “You’re an educated man.”

  “What of it?” asked Victor. He filled the empty bucket with clean water.

  “I was wondering if we could talk. I’m curious about what you know of the First Civilization and its history,” Cormac said.

  Victor stopped the flow of water into the bucket and lifted if from the sink. He turned to face Cormac and said, “I know the technology that we have today pales in comparison to what the First Civilization had. I know everything we have was either rediscovered after the Fall or reverse engineered from their artifacts.”

  “Everyone knows that,” Cormac said, blocking the hatch.

  Victor looked up at Cormac. “But not everyone knows that they never called themselves the First Civilization. That was a term invented after the Fall. Before the Fall, they were called the Interstellar Union. Now could you get out of my way?”

  The starchild moved from the hatch to allow Victor through. When he walked into the corridor and toward the galley, he noticed with some irritation that Cormac followed him.

  “I’m impressed. Where are you from?” asked Cormac.

  Victor stopped in his tracks. What should I say? he thought, saying, “Nowhere in particular.”

  A knowing smile appeared on Cormac’s face. “An outcast then?”

  No, a survivor, Victor thought, instead saying, “Something like that.” He continued toward the galley.

  When he got there, he set down the bucket and poured a cleaning solution into it, stirring it with his mop. He glanced around the galley. Not quite as many blood splatters were in here as in the forward section. It wouldn’t take as long to clean.

  Cormac joined Victor in the galley. “Well, wherever you are from, they clearly had a good education system. Or you came from a family who could afford to send you to good schools.”

  Both, Victor thought. He pulled the wet, soapy mop from the bucket and scrubbed the blood off the galley’s deck, trying not to think of the memories Cormac’s questions were digging up. “I assume you’re also from a place with a good education system?”

  “Why, yes. I am from Agria Colony,” Cormac said.

  “I assume that’s a station of some sort?” Victor said. Starchildren were engineered specifically for zero- and low-gravity environments. The product of an alternative kind of thinking in the First Civilization. Instead of changing the environment to suit humans, they changed humans to suit the environment. And there’s no more common environment than space.

  “A hollowed-out asteroid actually,” Cormac said.

  Victor tried to think of what system Agria would be in. Worlds and colonies often shared the name of their home stars. But there were at least four stars named Agria that he knew of.

  Cormac seemed to realize what Victor was thinking. “You would not find it on any map. My people preferred to remain hidden. Many a starchild colony has been destroyed by pirates looking for loot or by people who simply hate us for being different.”

  Victor nodded. He knew what it was like to see a world destroyed because of hate. “So are you an outcast from your world?”

  Cormac shook his head. “No, it would be more accurate to say I am a pilgrim.”

  “A pilgrim? Is this a religious thing?”

  “Not really. My people practice ancestor worship, which means they tend to be very attached to their home. I was simply curious about the outside universe.”

  Victor paused his mopping to look at the starchild. “Working on a mercenary ship is a strange way to go on a pilgrimage.”

  Cormac shrugged. “I learned early it is best to travel on an armed vessel.”

  Victor nodded. “I can understand that. What other lessons have you learned?”

  “That my people are right to hide from the rest of the galaxy. With all the wars and piracy, it is a dangerous place for a small, lightly defended colony,” Cormac said.

  Victor stared down at the deck. It was dangerous for large, heavily defended worlds too. “Nowhere is safe.”

  “No,” Cormac said.

  Victor looked again at the starchild. “So why are you still out here if the galaxy has turned out to be such a dangerous place?”

  Cormac was quiet for a moment, his eyes searching. “I would like to return home someday. It has been many years since I have seen my kin.” He shook his head. “But I fear, if I tried to return home, I would end up leading en
emies to their doorstep.”

  Victor sighed. “When secrecy is your home’s only defense, I can understand why you would try to preserve it.”

  Cormac nodded. “Yes.” He tilted his head to the side. “You know what it means, to not go home.”

  Victor found it a little unnerving how perceptive Cormac turned out to be. “Yes, more than you know.”

  “You will have to tell me about it one day,” the starchild said.

  Victor shook his head. “I think I’ll keep it to myself. But I appreciate the talk.”

  Cormac nodded and exited the galley, leaving Victor to his work.

  Chapter 9

  The Corsair and the Fortune jumped into the Goethe 32 system at the same time in order to make it appear only one ship had jumped in.

  No signs of other ships appeared. If a pirate base was in the system, its occupants were keeping a low profile.

  “Take the Corsair into the system, Fowler,” Warwick ordered. “The Fortune will drift here on minimal power. If you need backup, just send the signal, and we’ll be right there.”

  “Roger that, Captain,” Fowler said. “You heard him, Fara. Take us in.”

  Fara nodded and pushed the throttles forward. Soon the little ship was accelerating toward the innermost dwarf planet at 50 gs, leaving the Fortune behind as the larger ship drifted cold and quiet.

  Fara turned around in her seat. “We’ll reach Lucille’s Bay in about a day, Fowler. Since I’m also the gunner, I’d like to take a look at the big scary bomb the high councilor gave us.”

  Fowler pointed at Cormac. “Take him with you. Make sure that device is in working order.”

  “I would ask to have Victor come with us as well,” Cormac said.

  “Why?” asked Fowler.

  “Because I suspect he knows his way around a ‘big scary bomb.’ And I enjoy talking with him,” Cormac said.

  Fowler shrugged. “Fine, take him. At the very least he can clean any smudges on the bomb’s casing.”

  “Well, you heard the man. Follow us,” Fara said to Victor.

  He followed the nightwoman and starchild out the bridge’s rear hatch, toward the Corsair’s small cargo hold.

  Cargo containers recovered from the freighter stuffed the Corsair's cargo hold. It was part of the disguise, making the Corsair look like a pirate vessel returning from a successful raid.

  Cormac walked up to a large crate almost identical to the others stacked around it and then punched in the key code to open it.

  Inside was the conical warhead taken from one of the Gryphon’s missiles. By Victor’s guess, the two-ton device would carry enough punch to blow Lucille’s Bay’s dome right off the face of the asteroid. Assuming, of course, they could sneak it in there.

  Cormac plugged his datapad into the bomb and studied it. “The device is in good working order.”

  “In other words, it’s exactly the same as the last time you checked it,” Fara said.

  “Correct,” Cormac said.

  Victor took a closer look at the warhead. “What kind of detonation method are we using?”

  “It’ll be put on a timer,” Fara said.

  “How long?” Victor asked.

  “Four hours. Just enough time for us to unload our cargo, refuel, and then leave,” she said.

  “Are you sure that’ll be enough?” Victor asked.

  Fara shrugged. “I hope so. We could always adjust the timer as necessary if we’re forced to wait.”

  “And what happens if our Trojan horse ploy is detected?” asked Victor.

  “We set the bomb on a short timer and dump it. Then run like hell and hope we make it far enough from the blast radius,” Fara said.

  “Hrmm. Well, I personally hope for the boring option myself,” Victor said.

  “I don’t know.” Fara smiled at Victor, brushing back her streak of blue hair. “A harrowing escape could be exciting.”

  Victor chuckled. “I’ve had my fair share of excitement.”

  “The fight against the pirates wasn’t that interesting,” Fara said.

  “Who says I was talking about the pirates?”

  “Ah.” Fara’s smile deepened. “Cormac said you were reluctant to talk about your past. Do you see yourself as a man of mystery?”

  Victor shook his head. “No. My past just isn’t a nice place to visit. Why the interest?”

  Fara smirked. “I would like to get to know you before we all get killed on this suicide mission.”

  Victor raised an eyebrow. “This is a suicide mission?”

  “Do you see Captain Hyde on board?” asked Fara.

  “No.” Victor’s eyes narrowed. “He’s back on the Fortune, providing backup.”

  “Drifting. By the time we reach Lucille’s Bay, the Fortune will still be within one hundred million kilometers of the jump point. That’s not a very long distance for a ship as fast as she is.”

  “So you’re saying that Captain Hyde is a coward,” Victor said.

  “He is, but that’s not quite the game he’s playing.” Fara placed her hands on the lip of the crate and leaned toward Victor. “He doesn’t show it very often, but Captain Hyde doesn’t like modified humans.”

  Victor tilted his head. “He made a heavy-worlder his second-in-command.”

  Fara chuckled. “And he’s just as expendable as the rest of us. More so really. Cormac and I both have valuable skills. Fowler’s just too dumb to question Warwick’s orders.”

  Victor looked to Cormac. “Do you believe that?”

  Cormac nodded. “It has been my observation that Warwick devalues the lives of those who fall outside the boundaries of what he considers to be ‘pure’ human.”

  “If that’s true, then why am I here? I’m pure human.”

  Cormac tilted his head. “Captain Hyde simply does not like you. You embarrassed him when you answered Holace Quill’s question about the Trojan horse.”

  Victor rolled his eyes. “So, not only is he racist, he’s petty as well?”

  Fara nodded. “Yes, but he’s not stupid. He’s set this up as a win-win for himself.”

  “How so?”

  “If we beat the odds and destroy the pirate base, he gets the lion’s share of the five-million-credit reward. If we fail and die, then he gets to pocket our share of the money from the antipiracy patrol.”

  “Huh. So, either way, he gets money and doesn’t have to stick out his neck,” Victor said.

  “Like I said, he’s not stupid,” Fara said.

  “Hrmm. Well, I don’t plan on dying on this mission. I still have things to do,” Victor said.

  “How do you propose we improve our odds of survival?” asked Cormac.

  Victor thought for a moment, rubbing his rough, stubbly beard. “Can you rig a dead man’s switch on the bomb?”

  “Yes. Why?” asked Cormac.

  “If we get caught, we could use it as leverage to keep our skins intact,” Victor said.

  Fara smiled and reached up to pat Cormac on the shoulder. “I like the way this guy thinks.”

  Cormac nodded. “It should be simple enough to make. The only question is, who will carry the detonator?”

  ***

  When the Corsair reached low orbit over Lucille’s Bay, a comm laser from the surface activated.

  “Lucky Corsair, you’re back early. Where’s the Harlot's Due?”

  “Got blasted by the merchant cruiser we hit,” Fowler said into the microphone. Cormac had rigged a voice emulator based on the voice recordings of the Corsair’s late captain.

  “So you didn’t get any loot? Don’t waste my time getting a landing clearance if you’re coming back empty-handed.”

  “We got lots of loot from the freighter,” Fowler said.

  Victor shut his eyes, wishing someone else was speaking into the microphone.

  “With a tiny ship like yours, I doubt it. What you have better be valuable. You’re cleared to land,” said a female with a rough voice who Victor assumed passed for Lucille’s Bay�
�s space traffic control.

  Fowler acknowledged and closed the circuit. “Take us in, Fara.” He turned to Gaz. “Are your people ready to play pirate?”

  “I say we look the part,” Gaz said.

  Victor looked down at his armor, now decorated with bits taken from the suits of the Lucky Corsair’s former crew. The boarding party’s job was to offload the cargo, including the bomb Holace Quill paid them to deliver. That meant being outside, where the actual pirates could see them.

  The prospect of that didn’t exactly fill Victor with joy. If things went sideways, which they likely would, his job was to fight off a horde of angry pirates until the Corsair could take off.

  He hoped the dead man’s switch Cormac had fashioned would make a good deterrent, should it become necessary.

  Fara broke orbit and dove the Corsair for the surface of the dark side of the dwarf planet.

  The dwarf planet itself was utterly mundane. Its airless, cratered surface was colored in shades of green by light amplification.

  Fara followed the approach vector provided by Lucille’s Bay’s traffic control, flying the ship over a shallow crater just north of the base, on a slow final approach.

  Then Victor saw dozens of bright flashes coming from below. He had just enough time to remember the Corsair’s shields were down before multiple hammer blows shook him in his seat.

  Shrapnel bounced around the bridge, one piece hitting Fowler’s chest and blowing through the back of his seat, smearing the heavy-worlder’s insides over the deck.

  And then the gravity cut out, and the ship fell. Victor sealed his visor and bent over in his seat.

  Seconds later, a long metallic screech echoed through the Corsair as the stricken ship’s hull scraped against the surface of the dwarf planet.

  ***

  The first thing Victor noticed when he came to was the weak pull of gravity. The second thing he noticed was that he was upside down.

  He looked around, confused, until the memory hit him like a bolt of lightning. The ship had been shot down. It must have rolled over as it scraped across the surface. The low gravity was likely the reason why he survived.

  Victor released his straps and slowly fell to what used to be the ceiling of the Corsair’s bridge. He reached out with both hands to break his gentle fall and to get his feet under him.