Enter the Sandmen

by William Schlichter

  Two Halcary left standing in the corridor drop their drained energy clips and jam in freshly charged ones. Reynard rolls off the female in time to witness Joe slice his blade through the only weak point in the Halcary armor. The neck joint comprised of a microfilament fiber lacks the hard armor carapace of the rest of the suit. Nearly impossible to target and hit with energy weapons, the blade of a Calthos warrior slides easily through the neck junction.

  Before the first Halcary falls, Joe severs the windpipe of the second.

  “Three Halcary, six Braeco’n remain.”

  Reynard flips to his feet from his back. He keeps the Aurulent from running away, flinging her toward Mark and Leahla. “Hold her. We need her to retrieve our weapons.” He trades the polearms for the Halcary rifle activating the e-clip.

  Scott secures a Halcary rifle.

  “Where’s Amye?”

  “I have yet to locate her,” Joe admits as he draws a cloth across his blade to clear it of blood.

  “No hunting for her now. JC’s unconscious near the entrance, Doug’s pinned down as well as Hauser, and there’s trouble on the Dragon.”

  “Australia?” Scott asks.

  “Keep the Aurulent secure,” Reynard marches past them; he has little time to formulate a plan let alone answer questions from rookies only slightly less combat green than him.

  “What do you propose, sword brother?”

  “Kill them before they kill us.” Reynard presses his communicator, “Doug, find and get to the weapons cage door.”

  Only Reynard’s first shot hits his planned target. The top of the slot machine explodes. The Braeco’n behind it catches a shower of superheated metal chunks. Shrapnel rain forces the remaining warriors to cover as more plasma bolts destroy the casino around them.

  Scott sends his own dispersal of plasma at the Halcary. The well-armored warriors seek cover as swiftly as the Braeco’n. They return fire only to have their shots blocked by the wounded Tibbar leaping at the Commander.

  The opportunity affords Hauser a vantage on the Braeco’n.

  Doug maneuvers into the next row of slagged gambling machines placing himself closer to the inside entrance of the weapons storage area.

  With the last discharge of plasma, the red barrel of the Halcary rifle fizzles, allowing the latest Tibbar to arrive to leap clear. Reynard clubs the beast bending the heated barrel.

  Scott blasts the creature, but even the Halcary weapons only singe the natural armor hide. He jams the trigger mechanism, and the remaining energy clip whines in a backwash. Scott turns his rifle into a club as well, making sure the Tibbar crunches down on the power cell location.

  Reynard falls to the floor, flipping to his stomach the instant before the weapon paints the casino in Tibbar chunks.

  Two down.

  Hauser uses the distraction to reach a vantage point. The computerized manacle on his forearm whirls to life.

  Reynard scrambles from the raptor corpse remains, calculating how to reach the weapons storage with the Aurulent, unarmed and with five Braeco’n, three Halcary Head Hunters, at least one remaining Tibbar and Mokarran marching through the door.

  His assessment sends him into a double take and he notes fully armed Mokarran units have arrived. The cannons they sport as simple blasters have more firepower in each than all the remaining warriors combined.

  Before Reynard forms a stratagem, the entire entrance foyer erupts in a fireball of fanatic explosions. Structurally, the building shakes from the impact before secondary expulsions send lateral flame pillars erupting past the Mokarran. Parts of the inner wall leading into the entrance collapse on the Braeco’ns position.

  A Halcary engulfed in the blast cooks in his suit. The other two barely escape the explosion. Flaming wreckage shreds and broils the Mokarran. Chunks of spacecraft shatter the entrance.

  Spotty fires burn among the glamorous entrance wreckage. Heat and smoke hang in the air. Hauser hurtles to his feet, claps his hands together before rubbing them in satisfaction. Ecstatic, he howls at Reynard, “You owe me one ship, Commander.”

  Insane plans seem to work the best. Reynard moves from his position, not sure which of his attackers are completely dead.”

  “If the Mokarran are here, there’s a battle cruiser en route,” Hauser claims.

  Scott nods in agreement, bringing the Aurulent slave girl to the entrance of the secretary room. A Halcary drops the slave girl with a single blast only to be blown apart by a Mokarran weapon.

  Doug releases beams of sound from his weapon. The Mokarran slinks back into the pile of debris it crawled from. Blood rolls from twin spots on its skull.

  Doug adjusts a cylinder over the end of his gun barrel. The weapon hums, recharging.

  Hauser fires on a Braeco’n unable to reach a weapon.

  Chunks of Tibbar meat scatter around the room when the third raptor becomes incinerated midair by Amye emerging from the broken entrance way. She swings the rifle and fires a second shot, shredding open the last Halcary. Her third shot decimates any Braeco’n surviving the collapsed wall.

  Even in the haze-filled chamber, Amye’s exposed arms have a bluish-purple hue from long exposure in the asteroid’s thin atmosphere.

  “Do I even want to know how you got outside?” Reynard scoops up a Braeco’n weapon.

  Scott grabs the Halcary rifle, motions for Joe to follow him, and waves Doug to check on JC. The chief engineer and Calthos warrior slink back into the casino.

  “We should burn this place to the ground,” Amye demands.

  Doug checks for a pulse in JC’s neck. “You haven’t time, Commander. Ki-Ton has abducted the princess. He used some kind of hidden shuttle built under the bridge section of the Dragon.”

  “You’re making less sense than usual, Doug.” Amye keeps her back facing the wall while she holds her finger on the trigger.

  The Braeco’n splayed with shrapnel crawls from the collapsed wall. “Don’t…shoot.” Once free his breath returns. “We found the body of Kelben in one of the rifle transport cases. He was last seen with your man Ki-Ton and weapons all proved to be IMC fakes. They exploded during a raid Youshon led himself.” Half blind, he crawls to another dead Braeco’n.

  Reynard keeps his weapon poised to fire.

  The Braeco’n draws a leather chunk from the man’s side pocket. He tosses it at Reynard’s feet. The Commander recognizes it instantly. The same tattoo as the queen and Micah Donkor had.

  “Youshon bade us to cut this from him and deliver it to Maxtin before we killed him. We, last of the Braeco’n, have failed.”

  Reynard takes the jagged flesh. Before promising he’ll see the responsible party for Youshon’s death die, the Braeco’n coughs his last breath.

  Doug gets the cadets to help him with JC.

  “There’s a Mokarran battle cruiser,” Hauser reminds him. “I don’t have a ship. I don’t want to be here when they arrive.”

  Amye swings her rifle toward the one-eyed male. “I get the UCP cadets, but who’s this smerth?”

  “Another of Maxtin’s agents—Hauser.”

  “Don’t trust him,” Amye says.

  “He’s been useful, so far.”

  “Not for long with those Cybernic implants. They have a tendency to drive Osirians insane. Doug’s a prime example. Most organic tissue cloned instead of using implants.”

  “You forget, as technology advances not every planet has such nice expensive medical labs. When you get wounded on a backwater planet with half your face blown off a doctor with any Cybernic skills becomes your new best friend.”

  “Why don’t you get it replaced now?”

  “Pain. Grafting the metal hurt; if they hadn’t strapped my hands down I’d of shot myself. Their sawbones was amply christened. He drilled and cut and chiseled into the bone until he could attach the one-size-fits-all metal jaw. All without the benefit of anesthesia or my passing out.”

  “Not at a proper medical facility?” Reynard still learns something new about this
epoch every day.

  “I don’t want to find out. No one could live through such pain a second time.”

  Scott drags an Aurulent slave girl from the corridor. “We found one.” He assists her to her feet, escorting her into the doorway. Sensors scan her and release the genetically coded door locks. Scott disappears inside with the woman.

  With the Braeco’n dead, Amye moves to inspect the Halcary. She unclasps the breast plate of the one she killed and snaps free a pendant from around his neck. She pockets the jewelry.

  JC gains her bearings and, once on her feet, slips the Silver Dragon jacket off her shoulders covering more of her flesh than her telepathic uniform. She offers it to Amye. “Leaving without this?”

  Amye drops the heavy blaster rifle before climbing into her coat.

  THE MAIN VIEW screen stretches across the cramped shuttle cockpit. Racks of tightly packed IMC rifles fill all the compact passenger space in the shuttle. Michelle fidgets in the captain’s chair next to Ki-Ton. He sports a Silver Dragon jacket with a second identical Silver Dragon jacket draped over the chair behind him.

  “You want some kind of explanation, Princess?” Ki-Ton taunts her. “You’re entitled to an explanation?”

  “If you aren’t going to kill me, I’d like to know why. Your issues with the crew occurred before they took me.”

  “Who said I wouldn’t kill you? I need you alive to entice the Commander—to complete his downfall. No one on the Dragon ever learned of this shuttle. It provided the perfect location to contemplate my revenges.” Ki-Ton inspects the princess’s bonds once more. “You’re at the center of my issues with the crew.”

  He strokes the leather jacket on the back of the chair. “Slave.”

  “At your command,” the A.I. computer responds, lacking the female personality of the Dragon’s main computer.

  “Select previous destination.”

  “Course calculations locked in,” Slave reports.

  “Why do you call the computer Slave?”

  “You want me to regale you with stories of what I’ve done. You even question calling a computer Slave. What is a computer if not a slave? Slaves have no need for names.”

  Her diplomatic training is not experienced enough to fence with her captor and win her release.

  “I don’t understand. You’ve been in Maxtin’s service for so long.”

  “I’ve been in the service of others for longer and I’ve no desire to serve either.”

  “I don’t care,” Michelle turns up her nose as if her dinner has spoiled.

  “Don’t be a child. Even if you are. You’ve been trained to be regent of an entire planet in service to your liege. If I choose to explain to you my plan like one of the supervillains from the Commander’s entertainment vids, I shall do so because I wish you to know why I want Reynard dead.”

  “Amye says he brought you into his crew. He holds no malice against you.”

  “Not yet, but he will.” Ki-Ton feeds planetary jump calculations into the computer.

  Michelle wonders why he’s not in a hurry to escape into hyperspace before the Dragon follows instead of the double speak Ki-Ton spits out about future insults. She knows little of piloting a spacecraft, but the longer it takes to jump the more likely his trajectory plot will be copied. Unless that’s what he wants. How careful has he planned this?

  “If he tracks you, the Commander will stop you.”

  “You put a lot of faith in your kidnapper.”

  “He protected me from execution at my mother’s behest.”

  “Your mother wants his head now.”

  “What did you do?”

  “My attempt to assassinate her failed. The bounty on his head prevents him from traveling to any civilized star system.” Ki-Ton adds, “The Braeco’n hunt the crew because the weapons we gave them were faulty.”

  “You spent years building trust in order to ruin the crew.”

  “I spent nine years under Maxtin’s direction. Considering Osirians’ limited life span, it might be a long stretch of your puny lives, but for some who have lived for thousands, what’s a decade?”

  Michelle assembles the clues Ki-Ton’s given. His statement of Reynard having yet to offend him lacks reason.

  “You’ve spent years witnessing firsthand what the Mokarran are doing to billions, and you turn your back on them for petty revenge?”

  “It has happened to me! It’s Reynard who has yet to commit the offense.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “Not when you understand temporal mechanics.”

  “Time travel’s impossible,” Michelle scolds.

  “Nothing’s impossible,” Ki-Ton activates the hyperdrive.

  The shuttle shifts from the blackness of space into a subreality where the stars streak past the view screen.

  “The blind and feeble should be able to track me.”

  “Why not just kill them, if they have no idea who you are?”

  “Simplistic. The Commander won’t suffer the way he has left me to suffer if he’s dead. I’ll leave him a broken man with his close friends and crew dead, and his allies turned against him.”

  “You’re going to toy with an enemy instead of destroying them when you have the advantage. No wonder the Commander defeated you before.”

  “Taunts won’t elicit a response. I haven’t spent those years being Maxtin’s lapdog for some sheltered child to upset me.”

  “When I reclaim my planet from the Mokarran, I’ll have them executed for their injustices.”

  “You’ll never reclaim your planet from those creatures even if you live long enough to make the attempt. The Mokarran and the Tibbar both like to send patrols to the casino.”

  Ki-Ton transforms his upper body into that of a Mokarran warrior before activating the communications system. He speaks to a Mokarran in a language that Michelle’s universal translator doesn’t recognize.

  Once the conference ends, Ki-Ton shifts back into his recognizable form, panting from exertion.

  “Why use transmography if it hurts so bad?”

  “It won’t hurt much longer. I’ll restore what Admiral Reynard did to me.”

  “SHOULDN’T THIS BE a job for Scott? After all, he’s the Dragon’s engineer,” Kymberlynn asks.

  Amye slides around on a platform, making up the edge of where the hidden shuttle locks into place. The living skin swims over the hole, preventing the atmosphere from evacuating into space.

  “At what point did we become the most inefficient crew in the galaxy not to know we had a shuttle hidden?” Amye crouches down and brushes her fingers over the living skin. It’s malleable, but when she pokes her finger into it, it hardens to prevent anything from passing through.

  “It’s easier than you think. This ship is full of hidden wall panels. You probably don’t even remember where you’ve hidden all those bottles of liquor you’ve stashed,” Kymberlynn prods.

  “If you’re going to be in here, you need to be helpful, or I’m going to send you away.”

  “Send me away, throw away your bottles while you’re at it.”

  “Enough, Kymberlynn,” Amye snaps before she scans the ceiling with her eyes. The framework appears to be extra-reinforced. “I…tire of your…drazz.”

  “I still don’t know why you came in here. If Ki-Ton left clues, they’re inside the shuttle.”

  “You’re not wrong,” Amye says, “What I’m trying to understand...Ki-Ton was a double agent with his own agenda, infiltrating Admiral Maxtin’s command for nine years to eliminate his allies.”

  “He used the Silver Dragon’s crew to eradicate them.”

  “I pulled the trigger. I know,” Amye hisses. “But Ki-Ton wasn’t Reynard’s first crew member. Australia was assigned initially by Maxtin. Why didn’t she find the shuttle when she deciphered the alien languages on the computer controls?” Amye spots what could only be an escape hatch from the bridge to the top of where the shuttle would be.

  “Reynard was brought out of a
thousand years of cryogenic sleep and somehow got command of this ship.”

  “He doesn’t speak about it. The thousand years being frozen affects memory in the short term,” Amye says.

  “What do you know?” Kymberlynn asks.

  “It was some research facility in the Throgen section of space that found the Iphigenians’ transport ship. There were a few Osirians able to be reanimated. The labs had a collection of alien artifacts including the Dragon and a Calthos clan sword.”

  A revelation clicks for Kymberlynn. “Answering how he got Joe’s people to train him—he returned their sword.”

  “I don’t know how long he was at the Throgen lab facility before he returned the sword, allowing him the privilege to ask about being trained. Joe says they only train those who are worthy.”

  “How long did he train on Calthos because someone had to instruct him in piloting?”

  “He spent a year on Calthos,” Amye recalls. “Then someone gave him pilot lessons.”

  “He never found the shuttle at that point because he could barely fly the ship.”

  “I understand why Reynard didn’t discover it. The Osirians from his world could barely visit their only satellite moon and without gravity.”

  “Zero-g. Wow. Imagine traveling an entire trip in free fall—destroying their muscular system.”

  “Focus, Kymberlynn.”

  “I’m focused. Why don’t you just ask Athena?”

  “Brilliant.” Amye asks before her sister gloats over using her brain before Amye could. “Computer. Why did the crew have no access to the shuttle’s…location?”

  “Access to shuttle information remains restricted to Genesis Level clearance,” Athena responds.

  “Australia and Reynard both have Command Level clearance. The highest level.”

  “Incorrect,” Athena’s feminine robotic voice responds.

  “Reynard figured out the command clearance code, giving him control over the ship.”