Space Rogue

by Jay Toney

  "You mean they are used to create a lifetime bond between couples?" he said astonished. "I thought they were just a novelty or party item for sharing emotions."

  "They start that way, but once the bond is established, it creates a permanent telepathic link, that continues to strengthen the bond between couples allowing them to feel each others emotions over greater distances. Also once the bond is complete, the discs are no longer needed."

  I also told him that I brought a shipment of goods from the Iniguar.

  "You attacked one of their vessels?"

  "Just the opposite. I rescued one of their vessels. I have been given a lifetime debt of gratitude, and am welcome on their worlds anytime. I think I saved someone of importance, named Shree'tek. While there I purchased enough goods to fill one of my cargo bays."

  I told him about the clothing my wives selected; the breast plates designed for their women, having six breasts; the artwork and sculptures I found appealing and of course the furniture.

  "It sounds like I'll have to open four or five new stores," he said agreeing to my price for the entire shipment."

  I asked if he might know someone who might be interested in my old bed. It was still like new, and was large enough for four. Being large enough for four was the buying point he was interested in. He wanted a larger bed for his family. and agreed to buy it too.

  It was a very successful day I thought, having made tenfold my investment. I made my way back to the ship. Red was there talking with Amber, Tanya, and Natty. We greeted each other then got down to business.

  "You really put some holes in that frigate," he remarked.

  "They didn't know when to quit."

  "It was a near thing, but she is repairable. I'll give you 200,000 credits for her."

  I accepted his offer and asked, "Did you notice her markings?"

  "No, what do you mean?"

  "She was Alliance military."

  I explained how the two frigates were allied with our friends, the Crimson Tide.

  "What are they doing in this sector of space? Its a clear violation of the treaty."

  "What are they doing is a very good question. I doubt they will voluntarily give us that information, so I expect we will have to find out for ourselves."

  "I'll have to let the governor know, so he can alert the other system governors," Red said, briefly talking into his comm unit. "What is going on with Beverly?"

  "I don't know if she's jealous of Amber, or if she truly hates her. She gave up trying to seduce me, and took everything else away from Amber, to hurt her."

  "Not so long ago, they were very close. They use to share everything, including boys. They were a lot like Tanya and Natty. Then something happened to change that."

  "Perhaps it was when Sultan left Beverly to be one of Amber's work associates."

  "No, I think it happened before that. It may have even happened before Amber bought the Lucy. She was a tired old freighter, destined to be cut apart for scrap. Amber found her and fell in love with the relic, seeing its potential. She spent over a year, rebuilding her, deck by deck."

  "The only thing left, that I can think of, is that the rivalry was always there. It was just well masked. One thing I do know is that there isn't any hatred in Amber. Beverly hurt her sister more deeply than she shows." I said this showing the alien disc to Red.

  "I haven't seen one of those Iniguar bonding discs in a long time," Red said while examining the disc. The four of you are bonded, I take it. Do you know what it means to have a lifetime bond?" Before I could ask Red continued. "What it means is that if one of you dies, or are killed, you will all share the same fate together. That is the price you pay for the pleasure you share from the bonding."

  "It's worth the risk Red. Its hard to explain. We all share each others emotions and feelings, and the link grows stronger every day. We all feel each others; Love; desire; passion and more. It is sometimes overwhelming, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. It's one of those things you have to experience to understand."

  "So if one of you are feeling a little horny."

  "Its a mad dash to rip off each others clothes and have sex," I replied.

  "How about when one of you climax?"

  "We all feel the climax together, and with the four of us, it goes on multiple times, until we pass out exhausted."

  "I've got to get me some of those discs," Red said.

  "There is a shop that deals with alien artifacts in green section, last I saw they had a whole box full."

  "How long are you going to be staying?" Red asked.

  "Just for a few days, long enough to resupply and replace our expended ammunition," I answered, knowing that we would have to obtain the information we needed from the Alliance ourselves.

  Chapter 42

  "Natty start undock procedures, move us out thrusters only."

  "Aye, aye Cappy."

  Once the docking clamps were released, Natty carefully maneuvered the ship away from the station. We made our way out system where we could safely enter hyperspace.

  "What course Cappy?"

  "Set course for the Sarania System."

  We jumped to Sarania. This system was occupied by Blue giant. Its radiation would have scorched any planetary bodies long ago. Even as far out as we were we could feel the affects of the hot star. Our environmental systems struggled to compensate for the rising temperature, and our engines worked constantly to keep us out of the stars gravitational well.

  "Natty, go to full power, lets get out of this system."

  "Full power now Cappy."

  At first we started slowly moving away from the stars hold on us , we gained speed as we increased our distance. The distance also brought us relief against the heat as the environmental systems returned to normal.

  As soon as we were clear we made a jump to the next system. This led us to the Faraka System. Its star was a yellow dwarf, with 10 planets orbiting it. three planets fell within the Goldilocks Zone.

  "Cappy, scans indicate heavy Alliance traffic in this system. There is an orbital outpost on the third planet." Natty reported.

  "Kill drives and run dark," I said, "passive scanners only, lets see what they are up to."

  We drifted, monitoring and recording traffic, and communications. Hopefully we would remain unseen or mistaken as a piece of space junk. Our scans showed a few large asteroids close by, whose orbits would bring them in close to the third planet. It gave me a chance I would have to take. If we could get close enough, we might be able to learn more about what the Alliance was doing here.

  "Natty, can you sneak us in closer to one of the large asteroids?"

  "I can try Cappy. We are in open space, and their will be a chance that they may see our drive plume."

  "It's a chance we will have to take," I replied. "Try landing on one of them. Its mass and composition should help hide us."

  With our engines back on line, Natasha carefully maneuvered us towards one of the asteroids. She angled our plume away from the planet as much as possible, and minimized the drive plume by running at minimal power. It was slow going, as we crept closer and closer to the asteroid, ready to bolt out system at the first indication we were spotted.

  Finally we landed on the asteroid, being held in place by its microgravity. As our orbit brought us closer, we were able to discern more facts. The Crimson Tide was in fact allied with the Alliance. We were not clear yet what their roll was. At least a splinter group from the Alliances military was mobilizing here, and they meant to attack. Where and what we were still trying to determine.

  We had more than enough evidence to
petition the Alliance government for the gross treaty violation. We also had sufficient evidence to mobilize our military forces. But we still needed a time and location.

  After weeks of monitoring the communications traffic, we were approaching our closest orbital approach. Soon, its orbital path would carry us away from the planet where we could make our escape.

  We poured over the ever incoming data hoping to reveal some piece of missing information, but it still alluded us. All this sitting and waiting had the crew on edge. There was little we could do but wait.

  Either someone got suspicious, or something triggered their sensor net. Probes were launched our way to scan the sector of the asteroid belt we were hiding in. Hopefully the metals in the asteroid we were parked on would continue to hide us.

  "Captain, I am picking up an unauthorized communications signal coming from cargo hold three," Tanya announced.

  "Tanya jam the signal and seal the hatches."

  "Doc, take a team and capture whoever is in there, and bring them to the bridge."

  "Natty, get us out of here, max burn."

  "Tanya, go to active scans. Announce condition yellow. Secure all bulkhead hatches."

  Our repulsorlift engines pushed us away from the asteroids surface and our main engines kicked in. We were accelerating away from the asteroid at maximum thrust. In an attempt to escape with the data we had collected.

  Chapter 43

  "Captain, we have a fleet of ships moving from planetary orbit, on a intercept course," Tanya reported.

  "Natty, maintain course, lets see if we can outrun them."

  Doc, entered the bridge with our traitor in custody.

  "I have only one question. Why?"

  "I won't answer to the likes of you, traitor!" he yelled spitting at me.

  "Doc, throw him out the nearest airlock."

  "You can't do that to me! I know my rights," yelled the prisoner.

  "You only have one right, and that is to die!" I responded.

  "Perhaps he is correct," Doc remarked. "Red will know how to get any useful information out of him, before he is conscripted to the mines as slave labor or worse."

  "I see your point. There are worse things than death. Lock him in an isolation cell, no visitors," I said.

  We continued our mad dash across the solar system evading our pursuers. It wouldn't be long before we could jump to safety.

  "Captain, I'm tracking incoming missiles," Amber announced.

  "Natty, evasive action."

  "Jane, get our shields up"

  "Tanya, sound battle stations."

  "Captain, ECM is online and PDC are active." Amber reported.

  "Randolph, take over engineering."

  "Doc and Jane on guns."

  "Tanya, do we have a target?"

  "Negative Captain, they're running dark."

  "Cappy, I have a vector from tracking their missiles," Natty informed me.

  "Fire a full spread," I told her.

  Four missiles fired from our launch tubes, seeking a target on their course.

  "Captain three incoming missiles spoofed, PDC are engaging the fourth." Amber reported.

  Natasha fired four more missiles as the launch tubes were reloaded.

  There was an explosion as one of our missiles impacted the target and detonated. We changed course to pursue the now visible target. As the Alliance vessel turned to evade it was struck by two more of our torpedoes. Life boats and escape pods jettisoned from the floundering vessel.

  As we grew nearer we were able to identify it as an Alliance destroyer.

  "Natty, dock with our prize. As soon as we are secure, flank speed out of here."

  Natty gained access to the ships command functions. She shut down the drives and life support functions, just in case there were any stragglers. The ship would soon be in deep freeze. We docked with the destroyer. As soon as the docking clamps were locked, securing the vessel, we resumed our journey out system.

  Instead of chancing another jump across the Sarania System, especially with the additional mass, we took the long way around jumping to the Far'nar System. The question of why the Alliance ships were in that system started to make sense. One trip across the Sarania system with its blue giant star was enough. Hopefully, we made it back in time with the information we had aboard. Without dumping velocity, we made our next jump to the Castel System, then the Auelra System and finally Buenos Aires.

  We decelerated hard, coming out of multiple jumps. The Queen Anne's Revenge had accumulated a very dangerous velocity. Only someone on the brink of insanity, or very desperate, would make a series of jumps without first dumping velocity.

  "Tanya, as soon as we can establish communications, contact Red. We need to get all the information we gathered to him."

  "Aye, aye Captain."

  She busied herself at the communications console until she finally was able to make contact. She briefly explained what we encountered and started transferring all of our data.

  As soon as she completed the data transfer she said, "Captain, Red said to dock at the repair section. The repair crew could handle the destroyer from there."

  We made our way to the space station decelerating in a spiral orbit. It would be twelve more hours before we could dock.

  It had been a long day for us, so I suggested we all get some rest so that we would be fresh when we arrived aboard the space station.

  We went to our cabin. I collapsed onto the bed desiring a much deserved rest.

  "No you don't," Amber said, pulling me up and back onto my feet. She started undressing me and then herself. With all of us undressed, I was led into the shower. Natty, unable to resist started washing me. My excitement, with her gentle caresses quickly rose, and I took her and ravished her in the shower.

  I was more gentle, but no less eager, when I made love to Amber and Tanya. We all collapsed in bed cuddling each other before we fell asleep, exhausted.

  Chapter 44

  As soon as we docked, we made our way to the airlock. Red and Chief Mike were waiting for us.

  "I haven't had a chance to review all the data, but I skimmed over enough to tell that the Alliance is up to something. There presence, not to mention having established an outpost in our sector is a clear treaty violation and an act of war. Perhaps the data you collected will reveal more," Red said to me.

  "Chief, hopefully the destroyer isn't too badly damaged. I'm pretty sure we are going to need every available ship, in the near future. Red I have a traitor aboard, that may be persuaded to give us some information."

  "Tanya didn't say anything to me about capturing any prisoners," Red said while stroking his beard, deep in thought.

  "We didn't exactly capture him. He was a member of my crew. He was caught trying to transmit a message to the Alliance."

  "You don't want him back after I question him, do ya?" Red asked.

  "Of course not. I wanted him thrown out an airlock, but Doc persuaded me to keep him alive for questioning."

  "I'm glad you didn't. If he has any information, I'll get it out of him. Of course he probably won't be of much use to anyone afterward. I do a bit of trading with an alien species that finds live human flesh to be a delicacy. They don't mind if the person has been tenderized a little." Red told me.

  "Chief, I didn't get a chance to clean up any bodies, or stragglers. We put the ship in deep freeze to take care of them, then we were pretty busy getting back. You may want to do a quick inspection of the Revenge. We hot jumped the last three systems, without dumping velocity. When we entered this system, we were well
over v-max, and had to decelerate hard," I said.

  "Do you know what your chances of hot jumping more than one system are?" He asked, not waiting for an answer, "Three systems is insanity!"

  "I've heard all the stories, maybe our ships have advanced enough that it is possible. I made it after all."

  He shook his head no, and said, "The Gods must have been watching over you."

  His crew got busy undocking, the destroyer and inspecting the Revenge for damage, from our mad flight back home. I looked out the stations viewport, at the light cruiser the chief was reconstructing. The exterior of the ship looked nearly complete, with the hull plating in place. I knew better, there was still a lot of work to do inside.

  "Nathaniel, give me a little time to go over this data. In the mean time, I will recall every vessel I can. I will also inform the governor, and try to persuade him to contact the assembly of system governors. You did good getting back here as fast as you did. It may have bought us some much needed time. I'll see if I can talk the governor into buying that destroyer. Do you think 500,000 credits will do? I will also talk him into covering any repairs and expenses for your ship. After all, your last mission was in defense of our system."

  "That would be fantastic Red. Thank You."

  "Don't thank me yet. We may soon find ourselves in battle with the Alliance and the Crimson Tide.

  Back on board I told my wives about my conversation with Red and the Chief.

  "When will he know something?" Natty asked.

  "We will have to give him some time to question the prisoner, and go over the data. Red is recalling as many members of his fleet as he can. He will get hold of us when he knows something.

  We headed to white section, where we had dinner and some Sangria. I limited myself to just two glasses knowing how much it affected me. The girls heard about an opera that was performing this evening, and wanted to attend the performance. I reluctantly went with them. Listening to people screech on stage was not something I looked forward to listening to.