The Voyage Home

by D. J. Holmes

  The frustration drained out of Divar’s face. “I understand,” he said. “I can’t return to my home. At least for as long as it remains a Protector World. But I understand your desire. You want your people to be more than the Elders, more than the pirates we have come to know. I fear you will be disappointed. But I won’t be the one to ruin your dream. Let’s go teach Ranack a lesson.”

  “Thank you,” Sarah said as she closed her eyes. Tightening her jaw, she opened them again and nodded to Divar. Then she turned around in her seat and ordered the interface helmet to descend. You’re not getting away so easily, she thought.

  *

  Two hours later, Destiny was stationary in sub space at the edge of the 10045x system, right where she had jumped in almost eight hours ago. Just two minutes after Alexandra estimated Ranack should appear, five ships entered subspace and accelerated away from 10045x as fast as they could.

  “Look at that,” Sarah said out loud.

  He had predicted that the five pirate ships would split up to make it harder for the Elder frigate to pursue them all through sub space. They had, though Ranack had obviously prepared another trick as well. From each of the pirate ships, four new contacts appeared and accelerated along various trajectories into subspace. When the Elder frigate appeared, it would have twenty-five contacts to try and hunt down.

  “This is Ranack’s ship,” Alexandra said. Having flown with Ranack through sub space it was easy for her to identify it.

  “It’s not going to work,” Divar said.

  “What do you mean?” Sarah asked.

  “Remember,” Divar explained, “We gave the Elder frigate our sensor data on Ranack’s flotilla to try and persuade them to leave us alone. Just as we can, the frigate can use that data to identify the real ships in Ranack’s flotilla.”

  “That assumes the frigate will trust our data,” Alexandra said. “It didn’t earlier.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” Divar said. “Anyway, shall we go after Ranack?”

  “Not yet,” Sarah said. “They will have a rendezvous point planned out. We’re going to follow Ranack and deal with his entire flotilla at once.”

  “What about the Elder frigate?” Divar asked.

  “Let’s see what it does,” Sarah said. “It may not pursue any of Ranack’s ships at all, or it may pursue one of his decoys. We’ll let things play out and then follow at a distance.”

  “Right,” Divar said.

  Sarah could tell he wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of taking on Ranack’s entire flotilla, yet he obviously was not going to say anything.

  For three more hours, they watched Ranack’s flotilla and its decoys move further and further away from 10045x. Then the Elder frigate appeared. Initially it accelerated through sub space. Very quickly it began to slow again. Then it turned around and headed back to 10045x. Soon it disappeared off Destiny’s subspace sensors as it jumped back into normal space.

  “You were right,” Divar said. “I guess it didn’t want to get involved in a long chase.”

  “I’m sure there is a lot more gold on the planet that needs protecting. There is no way Ranack managed to carry it all off,” Sarah said.

  “I guess so,” Divar replied.

  For another two hours, they waited patiently as Ranack’s flotilla got further and further away from 10045x. Only when they were far enough away that Alexandra was sure that the Protector World ship’s subspace sensors couldn’t detect Destiny, did they begin to move.

  “The chase is on,” Divar said.

  “Yes,” Sarah agreed. “Though for now I’m just going to be happy for a rest.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Divar replied. “Pursuing Ranack will also give Alexandra plenty of time to finish her repairs.”

  “It will take me another thirty-six hours to finish,” Alexandra reported.

  “How much heavy metals will we have left?” Sarah asked.

  “We will still have twenty million credits worth,” the artificial intelligence answered.

  “That will be plenty to buy more anti-matter when we come to need it,” Divar said.

  “Hold on,” Sarah said as a thought occurred to her. “Alexandra,” she asked out loud. “If you can repair damaged sections of the ship from scratch. Can you build new weapon emplacements?”

  “Yes,” Alexandra said. “Though that is not part of my damage control protocols.”

  “I’m sure you can overrule those,” Sarah said. “Let’s see Destiny’s schematics. I’m sure we can find a way to fit in a few more laser cannons and point defenses.”

  “Adding more weapons will tax our reactors,” Alexandra warned. “I cannot produce new reactors. They require an Elder shipyard to fabricate.”

  “That’s ok,” Sarah said. “We’ll just see what we can accomplish with what we have.”

  “If we use all our heavy metals we won’t have any left to buy anti-matter,” Divar cautioned.

  “That won’t matter,” Sarah said. “I suspect when we catch up with Ranack, he will be providing us with all the gold we will need for the foreseeable future.”

  “I see,” Divar said with a grin. “That would be very fitting.”

  Chapter 25

  For six days Sarah followed Ranack’ ship at a safe distance. As Sarah expected, he led them to another uncharted system. This time, Sarah jumped Destiny out of subspace four light hours from the system’s mass shadow. They then crept into the system as stealthily as possible.

  “It’s definitely a black colony,” Divar said after they had been in the system for four hours. “I’m starting to pick up stray electromagnetic traces.”

  “Well it looks like all of Ranack’s flotilla are here,” Sarah said. “They’re not exactly taking any precautions to protect the colony.”

  “No,” Divar agreed. Whilst the third planet in the system was doing its best to appear barren, Ranack and his flotilla were in orbit making no efforts to mask their presence. “I imagine they are celebrating too heavily to have time to worry about things like security. They just pulled off one of the greatest heists in history.”

  “Well it’s time to give them a fright,” Sarah said. “Let’s move.”

  In response to Sarah’s order, Alexandra powered up Destiny’s main reactors and rapidly accelerated into the system. The pirates manning the bridges of Ranack’s ships must have been half asleep, for it took more than five minutes for them to react. When they did, it quickly turned into an uncoordinated mess. First one ship began to break out of orbit. Then the others followed. Two ships almost collided before their pilots realized the danger and swerved to avoid each other.

  Destiny had snuck to within one light minute of the black colony and the pirate ships were facing an immediate threat. Yet instead of working together, they were all trying to flee separately.

  “Target the Protector World ship and open fire,” Sarah ordered.

  “Firing,” Divar reported as eight missiles shot towards Ranack’s flotilla.

  As if the missiles had pulled the pirates out of their confusion, the five ships converged on each other and formed up into a proper defensive formation.

  “Ranack has finally taken charge,” Sarah guessed. “It looks like we have a fight on our hands after all. Make sure you don’t destroy his ship.”

  “I know,” Divar said.

  The missiles took just two minutes to close the distance to the Protector World ship. Though the rest of Ranack’s ships had moved closer to it to provide overlapping fields of defensive fire, they failed to take out all of Divar’s missiles. A last ditch evasive maneuver saved the ship from being destroyed by a direct hit. Though two missiles still scored proximity hits. The anti-matter tore down the ship’s energy screen and burnt a number of deep gashes into its hull.

  “They’re finally returning fire,” Divar reported as twelve missiles accelerated towards Destiny.

  “Finish off the Protector World ship,” Sarah ordered. Though it was heavily damaged, it was still the biggest threat t
o Destiny. Already it was pumping out laser beams. Whatever laser weapons it was equipped with, they had the same range as Destiny’s.

  Divar filled space with gamma beams. Sarah’s modifications to Destiny had allowed them to equip the frigate with two more laser weapons. Unable to dodge as effectively due to the damage it had already received, the Protector World ship immediately began to take hits. Without its energy screen, Divar easily chewed through its hull. Within five seconds, he hit something vital and the ship exploded as an energy capacitor or reactor overloaded.

  As soon as it was destroyed, Sarah reduced Destiny’s evasive maneuvers to allow Alexandra to target the incoming hypervelocity missiles. The rest of Ranack’s ships had opened fire with their laser weapons, yet the missiles were the bigger threat. Alarms went off as beams struck Destiny’s energy screen. Sarah ignored them as she focused on helping Alexandra take out the missiles.

  One of the other modifications they had made to Destiny, was to increase her energy screen and point defenses. As a result, Alexandra quickly took out the incoming missiles. Three reached attack range, yet before Sarah felt the need to begin some serious evasive maneuvers, Alexandra destroyed them. A quick check of the energy screen showed it was still at ninety percent efficiency. The laser beams from Ranack’s ships were having minimal effect.

  “I’ve almost battered down the smallest ship’s energy screen,” Divar reported. While Sarah and Alexandra had been focused on the missiles, he had continued to fire whatever laser he could bring to bear on Ranack’s flotilla. Now that Sarah was not trying to give Alexandra the best field of fire for her defenses, she switched to lining up Destiny’s lasers on Divar’s target.

  While she ducked and wove through space to avoid the return fire, she enabled Divar to score five hits on the small pirate ship in quick succession. The return fire from Ranack’s flotilla barely made a dent on Destiny’s energy screen now Sarah was trying to avoid it. After fighting two Elder warships, taking on Ranack was child’s play. As soon as the small pirate ship’s energy screen vanished, Divar fired two more beams. They blew through the small ship, sending it into a tailspin.

  “Open a COM channel to the rest of the ships,” Sarah said. “Don’t stop firing though.”

  “It’s open,” Alexandra said.

  “Ranack,” Sarah said as she tried to keep her voice as level as possible. “Surrender your ships now and we won’t kill you. You know what I want. If you don’t stop now, I will kill you.”

  “I don’t think they’re listening,” Divar said as laser beams continued to rain down on Destiny.

  Sarah took control of the particle lance. She had been saving it for just this moment. They were now so close to Ranack’s flotilla that there was no hope of dodging her shot. Lining up the lance on the largest remaining pirate ship, she waited until it finished an evasive roll and fired. The stream of particles shot out of Destiny’s lance at 0.9c. It crossed the distance to Sarah’s target in less than a second. In an instant, the ship disappeared in a colossal fireball. As the flames receded they revealed nothing but an expanding ball of debris.

  “One of the last two pirate ships has ceased fire and is decelerating,” Alexandra said. “Ranack’s is still running. He has opened a COM channel.”

  “Let’s hear it,” Sarah said.

  “I must congratulate you,” Ranack said as Alexandra projected his voice into Sarah’s head. “I never thought you could fight off two Elder frigates. I should have known you would follow me. I have a deal for you. I will give you Earth’s coordinates if you let my ship go. I have released a stealth drone. It will transmit Earth’s coordinates in eight hours. If you stay in the system you will be able to receive them. The drone will only transmit if you let my ship jump into subspace. If you kill me, you will never know where to find Earth.”

  “There is no way I’m trusting you again,” Sarah spat. “Decelerate now, or my next shot with the particle lance has your name on it.”

  “You won’t kill me,” Ranack said in a tone that enraged Sarah.

  “So be it,” Sarah responded and cut the COM channel.

  “Disable his ship,” she ordered Divar. “Send a message to the rest of the surrendered ships. Tell them to dump the gold they got from 10045x and then leave the system. If they don’t, let them know we will destroy them.”

  “Will do,” Alexandra acknowledged.

  “Ranack’s energy screen is tough,” Divar said as he directed his fire at the pirate ship.

  Sarah grunted. She expected nothing less. It didn’t matter though. Destiny’s was tougher. Just to make the point, she stopped trying to dodge Ranack’s laser beams. Instead she kept Destiny on a steady course that allowed Divar to target most of his laser cannons at Ranack. It took just thirty seconds to reduce the energy screen to a point where Divar’s beams began to penetrate it. In rapid succession Divar took out Ranack’s laser cannons, engines and hypervelocity missile tubes.

  “Ship disabled,” he said when he was done. “And can I say, that was satisfying.”

  Sarah merely grunted again. She had lined up Destiny’s particle lance on Ranack’s ship. It was recharged and ready to fire again. A part of her wanted to pull the trigger. She knew she could never trust the coordinates Ranack gave her. He could send her on a wild goose chase. Or worse, he could give her coordinates for a heavily defended Elder world. She would be walking into a trap.

  Killing him would be so much easier, she thought as she remembered how she had felt the moment he had betrayed her. I trusted you, she thought. You were the only connection to my homeworld. And you used that to manipulate me. You are disgusting. I should just kill you. For a moment, Sarah paused, expecting Alexandra to say something to stop her. When she heard nothing, she sought out the artificial intelligence. Alexandra was keeping herself distant. Nevertheless, Sarah could feel emotions that mimicked her own. Alexandra loathed Ranack for what he had done. Yet at the same time, there was a sense of apprehension coming from Alexandra. She seemed to be waiting to see what Sarah would do.

  As she looked back at Ranack’s ship through Destiny’s sensors, Sarah’s rage built. No doubt Ranack had betrayed many others. He was nothing more than a pirate after all. He had probably raided, plundered and murdered his way across this part of space. He deserved death. Just as Draxler had. As she thought of the now dead pirate, images of his burnt body filled her mind. Occasionally she dreamed of the day she had killed him.

  With an effort, Sarah commanded the particle lance to power down. I won’t let you make me like you, Sarah thought. I’m not going to kill you in cold blood.

  Sarah felt a wave of relief wash out from Alexandra. “You made the right choice,” the artificial intelligence said. “Killing him would only mar your honor and character.”

  “I know,” Sarah thought back. “But I still wanted to.”

  “The other pirate ships have dumped a huge amount of gold into space,” Divar reported, unaware of what had just gone on in Sarah’s head. “There’s no way to know if they have given up all they have, but they are now accelerating towards the system’s mass shadow.”

  “Let them go,” Sarah said. “Even if they have kept some, we have relieved them of most of what they had.”

  “What are we going to do with Ranack?” Divar asked.

  “I don’t know,” Sarah said. “We can’t trust whatever he gives us.”

  “That’s not necessarily true,” Alexandra said. “There is a way. The Elders developed some very successful interrogation techniques more than a millennium ago. According to my records they haven’t been used in centuries. At least not in the sectors I have operated in. The Elders prefer to kill rather than talk to pirates or rebels. Yet I have records on how the techniques were developed. If we could bring Ranack over to Destiny, I should be able to determine if he is telling the truth when you ask him for Earth’s coordinates.

  “Then we need to bring Ranack over to Destiny,” Sarah said, making up her mind. For a moment, she considered sen
ding a COM message to Ranack’s ship offering to spare his crew if he would surrender himself. Then she dismissed the idea. He would never agree. He had already shown that he only cared about himself. “Ready the shuttle and fill it with as many combat drones as you can,” she said. “Divar, you have the bridge.”

  “I should be the one going,” Divar protested.

  “The drones are designed to work with me,” Sarah said. “I’m going.”

  “But we need him alive,” Divar followed up.

  Sarah shot him a serious glance, then she smiled. “He’ll be ok. I’m in control. Earth is my priority. Not revenge.”