Endless Sky (An Island in the Universe Trilogy Book 1)

by Greg Remy

“We are approaching a planetary system 30 degrees from the port bow. It appears to be heavily populated. Perhaps a good place to lose the man in the cowboy hat?”

  Darious sent the information to Zoe’s display. They were near the Agora Bazaar System. Indeed, it was densely packed with many inhabited planets, planetoids, and space stations.

  “Good call,” said Zoe. “Changing course to intercept.” She continued to monitor the Drak-9. It was slightly gaining on them, though its distance was currently too great for it to be a threat.

  Within twenty minutes they were upon the Agora Bazaar. As they passed into the boundary of the solar system, Zoe had to reduce their speed dramatically. The solar system was absolutely crammed with other spaceships. Zoe slowed her ship to a stellar crawl, just as a proximity alert went off and a massive trader vessel flew just overhead. She looked out at the busy surroundings; it was truly a human wonder to behold. From the alert, Darious had come over.

  Zoe’s computer was quick to scan the system and overlaid her screen with dozens of ruby and orange-swirled planets. Lanes of interplanetary vessels flowed from one world to another and even more led out from the system. Zoe swiped away the digital view and stared outward. Massive fleets of cargo ships swooped and arced all around them. The entire star system was a living hive of trading. Zoe had never seen such a sight. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of ships were present in the Agora System. Who knows what treasures passed through its hands every day? Zoe wound gracefully around a 100-kilometer-long cargo vessel. Painted red on its side were markings from the Terenginar System. She knew that system was in another quadrant from where they were. There must be people here from all over the galaxy. Zoe bisected a double lane of vessels, noting the various insignia on each. She chanced to look over at Darious who was still absorbed by the sight.

  “I know,” said Zoe. “I have never seen such a place either.”

  “It is humbling,” he said.

  An alert shot across her screen. Darious was first to read it aloud.

  “Locked on. Ship: Drak-9. 10,000 kilometers. Engaging.”

  “Darious, take your seat!”

  Zoe braided through several lines of vessels, keeping tabs on the Drak-9 with her sensors, but it remained locked on them.

  “Damnit!” said Zoe. The pursuing ship was advancing quickly, too quickly.

  “6 locks! Powering up!” shouted Darious.

  They were approaching a large vessel with antennas splayed around its central fuselage. She brought her ship toward it and matched its speed. Proximity alerts rang, but she turned them all off. Zoe piloted down toward the craft to be as close as she could to its hull, hoping to blend in with the confusing metal structure. Though just a meter from the vessel, the lock-on alarms continued to sound; her ploy would not work. Zoe smacked her forehead.

  “Of course!” She quickly typed in her console and retrieved one of the programs she had tucked away in a cryptographic folder during their recent meeting with the CF.

  “Weapons powered at 75 percent!”

  Zoe flew upward from the trader ship. The Drak-9 was nearly upon them and warnings signaled all across Zoe’s screens. She loaded the program and turned off power to the wings, diminishing her ship’s electromagnetic signature, but also drastically reducing its agility capabilities.

  “Weapons powered!” yelled Darious. “Weapons fired!”

  A large alert on Zoe’s screen overlaid all others.

  Incoming Projectiles

  Zoe began winding her ship through space. Trader vessels strayed from their lanes to avoid impact from her erratic flight path.

  Zoe could see on her screen that six rockets were fixed along her route, twisting as she was. In mere seconds, their needled points would be upon her, but Zoe knew this was not the end. Her sensors had shown the missiles were of an older and outdated—probably black market—model, no longer in use by any fleet.

  Just as the rockets were about to contact her ship, she flipped on the program, turned off the main thrusters and banked hard to her left. The projectiles missed, continuing their twirling tirade in the wrong direction, now chasing nothingness.

  “Huzzah!” chirped Zoe.

  “What was that!?”

  “One of those ‘ill tempered’ programs,” she replied. “The CF would be pissed if they knew I had that one. It throws out bogus resonant nodes of my craft’s energy signature—like a ghost ship. In empty space it doesn’t work all that well, but here our chances are much improved. Not a bad one, eh?”

  “Indeed Captain!”

  Zoe arced around another lane of travelers and wove through a grouping of several hundred ships. She purposely flew her ship into the thickest of craft thickets. There’s no way he can lock onto us here, she thought.

  “Weapons locked!” yelled Darious.

  “Damnit!”

  “One rocket fired!”

  Zoe did her best to pivot her ship upward as its wings were still powered down. They passed just above a fatty semi with a triple wide cargo bay. She could see the single rocket incoming. It too was a fatty one.

  “Oh Darious, this is gonna be bumpy.”

  The rocket dexterously dodged around many trader ships, heading right for Zoe and Darious. She curled her ship beneath another vessel and again engaged the ghost ship program. For a confused moment, the rocket shot upward, but it quickly recovered and swept back toward them.

  “Damnit. Too smart for that trick...”

  Zoe banked again, as hard as she could, around a massive freighter. The rocket was rapidly approaching them. Zoe reengaged her ship’s wings and shot around the vessel’s mighty starboard side. The missile was not so nimble and tipped the cargo ship’s wingtip, exploding on impact. The gigantic exothermic blast sent metal debris into the back of Zoe’s craft. Loud crashes echoed, and half of her screens went blank as numerous systems went offline. Half the thrusters spasmodically fired, sending the craft into a mad spin. Zoe had lost control of her ship.

  Through the chaos, she remained at her post, flipping switches and rebooting systems as fast as she could. Fires within the engines were autonomously put out by the ship’s safety hardware. The recently circumvented circuits that were now corrupted were once more circumvented. Zoe regained what was left to command of her craft, but it was now beyond flight. She strained to correct multiplicities of malfunctions, but new ones were continuously cropping up.

  “Darious! We gotta land!”

  “Aye, Captain!”

  Zoe could see on one of her side monitors that Darious was also fervently working away to compensate the errors of the ship.

  “A planet is just off our port bow!” he yelled back.

  Zoe used the last bit of her navigational thrusters to aim for the oncoming planet while engaging landing protocols. The planet drew into view as a wide semicircle of oxidized deserts and shining cities. They plummeted toward it. The Drak-9 slowed its pursuit and was no longer locked on. It would seem the cowboy would rather watch them go down in flames.

  Chapter 35

  Verve, Nerve, and Adventure

  Zoe was typing as fast as she could, her face hardened with concentration through the tense tremors of her craft. The great red planet filled the view of the cockpit window. Its atmospheric ring gleamed as a bright halo in the sunrise. Zoe managed to reboot the fore heat dissipaters just as they entered through the thick atmosphere. Red alerts continued across all screens. Zoe’s face hurt from the vibrations. Her fingers had trouble keying in commands. Twice she mistyped, almost losing the fine balance that kept the ship from tumbling end over end.

  It was a very steep descent. The hull remained intact, but within, components were flaking away. System after system encountered faults. With much finagling, they finally broke through the clouds to the lower atmosphere. The rubicund desert of the planet shone in long stretches reaching to the horizon. Arid cities spackled the lands. Zoe was signaled by the nearest establishment toward a large airstrip and she quickly accepted the req
uest. At least they would have vehicles there to put them out if they did end up a fiery mess.

  “We’re coming in hot!” yelled Zoe, gripping the console.

  As the ground came very near, Zoe forced the nose of the ship as high as it would go. She engaged all the landing and reverse thrusters that were still operational. The ship jerked violently, and Zoe was nearly thrown onto the console.

  They skidded on the ground, leaving a trail several kilometers long on the landing track, usually reserved for mammoth vessels but had been designated for her failing craft. The ship came to a final stop. As it shifted backwards to its ultimate resting position, one landing strut seized and the whole ship leaned down on its port wing.

  Zoe looked out through the window. They had made it. Around them was a trader’s city, a bustling metropolis matching the desert panorama surrounding it. Ships continued to fly above them; business as usual. Zoe could see several emergency robots rolling toward them to take care of any fires that might exist.

  “Darious!” she leapt out of her seat.

  He was still in his chair with his fingers unmoving at his console. He slowly turned and looked at her.

  “We made it,” he finally said.

  “Ha ha! We did! We have to get out of here. I’m sure the cowboy will be making sure we’re nothing but ash. Come on!”

  Zoe wasted no time packing up things. She ran to the main chamber and worked the panel next to the gangway. The door slowly opened, letting in a hot gust of wind. Once halfway detracted, the door squealed and jammed, but it didn’t matter. The pair jumped from down the opening and onto steady land.

  Zoe looked at her craft. It had certainly seen better days. Suddenly overhead, loud engines boomed and bellowed in their direction. The Drak-9 was coming down right at them.

  “Come on!” yelled Zoe, taking Darious by the hand and the two entered the merchant city.

  They were soon among other people in a poorer part of the municipality where shop tents lined the pathways and voices loudly haggled. Zoe and Darious ran through the busy streets, constantly taking lefts and rights, hoping to obfuscate their trail.

  Zoe began losing breath. Darious was gaining ground ahead and she called to him.

  “I need,” she said gulping in air, “I need to stop. For just a moment.”

  They attempted to get out of the way as people pressed around them. Zoe and Darious took to a narrow alleyway that was shadowed from the sun and Zoe leaned against a crumbling brick wall. With hands on her knees, she sucked in several large breaths.

  “Perhaps. We can procure. A shuttle?” asked Darious through heavy breathing. “Or a place. To hide?”

  “I don’t know,” said Zoe. “He won’t stop. He just won’t. Come on. We gotta keep moving.”

  They continued down the alleyway at a rapid pace. It emptied out into a larger back area with garbage bins and scrawled writing on grimy walls.

  “Stop!” a voice shouted from behind them.

  Zoe spun toward the voice and froze. It was the cowboy.

  He was standing in his overcoat and hat. Now face to face, Zoe noticed the unusual nuances about his face, in particular around his brow line and long, muscular chin. He was from the Laconial System. Zoe was familiar with that system. It was very military-like and many from it served in the CF, that oxymoronic peacekeeping force. So, she thought, they must have branched out to contract killing. The cowboy was smiling, an unusually large smile for a Laconian. Someone from his recent family history must have been from somewhere like the Rimaldi System. Only these two places could have added up to the unique and relentless character standing before them.

  “You two!” he roared, his long grin fading. “You two have been hell for me!”

  He took a step toward them and flipped back the flap of his overcoat, revealing a large pistol. Zoe quickly looked around. He had them cornered and defenseless. There had to be something of use around them or some way of escape.

  “What the hell did you do to my ship back there!?” he furiously shouted at them.

  Zoe looked at him defiantly. “I sent it to a better place.”

  “What the hell did you...,” he repeated, growling.

  “Who do you work for?” asked Zoe, snarling. “The CF?”

  He cocked his pistol. “Naw. Not these days.”

  “So, you had? And now what, you’re a killer for hire!?”

  Zoe was in a state of fury and panic that she had never felt before; after all they had been through, just to die in an alley like this. Her mind was screaming. The cowboy took another step forward and then stood stolidly.

  “Tell me!” she shouted.

  His eyes narrowed, and that elongated smile crept upward from his lips. “I was in the CF for some years. Now I am a private contractor.”

  “Wow, so you went from helping people to murdering them!? Just like that!?”

  “He-ey,” the cowboy responded, in a tone not the least bit offended. “The job has always been the same. Receive orders, get the job done. Explanations were rare even before I went solo. The difference is now the pay is much better.” His grin broadened.

  “Well, do you know why you’ve been hired to kill us?!”

  “Yes,” he said coolly. “You’ve been stealing corporate secrets, which is illegal in the first place, but from Pantheon Industries—from its headquarters—phew! What did ya’ll expect would happen?” He brought up his sidearm.

  “Corporate secrets!?” Zoe shouted, astounded. “Pantheon has been murdering innocent people. We are trying to find out why!” Darious held steadfast next to Zoe.

  “Innocent. Not innocent. It depends on who’s giving the orders really. The people on the wrong side of the CF always said the same thing. And yet on their own side, no one ever has any quips about the lives they take. Tell you what, it’s been a while since someone has given me such a hard time, even though there are now just two of you...” Zoe bit her lip at his gibe while the memory of Dr. Saknussemm being murdered flared in her mind. “...and although I can’t let you live, I’d say you have earned a little reprieve.” He twirled the gun around his finger. “Tell me why you and your clone deserve a quick death instead of a slow one and I will comply.”

  Zoe and Darious were equally wide-eyed. Doom filled Zoe’s heart. A deep survival instinct was coming to the forefront of her consciousness, that age-old fight or flight response. But they, cornered and without any weapons while he was holding the only gun and had it aimed directly at them. There was no way to maneuver, nowhere to run.

  The lack of response agitated the cowboy. “Either way,” he said cruelly, “your bodies will be pieced and disposed of. No one will ever be able to identify you. I’m sure you understand.” Zoe took a slow step forward. He aimed the gun at her chest. “Yes?”

  Water began to fill her eyes. She stood, hands at her side, trembling. “Three words.”

  He considered a moment and lowered the pistol a bit. Zoe breathed and then said, “Verve, nerve, and adventure.”

  “Well I suppose technically that’s four, but I’m an easy fellow.” He then paused, evidently taking in her words. “Wait. Verve you say? Nerve? Adventure?” His expression began to change. No longer was it a smile or a frown, but altogether something very obscure. His muscular jaw tightened and his eyes strained, as if his mind was being gassed. “Zoe and the clone. Verve. Nerve. And adventure.”

  The cowboy moved several steps back. While still holding the gun toward them, he used one hand to drop his overcoat and then diagonally removed his shirt. His exposed skin revealed a muscular torso of various scars, but moreover, of many tattoos. In the center of his chest, curved over one brawny pectoral to the other, were letters formed into three groupings. The characters were odd, and Zoe could not understand them.

  “Ancient Latin,” he said and point to each in turn. “Verve. Nerve. Adventure.” Zoe was beyond taken aback. The cowboy raised the gun to her head. “Who are you?” His grip around the pistol tightened. “Who are you!” He too
k a step foreword, bringing the firearm less than a meter from her face. Darious took Zoe’s hand. She made eye contact with him and then looked back at the contract killer.

  With her throat choked up she said, “I am Zoe, and he is Darious.”

  The three stood for a long while, not moving, not saying anything. Several tears were making their way down Zoe’s cheek. The mercenary’s nostrils flared, and his lips curled as if he was beginning to smell something foul...

  …something undeniably foul. Within Kappa, his top-notch military training was being sidestepped by a sensation he had not felt in a long time. Something was not right; this was all too rotten, like kipple. He could feel his eyes began to squint, producing an outward glare and an inward one too. Verve. Nerve. Adventure. These were the three words which had resonated within him all the way back to his youth. At night his grandfather would recite stories of fantastic voyages from Earth-1. In almost all, some lone explorer or captain had uttered these words. It was the motto of the greatest men who had ever lived.

  These were the three reasons why he’d left his homeworld years ago. They had stoked his own voyages from one end of the galaxy to the other, after which he had joined the Copper Force, with still enough steam to be installed in their elite division. Those three words had faded; the spark had faded.

  That particular word ‘adventure,’ it was such an underused word these days, practically forgotten. He himself had not heard it in years. A tiny ember ignited in his soul, the likes of which had been not felt since those daring days. He teased the trigger of his cobalt six-shooter, but did not apply any pressure to it. The renewed flames of that deep yearning began to warm his entire being.

  “Bah!” he said suddenly, ending the stalemate. The cowboy spun the gun around his finger and holstered it. “Zoe and Darious, you say?” His facial muscles relaxed; his rigid stance loosened. The cowboy held out a hand to shake. With a big smile he said, “I’m Kappa.”

  Zoe and Darious burst out sobbing. Zoe nearly crumpled to the floor but Darious had wrapped his arms around her and was holding her tight. It took several minutes before their tears subsided. Kappa stood unobtrusive the entire time, though he wore an even wider smile than before. To Zoe it looked a bit awkward on him, a man of his stature and composition, grinning like a boy with a new speeder bike. She let the last of her sniffles cease and slowly shook his hand. Darious did likewise, albeit a bit more cautiously.