by T. R. Harris
Fortunately, the one thing the killer bots couldn’t do was fly. And that’s what saved the commandos.
“Set us down in that clearing in the path of the survivors,” Adam said, pointing out the forward viewport. He looked around at the crowded pilothouse. “Any of you have weapons?”
Riyad held up an MK-17. “Just this, but the battery pack is dead. I could throw it at the robots if it comes to that.”
Coop held up an M-101. “Mine’s better,” he said to Riyad. He flipped the rifle around and grabbed it by the barrel. “At least I can use mine as a club.”
The team had used all their ammo defending the compound from the attack by their allies and the Nuoreans, with any last rounds expended on the parachuting Klin robots. The TD-ship did have a weapons arsenal built into its operating system, but it had never been charged while sitting in storage on Earth. In addition, no extra hand weapons were stored aboard.
“Kaylor, turn us ass-end to the commandos and open the landing bay door,” Adam said. “They’ll just have to get to us the best they can.”
“Ass-end…oh, I understand.”
Adam smiled. “Good man.”
Kaylor looked at Adam and scrunched his face.
“You know what I mean,” Adam said. “Now everyone else get to the landing bay. Some of the troops may be injured. They’ll need our help.”
When the Defiant touched down it began to sink in the soft, wet sand and sludge of the marsh. With the rear bay door opened, a shallow flood of water poured in and drained down into the void below the grills of the deck. The void soon filled up leaving sandy water covering the deck to a depth of two inches. Adam and his team splashed through the small flood and to the open doorway.
The tall alien palm trees had once been beautiful, swaying in the ocean breeze with the blue-green water beyond. Now they were being blown to bits, exploding and splintering apart as the horde of alien robots peppered the forest with laser fire. The Human commandos—what was left of them—rushed through the growth, scrambling over thick vines of mangrove-like bushes. The going was rough, but these men were trained for worse than this. The first survivors reached the landing bay door and raced inside, carrying their wounded and guided by Adam and his team.
The Expansion troops were a menagerie of species. Some navigated the thick growth with ease, others didn’t. Adam could see three tall Juirean Guards rushing towards them. Their green manes were flaring in the wind, although now matted and tangled. Then about twenty feet from the ship, a white beam of light erupted from the chest of one of them. He fell where he stood. The others barely gave him a glance and kept running.
More survivors rushed into the landing bay. Adam gave a sigh of relief when he noticed the Klin robots stopped firing as the commandos got close to the Defiant. This allowed the last of the Human and Expansion troops to pile in. Adam slapped the close-door button as the last of them scrambled past.
“Kaylor, they’re in. Get us out of here.”
The floor pitched at a steep angle, sending everyone tumbling toward the bay door. A moment later, internal gravity kicked in and orientation righted itself.
But Adam was pressed against the cold metal of the hangar door with a stack of aliens and Humans against him. Everyone was packed in the room like sardines. No one could move until the inner airlock was opened. Then over thirty people flooded the spine corridor and other compartments of the Defiant. Even then, Adam had to push his way through the smelly, wet and bloody crush of bodies to reach the common room.
The Army Ranger officer was there, packed in between an unknown species of alien and one of his men. Most the troops—both alien and Human—were still armed. Whether they had ammo and power packs was another question. Adam and the major made eye contact.
The mission of the commandos was to secure the TD-starship and return it to Earth. Now they were aboard the ship, and with superior numbers and armament. Adam could see the conflict in the Ranger’s eyes.
“What’s it going to be, major?” Adam asked. “I don’t have all day.”
The big man sighed. “It would be really shitty on my part to bite the hand that just saved our asses. He stepped up on a couch and placed a bloody hand on the ceiling for balance. “Listen up! We’re to take no action while aboard this ship. We owe these people our lives. Let’s not be assholes about it.”
A chorus of agreement echoed throughout the small spaceship, some even coming from the Expansion troops. Adam wormed his way over to the two surviving Juireans. Normally, their huge manes would have been scrapping the ceiling. But now the wet hair lay limp on their heads and formed a dripping veil reaching all the way to their alien butts.
“Are we in agreement?” Adam asked.
The lead Guard leaned over the much shorter Human. He looked at Adam’s blooded soaked shirt and paisley-print boxer shorts and snorted. “I have heard much of you, Adam Cain. You are not as I imagined. Yet we will comply.”
“Good. Now, let’s get organized.” He looked around the packed compartment. He could see down the corridor to the landing bay. It, too, was filled with wet, sweaty and smelly bodies. Fortunately, Kaylor had closed the door to the pilothouse before it could be invaded by the survivors.
“Sherri, Riyad!”
A harmonized ‘here’ came up the corridor.
“Get the landing bay organized. Clear it out and then let our guests back in one at a time. We need a head count. And try to keep the Humans and Expansion troops separate.”
“We’ll try!” came the reply, barely heard over the cacophony of alien and Human voices. Adam’s head was spinning from the potent mix of odors. He knew his tiny ship would never be the same after this.
Thirty minutes later, the ship had reached a somewhat orderly state of chaos. There were seventeen Human commandos out of the original force of forty-five. The Expansion troops had faired even worst. They started with seventy and ended with only ten. Counting Adam’s team of seven, the Defiant carried thirty-four people aboard, when it was only designed for six at the most.
The pilothouse was restricted to only Adam’s team. This allowed them to plan their next moves in private and with a little elbow room.
“There are nine seriously wounded, with just about everyone else suffering from some kind of minor injury,” Sherri reported. “There’s barely room to stand back there, let alone set up a sickbay. And that’s not even the worst of it. The Defiant had something like two days’ worth of food stock when you and Arieel took off on your little romantic hop into a neighboring universe. That’s almost gone. We don’t even have enough to feed ourselves, let alone another twenty-seven mouths and assorted orifices.”
“And I have more bad news,” Kaylor announced. “The fuel modules are nearly drained.”
“What the…. How can that be?” Adam asked.
“I’ll answer that,” said Copernicus. “The existing mods are just temps, used back on Earth when the scientists were running tests. They were never designed for long-term use. And your trip to…where ever you went…drained them even faster than normal.”
Adam pursed his lips in disgust. “How long can we run?”
“A week, at tops. And no trans-dimensional jumps. We have just enough power to make half a jump, meaning we’d be stuck in another universe with no way back.”
Adam slumped back in his chair. “Any other thing I need to know about?”
Riyad cleared his throat.
“What is it, buddy?”
“Just got a report that the only toilet aboard has backed up. I wouldn’t go aft if I were you.”
“How could the stench be any worse than it already is?” Sherri asked.
“I’m afraid to find out,” Riyad answered.
5
An hour later, Panur’s glowing white starship came up alongside the Defiant.
“Do you have room in the landing bay for my ship? It’s cooled down enough,” the mutant asked.
“Not even close. We have a cargo of hungry, injured and f
oul-smelling commandos, stacked from bulkhead to bulkhead. We have to get rid of them before your ship will fit.”
“Perhaps you should not have rescued them.”
Adam couldn’t tell if Panur was serious or not, but he gave him the benefit of the doubt. “That was never an option. We had to do what we could. I’m getting the senior Human officer up here in a few minutes and figure out what we can do with his people. Just hold tight. I’ll let you know more after I’ve spoken with him and the captain of the transport that brought them here.”
Adam called Major Ryan Mathis to the bridge.
“We have to get your men—and the Expansion troops—off the ship as soon as possible,” he began without preamble. “We have no food or water. The ship wasn’t stocked before we bolted.” He didn’t feel the need to tell the army officer about the power modules. He wasn’t sure how the transport captain would react to having the TD-starship within his reach and knowing it was running on fumes.
“Yessir, you’ll get no argument from me,” said the young officer. “We also don’t have adequate bunking and medical facilities…and the toilet has backed up.”
“Yeah, I noticed.”
“We could dump bags of crap out the back,” Mathis suggested.
“If we had bags,” Adam replied. “I’m telling you, major, we’ve got nothing useful onboard. I need you to contact your transport. Do you have the link code?”
“Yessir.” He moved to the comm station where Riyad relinquished his chair. A few moments later, the army officer was in contact with the captain of the Human transport vessel.
After Major Mathis gave a quick briefing regarding the events on the surface of Pyrum-3—and Adam’s rescue of the remaining strike force—the ship’s captain asked to speak with Adam.
“Captain Cain, I appreciate your actions in support of the men. You took a considerable risk in doing so. In light of recent events—and the politics involved—I wouldn’t have blamed you if you hadn’t,” said Captain Angus Klein.
“Captain, we are not enemies. I understand you were only following orders. But now we have a serious problem. We cannot support the added personnel aboard, not even for a couple of days. Where are you now?”
“We were ordered out of the area when the Klin ship arrived. We’re about two light-years away, awaiting further orders. I can send you the track and we can meet halfway. It shouldn’t take more than six hours to rendezvous.”
Adam studied the craggy face of the senior line officer on the viewscreen. “Captain, I understand your orders are still in effect. I’m hoping we can call a truce during the transfer.”
“Consider it done.”
“Won’t that get you in trouble back home?”
“Sure, there’ll be the higher brass and politicians to contend with, people who consider the return of the TD-starship of more value than the lives of seventeen soldiers—and the Expansion troops. But when we get home, and the survivors are reunited with their families in front of the cameras, they’ll be singing a different tune, at least in public. I’ll deal with the backdoor consequences as they come.”
“Very good. Send the track and we’ll be on our way. By the way, the mutants Panur and Lila Bol will be accompanying us in their own ship, so don’t be surprised when you see a secondary contact.”
“Are they here to help against the Klin?” asked Captain Klein.
“That’s the plan…if people will stop shooting at us.”
Klein’s smile seemed genuine. “Sorry about that. I suppose that’s why you needed the prototype starship, to contact them?”
“That’s right. Now send the track, Captain. The air in here is getting pretty ripe.”
6
The Defiant met up with the Human USF Kentucky six-and-a-half-hours later. In the interim, a lower-ranking enlisted Ranger donned a spacesuit, tasked with dumping the disgusting contents of the single bucket they found in the cargo hold out the back of the ship. A section of the landing bay was designated as the new latrine, since the real one was a foul mess that may never recover from the abuse it had taken. There were no liners for the pail, and in order for the unfortunate soul to dump it, everyone in the landing bay had to crowd into the living area of the ship every half an hour so the rear door could be opened. But no one griped. They were just glad to be rid of the toxic mixture of Human and alien bodily waste.
Captain Klein asked if Adam wanted to bring the Defiant into one of the dual landing bays of the much larger ship for the transfer. He declined, preferring the passengers to be shuttled from his ship to the Kentucky. Even though he trusted the Navy captain, he didn’t feel comfortable placing his ship inside the other vessel. If something went wrong, it would involve a major fight to get away.
Of course, having Panur’s glowing egg-ship sitting twenty miles away did provide Adam with a pretty effective deterrent. He’d spread the word about how the tiny mutant spacecraft had chased the huge Klin black ship from the Pyrum system. That wasn’t exactly how it happened, but a little twisting of the truth never hurt anyone.
Captain Klein sent over a small amount of food stocks from his reserves, even though he couldn’t spare much. It would help, at least for a few days.
When the last of the Human and Expansion forces were gone, and the well-wishes expressed, the ships parted ways. Adam waited an hour before sending the Defiant away on an arbitrary course. He had no idea where they were going, but he also didn’t want Klein to report their whereabouts, which he was obligated to do. Adam and his people were outlaws within the Union, and the TD-starship still coveted by the Expansion—and everyone else. He’d traded the survivors for a head start. How much of one remained to be seen.
The crew climbed into spacesuits and vented the interior of the ship. It worked—to a point. It would take a strong chlorine scrub to remove the trace odors, which had soaked into clothing, furniture, even the overhead panels. It took another hour to get the toilet working again, with the repairmen still in their spacesuits until the job was done.
Panur brought his tiny ship into the landing bay, reuniting Lila and Arieel again. The mutant was Adam’s daughter, yet he didn’t have near the bond as mother and daughter. Nevertheless, Lila treated him with respect and acknowledged her Human heritage, but Adam got the impression she often went through the motions for his benefit. But the connection she and Arieel shared was real.
There were now nine bodies aboard the Defiant, which, while still overcrowded, was a lot better than before. There was Adam and the other Humans: Sherri, Riyad and Copernicus, along with the three mortal aliens, Kaylor, Jym and Arieel. Then there were the mutants. Fortunately, they didn’t eat any of the limited food supplies and could sleep in their own starship in the landing bay…if they every slept, which they didn’t.
Adam called everyone together in the common room.
“Okay, first things first,” he began. “Our power mods are just about drained, so we have to find someplace to resupply within five day’s distance from our present location. Most advanced worlds carry a ready supply of modules, so we won’t have to risk one of the Expansion-controlled production centers. Jym, what have you found?”
“There is a world called Siron located at the outer range you mentioned. It serves as a global mining colony, with a mixed population working the nearby asteroid belt. A fair number of ships pass through the system regularly, so they should have power modules that will fit the Defiant. And of course, food stocks should be plentiful.”
“Sounds good,” Adam said. “Give Kaylor the coordinates.”
Adam looked around at the faces of his makeshift team. “There’s another issue,” he said. “Unless some of you are hording a stash of credits somewhere, we have no money to buy the supplies we need. Everything I had was either in the residence building on the island or in the freighter. Hell, I didn’t even get off the planet with my pants, let alone my wallet.”
The Humans laughed; the aliens and mutants didn’t.
Adam had commandeered a
pair of pants and a shirt from one of the commandos. Even then, he only had one of each to last him until…well, he had no idea. He was more-or-less shooting in the dark here.
Coop produced a small stack of Juirean credits. “This is all I have on me. One hundred forty; that won’t do much, but it’s yours.”
They went around the room, and by the time it came back to Adam, they’d scrounge up five hundred eighteen JCs and fourteen Human dollars.
He looked at Panur and Lila. “I don’t suppose you have a fortune in gold hidden aboard your little leprechaun spaceship?”
“Currency has little meaning to us,” Panur said. “Yet if I may make a suggestion: Games of chance.”
Sherri shook her head, confused. “What does that mean?”
“It means I should be able to parlay the small amount you’ve collected into a much larger fortune. I assume they have gambling on Siron?”
The room was silent. In any other situation—and with different personalities—there would have been a round of protests from people not wanting to risk what little they had on something as unpredictable as gambling. Yet Panur was not your average person. And when it came to calculating odds and playing percentages, no one was better at it than the immortal mutant alien.
Several years back, he’d won almost two million dollars in the casinos of South Lake Tahoe while Adam was gone to Phoenix for a week. When he returned, Panur had used his winnings to purchase material and equipment needed to modify the Pegasus into a Sol-Kor stupor-beam-defying super starship. He also built a personal TD portal in Adam’s garage, which precipitated the attack—and subsequent destruction—of his home.
The team didn’t have a choice. And besides, with Panur sitting at the table, Adam was confidence the mutant could pull it off. He’d done it before.
