by Chris Bunch
“There it is,” he said.
“Standing out like a maiden aunt at an orgy,” Goodnight said.
“I wonder if Mister Tomkins is a brave man, leading from the front and all, and decided to attend the final destruction of Star Risk?” Friedrich murmured.
“Yes, indeed,” von Baldur said, answering his own question as the ship onscreen flashed into motion. “Things are suddenly not going well for the Alliance, and so our friend settles on the better part of valor.
“With no one noticing.
“No one but myself, that is. Mr. Spada, could you pursue that ship?”
“No problem,” Spada said. “We’ve got legs and legs on it.”
The McMahon was in pursuit.
Star Risk was watching the forward screens, paying only slight attention to the battle still raging on, its outcome no longer clear.
No one said anything as the armed merchantman grew larger.
There was a single destroyer with it.
“Unless he turns to fight,” von Baldur said, “ignore that escort.”
Spada didn’t bother replying.
“Closing … closing …” he reported, checking a proximity screen.
“Would you care to do the honors?” he asked von Baldur, indicating the weapons console.
Von Baldur didn’t answer, but sat down at the weapons station and hit sensors, a rather holy look on his face.
“Closing,” Spada said. “Four seconds to launch range. In range. Fire when ready.”
But von Baldur waited.
“I will make sure,” he said firmly.
“Well, don’t wait until we’re up his arse,” Goodnight said.
“And this is now that,” von Baldur said, and hit a launch key.
A missile spat out of the McMahon’s tubes.
Friedrich took it under manual guidance, and looped it over the fleeing Cerberus ship, then smashed it down, just behind the command area.
Flame flashed and went out.
There was a sudden shout on a com.
Riss guessed it was from the stricken ship.
Its escort paid no mind, but held at flank speed.
“Uh, Freddie,” Riss said. “I think we’ve got a lifeboat launch.”
“So we do,” von Baldur said. “I cannot see the justification for that.”
A second missile shot out, homed on the tiny craft holding no one knew whom.
The missile exploded, and there was nothing but empty space when the roiling gasses cleared.
“Well, well,” von Baldur said, turning from the weapons panel. “The quality of mercy is, indeed, somewhat strained.
“You know, this did not turn out to be such a bad day after all.”
FIFTY-EIGHT
Eldad Yarb’ro tried to ignore the throb in his arm, as well as the worry about whether they might have to amputate and graft.
A word had come to him:
Baraka.
It came, he remembered, from an extinct Earth culture, and he didn’t know where he’d come across it.
It meant luck, but more than luck.
The gods would be on your side if you had baraka.
Star Risk had baraka.
Yarb’ro could have been angry.
He wasn’t.
The disaster to Cerberus was so total he almost wanted to laugh.
Especially since his personal nemesis Ral Tomkins was most surprisingly quite dead, and vanished somewhere as he fled the battle in the Alsaoud System.
The Alliance forces that Tomkins had been so proud of had turned out to be nothing but some third-ranked reservists, who had been quickly withdrawn by their home system when the casualty rate of that disastrous battle was reported.
And so Star Risk had won.
More than won, Yarb’ro thought.
After the battle had subsided, without a clear victory on either side, they had the temerity to orbit over the capital, whatever the hell it was, and threaten the Alsaoud government with bombardment if a ransom was not paid.
It was paid, and then the government had hastily resigned, in favor of whoever those goddamned immigrants were who’d started this nonsense.
Yarb’ro sighed.
With Tomkins dead and his satraps in disfavor, Cerberus had turned back to Yarb’ro to take charge again and bring about some kind of order, and try to reestablish their rather injured reputation with the Alliance.
That, Yarb’ro knew, wasn’t quite the task others in Cerberus thought it would be.
Time would pass, memories would fade, and others would make bigger errors.
Of course, Cerberus was out of the Alsaoud worlds for all time.
And equally of course, there were those who wanted Star Risk to be hunted down and obliterated.
Yarb’ro smiled wryly.
Maybe they should be.
But they had baraka.
And, at least for the time being, they were to be feared and shunned.
The Galaxy was a very large place, with room for everyone.
FIFTY-NINE
M’chel Riss sat against a tree and listened to the sounds of her island being rebuilt.
It was a beautiful day.
She had credits in the bank. A new bank. Although Alliance Credit had whined their apologies, that wasn’t good enough.
Maybe not as many credits as she would like, but enough to reconstruct her home so that it was even better than before.
Next, she would have to start looking for work.
Not, she thought smugly, as a solo act, but once again as a member of Star Risk, ltd.
The others were scattered, intent on their various forms of rest and recovery.
Except for Freddy, who was bustling about supervising the finishing, custom touches on the completed building they’d bought on Trimalchio.
Work.
Yes.
In a while.
There would be the perfect assignment, somewhere out there, she knew.
M’chel Riss felt very lucky.
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Text Copyright © 2005 by Chris Bunch
All rights reserved.
Published in association with Athans & Associates Creative Consulting
Cover image(s) © 123rf.com
Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author's imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
eISBN 10: 1-4405-5383-1
eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-5383-7
