“There,” Tamika said with confidence, “that takes care of number 1 and 2 clamps.”
Lemus returned another thumbs-up to confirm that his clamp was released. As they moved to the second set of clamps, Tamika pressed her com link on her arm control. “Lanatek, signal the Telenian to circle around for a pickup. We are going to need them to collect our core once the plasma has been purged.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Lanatek answered through the com link, “they are waiting a short distance away for safety.”
“Good,” Tamika acknowledged.
The two followed the same procedure for the second set of clamps, and both confirmed success by exchanging smiles through their helmets.
“Now,” Lemus said, “just one more final clamp located on the top of the reactor core at the front.”
“I will go,” Tamika said to Lemus.
Tamika made her way to the final clamp and climbed the side ladder to the top of the cylindrical reactor tube that paralleled horizontally down the center of the room.
Once Tamika reached the access panel, she let out a gasp as she discovered that a piece of hull fell onto the control panel and broke the silver ring off the control.
“We are going to have a little problem with this one,” Tamika said, calling to Lemus. “Bring a laser autovise and an ionic lever so we can get ahold of this clamping ring. The ring has been broken off.”
Lemus gathered the requested tool kits and carried them to Tamika. He set them on the top of the cylinder and opened the kits and handed the first tool to Tamika. The laser autovise was a laser vise-gripping device that could be used to grab and hold objects with great force. Tamika placed the tool and positioned the laser on the broken handle. She switched on the autovise and turned up the gain power to securely hold the base to the surface to prevent any movement and then fired the autovise onto where the ring should have been. Lemus handed her the ionic lever, which was used like a high-tech crowbar that could attach to laser beams and then bend them.
Tamika took the ionic lever and positioned it three-quarters of the way up the laser autovise’s beam. The ionic lever surrounded the laser beam with a shimmering blue light. Using both hands, she pulled with all her might to pull up the locking cylinder. The ionic lever began to slip through Tamika’s gloves. Lemus put his gloved hands around Tamika’s to help her stabilize the ionic lever. The two of them pulled as hard as they could. Finally, they unlocked the clamp and then turned the cylinder to the fully unlocked position. When Tamika turned off the ionic lever and the autovise, the cylinder fell into the reseated position, which switched both indicator lights to red.
“Come on,” Tamika shouted into her com system, “we need to get out of here before we eject the core. We do not want to be pulled out with it.”
“Right!” Lemus acknowledged as the two made their way to the air lock.
“Open the air lock door. We are finished here. Prepare to jettison the core on my command,” Tamika ordered.
The air lock door slowly opened, allowing the two to exit the core room. The air lock closed behind them, and they began to hear a swoosh of air in the chamber as it equalized to the engineering control room. The outer door opened as the two removed their life suit helmets and looked into the core chamber room.
“Now!” Tamika shouted. “Eject the core!”
The Crytore began to shake and shimmy as they reached their highest critical velocity. The hull made loud groaning noises and then a large explosion as the core ejecting bolts fired in succession at each clamp. The core started to move down the end of the ship. The emergency core jettison port opened at the rear of the ship, and the core exited the Crytore followed by a tremendous explosion a few thousand meters behind the ship as the Crytore continued to hurl through space.
Lanatek fired the reverse thrusters to slow the ship back to safe levels while the shock wave of the exploded plasma core approached the Crytore from the rear.
“Brace for impact!” Lanatek ordered from the bridge.
“Hold on!” Tamika shouted.
The shock wave came in contact with the Crytore and enveloped the entire ship with an energy wave. The ship rocked and jostled back and forth as the bridge team attempted to maintain a positive attitude to the wave.
“We are getting some very high levels of tachyon readings inside this energy beam,” Lanatek reported.
Tamika returned to the bridge with Lemus. She headed over to the science station to have a look for herself at the strange readings Lanatek had reported. “Open a channel to the Telenian,” she ordered.
“They are not there, Captain,” the com officer said. “They were out there a minute ago and then nothing.”
“Tactical, any sign of debris? Could they have been in the way of that explosion?”
“No, ma’am, they were well out the path of the explosion. I suppose they could have been knocked back by the shock wave, but I do not see any readings of any kind from the Telenian.”
The energy wave had now depleted and no longer had any effect on the Crytore. Tamika started to make preparations for their survival.
“Okay,” Tamika began, “start shutting down all nonessential systems. We need to preserve our energy supply for as long as we can. That means any system we do not need for navigation or life support.”
The crew followed Tamika’s orders and started to shut down lights, artificial gravity, and only kept basic environmental settings.
“Helm, I need to you find us a place to set down. We only have a few hours of reserve power. The rest of you gather together all supplies and stock the crew transport, shuttles, and fighters. If we do not find a suitable place to land, we will be forced to abandon the ship. I will remain, as the captain’s duty, last on board. Mother, this means you too. You need to get yourself off this ship with the others.”
“I will not leave my daughter behind. I am staying with you to the end,” Luanren sternly answered.
Tamika only gave her mother a stare for a moment and then turned to address other matters, knowing full well that she would lose that fight.
“Helm, have you found anything yet? Do you have any coordinates or a heading to program?”
“Not yet, Captain,” the Helmsman answered with a look of concern. “However, I do have a ship on an intercept course. It is of an unknown ship design.”
“Increase scanning power. Can you put it on the view screen?”
“Yes, I’ll have it in a moment.”
The helmsman continued to fine-tune his instruments, and an image began to appear on the view screen, but the image was fuzzy and a little blurry.
“Can you clean that up any?”
“One more adjustment,” the helmsman said. “There.”
The crew of the Crytore stood on the bridge, looking at the view screen in confusion.
“If I am not mistaken,” Tamika stated, “that is an ancient star cruiser. In fact, that is an ancient Zelinite star cruiser! What is that doing out here?”
“I do not know, ma’am,” Lanatek answered. “But I do know that if they are on their way to intercept us, we have no defenses or weapons without our core power. We are sitting ducks. Even with their outdated weapons, we are no match.”
“All right then,” Tamika ordered, “abandon the ship. We have about seventy-five as our crew complement. With the remaining fighters, the crew transport, and the two shuttles, everyone has a seat. My mother and I will remain last and will escape with my shuttle. We will make our way to the Karillian system as a unit. Once you get in range, put out a distress call and have one of them send out a rescue ship. We will rendezvous at Karillia.”
“But, ma’am,” Lanatek began.
“This is not up for debate, Lanatek. You will be in charge of the fleet. Just ensure they make it safely. Mother, you and I will plant charges on the ship and will blow it so they will not gain the technology.”
Luanren gave her daughter a nod of approval. “If we can do it just right, we may get lucky and take them
out with it,” Luanren said.
“We can only hope, but I do not plan on sticking around too long. Okay, everyone get busy. They’re getting closer.”
“Still,” Tamika quizzed, “that does not explain how a ship that has not been on any roster for over a thousand years is out here.”
“And it looks like it is in pretty good shape for as old as it appears to be,” Luanren added.
The crew prepared the evacuation in record time. Once they left the ship, they made their way to the Karillian system with Lanatek in charge of the convoy. Tamika and her mother finished setting the charges along the critical section of the Crytore. Their hope was that the Zelinite ship would see them as disabled with no power and come in for a closer look. They would wait for them in Tamika’s shuttle. When the time was right, they would power up all their systems, exit the Crytore, and throw the switch, setting off the explosives. Their hope was to catch their foe off guard, and with the destruction of the Crytore, they would take out or significantly damage the cruiser. Then they could make their getaway and join the rest of the convoy.
The Zelinite cruiser stopped just outside the range of the Crytore. Tamika and Luanren monitored the ancient ship’s movements inside her shuttle, only using minimal power so as to not alert the approaching enemy.
Luanren whispered to her daughter, “They stopped… Looks like they might not take the bait just yet.”
“Why are you whispering?” Tamika whispered back.
“I do not know,” Luanren again whispered.
“Look, they launched a shuttle,” Tamika said in a normal voice. “We did not anticipate that. They are going to board her to have a look.”
“Once they make the open shuttle bay, we will be trapped,” Luanren said with panic.
“Power up engines... full throttle. We need to get out of here,” Tamika said as she activated her shuttle systems.
As Tamika and Luanren exited the shuttle at full power, they turned away from the approaching enemy, set off the charges, and began to speed away.
“Shields are not activating. We took too much damage when we docked,” Luanren said.
Three fighters exited the Zelinite ship and approached their damaged shuttle. The charges went off, causing the Crytore to fire its explosives at all the strategic places they had set. The ship began to light up like a Christmas tree as it broke into three sections. The separated sections drifted apart and then exploded, causing the Crytore to disintegrate into millions of bits, scattering debris in all directions.
The Zelinite shuttle was hit by a large section during the explosion, causing it to burst into flames, and then it too exploded. The flames lasted only seconds as the air that the fire needed burned up quickly. This left the bulk of the Zelinite shuttle spiraling out of control, and then it crashed into what little that remained of the Crytore. The two pilots and a small complement of Zelinite soldiers were hurled out into space and killed by its vacuum.
The cruiser was rocked sideways by the shock wave of the exploding Crytore but quickly resumed control and appeared to not have sustained any damage. The ship turned and began to pursue Tamika’s shuttle with the three fighters quickly surrounding them.
Tamika changed course with one last chance to evade their pursuers, but one of the fighter pilots aimed and shot its laser blasters at their engines and knocked the power out of the shuttle.
“Well,” Tamika said, looking at her mother, “it has been a rather bad day.”
“I would agree with that, but I do not like stating the obvious,” Luanren answered. “And I think it is going to get worse before it gets any better, my dear.”
The fighters who captured the shuttle with a tractor beam escorted the two back to the docking bay of the Zelinite ship.
Once inside, two soldiers approached their shuttle. Tamika and Luanren tried to see what they looked like, but the shuttle glass was fogged up just enough to prevent them from seeing their adversaries.
One of the soldiers held up a hypnotic controlling mesmerizer device and fired it at the two, causing both of them to fall into unconsciousness.
* * *
Zelinte Ship
Interrogations
Tamika slowly began to wake up from the stun the Zelinite had put her under. She was dazed and confused. Her head was covered by a cloak, and her arms and legs were fastened to the chair by some type of beam that caused tingling at each point of her body where it was holding her. She heard someone rustling around. The room was cold and damp. She could hear a constant hissing sound as steam was being released into the room.
She thought to herself that this was a bad situation, being captured by the Zelinite. They will surely kill me after they obtain any knowledge, she thought. More concerning was that she didn’t feel the presence of her mother in the same room. What have they done with her? She began to get restless, and she began to moan and groan the more the stun wore off.
“Well, well, well,” the Zelinite said, “I see you are finally waking up. Good. Tell me who you are and where you came from?”
“Take this bag off of my head first. I wish to see my captors.”
“Very well,” the Zelinite said as he reached over and pulled off the hood that had been covering Tamika.
The room was dim, and her eyes needed a few moments to adjust to this low light.
“Now,” he continued, “tell me what I want to know.”
“Tell me your name first. We have a custom to address our enemy by our first names.”
“My name is Milanaka,” he said with a proud voice, “captain of this vessel, and your name?”
Tamika’s eyes finally became acclimated to the dim-lit room. She looked at her captor, Milanaka, and for the first time, she found herself face-to-face staring at a Zelinite.
Milanaka had now sat in front of Tamika in a tall-backed chair that was padded with leather-looking material. He had a bulky torso, and his arms were small and spindly as were his legs. He had an exo-muscular structure and appeared to be very strong in nature. His arms and legs were dotted with thick black hair, which had the appearance of very large fly hairs. His head was narrow with his eyes appearing on the sides of his face, giving him excellent peripheral vision. His jaw was jagged and protruded, giving him a large underbite. The muscles that covered his body were the color of reddish black. He was wearing a vest that looked more like an overcoat that covered his shoulders and flowed down below the back of his knees.
“My name is Tamika of the royal house of Sö’,” she answered with just as much pride in her voice as her captor. “What right do you have to take me prisoner?”
“Well, Tamika of the royal house of Sö’,” Milanaka said in a sarcastic voice, “you are my prisoner because you tried to destroy my ship.” He leaned closer to Tamika’s face as he finished.
Tamika could barely stand the stench coming out of the Zelinite’s mouth, causing her to cough a couple of times. “Do you not know who I am?” she coughed out. “We are at war.”
“War?” Milanaka asked, leaning back, giving Tamika some breathing room. “What do you mean war? With who?”
“With Ackturra,” Tamika said with sternness.
“With Ackturra?” Milanaka said with a troubling voice. “We are not at war with Ackturra. We are on a peaceful mission of trade. We are on our way there right now, in fact. We seek the power crystals.” He finished speaking with glee in his voice.
“If you are on a peaceful mission, then why a military ship?”
“Space is a dangerous place. Many predators. We protect ourselves, and if we don’t get what we want, we take it. Besides, you changed the subject. You need to answer my questions.”
“You have not asked any new questions for me to answer.”
“So for instance, where did you come from? I’ve never seen such a nice ship before, so advanced. Too bad you blew it up.”
“I was going to ask you the same question. Where did you come from, and where did you acquire such an ancient ship?”
Tamika sat motionless for a moment as she began to put some of the pieces together. She thought about the Telenian missing from their tracking sensors and the core explosion followed by the tachyon readings. Then there was this appearance of this ancient ship that seemed to be in mint condition. Finally, the current conversation with Milanaka stating this ancient ship is only months old, and his lack of knowledge of an Ackturrian war. She had a feeling that they had traveled back in time somehow.
Not wanting to tip her hand, she began to play along with the Zelinite. “Okay, I will tell you that I am from the Ackturrian High Council. We were en route to the Karillian system when we had engine problems. We had to eject our core, and it exploded.”
“That didn’t look like a core breach to me. It looked more like a trap that backfired. You were after the Rune, weren’t you? Come on, admit it!”
“Okay, you got me. We wanted the Rune,” she said, wondering what that was.
“Well, you can’t have it. That is my only bargaining chip if Ackturra doesn’t give us the crystals we want.”
That is the infection that they put on the crystals, she thought, almost exclaiming out loud. “The Rune infection huh,” she said to Milanaka. “Do you think you can take the crystals by force if we do not trade with the Zelinite?”
“That’s how we run our business. If we don’t get our satisfaction, we take by force. The Rune infection will ensure that Ackturrians won’t want the crystals anymore. Really, it’s just business,” Milanaka said with passion.
“Maybe we can reach a deal before we arrive at Ackturra. I am on the high council.”
“Perhaps. I will entertain your proposal,” Milanaka said, waving his hand in the air.
“But first, you have to release us, and I will not deal with you if you have harmed my mother in any way.”
“Don’t be silly. She is fine. Fine indeed. She is waiting in one of our holding cells. Actually, I questioned her first, but she wasn’t quite as cooperative as you. Your people are remarkably resilient—and strong willed too, I might add.”
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