by Linda Mooney
Kyber started to respond when he sensed something was about to occur. Something that set the hairs on his body on end.
“No.”
“Then no one else knows of this purported alliance between you and those skints?”
Hearing his brother use the derogatory term for Terrans, his foreboding rose another notch.
“As far as I know, no. No one else knows of or is aware of the alliance.”
A small voice whispered in his ear, warning him. Telling him something was wrong. Something was amiss. “Remember what you thought earlier?” it murmured. “Remember? They have already tried you and found you guilty. All they need is the formality. The Triumvirate is present now. Do you know what that tells you? It tells you there will be no further hearings once you reach Seneecia.”
You have been found guilty.
The Terrans have been found guilty.
Kleesod, Massapa, Gaveer—guilty.
And once found guilty, their sentences will be imposed…with all due expediency.
“D’har Kyber, it is our belief that you acted unjustly and in defiance of our laws when you fought D’har Plat,” Jeha announced. “In addition, you knew your actions regarding contact with the Terrans was illegal, and sustaining an alliance with them would be considered treason. One final question. Is it true you took the Terran female as your consort?”
There it was. The question he had been waiting for.
Straightening, Kyber never broke eye contact with the man as he answered, “Yes, I did.”
“Then you know what the penalty for treason is, do you not?” Duruk inquired.
Kyber glanced up to see smirk come over his brother’s face. At that moment he knew exactly where Kelen and the others were. He knew exactly what was about to happen to them, and icy fear filled his bloodstream.
When this ship returned to Seneecia, he, his crewmembers, and every Terran would not be aboard.
The penalty for treason was death.
Chapter 9
Shuttle
Kyber burst from the conference room, taking the guard waiting outside by surprise. Jabbing his elbow into the man’s face, he snatched the Seneecian’s weapon from his belt and began running down the corridor, toward the lifepod bay. He only had a short time to make it there before Duruk hit the alert—
A high-pitched blare filled the ship. Kyber continued running through the ship, bypassing confused warriors who had paused to listen to the explanation for the alert that would immediately follow. He paused momentarily at a juncture, glancing both ways. There was the remote possibility they hadn’t been taken where he suspected. Knowing his brother, there was another way the man used to be rid of—
A familiar, beloved scent hovered in the air.
He sniffed again, and his body tensed with recognition.
Kelen.
If he hadn’t stopped, he would have missed it.
He took another step toward the lifepod bay, and her scent was stronger. Barely detectible, but stronger. He took off, following it.
He was almost to the bay when Duruk’s voice came over the intercom. “D’har Kyber is the enemy of Seneecia! Stop him at all costs! Stop D’har Kyber!”
As Kyber neared the end of the corridor, he couldn’t help but inwardly smile in amusement. Less than a handful of these warriors knew who he was. Add to that, the chevron emblazoned on his skin still noted him as being a Por D’har. One glance at his emblem, and the majority of the crew would dismiss him. He prayed those precious few seconds gained because of it would be enough.
The bay door slid open a split-second before he entered the large room. His brain took in the scenario before him as he raised the blaster to take out the four guards preparing and placing Kelen and the rest into individual lifepods. Several called out his name, but this was not the time for a welcome ceremony.
After removing the controls from one unconscious guard, he freed them from their shackles. “Get everyone out of those pods! Now!” Not waiting to watch them help those who had already been placed inside the single unit containers, Kyber raced back to the door and slammed down the inner locking mechanism. On every ship there were two such locks—at the lifepod bay and at the shuttle docking bay. Since both bays opened directly into space, the locks were a safety measure, meant to prevent the ship from decompressing and imploding.
He turned around to see everyone waiting for him. His eyes locked onto Kelen’s, and the need to pull her into his arms was almost overwhelming. Steeling himself, he strode over to where they were gathered.
“Is everyone all right?”
“We’re fine,” Cooter assured him. The man had taken possession of one of guards’ blasters. Fullgrath, Kleesod, and Massapa had the others.
“What’s happening, Kyber?” Sandow asked tightly.
Kyber shook his head. “I don’t have time to explain. We have to get out of here. Now. Before they manage to get the ship to unlock the bay.”
“Is the ship under siege?” Mellori questioned.
Kyber threw him a wry smile. “Yes. I’m the siege.”
“But they were evacuating us,” Jules informed him.
“Yes. They were going to jettison you out into space to die.”
His remark left them momentarily stunned, and they didn’t have time for that.
“We need to get out of this bay now!” he repeated with a growl.
“How? And go where?” Massapa questioned.
Kyber glanced around the bay as he tried to recollect the schematics for the ship. It was Gaveer who reminded him of what he was trying to recall.
“The access tubes!”
“Yes! Hurry!”
The Seneecian led them to the farthest end of the bay and dropped to his knees to begin undoing the plating in the floor. Kleesod joined him, quickly removing the panel to reveal a square-shaped tunnel. “Go to the shuttle bay,” Kyber tersely ordered.
Gaveer nodded and dropped into it head-first. Kyber shoved Kelen toward the opening. “Go!” he urged her. She entered without comment.
As Kleesod helped the rest of the Terrans into the tube, Massapa directed his attention to the opposite side of the bay. “Want to slow them down for good?” The Seneecian didn’t question Kyber’s actions. The man had already figured out how close they’d come to death.
Kyber glanced over at where the man was pointing. It was the panel where the lifepods were monitored as they were being loaded. He gave the man a nod. “Do what you can.”
Massapa grinned and took off as Fullgrath went down into the tube, leaving Kyber and Massapa as the last to join them.
“Where’s this thing taking us?” the former weapons master demanded to know.
“It interconnects with the shuttle bay,” Kyber informed him.
“Wait! We’re heading for the shuttle bay?” Mellori’s voice drifted back to them.
“We have to get off this ship as soon as possible,” Kyber told them.
They hurried on hands and knees through the dimly lit, squarish corridor. At one point, Fullgrath sarcastically remarked, “Does anyone else find it ironic that we’re back to crawling through more itty bitty-ass tunnels again to reach a bigger room?” No one answered him, but there were a few chuckles.
Word came down the line when they reached the shuttle bay. Kyber sent an order up to Gaveer to lock down the shuttle bay, and for Kleesod to ready the first shuttle he could reach that was large enough to accommodate them all. By the time he and Massapa emerged from the access tube, the others had already boarded one of the crafts and were waiting for them. Kyber and Massapa rushed inside. Kleesod sealed the door the behind them.
“Interior bay entrance is locked,” the Seneecian stated.
Kyber took the middle seat, noting that both the pilot and navigation chairs remained empty. As neither Massapa, Kleesod, nor Gaveer were bridge certified, he whirled around to where the Terrans were strapping themselves into seats.
“Kelen, Jules, I need you to take the helm, please.”
The two showed surprise at the request, but hurried to the front to take their seats.
“Oh, cool. I’ve always wanted to drive a pressure point,” Kelen remarked, sliding her hands into the two depressions on the console in front of her.
“Be careful. It is very sensitive,” he warned her a second before the ship unexpectedly lurched forward, taking them by surprise.
Kelen gave an embarrassed laugh. “So it seems.”
Kyber hit the button to begin opening the outer doors. Lights started flashing as a warning siren gave notice of immediate decompression. “We have to hurry. Kelen, take us out of here the second that opening’s wide enough.”
“Affirmative, D’har,” she crisply responded.
Jules held out his hands in exasperation. “I can’t read Seneecian. How am I supposed to navigate?”
Undoing his harness, Gaveer moved up to the console and pointed out the three basic features the navigator needed. “Input, distance, duration. In most cases, we use the same names for destination points as Terrans do. A majurr is our spacial mile, equivalent to approximately four point three of your kilometers. A babvar is equivalent to your parsec. And a hunta is one of your hours, give or take.” The Seneecian flashed him a brief smile. “You do the math, bright boy.”
Jules took a deep breath. “Ooookay. Where to, Kyber?”
“Try to discover where we are, In the meantime, Kelen, when you can, take us out four hundred meters, then turn this vehicle around to face the ship.”
This ship’s warning suddenly changed to a wail. The doors slowed, stopped…then began to close.
“They’re onto us!” Cooter cried out. “We’re not going to make it!”
“Not if I can help it. Hold on! This is going to be tricky!” Kelen squared her shoulders and focused on the narrowing opening.
Kyber felt the craft lifting, and the view outside the viewscreen changed as she rotated the shuttle vertically. Gradually the transport moved sideways, gaining speed as she tried to squeeze it between the tall doors.
Kyber barely had time to hold his breath when they slipped past the bay doors and out into space. By the time she righted the shuttle and turned it to where they were following the Seneecian ship on a parallel course, the bay doors had closed.
“They still have to re-pressurize the bay,” he called out. “Kleesod, take out those outer hatches!”
“Yes, D’har!” the man almost responded gleefully, and hurried over to the navigation board to take control of the weapons.
The shuttle vibrated as two warheads were fired from the belly of the craft. Everyone stared at the twin beams of light arching forward, striking the bay’s outer doors. There was a miniscule flash of light as that section of the hull evaporated, leaving a yawning gap. From where they were, they could see some of the shuttles within the ship had been damaged, but for the moment there was no way Duruk or his men could come after them. Not unless he used the massive warship itself to give chase, which Kyber believed the man would.
“Jules, any idea where we are?”
The navigator dragged his attention back to his readouts. “As far as I can tell, somewhere near the Bak Dur Bak system.”
Another faint memory nudged his brain. “Is there not a Terran defensive outpost in that system?”
“Uhh, yeah! Yeah, I think there is, although we’ve never been this far deep. Hold on.” The man’s fingers flew over the board. “Got it! Shit, I wish I knew how to punch in the coordinates.”
“Just give them to me,” Kelen tightly ordered. “I’ll wing it…somehow.”
Kyber turned to Kelen. “Set course for that outpost with all haste. His shuttles may be out of service, but I would not be surprised if Duruk tried to come after us with his ship.”
“You got it!”
“By the way, my one, nice trick with the vertical move.”
Although he couldn’t see her smile, he knew one was spreading over those beautiful, full lips as she took the shuttle out of that sector of space and away from the Seneecian warship.
Chapter 10
Allies
“Massapa, check the scanners. See if that warship is on our tail.”
The Seneecian left his seat to read them. “Nothing within range,” he responded.
“More than likely they’re still trying to comprehend what just happened to their shuttle bay,” Cooter remarked.
“We can only hope,” Kyber agreed.
“Wait until they find out what has happened in their lifepod bay,” Massapa quipped. When everyone turned to silently question him, the Seneecian grinned. “I set the automatic timer to begin ejecting the pods in sequence.”
“Can’t they override that command?” Cooter countered.
“Not as long as there is a hull breach,” Kyber told them.
Fullgrath let out a bark of laughter. “Oh, that’s rich! They’ve lost temporary access to their shuttle craft. And now all their lifepods are being squirted out into space like a Malgonese ballox giving birth to a litter of pups!”
The laughter that followed was needed. It also helped to relieve some of their tension and fear. Kyber turned to the navigator. “Jules, how long before we reach that outpost?”
“Umm, hold on. Gotta do the math mentally. At our current speed, a little over two hours.”
“Fuel?”
“Help me out here, Massapa,” Jules asked the Seneecian. Massapa did a quick estimation.
“We have enough for four hours. Maybe a little more.”
“Kelen, can we coax a little more speed—”
“Way ahead of you.”
“Keep an eye on that scanner.”
They continued on in silence. After a while, Sandow voiced the question Kyber knew the others had been needing to ask.
“What happened back there, Kyber?”
He swiveled slightly in his command seat to where he could glance back at them, while at the same time keep an eye on the front of the ship.
“Duruk never intended for us to live long enough to reach Seneecia. That’s why he was having you placed inside those lifepods. Once all of you were podded, you would have been ejected into space and left there to die.”
Fullgrath uttered a blaspheme. “That’s sick. What a fucking sick way to make someone suffer.”
“What about Plat?” Massapa wondered.
“I was told I had wrongfully bested Plat according the Law of Tooth and Nail. Plat claims I drew a weapon on him. That I earned my new ranking illegally.”
“That’s not what happened,” Fullgrath exclaimed. “He drew a weapon on you.”
“I even testified to that fact,” Jules added.
Kleesod spoke up. “It matters not. Duruk and the others would never accept the word of a Terran.”
“What about your word?” Kelen asked.
“Their word matters not. To the Triumvirate, their word is tainted,” Kyber responded.
“How’s that?” Cooter demanded.
Gaveer answered. “Because they believe we were ordered by our D’har to lie for him. That is why our word means nothing.”
“But Plat is lying,” Kelen insisted.
“Wait a minute.” Sandow leaned forward slightly. “Are you telling us Duruk will take the word of his friend over that of his own brother?”
Kyber managed a partial grin. “The bond between Plat and Duruk is stronger than blood.”
“That’s twice fucked up,” Fullgrath muttered.
“So what happened?” Mellori questioned. “How did you know we’d be where the lifepods were located?”
“I was brought in front of the Triumvirate to testify,” Kyber admitted. “They specifically asked me about our run-in with the Terrans. About the tegris. About who knew about the neverwylde planet.”
“Hoooold on there a minute.” Cooter held up a hand for attention. “Back up. Tegris? Neverwylde?”
“You mentioned a tegris before,” Kelen noted.
“It is what we call an anomaly that remain
s stationary in space,” Kleesod explained.
“Like wormholes and black holes?”
“Usually,” Kyber acknowledged.
“What about Neverwylde? I thought you said that planet wasn’t called Neverwylde,” Fullgrath brought up. “I thought you said its name was something else.”
“I was informed that a neverwylde is a planet that has sustained a cataclysmic event, yet still is able to sustain life forms,” Kyber told them. “That planet we were on is a neverwylde. Apparently our superiors have known about it for some time, but for some reason have kept its existence and location secret.” He pointed to Dox. “Dox was right all along when he called it Neverwylde.”
“Go on with your story,” Sandow urged. “They asked who all knew about the wormhole and the planet. And?”
“I could tell they were covering their tracks.” Kyber bowed his head. “They wanted to make certain no one else was aware we had crashed on that planet.”
“And by disposing of us all nice and tidy, no one would ever be the wiser,” Cooter drawled. “No need to bring politics into it. No need for diplomatic shit. All cut and dried, nice and neat.”
“And Plat?” Jules whispered.
Fullgrath snorted. “My guess is he’d become a miraculous rescue from space. The sole survivor of a vicious battle with a Terran warship. He’d go home and be lauded as a hero.” The man eyed them all. “And none of Duruk’s men would or could say anything, or else they’d find themselves also jettisoned out into space to die, like they tried to do with us. You guys have one hell of a way of ensuring crew loyalty.”
“Kyber.”
He turned to look at Kelen.
“You figured out their plan and came to rescue us.” She locked eyes with him. “You could have just as easily escaped on your own, but you came for us.”
“There was no choice involved,” he whispered. “I did what I felt was the right thing to do. With faith and a little luck, we will survive this, the same way we survived Neverwylde. Together, as allies.”
“And friends,” a small voice added. It was Dox, speaking up for the first time since leaving the planet.
