Dark Space

by Stephen A. Fender

  Grabbing his helmet from his locker, Shawn was vaguely aware that his name was being called over the ship’s intercom—a message for him to return to the bridge. Disregarding the notice, Shawn stepped purposefully from the locker room and into the main hangar deck. Rushing to the side of one of the Jolly Rogers’ fighters, Shawn put his identity card to the side of the canopy, and he breathed a sigh of relief that it opened. Thank God they haven’t cleared my memory card. This would have been over before it even started.

  It was then that Trent came bounding around the corner and hefted himself up to the cockpit as Shawn strapped himself in. “What’s going on, man?” Trent asked hurriedly.

  Shawn pointed a gloved finger at the launch door. “I need to get through that door in two minutes. Make it happen.”

  Trent followed the direction of the finger, then turned back to Shawn. “Come again?”

  “Get the doors open. How hard is that to understand?”

  “Umm, begging your pardon, Commander-sir, but can’t you just request that they be opened from the bridge?”

  “No, I can’t. Just do it.”

  “Do the words ‘highly illegal’ or ‘court-martial’ mean anything to you?”

  “They would if I cared. Besides, I know you can hack into the system and do it, so don’t give me that bull that you can’t. Now, I’m going to put this as bluntly as I can, old buddy: open the launch bay doors now. That’s an order, Sergeant.”

  Trent could see the unwavering look in Shawn’s eye, and could tell there was going to be no dissuading him from his cause. Whatever his reason, Shawn knew what he was doing—and was willing to accept the consequences for it. Trent, however, swallowed hard at the thought of peeling potatoes for the rest of his life. With a slow nod, he agreed to do what was ordered of him. “Sure thing, Skipper. Good luck.”

  Shawn reached out a hand, which Trent took without a moment’s hesitation. “Thanks.”

  Four minutes and thirty seconds later, the launch bay doors opened, and Shawn’s fighter rocketed out into space to intercept Nova.

  Glancing down to his computer console, Shawn could easily see that the Duchess was trying to hail him. In truth, he was half-surprised that the carrier hadn’t instantly overridden his navigational computer to bring his fighter back automatically. He pondered if opening the channel would press his luck too far, but decided that—if this was to be the end of his career as he had come to know it—he would still try to do it by the book. Pressing the switch, he opened a channel to the Duchess’s communications system.

  “Go ahead, Duchess. This is Kestrel.”

  “I’d sure like to know what the hell you’re doing in one of my fighters, mister.” It was Ramos, and he was far from happy.

  “Just going after our little problem, sir.” Shawn said, trying to sound both casual and calm, although he felt neither.

  “You don’t have authorization for this, Commander. We’ve got two interceptors already on patrol on the far side of the planet. They’ll be in range in ten minutes. We’re also launching additional fighters to support them, any they’ll be away in less than five. That’s more than enough to handle one rogue fighter. Now get your ass back here on the double, Commander. That’s an order.”

  “I’m already in range. Besides, Santorum will be long gone before your fighters ever get close.”

  “That’s an opinion, and not one up for debate, Commander,” Ramos replied angrily. “If you’ve got some personal vendetta for what he did to Roslyn, let me tell you this: we picked up a life sign reading from what remains of her craft. We’re sending out a team to retrieve her as we speak. Now you get back here this instant or you’ll find yourself on the losing end of my patience, not to mention a court-martial.”

  Shawn breathed a short sigh of relief, knowing that Roslyn was still alive. Still, that was of little comfort over what he still needed to do. Nova needed to be brought back, and if Shawn didn’t act quickly, there wouldn’t be a chance in hell of that happening. Once Santorum was through the jump gate he could easily destroy the one at his end point, sealing any chance of bringing him to justice.

  “I’m sorry, Captain,” Shawn replied regretfully. “This is something I have to do. I guess that faith you had in me was misplaced.” Reaching down, he silenced the communications channel before reaching for the thruster control. With one hand on the control stick, he pushed the accelerator to full burn, rocking the fighter in a burst of acceleration that pushed him back into his seat.

  “Full military power cannot be maintained for much longer, dear,” the synthetic female voice of the computer chimed in after two minutes.

  Shawn looked down at his sensors, noting with satisfaction that Nova had just entered his weapons range, still seemingly oblivious to his pursuer. Flipping on the ship-to-ship, Shawn opened a channel to him.

  “Jerry, this is Kestrel. I know you’re in there. Disengage your weapons and return to base.” There was no answer, and the jump gate was getting dangerously close. “Jerry … don’t make me open fire on you.” Again Shawn was met with silence. “Computer, charge the particle cannons.”

  “You got it, baby,” it replied a second later.

  On the sensor screen, Shawn watched as two additional fighters came into range. The interceptors from the Duchess. Grasping the control stick tightly, Shawn fired a short burst of rounds that skirted Nova’s Maelstrom. Not close enough to hit him, they did an admirable job of causing the wayward pilot to veer off from the jump gate. Still, Nova was a capable pilot, and could get his fighter to turn on a dime if need be. Shawn figured he had less than sixty seconds to end the situation before it became critical.

  As if reading Shawn’s thoughts on the matter, Jerry pivoted his fighter in a one-hundred-eighty-degree hard turn. For a moment, the two fighters were head to head, and Jerry took the opportunity to fire a single missile at Shawn.

  Correctly sensing the maneuver, Shawn veered to port, narrowly avoiding the missile in the process.

  “In case you’re wondering,” the computer said leisurely, “sensors report J-R-One-Zero-Four is out of missiles.”

  “It’s a start,” Shawn mused. He looked to the sensor screen to see that Nova had doubled back on his original heading. He’d be at the gate in fifteen seconds. “Are his particle cannons charged?”

  “Affirmative, dear.”

  Shawn pivoted to starboard, bringing both Nova and the jump gate dead center in his targeting system. Switching to missiles, Shawn was intent on blowing the jump gate itself into space dust just as Nova’s navigation computer activated the portal. In a flash of light, he was gone.

  Shawn had little time to waste, as the gate’s internal memory would self-wipe in a few short seconds. He had one chance. Pushing the throttle lever full forward, the Maelstrom once again rocketed through space. “Computer, activate the jump gate using the last programmed coordinates in its memory.”

  “Are you sure?” it asked in a lazy tone. “Wouldn’t you rather go to—”

  The gate quickly filled the cockpit. In ten seconds it would be all over one way or another. With one hand on the control stick, he subconsciously put the other one on the ejection lever—not that it would do him any good at his rate of speed. “Just do it! Now! Activate the—”

  “Fine, dear. Don’t get your underwear in—” the computer began just as a brilliant light flashed all around the fighter.

  %%%

  “—a wad,” the computer finished after the Maelstrom emerged from the destination portal.

  Shawn’s eyes quickly adjusted to his surroundings. It wasn’t often that fighters were authorized to utilize jump gates. The fragility of their craft made such journeys tenuous at best, usually approved only in emergency situations. As Shawn looked down to the myriad of computer readouts he was receiving, he could understand why.

  Most importantly, his fusion core was empty. That meant that not only could he not jump back to where the Duchess of York and the fleet was, but that the remainder of h
is maneuvering would be on solid fuel only. In a combat situation—as he was in now—that would afford him about thirty minutes of powered flight. After that, the batteries would kick in.

  Unfortunately, their power had been halved. Any reserves he could normally tap into in an emergency were useless. The long-range transmitter antenna was a pile of junk, and the automatic landing systems operation was dubious at best. The only saving grace was that, very likely, Santorum’s fighter would be in the same shape. That meant that Nova was somewhere nearby—wherever Shawn was. Thankful he hadn’t materialized in some backwater asteroid field, Shawn accessed the sensors and tried to get a quick overview of his immediate surroundings. A moment later he was greeted with limited, but useful, information.

  At least the sensors still work.

  On the small readout, Shawn saw the overview of a nine-planet system, with a white-dwarf star at its center. The name of the system, Mardron, was flashing in bold text above the diagram. The fifth planet was habitable, if you enjoyed the idea of living on a giant snowball. All the others were either enormous rocks or gas giants. He didn’t take the time to count the total number of satellites in the system, but guessed there were dozens.

  Mardron. He pondered the name for a moment. He knew of it, but only in passing. It was an out-of-the-way system, too distant from anything to be an effective outpost, but still close enough to Temkorian space that it made Shawn exceedingly uncomfortable. That put him several dozen parsecs from the Duchess—let alone any Sector Command support. If one of the scaly-skinned mercenaries’ frigates or cruisers happen to come upon his lone fighter, he was quite sure no one would ever discover his fate. Thankfully, the sensors showed no such warships in the area. However, it did show Nova’s fighter limping toward the fifth planet at reduced speed. Shawn had been right: the jump had wounded him.

  Requesting all available power, Shawn pivoted to once again intercept the fighter, his thoughts about being permanently stranded in the backwater system all but forgotten. A small light on his console informed him that he was well within communications range. Pressing the call button, Shawn tried once again to open the channel. “Jerry, this is Shawn. Come in, please.”

  He was greeted with static. Either Shawn’s transceiver was damaged, or Santorum was still giving him the silent treatment. Quickly looking over his diagnostic terminal, he leaned toward the latter. “Jerry, I know your fighter’s damaged,” he began, hoping to lure the lieutenant into conversation. “You’re stuck out here, and there’s nowhere to run. The gate isn’t going to do you any good, and it’s only a matter of time before Sector Command figures out where we are.”

  More static. Santorum continued on course for the icy Mardron-Five without a single fluctuation in his heading.

  Fixing his scanners on the planet, Shawn was greeted with a reading of no humanoid life, and only spare life sign readings from indigenous creatures. No vegetation, except for the equator, which contained large patches of a blue-green algae that was toxic to humans.

  “There’s nothing out here, Jer,” Shawn said, as much to Santorum as to himself. “I’m getting cold just looking at that oversized snow cone out there. What do you say we find a nice bar with some warm drinks and talk this over? Whatever it is, it can’t possibly be worth dying over. And by the looks of the damage to your fighter, you’re going to need all the help you can get.”

  More static, but Shawn got the distinct impression he heard a faint sigh over the comm channel. Did I just imagine that, or am I finally getting through to him?

  After another tense moment, Shawn’s computer informed him that not only was Nova now in weapons range, but that he should also fire at his earliest convenience. Disregarding the machine, Shawn gripped the control stick, his finger hovering over the particle accelerator trigger when he heard Nova’s voice.

  “I can’t go back, nor do I want to.”

  Surprised, Shawn wanted to try and keep the man talking. “Aw, come on, Jer. The food isn’t all that bad.” If he could just get a little closer, Shawn was sure he could disable the fighter with a single, well-placed shot to the drive module.

  “This … this isn’t right. Can’t you see? Don’t you understand?” Jerry said, sounding both bewildered and terrified.

  “Help me understand, Jerry. I want to help.”

  “No,” the lieutenant replied, then repeated himself thrice more, each one louder than the previous. “You don’t understand, and I’m not going to try and convince you. It’d be pointless.” There was a pause before he spoke again. “Raven … she was my friend. I didn’t … I didn’t … but I did. I had to.” This was followed by what sounded like a grunt of pain.

  “Jerry? Are you okay. You sound hurt.” But Jerry seemed more than just hurt. It was almost as if he were … confused. “You’ve only got a few minutes of fuel reserves left. We need to—”

  “In a few minutes, one of us is going to be dead, and I’m willing to bet that it isn’t going to be me.” Jerry’s tone was no longer labored, replaced now with ominous inflection.

  Shawn nudged his fighter a little closer, slowing to one-quarter power. “You seem awfully confident there, buddy. What’s your plan?” Shawn switched on the computer-controlled targeting computer. He hated the thing, but it was the only way to make sure the first shot was the only one fired in this altercation.

  “First I’m going to kill you,” Jerry said with a maniacal chuckle. “Just like I did to Raven. Then my friends out there are going to come pick me up. I’ll be drinking to your bad health long after Sector Command even figures out where you jumped to, let alone comes to your rescue.”

  Gone was the West Texan drawl that Shawn had become accustomed to hearing from the young man. If it weren’t for the pitch and tone, Shawn doubted he would even recognize the voice as Jerry’s. And what “friends” was he talking about? The sensors were still a blank … unless his computer was still acting up. Then again, if someone were out there, they would have undoubtedly come to the rescue already. No. He’s waiting for someone, and if I don’t take care of this quickly, they’re going to take me out when they show up.

  The computer registered a positive lock on Santorum’s drive module with a beep that broke Shawn’s chain of thought. He increased the pressure to his finger, but as the single energy blast shot out from his fighter, Jerry managed a dive that would have caused most pilots to lose their lunch. The charged energy rounds passed harmlessly through empty space.

  “You’ll have to try harder than that, Commander,” Santorum jibed.

  Shawn watched as the fighter came out of its descent in a leisurely manner, as if the younger officer was gloating. Shawn still had a full load of medium-and long-range missiles. He could easily fire off a small salvo, knowing that Jerry wouldn’t be able to evade them all. However, Shawn wanted him alive, and would do whatever he had to do to get Santorum to talk. Keeping the cannons set to half power, Shawn throttled up and moved to intercept him once again.

  Jerry likewise accelerated, then turned to bring his craft head-on with Shawn’s once again. Shawn was silently grateful Nova had depleted his missiles, knowing that the lieutenant would have likely fired more than one at the oncoming Maelstrom.

  Once in range, the two fighters traded rounds again, Shawn’s missing where Nova’s scored a hit. Thankfully the damage to Shawn’s port stabilizer was superficial. That could have gone better. Turning in a wide arc to starboard, Shawn momentarily lost sight of Santorum. The sensors were also giving him false images, likely the result of Santorum attempting to jam Shawn’s electronics. Panning his gaze around the cockpit, he caught a glimpse of Nova just in time. The lieutenant was coming in from above, and Shawn deftly rolled the craft to port to avoid the barrage of blasts heading for his ship.

  As luck would have it, Shawn ended the roll in time to see Nova rush through his previous position. Taking the advantage, Shawn opened the valves for the auxiliary fuel stores. Kicking the dual engines into full burn, he pulled back and twisted the f
ighter, ending up right on Nova’s tail. Surprising the commander, his fighter’s short-range cannons automatically came online—the result of Shawn having left the targeting computer on. They found their target quickly enough, putting several holes in Jerry’s starboard engine before he had a chance to pull away. Smoking and sputtering plasma, Jerry quickly angled his injured fighter for the frigid Mardron Five.

  Shawn turned in the opposite direction, giving him a chance to make a wide arching turn and getting a proper weapons lock on Santorum. Jerry’s fighter was getting dangerously close to the upper atmosphere, and Shawn had doubts that the damaged fighter could make it through to the surface intact. Was it a death wish? “Jerry, increase your pitch or you’re going to bounce!” he shouted.

  Whether Nova was doing as he requested, or because his own piloting skills told him so, the damaged Maelstrom’s nose pitched slightly up. Shawn breathed a sigh of relief until he noticed that Santorum had increased the output of his remaining engine. Outside the cockpit, Shawn watched as heat wave began forming around the front of Jerry’s craft. If he makes it through the atmosphere, I won’t be able to hit him from space. Resigning himself, Shawn requested the navigation computer make preparations for planet-fall.