The Star Pirate's Folly

by James Hanlon

  Silver unstrapped her harness while the Governor pushed her shoulder against the wall to keep her upright. Silver noticed some exposed skin on her right shoulder was stained by the mottled red-purple of fresh bruising. That was where he’d grabbed the girl aboard the station. He hadn’t meant to hurt her, but with everything that was happening—well, she stole the damned map right out of his pocket, what did she expect?

  At least they were finally on board.

  ***

  Starhawk’s chair on the bridge of Deep Fog held a commanding view out the warship’s main window. The chair was mounted on a platform which overlooked several other crew members below as they worked different stations. Several windows were projected in front of the chair at eye level—a gravitational chart of Surface, a live feed from Red Shade, and a three-dimensional map of the planet and all nearby objects.

  Red Shade was anchored in the path of the orbital station. The carrier Bleachbone approached from behind, gaining on the station but still well out of range.

  “Gruce, they contact you?” he said.

  “Nothing yet.”

  Starhawk growled with frustration as he swatted the projected windows away and stood. He had less than a week before the Core Fleet returned. If he couldn’t get ahold of Lee before then they’d be too heavily outmatched to have any leverage. He had to push now, hard.

  “Fire off a warning salvo.”

  Red Shade was still out of range, but it would draw attention. Gruce grunted an affirmative, and Starhawk watched as several of the warship’s cannons primed green and fired massive slugs of nullsteel toward the orbital station. They’d miss—barely.

  “Give me a channel they’ll hear me on,” he said to his underlings, and waited for a confirmation from one of them. “Okay, fine citizens. Time’s up. What’s it gonna be?”

  Starhawk paced the small area on the platform around his chair.

  “I’m in a bit of a hurry here, so expedience is appreciated,” he said.

  A calm, steady male voice answered him. “Transport shuttle en route to fleet carrier Red Shade.”

  Starhawk sat back in his chair and the projected windows returned, allowing him to confirm that a single shuttle had indeed been launched from the orbital station. “Well hey! Look at you, cooperating with us! That wasn’t so hard, now was it?”

  “Boss,” Gruce said over the comms. “They sent out a shuttle. Just one, nothing else.”

  “Good, they’re giving up Lee. Just get him on board.” Starhawk turned to the impassive Zeeda behind him and grinned. “Just like I planned.”

  At that exact moment the defense cannons near the orbital station primed and fired their own barrage of deadly nullsteel at Red Shade. They’d waited just long enough, and were well in range of the carrier.

  Starhawk watched the feed from Red Shade’s bridge as the impact rocked the ship. Crewmen shouted updates at Two-Gut, who was frozen in a state of silent fear. Then without warning he jumped out of the captain’s chair and scrambled off screen. The coward was heading right for the escape pods.

  “Well,” Starhawk said. “Then plan B is now officially in effect.”

  Chapter 11: Surface

  It was so easy to dodge these softie dirtwalkers.

  Jensen Lee cruised the emergency tunnels beneath Overlook City in a stolen maintenance car. The city was on a manhunt for him, but their security systems were laughably outdated, easily penetrated. He was a ghost to them now. Despite all their posturing and wealth, the Core was apparently well behind the curve in cyber warfare.

  He’d linked up to the tunnels’ security cameras and waited until he saw one of the levitating maintenance cars stop nearby. The two workers in the car had been prepping the shelters for evacuation. Ambushing them was easy. All of it was. So far the worst part was just getting into the city—he’d spent five days crammed in a tiny shipping container, surviving off the water and rations in his suit, to smuggle himself inside.

  “How you doing, Blondie?” Lee said to the passenger in the back seat.

  A middle-aged female maintenance worker was lying on her side, bound and gagged with her own clothing. She squeezed her eyes shut, and a fresh stream of tears ran into messy yellow hair.

  Her partner put up a fight. Jensen put him down.

  Lee grinned and let out a sadistic guttural laugh. Good thing they weren’t both men. He was all worked up from that fine little blonde at the hotel. Nothing like the scent of a young woman. He glanced at his half-dressed hostage. She was older, and no fox like the other one, but she’d do just fine. The hair was a bonus.

  Once they got to the shelter, he’d blow the tunnel behind him and wait for pickup. Could be hours, maybe even a couple days. He smiled, and his tongue traced a wet line along his upper lip, catching on his chipped front tooth. It had been a long time since he had a woman to himself.

  ***

  Hargrove watched from behind the sliding glass front doors of the hotel as another row of public transport hoverbuses descended to the street. This was a baffling departure from the day he’d originally planned for.

  The buses had been coming and going in waves since noon. Loudspeakers instructed citizens on the street to stand back before the craft touched down. A crowd gathered around the cobalt vehicles as they settled.

  “Please form an orderly line to prepare for boarding. All transports are bound for bombardment shelters. Please form an orderly line in preparation for boarding.”

  The speakers continued to loop as the crowd rearranged itself around the buses, forming winding lines all the way back to the sidewalk. The bus doors opened for the first passengers, and snaking columns of organized citizens began to shuffle inside.

  Bee never came back.

  Hargrove had called her a dozen times at least since he heard about Orpheus. The city was in a full-blown panic. First there were reports of the comet’s erratic trajectory, and speculation that it could impact the planet. Then came the images of warships hiding in the coma of Orpheus—the “ghost fleet,” as it was quickly dubbed by the news media. Pirates.

  The pieces added up in the news reports. There was a spate of attempted vehicle thefts from asteroid-towing shipyards across the belt. Most were recovered after the thieves were caught, but one industrial grade dual-generator tugboat was never found.

  Experts debated the feasibility of a single craft handling a comet the size of Orpheus, but many contended that its gravity generators could easily be modified to produce sufficient pull for a short time, even by a half-decent mechanic. In any case, as the day wore on the answers were revealed.

  Their leader called himself Starhawk.

  He claimed to bear no ill will to the people of the Core, and that his only intent was to retrieve the man responsible for bombing the hotel, Jensen Lee. But Lee was still on the run from Overlook City police based on what Hargrove heard.

  Between the manhunt and the evacuation, the police force was spread thin—and they also had Starhawk demanding they give Lee up. Starhawk warned if the city didn’t give up Jensen Lee, the pirates would storm the orbital station and begin bombardment.

  Hargrove believed it. Orbital bombardment was no threat to be taken lightly, especially with the planet’s defenses down. He could have gotten on any one of those buses today and probably would have been at one of the shelters by now. If shells started falling, he didn’t want to be under the dome.

  But Bee never came back. He couldn’t leave without finding out what happened to her. For almost the past year she’d made a habit of holing up in her room every moment of every day she wasn’t working, and she picked today of all days to leave. He knew she wasn’t telling the truth when she claimed to be “going for a walk,” but he didn’t press her on it. Now he wished he had.

  It was a clumsy lie, and Hargrove found himself oddly comforted by the fact that she clearly wasn’t used to being dishonest with him. He never asked about her past, but he’d seen enough kids like her to guess. Best to leave that all behind an
d move forward. Dwelling on hard times was unhealthy.

  When Hargrove first took Bee in everything was new to her, fresh in a way he found endearing. He gave her a decent path to walk and was proud to see how she took to it, becoming a valuable employee he relied on with certainty in any position he gave her. He wasn’t sure where she would end up in life, but he knew natural talent when he saw it. With just a chance to grow, she could become somebody.

  And now she was gone.

  Out on the street the hoverbuses blared for everyone to stand back before lifting off in unison. Most of the crowd was gone but dozens of citizens were left watching the buses glide down the road to the subway tunnels. A navy-uniformed police officer picked his way through them to the hotel entrance.

  The doors slid aside for him, and Hargrove shook the man’s outstretched hand. It was Officer Jimenez, one of the policemen that responded to the bombing.

  “Sir, there’s only a few more waves of buses coming. You need to clear out of here so we can get ready to head to the shelters,” the officer said. “There’s more than enough room for everyone.”

  “Maybe you can help me,” Hargrove said. “I’m looking for someone. I’ve tried calling but I can’t reach her.”

  “When was the last time you saw her?”

  “Maybe four hours, not too long after the bombing.”

  “Most likely she’s in a shelter already.”

  Hargrove nodded. “It’s possible. Any way you can check?”

  “Not until we get there.”

  “I don’t want to leave without her.”

  Jimenez shrugged. “Your choice. But like I said, these are the last transports. You got maybe five minutes. My advice, come with us. You don’t want to be under the dome if it starts raining shells.”

  The officer turned and exited the hotel, leaving Hargrove to consider his options. Distraught citizens milled around outside looking up and down the street for the next set of buses. He wondered if the pirates would really go through with it. If they did, he didn’t like his chances staying.

  ***

  The old bag was heavy. She couldn’t stand on her own, so Jensen had to haul her out of the car. She hit the smooth concrete of the platform with a whuff as the wind got knocked out of her, and she wriggled away from the car as fast as she could.

  He leered at the hysterical woman’s ample white thighs, his mind wandering from the task at hand. It was time to detonate the charges and block the track outside the empty bunker, one of the last ones in the city—the rest were chock full of nice little law-abiding citizens. Jensen didn’t want to have to share it with anyone else.

  No, he’d have it all to himself.

  Getting out would be a breeze. Before bombing the Midtown, he’d set up an escape route they’d never see coming. In another room in the hotel, he left a hidden hole. The paired devices created a short-range gate that could stay open a few seconds at a time. He left one there and had the other attached to his hip.

  His warthog lips stretched into a depraved smile. He’d already set the explosive charges on the way in, before he’d even gone to the hotel. Lee tapped some commands into his suit’s left forearm to set a timer for the charges—ten minutes should be enough for him to finish. A race against the clock. Another tap and the timer started counting down.

  As Jensen began to remove the legs of his nullsuit, he noticed the woman had stopped trying to escape. Probably figured out where she was. Once he got her inside that bunker, there was no getting out. He’d have plenty of time with her after he detonated the charges to block the tunnel. And when the bombardment started, he could just wait in the safety of the bunker for his pickup, take the hidden hole back to the hotel he’d bombed, and escape the city from there.

  Before long, Jensen Lee would be the last thing on the dirtwalkers’ minds. The woman wept with fear when he walked toward her. He’d left his boots on, and they made a satisfying thump with each step.

  ***

  Hargrove ended up on the last bus to leave, reasoning he could at least wait that long for Bee. Officer Jimenez had stayed at the hotel until the last wave showed up, and now Hargrove was riding shotgun next to the officer as the hoverbus sped above the city streets.

  “Should only be about ten minutes,” Jimenez said. “With no traffic it’s a breeze getting across the city.”

  “How come we’re going a different way than the other buses?” one of the citizens in the back asked.

  Jimenez turned to address the question. His head was completely shaved, accenting ropy veins that stood out under his skin. Friendly brown eyes and a smile softened his appearance.

  “The other shelters are at capacity,” he said. “We’re headed to the empty ones in a different section of the city. It’s a bit farther, but you’ll have a lot more room than you’d have at the others. Plus, you get first pick on bunks since we’ll be the first to get there.”

  Someone’s child gave a quiet “Yay!” and Hargrove couldn't help but smile and look back to try to pick out the source. The kid must have been near the rear of the bus, or hidden behind someone else, somewhere out of sight.

  The bus descended and banked left, slipping into the tunnels underneath the city. Lights on the vehicle’s exterior snapped on and illuminated the darkness ahead. They were skimming along the flat sunken floor of the tunnel beside an elevated maintenance walkway running parallel to them on the right. Every so often, they passed a recessed maintenance hatch.

  The hard knot of worry in Hargrove’s stomach began to unwind. Bee was probably at one of the other shelters. He’d have to wait out the chaotic situation in safety with the rest before he set about finding her. Never should have let her go.

  It was this thought that occupied the forefront of Hargrove’s mind when a roar and a flash of light flooded the tunnel. The bus was rocked with brutal force and thrown against the walls, crashing against one side and whipping back against the other, rolling and tumbling along the tunnel floor as the crumbling ceiling began to pound against the bus’s roof.

  Did they start the bombardment already? Hargrove felt someone unbelt him, heard a muffled shout over the thunder in his ears. Jimenez. What was he saying?

  “Get down!”

  He slid out of the seat onto his belly and felt Jimenez shoving him toward the back of the bus so he pulled himself along on his elbows, trying to keep his head on the floor. Someone at the rear opened the emergency door and kicked it partly open. Then there was another crash behind him, the shriek of crumpling metal and glass.

  In the silence that followed, he heard a wet grunt of pain from Jimenez. Hargrove twisted to check on the officer. The bus roof had caved in on him, pinning everything below his chest.

  “Shelter’s ahead,” he managed haltingly. “Can’t move. G-go.”

  “Okay. Okay.” Hargrove nodded, turned away, and began a slow crawl to the exit. Fear and shock pumped adrenalinee into him, and his vision darkened at the edges. His breaths were coming short and sharp. Almost there. Helping hands reached out to grab him as he slithered out face first, slowing the drop to the ground, and he scrambled to his feet.

  Pain barbed through his right shin. The fear was roiling inside him now, coming in waves. The others were asking him about the officer, but he couldn’t speak. He just shook his head and staggered down the tunnel, using his arm to support himself against the wall. He would have run if not for his leg, so he hobbled as quickly as he could. The shelter was just ahead—he could see the entrance.

  He could have looked back to see the damage, to see who else was behind him, but he didn’t care. He felt like a coward. Just get inside, he told himself, it’s safe, just get inside. The thought swept him forward in a rushing tide, and he went along with it. Just outside the open door was an empty maintenance vehicle. Hargrove paid it no mind, limping past into the shelter. Relief surged through him.

  Then from inside, a screech of pain. He saw yellow hair, a figure forced down onto a table with a half-naked man behind. Th
ey didn’t see him. His immediate thought was, it’s Bee. Red fog bloomed in his vision, an inner primal response took over, and in three long strides he closed the distance. He didn’t remember picking up the helmet, but once it was in his hands instincts took over.

  He must have blacked out. When his vision cleared, Hargrove was heaving with rage astride the attacker holding the back collar of the man’s nullsuit with his left hand and the helmet with his right. The back of his head was smashed in, streaming blood, and Hargrove lifted the helmet to see it spattered and smeared with red.

  He dropped the helmet and the man in the nullsuit, who flopped over onto his back. It was Jensen Lee. Half-dead eyes squinted up at the magenta-clad hotel manager. The seasoned pirate snorted in disbelief.

  “The f-fuckin’ m-manager?” Lee’s disgusted lament spilled from his lips with a slop of blood as he died, his head lolling back heavy in the nullsuit.

  Chapter 12: Crew

  Strong arms carried Bee with ease. Was she dreaming of Hargrove? A sense of exhaustion overwhelmed her, but she fought to stay awake. She was treading water—warm, relaxing water she could just slip into and—and—drown. You’ll drown. Fight it.

  Find him.

  Mother’s voice rang clear, a strong arm hauling her to the surface.

  Kill him, she said. Kill the Starhawk.

  Starhawk. The name snapped her into consciousness, the old fire in her belly flaring white-hot. She was strapped by her ankles and wrists to a bed in an infirmary, all shining chrome and bright lights. Bill Silver came into focus at her feet.

  “You son of a bitch,” she slurred. He drugged her. He drugged her.

  “Willis,” Silver said. “She’s up.”

  Soft fingers inspected her neck where Silver had made the injection.

  “You really shouldn’t have done that,” Willis said, who shot a glare at Silver. “You’re Quartermaster, you should know this. Those sedatives are only for use on the crew. You had no idea what kind of medical history this girl’s got—and neither do I, so thanks for putting her on my table.”