Bartoc Secret

by Clara Woods

  The weapons screen started beeping. Lenah ignored it. “Now, Lorka!”

  He let out a barrage of laser shots.

  The Star Rambler rocked as they themselves were hit, and Lenah saw the shields dip down to seventy percent. She flipped the ship back, then brought them closer to a mountain range in the east.

  Lorka let out a sharp breath, and she patted him encouragingly on the arm before taking a sharp turn, trying to put the mountain peak between her and their pursuers. “Once more, be ready.”

  Lenah pulled up their nose again sharply. “Go,” she instructed Lorka.

  He pressed the buttons, doing a wide sweep of their weapons. Lenah kept herself from saying anything, but Cassius would have better preserved their energy with more precise shots. For his first time, Lorka was doing very well. It wasn’t his fault that his first time was in a combat situation.

  Lenah took them in a low dive, so they were about to drop behind one especially sharp mountain peak. Lorka lowered his thumb. “Keep shooting,” Lenah said. He complied.

  They were rewarded by the sight of one pursuer diving down in free fall. The ship went out of sight, only to cause a dusty cloud to explode upward when the ship crashed into the mountain. Lenah let out a breath and took them in a sharp curve.

  Another cloud of dust on the horizon caught her attention. It climbed up into the air in a weird pyramid shape.

  “What is that?” Lorka asked, staring in the same direction.

  “That’s most likely our destination.” Lenah set them on course, feeling more urgency than ever. Were the others fighting there?

  Both ships followed as Lenah flew a wide arc around a few mountains, trying to figure out how to get rid of them. Presently, the mountain peaks provided enough cover, so she never presented a direct target, but flatter land lay up ahead.

  Another dusty cloud from the horizon made her curse, and she sped forward. It was just a few dozen clicks away, and she couldn’t stand not knowing what was happening there.

  She dipped up and down, trying not to present a target for the two ships behind them. Only once were they got caught by another blast, and the shields lowered to twenty percent. At the same time, the engine power reduced.

  “Lenah, there’s a red light blinking now,” Doctor Lund said over the comm.

  “Understood, Doctor. We’re almost there.”

  She hoped that was good news. The other ships were rapidly catching up. Lenah bit her lip, looking left and right for a solution. She reached out her senses, but the pilots were too far away.

  A mountain peak at the starboard side caught her attention. It looked particularly steep, its tip jutting out high over its neighbor’s peaks.

  “Doctor Lund. Strap in. You have ten seconds,” she said curtly over the comm. Lorka gave her a panicked glance, then his free hand grasped the armrest of his seat.

  Lenah counted to ten, then took a sharp turn toward the mountain. She flew as low as she dared, calculating to be only a few dozen meters over the highest point. When she was right on top, Lenah let go of the thrust and put on full brakes. The Star Rambler jumped in the air, losing balance and its flying momentum.

  Lorka made a nervous sound next to Lenah, but she kept her eyes focused forward and slowly gave thrust again, just enough to keep them from going into a free fall.

  “Get ready, Lorka.”

  He jerked into action.

  “Shoot and don’t let go until I tell you to.” Lenah stared at the proximity meter, trying to keep the Star Rambler steady. They were hanging right behind the mountain peak, facing the wall of stone, a position that exposed them to the lasers of the other ships. The other ships hadn’t braked with Lenah and approached quickly.

  “Now!” Lenah yelled, and Lorka started shooting, never letting go of the button. The engine power declined once more, and Lenah had to correct to keep them from dipping too low and into the mountain.

  Another shot hit them, rocking the Star Rambler violently as the shields dropped to zero.

  “Keep shooting!” Lenah yelled over the noise of the impact.

  Then they were wrapped in a cloud of dust when one of the ships went down. Under Lorka’s barrage, the other one followed.

  “Oh, blazing stars,” the young man said and let go of the weapons control.

  Lenah grasped her control stick and flew them up. They cleared the dusty area where the two ships had gone down. She could still see both of them on the sensor, which meant they had merely gone down, not been destroyed, but that gave Lenah the little bit of time she needed.

  38 Striker’s Army

  The area was a complete mess. The two trains had crashed into each other, and multiple wagons lay scattered on the ground several dozen meters below the hover rail.

  Lenah cringed when she confirmed that it was parts of both trains, not just the second one. She wouldn’t have minded the Bartoc train crashing. The remains of the ships Lenah had seen fly overhead littered the west side of the plateau. A few hundred meters east, a blackened crater emitted smoke, showing remains of cement walls and the occasional furnishings. The leftovers of the Strikers’ secret hub?

  Despite the destruction, there were a lot of living creatures, human and Bartoc, hiding in small groups behind the occasional boulder. Most were engaged in a wild mental battle. From their high vantage point, Lenah and Lorka glanced at both parties. Despite the apparent destruction, many stood still with their eyes closed.

  When Lenah used her inner eye, the picture changed dramatically. Hundreds of different streams of mind magic swarmed out from the Bartoc, directed at the humans.

  The Strikers, several dozen of them, had split into two groups. Some directed their power into forming a protective border around everyone to keep the incoming Bartoc attacks at bay. Others were on the offensive, doing their part to try to penetrate the borders that the Bartoc had built around themselves. A few also had guns and were leaning out from behind the boulders, trying to hit the Bartoc. They weren’t very successful: the Bartoc were well protected in their plates.

  A group of eight Bartoc broke away from the rest and headed toward the largest group of humans.

  “Lorka, weapons control,” Lenah instructed. “We’re hitting those Bartoc at two o’clock.”

  The young mage nodded as Lenah flew them closer, then made a half turn so the rear cannon faced the Bartoc.

  “Now.”

  Lorka shot, and the group of Bartoc looked up in surprise, then scattered. But several of them stayed behind, unmoving on the floor.

  The Bartoc started to aim weapons upward, but Lenah ignored them. Even with the shields down, a handheld laser weapon wouldn’t do much damage to the Star Rambler’s thick outer hull.

  “Lenah!” Lorka yelled as something hit their hull. The ship rocked.

  Lenah followed Lorka’s outstretched finger. Several Bartoc had enhanced stingers with a barrel several times the size of a handheld weapon. Lenah brought the Star Rambler up higher, then flipped them toward the group Lorka was pointing out. Another hissing sound indicated another hit by the Bartoc, but no alarm blinked to life on the dashboard. Yet.

  Instead, multiple ships appeared on the proximity sensor. Many ships.

  “Oh, shit.” Lorka said, staring.

  “Shit.” Lenah agreed. “Can’t you do something with warp magic? Like warp away their weapons?” she asked. “Or them?”

  The young mage stared at the proximity screen.

  “Lorka?”

  “Uh, what?” He looked up. “Warp them away? I—” He shook his head. “It’s hard to warp something you’re not in. And they don’t have a conductor like a ship. I won’t be able to warp them securely.”

  “Securely? As in they might…”

  “…not warp fully.”

  “And do we care about that?”

  “I—”

  “They’re trying to kill us, Lorka. Do it. I’ll bring you closer.”

  Lorka’s mouth snapped shut and he nodded.

  Le
nah dipped them down sharply, sweeping as low as she dared.

  Lorka closed his eyes. Power emanated from him and sweat formed on his forehead.

  A whole barrage of mental attacks pressed toward the cockpit as if the Bartoc knew what they were planning, or they just wanted to get rid of the threat from above. Lenah raised her own magic to counter them. The force of the mental impact smashed her into her seat and she dimly felt the Rambler’s controls slip from her fingers.

  She held on, her magic wavering and overwhelmed by the much stronger Bartoc. She was cracking, diminished under the force.

  It lifted.

  Lenah, not prepared for the sudden release in pressure, fell over, crashing into someone…

  Doctor Lund.

  He leaned over her, the Star Rambler’s controls in his trembling hands. They were headed straight for a mountain.

  Lenah pushed the doctor’s hands over, maneuvering the ship into a sharp incline. He stumbled backward, bumping into the closed hatch.

  Lenah swung the Star Rambler around, finally steadying them. Where had the Bartoc gone?

  She swallowed when she saw only a scattering of limbs and weapons where the group of attackers had just been. She looked over at Lorka.

  He still had his eyes closed. His lips trembled and moved in silent words. Another group of Bartoc partially vanished. One was cut in half, his body taking some time to realize its fate as it kept moving for several seconds. It finally fell over.

  Lenah averted her eyes. No wonder humans never warped themselves and only tried with the conductive c-nano hulls of spaceships that gave the warp magic a surface to grip.

  Shrieks made Lenah finally look back at the scene. Panic had broken out within the Bartoc formation. Mind magic streaked upward toward the ship, and Lenah blocked it. It was uncoordinated, accompanied by wild shots and attempts to run away.

  She looked at the proximity screen. A whole armada of ships was incoming, maybe two minutes away.

  Lenah ignored all risk and brought the Star Rambler down amid the chaos. She spotted a familiar blond head crawling out from behind a large boulder.

  Cassius ran toward a group of remaining Bartoc, surprising them in their flight. Persia, Uz, Penelope, and Jann were right behind him, the latter two spinning a protective wall of mind magic around him, while Persia and Uz took well-aimed shots at the Bartoc.

  As Cassius reached them, the Bartoc were momentarily startled, but when the first one lost its head to Cassius’s enhanced strength, they opened fire. Cassius jumped, landed on top of the second one, and ripped at its stinger. Its body jerked, and they went down to the ground. The Bartoc stopped moving, and Cassius was up again, instantly making for the third one. But it collapsed in that moment, hit by Persia’s blasts of laser. Cassius turned to find his next victim, but the area was cleared. He turned toward the Star Rambler, and a wide grin spread on his face.

  Lenah didn’t grin back. With one last look at the proximity sensor, she bolted through the hatch, down the corridor, and out through the outer hatch. Cassius, Persia, and Uz had rounded the Star Rambler to receive her, and their grins faltered when they saw Lenah.

  “Persia, do you have the stone?” Lenah urged.

  Persia nodded, patting her jacket.

  “Start heating it now. Cassius, Uz help me get everyone into the ship. We have about one minute until a whole armada of enemy ships arrive.”

  Penelope and Jann walked around the corner but stopped dead in their tracks at Lenah’s words.

  “Move, move!” Lenah shouted at them just as Cassius ran by, starting to wave at the Strikers. “Attack incoming. Inside the ship! Now!”

  “To the ship! Quickly!” Lenah yelled and received the first few Strikers reaching the hatch. “In, make space.”

  They climbed up, then the first one, a small woman with fiery red curls, stopped dead in her tracks. She shrieked and backed away from the construct.

  “It’s off,” Lenah urged and pushed her forward again. “Get in.”

  The woman turned toward her. “Off?” she asked in a quivering voice.

  Lenah nodded impatiently. “Yes. Get in. Get in!”

  “Can’t you get it out?” the woman asked. She sounded close to panic.

  “No time. In!”

  Finally, the woman followed her instructions, carefully rounding the Bartoc robot. A line of more people entered behind them.

  Lenah scanned the sky and could already see the first signs of the approaching ships. Multiple black dots flying in quickly from the horizon. “Quicker!”

  She heard Cassius, Martello, Persia, and Uz shouting urgent instructions and dove into the ship after a tall man.

  Getting to the cockpit wasn’t easy. Strikers were huddled everywhere, standing in a line in the corridor and unsure where to go.

  “Into the cabins. We’ll figure it out. Make space!” Lenah yelled over the noise of their voices.

  Lorka was alone in the cockpit, bathed in sweat and trembling slightly.

  “Lorka?” Lenah asked, sinking into the seat next to him.

  He nodded weakly. “Fine. Exhausted.” He was asleep a second later.

  Lenah stared at the proximity radar. The ships were so close now all she could see was a big red blotch on the screen. They would be too late. Parked without a shield, easy prey.

  She started the motor with shaky hands and turned on the camera in the cargo hold. The construct was blocking most of the view, but then Lenah saw the hatch close and the interior lights turn on.

  From outside, loud reverberating engine sounds drew closer.

  Lenah jerked them upward with all the thrust the Star Rambler had, ignoring the alarms from the engine. She tried to find cover on the other side of the plateau.

  It was too late.

  Bright lights flickered as thirty lasers started blasting at once. Lenah dropped them low, scraping the Rambler’s belly over the ground. Someone crashed into her. Persia.

  The stone she was holding flew against the front window and then crashed onto the dashboard.

  The ships were right behind them.

  Lenah frantically typed in the coordinates that would bring them close to the Saltoc border.

  Something crashed into the back of the Star Rambler, and the ship rocked hard. Then it evened out as colorful swirls replaced the dusty mountain range.

  Lenah laughed out loud, joined by Persia. Then Persia fell into her arms and started to sob. “We thought you had died!”

  Lenah laughed again, nodding, and for the moment just happy to be momentarily safe inside a warp bubble.

  Then her eyes met Lorka’s scared face. He’d woken up, and he was shivering harder than ever. His lips trembled. “Did you just take part of the planet with us?”

  Lenah stared at him. Persia stopped sobbing.

  “Did I what?” Lenah asked, a stone the size of Kalhhok dropping into her stomach. Every child knew how dangerous that was. The momentum of heavy terrain would smash a ship within moments after coming out of a warp bubble. That was why no one ever initiated a bubble too close to a planet. “Shit.”

  39 Baggage

  “Uz, at current speed, we’ll have twenty-two minutes until we reach the Saltoc border.” Lenah tried to calm her fast-beating heart. She’d said ‘until’ not ‘if,’ and she was going to make damn sure that was the case. They hadn’t lost over a dozen Strikers on Kalhhok to not make it now.

  Uz barely acknowledged Lenah’s words, instead kept her head low over some notes. Zyrakath was hovering right behind her head, reading over her shoulder, and Lenah knew that Uz usually would be uncomfortable by the nearness. The situation was far from usual though.

  The Star Rambler was fast approaching the end of its warp journey. They would soon find out if they had really hauled part of Kalhhok with them. And they would also have to find a way back into the Cassidian sector through the closed border. Lenah closed her eyes. That made the slim odds even slimmer.

  “It’s just impossible!” Uz exclaimed and
looked up as if only now realizing that Lenah was with her.

  “Calm yourself, young Uzara,” Zyrakath said but fell silent at Uz’s glare.

  Her green eyes were burning. “I am perfectly calm.” She pressed through thin lips. “As calm as one could be who has no clue how to get us back home.”

  “There’s not much you can figure out without seeing the border,” Lenah said.

  Uz lifted her shoulders in a helpless gesture. “Yes, but what am I going to figure out in twenty-two minutes? We’ll be dodging a giant chunk of planet or persecuted by the Bartoc. Maybe both. Figuring out something that no one in the Cassidian sector could,” Uz muttered.

  “But they haven’t looked at Bartoc technology like you have.” Lenah tried again but shut up when a countdown appeared on her main screen. She swallowed. “Two minutes till we leave the warp bubble.” Lenah opened a connection to the ship-wide comm.

  “Everyone, strap in or hold onto something. We are leaving our warp bubble in two minutes and won’t know what to expect. Be prepared.” She shut the connection. Had it been wise of her not to tell the Strikers what they were potentially hauling? It almost felt like she was giving them false hope, but that was better than a mass panic on board.

  “Decided not to come out with the truth?” Cassius walked in, followed by his grandfather.

  Martello beamed, the only one of them who could feel happy on a crowded ship like this. But Lenah wouldn’t criticize. He had done an excellent job getting everyone settled.

  “Twenty-six mages are in their seats,” he said when the hatch closed behind him. “Or their blankets, stairs, or corners.”

  Lenah nodded as Cassius stepped behind her and laid his hands on her shoulders like he had done so many times before. She leaned back, giving herself two seconds of intimacy. Maybe the last two. Then she took a breath and sat up straight. “You two should find a seat as well. There’s pretty much a guarantee that it will get rocky. We just don’t know how rocky.”

  “We’ll sit here with you,” Cassius said and pulled his hand away. “There’s nowhere else.”

  “Not with that construct out there taking up most of our space in the cargo hold,” Martello added.