Unexpected Destiny

by Trevor Gregg

  “That’s an orlix, he’ll have wings hidden under that lab coat,” Alis whispered to him.

  The creature’s eyes widened when it saw Theophax. “Theo my buddy, what are you doing here?” it said in a high pitched nasally drawl, “and who are your friends?”

  “Long story Skurn. My friends and I need to get off world quickly. Everybody, this is Skurn.”

  “Well come in then, let’s not talk on the doorstep.” Skurn said amiably, gesturing them in with a three-fingered hand.

  They entered the huge empty space, what appeared to have been a warehouse of some sort, their footfalls echoing in the vast chamber. He led them to the far wall, where several tables with various pieces of equipment were laid out. Alis perked up at the sight of the tech, as she slowly sidled closer to get a better look.

  “Don’t touch!” Skurn admonished.

  “So can you help us? Is that old rattle-trap you call a shuttle still space worthy?” Theo asked

  “Rattle-trap?! What do you mean?! Lola’s always been space worthy, to imply otherwise is demeaning” he said with feigned injury. “Follow me, y’all can help with pre-flight checks.”

  They exited the grand space through a small door in the far wall, and stepped out into a massive courtyard, surrounded on all sides by large industrial structures. Sitting in the middle of the space was a small white shuttle. The crew compartment, which looked to hold five, hung below the massive x shaped cross-brace, at the ends of which were four huge thruster pods.

  “So you’ll help us, then?” Theo asked.

  “Hey, I just said come in and talk. I didn’t say anything about hauling you and three others all the way to space for nothin!” Skurn retorted, not quite feigning insult this time.

  “So you’ll do it if we can come to some arrangement, eh?” Theo pushed.

  “Yeah, yeah, what have you got to offer?” the orlix questioned.

  “How about a pair of Durian jet boots?” he said while motioning to his feet.

  Skurn took a look at his feet and his eyes went wide. His eyes went even wider when he saw Kyren was similarly equipped. “Hmmm, I think I’d need two pairs of boots in order to cover fuel costs,” he said while eying the boots greedily, hands clasped and fingers tapping together.

  “Okay, you’ve got a deal as long as we can leave now,” Theo finished.

  “Deal!” He replied, walking over to the entry hatch and keying it open while Theo and Kyren shucked out of their boots. Skurn disappeared inside for several moments, as exterior lights came on. He popped out and then began to walk around the craft, opening access panels and checking equipment, taking readings with his scanner or making adjustments with various tools. Satisfied, he stowed his tools and climbed aboard, motioning for the others to follow suit. They entered a small passenger compartment with two rows of two seats each, and a pilot’s station.

  Skurn walked up to the pilot’s station and keyed in a command. The holopanel sprung to life and he began issuing commands and examining readouts. Systems began to light up, and a faint hum filled the cabin. Then lights went out, alarms flashed, and the humming ceased. Outside the ship, an access panel popped open and sparks poured out. He darted out the hatch and examined the burned compartment.

  “Damn, gonna need to replace the quantum hadride coupler. I don’t have a spare one, but I know where I can get one in a hurry. You folks hold tight, I’ll be back shortly.” He said through the open hatch, and then trundled away.

  “Okay, Alis, do you think you could help me fly this thing?” Theo asked as soon as Skurn was out of earshot.

  “Help you? I could fly this thing myself,” She said defensively.

  “Very sorry, did not mean you any offense, young rillian,” Theo soothed. “I shall defer to your expertise.”

  “Wait, what are you talking about, we can’t fly this thing, it’s broke. And shouldn’t we wait for your friend to get back?” Kyren said puzzled.

  “You dolt, he’s not going for parts, he’s going to turn us in,” Alis lambasted.

  Turning to Theo, she said “We can just bypass the coupler, we won’t need it since we aren’t re-entering the atmosphere.”

  “Good, get to it. I will finish the preflight checks.” He turned to Kyren, handing him his ion blaster again. “Go guard the door in case he gets back here too quickly.”

  30

  The Shuttle

  Kyren entered the vast space and looked about desperately. The only cover was that afforded by the tables and pieces of equipment. He upended a table and piled junk high in front to create as much cover as he could manage. Then he crouched down and waited. He didn’t have to wait long, only a few minutes later, the roll-up door began to grind open.

  Silhouetted in the door frame were four figures, the diminutive form of the orlix, two large saurians, and the massive bulk of a grendle. Kyren realized this was the only chance he was going to have to get the drop on them, so he leaned out around his cover, took careful aim with Theo’s ion pistol, and began pulling the trigger. Bursts of blue energy streamed from the barrel.

  Halting his barrage he watched the figures scatter, one of the saurians going down in a heap. Skurn and the remaining saurian, dodged around the corner out of the line of fire, but the grendle just roared and began to charge. Blasts of energy hit his makeshift barrier, forcing him to duck behind as the saurian brought his small rifle to bear. Fire continued to rain down on the barricade, pinning Kyren in place, while he could hear the grendle’s charge bringing him ever closer.

  The withering hail of fire ceased as he heard the saurian struggle to reload. Kyren popped up to find the grendle only fifteen or so yards away, in a full run. He lined up the pistol and pulled the trigger. The blue energy washed over the charging grendle and he staggered a step, but recovered and kept on coming.

  Panicked, Kyren pulled the trigger rapid fire, bolts of energy washing over the grendle with little effect, slowing his charge only slightly. Kyren decided to run but it was too late. The grendle hit him like a freight train, sending him flying out through the door and into the courtyard, skidding heavily along the gravel on his back. His momentum carried him backward and he slid underneath one of the shuttle’s thruster pods.

  Hearing the telltale clicking of ignition, he rolled to the side and scrambled out of the way as the thrusters began firing up, a jet of superheated plasma bathing the ground where his head was mere seconds before.

  He was barely back on his feet when the grendle’s punch connected. Kyren went sprawling, losing his grip on his pistol and landing heavily in the gravel. He scrambled backward while the grendle advanced. Suddenly, the shuttle jerked off the ground by just a few feet, and then spun rapidly as the thruster pods angled. The extended landing gear caught the unsuspecting grendle in the chest, launching him backward into one of the courtyard’s four concrete walls. He slumped to the ground in a heap.

  The shuttle touched down again and Kyren sprang up, snatching the fallen pistol as he ran. He scrambled up the ladder and into the hatch as the craft began lifting off again. He sealed the hatch just as a burst of laser fire raked the side of the shuttle, the saurian with the rifle coming into view in doorway of the courtyard.

  The thrusters went to full and the small shuttle began to lift off, rapidly heading towards the sky as the thug with the rifle fired away. Kyren was scrambling to get buckled in when the shuttle lurched dramatically, sending him flying across Elarra’s lap and crashing into the far wall. Alarms sounded and alerts flashed on the holopanel as Alis struggled to keep the craft from careening out of control.

  “Shit, we’ve lost an engine!” she cried.

  Several tense seconds passed as the shuttle swayed back and forth and spun around, but Alis was able to arrest their lateral movement and restore their ascent. She maxed out the throttle and they corkscrewed into the sky, the thrusters leaving contrails streaming behind. Kyren tumbled back a row but managed to land seated and quickly buckled in.

  “Do we have enough thrust
to reach orbit with three engines?” Alis asked Theophax, who was strapped into the co-pilot’s chair.

  After a moment working at the copilot’s panel he exclaimed “Okay, with our current thrust rate we’ll be able to reach escape velocity, although just barely.”

  Kyren buckled in as the shuttle streaked into the atmosphere, heading for Marellan’s space station. It shuddered and rattled as they drove ever higher into the upper atmosphere, the shuttle angling into a steep trajectory. Then they felt the bounds of gravity dropping away, and soon they were floating against their restraints.

  31

  Custodian

  The shuttle sped on toward the orbiting station, thrusters not quite at full burn. Alis set the autopilot once the station’s nav signal was locked in and then turned in her seat to face everyone. Kyren noticed she looked like she wanted to speak but seemed like maybe she was unsure what to say.

  “So Oracle, what do your visions say about our plans?” Kyren asked on both their behalf.

  “I will defer to Theo, he is the expert in locating lost relics,” Elarra replied.

  “We’ll need to get to Zataxia first. I’m hopin’ we can trade this baby for a ride,” Theo said confidently, patting the side of the shuttle. “From Zataxia we’ll have to hire a ship, one that can withstand a debris field. A heavy hauler or something.”

  “Or a mining ship or tug,” Alis offered.

  “Sure. The rest we’ll have to make up as we go along,” he said casually.

  “So what’s this relic we’re going to retrieve? Is it a weapon? ‘Cause we need something to fight Tharox with,” Kyren broke in.

  “No, and yes,” Elarra said enigmatically.

  “Enough with the suspense,” Alis interjected, unable to hide her frustration any longer. “What is it we are going after? What the heck is an Ashari?” Alis hated the Oracle’s obfuscation.

  “Okay, I guess I better tell them,” Theo said, looking hesitantly at the Oracle. Alis noticed her give a slight nod.

  “Twenty six years ago, Elarra enlisted my services to find a mysterious alien relic for her people,” Theo began. “We journeyed together for some time in our pursuit of this relic. We passed through a system called Pharos, where we picked up an identification beacon amongst the background noise.”

  “Ooh, I know what that means.” Alis said excitedly.

  “So when I cross-referenced the beacon’s ID with the data structures in my datacore, I found a match. The ship was a Consortium scout cruiser,” Theo explained.

  “Ooh, a scout cruiser, primarily used for escort and scouting missions. Standard crew of sixteen. And an antimatter coupled ion drive!” Alis’ voice rose and her speech sped up. “It also has its own warp drive, and a complement of weapons, too.”

  “Where’d you get your ship knowledge? That is impressive,” Theo said.

  “I grew up around ships,” was all she said, her mouth tightening imperceptibly.

  “Anyway, we were unable to investigate the source of the beacon at the time,” Theo began, only to be interrupted by the Oracle.

  “And why couldn’t we investigate?” she asked.

  “Uh, we were being chased,” he said hesitantly.

  “Chased? By who?” asked Kyren.

  “And why was that?” Elarra chided, ignoring Kyren.

  Theo snorted, ignored Elarra’s question, and continued, “So, contained within my data core is the beacon’s signature, which will allow us to follow it to the source. If we find the ship intact, I have the access codes. We should be able to take full control of her, provided she’s still operational.”

  “I’m not going to let that mystery rest, Theo. You’ll tell me eventually,” Alis teased, winking playfully at him.

  The alert light on the archaic manual controls began to blink, and Alis spun back around and began toggling switches as she prepared the craft for approach to the station. The huge X-shaped station, with a great central cylinder at the junction of the four arms, began to loom in the main viewport. Alis deftly jockeyed the shuttle up to the docking portal at the end of one of the great arms. The tube extended and sealed with the shuttle’s side, an audible ‘clunk’ as the airlocks connected.

  The indicator above the door went from red to green as atmosphere was pumped into the docking tube. They entered the station and Theo made for the first public terminal they saw. Running a search, he soon had a list of possible transports. Theo left them to go arrange for their transport. Kyren chose a dingy pub for them to wait for Theo.

  Several agonizing hours later, Theo returned, looking triumphant, much to Kyren’s relief. “We’ve got passage to Zataxia, folks.”

  Kyren knew the trip would take awhile, but he was anxious anyway. He had learned that while travel by warp gates was instantaneous, travel between gates often took hours, as they needed to reach points of stable gravitational interaction before jumping. Unfortunately, the trip to Zataxia took most of the day.

  The freight hauler Theo had arranged deposited them on Zataxia station and continued on its way. Another terminal search by Theo and they boarded the central elevator destined for the Spacers’ Lounge. Occupying the entire top floor of the station’s central structure, the Spacers’ Lounge was covered by a great plexi-steel dome.

  “You must be Captain Gravos,” he heard Theo saying as he wove through the mostly empty tables. By station time it was early morning, so the lounge was nearly deserted. Except for a middle-aged blond man with hawkish features and a vindel with its four arms folded across its chest and its legs propped up casually on the table. The man stood, extended his hand and Theo grasped it.

  “I’m Theo, and these are my crew. I’m looking to hire a sturdy ship. By all accounts yours sounds like the sturdiest around,” he said flatteringly.

  “Yes, you’ll get no safer transport into the debris fields than the Custodian,” Gravos said, the vindel nodded. “This is Sarwan, my second. Sarwan, would you show ‘em?”

  Sarwan stood and pointed with her two left arms outside. They turned and saw a large salvage tug floating just outside the dome. The front of the boxy ship came to a point to shunt away debris. It was heavily armored, many dings and scratches in its gray surface evidence of many close encounters with wreckage. On each side was a huge cargo bay and large robotic arms, folded up and tucked in.

  “What’s the destination, mate?” Gravos asked bluntly.

  “Pharos system,” Theo said tentatively.

  Gravos let out a long whistle. “That’s gonna cost you, mate. That’s Crevak territory yer asking me to enter. I put my ship and crew at risk, it better be worth it. I’ll need half a million creds,” he said with bravado.

  Alis gasped, Kyren did a double take, Theo looked taken aback. Even Sarwan seemed surprised, almost losing her balance as her feet dropped from the table. Only the Oracle was unfazed. As usual, he thought sarcastically.

  “Half now, and half when we return, that will be the terms,” the Oracle said, producing her chipscan and waving it over his. Holographic numbers shown on the surface of both cards as the balance transferred. Kyren was astounded by the numbers. He had no idea the Oracle was carrying around that kind of wealth.

  “Congratulations mate, you have hired yerselves a ship and crew. Board in two hours, dock E-215.” Gravos said, rubbing his hands together greedily.

  32

  Eyes On The Prize

  The Custodian’s gray, armored bulk crept cautiously through the warp gate, emerging into close orbit around Pharos’ binary star. The two suns beamed in the viewscreens, so bright they nearly whited them out.

  Alis was glad they had been invited to the bridge by Captain Gravos, even cramped as it was. There were five stations, including the captain’s chair. All were crewed but one, where they were sitting on fold-up chairs.

  “The gates in this system are placed in close proximity to the stars, so they can be powered indefinitely by solar output,” Sarwan explained to them. “But that means we’ll have several hours flight ti
me to reach the planet Infernus and the surrounding debris field.”

  “Boris, full burn to Infernus,” Gravos commanded. Boris’ beard of tentacles wiggled in assent.

  A cerulian! Alis thought. She had heard of them, yet never met one. They were blessed with extremely fast reflexes, making them ideal pilots.

  “How about the signal, have you picked that up?” asked Theo.

  The ship’s engineer, Chk’thra, a dark green skinned rohvar with yellow faceted eyes, chittered and screeched at Sarwan.

  “He says yes, we are locked on,” Sarwan translated. “Why don’t you go rest up. Never know what we’ll find when we get there. Right?”

  “No thanks, we’re fine to stay here,” Theo firmly declined the offer, voicing Alis’ unspoken sentiment.

  “Suit yourself,” Sarwan responded neutrally.

  A few hours later, the outskirts of the debris field drifted into view. The helmsman reversed thrust, decelerating the ship. Alis felt some change in velocity as the ship’s ancient grav plates strained to dampen the momentum inside the cabin. By the time they entered, the Custodian had slowed to a crawl. It began to shoulder aside the wreckage, shaking and creaking as they impacted with increasingly larger fragments.

  Boris was doing his best to avoid the largest pieces of debris, but the ship was taking quite a pounding.

  “Can the ship withstand this?” Kyren asked nervously.

  Even Alis was a bit nervous, the Custodian wasn’t exactly in tip-top shape, she saw a lot of binding tape and band-aid repairs on her way through the ship to the bridge.

  “Of course she can, she’s a millennium-age spacecraft designed for just such a job,” Gravos replied encouragingly.

  They plowed onward, following the signal, pushing aside junk and detritus as they crept onward. If the burn from the gate to the planet was boring, the debris field was downright tedious. Maybe it was her excitement that made her so impatient, she thought.