by C H Gideon
Phraim-’Eh snarled and backhanded Reynolds, driving him back several steps, but the AI stayed on his feet.
Phraim-’Eh roared, “I will slay you all!”
He bounded forward and crashed into Reynolds again. A vicious punch to the android’s side bent several of his ribs. A second blow bent them inside, and Reynolds felt the metal framework of his body grinding hard against its internal workings.
Phraim-’Eh’s third punch definitely destroyed something.
Reynolds coughed and spit out a mouthful of greasy oil. It dribbled down his chest as the god drew back his hand to strike Reynolds again.
“You’re starting to piss me off,” Jiya told him as she unloaded her gun into Phraim-’Eh’s spine.
He stumbled forward, ranting and raving, clawing at his wounds as he darted sideways to step behind cover.
Jiya reloaded.
Ka’nak stepped out of nowhere and drove his good fist into Phraim-’Eh’s nose, adding shattered cartilage to the orbital injury he was already nursing.
Phraim-’Eh shoved the warrior aside and managed to step away just as Jiya found a good angle and lit him up. Several rounds grazed the wannabe god as he circled around a console and came at Reynolds again.
“This is all because of you,” he screamed. “I will tear down your Federation and burn everything you hold dear to the ground. I am a god, and you will kneel before your better!”
Phraim-’Eh crashed into Reynolds again and drove his back into a wall. The bridge shuddered under the impact.
“Die, android! Die!” he shouted over and over as he pistoned blows into Reynolds head, neck, and torso.
Reynolds’ vision blurred and began blackening at the edges, his sight beginning to tunnel.
Fuck this!
Pressed against the wall, Reynolds could barely move, but he sure as fuck wasn’t going to sit there and let this asshole beat him into so much scrap.
The AI fought back, trading blow for blow with his one good arm, but there was no doubt he was losing the war of attrition. His mechanical body would give out before Phraim-’Eh’s would.
“You are nothing!” the god screamed. “I am a god!”
As Reynolds suffered under the hail of brutal punches, he caught sight of his broken arm flapping at his side.
It looked almost comical as it waved like a banner in high winds, whipping all over.
“You will die! I. Am. A. God!”
Reynolds growled and spat oil in Phraim’ Eh’s face.
“Seriously, shut the…” he started.
He reached down and grabbed his flapping arm with his good hand. Reynolds yanked hard, ripping the limp appendage from the rest of his frame. Then he maneuvered the broken arm around and stuffed the forearm into Phraim-’Eh’s mouth.
“…fuck up!” Reynolds finished.
Phraim-’Eh snarled around the mechanical limb in his mouth, but he couldn’t shake it free without releasing Reynolds.
Which was what the AI was looking for him to do, but Jiya had other plans.
“A hand, please,” she called.
For a second, Reynolds thought she was being a smartass, referencing the mangled arm stuffed in Phraim-’Eh’s mouth, but his confusion only lasted for a second.
She and Ka’nak came to stand at Phraim-’Eh’s back.
Enveloped in his rage, the would-be god didn’t even notice.
At least not until Ka’nak locked his hands on both sides of the arm stuck in the god’s mouth.
He grunted a muffled, “What…” but that was all he managed to get out before the Melowi dropped all his weight on the android arm and pulled down.
Phraim-’Eh’s eyes shot wide as his jaw stretched, all of Ka’nak’s weight and strength yanking it downward.
There was a moment of resistance, then the would-be god’s jaw snapped on both sides, the bone stretching the tendons hanging loosely in front of his neck.
All resistance gone, Ka’nak fell to the deck with Reynolds’ arm still in his hands, blood and spittle everywhere.
Phraim-’Eh stumbled back a step, his grip on Reynolds lost.
That was when Jiya moved up beside him and stuffed a small, round, metal device in the wannabe god’s gaping mouth.
“Now it’s grenade time,” the first officer told Ka’nak as he sat there gathering his strength.
Phraim-’Eh realized then what Jiya had stuffed in his mouth. He gurgled and reached to yank it loose, but Reynolds was quicker.
He drove his metallic stump up under Phraim-’Eh’s mangled chin and forced his mouth shut around the grenade.
With his good hand, he grabbed Phraim-’Eh’s hair and spun him around, kicking out his feet. Phraim-’Eh toppled forward, and Reynolds helped him down. The would-be deity slammed face-first into the hard steel of the deck, muffled shrieks spilling from him the entire time.
He squirmed and thrashed and fought, but Reynolds held him still, grinding his face into the deck so hard his every shout vibrated the deck.
“You are no god,” Reynolds told Phraim-’Eh.
And then he was nothing.
The grenade exploded, taking Phraim-’Eh’s head with it.
Reynolds didn’t even turn away.
He wanted to witness every instant of Phraim-’Eh’s death.
It wasn’t until the body stopped squirming that he let go and straightened, the servos in his back squealing.
“That…was fucking gross,” Jiya said, letting out a muted chuckle as she wiped her face.
Reynolds went over and helped Ka’nak to his feet.
As the three stood there gathering their wits, a sharp snarl came across the comm.
“If you three are done playing around over there, we could use your help,” Asya barked.
Chapter Twenty-One
Takal transported the trio back to the Reynolds, and the crew stared at them wide-eyed, seeing the condition they were in.
Reynolds assessed the situation and waved off their concerned offers to help.
“There’s no time,” he told them, waving Asya back to her seat.
Despite the Godhand being disabled, the last two destroyers had yet to relent.
All of the Gulg ships had been destroyed. The only craft left was the Reynolds, but it was little more than a heap of battered steel after all it had been through.
Shields gone, its armor had been chipped away at by the remaining cultist ships, and nothing remained of its ammo save for a few thousand railgun rounds. Those would be chewed up in moments.
“You didn’t happen to bring a magic wand back with you, did you?” Tactical asked.
“I wish,” Jiya replied. “We have any Pods left?”
“A couple, but we’ve been throwing those at the destroyers ever since we ran out of missiles,” Asya told her.
“Pucks, mines?” Jiya pressed.
“Some loose ones out there somewhere.” Asya gestured in the general direction of space.
“Can you and your people power us up?” Reynolds asked Xyxl.
The pale, ghostly alien shook his head. “I’m afraid not. We’ve been sustaining the last of the shields and allowing your pilot enough power to continue evading, but even that will soon come to an end.”
“What about yours and Takal’s program?”
“There was a flaw in the coding,” Xyxl admitted. “While we had success early on, with each successive attempt, it became harder to control the enemy craft. We are unable to access their programming at all now.”
“Gate drive’s out too, before you ask,” Asya reported.
“Then we’re left with one last option,” Reynold said.
“That ship has sailed, buddy,” Tactical told him. “We ramp up the ESD now, and none of us are walking away from this. It won’t be a victory, it will be a glorious tie.”
The ship jumped as the destroyers closed, every blow tearing the life from the superdreadnought.
Reynolds reached into the ship with his senses and felt for his personalities
, felt for every wire, every conduit and circuit, every electrical charge.
The ship was spent.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I refuse to surrender. I refuse to die and let even two of these fucking ships get away.”
He turned to face the crew. “Everyone strap in. We’re not going down without a fight.”
Jiya nodded and went to her station. Ka’nak followed, and Geroux and Maddox buckled in a moment later.
“Let’s kick their asses,” Jiya said.
Reynolds offered her the best smile his mangled face could manage, and he motioned to Tactical with his one good hand.
“Fire up the ESD.”
To his surprise, Tactical didn’t bother to argue.
As the weapon warmed up, Xyxl and his crewmates down in the bowels of the ship providing the ship with as much energy as they could bear to part with, Reynolds eased into the captain’s chair.
The enemy destroyers hammered at them all the while, each blow chipping away at the armored hull and bringing them closer to destruction.
Reynolds sank into his seat, both mentally and physically.
The part of him that was the ship hummed in the background, growing louder and more powerful with every passing second. He reached into the ship, dove into it and drew it in, welcoming back the solid steel structure that had been his home for so long.
It was as if he were adrift on the ocean, the waves carrying him, buoying his essence as he connected with the hulk that was him once more.
Earlier, he’d stepped away from the ship, severed the link and tasted what he had believed was freedom.
He’d been wrong.
Being separated from the ship, from himself, was not freedom. It was torture.
No matter how much he wanted the experience of walking upright and appearing humanoid, in the end, he was who he was.
The ship.
It was him, as he was it.
There was no separating them on a molecular level. They would always be one.
But he’d learned many lessons while he’d been mobile, the greatest of which was perseverance.
There were still too many things he wanted to experience, to take part in, to feel, so he found it impossible to give in and accept defeat if it meant he would fail himself, fail Bethany Anne or, most of all, fail his crew.
All their trials had led them here, to this moment, and he would use his strength to overcome.
“Bring us about!” he ordered, his voice ethereal, barely above a whisper. He realized it came both from his mouth and the speakers built into his flesh in the ceiling above.
Ria obeyed and swung him around.
He could feel her hands on his controls, sense the anticipation and excitement in her grip. She moved him instinctively, and he gave in to her, letting her have complete control.
A rumbling in his center drew him through the system; a gnawing, burning hunger that seared his guts.
He followed the feeling deeper and deeper into himself. He slithered through the channels he had designed to protect him from the ravaging power spewed from within.
It was like riding a volcano in reverse, diving down into the cone and fighting the flow of lava as it fought to dislodge him, spit him out.
Reynolds wasn’t going anywhere.
He doubled-down and pushed harder, at last coming to the source of the scalding, searing sun that churned and bubbled, its energies growing harder and harder to contain.
The view was mesmerizing.
He stared at it, watch the power grow and expand until it was ready to overflow.
Somewhere deep inside himself, he knew he had come there for something, to do something, but he didn’t know what. He couldn’t remember.
And the power started to spill over.
He touched it, and sharp agony fired through him.
It was then that he remembered why he was there, what he had to do.
Some piece of himself that sat in the captain’s chair recalled his purpose. It drew him back from oblivion.
It’s the pain. That’s why I’m drifting.
Reynolds spat his defiance at the agony that threatened to consume him, and he remembered the enemy ships he was facing down.
The ones that wanted to kill him.
No!
His voice roared, and he rode it out alongside the gushing energy. Blackness appeared ahead, a circle of emptiness that grew larger with every passing instant.
It hurtled toward him as he rode the energy upward toward the enveloping darkness.
That same voice that had summoned him back from the edge warned him about the darkness, warned him away from it.
It was a place for the light, not for him.
His job was to see the light to the end of its passage within him, and then let it go.
So that was what he did.
At the very edge of the tunnel, he braced against the walls, clutched himself, and held tight.
The raging energy spilled past him, tearing, tugging, desperately trying to drag him along, but he resisted. He wouldn’t give in to its pull.
He clung to himself as great tremors rattled through his frame, trying to shake him apart.
Reynolds hung on because he knew Bethany Anne would want him to. Because he knew people were counting on him.
Because he needed to.
At that moment, he was everything and nothing at the same time.
Still, the energy clawed at him, trying to drag him along.
Reynolds denied it.
He screamed his defiance into the rage of the energy surging past him, and he felt it give way and weaken.
It had bowed to his will, and then it was gone.
Spent.
And so was he.
Yet he still held on.
The next thing Reynolds knew, he was back in the android body he’d been sporting for the past several months.
Battered and beaten, missing a limb and barely able to walk, he smiled as he settled in again.
He blinked to clear his vision and saw the crew standing around him, eyes wide with wonder. They saw his motion, and smiles rippled across their faces.
“There’s no place like home,” he said, letting his head loll back against the headrest for a second.
“Are you okay?” Jiya asked, gaze darting about, examining every inch of him.
He nodded, straightening in his seat.
“I’m okay,” he told her, easing his neck from side to side while listening to the squeaks of its motion. “I might be about a quart of oil low, though.”
Jiya laughed, and the crew crowded tighter around, murmuring platitudes and saying how glad they were he’d made it through everything.
That touchy-feely shit lasted all of two seconds.
“Get the fuck back to work, you slackers,” Reynolds ordered. “I don’t pay all of you to hang around and grease my wheels. Man your stations, and tell me what the fuck-all happened while I was riding the LSD trip up my asshole. And get rid of Phraim-‘Eh’s fucking flagship, while you’re at it. Might as well take out all of the trash before we leave.”
“Good to have you back, Captain,” Asya remarked.
“Good to be back,” he replied. “Now, someone track down Takal and tell him I need a tune-up. And a new arm.”
Epilogue One
Jiya stood on the corner, staring down the street as though she were watching the parade roll by like all the other people gathered there on a quiet holiday morning in the sleepy city of Augst.
She wasn’t, of course.
She’d been stationed there to keep an eye out for the Voice, or as they’d learned, his real name was Commander Ast, and he was from the same world as Asya, a Loranian.
That had been a real kick in the ass to find out.
Asya had even worked for him for a time.
She’d damn near flown into a rage once she realized Ast had been the reason for Reynolds’ earlier mistrust of her. The male had manipulated everything, giving the AI cause to
doubt her loyalty before she’d proven herself.
All that just pissed Jiya off even more.
It was one thing to stalk the crew across the universe and try to murder them, it was something else entirely to betray Jiya’s friend and use the crew.
He’d been behind everything from the very first mission, Phraim-’Eh’s eyes and ears…
Jiya laughed about that.
He’d have to be now, seeing how the wannabe god didn’t have eyes or ears anymore, or nose or mouth or anything now that his head had been blown off.
Jiya wanted to do the same thing to Commander Ast, but so did Asya and the rest of the crew.
They’d worked it out that the first person who found him got to put a bullet in his head.
It’d become a bit of a competition.
Now, nearly three months later, the crew had figured out where he’d been hiding since they’d killed all the rest of the Phraim-’Eh cultists that had scattered across the universe.
He’d vanished as soon as he’d learned that Phraim-’Eh was dead.
Jiya couldn’t blame him, but she sure as shit didn’t have any sympathy for the guy. He was a dead Loranian walking, and she wanted him found and taken out sooner rather than later. He’d been free far too long as far as she was concerned.
The chatter of the crowd threatened to lull her to sleep with its tepid pitch as she casually used her peripheral vision and her suit’s computer systems to scan each and face that came anywhere near her. Every whispered “ooh” and “aah” gave her reason to glance around and scan even further.
She hadn’t been lucky enough to catch sight of him, though, and she was beginning to think they’d followed bad intel.
“Anyone see him?” Ka’nak asked.
“Would we tell you if we did?” Maddox answered.
“The mission is what matters, people,” Reynolds said over the comm. “And I’ll let you know if I spot him…right after I scoop his fucking brains off the sidewalk.”
“You are all much too competitive,” Geroux told them.
“You’re not exactly immune to it,” Jiya fired back. “I saw how much computer equipment you packed when we heard he was down here. You took half the damn ship with you just so you can find him first.”