The First Nova I See Tonight

by Jason Kilgore

  "It is no use, my friend," 'TakTrak said, stepping into the corridor from behind a cooling unit. A pair of his crewmen, including a lanky, four-legged Jen'torian and a faun-like Pleiadean, stepped out as well, each with a blaster aimed at them. 'TakTrak continued, "I had hoped you would stay in the comfort of the VIP suite. It was meant for you, after all. But you will need to ride out the last of the trip to Earth in these beams. Do not worry, though. We are in low orbit."

  Damn, Dirken thought. Back to Earth. After all of this!

  "What do you mean it was meant for us?" he asked. "You couldn't have known we would show up in the hangar when we did."

  'TakTrak laughed, whirling and clacking. "Do you not remember me telling you in the Ruby Lounge that I was at the Witch's Tits looking for someone who was wanted by some powerful people? You are the VIP. I know you so well, old rogue! I had a tip that you might show up there, so I outfitted the Raptores with the luxury suite and a couple of excellent escorts. I figured I would be able to lure you on to the ship with them. But when Grimmag's gangsters took you away, I thought my chance was lost. Imagine my surprise when you and Yiorgos showed up again during the attack! Feleesha thought I was a fool to wait, but here we are."

  "Who are these 'powerful people?' And why me?"

  The Corthian shrugged. "You will find out soon enough, my friend."

  "I'm not your friend. Stop calling me that or you'll regret it!"

  'TakTrak shrugged. "It is only business, old rogue. You of all people should understand. I do not wish you dead. In fact, my orders are to bring you and Yiorgos to my employers alive." He pulled a green goron'oc card from his sleeve and tossed it toward Dirken. The triangle flipped through the air and flopped to the deck in front of Dirken's feet. "We smugglers cheat our way to profit. There are no friends. Only temporary allies."

  Clacking and chirruping with laughter, he turned and walked back through the narrow corridor, ducking beneath a conduit, leaving the two crewmen to guard.

  Dirken tilted his head as far as he could and was just able to make eye contact with Yiorgos.

  Yiorgos grunted. "'Don't worry,' you said, 'I've got a plan.'"

  Dirken frowned. "Just give me a minute."

  He turned and looked the guards in the eyes. The Pleiadean shifted nervously. He had a slim build and remnants of spots on his tan fur that hadn't fully disappeared — still a juvenile. He licked his lips with a dark blue tongue and flicked his eyes back and forth to the other crewman as if awaiting instruction.

  The Jen'torian was a female, as evidenced by the rows of gills on her forehead and her rounded mouth. Like others of her species, she had four expressionless, all-black eyes, and a full-face mask and breathing apparatus to filter out nitrogen from the ship's air, making it hard to read her expressions. But she stood confidently and held her blaster firmly. Dirken had seen her with 'TakTrak in the past. She was a seasoned spacer and likely not given to intimidation.

  Dirken formulated an idea, but what he envisioned would be noticed and they'd have the draw on him. He would need a distraction, so he waited.

  He didn't need to wait long.

  The ship shuddered as two explosions resounded through the corridor in quick succession.

  What the fuck? Dirken thought. Those were missile hits. He and Yiorgos exchanged confused looks. The Raptores was under attack.

  The young Pleiadean lowered his blaster and darted his wide eyes. "What was that?" he yelled, then wailed in his native language.

  The boy's panic could work to our advantage. "'TakTrak is a wanted man in the Sol system," Dirken said aloud. "Likely the orbital patrols found him. He'll have us all killed!"

  A hot water pipe burst at a joint and sprayed the corridor with water and steam.

  The Jen'torian kept her weapon trained on Dirken, but half-turned toward the Pleiadean, then muttered, "Hole yerpozishish."

  It took a moment for Dirken to realize the Jen'torian had said, Hold your position. The Pleiadean apparently didn't understand, either, or perhaps ignored it, because he shouted, "They'll depressurize the ship!" and ran down the corridor toward the bridge.

  "Hole yerpozishish!" the Jen'torian shouted after him in vain, turning away.

  That was the distraction Dirken needed.

  Dirken strained against the suspensor beams, gritting his teeth as he tried to pull his right forearm toward his face and his head toward his forearm. Just as she started to turn, Dirken's chin hit the button on his bracelet.

  The bracelet unfolded into a mirrored vambrace, covering his forearm. He swung it around, reflecting the suspensor rays and cutting the tension.

  The Jen'torian jerked her head around at his movement and aimed her blaster. Dirken beat her to the draw. Fired. Hit her square in the chest and through her filtration tube. She fell, unmoving, to the deck, the hole in her chest smoking, the tube hissing nitrogen-free air.

  Dirken activated the other vambrace, and with the two arms gesticulating as if swatting flies, he managed to reflect enough of the suspensor beams to break free and stumble to the deck.

  He used the mirrors to reflect Yiorgos's beams, and the cyborg stepped down with a graceful step.

  "Thanks, partner," Yiorgos said. "Smart thinking." He guarded the passage as Dirken reflected the beams from the Heart and its duffel bag and pulled it free.

  "What about me?" Andy said.

  "You just keep your smooth, sexy ass up there where you can't cause trouble," Dirken replied. "We'll come back for you soon enough."

  The ship rocked with another blast. This time the rip of metal screeched through the air and the Raptores swung wide, tilted, and lost artificial gravity completely.

  Dirken floated upward, but then expertly pushed off a conduit and glided down the corridor. Yiorgos followed.

  There was movement at the far end of the corridor. A shout, then someone fired a laser, the red beam slicing across the hall. It burned a line across the wall then down the corridor and into the ceiling over Andy. Yiorgos returned fire, missing.

  Dirken ducked into a side corridor. Less than a meter away, a bowl of yakisoba floated away from a mess hall table, the noodles and bubbles of broth spreading out. Chopsticks followed, turning lazy somersaults.

  Dirken glanced around the corner and fired. The shot blasted a hole in a wall next to a human crewman's head. Dirken glanced to his partner. "We need to get to the bridge."

  "I have a better idea." Yiorgos holstered his weapon and floated over to a computer terminal. He plugged in the cord at his wrist. Soon his head tilted, eyes fluttering, as he entered their computer system. He sighed, mouth parting, as his mind fully integrated with the system.

  The crewman fired, his laser burning a line in the wall. Dirken fired again, this time hitting the crewman in the arm.

  The ship's engines suddenly thrummed and Dirken felt a lurch in his guts as the craft went into some sort of rolling maneuver. Then came a reverberation of the ship's cannons firing.

  Yiorgos partially came out of his trance. "It's a United Worlds patrol ship. They opened fire when they realized 'TakTrak has a warrant for his arrest on Earth. Feleesha just disabled the patrol ship, but…." He went silent as his head tilted again, exploring some other part of the computer.

  Dirken looked around again. The crewman was joined by another, a Rigellian with a pulse rifle, and they were floating toward them. Stupid, really, Dirken though, since you can't dodge while floating in zero G. He fired, hitting the wounded human crewman in the chest and flinging him backward, dead before he hit the bulkhead. A stream of blood flew out of the wound, forming spiraling lines of blood bubbles as he turned end over end without gravity. The other crewman pulled himself back into cover.

  "But what?" Dirken said to Yiorgos.

  "But we're damaged. Half the thrusters are offline. We're entering Earth's atmosphere."

  "So? It's equipped for aerial flight."

  Yiorgos shook his head. "One of the aerial engines was damaged, Dirk, either back at the comet or
during the dogfight with the UW patrol ship."

  Dirken gulped. "So, we're going down?" Memories rushed unbidden through Dirken's mind of his last ship, the Brilliant, tumbling through the atmosphere of Rorgos, engines down, and slamming into the barren, volcanic surface. Marooned. Injured. His crew dead or dying.

  "Not if we can get back into orbit, or Feleesha can pull off a miracle. But the nav charts say we're still headed to coordinates on the surface of the planet. I guess she thinks she's a miracle worker."

  "Or 'TakTrak is getting paid enough to make him risk it. He already risked coming to Earth and a firefight with the patrol. Other ships will be coming."

  The ship vibrated in waves. Red light flashed in the corridor. Panicked voices echoed from other corridors.

  'TakTrak's voice came over a speaker system. "Dirken, Yiorgos, my friends, this will be a bumpy ride. I fear even Feleesha's expert abilities may not compensate. Give yourself up to my crew now and they will escort you to a crash room."

  "That's it," Dirken said. He blasted the speaker, then pulled himself around the corner. Pushing off with his legs, he flew down the corridor, blaster forward.

  He caught the crewman off-guard. As the Rigellian raised his rifle, Dirken shot him almost point-blank in his pear-shaped head. Yellow blood and tissue splattered onto the wall behind and floated off in all directions in globules. Dirken continued forward. Looking behind, he saw Yiorgos following.

  "Are you mad?" the cyborg said.

  "The bridge!" Dirken said. "He's trying to land us. We need to stop it."

  The ship shuddered and bounced. Dirken and Yiorgos passed a side room, the door ajar. Inside, half a dozen crew were strapped into crash seats. Dirken turned to fire but held off. These crewmen didn't seem interested in the fight. Their eyes rolled with fear of a different kind.

  Dirken passed the gangway. He continued forward toward the bridge, Yiorgos following. Gravity was returning, and not in a good way. He was pulled back toward the deck, but the ship heaved and threw them both to the floor.

  "We need to strap in somewhere," Yiorgos said.

  "Yeah. In the bridge!" Dirken yelled. He hauled himself up and toward the bridge door, struggling to stay upright as the ship careened into the atmosphere. Setting down the duffel bag, he reached out and activated the door console, but it flashed red and stayed shut.

  "Yiorgos, the door."

  The servos in the cyborg's legs whined as he pushed forward against gravity. Dirken was flung against the wall, barely catching the duffel as it slipped past. Yiorgos's robotic legs held him steady as he reached the door and started to plug into the console, but then seemed to think twice. He pulled out his mini blaster, put the emitter against a circular pad connected to the readout. "Turn your head," he warned, then fired. When Dirken looked back, the console was in fiery shambles and the door slid open.

  Immediately a green laser cut across the hall from the bridge. Dirken raised his arms just in time for the beam to reflect off the mirrors on his forearms and off to the wall. Then he fired, killing the crewman with the laser.

  But others fired and Dirken ducked back behind the door frame.

  The ship bounced and jostled. Through the doorway he saw the bridge windows bathed in flame from the re-entry friction. They had hit Earth's Kármán line and turned into a man-made meteor.

  "Watch out!" someone called from behind.

  Dirken turned in time to see a blur of smooth skin and blond hair leap and roundhouse kick the craven Pleiadean crewman from earlier, knocking him out cold.

  "You!" Dirken said.

  "I told you, I'm not here to hurt you." Andy glanced through the doorway, narrowly missing a hit by a blaster bolt. His slim muscles tensed. "We aim to protect you… and that." He pointed to the duffel with the Heart.

  Another bolt flew through and grazed Andy's arm. He grimaced, then ran through the door into the bridge, screaming.

  "He's insane!" Yiorgos exclaimed.

  They looked through and watched in amazement as Andy leaped and whirled, kicking a crewman in the face, then swinging around and chopping another in the neck. Both went down. Dirken and Yiorgos ran in, as well. Dirken shot a crewman and killed him. Yiorgos finished off the two that Andy had wounded.

  Other than 'TakTrak, who was strapped into the captain's chair, this left Feleesha, struggling as she was to keep the ship on path. Three different holographic displays revolved around her, all of which were flashing red. She dared to take her one good eye off the navigation panel and flash an angry look toward Dirken, teeth gritted with the effort of leveling out the ship's control.

  "Dirken!" 'TakTrak said. "You have to stop this! You will kill us all!"

  The Corthian's flechette rifle was strapped to the side of the captain's chair next to him.

  Dirken leveled his blaster at Feleesha. "Take us back into orbit! That's not a suggestion!"

  "Fuck you!" Feleesha said. "You shoot me and the ship loses control. We'll all die!"

  "Friend Dirken. Reconsider!" 'TakTrak's hand edged toward the flechette rifle.

  Dirken growled and shot between 'TakTrak's feet, barely missing his splaying avian toes. The Corthian yanked his hand away from the flechette rifle.

  "I told you to stop calling me your fucking friend!" He turned again to Feleesha. "Now take us back up!"

  Feleesha emitted a groan. "I… can't…."

  The Raptores wobbled, alarms blaring. Over-compensated. "Shit!" Feleesha spat. Lurched back.

  The ship abruptly did a barrel roll and Dirken tumbled across the bridge.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  PLUMMETING TO EARTH

  Dirken rolled across the window of the bridge, knocking heads with one of the dead crewmen, before crashing against the base of the communications panel.

  Feleesha managed to get the ship out of the roll. When Dirken looked through the bridge window, the re-entry flames had sputtered out and revealed a verdant landscape growing closer, bordered by an azure sea.

  Yiorgos managed to strap into the seat for the weapons panel. Andy was crumpled in a heap by the door.

  "Retro thrusters!" 'TakTrak yelled.

  "Won't be enough!" Feleesha yelled back. "Hold on!" She banged on a console and yanked a thruster handle.

  All of a sudden the ship was flung upward and rolled with a G-force that made Dirken see spots and glued him to the floor. He wrapped his arms around a secured seat base to stabilize himself.

  Alarms rang louder. The ship seemed to scream as metal ripped and the wind whistled through openings that shouldn't have been there.

  Next to the comms panel a damage control readout flashed an angry red across the entire map of the ship. Three of the six cargo cubes had been lost, including the VIP cube. As the G-forces relaxed a little, Dirken wondered if Sugarplum was still in there or her own trajectory to the surface.

  Through the bridge window, Dirken now saw only sky and clouds. Feleesha had performed an aerial one-eighty with the stern of the ship now aimed at the ground. They were falling fast.

  She slammed again on the nav panel and threw the thruster handle back the other way.

  Dirken was thrown again, this time tumbling through the bridge and hitting the back wall, held there next to Andy's splayed and unconscious body.

  The ship complained, its engines roaring like an enraged giant, pushing him against the wall.

  "Not sure it's enough!" Feleesha yelled. "Ground in twenty seconds!"

  "Lower landing gear!" 'TakTrak barked.

  "According to your weapons panel," Yiorgos said, "you have external-mounted missiles. I'm firing them without arming or launching."

  "Do it!" 'TakTrak said. "A bit of extra thrust to slow us."

  Yiorgos fired the missiles and the ship did a little shimmy. The nav panel cried out an urgent audible warning in Corthian, but Dirken didn't need to know what it said to understand that impact was imminent.

  "Engage safety cushion!" 'TakTrak barked. Feleesha reached up into the holo display and pres
sed a red button twice.

  Strings of white foam shot out from the walls, filling the room, covering every surface, and immediately expanded a hundred-fold to fill all the empty space in the bridge. In a fraction of a second it thickened and swelled against Dirken's face and body. Pushed him against the wall. Formed a hard gel.

  And then they hit.

  Metal whined and ripped. Explosive cracks issued through the foam as the ship slammed to Earth. Dirken was buffeted against the wall and launched back and forth. But the safety foam held him in a tight pillow.

  Then the movement stopped.

  Dirken gasped. His organs felt like they'd been shuffled like so many goron'oc cards. He was suffocating against the foam.

  Then the foam dissolved, crumbling apart and collapsing to the floor in drifts of clumps and dust.

  Dirken coughed, wiping the foam remnants from his eyes and spitting it out of his mouth. Blinked against the foam dust in the air.

  The room still echoed with dire alarms. All of the panels were flashing red. Exposed electrical panels sparked. Hanging fiber optic cables flashed. The ship had come to rest upright, though listing to port. Through the cracked transparent aluminum window of the bridge, Dirken saw the trail of destruction that the Raptores had left in its skidding wake. Broken trees littered the deep trench that marked its landing. They had landed engines-first.

  Dirken blinked, realizing the miraculous landing — a testament to Feleesha's piloting skills.

  Andy moaned on the floor next to him. Feleesha lay bent over the navigation panel, unmoving. 'TakTrak snorted and twirled, his head lolling, and said to her, "Status?" His translation necklace was damaged, the word coming out digitized and staticky. Across the room, Yiorgos unbuckled himself, brushed off the foam powder, and looked over to Dirken as if he'd just had an average landing. He answered for the pilot. "We're down."