by Caleb Fast
“Some are, some aren't,” Richardson starts, carefully choosing his words, “Some are lifelong criminals, killers, insurgents. Others are people the Coalition wanted to silence, so they sent them here.”
“I see… Why didn't the last Major… Major Triborn. Why didn't he let on about any of this?”
“Because he was just as evil and corrupt as the commander. He enjoyed the killing, and the control.”
“And why are you the Major now?”
“Triborn went missing on his patrol in the mines, he and his whole squad. That left me in charge.”
“Missing?”
“Some of the prisoners set a trap of sorts and reopened a shaft that had been infested with kintics. He and his squad are presumed dead. The shaft was resealed just this morning.”
“No rescue effort? No recovering their bodies? Just assume they are dead and move on?”
“That is how the commander operates. No regard for life be it her people, or her inmates.”
“That's insane,” The captain breathes as he takes in all the information, “How many prisoners do you guys want to sneak out?”
“I don't intend to get every single prisoner out, that’s impossible. There are a choice few, about a hundred really, selected by a prisoner named Clive Ranger, he’s had this esca—"
“Sorry to interrupt, but Ranger, I’ve heard the name before…” The Captain pauses and his eyes glaze over as he recollects the past, “Yes, there was a man who visited my family and helped us out after the war on my planet. I named this ship after his! He spoke of his kid, and if I remember right, it was something like Clive. Show me this Clive.” The captain finishes, he stands and briskly makes his way across the empty bridge to the viewport.
“Alright,” Richardson says standing, he joins the captain at the viewport, “See that one? Right there with the blue in his hair?”
“He looks just like his father,” the captain says nostalgically, after a moment, he continues, “How can I help?”
“Just keep off the bridge for the time being. We’ll take it from here. Oh, and one last thing Captain,”
“Yes, what is it?”
“Might you be interested in taking these as payment?” Richardson asks, showing the captain the diamonds Clive had given him, “Pay for your expenses and such.”
“No, no, I couldn’t. That's all yours mister…?”
“Richardson” The Major replies as he shakes the captain’s hand enthusiastically. Feeling like he had won a hard-fought battle, Richardson makes his way quickly down to Clive.
“Clive,” Richardson says, tapping his shoulder to get his attention, “The captain of the freighter wants to help. So, let’s get everyone onboard now. You have the fighters yet?”
“Of course, we have the fighters,” Clive says in an agitated tone, “And what do you mean he wants to help? You told him we were breaking out?”
“Yes, I told him. He and his crew are a friendly lot, they didn’t even know this was a prison! “
“And you believed everything they said,” Clive asks skeptically, eyeing Richardson for any trace of ill-intent. Richardson knew it would take a while to earn Clive’s complete trust, but after providing him with the box of Trix’s belonging, he had hoped that he would have earned enough trust to pull of this stunt.
“Yes, I did. Now get on that blasted ship! You can talk to the captain later, he’s left the bridge to you,” As Richardson spoke, his comm buzzes with a message from Jenniston. She was coming down to oversee the loading. Richardson stops Clive who had started towards the ship and whispers just loud enough to be hears above the din of a busy hangar, “Clive, Jenniston is coming right now to monitor the loading process, get everyone on, now!”
“Everyone, get on the freighter now! Jenniston is coming! Richardson here says the crew’s friendly,” Clive shouts to everyone. He makes his way to several crates and opens them. Nearly thirty people tumble out and they all follow Clive as he jogs to the freighter. The entire hangar is abuzz with the commotion of a hundred or so prisoners emerging from their hiding spots. Everyone excitedly rushing toward the Accolade, cheers and whoops of joy sound from the crowd who finally have the means to regain their freedom.
Richardson watches as everyone scampers around, liberation just moments away. He checks in on his men, “You have the fighters?”
“That’s an affirmative, boss,” The voice of Reed responds, sounding more excited than a kid in a candy store, “Three for us, one for that Srin lady, and the last for the guy who took over Dream’s spot. I sure hope they can fly though.”
Reed Jameson was the perfect complement to Apollo as far as piloting went. Reed could fly a fighter better than most Coalition pilots, even better than Apollo, who preferred larger ships. Reed was just daring enough to be dangerous, but not so far as to be a danger to himself. Something Richardson had long admired about Reed was that he was happy to join any team, so long as Richardson requested it, which didn’t happen too often. Reed had been on Richardson’s team since he was about eight, and Richardson had only asked him to help out other teams maybe five times in all of these years. Richardson was a fan of keeping his team close, since he knew no one else could compare to them. He also knew he could keep his team—his family—alive when they were all together.
“Me too. But I trust Clive did his job and picked the right guys to join you,” Richardson answers as he works his way about the hangar assisting with the last second preparations. Suddenly, Jenniston calls him on his comm, reluctantly, he answers, “Richardson here,”
“We’ve got a problem; some prisoners have taken the fighter escorts. I’m sending some guards in to dispatch them. I need you to activate the AA guns for me.”
“Will do ma’am.” He lies, delivering the best lie of his lifetime, “What’s your ETA, commander?”
“I’ll be there in a few seconds, why?
Richardson switches his comm on and off to make it sound like he was breaking up as he responds, “Because I think the complex’s comms are acting up again, Commander,”
“I—” Jenniston starts before Richardson cuts her feed.
Richardson switches his comm channel to Reed’s and shouts, “Take off. Do it now. Jenniston is sending troops.” Without waiting for a response, he drops his comm, and smashes it with his foot, he didn’t want any more calls from Jenniston.
“Have a good chat?” Phelix asks as she pulls up next to Richardson.
“Jenniston is just such good company,” Richardson says sarcastically, which gets a chuckle out of Phelix. After a beat, he continues, “Get on the ship now, I don’t want you out here.”
“Alright,” Phelix agrees, seeing how serious Richardson was.
“Everyone! On this ship. Now! Jenniston is just seconds out.” Richardson shouts to the final few prisoners who hadn’t heeded his previous order. As he races up the freighter’s ramp, the doors at the end of the hangar open. Richardson and his men open fire toward Jenniston and her troops, taking them by surprise. They fire as they retreat to the Accolade. Thinking fast, Richardson shoots the fuel tanks between them, and Jenniston. Flames quickly engulf the fuel tanks and Richardson stumbles from the shockwave from the first blast. Between the explosions and his men’s cover fire the last few escapees make their way to the ship.
“Hurry up!” Wyndover yells to last few stragglers as the first volley from Jenniston’s men rain down on the freighter. Richardson dives out of their line of fire, ducking behind a cargo crate as bullets ricochet from every direction. Two more prisoners duck into the craft, diving out of sight as soon as they are in.
Peeking over his crate, Richardson checks for anyone else. Two inmates lay at the bottom of the ramp, caught in the crossfire. Richardson looks over to Wyndover, who is carefully firing from the Accolade’s ramp, and yells, “Give me some heavy cover fire! I gotta get those two. Tell Clive to get this thing in the air, pronto.”
“Copy,” Wyndover shouts above the din as he unleashes a torrent of bullet
s.
Richardson glances out again to see if the coast was clear, fortunately it was. Racing down the ramp, Richardson’s men continue blindly shooting in, although visibility is next to nothing in Jenniston's general direction. The smoke hadn't spread to the rest of the hangar yet, which would make flying a little easier. Richardson reaches down and takes the first man over his shoulder, he drags the other by his arms and starts back up the ramp.
As Richardson struggles, more gunshots rattle off. One bullet tears through his leg armor, and Richardson feels it lodge itself into his calf. Crying out in pain he falls to his knees, the bullet burns, and he could feel his leg growing numb. He struggles to his knees knowing his only option was to get up the ramp. Another bullet rips into him, lodging itself in his back. The force of the bullet knocks him all the way to the ground and his chin bashes the freighter's ramp. Darkness dances at the edge of his vision as he struggles to push the other two up the ramp. Richardson fights to stay conscious as the pain from his wounds make him sick. Halfway up the ramp his eyelids grow too heavy, and he lets them drop, still squirming up the ramp. Gunshots continue all around him, but Richardson had lost interest in the fight, all he cared about now was making it onto the ship. He hears several bullets ping off the ramp far too close for comfort. Richardson hears shouting, then feels himself being lifted and carried into the safety of the ship, only then does he allow himself to drift off.
Seven
Paradise, Galatia
Clive meets the five he had chosen to fly the freighter on the bridge. He stands at the primary weapons system’s station, familiarizing himself with the controls. The five also familiarize themselves with the ship, tapping random buttons, flipping an occasional switch. The group of under-trained, passionate pilots are seeing tech they had never even heard of. However, they are ready to risk it all in the name of freedom. Rather than be discouraged, they fearlessly do whatever they can to make their bird fly. Powering up the weapons station, Clive anxiously toys with the various targeting systems. The screen before him flashes to life showing a grey cloud swirling about. Flashes of gunshots, and the occasional tracer round illuminate the otherwise dark image.
Confused, Clive looks up to the nearest viewport and sees clouds of smoke, irritated, he radios the comm-port nearest the ramp, “What are you doing down there?” He yells. Waiting for a response he listens to the sound of a roaring fire and the occasional spurt of gunfire. He hears a few voices, and makes out a few words from the voice he figures belongs to Richardson, “Give... cover fire… get those two… Clive in… air, pronto.” Clive figures Richardson was in a bind, so he quickly complies to Richardson’s broken request to get flying. He yells to the five others on the bridge to get them in the air yesterday. He continues listening as gunfire roars over the comms, most likely, Richardson’s men were opening fire. He hears a few bullets ping off of the ramp and hull, and then his feed is cut.
Feeling the power of the Accolade surge, they suddenly lift off the ground, “How fast can this thing go, T?” He asks T who is sitting at the navigation computer.
T looks up, his legs propped up on the Navi as he reads off the ships specs, “I’ve got good news, bad news, and some news we can hope is good. I’ll have to talk to the captain before I can tell you for sure.”
“Just give us the good news first,” Clive says, leaning forward in his chair as the freighter slowly makes its way out of the hangar. Clive finally figures out how to operate the gunner’s system and begins firing at anything and everything that moves. After getting a therapeutic amount of shooting in, Clive turned on the automated firing system which was surely a better shot than he. After all, years in prison weren't too helpful to a marksman.
“The good news: This baby can go fast enough when she’s empty. Twenty-five hundred kilometers an hour is what this book says. Which leads to what I gotta talk to the captain about, the system computers…” T lowers his feet and kicks his chair back, he continues as he rolls to the computers that display the various gauges, levels, indicators, and engine information, “The engine room’s computers are off though, like they are getting some crazy readings. Someone seems to have modified these engines. They are reading out as roughly three times as powerful… It’s very odd that the crew came in so slow earlier.”
“And?”
“And, what?”
“What about the bad news?”
“Oh, yeah. The bad news, brace yourself for this,” T says enthusiastically, “They’ve gone and rigged this—"
“They’ve rigged this ship!?” Clive interrupts jumping from his chair, fearing that his meticulous plan was about to go up in a fireball. Sure, things hadn’t gone exactly to plan, but they had made it this far.
“No, they’ve rigged this snack machine down in the rest area over there,” T finishes, as he points through the entryway, “It’s a cruel trick, sir.”
Clive laughs at T’s bizarre sense of humor. It always comes up at the least opportune times, and T somehow manages to keep a straight face. He could talk about a snack machine as they were being shot at, and escaping a prison, yet still manage deliver his joke and appear serious.
“Alright, hold on,” The guard who goes by Apollo says once they were amply clear of the complex, “Anyone know how to lock these chairs in place? I don’t wanna fall over when we really take off.”
“Yeah, like this,” Clive says as he begins to sit, missing his chair which had rolled away in his sudden leap moments before. With a curse, he gets up amidst several stifled laughs. Embarrassed, he carefully lowers himself into his chair, “Like this.” He repeats as he taps an icon on the armrest for everyone to see.
“Thank you,” Apollo says with a chuckle as he locks himself in place and secures his harness. He taps another icon and leans over to a microphone. Imitating a shuttle pilot’s speech, he addresses everyone on board, “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for flying Freedom Starlines. Please keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle… Don’t throw up… Don’t die. Also, don’t complain, I’m a bit rusty, and it's just impolite. Fasten your seatbelts, we’re getting off this rock!” As he spoke, Apollo gives the ship full power, and they shoot off, going much faster than anticipated.
Clive sees a comm icon on his left flash, tapping a few buttons he tries to activate the comm to no avail. Seemingly a thousand buttons later, he finally is awarded with an anxious voice, “I need to speak with Clive. This is Captain Belmont.”
“This is Clive, whatcha need?” Clive asks nonchalantly.
“We can’t keep going this fast, it’ll burn out the engines,” The Captain informs Clive, sounding scared for his life, “I know my ship. I know we can only go this fast for about a minute. We are as good as dead if you keep pushing it.”
With Apollo flying this bird we're probably as good as dead anyways, Clive thinks, then he addresses the Captain, “Thanks for the heads up, we are just getting as far from the prison as possible, as fast as possible,” Cutting the feed he yells over to Apollo, “Slow down! You heard the message!”
“On it,” Apollo says, immediately cutting power and throwing T off balance, since he wasn’t harnessed in his seat, “Oops, sorry.” Easing the ship to a reasonable speed, Apollo starts making a wide ring around the prison.
Clive stands and makes his way to the viewport. He takes in the jungles of Galatia below, and watches the billowing smoke from the prison's fires which darken the sky. Richardson and Mav had both made good on their promises to cripple the prison, judging by the amount of smoke Clive could make out. He watches as their stolen 180 escorts finally begin making their way toward them at their rendezvous point.
“Clive, it looks like—” Apollo starts before a loud explosion sounds, far too close for comfort.
“Incoming!” Clive shouts as he braces himself.
“Looks like Jenniston saved a few of her guns!” T reports as several more explosions light up the sky.
“Take those batteries out!” Clive shouts into a microphone once he h
ad switched to the channel the escorts are on.
“Already on it,” Clive hears Srin’s voice report.
“Shields are at 97.8 percent, and they are holding,” Mav reports after a beat. He studies his console for a moment before continuing, “It appears like we can continue on like this forever.”
“I don’t plan to wait nearly that long,” Clive mutters.
Outside, the 180s break from their sloppy formation, and begin racing back toward the prison. All the while, flak continues peppering Clive’s shields.
“I see two batteries,” Reed calls out over the comms.
“There’s three!” Srin corrects as a stream of gunfire tears through the sky toward the fighters, which all scatter and begin making more sporadic approaches.
“I got clipped!” Dream’s replacement, a man by the name of Neche calls out as smoke erupts from the right wing of one of the fighters, leaving behind a trail of smoke.
“I’ve dropped the machinegun,” One of Richardson’s guards report joyously as the stream of bullets stops chasing down the fighters.
“Pull in closer,” Clive instructs, “Let’s see if we can draw some fire,”
“Copy,” T replies.
Their ship slowly begins descending back toward the prison, and sure enough, the freighter draws fire from the flak cannons.
“Thanks for distracting them!” Reed shouts over the comm as an AA gun is lit up by one of the fighters. After a moment, Reed continues, “Two down,”
“I got the last—” Srin’s voice cuts out.
Looking out of the window, Clive sees one of the fighters burst into flames and crash into the prison, barely missing the final AA gun. Upon closer inspection, Clive can see several guards on the ground, doing their best to defend the final battery with their small arms.
“Srin’s gone,” Reed reports solemnly.
Moments later another fighter avenges Srin and lights the cannon up with two missiles, both of which score direct hits. Flames burst out of the gaping hole that was created by the missiles, and the building quickly collapses in on itself in a cloud of smoke and dust.