by M. D. Cooper
Tanis sighed and set her rifle down on the deck, leaning it against the console. “I guess there’s no point in me hanging onto this, then. Say I do give up. What then?”
“Then you’ll be our hostage,” Unger replied. “Just you, though. Easier to deal with one. Your boys and girls can take a walk out the airlock.”
Unger raised his chin, gesturing at her arm. “Looks like a bit of a dent there.”
“I did say ‘not much of a dent’.” Tanis chuckled.
Tanis released the maglock on her boots before pushing off the console with her right hand. She grunted as pain lanced up her arm, but her trajectory was true. Unger’s eyes widened with surprise as she flew toward him, then they narrowed as he slammed his hand down on the manual ignition switch.
Which did nothing.
“What?!” he cried out as Tanis collided with him.
She delivered a punch to his solar plexus, and Unger curled up, flying back into the reactor’s rad shield. Without gravity, Tanis’s momentum kept her moving forward, and she crashed into the freighter’s captain, delivering a blow to the side of his head and a knee to his groin.
The strike sent her cartwheeling backward, high over the engineering bay’s consoles.
“Shit!” Tanis swore as she activated her armor’s attitude jets and flew back toward the console. Unger was pulling himself forward across the deck, and she flung her lightwand at him with her left hand while reaching out for the switch with her right.
She was going to miss; throwing the lightwand had altered her trajectory just enough that her fingers wouldn’t reach the switch. Tanis swung her arm up, the movement sending her spinning. Just as Lovell began to call into her mind again, the tip of her right boot caught the switch and pushed it back up.
Tanis didn’t have time to recover from the move, and she slammed into the deck half a meter from Unger. The captain had one hand wrapped around a support pole, and in the other he held her light wand.
He caught that?
Tanis called the Kirby Jones’s pilot.
Tanis returned her attention to Unger as he lunged soundlessly at her with her lightwand in hand. Tanis reached for her slug-thrower, and realized that it had come free from its holster sometime in the scuffle. She widened her stance and waited for the freighter captain to get within arm’s length before slamming her left hand into his wrist, deflecting his strike. The maneuver spun her around, but it did the same to Unger.
She grabbed the edge of a console and activated her maglock boots, swinging them down to the deck. Finally reattached to a solid surface, she turned back to Unger to see that he had done the same thing.
“C’mon, soldier girl. Let’s finish this.” Unger’s voice dripped with menace, and Tanis saw that he held a ballistic handgun as well as her light wand.
Where’d he get that? she wondered. No matter, it would take more than a few shots from the weapon to penetrate her armor. The lightwand was what she needed to worry about.
Unger fired a trio of rounds at her: two striking center mass and one hitting her right arm—missing the wound, but still hitting the under-layer, which stung more than a little.
Tanis lunged forward again, closing in to use her augmented strength against the man. He slashed at her, coming in high, and she raised an arm to block the blow while kicking at his right knee. Unger jerked his leg away in the nick of time, and fell back only to renew his attack once more, firing point-blank at her head while bringing the lightwand in low.
She sidestepped and managed to grab Unger’s gun-arm under her left arm. He grunted and swung the lightwand around, aiming for her head. Tanis caught his wrist with her right hand, gasping as she felt her humerus bend and fracture further. She closed her eyes against the pain, and twisted to the right, getting her hand on Unger’s gun.
Unger cursed and bore down on her with the lightwand. “Gonna die here, soldier girl. And I’ll still get my cargo where it needs to go.”
“Fahhhk!” Tanis screamed as the bone in her arm snapped, and the lightwand came down into her shoulder.
But the movement shifted Unger just enough for her to wrench his pistol free, and unload the remainder of the magazine into his torso.
His eyes opened wide in surprise as droplets of blood filled the air between them.
Tanis stumbled back, leaning heavily against a console. She dropped the spent handgun, and reached up, thumbing the switch to stop the lightwand’s electron flow before pulling it out of her shoulder.
A blood-curdling shriek escaped her—both audibly and over the Link; at least, that’s what her crew told her. Tanis had no memory of it. She slumped in her armor, only remaining upright with its support, while it filled her wounds with biofoam. She blinked to clear her vision, and a predatory smile touched her lips while she watched Unger gasping his last breaths as he floated in front of her, blood squirting from his chest, coalescing into red globules in the air.
She knew she should signal for Lukas or Yves to get a stasis kit for the freighter captain, but she really didn’t care right now. Let the scum die. Sol would be better for it.
* * * * *
The autodoc’s arm pulled back, and Tanis sat up, slowly flexing her right arm. It would still take some time to fully heal, but, with the additional supports the ‘doc had inserted into her bone, it should manage any strain she might put on it over the next few days.
Her left shoulder still ached—a lot. The lightwand hadn’t reached her heart, but it had punctured her lung, sliced clear through her collarbone, and shredded more than a few ligaments. Another day in the autodoc would see the wound fully healed, but Tanis didn’t have time to lie on her back. Her internal nano could keep repairing the damage while she tended to the mess that boarding the Norse Wind had created.
The freighter’s total complement had been sixteen crew, including the now-deceased Captain Unger. Only six had perished in the fighting, which meant that the Kirby Jones’s small brig was overflowing. Tanis was considering converting one of the holds on the freighter to a brig, but maintaining security there would be problematic to say the least.
“Ready to be up and about, Commander?” Connie asked from the medbay’s entrance.
Tanis glanced up at the redheaded sergeant and smiled. “Ready enough. There’s too much work to be done for me to be lying around.”
“I wouldn’t mind lying down for a day or so,” Connie replied. “We’ve run though that ship top-to-bottom, and those ancient engine regulators are the only contraband we could find—well, the only serious contraband. Not that those regulators should be illegal anywhere, anymore. The only crime here is that they should be in a museum.”
“Crazy that they’d put up such a fight over them,” Tanis said. “Maybe there’s still something hiding over there, and the regulators are a decoy.”
“Dumbest decoy ever. Either way, if they have anything else in there, we’d have to tear the ship to pieces to find it.”
“Well, I guess we’ll just tow it in, then,” Tanis replied.
“Seriously?” Tanis asked. “Isn’t the Arizona assigned to Fleet Group 743 out at Ganymede? What’s it doing on the InnerSol border?”
“Not much we can do about that,” Connie said, and then flashed a grin, her green eyes sparkling. “Not that I care. Means I don’t have to clean up the mess we made over there while searching all their hidey-holes.”
“Good point,” Tanis said with a smile. “With any luck, we’ll get the go-ahead to end this patrol once we hand them over. If not, we’re going to be sucking on whatever food we have in the bottom of the vats.”
“Well,” Connie smirked. “We may be OK in the food department for a bit. I lifted some of the fresh produce from the Norse Wind. They had bacon, too.”
Tanis slipped off the autodoc, and landed unsteadily on her feet. She reached back to stabilize herself and winced as her right arm protested.
Connie frowned. “That was a bit fast there, Commander.”
“Well, you did just tell me that there is a BLT in my future. That’s more than enough to get me excited.”
* * * * *
Tanis had just settled into a chair in the Kirby Jones’s tiny galley and picked up her BLT, when Lieutenant James messaged her on the Link.
Tanis sighed and set her sandwich back on its plate.
Tanis replied.
Going in? A month of leave? Tanis couldn’t believe what she was hearing. The crew would be ecstatic.
Tanis signed off and the galley came back into focus around her. She leaned back in her chair and eyed the BLT resting on her plate. She may be beaten and bruised, but a month’s leave? That would be enough time to catch a ride to Mars and see Peter.
She picked up the sandwich, took a bite, and smiled.
Not such a bad day, after all.
THE END
* * * * *
If you’ve enjoyed reading about Tanis Richards, and would like to know what comes next, you’ll get to find out in June of 2018, when the first book in the Origins of Destiny, Shore Leave, comes out.
Shore Leave’s initial release will be as a part of the Galactic Genesis anthology—six brand new books by six authors for the price of a single novel.
Also, jump ahead to Tanis’s final days in the Terran Space Force in the book Outsystem.
THE BOOKS OF AEON 14
Keep up to date with what is releasing in Aeon 14 with the free Aeon 14 Reading Guide.
The Intrepid Saga (The Age of Terra)
- Book 1: Outsystem
- Book 2: A Path in the Darkness
- Book 3: Building Victoria
- The Intrepid Saga Omnibus – Also contains Destiny Lost, book 1 of the Orion War series
- Destiny Rising – Special Author’s Extended Edition comprised of both Outsystem and A Path in the Darkness with over 100 pages of new content.
The Orion War
- Book 1: Destiny Lost
- Book 2: New Canaan
- Book 3: Orion Rising
- Book 4: The Scipio Alliance
- Book 5: Attack on Thebes
- Book 6: War on a Thousand Fronts
- Book 7: Fallen Empire (2018)
- Book 8: Airtha Ascendancy (2018)
- Book 9: The Orion Front (2018)
- Book 10: Starfire (2019)
- Book 11: Race Across Time (2019)
- Book 12: Return to Sol (2019)
Tales of the Orion War
- Book 1: Set the Galaxy on Fire
- Book 2: Ignite the Stars
- Book 3: Burn the Galaxy to Ash (2018)
Perilous Alliance (Age of the Orion War – w/Chris J. Pike)
- Book 1: Close Proximity
- Book 2: Strike Vector
- Book 3: Collision Course
- Book 4: Impact Imminent
- Book 5: Critical Inertia (2018)
Rika’s Marauders (Age of the Orion War)
- Prequel: Rika Mechanized
- Book 1: Rika Outcast
- Book 2: Rika Redeemed
- Book 3: Rika Triumphant
- Book 4: Rika Commander
- Book 5: Rika Infiltrator (2018)
- Book 6: Rika Unleashed (2018)
- Book 7: Rika Conqueror (2019)
Perseus Gate (Age of the Orion War)
Season 1: Orion Space
- Episode 1: The Gate at the Grey Wolf Star
- Episode 2: The World at the Edge of Space
- Episode 3: The Dance on the Moons of Serenity
- Episode 4: The Last Bastion of Star City
- Episode 5: The Toll Road Between the Stars
- Episode 6: The Final Stroll on Perseus’s Arm
- Eps 1-3 Omnibus: The Trail Through the Stars
- Eps 4-6 Omnibus: The Path Amongst the Clouds
Season 2: Inner Stars
- Episode 1: A Meeting of Bodies and Minds
- Episode 3: A Deception and a Promise Kept
- Episode 3: A Surreptitious Rescue of Friends and Foes (2018)
- Episode 4: A Trial and the Tribulations (2018)
- Episode 5: A Deal and a True Story Told (2018)
- Episode 6: A New Empire and An Old Ally (2018)
Season 3: AI Empire
- Episode 1: Restitution and Recompense (2019)
- Five more episodes following…
The Warlord (Before the Age of the Orion War)
- Book 1: The Woman Without a World
- Book 2: The Woman Who Seized an Empire
- Book 3: The Woman Who Lost Everything
The Sentience Wars: Origins (Age of the Sentience Wars – w/James S. Aaron)
- Book 1: Lyssa’s Dream
- Book 2: Lyssa’s Run
- Book 3: Lyssa’s Flight
- Book 4: Lyssa’s Call
- Book 5: Lyssa’s Flame (June 2018)
Enfield Genesis (Age of the Sentience Wars – w/Lisa Richman)
- Book 1: Alpha Centauri
- Book 2: Proxima Centauri (2018)
Hand’s Assassin (Age of the Orion War – w/T.G. Ayer)
- Book 1: Death Dealer
- Book 2: Death Mark (August 2018)
Machete System Bounty Hunter (Age of the Orion War – w/Zen DiPietro)
- Book 1: Hired Gun
- Book 2: Gunning for Trouble
- Book 3: With Guns Blazing (June 2018)
Vexa Legacy (Age of the FTL Wars – w/Andrew Gates)
- Book 1: Seas of the Red Star
Building New Canaan (Age of the Orion War – w/J.J. Green
- Book 1: Carthage (2018)
Fennington Station Murder Mysteries (Age of the Orion War)
- Book 1: Whole Latte Death (w/Chris J. Pike)
- Book 2: Cocoa Crush (w/Chris J. Pike)
The Empire (Age of the Orion War)
- The Empress and the Ambassador (2018)
- C
onsort of the Scorpion Empress (2018)
- By the Empress’s Command (2018)
Tanis Richards: Origins (The Age of Terra)
- Prequel: Storming the Norse Wind (At the Helm Volume 3)
- Book 1: Shore Leave (June 2018)
- Book 2: The Command (July 2018)
- Book 3: Infiltrator (July 2018)
The Sol Dissolution (The Age of Terra)
- Book 1: Venusian Uprising (2018)
- Book 2: Scattered Disk (2018)
- Book 3: Jovian Offensive (2019)
- Book 4: Fall of Terra (2019)
The Delta Team Chronicles (Expanded Orion War)
- A "Simple" Kidnapping (Pew! Pew! Volume 1)
- The Disknee World (Pew! Pew! Volume 2)
- It’s Hard Being a Girl (Pew! Pew! Volume 4)
- A Fool’s Gotta Feed (Pew! Pew! Volume 4)
- Rogue Planets and a Bored Kitty (Pew! Pew! Volume 5)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael Cooper likes to think of himself as a jack-of-all-trades (and hopes to become master of a few). When not writing, he can be found writing software, working in his shop at his latest carpentry project, or likely reading a book.
He shares his home with a precocious young girl, his wonderful wife (who also writes), two cats, a never-ending list of things he would like to build, and ideas…
Find out what’s coming next at http://www.aeon14.com