Charmed by the Alien Pirate

by Kyle, Celia

  I punch in the code, and the pod lid cracks open. My face splits in a wide grin when I see the tanks are still present, each one longer than I am tall and thicker than my waist.

  “Jackpot.”

  “I’m confused. Why do you need such an outdated, volatile accelerant as methane?”

  “Because we need an outdated, volatile accelerant to build a bomb nasty enough to get the Prestige off our tail for good.”

  “A bomb?” His handsome face gapes in shock. “But—but we have torpedoes.”

  “I’m trying to make something with a lot more punch.”

  “I see. Would not Montier or Vander be a better choice than me? They have the technical expertise.”

  “Yes, but they’re not my fated mates. Are they?” I flash a grin at him as I struggle to lift one of the tanks. “I don’t have to overexplain myself to you. You just know what I’m getting at on instinct.”

  “I see. Taking advantage of our pairing is an adept move.”

  “Pro gamer all the way.”

  Spots dance before my eyes, and I haven’t even budged it by an inch. Fortunately Swipt leans over and grabs it easily, moving the heavy tank as if it were a down pillow.

  “Where do you want these?”

  “Set them in the back of one of the shuttles.”

  Swipt’s eyes widen with understanding.

  “I think I get what you’re doing here.” Swiftly, he stows the tank in the rear of one of Solair’s elegant golden-hulled shuttles and then runs back to the cargo pod for another. As he works, I start making calculations in my head.

  “Swipt, is there a way to remote pilot the shuttles?”

  “Not that I know of.” He picks up another thank and tosses it over his shoulder before hustling across the cargo bay’s metal-plated floors. I try not to be distracted by what the motion does to his muscular back and shoulders.

  “Could they be modified in some way for remote operation?”

  “Probably?” Swipt shakes his head. “It’s not my purview. I just fly the ships. I don’t program their computers.”

  Fiona can probably figure out how we can remote pilot the shuttle. Swipt finishes stacking the methane tanks in the back of the ship, which is filled to the brim. With the way the tanks jut up into the driver’s compartment, you probably couldn’t fly it conventionally anyway.

  “How are you going to get these to detonate?”

  “I’m going to rig up an ignition switch.”

  Easier said than done. My mind races through dozens of possibilities in mere seconds. The tanks have a thick, metal skin. I need a way to pierce at least one of the tanks and simultaneously ignite the contents.

  First things first, though. I need to disable the safety valves on the tanks that are designed to prevent the methane from turning into a bomb in the first place.

  Swipt comes over, sees what I’m about, and starts working on the opposite side without me even having to ask.

  “Decoupler.”

  I hold my hand out, not even looking in Swipt’s direction, and soon feel the cool handle of the tool placed in my palm. We move in concert, inching out of each other’s way when necessary and passing tools and equipment on demand.

  I’ve worked with a lot of good engineers, but Swipt is the best assistant I’ve ever had. He’s completely putting his ego aside and letting me be in charge, which I greatly appreciate. It’s also going to save our lives, I remind myself.

  Once the safety valves are off, it’s time to figure out my detonation device. Moving my gaze about swiftly, almost frantically, I look at all the tools and equipment the Queen’s cargo bay has to offer.

  Then my eyes settle on an automatic bolt driver, and I feel a rush run though my body.

  That’s it.

  “Swipt, help me get this casing off the mechanism. Hurry.”

  His big, golden-skinned hands make sort work of the screws holding the metal casing over the driver’s mechanics. Once I have access, it doesn’t take much work to change it from a bolt driver to a methane tank puncturing armature.

  I test the device several times and then go over to an empty tank.

  “Tell your captain I’m sorry about this.”

  “Sorry about what?”

  I hit the device, and it punches a hole through the metal skin of the empty tank big enough for me to put my finger through. Perfect.

  “I think since we’re trying to save the entire ship, Solair isn’t going to mind the loss of one empty gaseous materials tank.”

  “Well, I hope the hell not.”

  We share a nervous laugh, and I blink sweat out of my eyes as I rig up my ignition switch. Using the electric sparker from a torch welder, I create an attachment for the tank puncturing armature.

  Then I very, very carefully arm it. If I touch the wrong button on my datapad, the whole thing will go up while still on board the Queen. That much power packed into such a small space would rend the hull in two.

  “That’s finished. Now we just need to remote pilot this thing. Somehow.”

  I bring up Fiona on my comm, and we bandy about ideas while Swipt works with decoupling the console casing. She’s the expert, so I’m mostly just telling her whether her plan is feasible or not.

  We wind up offloading Davenport’s files from my datapad before wiring it into the console itself, and we can use the holonet connection contained therein to pilot the ship remotely.

  It’s an ugly job, and with the added bulk of my datapad, the casing won’t go back on properly. When I attempt to power on the engines remotely, the nacelles light up on cue, almost by magic.

  “It’s working.” I jump up and down and grab Swipt’s hands with glee. “It’s working.”

  “You’re a genius, beloved.”

  “Damn right I’m a—what did you just call me?”

  Swipt gets a semi bashful grin on his sweet face.

  “Beloved?”

  “I like the sound of that.”

  I grab his hand and race for the cargo bay exit.

  “Come on. Let’s get back to the bridge. The Prestige might be right on top of us already.”

  “Indeed. Should I carry you again?”

  I pause and then look up at him with my best puppy dog expression.

  “Only if you want to…”

  He smiles and seizes me in his powerful grip. I throw my arms around his neck ostensibly for a way to hang on for dear life, but it also makes it quite convenient to kiss him on his cheek.

  “Thanks for being an awesome helper.”

  “Whatever you desire, I’ll see that you get it.”

  Well, he just has this whole husband thing down. Now doesn’t he?

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Swipt

  I race into the bridge, deposit Ilya on her feet, and leap over the back of my pilot’s chair as soon as Grantian clears the way.

  Solair fixes me with a worried frown. I don’t think he likes being in the dark about things happening on his ship.

  “Want to clue me in on what the two of you have hatched up?”

  My fingers punch keys rapidly, but I respond immediately to his query even if I don’t turn around to face him.

  “Ilya turned one of our shuttles into a methane bomb. We’re going to remote pilot it right into the Prestige and get them off our ass once and for all.”

  “A methane bomb?” I can feel Solair’s incredulity even if I can’t see his face. “Isn’t that primitive tech?”

  “It’s very primitive, Captain.” Grantian’s eyes narrow. “And while I’m not an expert on IHC-class star ships, I find it very unlikely that the resulting explosion will be enough to do significant damage to the Prestige.”

  Ilya comes over to his side and peers over at his console.

  “True enough, but that’s why we’re going to aim for a critical spot on their ship.”

  “What critical spot?”

  “I don’t know yet. I’m sort of waiting for you to move so I can use your console and try to fin
d one.”

  Grantian arches an eyebrow at Solair, who nods his assent. The big first mate rises out of his chair and offers it to Ilya, who immediately plops down heavily.

  “How come your seat is so much more comfortable than anyone else’s? Is this genuine Corinthian leather?”

  Even as she jibes, Ilya gets down to work. I think she’s downloading schematics of destroyer-class IHC ships from the dark holonet. Hopefully she doesn’t give us a virus in our systems, but I trust Ilya to know what she’s doing.

  “Holy shit.” Ilya’s mouth gapes open as she takes in the enormous amount of information displayed on the file. “I—I don’t have time to go through all of this.”

  “Hang on.” Fiona rises from the nav chair and comes to lean over the back of Ilya’s seat. Fiona’s eyes narrow, her lips move silently as she takes in the data on the screen. Then she reaches out and taps her nail on the monitor. “That’s it.”

  “What’s it?”

  “The life support system on the underside of her hull.”

  Ilya’s eyes get wide, and then she smiles craftily.

  “Oh yes.” Her fingers punch keys in rapid succession, and then she chuckles to herself. “Oh yes, yes, yes.”

  “How’s it coming, beloved?”

  Ilya turns about in her seat and shoots me a smile.

  “Their life support module is generating oxygen for the entire ship. Once the methane ignites it…”

  I grin in response and rub my hands together like a super villain.

  “I like the way you think, honey.”

  I blow her a kiss, and she pretends to catch it and press it to her lips. Then she holds my gaze while she pointedly moves her hands—and my metaphorical kiss—down between her legs.

  “You can show me how much you like it later.”

  “By the twisty designs of the Precursors, there is to be no more flirting on the bridge of my ship.” Solair slams his fist down on his console, though the fact that he’s laughing seems to belie his decree. “This is a professional operation.”

  “Since when?” I laugh at my own joke and start making the preparations to remote guide the shuttle.

  “Solair, the Prestige will be in weapons range in thirty-five seconds.” Fiona’s voice has a note of panic, but she’s holding it together remarkably well for her first space battle.

  “Red alert.” At Solair’s decree, the lights on the bridge dim and shine with a red light. “Swipt, bring us about hard to starboard. I want every cannon we have pointed right at them.”

  “Hang on to your butts.” I activate the thruster array on the port side, increase power to the inertial dampening, and hit the execute button. Even with the inertial dampener circuits going, we’re still thrown pretty hard to our relative lefts as the ship pivots about to face the oncoming behemoth.

  “Fire all weapons. Keep them too distracted to worry about the shuttle launch.”

  The main monitor lights up with green flashes from the Queen’s gamma ray emitters and solid yellow beams from the ion cannon. Apparently we caught the Prestige off guard because they don’t even have their shields up. Charred lines rake across their fore deck before the shields finally come on line.

  Then I kick on the afterburner and angle our trajectory beneath their hull. The Prestige moves to counter, but one advantage we have in this fight is maneuverability. Their slow bulk can’t hope to correct course fast enough to stop my nimble, artful dodging.

  The massive hull looms overhead, and I open the cargo bay doors.

  “Cargo bay is open. Launching shuttle now.”

  This is it, the moment of truth. Their sensors are going to detect the shuttle launch. There’s no getting around that. But will they treat it as a threat? I’ve aligned us so the launch happened in an area with the least amount of gunnery, but there’s still the aft point defense cannons to worry about.

  “Steady, Swipt.” Solair leans forward in his chair, watching the shuttle’s path.

  “Steady as a rock, Cap’n.” Despite my bravado, my brow is beaded with sweat. I’m essentially flying two different ships at once. Yes, I’m that good, but it does take full concentration.

  “Solair, the Prestige seems to be ignoring our shuttle.” Fiona’s tone grows more confident buy the moment. “They’re preparing to launch a torpedo spread at us.”

  “Time until launch?” Solair’s voice trembles ever so slightly, but I don’t think it’s pure fear. I think he’s eager to strike back at this big bully who’s been chasing us all over the frontier.

  “Fifteen seconds.”

  “Time to impact, Swipt?”

  “Eight seconds.”

  “Then we’ve got time to spare. Get us to a safe distance, Swipt.”

  “Already on it, Cap’n.”

  The bridge grows silent while I work fervently at my console. The point defense weapons are finally attacking the shuttle, so I have to take evasive maneuvers. I calculate the difference in time and realize it’s going to be almost a simultaneous impact to their torpedo barrage launch.

  Nothing to do now but rely upon good old-fashioned luck. But after finding my fated mate—impossibly finding my fated mate, and not even from my own species—I’m willing to give fate the benefit of the doubt.

  “Impact in three…two…one…impact.”

  My calm declaration is greeted with a small orange globe on the underside of the Prestige. Then the oxygen in their life support ignites, and another expanding, silent globe appears, rending half of the underside of their hull in twain.

  Worse for them, their torpedoes are trapped inside their launch bays. When the oxygen lines blow, it sends streaks of fire all over the hull of their ship.

  Then the torpedoes detonate, and we ride away from the dying vessel just at the edge of the ever-expanding explosion.

  Solair grimaces as it begins to overtake us and turns his baleful gaze on me.

  “Swipt…”

  “I’m on it, Captain.”

  “Wait, why are you engaging a waste gasses vent? Now?”

  “To give us a little boost in speed.”

  I vent the carbon dioxide gas from our own life support system, which gives us just enough extra thrust to escape the ever-expanding fireball and debris cloud. A ragged cheer shoots up on the bridge as we make a clean getaway.

  “Fiona, status on the enemy vessel?” Solair’s tone suggests he knows full well the answer but can’t resist asking anyway.

  “What enemy vessel, sir?”

  That makes us all laugh, and I relax at last. Against all odds, we’ve won.

  Thanks to my clever fated mate.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Ilya

  To say the mood on the Ancestral Queen’s bridge is celebratory is an understatement.

  Solair broke out bottles of carbonated spirits, which are similar enough to champagne to count in my estimation. The entire staff is filling glasses and making toasts to our luck and occasional brilliance.

  At the moment, I feel like the Most Valuable Sapient in a Battle Bowl League game. Everyone has come over to me individually to offer their thanks and congratulations on my successful plan. It’s a great feeling, and I soak in the minor adoration like a sponge soaks in water.

  Not that I’m surprised my plan worked. It was a sound one. I am pleased that it did, however.

  Given how little time I had to prepare and the improvised nature of my methods, perhaps I should be a little bit surprised that it worked. My hastily modified armature could have failed to function, or the ignition switch could have failed. There was even a possibility that the methane might ignite because the shuttle got too close to weapons fire.

  But work it did, and I’m very happy about that.

  After we’d cleared the debris cloud and slowly dissipating globe of fire, Solair had insisted upon doing a scan for life signs, in case there were survivors. He really is a decent man for a pirate. Even now Fiona is continuing the scan, though I’ll be quite surprised if there are any lif
e signs detected.

  That was one hell of an explosion.

  I suppose it’s possible that one of their escape pods may have managed to make it out of range before the ship exploded, but it doesn’t seem likely. My suspicions are confirmed in a few moments when Fiona swivels in her seat and turns to Solair.

  “No survivors detected, Captain.”

  “We weren’t really expecting any, but I had to try.” Solair rubs his chin and examines the data on his command console. “I’ve never seen a catastrophic failure like this on a military-grade star ship before.”

  “Maybe we should rig up a bunch more of Ilya’s bombs?” Swipt grins, and I saunter over to him to sit on his lap so I can refill his glass with the bottle in my hand.

  “I don’t think there’s any methane left, babe. Besides, that was what is referred to in human parlance as a ‘Hail Mary’ type of play.”

  “Hail Mary?”

  The Kilgari men on the bridge all exchange puzzled glances, but Varia lets them off the hook.

  “There used to be an ancient Earth sporting event called Scrimmage, or American Football. It’s what the BBL was based off of, though of course it wasn’t played on a giant anti-gravity cube, and it was just one team against another instead of a free for all.”

  “I recall reading something about that…” Solair arches an eyebrow at his mate.

  “Right. Well, the primary way of moving the ball in Scrimmage is to pass it, but of course there’s a limit to how far a human being can throw even a small aerodynamic object. When the time was running out on the game clock, a player made an incredibly long pass that shouldn’t have succeeded, but did.”

  “I can get the analogy.” Swipt shakes his head. “What I don’t get is the name. Why would hailing a ship named Mary be associated with a desperate plan?”

  Varia and I exchange looks and realize there’s no way to condense thousands of years of Earth religious history into a succinct explanation.

  “I’ll tell you later.” I kiss Swipt on his cheek and snuggle in his lap.

  “It’s a shame there were no survivors.” Solair shakes his head and sighs. “I hate massive bloodshed.”