by Justin Bell
As enemies go, he is impressive. He's one of the tallest Reblon warriors I've ever seen. His face is a scarred clump of blue muscle with narrowed eyes, snarling lips, and fang like teeth. He is wearing a thick onyx helmet shaped like the skull of some large, horned creature that I've never seen before. He's not wearing a tunic or any kind of tactical vest, just facing off against me bare chested. He does have reinforced armor covering his already massive legs.
"Bragdon, Reblon, mutated Athelonian. It doesn't matter," he snarls. "I'll kill you no matter what race you represent."
He lunges towards me, his club up over his head. As it comes crashing down, I roll to my right, letting the weapon slam down into the dirt where I was lying a moment before. How is someone so huge also so fast?
I push myself forward, snake underneath another club swing, and bury my fist deep into his stomach. It's like punching iron. He takes a step backwards, but my fingers scream with pain as I draw my hand back in stunned agony.
His other hand, the one not clutching the deadly looking club, clenches into a fist that he hurls it at me in a dark streak of furred motion. I roll right and the fist glances off my left shoulder. His eyes gleam in the starlight.
I look back over my shoulder at him standing between the two Crashers. His own super-powered mech suit is several yards away at rest.
"Your battle is over, young Northstar," he growls. "This false myth stops here and now, and the quadrant will soon belong to Reblox."
It's tough to argue.
A bright white flash catches my attention, and my gaze shifts just in time to see a twist of light smoke streak the night sky. It punches into the Crasher to Flox's left and detonates, blasting the mechanized suit into a spray of gunmetal fragments, leaving just the legs standing there underneath a shattered, smoking wreckage.
Flox whirls around, ducking and bracing a hand over his face as a second swirl of smoke slams down into the other Crasher, striking it in the center and obliterating it.
Hot metal sprays down around us, setting some of the long grass aflame. The smoke stings my sensitive Bragdon eyes. The world ahead of me is a haze of fog and tear streaked vision, but Hunjar Flox is breaking into a sprint, running at full tilt towards his darkly armored Crasher. He's moving faster than I've ever seen a Reblon run.
I look up, pulling the back of my hand over my eyes, trying to clear the streaked vision.
A jump ship. The resistance jump ship; they came back for me.
It's a squat, rounded spacecraft with downward angled wings, and under each wing is a trio of square rocket pods. A pale light glows from behind the clear canopy, and though I can't see it clearly, I can almost envision Drewsk behind the sticks, guiding the ship down towards me.
Scrambling, I pick myself up from the ground and wave to the ship as it drifts downward, coming in to land. A metal slam off in the distance draws my attention. My eyes grow wide as Flox brings down his canopy on his dark Crasher.
"Hurry!" I shout to the ship as if they can hear me. I step back as the surrounding grass is flatted by the blasting air of landing thrusters. The ship doesn't set down; it hovers there above the ground, rocking back and forth with bright blue flame shooting to the ground, scorching grass and darkening the dirt underneath. Near the rear of the rounded ship, a wide metal door swings open, slamming down toward the ground with a metallic clang.
Kleethak stands in the opening with his robe whipping in the night wind waving his arm towards me.
"Brie! Jump!"
My eyes flash to Flox's Crasher as it takes one massive, slamming stomp forward with red headlight eyes igniting.
"Watch out!" I shout again. "His Crasher has ground-to-air missiles!"
I take four steps backwards, measuring the distance to the door-ramp as it hangs there, several yards above the ground. Off in the distance, bright flashes and narrow streaks of smoke, scream towards me. I draw in a breath and run. They're on top of me now as I coil my legs and launch myself, as hard and as fast as I can. As I leap up through the air, I twist through coils of smoke that seem like fingers trying to grab me.
They miss.
The ground underneath me explodes in a yellow shower of dirt clumps, toasted grass, and debris as I leap through the air. The explosive blast actually carries me further and faster than I can manage on my own.
It's the first mistake I've seen Flox make. My fingers clutch the edge of the open ramp where Kleethak is already reaching out his hand. I wrap my fingers around his arm, letting him draw me in as the door begins to close. We both scramble and tumble inside, desperate to get to hand holds as the door seals us off from the night air beyond.
"Grab a hold of something!" a voice shouts over the ship's intercom.
Neither of us have time to follow that order before the ship tilts wildly, throwing us both off balance. Three rapid, muffled blasts roar near the right, and the ship jerks down.
"We're hit!" Kleethak shouts.
"Minor damage!" comes the report over the intercom, as if in response. "Compensating!"
Reversing momentum, the ship tilts back to the right to even itself out. I pick myself up and run out of the cargo bay, past rows of seats with familiar faces strapped in and holding on tight. I burst into the cabin where Drewsk and Segaris are in pilot and co-pilot's seats, watching the onyx Crasher with red headlights glares back up at them.
I won't forget that Crasher for a very long time.
Shoulder mounted missile pods explode to life, sending a dozen smoking streaks up towards the ship. Drewsk doesn't say a word; he just lunges to the left, wrenching the sticks with him and the ground below zooms right as he brings the ship around to port, then slams down on the thrust.
My stomach lurches as the ship leaps forward, zooming past the Crasher on the ground, heading uncomfortably towards a thick row of trees. The sky around us pulls into multi-colored streams of unformed patterns as the ship reaches massive acceleration. As I pull myself up, I can hear the scraping of the trees on the metal hull of the ship, but we scrape clear, then arc upwards, pointed out to the sky. Stars smudge together, colors blur into a single darkened mush, the atmosphere thrashes around us, jostling the ship back and forth, and then we're breaking throughout into space and the world around us turns to hyperspace.
###
These days, moments of peace are few and far between, so as I stand in the rear hold and look out the slender window into space, it's somewhat unnatural.
"No matter how many times I see it, it's still beautiful."
I look over my right shoulder and smile. Luxen approaches me, walking with a slight limp. His left arm is wrapped in a sling that curls around his entire chest.
"Feeling better, kid?" I ask him. He hates it when I call him that.
"I'm not a kid," he snaps back.
"Keep volunteering for missions like you did back there and you won't see adulthood either."
"You're not that much older than me, you know."
I smile. "I know. Sorry, Luxen. You were very brave back there, but almost very dead."
"Risks must be taken sometimes, for the betterment of the Yarda Quadrant."
"You've been talking to Drewsk too much."
"Is that a bad thing?"
I pause for a moment, trying to consider my answer. Drewsk's heart is in the right place, of this I'm certain. He believes that what he's doing is right. But letting a young Bragdon boy risk his life for an ideal he doesn't truly understand doesn't seem right to me.
The resistance put the senator in harm's way for a plan that had about a fifty percent chance of working and ultimately got that same senator killed.
These seem like a lot of unnecessary risks. Are things that desperate?
"Speaking of Drewsk," I continue, "has he said where we're heading?"
Luxen doesn't seem to want to answer, he just stands next to me, glaring out of the side window at the darkness of space.
I turn towards him. "Luxen?"
His silence bothers me.
<
br /> "We need to rejoin a larger group he says. One of the other resistance groups. Combine our forces."
I turn away from him, looking back out the window. "We're going back to Athelon, aren't we?" I ask.
"The largest group is in Adroxis," he replies quietly. "That's where he's taking us."
"Back home," I reply.
Isn't that where I wanted to go? Wasn't I just desperately missing the easier time of my life in the Athelon capital city? Could this be the perfect chance to rejoin my family and continue my past life?
Will they even welcome me back?
If there's anything I know about my father, it's that he has a long memory and low tolerance for bad behavior. I'd hazard a guess that turning traitor, breaking a Bragdon prisoner out of Adroxis Maximum Security, and running away from home to join the resistance probably qualifies as bad behavior.
"Do you want to go back home?" Luxen asks.
I'm not sure how to answer.
I miss the city. I miss my friends. I do miss my parents. But my life now is a lot more complicated than my life was then, more complicated than I can describe, and more complicated than either of my parents wants to hear about.
Especially Dad.
But that's where we're going. Like it or not, according to Drewsk that's the next stage of this journey and whatever comes next, I'm starting to see my place in the universe. A place that's not comfortable or hospitable, but necessary.
If home is my next stop, home is where I'll go.
Get ready Mom and Dad, here I come.
EPILOGUE
He sits in a dark room at a long, metal desk. The lights are out and his sloped form is draped in shadow. An open portable computer sits on the desk in front of him as his twenty figures dance across the extended input board. Characters spew out onto the screen which casts a pale light on his bearded face.
Redax Northstar focuses his attention on the screen and the words forming there.
Two small raps echo from the closed door to his office.
"Enter."
The door hisses open, revealing the back-lit form of a slender Athelonian who is grasping a memo pad in his four hands.
"We have word from Reblox, Master Northstar," the man says quietly.
Redax lifts his eyes, glancing up at him.
"Out with it."
"Resistance fighters attacked a motorcade in the city of Von Grandeur. Captured a Senator. Senator Freejok."
"Freejok?" Redax asks. "I thought he was friendly to the resistance?"
"Those were the rumors, sir," the other man says. "However, in the ensuing rescue attempt, Senator Freejok was unfortunately killed."
Redax doesn't reply, he remains at his desk, his fingers now tented and his eyes narrowed.
"That's not all, sir," the other man continues.
"What else?"
"Rumors are that an Athelonian girl was involved in the attack. An Athelonian girl . . . with only two arms."
No emotion shows on the face of the seated man. His face is still cast in darkness. His fingers tent and drum together.
"The rescue attempt also decimated the resistance headquarters at Von Grandeur. Reblon forces have started flushing out many of the others planet-wide."
"But no sign of the girl?" Northstar asks.
"No. They believe she may have escaped off planet."
"Headed where?"
"Of that, we are unsure."
Redax remains seated, linking his fingers together and placing his hands down on the desk in front of him.
"You are dismissed," he says.
The man nods his head and backs away. The door shut behind him, leaving Redax Northstar in a dark mood to match the dim light of the room.
"You're on your way home, Brie, aren't you?" he says quietly to the empty room. "We'll be waiting."
###
The small ship eases down through the dark night sky like a glowing, round ember floating on the breeze. On a flattened section of grassy meadow, Hunjar Flox stands tall and wide with his hands clasped behind his back and his eyes fixated on the ship.
Skids extend, flip down on a hinge, and lock into place. As the ship presses down onto the surface, compressed air shoots from pistons, and thrusters wind down to nothing.
A door opens on the side and rotates down to clang on the ground. Steps ratchet out from the sloped surface. The opening is wide and tall, but the yellow light that emanates from it is almost completely blocked by the dark frame that steps up into it. The large Reblon with slicked pale fur advances down the steps of the ramp, one-by-one, boots banging with a metallic sound on each step, slowly and methodically.
As Flox strides towards the ship, his steps are broad and confident.
"Commandant Loresk," he says, gesturing towards the approaching figure.
"Commander Flox," the light-furred creature replies. "Explain the circumstances behind the resistance escape."
"We succeeded in destroying their headquarters outside Von Grandeur and killed ninety percent of their fighting force. However, a handful of rebels escaped."
"A handful of rebels, including the Northstar girl."
"Yes, Commandant."
"How is the situation going to be rectified, Flox?"
Hunjar Flox adjusts his stance in the meadow, not to show deference to the Commandant, but in fact, just the opposite. He stands closer and holds himself straighter in direct defiance of his superior officer's confrontation.
Reblons do not bow to authority; they embrace conflict and return it in kind.
"We believe we know where they are headed. We will dispatch interceptors and will reach out to our underground network. She will be captured or killed very shortly."
Commandant Loresk draws in a breath, pushing his barrel chest out even further and exposing the darkened muscle beneath the layers of light fur. The subtle demonstration of rank and power is not lost on Flox. He sneers, but says nothing.
"I cannot emphasize enough the importance of her removal, Commander. Her mere existence threatens the entire campaign against Athelon."
"I am aware. She will not escape again."
Loresk nods, then turns and walks back up the stairway into his ship. The door slams shut, metal on metal. Flox turns as the ship lifts off, watching as it rises from the ground before thrusters ignite and send it scorching into the air at a steep upward angle.
He thinks about the Reblon warship in low atmosphere somewhere near. It is the most powerful vessel in the Reblox fleet, a massive carrier that had gone toe-to-toe with Braxis' most powerful star craft and lived to tell the tale.
No, Hunjar Flox will not disappoint them again. He will either accomplish his mission or happily die trying. Lowering himself down to a crouch, he lifts the thick post from the meadow. He smiles at the thick, rounded club shape at the end. It is the ceremonial talisman of his warrior clan, embedded with the sharpened tusks of his first successful hunt.
"Brie Northstar will fall before me. I will bury this club in her face personally and bring back her head," he mutters. "Then I will throw her head at Commandant Loresk and slaughter him where he stands. I will take command of the Reblon fleet. That is the only acceptable outcome."
Up ahead his Crasher stands, a large metal golem waiting at its post to be enchanted. It sits still with the patience of unmovable stone, begging to be brought to life to hunt, terrorize, and kill.
###
TO BE CONTINUED IN...
WAR OF THE THREE PLANETS (Book Five) – VOYAGE TO ATHELON
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