Pursue the Past: Samair in Argos: Book 1

by Michael Kotcher

  “Do we know if they actually left?” Hana pressed, looking intently at his officer.

  Again, a shrug. “No idea, sir.”

  The toad nodded. “Get a security team down to the hangar bay. If that shuttle is still here, do not let it leave.” Then he paused, eyes widening. “And get another team over to the compartment where we’re holding the freighter bums. Make sure they’re still there.” As the XO looked as though he was going to protest, Hana growled. “Use the damned radios!” he barked, infuriated at the constant excuses. “If internal comms are down, use the radios. That’s what they’re for!” He threw his hands into the air. “Damn it!”

  The XO sheepishly brought the communicator out of his pocket and began issuing orders.

  Jesma was seated in the pilot’s couch aboard the shuttle, anxiously awaiting the return of Xar and the others. Lorcan was calmly standing at the hatch, one of security’s rifle’s held easily in his hands. He was staying out of the hatchway itself, he didn’t want to be seen by any of the locals here raising questions as to why he was heavily armed, but he was in a position to be able to see into the hangar and down toward the main doors.

  The cargo ramp was up, which meant that the minute their people were aboard, they could seal the hatch and go. The shuttle’s engines were at idle, just waiting for her to stomp on the accelerator. She twisted her hands in her lap and checked the shuttle’s rear camera for the five thousandth time. “Anything?” she called.

  “Nothing new since the last time you asked forty seconds ago,” the heavy-worlder replied calmly. He rolled his shoulders to get more comfortable. “But I’m hoping they’re moving quick.”

  She let out a long breath, checking the ship’s status and rear camera once again. All green and still nothing. Jesma drew in another shaking breath and checked again. “Where the hell are they? What if something happened? What if they caught them?”

  “Then we wait five more minutes and then get the hell out of here,” Lorcan replied, irritation showing in his voice for the first time. “You know the drill, you know what Ka’Xarian ordered.”

  “He didn’t know!” Jesma despaired. “He’s an engineer, not a soldier!”

  Lorcan chuckled. “Relax, Engineman,” he told her. “Check your feed again.”

  She looked up, and sighed, her shoulders sagging. There they were, with three more in the group. “Oh, thank the stars!” she gushed. “Now can they hurry up?”

  He laughed again.

  “Almost there,” Ka’Xarian said as they entered the hangar. The shuttle was still there, they weren’t overrun by security and from what he could hear, the shuttle’s engines were on standby. As soon as they could get on board, they would be racing for open space. Which was a good thing, because the young one was on his last legs. He was not going much farther. Kay’grax was shaking now with pain and fatigue. The humming noise he was emitting was actually painful to Ka’Xarian, though the humans didn’t seem to mind. Marcos was easily carrying his captain, who had slumped unconscious in the man’s arms. The others of his team were formed up in a loose phalanx around the injured though according to the two security officers, they were just in a group, a loose mob, not a true combat formation. Xar didn’t mind. They had made it to the hangar. Now they just needed to get aboard and get the hell off this station and somehow get to the Grania Estelle without getting shot to pieces by the defense ships.

  Easy.

  “Nice to see you,” Lorcan called from the hatchway. He was staying to one side, leaving the entry clear for them all to climb aboard.

  “We decided to take the long way,” Ka’Xarian replied, his antennae straightening. “Be gentle with this one,” he said, as Lorcan gave his muscled arm to the injured zheen. “He’s had a bad day.”

  “Thank…” Kay’grax started to say, but he was just overcome. His legs gave way and he nearly fell, but Lorcan was there and easily scooped him up.

  “Don’t mention it,” the big man replied. “Now, you sit here and try not to move too much. We’re getting underway in just a minute.” He brought the zheen to one of the seats and gently set him in it. He quickly pulled the safety harness on and locked it in. “You just lie still, we’re getting out of here.”

  The others were clambering through the hatch, with Plonall and Sion being the last two through, continuously keeping their weapons ready.

  Sion smiled. “I think we’re going to make it.”

  Plonall started to smile, but then his face dropped, his gut filling with ice. A full squad of security troopers wearing civilian body armor and armed with a variety of weapons were trotting into the hangar. They looked professional and they looked like they had a purpose. One of them pointed at the shuttle and they started moving forward.

  “Fuck! Xar! We got company!” Without waiting, Plonall opened up with his assault rifle, spraying the entryway with bullets. One of the soldiers went down in a mist of blood and the rest of the group scattered, looking for any kind of cover. Sion fired as well, hitting one of the troopers in the leg, and a second in the shoulder. They weren’t killing blows, but they were enough to give the soldiers pause. “You rationing those bullets? Open ‘er up!”

  “You eat what you like and I’ll eat what I like!” the other man yelled back. “Either way we’re both full!”

  “Did you really just tell me that?” Plonall snorted. “Get on board!”

  Taking two more shots, Sion rushed inside the hatch. The troopers returned fire, forcing the man to duck instinctively. One shot zipped by him, missing only by the barest millimeter. He could feel the breeze as it went by and then ricocheted off the hull of the shuttle. A dozen more bounced off the shuttle’s hull and Plonall dove inside the hatch.

  “Go, Jesma! Go!”

  Lorcan and Sion were already slamming the hatch shut and dogging it closed. The pressure and indicator lights were all green, indicating the ship was buttoned up and ready for space and the young woman at the controls gunned the engine. The ship lurched forward, racing for the bay entrance and the force shield holding in the atmosphere. The ship would be able to pass right through it without slowing down and the bay would be able to maintain atmosphere. It was one of the very few systems not being targeted by the knock-knock, which was by design. Lorcan had tweaked the program for this, because he wanted the shuttle to be able to escape without hassle.

  “What is that?” Xar asked, pointing at the rear camera display. One of the troopers was pointing a squat tube at the departing shuttle. “Oh, no,” he breathed as he realized what it was.

  A powered projectile fired out from the weapon, raced across the bay and exploded against the shuttle’s portside engine just as they cleared the force shield. The shuttle bucked and tumbled forward and to starboard in an uncontrolled spin. The inertial compensators couldn’t keep up with the spin and the passengers, those not strapped in, were tossed around the interior of the ship. The shuttle continued to roll away from the station and no more weapons were fired at them, but it took over a minute for Jesma to regain control.

  “Port engine’s out,” Xar said, slipping into the copilot’s seat. “I’m shutting it down.” He checked the diagnostics. “No breaches. I’m rerouting power around the damage, closing out the fuel lines to that side.”

  “Where am I going?” Jesma asked, checking her sensors. There were over a dozen vessels, tugs and shuttles in the nearby area. Three small freighters were here too, as was the Emilia Walker, which was docked at one of the ports on the station’s long spindly axis.

  “Find the ship and head for it.”

  “What about the fuel collector?”

  The zheen paused. Right now the station was in chaos. And they’d come here to get all that fuel. If they just left it, and the collector… But he wasn’t sure. “All right, head to the collector. We’ll grab it and suck the fuel bladders dry. But I don’t think we’re going to have time to actually bring the collector itself aboard. Once we’ve gotten the fuel in the shuttle’s tanks, we’ll blow it
apart and be on our way.”

  “Got it,” she said, maneuvering the now very sluggish shuttle onto a new course.

  “I’ll be right back,” the zheen told her, unstrapping and moving to the main cargo compartment. “Everyone all right?” he asked.

  “No, we’re not fucking all right!” Sion spat, cradling his left arm. His forearm was bent at a crazy angle, clearly broken from when he’d collided with the bulkhead. “What the hell happened?”

  “The troopers hit us with some kind of shoulder fired rocket,” Xar explained. “Took out the port engine and well…” He shrugged in a very human fashion, his antennae copying the maneuver.

  Sion just groaned in pain. One of the team came over and injected him with a hypo for the pain and began trying to attach a splint. Xar looked around. Everyone was in varying states, having been tossed around the cargo compartment of the ship. The Captain of the Emilia Walker and young Kay’grax had been fortunate enough to be strapped into their seats and had avoided any further injury. Sadly, they didn’t have a medic in his team or on the shuttle, so they’d need to deal with the fuel collection quickly and get back to the Grania Estelle.

  “Captain, our shuttle just launched from the fueling station,” George reported.

  A weight lifted from Eamonn’s shoulders. He’d hoped that Ka’Xarian and his team had survived, but it had been agony cruising closer to the station for all those hours just not knowing. But now, finally, he knew that his people were safe.

  “The shuttle’s taken damage,” Stella said, standing straight at the holo projector at the front of the bridge. She seemed unusually somber.

  His heart skipped a beat. “How bad?”

  “Looks like they’ve taken damage to their port engine, Captain. Can’t get much more information than that. And to be honest, we won’t know much more until they actually land in the boat bay.” George’s frustration matched his own.

  “Keep Quesh in the loop,” the captain ordered. “Make sure he has an engineering team standing by when they land. And a medical team too,” he decided after a second’s thought. “Damage like that might have gotten some people hurt.”

  “Yes, Captain,” George replied.

  “Where is Xar going?” the captain mused, watching the shuttle’s flight trajectory.

  “He appears to be going to the collector farm, Captain,” Stella answered, frowning. “But with damage like that and possible casualties, that seems a bit… well… irresponsible.”

  Eamonn frowned. “Well, I did send them out there to get us fuel. It seems that’s what they’re going for.”

  “Captain, more bad news,” George piped up.

  The captain closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. “Why do I keep you on my bridge, George?”

  “Because no one else can make this job look as good,” the man replied. “And you need the best.”

  “What do you got?”

  “Three of the defensive pinnaces flying endless circles around the orbital have changed course, moving to intercept us. They’re at the extreme edge of the range of my sensors, but I can see they’re coming this way.”

  “Swell,” the Captain said aloud. “All right, not much we can do about them at the moment. Keep an eye on them and sing out when they get within a million kilometers.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  “What the hell is going on up there?” Mairi demanded. The fitting out of the Perdition was long since completed, and now Tamara and the rest of her engineering team were sitting around on crates and other things that had been stacked on the deck in the boat bay.

  The older woman looked at her. “I have no idea, Mairi.”

  “Bull. You’ve linked your implants to the bridge feeds, haven’t you?” the younger woman accused. When Tamara didn’t immediately answered. “I knew it! Spill.”

  “We’re approaching the fueling station. Should be there within about thirty minutes or so.”

  “That’s great,” Mairi replied, crossing her arms over her chest. “What else?”

  The others were looking at Tamara expectantly. “You know I don’t actually have to tell you all anything, right? The mystique of officers and all.”

  “If that was the case, Boss, then you shouldn’t have been explaining things to us for the last few months,” Pip pointed out. “And encouraging us to ask questions or asking for help.”

  She smiled. “Damn, outwitted! All right. Looks like the defense pinnaces are coming in from the orbital station to try and intercept us.”

  “We haven’t done anything!” Igraine exclaimed. “All we did was move toward the station! And we haven’t communicated with anyone, or done anything wrong! Why would they come after us?”

  “Well, we don’t actually know that they are coming after us,” Tamara pointed out. She raised a hand to forestall the objections. “But based on their courses and speed, it looks pretty likely. I think we are In Trouble.” She made sure to emphasize the capital letters in each word.

  The others were looking nervous. “What can we do?” Rory asked, looking worried.

  Tamara shrugged. “This big girl isn’t a warship,” she reminded them. “There isn’t a whole lot that we can really do.”

  “We could have if you’d authorized the replicators to start pumping out weapons,” Igraine accused. “Four laser cannons and four rail guns? That’s not much at all.”

  “We’re not going down that road again,” Tamara said firmly. “What we have is what the ship can handle. If we get out of here, we might think about putting in a few more rail guns, but this isn’t a dedicated warship with all sorts of hard points for weapons. She’s a bulk freighter, meant to carry huge amounts of cargo. I don’t know what you all want from me.” She sighed, ignoring the ever-increasing number of dark looks coming her way. “And it’s too late for this time anyway. There’s no time to start building anything in time to deal with the current crisis, we’re just going to have to ride it out.”

  “What about more warbirds?” Pip asked, pointing at the Perdition. “Obviously not now,” he said hurriedly, seeing Tamara’s expression, “But what about when we’re out of here? Can’t we make more fighters like this one?”

  The engineer touched her cheek, staring off at the bulkhead in thought. The others seemed to think this was an excellent idea. But then Igraine piped up. “Do you know how to fly it?”

  The thin man shrugged. “I can learn. Mairi can fly a shuttle.”

  “And you think that’s the same thing?” Tamara asked, looking at him with an amused expression. “It isn’t.”

  “But I could learn,” he pressed.

  “And what am I?” Mairi demanded. “Scrap metal?”

  “After watching you fly, Mairi, I’m surprised you aren’t,” Rory rumbled. They all chuckled, even the young woman.

  “So what about it?” Pip asked. “Can we make more?”

  Tamara sighed. “Yes, I suppose we could. Not now, of course. But yeah, we could. Problem is, where are we going to put them? I know I keep repeating myself but this isn’t a warship with a big hangar bay. And good luck trying to convince the Captain and the purser to part with one of their cargo bays just to stack up fighters.”

  She could see the brightness of their expressions dimming a bit. Pip sighed. “Yeah, the Captain is never going to agree to that. So much for that idea.”

  “Cheer up,” Tamara said, adjusting her position on her crate a bit to get more comfortable, smiling. “We might be super busy patching this big girl up in a few hours. You’ll be so busy you won’t have time to mope about our lack of fighter space.”

  “Says the woman who actually has her own starfighter,” Pip griped.

  Now her smile was smug. “The only starfighter on this ship,” Tamara corrected, raising one finger. Then she frowned. “But there is something that’s been puzzling me.”

  “And what’s that?” Pip asked sourly.

  “We bought some things in Kazyanenko, industrial supplies and things meant for the shipyard here.”


  “So?” Victor asked, sitting up a little straighter.

  “So where’s the shipyard? We’ve only seen the orbital station and the fueling station, right? And the defense pinnace ships that are hustling to catch up with us. But what about the rest of the system? We haven’t really gotten a good look at what’s around here. There are a few places, Lagrange points, maybe on the far side of the gas giant or on the other side of the system that they could be hiding it. But the people on Kazyanenko knew it was here. So it must be. And come on, half a dozen pinnaces to defend all of this? Even if there isn’t a shipyard, that’s just irresponsible.”

  “You’re saying there should be more defenses?” Igraine said.

  “It did seem a little light, considering all the real estate in orbit,” Mairi mused. “Even Hecate had a wing of starfighters. We didn’t see anything like that on the orbital.”

  “The ships here are a little better armed than those fighters at Hecate,” Rory pointed out. “But you’re right, it does seem a bit light. Makes me wonder if pirates have been here before. Because if there aren’t any other defenses, this place is just low hanging fruit.”

  “How goes it?” Plonall asked for the fifth time.

  “The pumps are working, and we should be full up in about twenty minutes,” Ka’Xarian replied patiently, watching the feeds. “Sadly, we need to leave the collector here. Such a waste.” The zheen’s antennae whirled in irritation. “Oh well, guess I get to build another one. Not like I haven’t done it before. Probably need to do it again.”

  “You’re remarkably chipper,” Jesma said anxiously. Her eyes flicked back and forth between the displays showing the pump feeds and the proximity sensors. So far, none of the nearby ships were paying any attention to them, but she knew, they all knew, that that would quickly change. She was quite a bit more vocal about her anxiety than the others, though no one was happy about hanging around gathering up fuel. They all wanted to be back aboard the ship and making tracks for the hyper limit.