Pursue the Past: Samair in Argos: Book 1

by Michael Kotcher

  Commander Harth sighed. “There’s no help for it. Track their course and vector and calculate all known destinations on that trajectory.”

  “I’m on it, sir,” the sensor officer replied, nodding.

  Harth shook his head. He’d had a small crop of crew brought on Legacy just a few days before they went on this mission. After months in space, he’d thought they’d had plenty of time to knock the green off these greenhorns, but every so often someone would say something like that, showing their small amount of experience and a lack of professionalism.

  “Very good, Sensors,” he said, grimacing. The officer didn’t even notice his captain’s irritation, so focused was he on his assignment.

  The man glanced up again a moment later. “Grania Estelle has jumped to hyperspace, Captain.”

  Harth nodded. Well, the chase would be on again. Once they got Ravage up and running, the little flotilla would be able to resume the pursuit. He relished it, wanting to bring that wayward vessel to heel. But on the flipside of that, after all these months of flying through hyper, trailing after a bulk freighter and a mysterious Commander, Harth was anxious for it to end. He wanted to return to the Republic and to the Fleet. There were things out here in the Cluster that the Admiral definitely needed to be made aware of and the Navy definitely needed a reinforced presence out here. Perhaps he could get himself assigned to a more permanent posting out here, to patrolling areas of the Cluster. Definitely a thought that might be worth pursuing.

  “Continue sensor sweeps of the area,” he ordered. “Lieutenant Tran, keep an eye on things; you have the conn. I’ll be in my ready room. Oh, and Sensors, get me that list of possible trajectories ASAP.”

  “Aye, Captain,” both men chorused as Harth stood and walked off the bridge.

  The landing had gone a bit rougher than they had expected, trying to put six starfighters down in a cargo bay with no landing tractors was apparently more difficult than anticipated, but they managed. As it turned out, it was more nerve wracking for the crew in the Grania Estelle than it was for the pirate pilots. They brought their fighters in under reaction thrusters only, a bit faster than was really necessary, dropping their landing struts and skidding to a stop on the deck. They, thankfully, came in one at a time and luckily the cargo bay was depressurized to help with the landings, otherwise the skidding fighters would have come in with a shower of sparks. As it was, furrows were cut into the decking by the pirates’ landing struts, something the cargo bay attendants furiously cursed about over the comms. The great cargo bay doors closed and less than a minute later, the ship made the jump to hyperspace.

  It wasn’t quite the smooth jump that the crew had gotten used to over the last few months since the drive had been properly calibrated, but it was nowhere near as rough as the teeth-rattling vibrations followed by a bone-jarring jolt of yesteryear. There was a shivering throughout the deckplates and enough vibration that it was noticeable, but nothing terribly violent. The soldier leader did make comment about this to the Captain, mocking the man for the poor repair of this massive ship. The Captain, to his credit, called a relief officer to the bridge to man the Operations station, and then simply walked off the bridge with no further comment. The leader followed, leaving his two compatriots on the bridge to watch the crew there. The two men walked into the wardroom, closing the door behind them.

  Tamara walked back to her quarters, her tiny cabin deep within the ship. It had been a very long few days. Now that they were in hyper again, and most likely for a good long time to come, the frantic pace of the work would diminish somewhat. Oh, there was still plenty of work to be done, but there was no one actively shooting at Grania Estelle now, no tricky maneuvers to work with, no time sensitive repairs that needed to be made. At least, not yet. She figured she’d have a few hours before either the Captain, Quesh, or the pirate leader stated banging on her door demanding some new job be done.

  Stripping off her sweat stained and filthy clothes, she dropped them all into the laundry and stepped into the shower. After a good hot scrub, she stepped out, feeling a great deal better. She was still exhausted, but the overwhelming malaise Tamara was feeling lifted. After drying off, she put on a t-shirt and underwear and flopped onto her bunk. After a long second, she felt herself relax and the tension that had built up in her back and neck and legs released, melting her onto the bunk. Tamara closed her eyes, ready to sleep.

  She wondered about Stella. The AI’s core matrix was still in the ship’s computer core, but most of her higher (and lower) cognitive functions had been shut down to avoid detection. She was still monitoring and controlling the ship’s fusion reactor but not much else. The rest of the crew was handling the other tasks that she had been doing for the last couple of months. It was much less efficient, but it helped keep her secret and safe.

  Tamara sighed as she felt herself sink deeper into relaxation. She missed their discussions, their talks about random things, even the nagging the AI gave her over her dark dreams. Tamara had been pushing herself so hard in the last few days that she hadn’t dreamed at all, simply collapsed onto her bunk and passed out. Now, she was feeling the same way, the sweet, comforting feeling stealing over her, but still, she missed her friend. Stella was still there, only not. It wasn’t quite the same, but Tamara took heart in the fact that her friend wasn’t dead or gone, but just silent.

  Sleep overtook her then and she knew no more.

  Sickbay was quiet. Finally, after all the madness, things were starting to settle down. Turan was slumped into his chair at his desk, hands on the desktop. The Guura had been working twenty-two hour days since the survivors of the Emilia Walker had been brought aboard. The three crew from the other ship were recovering, slowly in the case of the young zheen, Kay’grax. His entire arm was encased in a clear plastic container, filled with regenerative fluid. A new hand was regrowing, but it would take weeks before he would be ready for full duty. In the meantime, he was seated in a berth in sickbay his eyes and antennae buried in datapads overflowing with technical manuals. For now, he was working on getting up to speed, because Ka’Xarian had every intention of hiring on the young zheen. Kay’grax had done pretty well on his own in very stressful circumstances and the engineer had no intention of letting that raw talent go to waste.

  Marcos, the brawny human, had already been released and transferred to the cargo division. He was quickly adapting to his surroundings, getting in with his new colleagues. Taja was pleased to have such a burly and hardworking new member of her team. For the moment, there wasn’t a whole lot for the cargo people to do, especially now that they were in hyper, but Taja was making sure they stayed occupied.

  Captain Vosteros was also recovering slowly from his injuries. He’d had a lot of internal injuries and bleeding and while the station medic had pumped him full of drugs to keep him running and patched up the wounds; he had been on death’s door when Turan had gotten his hands on him. He was in and out of consciousness, though in his time awake he asked about his ship, but no one could give him any news.

  Ka’Xarian walked over to the Captain’s sickbed. Turan was nearby, but still at his desk. He had informed the Assistant Chief that he was not to get his patients too excited or he would throw the big bug out of his sickbay on his head. Meekly, the engineer nodded in agreement and went over to the Captain.

  “Ah,” Vosteros said, struggling to sit up. “My savior. I never did get the chance to thank you, my lad.”

  Ka’Xarian gave a small bow in acknowledgement. “I’m glad we could get you out of there, sir.”

  “But clearly there’s more,” the man replied shrewdly. “Though as I said, I am glad to see you.”

  “Yes, sir, there is.” Ka’Xarian’s antennae dropped a bit. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed down here in sickbay, but we’re in hyperspace now.”

  The captain nodded. “Yes, I did notice that a little while ago. So my ship is gone then.” It was a statement, not a question.

  The zheen nodded. “Yes, s
ir. And with the… situation we’re currently in, I don’t know when or even if we’ll be back in Ulla-tran. Even if we do someday go back, there’s no way of knowing if your ship will even still be there, or if Goris Hana will simply keep it, claiming he has salvage rights, since the crew abandoned it.” He held up a hand to forestall Vosteros’s furious retort. “Yes, sir, I do remember that they stole your ship and kidnapped you and your remaining crew.”

  “And killed one of them!” he shouted, before clutching his side and wincing.

  There was a scraping of a chair on the decking and the sound of feet walking in their direction. “I told you not to get him excited, Ka’Xarian,” Turan said harshly, running a hand scanner in Vosteros’s direction. “Damn it, you made him pop some of the sutures. Get out of here,” he said angrily to the zheen. “Captain Vosteros, I need you to be calm, or I’ll be forced to sedate you.”

  “Sorry, Doctor,” Ka’Xarian said, contrite. “I’m sorry, Captain.” He slipped out past the Guura and the orderly who had started to work on Vosteros and fled the sickbay.

  There was a hammering on the metal door, jolting Tamara awake. She rolled off her bunk just as the door slid open and two figures rushed inside. Rough hands seized her arms and jerked her to her feet and she fought them. A fist smashed into her gut and she doubled over, retching. Another hand backhanded her across the face and her vision swam. Another hit to the stomach caused her to spit up bile, but the burn in her throat was completely eclipsed by the agony in her abdomen and her jaw. She ceased her struggles and the two figures dragged her limp form from the room.

  “So, Captain,” the leader said, sitting himself down at the wardroom table. His rifle went on the table top, but his hand rested lazily on the butt of his sidearm in his hip holster. Eamonn was under no illusion that he could try to jump the man. He’d be gunned down with no effort on the pirate’s part.

  Eamonn frowned. “You’ve been aboard my ship for a while now, and I don’t even know your name. Or even a title or rank to call you,” he mused aloud, as though they were two spacers meeting at a conference.

  The pirate chuckled. “Gideon Jax, Captain. Pleased to make your acquaintance.” His eye held a malevolent twinkle. “If you must have a title, I suppose Armsman might be appropriate. I and my soldiers are part of the Captain’s Guard.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Now sit down, Captain. We have need to have a discussion.”

  Vincent Eamonn knew the sound of that voice meant trouble. He slid into his customary seat at the head of the conference table; Jax was to his left, but no one else was in the room. He tried to project calm and serenity; he was the captain of the Grania Estelle after all. But he couldn’t stop his hands from clenching and unclenching.

  “We need to have a talk about the industrial fabricators you have aboard this ship,” Armsman Jax said, his voice mild but dangerous. He smiled fully as Eamonn said nothing. “You’re not going to deny it?”

  Eamonn shrugged. “Why should I? Your troops are all over my ship and you’ve seen my engineering teams working on repairs. I know you’ve been interested as to where all the spare parts were coming from, especially since you knew that all the cargo bays were empty.”

  Jax nodded. “Yes. So I sent a team over to them to see what they could do, but you know what they found?”

  The captain shook his head, knowing he wasn’t going to like where this was going. “What?”

  “They found that the entire set of fabricators were locked down with security codes.” His voice hardened to iron. “Why would you lock them out, Captain? Do you not trust me?”

  The captain didn’t answer.

  Suddenly, Gideon Jax was on his feet. “Clearly, you’ve proven to me that I cannot trust you!” he roared. “You tried to hide all this from me? After all the growing pains we had and you still think that you can play games with me?” His sidearm materialized in his hand; the captain didn’t even see him draw. “Now, you’re going to spill everything about those fabricators. I want every bit of information, I want every code, I want a full manifest of everything that you can do with those fabricators. Because you are going to be turning them over to me. And every second you make me wait, or if you lie to me, I will kill a member of your crew. If I have to kill them all, so be it.” He slid a datapad across the table, which came to a stop right next to the captain’s clenched fist. Jax kept his weapon in his hand, but sat back down. “Now, begin.”

  Tamara felt her bare feet scraping against the metal deckplates, and the pain in her toes somehow managed to pierce the fog of pain emanating from her stomach and her head. She was still dressed in only a t-shirt and underwear. Her head lolled, but she was dimly aware of being pulled past other members of the crew; she heard a few cries of alarm, muffled as the soldiers dragging her along either glared at or backhanded anyone who looked as though they were going to intervene.

  After an eternity of corridors, of banging her legs and knees on the knee knockers on the bottom of every hatch they pulled her through, and the constant scraping of her feet on the deck, they eventually arrived at their destination.

  The wardroom doors slid open and they went inside. Dumping her unceremoniously on the deck, Tamara looked up to the pirate soldier leader looking down at her in disgust. He stepped over to her and squatted down next to her, a pistol held easily in one hand. The business end was pointed vaguely in her direction and she felt her breathing and her heart rate accelerate.

  “What do you want from me?” she croaked, her throat raw.

  “The good captain tells me that you are the key to the industrial fabricators on this ship,” Gideon Jax replied, his voice dripping with contempt. Tamara looked over at the captain, who refused to meet her gaze. “He tells me that you have the access codes to be able to unlock all of the serious materiel that the machines can make. I was concerned that you might try something stupid, like melting them down like you did the last set.” Reaching over, he took a two-inch wide cylinder, shaped like a coin with a trio of barbed prongs on one side and pressed it into the side of her neck, hard. Tamara screamed as the prongs dug into her flesh, and tried to thrash, but he swatted her hands away and pressed the barrel of the gun into her breastbone. She flopped around for a few moments, but then he pressed a control on the face of the device and a powerful electric shock ran through her body.

  Tamara convulsed, every muscle in her body going completely taut, unable to scream, unable to breathe. She was dying. That much was clear. Her HUD was flickering, her vision was tinged in red and then abruptly, it ended. The electricity stopped, her whole body collapsed, completely limp. She could do nothing but lay there and gasp like a landed fish.

  “There,” he said, matter of factly, moving back and then standing up. “I’ll give you a minute to compose yourself and then we are going to have a chat.”

  Tamara swiveled her eyeballs in the direction of the captain, who had a horrified look on his face, but he still would not look at her or meet her gaze. She could feel her limbs regaining feeling and after a moment, she groaned and pushed herself to a seated position.

  The man was smiling grimly at her. “I know you and I have seen each other around, Ms. Samair, but we haven’t been formally introduced. I am Armsman Gideon Jax, part of the Captain’s Guard. Not this man,” he clarified with a smirk, indicating Vincent Eamonn at the table, “But my Captain. And in case you’re curious, the device in your neck is interrupting the implants in your head. You will no longer be able to send or receive signals via those implants unless I disable the device.” He frowned a little. “The good captain here informs me that those implants are how you actually interface with the fabricators, but I’m sure we can work something out until we can come up with a more permanent solution.”

  “So what do you want from me?” she asked again, glaring at him.

  “I don’t appreciate that tone or that eyeball you’re giving me, Samair,” Jax told her. “You are not a free woman. You’re not a member of the crew, not anymore. Not that
you ever were,” he chuckled darkly. “No, now… Now, you are an asset. A possession to serve a particular purpose.”

  Eamonn’s jaw clenched, as did his fists. His gaze was locked on the datapad in the middle of the table.

  “Captain Verrikoth is going to be extremely interested the treasure I found aboard this ship,” Jax commented. “And you are going to make sure that this continues to produce treasures, Samair,” he informed her. “And if it doesn’t, if you, the possession meant to serve a singular purpose, isn’t fulfilling the mandate I set? Then I will throw you to my men and they will do as they like with you.”

  Icy fear clawed her heart. He was utterly serious, but what about Eamonn? Why the hell was he just sitting there, letting this happen? How could he abandon her like this? “Captain?” she pleaded.

  “You will perform the tasks I set you, Samair,” Jax told her sternly. “Or else your very long and painful death will serve as an example to the rest of the crew.” He nodded to the men behind her. “Get her up. Take her to the brig and toss her in a cell. I think she needs some time to reflect on her situation.”

  “Wait, no!” she started to say, but a sharp blow to the back of her neck relieved her of consciousness.

  Epilogue

  Saiphirelle sat next to her sibling in the brig. The two lupusan were sharing a cell, which was cramped, but not unbearable. Apparently the pirate guards had decided that they couldn’t trust that the wolf women wouldn’t go tearing into them the minute their collective backs were turned. And they were right to think that. Every minute they were locked in the cells only increased Saiphirelle’s ire. Even the normally even-keeled Corajen was starting to lose her cool.

  “How long are they going to keep us in here?” Saiphirelle demanded for probably the hundredth time since their incarceration.