Star Brigade: Maelstrom (Star Brigade Book 2)

by C. C. Ekeke

  “And yes, Irazu, I do have a plan,” Habraum answered the Rothorid, despite not having one until a moment ago. The Korvenites’ ship swapping and seeing the Vindicator gave him an idea. Charging the enemy in crowded spacelanes wasn’t an option. The KIF would know the Phaeton on sight. “Planet Hopper, we’ll sort out the bomb. But we’ll need your ship.”

  “[Union fools, you will never stop Korvan’s will!]” The Unilink among the seven Korvenite operatives pulsed bright with Atanos’ pride as he defiantly shook his fist in the air. Five were armored Retributionaries, bellowing in agreement, all standing in one of the TG-3450’s passenger sections.

  “[Korvan’s Anointed has foreseen it,]” a short, stout Korvenite male added, bobbing his head.

  Vantor heard their celebration all the way from the helm—despite this freighter’s giant size. On his first assault mission as designated pilot, he had been successful. He should be sharing in the exuberance bursting from their minds. After all, they had just tricked the Union Command and stole back what belonged to the Great Korvan.

  But even after a month of finally knowing freedom, Vantor still felt ill at ease. Everyone had such blind fervor to destroy the Union, humans in particular. Not that the young Korvenite disagreed. He unquestionably despised the humans. But did that call for mass xenocide? Remembering how nastily the Korvenites had disposed of this freighter’s pilots made him shiver. But Vantor knew not to poison the Unilink with such negativity.

  He sighed and focused on keeping the freighter on course. Soon they would enter hyperspace, leave this place and deliver their cargo to Maelstrom. That should be a good thing.

  [A credit for your thoughts, Vantor?]

  The question startled Vantor. So lost in his own thoughts, he didn’t sense Atanos approaching helm. Vantor spun his seat around to face Atanos. “[Why pay when you can simply read my mind?]”

  The taller Korvenite frowned. “[Hardly the case, young one. The others are drunk on their own self-congratulations, but your inner strife all but hit me in the face.]”

  “[Sorry for disturbing you.]” Vantor turned back to the helm controls.

  “[It bothers you doesn’t it?]” Atanos pressed, much to Vantor’s annoyance. “[In fact, our methods to achieve our goals disgusts you.]”

  Of course it does! But how could Vantor say that to one of Maelstrom’s most trusted operatives and not lose his head? “[It is not my place—.]”

  “[The Anointed One does what is best for our race.]” Atanos moved around the chair and next to the helm controls so that Vantor was forced to look him in the eyes. “[You lived in an internment camp most of your life! Of course there will be things that you do or see that will be…troubling. A small price to pay for regaining Sollus!]” The flash of a passing ship’s engines on the viewscreen illuminated the zeal etched into Atanos’ pallid face. Shocked, Vantor leaned away as much as his seat allowed.

  There had to be something else they could talk about, since Atanos clearly wasn’t going away. Like the importance of this freighter’s cargo? “[Can we at least open the cargo bay and see if—?]”

  “[No,]” Atanos refused flatly. “[Not until we leave this place.]”

  So much for changing the subject, Vantor thought, but made sure to mask his thoughts as taught. The helm console’s proximity alarm began to flash and beep, much to Vantor’s relief.

  “[What?]” Atanos asked. Vantor eyed the screen and gawped. A Union Command ship!

  “[Relax,]” Atanos said, undoubtedly sensing Vantor’s fear. “[How many?]”

  “[One.]”

  “[Is it an SR-21, or a Millennium-Class Command Cruiser perhaps?]”

  “[Just a small convoy. I’ll bring it up.]” Vantor brought up a smaller screen in the middle of the viewscreen. The ship looked nothing like a convoy, more along the lines of a Union Command snub fighter. The readings told him no other details, only that it was five macroms away from passing right over them. “[Atanos, should I exit the spacelane and jump? Or maintain course?]”

  Atanos straightened up, eyes still on the odd-looking ship. “[Do the latter and power down any unnecessary systems. They might have seen through our IDM ruse or even found the ship we commandeered.]” In less than a macrom, Vantor shut down all nonessential systems, only keeping on life support, artificial gravity and stellar drives. He turned in time to see Atanos’ eyes flicker and then a rush of Korcei Mindspeak filled his head, Atanos warning the others in the Unilink to prepare for possible engagement. Vantor felt all the questions in the others’ minds fade into a united determination.

  Vantor sucked in a deep breath and focused on the small ship, silently praying to Korvan that it wouldn’t find them. Closer it came, almost upon the Korvenites. Oh Mighty Korvan, please protect us.

  “[Here they come.]” No sooner than Atanos spoke, the small vessel sailed overhead on the viewscreen, past the TG freighter and spacelane traffic. Dagger-like shape, coated pitch-black, it looked big enough to hold a pilot and a passenger. The ship slowed. The Unilink tightened in anticipation.

  The vessel kept flying away. Were we scanned? asked a Retributionary psychically.

  A quick check showed otherwise. No, Vantor answered back. A false alarm.

  Anxiety melted away from the Unlink in ripples. Vantor slumped into his seat, not realizing how tense he had been. “[We’re safe,]” he told Atanos. “[Once we get to the L-Jump point—.]”

  Abruptly the freighter shook violently, throwing him and Atanos forward. Fresh waves of alarm flooded the Unilink. The freighter still moved, but flew upward, as if something was towing it. Vantor turned his attention to the flight console, and his heart sink.

  A much larger ship came out of sensory shroud and caught their freighter in a tractor beam—pulling them out of the spacelane. On his first KIF mission, Vantor had failed.

  “Planet Hopper to Phaeton, we have them.”

  “Brilliant, Planet Hopper. We’ll be in place for a boarding assault in about five macroms.” Habraum watched the ensuing conflict from his Captain’s chair on the Phaeton. Tyris, now at helm, steered them closer. The smaller UIB ship lifted the TG freighter up and out of the clogged spacelane with ease. The freighter buckled and strained against the tractor beam, which should disable its weaponry as well.

  In front of them a Star Brigade Shadowlancer, which had tracked down the TG’s location, hovered motionless in space, scanning for other enemy ships. Several commercial starships slowed down to watch. Habraum hoped this situation ended with no bystanders injured.

  “Commander, you have the bridge,” he said to Sam. She nodded tersely. After the rest of CT-1 left to the Transmat Chambers, Habraum had ordered a confession from her.

  And that’s still not the whole story, he fumed. Now’s no time to dwell. “Arcturus,” the Cerc called to Tyris. “Hold present course. Irazu, is the team prepped?”

  “Awaiting transssport, Reign,” Honaa answered through the comms. Habraum rose and headed for the bridge exit. So far his plan was going soundly—right until the freighter sprayed a few shots at nearby ships. A distant orange plume signaled the end of a large passenger ship’s engines.

  “Rogguts!” Habraum swore. Those weapons were supposed to be disabled. “Marguliese, disable that ship.” The Shadowlancer onscreen whipped about and fired several plasma shots at the freighter’s weapons bay, silencing the flurry.

  “Target neutralized,” Marguliese’s cybernetic timbre rang cold on the comm systems. “The passenger ship is damaged, but not in critical condition.”

  “Brilliant.” Habraum then sprinted to the Transmat Chambers. The sight of Khrome, Honaa and Liliana, standing ready on the transmat platform in field uniform filled the Cerc with extreme pride.

  “Heatstroke, four to transmat,” he joined CT-1, and the grey Transmat Chambers vanished.

  “[NOO!]” Atanos slammed his fists against the viewscreen. “[HOW DID THEY FIND US!?]” Sparks fizzled out of damaged consoles across the bridge. The Unilink flared bright wit
h rage and fear.

  All this was background noise to Vantor, who diligently tacked away at the helm console, trying to free them from the tractor beam. A warning flashed bright red across the console. Vantor didn’t need to look. It was blasted like a klaxon in the Unilink. They had been boarded.

  Vantor ran trembling hands through his hair. “[Korvan’s deserted us!]”

  A hard backhand silenced Vantor’s despair. “[You of little faith,]” Atanos spat, gold and black eyes blazing. “[Neither Lord Maelstrom nor our Maker would EVER send us to unavoidable slaughter! Now get us out of this.]” Flicking a switch on his wrist, Atanos’ Retributionary golden helmet molded over his face and he exited the bridge. A small snub fighter hung onscreen in front of him, weapons primed, the insult stinging worse than Atanos’s backhand. Vantor had to do something, but what? He connected his mind with those onboard, a commonplace action now…and was greeted by scalding, strident pain. Vantor cried out, covered his ears with both hands. Then the pain stopped.

  Vantor looked around, hearing the sounds of combat around the ship, but his mind was…so quiet. The Korvenite could no longer hear his brethren.

  “[What have those humans done?]” Vantor sank helplessly into his seat. Within moments, the freighter’s walls buckled all around him; the sounds of energy discharges, the screams!

  “This is Union Command,” the voice blared on the freighter’s comms. “Cease and desist your actions.” Vantor gaped at the UComm ships surrounding the freighter with weaponry primed. If he surrendered, they’d send him back to another internment camp. Freedom would no longer be his.

  Fighting back tears, Vantor balled up a fist and slammed it onto the flight console. [I can’t go back to the internment camps,] He shook his head. He wouldn’t go back alive.

  Alive. The idea hit him then. Blowing up the ship—taking those bigoted Unionists with him. The Korvenites who taught Vantor to fly showed him this option should he get caught. “[Yes.]” He tacked away at the console, bringing up the self-destruct options. “[The Union won’t take us alive.]” A feat Korvan would approve of. He might see the hallowed Psionic Plane. Yvyria….

  The battle began to quiet, its victor never in doubt. The Union’s triumph was complete. Not yet. Vantor selected the silent countdown option. A query for time amount appeared on the viewscreen. “[Forty nanoclics,]” he muttered. In Korvan’s name.

  Vantor finished the setup and watched the timer click away. It dawned on the Korvenite then that he was going to die. He actually felt relived. No more running.

  40…39…38…37…

  Vantor rose and smiled in relief at the viewscreen. “[I will not know fear.]”

  30…29…28…27…26…

  A peculiar, digitized sound caught Vantor’s ear.

  21…20…19…18…17…

  The frightened Korvenite reached out with his thoughts, searching—and finding a cold, calculating intelligence. Vantor’s heart stuttered. Someone else in the helm, behind him!

  A hand grabbed the scruff of Vantor’s neck and yanked him effortlessly off his feet. For a moment he was flying backward, until a wall cracked Vantor across the upper shoulders.

  7…6…5…4…3…2…. SELF-DESTRUCT ABORTED.

  A warm tingle jolted down his spine. Then, Vantor felt nothing.

  Reality swam back into focus, as did the back of a tall, slender female humanoid at the helm control. Through blurred vision Vantor noted the metallic sheen on her gold skin, far too shiny to be a pure flesh-and-blood humanoid. The Korvenite found himself slumped against the wall, his back screaming in pain. He winced while propping himself up to one elbow, and then gulped. The female’s arm!

  Cybernetic tendrils writhed and rippled out of that arm into the helm console! A cyborg. Vantor saw the viewscreen, horrified by the missing countdown. Somehow she had stopped the self-destruct.

  “No!” Vantor blurted out. The female snapped her head around. Her eyes, a deep fathomless blue, made Vantor want to jump out of his own skin. The tendrils withdrew from the console and quickly reformed into her metallic hand. At that moment, she moved on him.

  Moved? More like transmatted. Her speed—impossible! The next thing Vantor knew she had hauled him in the air by the throat. Not once did she take those cold, inorganic eyes off him.

  Vantor gagged, unable to breathe, flailing his legs uselessly. He grasped at the woman’s arm to try breaking free, quickly finding it useless once he felt the inflexible corded metal beneath her uniform.

  The female looked up at him blankly. “Maelstrom. Where is he?” Her voice was calm, emotionless.

  “K-Korvan is the beginning,” Vantor gasped, despite his towering fear. “Korvan is the—AAGH!”

  The female tightened her grip on his throat. “I could employ numerous effective ways to make you relay his location. However…I will inquire one more time.” Her voice remained steely, but her gaze sliced through anything in its path. “Where. Is. Maelstrom?”

  The lack of nitrogen made Vantor’s head swim. Still defiant, he accessed his Mindspeak and lashed out at the cyborg’s mind, hitting something solid.

  The female staggered at the assault—momentarily. Her grip remained unbroken. “You attempt to assail my consciousness.” It was more of an observation than a question. The cool composure of her voice as he fought back floored Vantor. So he pressed further into her mindscape, which felt like pushing full force against a wall.

  “Pry then, Korvenite,” her flat voice took a disdainful edge. “You will strongly dislike what you discover.” Her eyes flashed bright blue. Vantor sensed the female lowering her mental guard, letting in the full force of his attack. His heart soared…then fell.

  A trap? The cyborg tricked him. It’s mind was so strong and…mechanical. Vantor frantically tried pulling out, but couldn’t. Cybernetic cords snaked out from the cyborg’s mindscape at Vantor, stabbing through his awareness, dragging Vantor in further before shredding him apart. The Korvenite shrieked….

  6.

  Habraum danced aside, barely dodging a Retributionary’s psionic blast right in front of him. A few inches to the left and he might’ve been a waist size smaller. Seething at the thought, Habraum drove a fist into the Retributionary’s gut. Backhand, left high knee to the gut, right uppercut standing the Korvenite straight up, the Cerc reigned down blows on his adversary, finishing off the Korvenite with a pointblank biokinetic blast. The Retributionary collapsed in a heap, armor shattered and out of the fight. The encounter made Habraum’s blood sing. By the Twins, he enjoyed being in a field skirmish, the attacks and counterattacks. Almost beats dogfighting in a fighter vessel.

  Around this freighter’s passenger bay Habraum scanned his surroundings with his heightened vision, seeing jagged schisms of Korvenites trying to connect with each other. The KIF couldn’t form a proper Unilink thanks to Khrome’s psionic disruptor field device, upsetting their combat coordination. He turned his attention then to his Star Brigade combat team in action.

  Honaa tangled with a Retributionary swinging at the Rothorid using armored fist frothing with psionic energy. The Rothorid ducked and snaked out a taloned hand at the Korvenite’s breastplate, letting loose an air-rippling distortion burst. The Retributionary gave a grunt, then lifted off his feet while Honaa’s powers distorted his figure. Still he tried grabbing at Honaa…

  …until the Rothorid backflipped and smacked his thick tail up into the Retributionary’s armored jaw. The force of the blow rocketed the unconscious Korvenite over Honaa’s head and into the opposing wall like a sack of potatoes. The Rothorid was in fine fighting form, a vast improvement from what Habraum had seen weeks earlier.

  A resounding boom shook the cargo bay and Habraum turned to see another Retributionary hitting the floor, his armor a crinkly mess, courtesy of Liliana Cortés’ sonic blast. She stood over her fallen opponent, hands pointed like a gun. Three more psionic blasts shredded through the cargo bay walls around her, and the doctor astutely dove for cover.

  Anothe
r deafening crash, loud metal clanks—then a whoosh of air and a shriek; pretty much the story of Khrome smacking around more Retributionaries. Caught up in watching his Brigadiers, Habraum left himself open to a hard telekinetic shove from behind. The console wall pancaked him in the face. Pain consumed him for an instant. Luckily, his field uniform’s low forcefield absorbed most of the impact. The Cerc was jerked through the air against his will, like a puppet on strings, and slammed hard onto the unyielding floor. Caught me napping, Habraum scowled, struggling to get back up.

  Another raw telekinetic flare up; Honaa was sent flying into Habraum, knocking him back down again. Both lay sprawled on the ground, more than a little dazed.

  “Stop idiot! You’ll damage the cargo if you keep that up!” shrieked a voice in Standard dialect, but heavily accented.

  Three more Retributionaries stood a few metrids away. Their armor looked identical, but the one in the middle who spoke had a distinctive superiority, indicating he commanded the group. “The will of Korvan will pass today—AAH!” A flash of blue metal, coupled with a loud sonic boom and Habraum saw two Retributionaries tumbling backward.

  “Nothing you do will pass today!” Khrome fumed and sailed after the screaming Korvenites. Liliana trailed her fellow Brigadier in brisk strides. The Retributionary commander nearby hopped up far too confidently, until realizing he stood alone against the two seasoned Brigadiers.

  Habraum and Honaa glanced at each other mutely and smiled, rising to their feet to do battle.

  “[Korvan is the beginning, Korvan is the ending,]” the Korvenite preached in Korcei, “[His Anointed Lord Maelstrom will see to it that filth like you are purged from the galaxy!]” The Retributionary unleashed a blistering psionic salvo from his chest plate, buckling where Habraum and Honaa just leapt away from.