“Really?” said Vlaak. “That seems like… kind of an obvious design flaw.”
“The Sp’ossels never expected to have to fight off the whole Malarchian fleet. I’m not saying it will be easy, but it’s worth a shot.”
“Our Moment of Victory could do it,” Vlaak said. “It’s small, fast, and stealthy.”
“Not to be a downer,” Rex said, “but you’re badly outnumbered. No matter how stealthy this ship is, there’s no way you’re slipping past all those fighters. Not without some kind of diversion, anyway.”
“A diversion?” Vlaak asked. “What do you propose?”
“Well, as soon as you fly toward the framework, they’re going to figure out what you’re doing. What you need is another ship. One that’s a little bigger, slower and easier to spot than Our Moment of Victory. Send that ship through the shell first to draw their fire.”
Another Malarchian ship exploded in front of us.
“A second ship?” Vlaak said. “Does it look to you like a have ships to spare?”
Rex shrugged. “Not my problem. Anyway, it would be a suicide mission for whoever is piloting the decoy ship. I’ll tell you what, I sure as hell wouldn’t want the job. Well, good effort, everybody. Your Lordship, what do you say we head back to the Carpathian Winter? You can keep destroying your fleet, and Sasha and I will get out of here on the Flagrante Delicto.”
Chapter Twenty-six
And that’s how I found myself flying the Flagrante Delicto at maximum acceleration directly toward the surface of an alien planet made entirely out of rocket fuel.
I should have anticipated this turn of events, but I didn’t. In fact, even as I neared the patchwork frame that surrounded the Sp’ossel planet, I found it hard to believe it had come down to this. I was sacrificing my life—and that of Boggs and Donny—for a mission spearheaded by the enforcer for a repressive interstellar regime for the sole purpose of preventing everyone in the galaxy from being happy. I missed being a pirate.
Heinous Vlaak had insisted that Boggs and Donny accompany me in the Flagrante Delicto, and he’d given the Carpathian Winter orders to shoot us out of the sky if I did anything other than fly directly at top speed toward Planet Z. Meanwhile, Vlaak lurked at the edge of the asteroid field in Our Moment of Victory with Rex and Ort Felzich, ready to slip through the Sp’ossels defenses once I’d drawn their fire.
“I think we’re going too fast, Sasha,” Boggs shouted from behind me. We were pushing at least five gees. It was probably just as well that Boggs didn’t realize we were on a suicide mission. Anyway, it would all be over with presently.
“Donny thinks we should slow down,” Donny said.
“All part of the plan,” I said, trying to sound reassuring.
Several fighters, having noted our presence, had changed course toward us and opened fire with their lazecannons. Below, several torpedoes shot toward us. I shoved the stick forward and clamped my eyes shut, waiting for the inevitable.
Three seconds later I opened them as the Flagrante Delicto began to shudder with the turbulence of the planet’s atmosphere. Somehow we were still alive. We’d breached the shell.
And in another ten seconds, we were going to crash into the planet’s surface at twenty klicks a second. I pulled up hard and the Flagrante Delicto shuddered and screamed against the pummeling atmosphere. I couldn’t see anything but the glare of the heat shear. A red light flashed, telling me the heat shields were way beyond capacity. The cabin felt like a furnace. I braced for impact.
But the Flagrante Delicto leveled out, the warning lights went dark, and suddenly I could see again. We were skimming the clear crystalline blue surface of the planet at an altitude of less than a hundred meters. Somewhere behind us, half a dozen explosions sounded as the torpedoes detonated on impact. We had made it through the Sp’ossels’ defense, and it didn’t look like we were being pursued.
“Wow!” shouted Boggs from the cabin behind me. “That was great!”
“Donny does not think it was great,” Donny said.
“Now what, Sasha?” Boggs asked.
That was a good question. We weren’t supposed to make it this far. Scanning the area, I saw no sign of Our Moment of Victory. Vlaak’s ship had probably been taken out by the Sp’ossels. Ironic, I suppose. I didn’t particularly care about Heinous Vlaak or Ort Felzich—Vlaak was an evil bastard, and Felzich was as much to blame for this whole mess as anyone. Rex, though, deserved better.
Okay, that wasn’t true. Rex probably deserved to be blown to pieces by lazecannons as much as anyone. But what can I say? I have a soft spot for the big jerk. I was going to miss him—for the few minutes I had left before the Sp’ossels killed me as well.
There was no escape, that much was certain. Getting through those defenses once had been against the odds; getting through them twice would require a miracle—particularly since there was no way I could get up that sort of speed leaving the planet’s gravitational field. We were stuck here.
If we were going to die on this planet, though, we could at least make the most of our time here. I used the Flagrante Delicto’s sensors to survey the surface for any large structures. I found one—a structure nearly fifty meters high—a few hundred klicks from our present position. That had to be the control tower Felzich had mentioned. Maybe we could take it out and prevent the Sp’ossels from activating the transmitter. I banked left and settled on a new course toward the tower, keeping low to the ground to avoid attracting attention. Far overhead, I saw the occasional flash of an explosion, but the surface appeared to be deserted.
“How would you guys like to blow up a control tower?” I asked.
“Okay, Sasha,” Boggs said. “Where’s Potential Friend and Frozen Friend?”
“I suspect we’ll join them shortly, Boggs.”
Soon the tower was visible on the horizon. But no sooner had I spotted it than I noticed a small black ship in the distance, heading toward the tower from my right. Our Moment of Victory had survived!
My exhilaration was short-lived, however. Our Moment of Victory was being pursued by two Sp’ossel fighters, which were firing at it with their lazecannons. One of them scored a direct hit and Our Moment of Victory began to trail smoke and lose altitude.
The tower was now clearly visible. On the very top was mounted a parabolic dish similar to the one Rex and I had seen on the satellite above Vericulon Four. It even had a giant blue gemstone at the end of a pole protruding from its center. This puzzled me until I realized what it was: the smaller transmitter Felzich had spoken of, the one that produced the “siren” signal. This tower was the control center for both the siren transmitter and the much larger, planetary transmitter. If we destroyed the tower, with any luck we’d take out both.
Our Moment of Victory was headed straight for the tower, but it was several klicks away, and the Sp’ossel fighters were still blasting it with their lazecannons. It was clear Vlaak’s ship wasn’t going to make it without some help. I steered to the right, putting the Flagrante Delicto on an intercept path with the fighters. When I was only a few hundred meters away, I let loose a barrage of lazecannon fire. (While I’m unable to engage in personal combat or fire handheld weapons, I’ve found that a loophole in my programming allows me to use ship-based weapons.) I hit the first one dead on; it exploded into a million pieces. I only clipped the second one, but it was enough to destabilize it, sending it plummeting to the surface, where it came apart in a blast of flame. Our Moment of Victory was in the clear.
It was also on fire, losing altitude, and on a collision course with the control tower. We flew past them and came about just in time to see Our Moment of Victory smash into the base of the tower. As plumes of smoke billowed from the wreckage of Vlaak’s now-immobile ship, the tower began to sway, first toward the ship, then the opposite direction.
“Sasha, watch out!” Boggs yelled.
“Donny doesn’t like that building,” Donny said.
The tower was going to fall—and given
our current course, it was going to hit us. There was no time to change direction, so I did the only thing I could think of: I punched the accelerator. We rocketed past as the tower fell, barely missing us.
Breathing a sigh of relief, I decelerated and brought the ship around again. Down below, several people in black uniforms were running away from the tower. They didn’t appear to be armed, so I ignored them. They got in a small ship and blasted off.
The Sp’ossels had evidently never expected anyone to get past their defensive shell—and if we hadn’t had the Malarchian navy drawing fire, we wouldn’t have. Above us, the battle seemed to be winding down: the Sp’ossels and the Malarchians, evenly matched, had virtually annihilated each other’s forces. Maybe there was a chance of us getting out of here after all.
I landed the Flagrante Delicto not far from the smoking wreckage of Our Moment of Victory. Given that the Sp’ossels had run to their ship without vac suits on, I assumed the air was breathable. Presumably the Sp’ossels had terraformed Planet Z as part of their plans. I opened the hatch and a blast of cool air greeted us.
“Let’s go,” I said to Boggs and Donny. “We’re going to see if there’s anything left of Rex.”
Boggs and Donny followed me down the ramp. The surface of Planet Z was rough and hard, like walking on congealed salt crystals. It was mostly flat except for larger crystals that jutted out from the surface at irregular intervals. The air was cold and the ground and the sky were both a pale azure, giving the planet a desolate, melancholy feel.
“This place is fantastic!” Boggs exclaimed. “I love it here!”
“Donny does not love it,” Donny said.
“I’m not too keen on it either, Donny,” I said, shooting a suspicious glance at Boggs. “We won’t be staying long.” I doubted anyone had survived the crash, and any minute I expected to be cut down by a hail of lazecannon fire. The Sp’ossels and the Malarchy both wanted us dead; the only question was whether either of them had any ships left.
As we approached Our Moment of Victory, several figures stumbled out of the smoke toward us. Rex appeared first, with Squawky, none the worse for wear, still perched on his shoulder. Heinous Vlaak, his uniform badly scuffed from the crash, came next. Pepper and Ort Felzich followed.
“Sasha!” Rex cried as he saw me. “I’m so happy to see you!”
“Yes,” squeaked Heinous Vlaak. “I too am happy to see you, robot.”
Somehow, it was less disconcerting to hear this from Heinous Vlaak than from Rex.
“You are?” I asked, looking at Rex.
“Of course!” Rex said. “And Boggs and Donny! Isn’t this great? We’re all back together on this wonderful rock-hard blue planet!”
“I am happy to see you too, Potential Friend!” Boggs said. “I have never been so happy.”
Pepper and Ort Felzich, despite being badly scraped up and bruised, seemed oddly cheerful as well. Only Donny and I remained on edge.
“Donny does not like the blue planet,” Donny said. “Donny wants to leave now.”
A sickening feeling came over me as I realized what had happened. “We’re too late,” I said. “They triggered the happiness transmitter.”
Something didn’t add up, though. Boggs hadn’t shown any signs of being irrationally happy until we landed. “Is the effect localized to the surface?” I asked.
“They didn’t have enough time to activate the planetary transmitter,” Ort Felzich said, approaching us. “When Our Moment of Victory hit the control tower, it triggered the local transmitter.” He pointed at the parabolic dish, which lay on the ground, angled in our direction.
At first, I was puzzled that the transmitter wasn’t affecting Felzich, but then I remembered the whole reason he was carrying his consciousness around in a briefcase.
“The rest of the galaxy isn’t happy?” I asked.
“No,” Ort replied. “The effects didn’t take hold until we climbed out of the crash. It seems to be limited to the area in front of the dish.”
“So if they leave this area, they’ll be back to normal?”
“Yes.”
“Why would we do that?” Rex asked. “We’re incredibly happy here.”
Pepper and Boggs nodded in agreement.
“You’re incredibly happy,” I said. “I’m terrified.”
“Donny is not happy,” Donny said.
“In any case,” I said, “we can’t stay here. Whoever won the big space battle up there is going to be coming here to kill us shortly.”
“Relax, Sasha,” Rex said. “If we die, we die. The important thing is to enjoy the here and now.”
“Good point, Rex,” Pepper said. “I’m going to lie down and just take it all in.” She lay down on the ground. Boggs and Heinous Vlaak were hugging.
“Get a hold of yourself,” Squawky said. “I’m a born pirate.”
“No!” I shouted. “Don’t lie down. We have to get out of here!”
“It’s pointless, Sasha,” Felzich said. “They’re completely content. There’s no way to convince them to go anywhere.”
“Then what do we do?”
“Let’s see if we can shut down that transmitter.”
Donny and I followed Felzich to the huge parabolic dish, which had been badly bent out of shape by the fall. The zontonium crystal at the end of the column seemed to be the same size as the one Rex had tried to steal from the satellite orbiting Vericulon Four. There were no visible controls or any obvious way of shutting down the transmitter. Looking up, I still saw no signs of either Sp’ossel or Malarchian ships. Maybe we had gotten lucky and the two sides had obliterated each other completely. I wasn’t going to bank on it, though. The sooner we got off Planet Z, the better.
“Let’s check inside,” Felzich said, walking toward the base of the tower. I followed, and Donny skittered after me, his four arm-legs surprisingly well-adapted for walking over the jagged ground. The door to the building had been blown off by the impact of Vlaak’s ship; Donny and I walked right inside, finding ourselves in a room filled with a bewildering array of control panels. The walls were covered with dozens of display screens. At present, every single screen was displaying a numeric countdown. Donny and I watched as it went from 12:03 to 12:02 to 12:01 to 12:00 to 11:59.
“Donny doesn’t like the numbers,” Donny said.
“Does that mean what I think it means?” I asked.
Felzich nodded, a deep frown having come over his face. “The Sp’ossels have rigged the planet to self-destruct.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
“The whole planet is going to explode?” I asked, unable to believe it. “Not just the tower?”
Felzich shook his head. “The Sp’ossels are serious about not letting the planet fall into the wrong hands. The plans specified the construction of an underground zontonium reactor. The simplest way to build a self-destruct mechanism would be to overload the reactor. The reactor melts down and the chain reaction spreads to the planet itself. Pretty neat, actually.”
“Donny does not think it is neat,” Donny said. “Donny thinks it is very much not neat.”
“Could you disable the self-destruct?” I asked.
“It’s going to be tricky,” Felzich said, studying the controls. “Looks like the reactor has already been overloaded. Even if I cut the control circuit, the reactor will reach critical mass on its own. I have to tell the reactor to retract the zontonium rods.”
“And you can do that?”
“I think so,” said Felzich. “But just in case, you should get out of here. You and Donny.”
“I can’t leave without Rex and the others,” I said.
“Forget them,” Felzich said. “There’s no time. Save yourselves.”
“What about you?”
“This is my doing,” Felzich said. “I found Planet Z. I designed the psionic transmitter. Everything that’s happening is my fault. It will be fitting if I meet my demise when this planet explodes.”
“You mean if it explodes,�
� I said.
“Right,” said Felzich. “Because I’m going to try to keep it from exploding.”
I regarded him skeptically for a moment. “You are, right?”
“Of course! Do you think my guilt at having gotten us into this situation has manifested itself as a death wish?”
“I didn’t until right now,” I replied.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Sasha. I’m just being realistic. I’m going to do my best, but I might fail. Now get out of here!”
“All right,” I said. “Good luck.”
He waved us away irritably. Donny and I ran back toward the Flagrante Delicto. Rex waved as we went by. “Hey, Sasha!” he yelled. “Isn’t this place great?”
“Aye, sir,” I yelled. “But wouldn’t you rather come with us aboard the Flagrante Delicto?”
Rex shrugged. “I was kind of thinking about a nap.”
I wondered if Donny and I could carry Rex to the Flagrante Delicto. Probably not. There just wasn’t enough time. And we would still have to leave Boggs, Pepper and Vlaak behind. I paused at the ramp to the Flagrante Delicto. Donny skittered to a halt next to me. It just didn’t seem right to leave Rex behind.
“Donny does not like this planet,” Donny said.
“Nor do I, Donny.”
“But Donny does not want to leave without the others.”
I sighed. “Agreed. Let’s see if we can at least get Rex on board.”
We ran over to Rex, who was now lying down on the jagged surface. He looked extremely uncomfortable and ridiculously happy. I almost envied his complete obliviousness about our situation.
“Sir, get up,” I said, tugging at his left arm. Donny pulled on his right.
“What for?” Rex asked.
“If we stay here, we’re going to die. The planet is about to explode.”
“Okay,” Rex said, getting to his feet. Donny skittered around behind him. I was about to give Rex a shove onto Donny’s back when he suddenly took off running.
Aye, Robot (A Rex Nihilo Adventure) (Starship Grifters Book 2) Page 17