My Other Car is a Spaceship

by Mark Terence Chapman

  Kalen flashed a crooked smile. “All right, then. Let’s do it.” Kalen toggled the shipwide intercom. “Everyone evacuate the starboard side of the ship for now. Hang onto your hats, we’re going in.”

  Hal eased Queen Anne’s Revenge forward toward the chosen gap between asteroids. At a range of two kilometers, the four nearest asteroids launched missiles—one each at first, and then a second wave.

  Hal punched out a series of countermeasures: chaff and decoys. Without an experienced crew to help him, he was forced to handle all the offensive and defensive weapons himself. Two missiles detonated away from the ship. One missed. Hal fired lasers and picked off two more. He then shot at the missile launchers. Despite his twisting and bucking, the sixth incoming missile struck the starboard fore shield and the others hit the port and starboard midship shields. The asteroid APCs fired at the same targets.

  “Shields are holding—for now.”

  Hal’s return fire destroyed three launchers and damaged the fourth. He then blasted the APCs.

  “Now comes the tricky part.”

  He couldn’t simply launch the nuke into the middle of the shield wall and detonate it, because it was likely the defenses would attack it before it reached its target. So Hal had to find a way to keep the defensive weapons at bay; but he also couldn’t fly the ship behind the missile to defend it because he had to stay far enough back that he could hide behind an asteroid for protection from the blast and EMP.

  He launched two decoys into the next gap ahead, followed seconds later by two more decoys. Once they entered the gap, they split up, forcing the defenses to take on four separate targets.

  “There go the defenses. Eight defensive missiles fired, four APCs following up, as expected.” He paused for a moment. “Poof, no more decoys.”

  Hal then fired two missiles, specially modified with scraps of metal and spare parts from the machine shop crammed into packages affixed to the noses of the warheads. As soon as defensive missiles approached, the warheads exploded, sending hundreds of pieces of debris in every direction. The shrapnel shredded the incoming missiles and damaged one of the launchers and one of the antiproton cannons.

  He launched the remaining two modified missiles. Again they detonated, destroying the incoming missiles, as well as two APC emplacements.

  “We got all but one of the APCs, but missed three of the launchers.”

  Kalen nodded. “Let’s do it.”

  Hal eased into the gap and fired two more decoys. “That’s the last of them. This had better work.”

  Seconds later, “Launching the nuke. Everyone hang on!”

  He edged Queen Anne’s Revenge backward and to port, behind the nearest asteroid. “Five…four…three….” The decoys distracted two of the missiles and the APC, but the third missile kept coming. “Two…one….”

  A split-second before the final missile struck, the nuke detonated.

  An incandescent point exploded outward at the speed of light with the force of 180,200 tons of TNT, shoving the surrounding asteroids apart. More importantly, the electromagnetic pulse fried the circuitry of the defensive weapons in the surrounding area.

  And then some.

  “Whoa!” Hal cried out as everything went black.

  “What the hell happened?” Kalen asked. “I thought we were shielded from the EMP.”

  “So did I. Crap!” Hal grimaced. “Well, that’s it then. Without power, we’re stuck here.” He sighed. “We gave it a pretty good run, but—”

  “Don’t give up just yet. We’re safe here for the moment. No one’s shooting at us and we have plenty of provisions.” Kalen shrugged. “We made it this far. We’ll figure something out.”

  Hal nodded. “Let’s hope so. We’d better come up with a solution before any more pirates arrive and blast our sorry asses from one asteroid to the nex—”

  The lights on the bridge flickered and then came back on, along with the instrument consoles.

  “What the hell?” Hal muttered under his breath. “How—?” He mentally checked the instrument readings.

  “Ah, I see. The EMP didn’t actually hit the ship. Part of the shield extended past the rim of the asteroid. The energy pulse from the EMP grossly overloaded that shield, which made the shield generator fail and caused a cascade effect of circuit breakers tripping all over the ship. But it wasn’t a case of fried circuits, just overloaded ones. The emergency generator kicked in and the circuits reset. There’s actually only minor damage, other than to—wouldn’t you know it—the starboard midship shield generator. It’s a goner.”

  “Thank God,” Kalen replied with a nervous grin. “So the engines and weapons are still operable?”

  “As good as gold. With all the defensive weapons destroyed, the lack of a shield shouldn’t be a problem. One more set of asteroids and we’re home free—the EMP should have fried anything in the area. I can extend the starboard fore and aft shields to cover the midsection, so we’re protected from meteoroids and background radiation. We should be fine for the trip back to headquarters where we can drop off our cargo of prisoners and get this baby into spacedock for repairs. In the meantime, I’ll get the repair team working on the stuff that shorted out.”

  “Good.” Kalen let his head fall against his seatback, eyes closed. “It’s hard to believe we actually survived all that.”

  He shook his head in amazement. “Let’s get out of here before something else jumps up and tries to bite us.”

  “Roger that!” Hal agreed as he urged the ship around the asteroid and into the void between.

  Queen Anne’s Revenge slipped between the final pair of asteroids with open space dead ahead.

  “Yee-ha!” Hal crowed. “We made it!”

  “I wouldn’t celebrate too much if I were you.”

  Hal and Kalen whipped their heads around toward the doorway behind them.

  “You!” Kalen exclaimed. “How—?”

  “Yes, me,” Tarl Penrod replied with an easy grin. “I have to thank you both for rescuing me and the other prisoners. Without your help, I’d have fried back there, along with poor Jern and the others.”

  He waved his blaster loosely in the direction of the pilot and Captain. “If you please….”

  “Yes,” Captain Tro agreed. He passed Penrod and strode onto the bridge. “I’d like my ship back now.”

  He was followed by his pilot, MosVeksal, who walked toward the pilot’s couch that Hal had just exited. Two other pirates stood on either side of the doorway, each armed with a blaster.

  “These gentlemen will escort you to the holding pens,” Penrod continued, “where the rest of your people await—once you’ve turned over command of the ship to Captain Tro and his pilot, that is.”

  Hal looked to Kalen who shrugged helplessly. They were outnumbered five to two, and unarmed.

  The ship bucked and hewed to port, throwing everyone on the bridge to the floor. The lights flickered and steadied.

  “Captain!” Hal shouted. “Missiles! From three of the closest asteroids. The launchers were on the far side, shielded from the EMP.”

  As he regained his feet, he wanted to pounce on the pirates and try to wrest a weapon from one of them, but he had no choice in the matter—the ship came first. He returned fire on the defensive weapon emplacements with his APCs and the rear portside missile tube. The first pirate missile impact had shattered the rear starboard tube, along with several compartments. After a tense minute, in which the shields took several hits but no damage resulted, the battle was over.

  “Whew! All clear, Captain,” Hal said. He used the back of his sleeve to wipe sweat from his forehead. “We took a beating, but nothing that can’t be fixed.”

  “Thank you once again,” Captain Tro said with a nod. “Now, Captain, if you please.”

  Kalen considerd refusing, but after a moment decided that doing so would likely result in his death and that of the other prisoners. It wouldn’t do much to hurt the pirates, as they would eventually find a way override t
he codes and regain control of the ship.

  “Very well,” Kalen said with a sigh. He sent the correct authorization codes to the ship’s computer, which made the transfers.

  “Thank you,” Tro acknowledged with a nod to Captain Jeffries. “I think,” he said with a look to Penrod, “that given their service in rescuing you and saving my ship, we ought to be able to spare these two.”

  Penrod’s eyes tightened, along with his mouth. “Spare them? Have you forgotten that these two are responsible for destroying Smuggler’s Cove in the first place? I ought to have them torn limb from limb for that!”

  “Perhaps,” Captain Tro replied. “You are the CEO of BAE Corporation; however, aboard this ship my word is law. And I say we spare them.”

  Penrod opened his mouth, then closed it. Tro’s crewmen on either side of him, guarding the doorway, had turned their blasters fractionally in his direction.

  “Very well. I can afford to be merciful. We can rebuild the fortress, and without a Merchants’ Unity to interfere, we’ll grow bigger and stronger than ever. I’ll concede that they won a major battle here, but we’ve won the war.”

  The black-bearded pirate leader’s face stretched in a broad grin. “Take them away.”

  The two guards marched Kalen and Hal to the holding pens at gunpoint.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  With Tro’s guards gone, Penrod tried again. “I know you feel disposed to be lenient toward those two, Captain, but I don’t. They’ve been a thorn in our sides since the moment they arrived. Before we jump to hyperspace, I want you to shoot them and dump their bodies out an airlock. The rest we can sell as slaves and salvage something from this fiasco.”

  “I—” Tro began before Penrod cut him off.

  “You may be a god aboard this ship, Captain, but once we reach a pirate stronghold, I’m the king. I can have you and all your people shot for disobeying me. I want those two dead. That’s an order.”

  Tro gritted his teeth as he thought over Penrod’s ultimatum. “Yes, sir,” he replied with a sharp nod. “I will see to it personally as soon as we get the ship squared away.”

  “Good. As for how you managed to let them capture your ship, we’ll talk about that later. I’m going to my quarters.”

  “So?” Hal asked in a soft voice, so as not to be heard by everyone. “Have you come up with a brilliant plan to get us out of this mess?”

  He sat on a bunk in one of the two holding pens, accompanied by Kalen, Mynax, and the rest of the prisoners on other bunks. Mynax leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, listening, but not participating.

  Kalen’s mouth quirked upward for a moment. “Nope. You?”

  “Nope. I was just feeling sorry for myself and thinking I could have been home tinkering with my bike and mowing the lawn. Instead I’m out here getting shot at every five minutes.”

  “Instead you had the chance to fly a spaceship. How many people on Earth can make that claim? You got to see the universe and meet aliens. So what if a few of them decided to shoot at you? Isn’t this better than sitting in your easy chair, slowly rusting away until you’re some toothless old man drooling into your mush?”

  “Well, since you put it that way….” Hal grinned. “I guess this is much better. I’m really looking forward to being a slave on some backward planet where we can clear swamps or minefields for the rest of our lives—assuming they don’t just kill us instead.”

  “That’s the spirit!” Kalen grinned back.

  Hal snorted. “Okay, fine. But seriously, how are we going to get out of here?”

  “O ye of little faith. Ask and ye shall receive.”

  “All right, so you can quote scripture. What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

  Kalen smiled. “All things come to those who wait.”

  Hal rolled his eyes. “Meaning?”

  “And five…four…three…two…one….now!” Kalen pointed at the door to the cell.

  At that exact moment, it opened. Some of the prisoners jumped up from their bunks. Others recoiled.

  Hal’s jaw dropped. “How—? What—?”

  Kalen grinned. “Piece of cake. When those last missiles attacked us, everyone was distracted for a minute. As we picked ourselves up off the floor, I gave Queenie a few final commands before I turned control of the ship over to Captain Tro. One was to unlock the holding cell in ten minutes. Knowing when that would be was simply a matter of consulting my implant.”

  Hal’s mouth twisted in a wry smile. “You have a definite future in magic. Nice bit of legerdemain there.”

  Kalen made a mock bow. “Thank you. And now—” He paused for a moment. The ever-present, almost unnoticed background hum died. “That would be the hyper drive going offline until I give it the proper authorization code. That should keep the pirates busy for a while.”

  “Sneaky. Still, we may have the pirates outnumbered three-to-one, but they’re armed and we’re not.”

  “Not a problem. I also set a timer to unlock the weapons locker. We should be able to get what we need from there.”

  “I’m impressed. That was pretty quick thinking, considering there were missiles flying every which way.”

  “Thank you, kind sir. It’s not exactly a brilliant plan, but it’s a foot in the door—or maybe out of the door.” He winked. “Perhaps we’d better get going.” He turned to the rest of the group. “Nude, please keep Merry here. The rest of us will collect weapons and retake the ship—half to the bridge and half to the engine room. Let’s go.”

  “Mos! What happened to the hyper drive?” Tro barked via his implant. He and two other pirates were halfway to the holding pens.

  “Unknown, sir. The drive suddenly shut down and went into diagnostic mode for some reason. I have been unable to re-engage it so far.”

  “Jendor take him! It has to be Jeffries’ doing. Will we never escape this system?” Tro sighed. “Very well. Find Jok and check out the drive.”

  “Aye, Captain! On my way.”

  Tro glared at the two pirates with him, a Sestran and a Thorian. “This has gone on long enough. Now we finish this.” The Melphim captain strode ahead on long legs. The shorter pirates hurried to keep up.

  They arrived moments later at the prisoners’ pen. Upon seeing the open doorway, the captain and his crew drew their weapons. Tro peered around the doorway and saw no one immediately, so he entered.

  “Where are they? Where did they go?” He barked the questions at Nude, who knelt in a corner as far from the doorway as possible.

  Nude had his back turned to the pirates, his long arms wrapped around a trembling Merry. He stood and pushed Merry behind him. “They are not here.”

  “I can see that, you fool!” Tro strode closer to the prisoners. “I asked you where they are, not where they are not!”

  “I cannot tell you that.”

  “Then you are of no use to me.”

  Tro shot Nude in the chest. As the Chan’Yi crumpled, Tro reached behind him and grabbed Merry by the wrist. “Come with me!”

  He yanked her along behind him toward the doorway.

  “Nude! You hurt Nude! You’re a bad man!”

  She twisted and pulled, kicked him in the shin, trying to break free from the hulking Captain’s grip. When that failed, she burst into tears and looked back over her shoulder.

  “You hurt Nude….”

  As they exited the holding pen, the sound of blaster fire came from the direction of the engine room. Tro turned the opposite way.

  “Captain,” Sue said via the intercom, “we have taken the engine room.”

  “Good. Thanks, Sue. Don’t let the pirates get in there.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Hal turned to Kalen on the bridge. “Okay, we hold the two most important parts of the ship. But without Tro’s command authorization, we can’t leave. Now what?”

  Kalen grimaced in frustration. “Beats me. If we reactivate the drive, their pilot can fly the ship from anywhere. She doesn’t need to be on
the bridge. So the drive has to stay offline for now. It’s a stalemate. No one’s going anywhere.”

  Hal sighed. “I was afraid you were going to say that.”

  Mynax spoke for the first time. “There must be something we can do.”

  Kalen shrugged. “I’m open to suggestions.”

  After a moment of uncomfortable silence, the intercom blared to life.

  “Captain Jeffries. This is Captain Tro. I have the human child. It is time we talked.”

  Kalen and Hal exchanged worried looks.

  “Where’s Dr. Chalmis’Noud’Ourien?” Kalen asked.

  “He…will not be joining us.”

  “You bastard!” Hal shouted.

  “Hal! Not now,” Kalen rebuked. “Come up to the bridge, Captain. We’ll talk here.”

  “On my way. We will be there shortly.”

  Kalen cut the connection.

  “He killed Nude!” Hal seethed.

  “I heard what he said. He didn’t say anything about killing Nude. He may be unconscious or tied up somewhere. We can’t jump to conclusions.”

  “It wasn’t so much what he said, as how he said it. Nude’s dead.”

  “Again, we can’t worry about that right now. We have to regain control of this ship. Then we can go looking for Nude. Got it?” Kalen spoke the latter with his command voice, which brooked no argument.

  Hal took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Roger.”

  “Good.”

  “Speaking of ‘good,’ this would be a good time for that brilliant plan,” Hal prompted.

  “Sure would,” Kalen agreed. “Got one?’

  “Nope.”

  “Me neither.”

  The three men, accompanied by nine other armed former prisoners waited with grim looks on their faces and gripped their blasters all the tighter.

  Tro arrived a minute later, holding Merry by the shoulder and accompanied by the other two pirates. The foursome stood just inside the doorway, so as not to be completely surrounded by the ex-prisoners. Everyone but Merry held a blaster pointed at someone else on the bridge.