He also looked to the ceiling addressing SHIP. “As powerful he feels right now, the Karthanians are not as easy a target as you made it sound. The Karthanians do have strong contracts with the Oghr-Ogrs and they tend to honor their commitments. Neither are the Karthanians fools and Oghr fleets are most likely already deployed and on their way to protect Karthanian worlds and systems.”
“You got a point, frontier colonies don’t have enough resources for one clan. The Karthanians might be a tad too big for him right now. However the Admiral thinks it is a possible scenario. ” I said while glanced at the main screen and watched the Red Dragon jumping to Translight, while the Intruder struggled to build up threshold speed.
Har-Hi agreed. “Father believes that once he has sufficient control he might move against one of the smaller independents, such as the Jooltar or perhaps even one of the weaker Oghr Kingdoms. The other Oghr species won’t lift a finger to help their brethren.”
Mao interrupted us with urgency in his voice. “Fast approaching contact on our scanners. Captain, a Togar Womptar Battle Cruiser has just dropped out of Quasi and they are under shields and weapons charged.
Elfi said. “They are hailing us.”
“Alright, SHIP sound Battle stations. Mao, stand by on shields but don’t raise them yet. Elfi put them on.”
A magnificent strong looking Cat Warrior became visible and he growled. “Pirate you are identified as one of the ships and individuals involved in a transaction involving a Togar fugitive and criminal of the highest order, we demand that you stand down and be boarded and searched for evidence and details." Do that and we will consider to let you live. Do it not and we will have no mercy.”
“I have no Togar Criminal aboard. I sold that Cat.”
“We will search your vessel now.”
“I don’t let just anyone come aboard.”
“You have no choice; your little Freighter has sharp claws but not enough to prevent your doom. Your Froth Casters do not have the range.”
I cut him off.
“Narth turn on our real sensors and check if he is alone, Mao full Giga Load as soon as I give the signal”
Our real sensors reached light years beyond the ones a Karthanian Freighter would have and also showed Quasi Space traffic. There were quite a few signals both Karthanian and Dai but only one Dai Signal was coming this way as well.
Narth said. “He is about to call for back up and tell his Superiors about us.” “Mao, fire!”
Chapter 20: A Third Way
The Giga Load Translocator bomb detonated right in the command center of the Togarship engulfing it in a sun like sphere of bright expanding energies. I was well aware that this explosion would show on every sensor in the region and that we had not much time.
“Elfi did he send his message?”
“No, he just started sending his ID sequence and their communication systems are much slower than ours. It will take over twenty two hours before this code sequence is received. He was unable to add more.”
“However someone noticed the explosion.” Shea said. ”Two long range scanner contacts a Dai and two Togar have changed course and they will be here in less than five minutes.”
“We need get out of here. If we keep using Translocators they get wise to the fact that we are not Pirates.”
Har-Hi warned me. “Captain if we accelerate too fast, all patina of our disguise is gone. They are close enough for their sensors to detect us. An anti matter explosion could have other reasons than a Translocator bomb, a ship accelerating with TL 8 speeds however screams Union.”
“Shaka, get us going Silver Streak maximum.”
It was not fast enough for us to reach threshold speed before they arrived.
A Dai ship dropped out of Quasi Space, followed moments later by two Togar units.
The Togar almost immediately fired upon the Dai Joth-Yi destroyer, only to receive a salvo of the Dai destroyer raking their shields with nuclear plasma.
I felt as if there were needles in the upholstering of my command seat and I sat on its utmost edge, “Guys it is about time we take our leave.”
“Two minutes and six second to Threshold.” Shaka said.
The other Togar fired at us, and while the shields held, the kinetic energy of the missiles hitting us, knocked us out of the acceleration path and Shaka had to recommit.”
We had to show the world that we had only Karthanian shields, they were fed and simulated by the Narth designed Janus projectors of our disguise and it would take a lot more than that to make our simulated shields buckle, but a straight and uninterrupted acceleration was still crucial.
I decided to let them worry why their blasts did not drain our shields as they should have.
Shaka was taking us to the maximum acceleration our disguise permitted.
The second Togar fired at us again and that gave the battered Dai an opening it did not waste and it hit the first Togar with a concentrated volley of all its main weapons, breaking the already strained shields of that Togar Destroyer. A secondary onslaught of Dai weapon fire sliced through the tough Togar mineral foamed composite armor and sun bright beams of destruction perforated the Togar’s Engineering section. That ship was done for! Greenish plasma fire leaked a heartbeat later out of the still bright glowing holes the Dai weapons had left behind.
Har- Hi had his fist clenched and slammed it on his knee. “She’ll go any second now.”
We watched as s handful of escape pods detached from the doomed Togar ship, the rest of its crew didn’t make it, the ship exploded violently.
The remaining Togar changed course and fired three Vagroorr Missile. Now, these weren’t Loki Torpedoes but the Togar were almost at par with the Kermac and out Tactical systems instructor aboard the Devi once said that 20 of these hitting simultaneously could ruin the day of a Union Battle ship.
One was intercepted by the Dai gunners; one exploded with force in the Joth-Yi destroyer shields and tore them down. The third was on our tail .We were committed to Threshold speed , and could not evade. Mao fired the Nul Froth caster and destroyed it before it could reach our aft but to escape the graviton shock wave, Shaka had to maneuver and change course and that meant he had to interrupt threshold acceleration once again and commit the ship to a new run. In all this I realized what a gigantic difference just two Tech levels made. The Tigershark easily maneuvered at twenty times the speed and it would have taken us seconds and not minutes to threshold speed.
“Shaka stop acceleration and go to zero thrust, take us around as soon as they are past us. Mao target the Togar and fire when in range.”
Mao fired our simulated Nul Froth Casters and chaotic oscillating graviton waves pulled and pushed the matter of the war cat’s ship in every conceivable direction, developing gravitational whirlpools and pulverizing much of the warships engineering.
The Dai was damaged and without shields but it still fired at the Togar. With its shields gone and a shredded aft , the Togar finished of the Dai destroyer, with another missile,
Shea looking over her sensor readings. “The Togar won’t go far either. The Froth effect did a number on these old fashioned reactors and without the necessary systems they are overheating and whoever isn’t killed by the radiation will suffocate as life support is no longer active.”
I rubbed my hands. “Good news then, Krabbel plot a course to Itheamh.”
Elfi reported. “Captain, the Togar hailing us!”
I signaled her to put them on.
A singed Togar Commander appeared, his bridge was damaged and I could see the distinctive flicker of open fire in the smoke filled background.
Togar coughed. “Pirate, I am Roghor, commanding the Vighrr, I should command you know to stop your engines and tell you we will board you, but we lost life support and my engineers are dead so I don’t know if we are to loose containment. I appeal to you from ship commander to ship commander to give me the honor of death and to take my surviving crew to Kaliment, don’t sell them
as slaves; my Lead Cats will make sure you receive a reward on Kaliment.”
Shea said. “Circuit thinks they have about 12 minutes before Containment goes.”
They were Togar, I didn’t like Togar. The less of these human eating cats the better, but he was a Captain knowing his doom was imminent and he asked me to help his crew.
“Commander Roghor, you have about ten minutes before your containment fails. Tell your crew to suit up and evacuate. I give you my word I will not sell you as slaves, but treat your wounded and take you to Kaliment. You have my word on that. You too must leave, Commander!”
“I will give the order, pirate.”
“Any tricks or subterfuge and you will wish we were slavers!”
“No tricks Pirate.”
Narth said. “There are survivors aboard the Dai wreck as well, four of them have survived but are injured.”
I threw my hands in the air. “Maybe we make it to Itheamh by the time the Red Dragon retires of old age.”
I turned to Har-Hi. ”Take a few marines and see if you can get them alive. Hans take a team and collect the cats and make sure they are unarmed and kept in one of the empty hangars.”
Har-Hi gave me a thankful look before he left.
We spend much longer drifting in space than I hoped. We ended up collecting the few escape pods of the other Togar as well. The hangar across our Pirate Den was the last room we had left and it was now filled with almost 200 Togar cats.
Not all of them, so Narth told me were happy about the Commander’s decision to accept help, but Hans and his marines had stripped them one by one and even the formidable warrior cats were quite terrified and docile as they saw Hans, our Nul prince and TheOther telling them what would happen if the did not fully cooperate.
Har-Hi had no problems evacuating the Dai, they were more dead than alive and in no shape to fight or resist.
Cateria and her team was busy saving their lives.
I went down to see if the Togar Commander made it and stepped through the force field curtain that was transparent for crew of my ship only and also projected the image of an old Karthanian ship corridor as I stepped onto the Togar filled Starboard Hangar B.
Most of them sat on the floor and one of my Pertharian marines in pirate costume of course, was serving soup or something similar in plastic cups while our Takkian pushed a hover cart with the bowl and more cups behind him.
The Pertharian despite his Pirate costume could not switch of being a Marine and as he saw me went into attention. “Captain Black Velvet on deck.”
I cringed and wondered just how thin our disguise was at that point and I was certain it would take little to convince even the densest Togar that we weren’t really pirates.
TheOther immediately moved from his spot next to the door like tremendous shadow behind me.
It was a reassuring feeling to have a real Y’All warrior watching my back. Not that I felt threatened but I disliked Togar and now I was in a closed room with a lot of them. While they weren’t armed, they still had claws and jaws filled with dagger like teeth just like a Fangsnapper.
One of them got up and even though he had nothing on but his own fur, he wore his rank like an invisible aura and I knew he was Roghor the Commander, that he had singed fur was not a distinguishing feature as it appeared many of them had burn and obvious radiation injuries. He was at least two heads taller than me and covered with short deep golden fur, except around his muscular neck and all the way to his round ears where it was dark brown and longer. It framed his head like a massive halo of longer coarse hair, almost like a hood around his wild looking face. He had a broad triangular nose and the sides of his muzzle were grey, making him look older than most of the other cats present. His eyes were bright yellow and his tail was thick and whisked the air in a somewhat nervous and almost independent fashion. It reminded me of my costume I wore as was with Deepa.
He crossed his broad paw like hands before his muzzle and bowed slightly then he took his long tail with one hand and held it like that. “It is not common for my kind to ask for help and especially not from other species. Now that I survived the demise of my ship, I will face death by the hands of my superiors once we reach Kaliment, but it is a price we pay when we take command, is that something a pirate can understand?”
I had to admit he kept surprising me and why would such a Commander only command a destroyer and not a battleship? Instead of answering his question I said, “I have seen a ship full of human body parts not so long ago, Togar. I haven’t forgotten this and I most likely won’t ever forget it. I know some of your warriors right now don’t feel very thankful or cooperative, so there won’t be zero tolerance on my side. If one of your cats even so much as twitched a muscle in a way I find agressive or makes any kind of trouble, I space the lot of you.”
I was unable to read his face or sense his emotions out of his voice as it sounded like an angry growl no matter what he said. “You will be rewarded for your decision on Kaliment, you will receive much Polonium which will make this a profitable venue.”
“I came to find out why you were chasing a Dai ship.” I looked him straight in his eyes even if I had to look up to do so. “This region is awash with rumors about a huge Dai fleet. You would not have information on that?”
He said very loud. “No pirate I am not in the habit of sharing any Togar reasons with you!”
He really tried to whisper as he growled silently. ”My life is over no matter what happens, but I am not a traitor or share Togar intelligence. However I am willing to share with you whatever I know that is not classified, but I cannot do so right here, there are those who have ears and eyes for others than the fleet.”
I said as loud as him, well almost as loud. “Then I have no use for you!”
I turned and said to TheOther. “Paralyze the whole bunch, stack them in Stasis boxes if we have enough left, but keep them asleep until we know what to do with them. Then bring that Commander into the Den, but have Cateria and Shea check him out for any real or artificial bugs or any other surprises.” TheOther declined his entire upper body as he had no neck to mimic the human nod. “Aye Captain!”
While the ship was finally in Quasi space and traveling towards Itheamh. I left Krabbel in charge of the Conn and took a detour to sick bay before I made my way to our Den.
The rescued Dai warriors so I learned had been critically wounded and two of them were still in the ReGen tank where nanites and tissue weavers replaced and restored the Dai warriors.
Har -Hi stood next to our recent crew addition, the white Togar female and our med tech turned Garbini. My red skinned friend stared inside the greenish goo filled tank where two still partially maimed and crippled Dai warriors hung suspended by hoses looking alien, pitiful and fragile at the same time.
“All four are of the Vun trine.” He said in a toneless voice.
“I only see two.”
“Cateria managed to saved both of the ones you see, literally in the last moment. The other two perished before we could them in stasis. We Dai never developed the same marvellous space suits where the well being of the wearer was the paramount core of the design. No auto docs and no space suits equipped with stasis capability.”
“Do you know them?”
“I know the Vun tribe. The Dai floating in the left tank, is Rur-Vun, he is the oldest son of the tribal leader Tar Laf-Vun. I fought him the last time I was on Thana Shoo, fighting him for the title of Champion of Thana Shoo. He was very good.”
He turned to look at me.“The Vun tribe was second in size only to ours. I am certain Tar Laf-Vun decided not to follow my father back then, because I had beaten his son. I am a Union Citizen now, I am an officer but have the feeling I am witnessing the demise of the Dai culture. Why did the Togar chase their destroyer, where is the rest of the Vun tribe?”
“I am on my way to the Den to ask that very question to the Togar commander. I am sure these two will recuperate and maybe give you the answers you seek.”
Jolai had her hands folded before her short white skirt. She too seemed troubled. “I am the reason the Togar have attacked you and I put everyone in danger.”
“It was my decision to purchase you so openly at the Asteroid base, not you. What I said to you when we met holds true now and in the future. You are part of this crew now and not the entire Togar empire could make me sell you out.”
The Garbini wiggled her and said.“That holds true for everyone aboard and in extend for the entire Union. Now let us check on the bio printer, I am sure the liver for our Dai patient is ready.”
While our Togar girl left with the Garbini, I was moved by my own feelings about the Togar and remembered my recent apology
The Togar Commander sat across me on our big table in our Den. He looked clean and his singed fur was gone, replaced by patches of almost white fur. Cateria looked at her PDD and said. “Our feline guest has been treated and is as healthy as I can make him. I fixed his burns and treated him for a nasty worm infestation of his stomach and intestines. I guess to much raw meat from an unclean source. He had nothing in terms of bugs or spy ware, neither biological, psionic or technological.”
He looked smaller now, sitting down and across the massive table.He blinked by closing his black lined eyelids and I assume that was how Togar acknowledged something. He kept looking around at all our treasure Sobody, Mr. Warner and my crew had piled up and the colorful decoration with bits and pieces from perhaps every corner of the galaxy. Of course he also noticed Hans and TheOther flanking him, while Xon stood behind me, giving no reason to doubt what he would do if our new guest decided to become agressive.
Cateria moved, leaned closer to me and whispered in Seenian. “He is also under a lot of stress and while we don’t have much Data on Medical Central on Togar Psych conditions, I think he is close to a nervous breakdown.”
The Togar Commander wrought his hands nervously and then said. “You have an amazing ship and a truly formidable crew.”
Eric Olafson Series Boxed Set: Books 1 - 6 (The Galactic Chronicles Series) Page 134