Celestial Ascension (Splintered Galaxy Book 1)

by Eddie R. Hicks

  Another set of flames appeared from down the corridor. Nodevar’s burning body slammed against the wall, his arms and legs covered in small flames. Whigli was establishing dominance in their fight. Lettielia panicked, making two jump-ports—one toward Nodevar, a second toward the connecting corridor he had come from. She was after Whigli.

  Nodevar’s body blinked a short distance away with a jump-port. As he rematerialized, Phylarlie immediately noticed his flames were gone, removed by his jump-port. Not a bad idea—she did the same, then waited for the medical systems to attend to her burns. Nodevar wasn’t moving much. Taking on a psionic such as Whigli clearly brought extreme levels of pain to him, all things considered, Nodevar was lucky to be alive at this point.

  ………

  Jazz floated through the airlock, entering the Voidwrath. He extended the rifle in front of him as he assessed the situation in the connecting hallway—all clear. However, he heard fighting and yelling coming from the other end of the ship. Shit is going down.

  A Hashmedaian pilot entered the hallway, floating toward him in a state of panic and terror. The pilot stopped and spoke to Jazz in a language he didn’t understand. He was trying to explain something to him, but what? Jazz clearly looked like a Linl ranger to him, so shouldn’t he be trying to fight instead? Not that it mattered, as the Hashmedai was swiftly sliced in half from head to crotch by Zhinbryo’s massive plasma sword.

  “Zinzin, my man, good to see you!” Jazz cheered.

  Zhinbryo spoke aggressively in his language to Jazz while pointing his sword at him. Jazz’s guess was that he viewed him as a Linl. This could get awkward. Onatiasha floated in afterward, also gazing at Jazz. Suddenly, her tractor beam dragged him into her grip. As she lifted her sword into the air, Jazz said, “Onatiasha, it’s me—Jazz!”

  She stopped, puzzled. “Jazz is dead, and you clearly are armed with Radiance equipment…Linl.”

  “Yet I clearly look and sound like Jazz, and know who you are.” He looked up at her sword, still in the air but not moving. “And you haven’t killed me yet, so I’m gonna say you’re having second thoughts on cutting me in half.”

  “Um, you OK, Jake?” asked Jason. He peeked out through the airlock to assess the current situation.

  “And that fool back there is my ex-wife’s current husband,” Jazz continued. “There’s also dead Union bodies onboard that ship, and you can rest assured that rumors of my demise are greatly exaggerated.”

  “Shut up, Jazz,” Onatiasha said, releasing him to float freely as she holstered her sword. “We saw you on the ground shot to death. Wasn’t sure if this was some Radiance trickery, or you’re just one clever person.”

  “Heaven didn’t want me,” Jazz said. “Hell’s afraid I’d take over, so y’all mothafuckers are stuck with me.”

  ………

  Nodevar turned out to be quite the challenge for Whigli. The fight from the infirmary all the way down to the corridor resulted in Whigli’s psionic shield failing. Nodevar floated in stillness one second too long, allowing him to get knocked back with a telekinetic push and grazed by a small white fireball. It angered Lettielia enough that she turned away from Phylarlie to make two jump-ports to appear behind Whigli. No armor, no weapon, and no psionic strength left, Whigli was defenseless, even more so after Lettielia’s stun disk put him out.

  Lettielia pulled Whigli’s head back, fully exposing his neck as her dagger aggressively went in for the kill. Nodevar, injured, looked on with a grin that quickly turned to a grimace.

  Phylarlie came into sight behind Lettielia, and Lettielia’s body launched forward, covered in flames and hurling toward Nodevar. She impacted the wall in the same manner Nodevar had earlier. Phylarlie appeared above Lettielia, spinning her weightless body around to face her and then passionately locked lips with her. Phylarlie probed the inside of her mouth with her tongue as her dagger thrust forward to probe the inside of Lettielia’s stomach.

  Nodevar’s screams echoed throughout the ship. He went for his daggers as he leaped onto Phylarlie. He lost his grip on the daggers when he was knocked back. Working quickly, he slipped and activated one stun disk on Phylarlie, grabbed onto the lifeless body of Lettielia dematerializing, and sent blue light toward the airlock. Whigli took notice of Nodevar actions, having regained full control of his body from the stunned state.

  Whigli floated inside the transport ship seconds before the doors swung shut to allow the transport to take flight. Nodevar sat in the cockpit, piloting the transport away from the Voidwrath. Lettielia’s body floated in the back with red orbs of blood escaping her burned stab wound. The stun from earlier gave Whigli’s psionic strength the chance to recover slightly, but it wasn’t enough for him to merge his mind with the transport’s systems. He cracked his fists, and his claws sprung out. Going have to do this the old-fashioned way.

  The two wrestled, fighting for dominance in the cockpit. The transport accelerated quickly toward the human world as their bodies landed on the flight controls. Neither cared about the state of the craft as they punched, kicked, and slashed flesh away with their razor-sharp claws. The fighting along the controls eventually put the transport into an uncontrollable downward spiral as the invisible hands of gravity gripped onto it.

  The two crashed to the floor as gravity became a reality once again. Whigli rose to his feet to see Nodevar’s head with a bleeding gash, suggesting he had hit it hard when he fell. The planet’s surface came in and out of view from the window. The ship was crashing, and full shields wouldn’t be enough to save them from a fall that high.

  Whigli took a seat, interacting with the flight controls with his shaking hands. Piloting a transport was one thing, but making it recover from a spiral was a daunting task, one best suited for trained and experienced pilots, which Whigli was not.

  Nodevar’s arms wrapped around Whigli’s neck and head, cutting off his breathing. Something needed to done—a teleport, anything. His psionic mind processed the available options. Teleport back to the Voidwrath? It was too far away with the limited strength he had. What’s close? A human city was getting closer as every second passed. Blue light flooded the cockpit, and Whigli vanished. Nodevar remained.

  ………

  “There he is!” said Hannah, pointing. “I told ya he’d come here.”

  Rina walked farther into the alley where Hannah stood pointing. A shirtless Hashmedai man with purple hair fell to the ground, his body bruised and bleeding, as if a wild animal had attacked him.

  “Oh my God. Hannah, watch out!” said Rina in a panicked voice.

  “Don’t worry, Destiny. Whigli is a nice man,” said Hannah. “He’s going to help us. We just need to help him first.”

  ………

  Jazz floated, watching as Onatiasha and Zhinbryo frantically monitored the situation outside in regard to the transport ship. Zhinbryo sat in the main pilot’s seat, while Onatiasha interacted with a terminal on the wall.

  Phylarlie floated in the cockpit, misery in her eyes. “We’re clear. The ship is ours,” said Phylarlie. Onatiasha translated Phylarlie’s findings to Zhinbryo.

  Jason approached Jazz and asked, “What about Odelea?”

  “She took off after you came up,” said Jazz. “Guess my story about Onatiasha really terrorized her.”

  “I can’t find it,” Onatiasha concluded. “It must have recovered and docked at full speed, as there are no signs or reports of a crash. We need to push on without him. We’re running out of time.”

  “How do we get onboard now that we don’t have a psionic?” asked Jazz.

  “The crew never got the chance to send out a distress signal, so the fleet still thinks we’re friendly,” Onatiasha explained. “We’ll dock with the command ship and do a quick sweep from the bridge to the engine room. As massive as the ship is, there’s very little space for the crew, so it shouldn’t take very long.”

  “And if we’re compromised, then what?” asked Jazz. “Fight our way back to the airlock?”


  “Just send me,” Phylarlie volunteered. “You said it’s small, right? I can enter in stealth. If I find something, you can head out to join me.” Onatiasha smiled upon hearing Phylarlie suggest this.

  Jazz added, “Given the fact that our team has gotten smaller, I say that’s the best choice.”

  “Very well,” said Onatiasha. She looked to Phylarlie. “Get yourself ready then, assassin. We’re counting on you.”

  ………

  Chloe’s eyes opened wide at the sight of the Hashmedai command ship, which hovered in high orbit above the North Pole. In fact, all the human occupants on board the captured Hashmedai corvette were wide-eyed, especially as they entered the main hangar doors. The view from the cockpit window displayed a colossal sight of engineering no human had ever laid eyes on before.

  Dozens of Hashmedaian battleships were all perfectly lined up, held in place by blue beams of light along the interior walls. As they ventured farther inside, they saw many more transport ships docking or departing from the parked ships.

  The sight was stunning enough to take their minds off the fact that it was so damn cold within the confines of this ship. It wasn’t enough however to take her mind off the fact that Gavin said he’ll be fine one moment then lose his shit upon seeing Chidorli the next. Yeah, she was responsible for his wife’s death, but still they had a mission to finish, and the male Hashmedai that was with her was surrendering, offering himself to take the hit. Now this young alien woman lies here, with no control over her body, slowly dying. Chloe didn’t know if she should feel sorry for her, or satisfied she got what was coming to her...or worried that if Gavin losses it again, it may cost them this much needed victory to save the human race.

  “Sweet Jesus,” muttered Chris. “Wonder how much it would cost to build and maintain something like this?”

  “The Hashmedai do not have a currency system,” Gengei said. “Most people are born educated and trained in a predefined profession, which they have to work in for little or no reward.”

  “So what you’re saying is the Hashmedai are a race of commies,” said Gavin. “I’m OK with blowing this thing to hell.”

  Gengei examined new data, which displayed on the screen, regarding the brainjack device. “Tractor beam is locked on. Get ready, everyone.”

  Chloe, Sarah, Chris, and Gavin floated their way toward the still psionic as Xyniea pulled Kroshka over to them. Gengei’s fingers fiddled with the device for a few seconds more. His face grew frustrated—something was up.

  “Is there a problem?” Chloe asked.

  “Indeed,” Gengei said, disappointment in his voice. “It is the mind shield for the command ship—it is blocking this psionic from teleporting us in.”

  “Fuck! No way we came all this way to be stopped by this,” said Chloe.

  “Mind shields have two layers of security,” Gengei explained to the group. “The first layer scans the target to ensure the psionic is of the right race, in this case Hashmedai. The second layer checks to see if the person is authorized to interact.”

  “Let me guess—she isn’t authorized,” said Chloe.

  “No, and normally this isn’t an issue, as the brainjack can hack that last layer anyway,” said Gengei.

  Xyniea interrupted, speaking to Gengei in their language.

  “It’s an upgraded mind shield, according to Xyniea,” Gengei said. “Newer Hashmedai ships have them installed to prevent us from doing this.”

  “Now what?” Sarah asked.

  Gengei pointed to a large object outside the cockpit window. “That tower in the middle—there’s an elevator heading to the bridge. We’ll have to perform a space walk to gain access.”

  Eight bodies wearing Hashmedaian spacesuits leaped out of the airlock into the open interior environment of the command ship. Kroshka and Chidorli were the only two without weapons, as they were pulled across the expansive space by their captors. Chloe looked down briefly before gazing forward to the tower. It was a long way down, and the sight of it nearly gave her vertigo. Chloe turned around to see another lone Hashmedaian ship enter to dock with the command ship.

  Powerful jets mounted to the backs of the suits propelled everyone toward the tower. The humans on the team had a few issues with getting their suits to work right at first, since Gengei had given them an exceptionally quick explanation on how they operated. The view of the bottom section of the tower became larger as they got close. Airlock doors were lined up all along the sides of it. Gengei took point and led the rest to the selected airlock as he interacted with the brainjack device. The door slowly turned and slid open.

  ………

  Jazz saw Onatiasha point her finger out the cockpit’s window. They had been looking for signs of the human and Radiance team ever since the Voidwrath was piloted into the command ship.

  “There,” Onatiasha said. “That has to be them.”

  Jazz looked out the window at eight people in space suits approaching the central shaft of the command ship. Some of them held Earth-based weapons in their hands, one of them directly looked back at the Voidwrath. “I take it people don’t typically do that,” Jazz said.

  “If you need to board the central areas of the command ship, you have your psionic teleport you or summon a transport,” Onatiasha explained. She floated toward the entrance of the cockpit where Phylarlie was. “Suit up, assassin.” Phylarlie sighed.

  “Oh, shit.” Jazz said.

  “You, too, Jazz,” said Onatiasha. “You and I will be on standby while Phylarlie scouts out ahead.”

  Jazz spun to face Zhinbryo. “Guess he ain’t coming?”

  “He’s still injured. Bringing him onboard to help us fight was risky as is,” said Onatiasha. “Besides, if we need to leave in a rush, I’d rather he be here at the helm, ready to take off.”

  ………

  Chloe looked through the window of the elevator as it rose up toward the bridge of the command ship. It was a tight squeeze as all eight of them floated inside of it. Looking up revealed the top of the command ship; it was getting closer at an impressive speed.

  “We are almost there,” said Gengei.

  “Get ready!” Chloe removed the safety from her rifle.

  Xyniea moved Kroshka’s helmet and space suit, and then pushed her to the front of the door, whispering something to her in a strange language.

  The sight of the command ship’s interior vanished from the windows, replacing it with the imagery of metal bulkheads and then later the bridge and its unsuspecting Hashmedai crew floating about in front of their workstations. The doors swung open to gunfire from Chloe, Sarah, Chris, and Gavin. Like fish in a barrel, Chloe thought as dozens of Hashmedaian bridge officers launched forward from the deadly force of their bullet rampage. Blood, body parts, and shell casings quickly filled the zero-g room.

  Jerut hid behind his chair during the massacre. Chloe thought, His time is coming. She saw him shoot a smile toward Xyniea, who in turn smiled back and dragged Kroshka down a nearby hallway. Were they signaling to each other? Chloe now realized Xyniea hadn’t fire a single shot, and running away with their hostage wasn’t part of the plan. Chloe held her fire, choosing to pursue Xyniea instead.

  Chris noticed from the corner of his eye that Chloe, Xyniea, and Kroshka were gone. As amusing as it was to slaughter Hashmedai for once, the three vanishing like that brought a certain level of concern to his mind.“Yo, where did your sister go?” Chris asked Sarah.

  Sarah turned to notice the missing three as well. “Shit, Chloe, where are you?”

  They all floated off the elevator to check for survivors. A secondary elevator door opened, and Gavin raced over to examine it. No one was in sight whatsoever.

  Chris faced Gengei and asked, “How do we use the comm system on these? Chloe and Xyniea are missing along with Kroshka.”

  While peering over the information on the brainjack, Gengei said, “As I recall, you need to—”

  The blade of an assassin sliced the brainjack in half, and a sec
ond slash severed Gengei’s right arm as he yelped in agonizing pain. Chris froze in shock and then snapped out of it when he realized two things—this was the same Hashmedai assassin he had encountered before, and he, Sarah, and Gavin were next as the assassin’s red-orange eyes locked on them.

  Before the trio could get a shot off, blue light streaked across the bridge. Sarah and Gavin tried to follow it, but it was too fast. Soon there was no target insight. Chris was all too familiar with this scenario. “Keep firing!” he yelled. “She’s in here somewhere!”

  Random bullets sprayed across the bridge, none connecting with anyone. Gavin floated toward Gengei to check on him, avoiding being splashed by the orbs of blood roaring out from where his amputated arm once was.

  “I’m fine,” Gengei said. “Disable the mind shield, quickly.”

  “How do we do that?” Gavin asked.

  “Captain’s chair, holographic interface,” Gengei said. “There should be a picture of a purple brain on it. Simply hit it until it turns gray.”

  “She’s invisible but not invincible. We’ll tag this assassin,” said Chris.

  “You’ve fought her before?” asked Sarah.

  “She wiped out my team,” said Chris. “You tag her, and I’ll buy you dinner.”

  “You like Italian?” she asked.

  Chris smiled. “I love it.”

  “Back off, Chambers. This bitch is mine!” Sarah said, laughing. Blue light flashed from behind them. It came from the corridor leading to the rest of the ship. “Follow me. I think I see her.”

  Chapter 24

  “Guess we should have just went up together after all,” said Jazz as the command ship’s tower elevator rose up to the bridge.

  Bulkheads covered the view from the elevator’s window. Onatiasha stepped in front of the door with her shield powered up. Jazz stood behind her, a magnetic rifle in hand.