Celestial Ascension (Splintered Galaxy Book 1)

by Eddie R. Hicks

  “Get ready,” she said.

  “I’m starting to miss that Radiance suit already,” Jazz said, examining his spacesuit.

  “You’re not the only one who misses armor. However this suit still does provide a small level of protection from small arms.”

  The elevator opened, and Onatiasha pushed through with her shield in front. Short gunshots could be heard as Jazz exited. Those shots turned into larger bursts as Onatiasha came into view. Someone with an Earth-based weapon, wearing a Hashmedai spacesuit, shot at Onatiasha. Another with a missing arm floated helplessly in the corner, followed by one more floating lifelessly next to him. Upon a closer look, Jazz saw green hair float through the glass visor of the space suit helmet—this was Chidorli.

  He pointed at her. “That’s Chidorli over there!”

  Onatiasha’s gaze followed his finger as she floated forward, forcing Gavin to back up and take over behind computer stations. Chidorli’s body launched toward Jazz’s arms via Onatiasha’s tractor beam. “Now we just need Kroshka!” said Onatiasha. “Phylarlie reports she’s down the corridor behind us, and she’s being chased.”

  As Jazz held onto Chidorli’s idle body, a voice called out to him, “In order for one to live, another must be sacrificed.” It was the same mysterious female voice from the Radiance lab.

  Chidorli’s body once again moved with life after the voice spoke. She floated toward the corridor, her left arm and legs limp and twitching. The brainjack device had messed her up pretty badly. Onatiasha took notice and yelled in the Hashmedaian language, then spoke in English. “We need to get her back! Too much brain activity will kill her.”

  “Ah, fuck!” exclaimed Jazz. “I’m going. Keep this fucker busy!”

  ………

  Multiple projectile shots raged past Phylarlie as she floated down a corridor toward the command ship’s galley. Not being in a space suit put Phylarlie at a slight disadvantage. There were no jets to propel her through the weightlessness of the ship—unlike Sarah and Chris behind her, who were gaining fast. Her cloaking device would not hide her and the space suit at the same time, so she’d removed the suit after entering the elevator. Adding to her troubles, her battery pack was at medium power, so she briefly powered down her daggers to conserve power. Keeping jump-ports to a minimum wasn’t a bad idea, either.

  She vanished into invisibility shortly after entering the galley. The two human pursuers floated in, firing off random shots and hoping to hit her by chance. Sarah pushed away from her partner, while Phylarlie covertly floated behind her with a stun disk primed—her last one.

  The woman’s body went limp when Phylarlie kicked her to the wall. “I’m saving her for last!” Phylarlie shouted to Chris as she reemerged behind him out of blue light. Rapid strikes with her daggers impacted his back, and if she hadn’t been conserving power he’d be dead now. The suit, while not body armor, was tough enough to take a few blows from the assault. He quickly spun to face her, and she reacted by grabbing a firm hold on his arm while projectile fire from his weapon propelled both of them backward.

  The impact of their bodies slamming into a table caused his weapon to spin aimlessly in the air. Phylarlie swam her way upward. As her opponent was unarmed and his partner down, now was the time for her to strike. Her daggers glowed once again as she used her feet to launch from the ceiling. She plummeted down toward him, her weapons extended.

  Seconds before her thrust was to land, a Hashmedai guardian shield activated. But how? Her dagger collided with it, and the shield slammed across her face, sending her spiraling.

  A jump-port brought stability to her movement while she fixed her eyes on the human. He floated to face her, his shield glowing bright. Sarah awoke from her stunned state shortly afterward, and she reached out to grab both projectile weapons as they floated past her.

  Shielded human, dual-weapon-wielding adversary and battery power conservation—this was not a fight Phylarlie was likely to win. Projectile fire rained across the galley toward her. The inescapable grip of a tractor beam plunged Phylarlie back toward the entrance. The speed at which she traveled caused her body to launch downward into the corridor. A series of flips got Phylarlie back to facing the threat before her. Onatiasha hovered with her glowing shield, repelling human projectiles—a delightful sight that took Phylarlie’s mind off the intense pain that ripped through her body. She smirked at Onatiasha’s unconquerable stance while holding onto her side as blood slowly floated out of her torso.

  ………

  Gavin's body propelled forward to the central command seat via light thrusts from his suit's jets. As he approached his hand gripped onto the side of the chair arm, causing him to stop, spin and then later examine the computer interface on the side of the chair. Alien text, numbers and diagrams populated the screen, he couldn't make out any of it, nor did he see the 'brain' icon Gengei mentioned.

  “Gengei I don't see it.” Gavin shouted.

  “Do you see three grey color circles on the bottom of the interface?” Gengei asked.

  Gavin stared down as directed at and reported his findings. “Yeah, I see it.”

  “A blue coloured... square just above those... can you see it?” Gengei said, his voice was becoming softer as blood continued to gush and float away from his wound.

  “I see it,” reported Gavin.

  “Push it repeatedly until those grey circles turn red. You should... you should be able to access it then.” Gengei said.

  Gavin's fingers interacted with the interface as Gengei's instructed. The blue square illuminated as his finger hit it, causing one of the grey circles to turn red. His finger tapped the square twice more causing a small prompt window to load on the screen. Hashmedian text populated the window; it instigated Gavin’s face to grimace. Umm sure why not, Gavin thought, not knowing what any of the text said. His finger pushed an orange icon next the text. A new window loaded, displaying an icon with a purple color brain.

  Gavin quickly pushed the icon, the icon's color switched from purple to grey, informing the user that the command ship's mind barrier as been deactivated. “It's done!” shouted Gavin to Gengei.

  ………

  Captain Gab Ueyei sat in his captain’s chair eagerly awaiting contact from Gengei aboard the Abyssal Explorer's main bridge. His yellow eyes lit up on seeing the sight of Gengei's face via a holographic projection. Finally, he thought.

  “Captain...” Gengei said. “The damping effect of the command ship’s mind barrier is disabled...”

  Ueyei noticed how rough and worn Gengei's face looked, in addition to the tone of his voice, their battle clearly didn't go according to plan.

  “You heard the commander.” Ueyei bellowed as the hologram vanished. “Helm set a course towards the Hashmedai command ship.”

  “Already on it sir.” reported Ensign Mil Grailea.

  “Raise shields, this might get rough.” Ueyei said, and then turned around to face his psionic bridge team. “Karklosea and Stolanei get ready to teleport over.”

  “We are ready to go once in range,” said Karklosea. “Dargonea will handle bridge functions.”

  The Abyssal Explorer accelerated forward passing the few remaining Hashmedai warships that remained outside of Earth's orbit. The Hashmedain ships quickly began to change course upon observing the Abyssal Explorer's new destination, the command ship. Plasma fire from the Hashmedai quickly began to rain towards the Abyssal Explorer; a few shots missed venturing into the vastness of space, while the rest rippled across the Abyssal Explorer’s shields.

  ………

  Karklosea and Stolanei floated away from the blue light of teleportation, behind Gavin and Gengei's wounded body. Karklosea floated down towards Gengei, conjuring a psionic barrier around his severed open would as she spoke to him in the Radiance language. The two exchanged information back and forth and then explained something to Stolanei.

  “Karklosea will take him back.” Stolanei said to Gavin. “In the meantime, show me to your nuclear d
evice. I need to know exactly where it is in order for my mind to reach it.”

  Well if you had tagged along from the start we could have avoided this... Gavin thought, and then said. “You're going to need a space suit for that. Back tracking is going to require a space walk.”

  “My shields will protect me,” said Stolanei.

  “Well then,” Gavin said as blue light swept Gengei and Karklosea away. “Follow me.”

  ………

  Xyniea floated inside the command ship’s engine room, Kroshka in tow. A massive blue glowing cylindrical object stood in the middle of the room. Around it was a transparent floor and several computer terminals. The section below it had the same layout, as did the one below that and the final one at the very bottom.

  Dead Hashmedai floated throughout the area and in the outside corridor leading to the bridge. Xyniea had viciously gunned down everyone she didn’t know—basically, the entire command ship crew.

  Xyniea was busy interacting with a computer, viewing the ship’s manifest, when another person entered the engine room. She turned, hoping it was Jerut. It wasn’t—it was that damn human female soldier Chloe, aiming her rifle right at Xyniea. She spoke in the human language and didn’t sound happy.

  “She wishes to know what you’re doing here with me,” Kroshka translated in the Hashmedaian language.

  “Tell her I no longer have a use for her,” Xyniea said, as Jerut entered behind Chloe, “and that she should watch her back.”

  Before Kroshka could finish translating, Jerut shot the human in the back with his plasma pistol. She fell forward, screaming, while Jerut kicked her weightless rifle away. “Xyniea, what is going on?” Jerut asked.

  “The humans have teamed with Radiance to plant a nuclear bomb on board the command ship,” said Xyniea. “I couldn’t find a good chance to warn you without being compromised, especially since I’m not familiar with accessing Hashmedaian comm systems.”

  “This is…troubling,” Jerut said.

  “Our objectives, however, are complete,” said Xyniea. The Abyssal Explorer will leave, along with the lab’s research and test subjects, and the Radiance fleet is coming to liberate the human world. There is no reason for us to stay here any longer, my lord.”

  Jerut paused and said, “The Voidwrath has my associates onboard.”

  “Yes,” Xyniea said. “I was looking at the manifest. It just docked recently. We need to board it quickly and leave this star system.”

  “Very well, then,” said Jerut. “I’ll summon a transport to meet us at the engineering airlock.”

  He turned to interact with a communication terminal. Suddenly, Xyniea remembered an important element. She raised Kroshka’s pendant up. “Have you seen this?”

  “Interesting” was all he had to say as he gazed directly at the orb.

  “She was wearing this the whole time,” said Xyniea. “According to her, the late emperor gave it to her as a gift. And she figured out how activate it—either that or someone did it for her.”

  “Empress Y’lin was known to have a lot of rare jewelry. I never paid much attention to it, however,” Jerut said. “When I return to the empire, I shall.”

  “This is going to be a major advantage for the Celestial Order, my lord.” There was happiness in Xyniea’s voice. “May the gods’ light shine upon us.”

  Jerut smiled. “May the gods’ light shine upon us all!” Suddenly, Jerut was launched forward, his head slamming against the railing next to Xyniea. Behind him stood Chidorli, the psionic Gengei had had under control. But Gengei was nowhere to be seen, and she was acting on her own. Xyniea’s rifle unloaded several rounds, each shot deflecting off the psionic’s shield. Chidorli's twitching hand reached forward, and her body became lifeless, floating in a stationary position.

  Xyniea grinned and said, “What were you hoping to accomplish?” At that, Xyniea was pushed back by a telekinetic throw. Her body weightless body twirled and crashed into the wall. Floating back to an upright position, she saw Kroshka hovering above her. Kroshka’s slave collar and bindings had been removed. Did that psionic remove it? She must have, Xyniea thought.

  “We had a deal, Kroshka. I was gonna let you go eventually.”

  Kroshka extended her arm, and Xyniea’s rifle moved through the air on its own. Kroshka then snapped her fingers, causing the rifle to take aim at Xyniea. “Let us make a new deal, Xyniea,” Kroshka said. “Don’t bleed, and I’ll let you live.”

  A furious storm of bullets shredded Xyniea, sending her bloody exit wound covered body to collide against the wall. Massive gobs of orbed blood orbited her corpse.

  Kroshka concluded, “You bleed.”

  She commanded the rifle to perform one last task—fire four bullets through Jerut’s unconscious head.

  ………

  Jazz followed the path of dead bodies toward the engine room. Inside he saw Chidorli’s unmoving body at the door, a human soldier lying in the corner with a blackened burn mark on her back…and Kroshka floating peacefully in the air. She gazed at him with a warm smile, lowering her body to the floor. She didn’t even need to swim or push her way downward—she simply floated down effortlessly.

  “Jazz, you are alive,” she said.

  “Yeah, I think.”

  Jazz held Chidorli, who was unresponsive. Removing her helmet revealed no signs of facial activity, no pulse—she was gone.

  “Most psionics do not survive this long being brainjacked,” Kroshka said.

  “Save her!” Jazz pleaded. “Just like you saved me.”

  “I can’t. I can only prevent death, not undo it.”

  “Just try.”

  “She gave her life to free me. Had I been released earlier, maybe.” She looked down at her pendant. “Plus, its power seems to have dimmed quite a bit since I helped you. I hoped it would recover by now, but…”

  The human soldier removed her helmet. It was Chloe. “I’m fine, by the way. Thanks for asking.”

  Jazz still held Chidorli’s body with every intention of bringing her back to the Hashmedai Empire. “I lost a good friend in Afghanistan, and I moved on without giving a damn. So why do I give a damn about her?”

  Down below floated an ice sculpture she had made. It was a unicorn. Jazz couldn’t quite remember what had become of all the others she had made him, but this would be put someplace cold so he could hold onto it.

  “Damn it,” Onatiasha said, floating in to see Chidorli’s final state.

  “Jerut called for a transport to dock at the airlock,” said Kroshka. “We can use it to escape.”

  “Phylarlie, you still around?” asked Jazz.

  Phylarlie appeared next to him. “Yeah, yeah.”

  “What the hell were you doing?”

  “Don’t ask,” Phylarlie said, raising her blood-soaked arm. “There are still two humans close to this level.

  Onatiasha led them down one level toward the engine room airlock. The doors opened to the transport, revealing two Hashmedai pilots. Onatiasha put them both down instantly as she sat in the cockpit. Jazz placed Chidorli’s body in the back. He reached back to grab the frozen unicorn, but it wasn’t there. Must have dropped it on the way in, he thought, floating back out to look for it. “I’ll be back real quick,” he said.

  The red glow of Jerut's gem began to intensify. The thoughts within the orb inside of the gem started to reach out to the deceased Hashmedai commander. Xyneia and Jerut's sudden demise was... unexpected especially at the hands of Kroshka, a Hashmedai who also was touched by a gem. Yet she didn't serve the gods like Jerut did. Could she have been touched by the others? No it couldn't be those maidens.' They were dealt with a great many cycles ago.

  “You have failed.” a voice called out to Jerut’s dormant mind. “We shall grant thee one last chance. Take our divine power. Smite the sinners. Our divine plans shall not be defied.”

  The weightless hands of Jerut began to twitch ever so slightly.

  ………

  The bridge crew on
board the Abyssal Explorer rocked back and forth as the ship continued to feel the fury of the Hashmedai battle group converging on the their spot just outside of the command ship.

  “Captain, three Hashmedai destroyers are closing in on our position!” shouted Ary Koniea.

  “They need to hurry this up, we can't hold this spot forever!” said Ueyei.

  Karklosea's hologram manifested before Ueyei. “Captain, I have Gengei aboard, he's badly wounded,” her hologram spoke.

  “What about everyone else?” asked Ueyei.

  “Xyneia and the humans retreated further back inside the command ship,” explained Karklosea. “Stolanei is trying to get a fix on the nuclear device's location so he can activate it.”

  “Get back there quickly and retrieve them-” Another violent impact cut Ueyei off as sparks erupted from bridge computer terminals. The crew manning those stations launched their arms up to shield their faces. “The Hashmedai are slowly surrounding us!”

  “I could use Karklosea's assistance,” said Dargonea. “I can't keep the over shields up alone in these conditions.”

  “I'll return to the bridge,” said Karklosea. “Stolanei will have to get everyone out.”

  “Very well,” said Ueyei. “Shut down all none essential systems and plasma cannons transfer the extra power to the shields.” he ordered the crew. “No turning back now.” He grunted to himself.

  The Abyssal Explorer found its self surrounded by a dozen Hashmedai ships. All of them taking turns launching volley after volley of green plasma against is shields. In the distance, three Hashmedai destroyers that were pounding Earth now maintained a steady course to join in on the interstellar dog pile.

  ………

  Jazz was sure the unicorn would be floating close to the entrance of the engine room. He saw Chloe slowly getting herself moving again. He didn’t like her, but she was down here getting shot up for a reason. Trying to free Chidorli and Kroshka? Maybe she’s not that bad of a person. Chloe grabbed her rifle as he got close with the intent to shoot. Come on, I’m trying to be nice and you still wanna fight? Jazz thought.

  Her aim pointed upward. He looked up as well. A glowing gem, much like the one Kroshka had around her neck, glowed red. Above it was Jerut with bullet holes through his head. The holes rapidly healed, and his eyelids to popped open.