Ep.#9 - I am Justice (The Frontiers Saga - Part 2: Rogue Castes)

by Ryk Brown

  Corporal Amund looked around. The back side of the ship was blown open. The ramp was hanging by one hinge and a strut, and was shifting back and forth. Conduit was hanging everywhere, and parts of bulkheads were warped from the intense heat. It was a miracle he had not been incinerated by the blast. He spotted Corporal Torlak, pushing a piece of the starboard bulkhead that had broken free off of him. “Torlak!” he called. “You okay?”

  “Yeah!” Torlak replied. “What the fuck hit us?”

  “Cargo bay!” Loki begged. “Somebody! Please!”

  “Amund! I’m good!” the corporal reported over comm-sets.

  “Torlak! I’m good!”

  After a moment, both men looked around for Dalen. Amund was the first to spot him, his twisted body, melded with the surviving portion of his plasma cannon, slammed into the lower portion of the forward bulkhead, just below the main deck landing.

  Both men immediately sprang into action, rushing to Dalen. Amund was the first to reach him. “Dalen! Dalen!” he shouted, kneeling down next to him and checking for any signs of life.

  “Dalen!” Loki called over comm-sets. “Dalen! Check in!”

  “Dalen’s dead,” Corporal Amund reported.

  There was no response over comm-sets.

  The ship rocked again as another blast slammed into the stern, just starboard of the damaged cargo bay.

  “Clear the bay!” Josh ordered. “We’ve gotta jump to space now, or we’re never gonna make it off this rock!”

  “I’m not going to be able to get his body out of here in time,” Amund replied.

  “Nothing we can do about it,” Josh insisted, his voice pained but firm. “Leave him.”

  There was no chatter in the cockpit between Josh and Loki for some time. The ship continued to be pounded as Josh fought to keep them flying. Systems were failing right and left, and Loki was scrambling to keep everything together, but the Dusahn shuttles, still pursuing them, were doing everything within their power to prevent them from escaping.

  “He’d leave you behind to save everyone else, as well,” Loki said quietly.

  “No, he wouldn’t,” Josh disagreed. “He was too stupid and too loyal.”

  “Cargo bay is clear,” Corporal Amund reported. “Door is sealed.”

  Josh didn’t say another word as he pressed the jump button on his flight control stick.

  Naralena felt a tap on her foot. She glanced downward, spotting Corporal Amund standing below her.

  “Ready for some relief?” he asked.

  “Gladly,” she replied, climbing down from her seat to the deck below.

  “You did fine.”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “You faced an attacking enemy and prevented the destruction of this ship. You could not have known the additional dangers Corporal Torlak would have to face.”

  “But I almost got him killed.”

  “Almost dying is what we do,” Corporal Amund assured her. He tipped his head toward the other gun turret, which Corporal Torlak was climbing into. “He is still with us, just as all of us are.”

  Naralena looked down. “Not that young man… Dalen, was it?”

  “Without death, war would not be something to avoid,” the corporal stated, climbing up into the gun turret.

  Deliza stepped over, having just vacated her turret, as well. “Come on, Naralena. We’re not out of this yet.”

  “Aft shields are completely gone,” Loki reported. “All other shields are below fifty percent, and our port dorsal shield is fluctuating and could fail at any time.”

  “Any other good news?” Josh asked sarcastically as he tried to trim his controls. “Christ, this thing is flying like a brick. I’ve got no lateral thrusters, and my translation thrusters can’t decide if they’re good or bad.”

  “Propulsion and basic maneuvering are still working, if that helps.”

  “So we can go fast and jump, but course changes are going to be slow as shit,” Josh summarized. “Lovely.”

  “Uh, jumping might not be the greatest idea right now,” Loki warned.

  Josh just looked at him.

  “I’m getting some odd readings from a few emitters. Three of them didn’t go to full power on the last jump. I’m surprised we didn’t leave anything behind.”

  The threat display beeped and Josh glanced over at the view screen. “We may not have a choice.”

  Loki studied the screen for a moment. “Gunners, we’ve got four octos inbound. Directly astern, two hundred clicks, and closing fast. We’ve got no aft shields, and our port dorsal shields are iffy, so be ready for anything. Whatever you do, keep them off our ass and our port side.”

  “Copy that,” Corporal Amund replied over comm-sets.

  “Great,” Josh exclaimed. “I’ve always wanted to fly evasive…backwards.”

  “Loki,” Deliza called over comm-sets as she and Naralena made their way forward. “Can’t we just jump?”

  “Uneven power on a few of the emitters,” Loki replied. “I’m afraid if we lose a couple of side-by-side emitters, the safeties will kick in, and we won’t be able to jump at all.”

  “What about the secondary array?”

  “We lost the field generators for the secondary array when they blew our back end off,” Loki explained.

  “They’re going to split up,” Corporal Amund warned. “They know our aft shields are down, so they’ll draw our fire and your angle with one pair, and the other pair will jump in and attack our weak side. You can’t let them get a shot at it.”

  “I’ll do what I can,” Josh replied, “but this thing is flying like a broken down barge.”

  “I can increase the power on the docking thrusters and tie them into the maneuvering thrusters,” Loki suggested. “That might help.”

  “I’ll take anything I can get,” Josh agreed.

  “One hundred clicks,” Loki reported, glancing at the tactical display as he worked. Two of the four icons suddenly disappeared. “Yup, two of them just jumped out. You nailed it.”

  “They’re going to jump past us and do a one-eighty. They’ll expect you to show the attackers your good side.”

  “Primary pair will be in attack range in thirty seconds,” Loki reported. “Docking thrusters are slaved to maneuvering thrusters.”

  Josh killed the main engines and twisted his control stick, causing the ship to yaw round to port, into a stern-first position.

  “What are you doing, Josh?” Corporal Amund wondered.

  “I’ve got an idea.”

  “They’re going to jump in and…”

  “Both turrets point aft, and be ready to track up when I pitch down and over!” Josh ordered, cutting him off.

  “I hope you know what you’re doing,” Corporal Amund replied.

  “So do I,” Josh muttered.

  “Five seconds.”

  “Bet you weren’t expecting this,” Josh said as he pressed the firing button on his flight control stick. A series of red-orange plasma torpedoes leapt from their tubes on either side of the Seiiki’s fuselage, lighting up the cockpit as they departed. The plasma torpedoes closed the distance to the targets in the blink of an eye, slamming into the Dusahn octo’s shields and lighting them up. The octos began to maneuver wildly, not expecting such heavy firepower from what they thought was just a light cargo ship with a few guns slapped onto it. “They may be stubby, but they pack a wallop!” Josh yelled as the two attacking fighters parted ways, veering in opposite directions. Josh ceased fire and pitched down hard. “Pitch up, boys!” he yelled into his comm-set. “They’re splitting left and right!” Josh held his control stick all the way forward, causing his ship to pitch down and around, back in their direction of flight. Just as his nose came up level, the other two Dusahn octos
jumped in only a few kilometers away, expecting to see the defenseless aft end of their target. Instead, they were introduced to the Seiiki’s twin, short-barreled, mark two plasma torpedo cannons. “EAT THIS!” he barked as he opened fire. The shields on the second pair of octos also lit up, flashing red-orange with each impact. They, too, split in opposite directions, knowing full well that their enemy could only target one of them at a time. But Josh had no interest in pressing his luck.

  Corporal Amund swung his turret up and to port, locking onto one of the evading octo fighters. The moment his targeting reticle flashed green, he opened up, adjusting his lead until he saw the target’s shields flashing over and over with the impacts from his plasma cannon. “Die, you bastard!” he cursed as he continued firing. Then, without warning, the target simply vanished. “What the hell?” He looked around, noticing a planet in the distance, where there had not been one a moment ago. “Did we jump?”

  “Hell yeah, we jumped!” Josh replied.

  “Shutting everything down,” Loki announced.

  “Just keep docking thrusters online for now,” Josh reminded him. “They’re cold jets, so they won’t detect them.”

  “Uh-oh,” Loki said.

  “No uh-oh’s,” Josh insisted. “Not now.”

  “What uh-oh?” Deliza asked as she climbed up into the Seiiki’s cockpit.

  “Four emitters have been taken offline by the safeties,” Loki told her. “We can’t jump.”

  “Give me a few minutes to bypass them in the code,” Deliza told him, climbing into the systems seat just behind Loki.

  “They’ll find us in two,” Josh told her.

  “Hide in the ring system,” Loki suggested.

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Guys, did you mean to power down our guns?” Corporal Torlak asked over comm-sets.

  “Everything is going down,” Loki replied. “We need to be undetectable for a few minutes.”

  “Are things always this crazy on this ship?” Corporal Amund asked.

  “Pretty much,” Josh replied.

  “That’s everything,” Loki announced.

  Josh glanced over his shoulder at Deliza. “Princess’s workstation is still up.”

  “She’s running on battery power,” Loki replied. “The chances of them detecting that tiny thing are a million to one.”

  “Rings coming up,” Josh reported, looking out the forward windows. “More dense than I thought.”

  Loki also looked out the windows, his eyes widening. “Are you going to be able to maneuver through that with docking thrusters?”

  “We’re about to find out,” Josh replied, moving his control stick slightly. “Come on, baby. Don’t give out on me just yet.”

  The first blue-gray, icy rock, more than ten times the size of the Seiiki, closed on them rapidly. Without any instrumentation, all Josh could do was look out the window and eyeball his approach. Several times, he pushed the stick over hard, trying to get the ship to respond more quickly. Just as it looked like they were about to strike the icy rock, he rolled the ship onto its left side, and it passed over them, missing by only three meters.

  “Damn, you always fly this close to things?” Corporal Torlak wondered aloud as he watched the icy rock pass overhead, barely missing his gun turret.

  “Not if I can help it,” Josh chuckled over comm-sets.

  Josh peeked back to his left, looking aft as the rock cleared the back of the ship. He spun his head back around to look forward, picking out his next imaginary line in space to fly past the next obstacle.

  This time, it was two icy rocks; the first bigger than the last, and the next one half its size. Both were slowly spinning in opposite directions and had bits of debris orbiting them in odd patterns.

  “Those two must have collided recently,” Loki observed. He glanced at Josh, and then looked out the window again, trying to determine the flight path his friend was about to attempt. “You know, you don’t have to go between them, Josh. You could go around the outside to the right.”

  “What’s the fun in that?” Josh giggled, firing the docking thrusters to adjust his course.

  “Not funny.”

  “Besides, I was planning on parking directly between them.”

  “The gravity of the larger one is going to pull us in,” Loki warned.

  “Not if I can find a stable gravity point between them.”

  “A gravity point.” Loki shook his head. “We’re being pursued by Dusahn octos, and you’re looking for stable gravity points.”

  “If we land, we may not be able to take off again,” Josh replied, “not even from these tiny rocks. If we keep flying past them, they’ll detect us by our motion relative to the rocks.”

  Loki shook his head again.

  “What?”

  “I really hate it when you’re right,” Loki stated.

  “Well, don’t worry,” Josh replied as he applied additional forward thrust to decrease their closure rate, “we both know it doesn’t happen that often.” Josh turned to look back over his shoulder. “How are you doing with those overrides, Princess?”

  “You just worry about flying, let me worry about coding.”

  Josh didn’t respond, just continued to guide the Seiiki in between the two icy rocks ahead, applying tiny bursts from the forward docking thrusters, slowing slightly with each burst. By the time they began to pass between the two slowly spinning rocks, they were barely moving by comparison.

  Three more spurts from the forward docking thrusters and the Seiiki came to a stop, hanging motionless between the two spinning rocks.

  “The one on the right is a bit oblong,” Loki pointed out.

  “I know,” Josh said, taking his hands off the controls. He glanced left and right at the two vastly different rocks as they spun in space. The oblong rock to the right came around, its closest end passing by them. Josh watched for a moment, and then began to smile. “I think I did it.”

  “Of course you did it,” Loki commented. “You’re Josh Hayes.”

  “Damn straight.”

  “And I did it!” Deliza announced triumphantly. “We can jump whenever you want. Just remember, without the safeties, there’s no telling what will happen, so you’d better be damn sure that all your emitters are green.”

  The tactical display beeped, pulling both pilots’ attention to the center display.

  “Damn, that didn’t take long,” Loki cursed.

  “What is it?” Naralena asked.

  “A single contact,” Loki said. “Too small to be an octo… Wait, it’s gone active.”

  “If you can see them…” Josh said.

  “I know. And now it’s gone.”

  “Pursuit drone,” Josh surmised as he began powering up systems on his side of the cockpit.

  “Time to go,” Loki agreed, also powering up systems.

  “And I just got us so nicely parked, too,” Josh declared.

  “What’s going on?” Naralena wondered.

  “The Dusahn have pursuit drones that are really good at following our jump trails,” Deliza explained.

  “They find you and then jump back to tell the others where you are,” Josh added, “which means a Dusahn ship will be here any second.”

  Another beep sounded.

  “And there it is,” Loki said.

  “Man, I hate being right,” Josh declared as he powered up the main engines.

  “Dusahn gunship, two thousand meters, and closing fast,” Loki reported.

  “Why couldn’t they send a battleship,” Josh muttered as he prepared to get underway. “We could outrun a battleship.”

  “Making your guns hot again,” Loki called over his comm-set. “Gunship inbound; thirty seconds.”

  “Here
we go,” Josh announced, pushing the throttles for the main engines forward. The Seiiki began to accelerate, pulling slowly out from between the two spinning rocks, and then accelerating quickly as Josh continued to push the throttles to their stops.

  “You may want to avoid full power, Josh,” Loki warned. “I’ve got more than a few systems nearing max ranges.”

  “Gotta use ‘em while we’ve got ‘em,” Josh insisted as they climbed up out of the rings.

  “We’re being targeted,” Loki warned.

  “That didn’t take long.”

  More beeps sounded.

  “Missile launch!” Loki announced with surprise.

  “Missiles! Gunships aren’t supposed to have missiles!”

  “Shit, I lost the missiles!”

  “Oh, crap,” Josh declared, pushing his control stick hard to port and forcing the Seiiki into a rolling turn. Again, the ship responded sluggishly.

  “I’ve got them!” Loki exclaimed in a near panic. “Two clicks! They’re jump…”

  The starboard gun opened fire, and one of the missiles exploded, rocking the entire ship.

  “…missiles!”

  Corporal Torlak was barely able to stay in his seat as he continued to fire, but the second missile reached the Seiiki and impacted its starboard shield, detonating and unleashing its entire fury. The turret bubble lit up with blinding white light that seemed to last forever, before fading away. When it was safe to open his eyes again, he looked outside and saw several shield emitters on the starboard side had blown apart, overloaded by the amount of energy that had just been dumped into them. He looked to his right, his eyes widening. “The starboard engine nacelle is gone!”