by D. J. Holmes
As the feeling of pressure on her brain mounted and mounted, she let out a roar as she pushed with all her might. Just as she was about to give up, she felt a small crack appear in the virus’s defenses. It was enough to rally her strength. With one last effort, she threw what was left of her strength against it. When it shattered, she let out another roar of relief. The fight wasn’t over though. As her mind broke into the virus’s center of intelligence she reached out, destroying everything she came into contact with. Behind her, Alexandra streamed in like a roaring tsunami as she attacked every part of the virus’s programming. Together they tore the virus apart.
“We did it,” Alexandra shouted with glee as the last part of the virus disappeared.
Sarah had just enough strength left to sense the death of the virus. The effort had been too much for her and before she fully realized the battle was over she lost consciousness. On the bridge, her body fell forward on the pilot’s command chair as she slumped over.
*
Divar had been getting more and more worried. Within seconds of Sarah telling him that she was going to find Alexandra, her body had begun to thrash. Only when she had first imprinted with Alexandra had he seen her appear to be under such duress. Without Alexandra present, all he could do was monitor her vital signs from his command console.
When she collapsed, he jumped to his feet and ran to her side. “Sarah, Sarah,” he shouted as he gently shook her. “Are you all right?” When she didn’t respond, he reached up to the interface helmet and tried to remove it. The helmet had perfectly encased her head and it wouldn’t budge.
“She’s all right,” a familiar voice said over the bridge’s audio transmitters.
“Alexandra,” Divar exclaimed. “You’re back.”
“For the most part,” Alexandra replied.
“What has happened to her?” Divar said as he propped Sarah back up into a sitting position on the pilot’s chair. Straps reached out from the chair to hold her in place.
“She’s just exhausted,” Alexandra answered. “Give her time, she will come around. I see you have deployed another sensor drone?”
“I have,” Divar said. “I didn’t know what else to do. We thought maybe the cruiser intended to destroy our passive sensors and sneak up on us. It doesn’t look like it has moved yet though. I think it is waiting for something.”
“I believe it is,” Alexandra replied. “It is going to be disappointed.”
“I was going to send a message to the drone we deployed deeper into the system to begin our backup plan,” Divar followed up.
“An excellent idea,” Alexandra said. “It will give us the cover we need to get out of the system. Though one problem still remains, if the Elders tracked us to the system, they will likely be able to track us if we try to leave.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Divar responded. “Sarah said that if the Elders knew we were in the system they would likely have come here with more than one ship. Suppose though, they have only been able to track us in subspace. They would have tracked us as we left the Aral system, yet once we dropped out of subspace, they wouldn’t have known where we went. Perhaps they have other cruisers and frigates out exploring all the nearby systems searching for us.”
“This would explain why there is only one ship here,” Alexandra said. “You could be right. That still leaves us with a problem. As soon as we jump into subspace we could be detected by other Elder ships in the vicinity. My subspace sensors have a range of fifty light years. It’s possible the Elders already have a Sentinel class destroyer in the vicinity. Sentinel destroyers are designed to be the eyes and ears of a larger fleet. However, they may have sent one after us. A Sentinel destroyer’s subspace sensors have a range of over seventy-five light years. If the destroyer was in range of the convoy when Draxler attacked it, then it could have been tracking us the entire time.”
“That makes sense,” Divar said. “If your presence in the convoy was meant to be an ambush, then having a Sentinel destroyer nearby would have been smart. There is something we can try however. If we manage to distract the cruiser, we can race to the mass shadow and jump into subspace. It would take the cruiser at least four, maybe five hours to chase us into subspace. In that time, we could cover a lot of distance and revert to real space before the cruiser jumps into subspace. We can then go into stealth and hide. After several hours, we could then jump back into subspace and sit idle and wait to see what happens.”
“You have obviously been thinking about this,” Alexandra said.
“I am the tactician,” Divar replied. “It gives us a chance, but they could still easily catch us.”
“We could just wait until the cruiser leaves,” Alexandra suggested. “That electromagnetic wave contained a virus that tried to take over my systems. With Sarah’s help, I managed to defeat it. If we wait long enough, the cruiser will think the system is empty and leave us alone.”
“I like that plan better,” Divar said.
“There’s just one problem,” Alexandra responded. “The virus managed to take over both of our sensor drones. I sent an order shutting them down but I don’t know if the virus managed to send a signal back to the cruiser before I did. It has been twelve minutes since the energy wave struck the drones. It will take another three hours and forty-five minutes for any signal to reach the cruiser, then it will take another four hours for the cruiser’s movements to be detectable, so we won’t know if our position has been compromised until then. If we have been detected, then sending orders to our decoy drone will force the cruiser to choose between two targets. However, if we haven’t been detected and we activate the decoy drone, then we will alert the cruiser that we were in the system, even if we have made our escape.”
“So, you’re saying we might still have to use my plan?” Divar said.
“We can try waiting and maybe nothing will happen, or we can act now and make our escape. Both options appear to have risks associated with them. What do you want me to do?” Alexandra asked.
“You want me to decide?” Divar said alarmed.
“As long as Sarah is incapacitated, you are the Acting Captain,” Alexandra replied.
“I think that’s something for the Captain,” Divar said as he quickly walked towards Sarah and gently shook her shoulder. “Sarah, Sarah, you need to wake up. You have to help us with the decision.”
*
“Decision?” Sarah said groggily in response to the hand on her shoulder. Her head still hurt too much for her to try opening her eyes, but she had been getting bits and pieces of Divar and Alexandra’s conversation.
“Yes,” Divar said. “We need to decide what to do next. That cruiser could be coming straight towards us.”
The concern in Divar’s voice caused much of Sarah’s pain to flee. It was replaced by fear. “I thought you managed to shut down the drones?” she asked Alexandra.
“I shut them down within twenty milliseconds of detecting the virus, however, I cannot be sure that the virus didn’t manage to send off some kind of signal,” she answered.
“So the cruiser could already be accelerating towards us and we wouldn’t know it,” Sarah said. “Couldn’t you have just made the decision without me?” she said, reluctant to once again have to make a decision she knew she wasn’t experienced enough to make.
“After analyzing his tone of voice, I came to the conclusion that Divar would rather you make the decision,” Alexandra said.
“He would, would he?” Sarah said as she turned to Divar raising her eyebrows.
“Thanks,” Divar replied waving a hand towards the audio transmitter that Alexandra’s voice was coming from. “My tone of voice aside,” he continued. “We need to decide what to do. If we are going to try and make a run for it, every second we delay means the cruiser could be getting closer and closer to us.”
“Then we try the decoy,” Sarah said, coming straight to a decision. “If we do nothing and find out the cruiser is already hunting us down, then ev
en if we make it to the mass shadow first, the cruiser will not be too far behind. It will be able to track us in subspace. That is a scenario I don’t want to face. Send the signal Alexandra.”
“It’s sent,” Alexandra responded. “The signal has been designed to mimic the background radiation produced by this system’s star. It should be undetectable to the cruiser. The signal will take six hours to reach the drone.”
“Then we have nothing to do but wait,” Sarah said as she sat back in the pilot’s chair and massaged her forehead. Though the pain had all but gone, she still felt strange. The virus had been trying to destroy her mind. Though her defenses had never fallen, she was still paranoid that the virus had managed to do something to her.
*
Exactly four hours after the virus had struck the drones, when the cruiser would receive any signal the drone had sent out, both Sarah and Divar sat in their command chairs. As the seconds ticked by, Sarah’s hands closed into a tighter and tighter fist. The cruiser wasn’t moving. She had made the wrong choice.
“You couldn’t have known,” Alexandra said directly to Sarah’s brain. “You made the decision you thought was right.”
“I know,” Sarah thought. It didn’t stop her from being frustrated. Now, whatever happened, the cruiser would know they had been in the system. If she had just stayed hidden and not used the decoy drone, the cruiser would likely have left them alone. “I’m sorry,” she said out loud. “We’re now in a tougher situation than we needed to be. We’re just going to have to deal with it.”
“And deal with it we will,” Divar said confidently. “This is still a good plan.”
Sarah nodded back at him, thankful he wasn’t upset with her. Though she knew she had to stay focused on the situation, Sarah couldn’t help but think of what would have happened if she’d made a different choice as she waited.
It took two more hours for the signal sent to the drone to reach its target. The decoy drone was in orbit around the system’s second planet. When it received the signal, it activated one of its small maneuvering thrusters to reposition itself slightly. The electromagnetic energy released into space took two hours to reach the Elder cruiser. To the cruiser’s artificial intelligence, it looked like a ship had carried out a very slight course alteration, possibly to avoid a meteor. The cruiser leapt into action and rapidly accelerated towards the rocky planet from which the signal came. It took another four hours for the movements of the Elder cruiser to be detected on Destiny.
“Get us out of here now,” Sarah ordered as soon as she saw the Elder cruiser move. If the cruiser continued on its course towards the decoy drone, it would take five hours for Destiny’s movements to be detected. By then, she hoped they would be long gone.
Sure enough, as they rapidly accelerated towards the system’s mass shadow, no other ships revealed themselves. It took just two hours to reach the edge of the system and jump into subspace. Sarah had no doubt that the cruiser would follow them as soon as their movements were detected. For now, they had escaped.
Once in subspace, Alexandra, Sarah and Divar closely watched the subspace sensors. There were no ships moving through subspace within fifteen light-years of the system they had just left. Having been informed by Alexandra about the Sentinel class destroyers, Sarah knew that an empty sensor field didn’t ensure safety. For six hours, they travelled on a course perpendicular to the Aral system. If they could, Sarah wanted to get back to Aral to see if they could get their hands on some more anti-matter. After the pirates had betrayed her, she was determined to get what she wanted. With their supplies of anti-matter dwindling, there was only one other pirate base they could reach and she wanted to make sure they had exhausted all the anti-matter on Aral first.
Half an hour before Sarah estimated the Elder cruiser would reach the point where it could enter subspace, she ordered Alexandra to bring Destiny to a halt. Only a ship moving through subspace created gravimetric disturbances that could be detected by subspace sensors. Right on cue, a contact appeared from the system they had been hiding in. It was traveling along the exact trajectory that Destiny had entered subspace. With nothing else to go on, that was the best guess the Elder cruiser had to work with. Of course, Sarah had ordered Alexandra to change course as soon as they had entered subspace.
From the relative safety of hiding in subspace, they watched the Elder cruiser for six hours, until it disappeared off Alexander’s sensors.
“Now what do we do?” Divar asked.
“Now we wait some more,” Sarah replied. “If there is one cruiser out there looking for us, I’m willing to bet there are at least a few more. If we try to fly through subspace we could attract a lot more unwanted attention.”
Chapter 13
One week later
“Right, I think it’s time we made our move,” Sarah said from the pilot’s chair on the bridge. “It’s been two days since we detected any new ships. If we sit here much longer, we won’t have enough anti-matter to reach Aral, never mind Elaijar”
“Are you sure?” Divar asked from his spot at the tactical command console. “Your guess of a few ships turned out to be rather on the low side. Shouldn’t we wait a while longer?”
Sarah was tempted to agree with Divar. Over the last week, they had counted more than eight ships passing through nearby subspace. Two of them looked like they were not involved in the search for Destiny. However, there was little doubt the rest had been. Methodically, the contacts had moved from uninhabited system to uninhabited system. They stayed in each system for between eight and ten hours before reappearing on the subspace plot and traveling to another system. Clearly, they were Elder ships following a search pattern. Though it had been two days since they had detected a ship, there could still be Elder ships out there. However, Sarah had concluded that if she was ever going to get home, she needed to take risks. There was no doubt Destiny was now the most hunted ship in the galaxy. Yet the ship was her only hope of getting home. If she was going make it, she would have to embrace that fact and not let it scare her into inaction.
“I’m sure,” she replied. “Sooner or later we have to move, we’re never going to know it’s one hundred percent safe. Take us to Aral,” she ordered Alexandra.
The journey through subspace only took seven hours. During that time, Sarah and Divar continued to discuss a number of possible strategies. They didn’t know if Angrave would still be on the black colony, or if they would be able to find someone else to deal with. They didn’t even know if there would be any more anti-matter on the colony. Yet they had to try. If they gave up on Aral and travelled straight to Elaijar, the next pirate base they intended to visit, they would have almost no anti-matter left. If Elaijar couldn’t provide them with anti-matter, they would be stranded.
Twice during the journey Alexandra pulled them out of their conversation with a fright. Each time, she abruptly reported a new contact entering range of her subspace sensors. Thankfully, in both cases, the contacts had continued on their original course. Neither showed any sign that they had detected Destiny. Sarah hoped that their actions meant both contacts were freighters or non-elder ships that didn’t have subspace sensors capable of detecting them at such ranges.
“We will reach the Aral system in ten minutes,” Alexandra announced.
“I think we’ll go with your second suggestion,” Sarah said, finally coming to a decision. “If Angrave is there, we will ignore him. Hopefully, after our last visit to the system the black colony will be scared of us. We should be able to force them to give us what we want. I’m not letting another pirate ship sneak up on us.”
“I think that is best,” Divar replied.
“Okay, get ready to enter the system,” Sarah said.
Silence descended as the interface helmet lowered onto Sarah’s head and Sarah and Divar focused on their responsibilities.
“Something is not right,” Sarah said out loud as soon as they reverted to real space. The last time they had come to Aral, the colony had bee
n a black void when it came to electromagnetic radiation. The colonists had known they had to keep their presence a secret from the Elders. Now, the first thing that Destiny’s sensors detected was a massive thermal bloom coming from the colony.
“The sensor readings are consistent with anti-matter detonations on the planet’s surface,” Alexandra explained.
“Those bastards,” Divar snarled. “They destroyed the entire colony.”
It took Sarah a moment to figure out who Divar was referring to. Then it hit her, the Elders must have followed Destiny to the Aral system. After they had fled the pirate attack, the Elder warships must have arrived at the colony. Having found an unauthorized colony, they had destroyed it. It’s all our fault, Sarah thought. What have I done? Though she had come to the system fully prepared to threaten the colonists because of their betrayal, in reality, she had wished them no harm. Having visited a few black colonies in the past, she knew the vast majority of the colony’s population were just trying to survive away from the oppression of the Elder Empire. And now they have lost their lives and their home. I took it from them.