A King's Ship (Empire Rising Book 2)

by D. J. Holmes

  “I already have,” Ferguson said. “We have sealed off the marines’ barracks and the crew members not loyal to me are confined to their quarters. My men have taken over engineering and the bridge. You will be joining the other Lieutenants and Chief Driscoll in the brig. It will take us almost three months to get home but you will be more than comfortable. Once we get there, I will turn Endeavour over to the Admiralty.”

  “You’re not going to help the Kulreans at all?” James asked, disgusted.

  “We will stay in stealth and see what the Overlord’s fleet does. But that is all. The Kulreans made it crystal clear that they don’t want our help,” Ferguson answered.

  “But they don’t know what they are facing, you are just taking the coward’s way out,” James spat.

  “I’m obeying our orders. You have endangered this crew and this ship for the last time,” Ferguson said, finally getting angry. “But enough of this. Take him to the brig. We will no doubt get a chance to present our points of view in a court martial. The Admiralty can decide if it is yours or mine that’s right.”

  As the two crewmen manhandled him out of his offices and into the corridor James saw Second Lieutenant Mallory walking past leading two more crew members, all three had pistols in their hands.

  “You too!” James shouted after him. “You are a coward.”

  Mallory didn’t meet James’ eye, he just hung his head and walked past the Captain.

  When James got to the brig it was already full. Julius, Becket, Chief Driscoll and all twelve of the Sub Lieutenants were there. One or two were carrying nasty bruises on their faces, testifying that they hadn’t submitted easily.

  “I am sorry everyone,” James said once his captors left. “It is my fault we are in this mess. I should have seen it coming. Do not worry, I will ensure your careers are not affected by this either way.”

  “We’re not sorry, or worried Captain,” Becket said for everyone else. “We followed you willingly and we would have followed you no matter what you decided to do about the Overlord’s fleet. We are just sorry that we cannot help the Kulreans. No race deserves what the Overlord’s fleet is going to do to them.”

  “No,” James said as he struggled to get his head around the fact that some of his crew were willing to just watch the destruction of an entire alien civilization.

  *

  Jil’lal knew something was wrong when the door to her quarters swished open without waiting for her approval. She had been told that no one would be able to come in without her say so. Instinctively she jumped to her feet and turned to face whoever was entering.

  A male human she hadn’t met before cautiously walked in with some kind of weapon raised. “I’m here to request you accompany...”

  Jil’lal didn’t let him finish his sentence, she had already jumped into action. Using all four legs she sprung into the air above his weapon and crashed into him. With two of her hands she wrestled with him for his weapon and with her other two she fired short sharp punches into his face.

  After the first couple of blows the human let go of his weapon in a vain attempt to cover his face with his hands. Jil’lal whipped the weapon away from him and jumped back.

  “Don’t say a word,” she said.

  “Ok, ok,” the human said. “Please, don’t shoot, I was just following orders,” he continued as his fear grew. Jil’lal’s attack had reminded him of just how alien she was. Now he wasn’t sure how she was going to react to being attacked.

  “I’m not going to hurt you. If you do what I want. If you don’t…” she left the rest unsaid.

  Ignoring the human for a moment she pulled out the datapad Lieutenant Becket had given her. For the first two days of the trip Becket had showed her how to work it but since then she had been teaching herself. With a few minor alterations in the datapad’s code she had been able to override the limitations Becket had put on the datapad and use it to interface with the rest of the ship’s systems.

  She understood the human systems far better than they realized. Tak’ar had said she had been the best computer expert on Vestar. As it turned out, the human systems, though far more advanced, still worked on very similar principles.

  With a few quick commands she got the ship’s computer to locate the Captain and the senior officers. Unsurprisingly the Captain was in the brig. Jil’lal hadn’t spent a great deal of time with Captain Somerville during the trip from Vestar but what she had seen she had liked. She certainly knew he wouldn’t have sent an armed guard to arrest her. Along with the Captain, Lieutenants Julius and Becket were in the brig along with all the Sub Lieutenants she had got to know. Something is definitely up, she thought to herself.

  When she looked for Lieutenants Ferguson and Mallory she saw that they were both on the bridge. I’m not liking this, she thought as she saw the armed guards that were on the bridge when she accessed the visual feed. It looks like Ferguson has taken over.

  “What’s going on?” she asked the human as she turned her attention back to him. “Is this some kind of mutiny?”

  “No,” the human said passionately. “Lieutenant Ferguson has just temporarily relieved Captain Somerville of command until we return to Earth. The Lieutenant felt that the Captain would launch us into a hopeless attack on the Overlord’s fleet. We all agreed that it was in the Admiralty’s best interest to prevent Endeavour being destroyed for no reason.”

  “You mean in your best interest,” Jil’lal said in disgust. “Has your Captain not led you to success and glory in the last year? He is a great war leader like my Tak’ar. It is a shameful thing you have done here.”

  As she looked at him the human didn’t respond nor lift his head to meet her eyes. “So be it,” she said.

  This time she connected her datapad to the door’ controls. She altered a few of the protocols so that any rudimentary scan of the room would tell someone that she was inside. Then she set the door to lock and restricted all COM channels out of the room.

  “You will have to wait out the rest of your mutiny in here,” she said as she walked out.

  In the corridor she paused to listen and look about before she headed on. Her first port of call was sickbay. She needed to see if Lieutenant Scott was still being looked after. She owed the Lieutenant a huge debt for saving her life.

  After five minutes of careful sneaking she came to the turbolift that would take her to sickbay. When she entered in her destination nothing happened. Trying again she still found that nothing happened. In frustration she pulled out her datapad and connected it to the turbolift. To her dismay she saw that access to the turbolifts had been restricted to a few select crew members. She could hack into the protocols and add herself to the list but it would surely alert someone to the fact that she was free.

  With a sigh she brought up the Endeavour’s schematics. The exploration cruiser was a big ship and it would take her a while to get to the sickbay on foot. Once she was satisfied she had plotted a safe route that kept her away from the more populated areas of the ship she headed off.

  Twenty minutes later she was finally standing outside sickbay. She had formulated a plan for her next course of action but first she had to see Scott. The doors into sickbay were locked from the outside but it didn’t take her long to override them. As they swooshed open doctor Anderson looked up in anger. “I said I wanted to be left alone,” she began angrily but cut herself short when she saw it was Jil’lal.

  “Jil’lal, what are you doing here? I thought they would have confined you to your quarters,” Doctor Anderson asked.

  “They tried,” Jil’lal responded with a feral grin, “but they only sent one man. They should have sent three.”

  “I see,” Anderson said carefully, “I hope you didn’t hurt him too badly.”

  “He’s fine,” Jil’lal said with a chuckle, “he is the one confined to quarters now. How is Scott?” she asked more seriously. “Are you still able to look after her like this?”

  “Yes, the Lieutenant is doing ok, at
least as well as she can. Ferguson was here himself to see her. He wanted to assure me that he didn’t want Scott’s health affected by his removal of the Captain. I am locked into my sickbay. At least until we leave the Kulthar system. But Ferguson assured me that if I needed anything to help Scott all I had to do was contact him.”

  “That is good,” Jil’lal said. “At least Ferguson hasn’t lost all of his honor.”

  “What are you going to do now?” Doctor Anderson asked.

  “Release the Captain of course,” Jil’lal said. “I don’t know what he plans to do about the Overlord’s fleet but he has seen us through so far. I think he has earned the right to finish this. Besides, as much as I want to go home the Kulreans don’t deserve what is about to happen to them. Even if they have been trying to meddle with my people for the last five hundred years.”

  “And how will you do that?” Anderson asked.

  “One of the marines is locked up in the general crew quarters. I think I can free her and together we should have a chance to fight our way to the Captain,” Jil’lal explained.

  “In that case I think I have something you could use,” Anderson said as she reached into a storage box above her desk. “This is a hypospray injector, it will deliver a very strong sedative that should render a normal sized human unconscious for up to ten hours. All you have to do is press this end to the person’s skin and hit this button. They should be out within a couple of seconds. This injector is good for five shots.”

  “Thank you doctor,” Jil’lal said. “If I manage to get the Captain out I will let him know that you helped me.”

  “Don’t worry about that,” Anderson said. “The Captain knows whose side I’m on. Just don’t get yourself hurt.”

  “I’ll try,” Jil’lal said as she turned to leave. “I’ll lock the door behind me so that no one knows I was here.”

  “Thank you,” the doctor said.

  Once she was outside sickbay she brought up the schematics to Endeavour and plotted out her next route. Being in the resistance had taught her a lot of valuable lessons and the first one had been that no one succeeds alone. She needed some back up and she believed she had found the perfect person to help her. Happy that she knew where she was going she trotted off at a brisk pace. She took a longer route where no crew members should be and she was confident that everyone’s attention was elsewhere.

  Fifteen minutes later she was outside one of the smaller crew sections. Normally this section would house about thirty of Endeavour’s crew, now it was a prison as Ferguson had managed to trap all thirty in their rooms.

  As she peeked around the corner of the corridor that led to the main living area Jil’lal was relieved to see that there was only one guard. Here we go, she thought.

  She flung a small metallic bolt she had removed from a power coupling down the corridor. It zipped past the guard and struck the floor ten meters past him. He looked towards the noise and raised his plasma rifle.

  Before the bolt had hit its target Jil’lal was moving and as soon as the guard began to turn she accelerated into a lightening quick sprint. No human could match her speed and she was on the guard before he had time to turn around and see what the approaching noise was. With two of her hands she fended off the guard’s plasma rifle and with the other two she held the injector up to his neck. With a click of the button the injector released its concoction into his system and within a couple of seconds he was slumping against her as she gently lowered him to the ground. Powerful stuff, Jil’lal thought as she brought up the schematic again and found Ensign Speer’s room.

  With her datapad she easily overrode the command that was keeping his door locked and stepped inside. The room was dark and as she crossed the threshold four arms reached out and tried to grab her.

  She jumped deeper into the room, in the direction her attackers would least expect. She turned her jump into a roll midair to gain some additional space for her to maneuver. As she came up she raised all four fists, ready to fight off whoever was trying to attack her.

  Instead of a follow up attack “Jil’lal?” a voice asked quietly.

  “It is me,” Jil’lal said. “I have come to release you.”

  “Oh, thank goodness. We nearly got into a fist fight with you,” Private O’Brian said.

  “I know,” Jil’lal said. “It is good for you that I held back.”

  “Ha,” O’Brian laughed, “I’m sure it is. This is Ensign Speers by the way. We were locked in here together when Ferguson began his mutiny.”

  O’Brian’s cheeks became a little redder when she introduced Speers but Jil’lal didn’t understand the cause. Dismissing it as irrelevant she moved on. “Well it is good that you were. The marine barracks is being guarded by ten of Ferguson’s men so there is no way I could have freed them. Getting you out was much easier and so here I am. I need your help to free the Captain.”

  “Well we are willing and able,” O’Brian said. “Do you have a plan?”

  “Yes, I think I can free the Captain myself. But I will need a distraction to draw some of the guards off. The brig is not far from the main engineering room. I think if you can cause a scene there it will draw off enough of the guards from the brig that I will be able to handle the rest of them,” Jil’lal said as she handed the unconscious guard’s plasma rifle to O’Brian.

  “I think I can handle that,” O’Brian said, she hefted the plasma riffle with a big smile. “I can send Speers with you if you want.”

  “No,” Jil’lal said. “I can move faster alone. Besides, your distraction will be more believable if there are two of you.”

  “Why don’t we just release the rest of the crew members in this section? That would give us more than enough people to take engineering and release the Captain,” Speers said.

  “I thought of that,” Jil’lal said, “but I wasn’t sure who I could trust.”

  “She’s right,” O’Brian said. “Ferguson would have locked up anyone who he wasn’t completely sure he could rely on. Yet that doesn’t mean there aren’t more crew members sympathetic to his view. If we let them all out one of them might turn us in before we can accomplish anything. If you are confident you can get the Captain out, then I think we need to do this alone.”

  “Ok,” Speers said. “I understand. I guess it’s just the three of us then.”

  “Just the three of us,” Jil’lal agreed.

  She then brought out her datapad and checked the time. “Do you think you can get to engineering in thirty minutes? We are locked out of all the turbo lifts so you will have to get there on foot.”

  “That should be doable,” O’Brian replied.

  “Then thirty minutes it is,” Jil’lal said. “Try to make as much noise as you can. If Ferguson thinks some crew members loyal to the Captain are trying to take over engineering he will likely send all the nearby troops to help out. If you can thin out the guards stationed at the brig, then I can make my move.”

  “Good luck,” O’Brian said. “Say hi to the Captain for me and Speers.”

  “I will,” Jil’lal said. “Just don’t get yourselves killed. You only need to cause a distraction, not actually take over engineering.”

  “We know,” O’Brian said, “now get going or our distraction will be for nothing.”

  Jil’lal nodded at O’Brian and Speers and headed off to her target. Ten minutes later she was heading down a long narrow corridor that would take her to the brig. Suddenly she stopped. In the distance she heard the familiar sound of human laughter. It was getting closer. As she listened for a few more seconds she was sure she could make out the soft thud of at least two sets of footsteps.

  She glanced back the way she had come. It was over forty meters to the other end of the corridor. Whoever was coming would round the corner ahead of her and see her before she managed to get away. Without thinking she whipped out her datapad and connected it to the nearest door to override the lock on it. The door was registered as a secondary storage room and it had some addi
tional security she had to overcome. It only took her a couple of seconds and as soon as the doors opened she burst in and turned to shut them behind her.

  A noise from her rear caused her to spin around in alarm, “Hold it right there,” a voice said as a stunner was aimed at her.

  *

  Mallory sat in the bridge watching the Vestarian fleet, the Captain’s words ringing in his ears, Coward. He had been called a coward before, on more than one occasion. Yet now that one word cut him to his core. He knew it was because he had come to love his Captain. Somerville epitomized everything that Mallory had dreamed of being as a little boy, he led by example, was a master tactician and seemed fearless in the face of danger, and to top it off he didn’t even realize he had those qualities. And now Mallory found himself betraying his childhood dreams

  Am I doing the right thing? He asked himself for the hundredth time since he had sat down. Ferguson had made a strong case. At least that was what he had told himself when the First Lieutenant threatened his career.