The Bounty Hunters from Arachnxx Three

by Milo James Fowler

  "We don't have the reactor coils. Without them, we're not going anywhere."

  "Right. That." Quasar nodded, glancing at the Ciliac soldiers seated next to the cockpit where Frayek manned the shuttle. He was a real hands-on sort of general, not leaving such a duty to one of his subordinates. "Well, let's have at it, then."

  Signaling Gruber as he unbuckled his harness, Captain Quasar charged headlong at the seated soldiers, knocking them against each other and landing as many punches as he could. Nearly as adept at close-quarters combat, Gruber did the same on his side of the aisle. Amid the sudden confusion, Hank approached the cockpit, drew the Cody 22 from his fur flab, and aimed it at the back of Frayek's head.

  "Take us to your space station," the Carpethrian growled, eyeing the soldiers who had broken into retaliatory fisticuffs but were now frozen in place, staring at his weapon with wide eyes, unsure of its capabilities.

  "Station?" Frayek remained cool under pressure. "We have no orbital space station."

  "Then I guess we'll get to see what your brains look like." Hank tightened his grip on the stun gun.

  "Oh, you mean that orbital space station." Frayek quickly changed course, and now the viewscreen no longer showed the lolling Effervescent Magnitude a few kilometers away. Instead, a crimson donut-shaped station loomed less than a kilometer out, floating in the black like some enormous entity's abandoned breakfast food item.

  "That's the one," Hank said.

  Captain Quasar had to admire the Carpethrian's bluffing ability. The most a Cody 22 could do was send Frayek into undignified spasms followed by an hour of unconsciousness.

  "Hand it over." Quasar gestured for the soldier nearest him to relinquish his laser pistol—a weapon he knew could do serious damage. He'd seen Princess Sya take out two of his own security personnel with a gun just like it. "On second thought, let's have all of you lay down arms. This is going to be a nice, peaceful ride amongst friends. No need for you to lug those things around."

  Obviously unhappy with the turn of events, the Ciliac soldiers relinquished their weapons to Captain Quasar and Chief Gruber, who jammed as many as they could into their belts. The leftovers they tossed to Hank, who tucked them into his fur flab. How much room did he have in there? It remained to be seen.

  With less than thirty minutes before the expected arrival of the Arachnoid bounty hunters, Quasar could only hope there would be enough time to obtain the reactor coils they needed, return to the Magnitude, install the coils, and get the heck out of there at near-lightspeed.

  As Frayek brought the transport vessel alongside the Ciliac station, however, Captain Quasar was dismayed not to find a single docking bridge or airlock in sight. How were they going to get aboard? And even if they managed to locate the reactor coils they needed, how would they possibly get them off the station in time?

  "I understand you are unfamiliar with our ways, Earth Man." Frayek turned from the shuttle's controls for the first time. The vessel appeared to be caught in a tractor beam of some sort, holding position a hundred meters away from the space station.

  "Hand over your weapon," Gruber said, reaching for Frayek's pistol with a sweaty palm.

  The Ciliac general didn't offer any resistance. "You will not be entering our station without an escort. It simply is not possible."

  "We'll decide what's possible," Hank retorted.

  "You do not understand. Without us, there is no way to transport you inside."

  Suddenly Quasar remembered Princess Sya saying something about the magic of her people being more supernatural than scientific, that it had to do with matter to energy transference. If only he'd been paying more attention at the time!

  Frayek swiveled from the cockpit and stood abruptly.

  "No sudden moves." Gruber narrowed his gaze, blinking back perspiration as he held the general's own weapon on him.

  "If one of you would be so kind as to volunteer, I will show you how it is done." All three of Frayek's eyebrows rose as he looked from Quasar to Gruber to Hank expectantly.

  "I'll go." Hank stepped toward the Ciliac general. "The sooner I get a look at their reactor coils, the sooner I'll know if we can use them."

  "You're not going alone." Quasar couldn't afford to lose the only pseudo-member of his bridge crew able to man the helm at near-lightspeed—not to mention the only Carpethrian in this corner of the galaxy able to get the Magnitude's new propulsion system up and running again. "We're going with you." He nodded to Gruber, who responded with a petrified stare.

  "Very well." Frayek signaled two of his men to stand alongside Quasar and Gruber, both of whom were uncomfortable with their proximity—even more so when the Ciliac soldiers threw their arms around them in a tight embrace.

  "Watch it!" Gruber barked. "This thing goes off kinda easy!" Arms pinned to his sides, he waved the pistol around at groin-level to get their attention.

  "I am afraid this is the only way," Frayek apologized, reaching out to hug Hank.

  "Just get it over with," grumbled the Carpethrian.

  Quasar couldn't have phrased it better.

  "Commence transfer," Frayek ordered.

  Everything instantly transformed into particulate matter. It was as though the shuttle and everyone on board had dissolved into a cascade of shimmering light particles—

  A split-second later, Quasar and his team found themselves in the command center of the Ciliac space station. Released by their escorts, they patted themselves down, looking each other over. By all appearances, they each were still in one piece, with no bizarre alterations to their physical makeup.

  "Show me to your engine room." Hank held his Cody 22 on General Frayek. The Carpethrian was all business.

  Captain Quasar, on the other hand, was whooping and prancing about, unable to contain himself. "Do you realize what just happened? Matter-to-energy transference! Sheer magic, I tell you!"

  It was a magical moment indeed—albeit short-lived.

  For just then, half a dozen Bromidian fighters bearing their royal blue insignia appeared on the space station's extra-wide viewscreen and opened fire. The laser beams blasted through the defensive shielding and rocked the gravity stabilizers off-kilter, causing everyone on board to stagger sideways and grab onto the nearest solid object for support.

  Episode 16: Enemy of an Enemy

  In the center of the viewscreen, the face of a Bromidian pilot appeared bigger than life. "We have come to rescue the Earth Man and his people," he said with an overbearing air of authority. "They are allies of House Bromidia. Release them to us, or you will be fired upon—again!"

  Captain Quasar had no intention of being rescued. He needed the Ciliac reactor coils, and that's all there was to it. Nothing would sway him from his course, and he was not above lending his enemy a hand to accomplish his objective. So that's what he did, standing shoulder to shoulder with General Frayek at the weapons console which had been abandoned by its unsure-footed attendant when the station shifted unexpectedly starboard.

  "Am I to understand you are now on our side of this conflict?" Frayek raised his eyebrows, but the one in the middle of his forehead only scowled. It was a very alien expression to behold.

  "Show my men to your storage bay and give them a couple spare reactor coils, then your fight will be mine." Quasar pointed at the screen as it switched to a view of the Bromidian fighters powering up their weapons. The laser cannons glowed red-hot against the backdrop of frigid space. "I would make up my mind quickly if I were you, General!"

  Frayek ground his teeth together, clearly irked by the situation. "What can you possibly offer in return?"

  Quasar squared his shoulders and set his jaw. "I have never lost a firefight, whether it be on land or in space. You will not die this day with Captain Bartholomew Quasar at your side."

  "Oh, very well." Frayek shrugged and gestured for one of the station personnel to escort Hank and Gruber. "Give them what they require—within reason."

  "Could you be more specific, sir?" said th
e attendant, a scrawny young fellow struggling to stand upright as the floor continued to tilt.

  Frayek growled almost as fiercely as a Carpethrian: "Two reactor coils. Nothing more!"

  The attendant nodded and scurried off to obey with Hank and Gruber following close behind.

  "General, the Bromidians are firing!" one of the other attendants announced the obvious.

  Another barrage of laser fire pummeled the station, sending it into rocking spasms as sparks rained down from the ceiling.

  Quasar frowned at the console before him, unable to decipher a single symbol on any of the controls. "Do you have defensive systems?"

  "A few," said a female attendant who approached warily, staring unabashed at the tall Earth Man.

  Quasar narrowed his gaze at the viewscreen. "Offensive weapons?"

  "Most of them are, but that is the point, is it not?" said the attendant. "Personally, I find all such things unsavory—"

  "Laser artillery is completely offline," Frayek said as he pushed her aside. "Our guns were knocked out during the first wave of their attack. It was as though they knew exactly where to target us!"

  Such was often the case in these situations. "What about magic?"

  "How do you mean?"

  Quasar pointed at the Bromidian fighters. "Can you lock onto them and matter-to-energy-transfer them elsewhere?"

  Frayek shook his head. "Not without a Ciliac transponder on board."

  "Could you matter-to-energy-transfer a transponder onto each of those fighters?"

  "We call it transferring," piped up the helpful attendant with a broad smile.

  Quasar nodded his thanks to her and returned his gaze to the viewscreen. But he knew she was still watching him. She probably couldn't resist. He often had that effect on women.

  "Yes..." said General Frayek with a slow nod. "Yes, I believe we can!"

  Dashing back and forth between two consoles and shoving the slightly disgruntled attendants out of his way in the process, Frayek managed to transfer a small transponder—similar in size to the communication device sewn into the captain's collar—onto each of the Bromidian fighters.

  Another barrage of laser fire erupted.

  "Brace for impact!" shouted one of the attendants, determined to find something useful to do.

  The entire station shook and sparked and rattled and pitched farther to its starboard side. Frayek gripped onto his console as the attendants around him slid against the wall in awkward tangles of arms and legs.

  "Here goes nothing, Earth Man!" He activated the matter-to-energy-transfer, and suddenly one of the Bromidian fighters vanished from the viewscreen. A gasp went up from the Ciliac crew, and Frayek himself couldn't believe his eyes. "We have never transferred anything so large before," he said in an awestruck tone. "But I suppose matter is matter!"

  "Where did you send it?" said the female attendant, clawing her way back across the steeply sloping floor. Her three eyes were still locked on Captain Quasar.

  "As far away as I could, while reserving enough power for the others. Soon, that pilot will have some company!" The Bromidian pilots realized something was definitely amiss and started to retreat at full speed, but Frayek activated the transfer sequence five more times, and they all disappeared. "It will take them hours to return!"

  Quasar's collar bleeped, and he quickly jerked his head to answer his first officer. "We're getting closer to—"

  "Captain, they're here."

  It wasn't often that he heard a tremor of fear in Commander Wan's voice. But it was understandable. The Effervescent Magnitude floated adrift in space, unable to maneuver itself effectively against what Quasar assumed were two vessels full of eight-legged, bloodthirsty bounty hunters. The Goobalob contract on Quasar's head demanded that he be taken dead or alive, but he already knew which option the Arachnoids preferred—and they wouldn't limit themselves to his head alone.

  "Forget everything I told you before," Quasar said quickly.

  "Sir?"

  "Blow those freaks out of the sky!"

  Frayek and the Ciliac attendants stared at him.

  Quasar cleared his throat. "General, my men and I are going to need some transferring."

  After a moment's pause, Frayek blinked with comprehension. "I am afraid that will not be possible, Captain. The power necessary to send you, your men, and the reactor coils to your ship is no longer available. Transferring that last Bromidian fighter has left us on reserve power systems." He paused. "But I may be able to transfer you short-range."

  Quasar nodded. "To your shuttle."

  "It would be my honor to act as your pilot. Without your aid, it is safe to say we would still be under Bromidian attack. For this, you have my gratitude." He handed Quasar three small transponders. "Attach one to each of your team, and we'll transfer you to our transport vessel."

  "Thank you." Captain Quasar gripped the general's hand in a hearty shake. "I'm afraid we'll be heading into the middle of what could be a heated battle between ships more deadly than anything you've experienced. You should stay here and get this station back up and running before those Bromidians return to finish the job." Quasar's boots began to lose traction as artificial gravity levels deteriorated. The station was also venting atmospheric gases into the black. The situation did not look promising. "Or bail out. Your call."

  Barking orders into his collar, Quasar half-jogged, half-swam through the air until he met Hank and Gruber returning from the storage bay with their escort and—low and behold—the two reactor coils they so desperately needed. Helping Gruber with one the size of an ancient washing machine, Quasar left the other equally large and cumbersome coil to Hank's capable hands and nodded to the Ciliac attendant half-floating nearby.

  "Transfer us to your shuttle," Quasar said, slapping a transponder onto himself, Gruber, and Hank.

  The speechless fellow did as he was ordered, and a split-second later, Quasar and company, along with the reactor coils, found themselves inside the Ciliac shuttle. Hank climbed into the cockpit, and soon they were underway, heading straight toward the Effervescent Magnitude and a spectacular fire fight that had already commenced.

  The two Arachnoid vessels hovered like leering vultures at the Magnitude's fore and aft, taking plasma torpedo hits with minimal damage and offering plenty of return fire. Incinerator rays cut into the Magnitude's hull plating and devoured the plasteel in golden arcs of devastation.

  "There's no way we're getting back on board in the middle of that!" Gruber cried, mopping his brow. "We'll be sliced in two!"

  Behind them, as if on cue, the Ciliac space station came apart at the seams with a flurry of escape pods jettisoning toward the surface of their planet. The Bromidians hadn't needed to finish the job, after all.

  Clenching his jaw until the muscle twitched, Quasar clapped Hank on the shoulder. "Follow them."

  "Captain?" the Carpethrian grunted in disbelief.

  "Take us down."

  "We can't leave her like this!" Gruber gestured emphatically at the Magnitude.

  "Steady, Chief." Quasar nodded to himself. "I need to see a princess about some magic."

  Episode 17: Not a Hero's Welcome

  Hank was far from optimistic about the idea. "There's no way the Ciliac will allow us to land, Captain."

  Quasar couldn't see why not. He had, after all, aided General Frayek in defending their orbital space station against the Bromidians, and it had been Quasar's brilliant idea that had taken those Bromidian fighters out of the picture. True, the station had fallen to pieces as soon as he'd borrowed their shuttle, but the Ciliac crew seemed to have survived the maelstrom that followed, since their escape pods were streaking toward the surface like a fleet of falling stars. They could hardly blame him. Besides—

  "They won't know it's us." Quasar pointed at the viewscreen. "Follow those pods and stay close. They'll think we're another bunch of evacuees."

  "Why didn't they just transfer themselves down to the surface?" Gruber squinted at the display
.

  "Frayek said their power reserves were low." Quasar raised an eyebrow at his chief of security. "We were lucky it worked on us. I would've hated for it to go kaput mid-transfer, leaving our atoms scattered in orbit around this alien world."

  "Humph," said Hank. Possible interpretation: he didn't like the sound of that either.

  "Permission to speak freely, Captain," said Gruber.

  Quasar nodded. "Of course."

  Gruber shook his head, and beads of perspiration flew like bathwater from a soggy dog. "I don't like it one bit—leaving the Magnitude at the mercy of those spider-freaks. There may not be anything left of her when we return!"

  "If we return," Hank muttered into his fur.

  "You said it yourself, Chief." The captain nodded grimly, ignoring the Carpethrian's negativity. "There's no chance of us making it through that melee in one piece. At least now we have a chance. We have the reactors. We just need to get them into our engine room." Quasar clapped Gruber on the shoulder of his damp uniform and squeezed. "If all goes according to plan, we'll return in time to give those Arachnoids a fight they won't soon forget."

  Gruber nodded with a frown, still not convinced.

  "Entering the atmosphere." All four of Hank's very hairy hands dashed across the console before him as though they had minds of their own, keeping the shuttle on course as it blasted through the planet's invisibility shield and shook from bow to stern.

  Quasar clenched his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering with the vibrations. "Follow those pods. Wherever they've been programmed to land is where we want to go."

  "H-h-how c-c-can y-y-y-ou r-r-r-r-r-ead th-th-those Cilia-a-a-ac c-c-controls?" Gruber's jaw smacked open and shut like a wooden puppet's.

  Hank shrugged both sets of shoulders. "I'm good with machines."

  Quasar nodded at that. Yes he was. And if it was at all within the captain's powers of persuasion, he intended to keep the Carpethrian on as helmsman for the remainder of the Effervescent Magnitude's voyage into deep space—assuming they lived through their current predicament, of course.