BOB's Bar (Tales From The Multiverse Book 2)

by Jay Allan

  “There’s not much more to tell after that. Once the bodies of the dragon and Nomad had fallen into the depths of Jupiter, we headed back to Sol Prime without further incident. Rane later chastised me for embarking on that wild goose-chase on my own after we settled Vex in somewhere she could rest up and think about what she wanted to do.

  “So there you have it. That was the first time I rode a dragon in space and through the clouds of Jupiter. Pretty crazy, hey?”

  “That’s some crazy shoite, so it is,” Artur spoke up.

  “That is kind of crazy,” Kelsey confirmed. “Cool, though.”

  “That’s certainly one of the more bizarre stories I’ve heard tell of,” Cain said.

  “Says the man with the talking cat,” Floribeth quipped.

  “Fair point, well made,” Cain answered with a nod.

  “It’s all true, I swear,” Amanda assured them, tracing her finger in a cross over her heart.

  “I can believe it,” Ridge commented.

  “Thank you, sweetie,” Amanda replied with a wink. “I knew I liked you.”

  “Aaah, well, thanks. I am currently spoken for though, miss,” Ridge told her.

  Amanda raised her eyebrows for a moment in surprise, before she gave Ridge a wicked smile. “Bring her along; more the merrier,” Amanda answered, her look and smile suggestive.

  “Um…” Ridge blinked.

  Amanda laughed. “I’m kidding,” she giggled and sat back in her seat. “So, who’s next to tell their tale?”

  Interlude

  “There are only two left, Amanda—the little pilot and the soldier,” Rika said

  “Short and sassy and a kick-ass pilot. Best there is,” Floribeth said, sweeping a hand from the top of her head to her feet.

  Neither Floribeth nor Charline had been particularly vocal while the rest had spoken, but they’d listened intently, involved with the stories. Floribeth’s comeback, however, indicated that she might have something to say. BOB settled in to listen.

  “Go for it then Ace. Let’s hear it,” Amanda said.

  The Pumpkin Ace

  by Jonathan P. Brazee

  Beth looked at the expectant eyes waiting for her “sea story,” as Bethany Anne had called them. While she still hadn’t figured out what Artur was, the others around the table were pretty high on the food chain, and she was a petty officer—an enlisted sailor. The tall blonde was an admiral. The general rode some kind of magic plane. Heck, there was a queen among them, and a princess too. High society for a girl from New Cebu.

  But hell, none of them is a Navy fighter pilot, and fighter pilots kick ass and take names. See what they’d do facing a flight of FALs in their crystal fighters. If they want a story, I’ll give them one!

  I can tell them about...no, the statute of limitations isn’t up on that one.

  Beth still couldn’t grasp exactly who the other people were. She didn’t think they were from her universe—if that was even possible, and that should send up all sorts of flares—but it didn’t really bother her. Even if they were from a different universe or dimension, she wasn’t going to take the chance that one of the officers might be able to reach back into her universe and report her up the chain.

  So, what to tell…

  “I’m Petty Officer Second Class Floribeth Salinas O’Shea Dalisay, Navy of Humankind, and I’m a fighter pilot. My callsign is Fire Ant, and my ride is the Tala II.”

  “Feck me, that’s a mouthful,” Artur remarked.

  “That’s quite the title you have there,” Amanda agreed.

  “You might not want to know that one of my LTs has been dubbed Anteater,” Ridge told her. “There might be comments if you flew in the same squadron together.”

  “You sure you’re big enough to reach your fighter’s pedals?” Bethany Anne asked with a laugh.

  Kelsey, who was only slightly taller than Floribeth, glared at Bethany Anne. “We folks on the smaller side can start at the ankles and wear you down just fine.”

  Rika laughed and winked at the two women. “I’m about your height—when my legs are pulled off.”

  “I bet you’re pretty popular with the guys when they are,” Floribeth retorted.

  “Well, anyway, my brother was getting hitched to my best friend and wingman Mercy. Mercy Hamlin, callsign Red Devil. With the war footing and all, leave was canceled for the duration, or at least until we could stand up a fourth Mike squadron.”

  “What’s a Mike squadron?” Cain asked.

  “The premier Navy one-seater is the Wasp, but the FALs were making mincemeat out of them,” she explained soberly. “We were losing lots of good pilots. Most were flying the FX6 Indias and Kilos, which are good birds but outclassed by the crystals. We were flying the Mikes, though, the best Wasp ever made. We didn’t have very many yet, only enough for three squadrons, and it was our mission to hold back the tide until all the new fighters and capital ships were online and we could really take it to the FALs.”

  “Wait a minute, you’re losing me. Is it universal that fleet speaks in code?” Cain wondered. Brutus rolled onto his back and gazed at Floribeth.

  Beth stopped, then with a slight roll of her eyes, answered in the tone of a mother explaining gravity to a four-year-old. “The crystals are the alien race that’s pushing out through the spiral arm. We didn’t know much about them. Hell, we still don’t know much about them, but they want our planets, and they take them by force.”

  “And the ‘FALs?’”

  “‘Fucking aliens.’ That’s what we call them in the Navy.”

  “Hah,” Amanda said with a laugh.

  “Once again, so glad we have no aliens,” Rika added.

  Kelsey gave the woman two thumbs up.

  Bethany Anne raised her drink. “I have to agree with the shorthand.”

  “If you’re all caught up, can I go on?” Beth asked, looking at the others. They nodded, so she continued.

  “So anyway, like I was saying, we were stuck on the Victory, no leave authorized for the duration. Mercy had gotten her ass shot up and she was in rehab back on Innamincka Station until her nerves knitted, so she put in a special request for three days to get married. She and Rocky, my kid brother, had met a year before, and well, you know how it is in war…”

  “Fight today so you can live to see tomorrow. Fight like hell today or tomorrow may never come.” Cain looked at his drink with a solemn expression on his face.

  “That’s why I married Talbot. Take what joy you can today because tomorrow might never come. Or worse, it might come and take you both forever.”

  “Yep, that’s the way it is. Any day could be your last.”

  She shook her head as if to clear memories of those no longer with her.

  “Mercy was one of those rich kids—you know, with everything given to her. But she wanted to do something in her life on her own merits, so she joined the Navy, wrecking whatever plans her parents had for her. With the war and us sort of being heroes,” she said, looking embarrassed for using the term, “they began to accept her. That’s until she said she was going to marry Rocky.”

  Rika’s brow furrowed. “Wait, it sounded like marriage was a good thing with your people. How does that make her unaccepted?”

  “You’ve got to understand. My family…well, the only way to make a decent living is to become an Off-Planet Worker, taking factory jobs or working as maids for the rich folks. Folks like Mercy’s family. My dad did it for more than twenty years, spending time away just so we could go to school and have a roof over our heads. And it killed him. He died, lightyears from home, in a construction accident. For Mercy to marry a penniless...servant was not acceptable,” she said, anger bubbling up through her voice. “So the assholes disowned her just like that!” she said, snapping her fingers. “You can’t just disown family. I mean, that’s family! But they sure did.”

  “I wish I had family,” Blackhawk said, the first comment he’d made other than when telling his story.

  Floribe
th nodded at him, a slight frown on her face before she continued, “She said screw them and decided to get married on New Cebu. My family, who was going to be her family now, was going to make sure she had a proper wedding—the whole kit and caboodle. And me being her best friend and Rocky’s sister, she asked me to be her maid of honor.”

  Rika looked bored and asked, “So your story is about being a maid of honor?”

  “Seriously?” Kelsey asked. “Let her tell her story and be bored on your own time.”

  “Yes. I mean, no. That just sets the stage. I wasn’t going to let my wingman and brother get married without me there, so I asked the commander if I could get just one day on New Cebu—not even a full day—to be there. Commander Tuominen—he was the Stingers’ CO—took it all the way up to Admiral Nzama, the task force commander, but she said no, she couldn’t make any exception, not even for me.”

  “That’s a long way to run it up the chain,” Rika commented. “Bad juju to catch the Old Woman’s eye.”

  Beth looked embarrassed, then in a quieter voice, said, “I was kind of a big thing then. I had been the first human to make contact with the FALs, back when I was a civilian scout, and then when I got pulled into the Navy, I sort of did okay.”

  Rika gave her a long, pointed stare, eyebrows raised in question.

  “I was tied with Capgun—that’s Lieutenant Jim Caplan—for the most confirmed kills at four. One short of an ace and there was—how did the Public Affairs Officer put it?—‘Significant public interest in the ‘Race to Ace.’ There hadn’t been a Navy ace in almost two hundred years. That and my Platinum Star carried some weight...but not enough for her to cut me a break. She turned my request down.”

  “Let me guess. You went UA,” Cain said.

  “Yeah. I mean no, not technically. I just sort of bent the rules a bit. It was Josh who thought of it. AT3 Joshua Frye, my plane captain. You see, I was pretty pissed. I mean, one frigging day? After over a year in the middle of the fight, I can’t get a day? Give me a break.

  “But while I’m bitching, he says there’s something wrong with my synch comb. The readings aren’t matching. Now, I know there’s no way he’s telling the truth. I mean, he loves the Tala II more than I do, and it’s like he only allows me to borrow it and take it out into the black. He may be a strange duck, but he’s the best plane captain in the squadron—maybe the entire Navy. He’d never let the Tala degrade that much. I started to protest, but he put his hand over my mouth to stop me.

  “‘I’m going to reset it. You’re going to need to take it out for a couple of gate jumps to make sure it starts synching.’

  “And then I know what he’s doing. He’s giving me the excuse to go off on my own for a day...and it’s only two gate jumps from Washburne IV to New Cebu. I can get in and get out before anyone knows it. Oh, they’d know later, but what were they going to do? Ground me when we need all the experienced pilots we can find? Or suspend me, letting Capgun become the first ace? That would piss off a lot of the indentured class who wanted one of their own to be the first.

  “‘So, when would you reset it?’ I asked Josh.”

  “‘Give me a day to try and find a workaround. If I can’t, then the day after that,’ he told me. ‘Let me know what you want me to do.’

  “Which was the day of the wedding. I already knew exactly what I wanted him to do, but I had to play the game. I got him to show me the numbers and pretended to study them. But I’m a pilot, not a tech, so I didn’t know what the heck they meant. I just nodded and told him to try and fix the Tala, and if he couldn’t, reset the synch comb.

  “I spent the rest of the day doing admin work before going to White Duck right after chow. White Duck had the concession for Station 3, the only non-military store there. Run by retired Lieutenant Commander Tracy Ruiz and her son, it was the sailors’ at the station’s sole touch of civilian life—and it was the only place for receiving commercial orders. I downloaded the file Mercy had sent, entered my measurements, and printed out a bright orange calf-length gown—my bridesmaid’s dress. I tried it on in the dressing room, and, as much as I love Mercy, her fashion sense sucked. The orange was bad enough, but from the strapless top down to about the knees, it puffed out in a bubble. I looked like a damned pumpkin. There wasn’t much I could do about it, though, so I just paid for it and went back to my quarters, where I stuffed it under my mattress.

  Bethany Anne mused, “Bad fashion is the expectation for bridesmaids. I’m never sure if it is because the bride’s fashion sense sucks, or the bride doesn’t want to be upstaged.”

  “Knowing Mercy, even as much as I love her, I’d say you nailed it with the second reason,” Floribeth stated.

  “Anyway, late the next day, I went into the Flight Ops to schedule my check flight. Of course, I went late enough that I couldn’t go out that day—the Navy was hell-bent on maintaining strict flight hours for routine flights. A check flight dealing with transiting gates needed a minimum of three jumps. I only listed my first destination, the Pyrus System, one of the junction complexes with no fewer than forty-two other gates—one being to New Cebu. When he asked me for my next gate, I told him I’d see what the traffic was on the other side before I made that decision.

  “That was a little out of the ordinary, but not enough to make him question it. He reminded me that I was dead-lined until the check flight, barring a FAL attack somewhere.

  “That night, I lay awake, dreading an alert. Normally, I’m excited to go into action—scared, but excited. I wanted the FALs to pay for Lieutenant Hadley, for Hurl, and for Trout. This time, I prayed that the bastards would take the night off. For once, the capricious gods of war had mercy on me, and I woke up bright and early for my check ride. I had my bridesmaid’s dress stuffed in my survival kit, and Josh had stashed the shoes inside the nose compartment. It was already 1200 local at Malapascua, my home village on New Cebu, and that meant I had about six hours to make it there. That would be cutting it tight, but it should be doable. The Victory was in orbit around Washburne IV, taking on supplies, and the station’s gate was only a few light-seconds away. On the other side, transferring between gates at Pyrus would be quick. The longest delay would be after arriving through the New Cebu Gate. It would take me over an hour to land at the small shuttle port at Bogo, then catch a ride to Malapascua for the wedding.

  “Josh was waiting for me, and he went over the entire pre-flight checklist, to include the synching procedures. I just wanted to get going, but even if he was helping me commit a potential court-martial offense, the Tala was still his baby, and there would be no cutting corners. I had to sit there and keep the grimace off my face until we completed the checklist.

  “Finally, we were done, the yellow shirts ferried the Tala to the launch rails, and once given the release by the Flight Officer, we took off, slotting in our gate entry. The interesting thing about the Washburne IV gate is that it is multi-faceted. That means—”

  “I hate to be the one who keeps asking, but when are you going to get to the good parts?” Rika asked.

  Beth blushed, then said, “Sorry. I can get a little long-winded, I know. Okay, to cut to the chase, I get to the Pyrus system, then track to the gate to New Cebu. I clear it with Gate Control, but I didn’t report back to my command until ten seconds before entry.

  “Well played.” Rika chuckled. “Just on this side of asking for permission rather than forgiveness.”

  Floribeth gave a wry grin but didn’t deny the intent.

  “I pop out in the New Cebu system, but the time is getting short. I didn’t think I could land at the nearest shuttleport and catch a ride in time, but a Wasp can land anywhere, so I called Mercy and told her to hang on, I was coming and would land just outside of town. Mercy being Mercy, she had a few choice words for me, but I think that was more nerves than anything else.

  “Time was getting tight, so I decided to cut some while approaching the planet. I squirmed out of my flight suit—”

  “In a fighter?
A single-seat fighter? No fighter I know has that much room in it,” Blackhawk said, his second comment since the others starting telling their tales.

  “In case you didn’t notice, I’m 4’6” in my bare feet and weigh seventy-two pounds. That’s thirty-three kilograms and 137 centimeters. There was room.” She swept a hand across her body. “It was tight, though.

  Rika lifted her right arm, which still bore the body of her GNR-41C. “You realize you weigh less than this, right?”

  “Maybe, Rika, but I’m a hell of a lot better looking than that thing,” Floribeth said before continuing. “So, I start changing, and as soon as I’m in my birthday suit—”

  Artur perked up. “Ye mean naked?”

  Kelsey rolled her eyes.

  “Yes, naked, if you must,” Floribeth agreed, turning red. “As I was saying, as soon as I was naked, I get a call from my CO over the visuals. I don’t know what to do, so I just held up my flight suit in front of me and took the call.

  “‘Dalisay, where the hell are you?’ I can see he’s royally pissed, so I tell him, ‘I’m at Quebec-Romeo-Papa-Four-Niner-Niner,’ which is the G-Number for New Cebu, hoping he won’t realize that.

  “Kind of stupid on my part. Not much got past him.

  “‘And why are you at New Cebu?’”

  “I’m doing my synch check, sir.”

  “‘Any particular reason you picked New Cebu, other than that your brother and Petty Officer 1 Hamlin are getting married there today?’”

  “With all due respect, sir, I have authorization to use any gate that does not lead to a restricted area for my check flight.”