Apex

by Aer-ki Jyr

  “Kitja,” she swore as the Resolute’s shields registered weapon impacts. The visual displays showed three fighters arriving around them, with one moving directly in front of the ship, blocking their path. The other two began peppering their engines with lachar blasts, trying to get through their shields and take out their gravity drive.

  The countdown went to zero and the ship’s plasma drives shut down. They were now exactly where they needed to be, but with that fighter sitting off their nose they’d obliterate both ships if they jumped now.

  Fortunately there was another option.

  Jalia shifted shield power 75% forward, reinforcing the bow shields, then kicked the plasma engines back on. The ship surged forward, with its big, blunt forward hull ramming into the fighter at amicable speed.

  The small, one-­manned ship bounced off the forward shield, crumpling under the impact as its own shields were overstressed and breached. It careened off the starboard side as the Resolute moved on through into the clear. A few puffs from the navigation thrusters appeared to correct the minute momentum shift from the impact and the freighter’s shields suddenly stretched out to a needle point in front just before it blinked out of existence, leaving the two intact fighters in its wake, unable to match speeds and follow them out of the system.

  Jalia finished shifting all shield power forward, for she’d held off 10% to keep the fighters’ fire off her engines through the jump, but now that power was needed to overcome the hypercompressed light and any tiny particle impacts on the ship at seventeen times lightspeed, which they were now accelerating up to. Without the shields, the ultra-­high frequency EM would eat through their unarmored hull plating.

  Jalia waited a few heartbeats, fortunate that nothing had gone wrong. She watched the tracking display as her ship quickly moved through the Hellis System on an outbound trajectory. Her gravity drives had been active only eight seconds, though if need be they could still have been adding velocity at a diminishing rate. Fuel was a concern though, and as it was she only had enough for this one jump, which included the deceleration at destination.

  Beside her, Ivara put away her hacking device. The systemwide information grid was now inaccessible. They were moving faster than the outbound signal, essentially creating their own blackout. The ship’s sensors were likewise useless. Any rebound signal would never make it back to the ship. All data on the Hellis System hologram was now dated, with their trajectory across it being calculated rather than measured. Likewise, they’d disappeared from the mercenaries’ point of view.

  “Woo,” Jalia breathed in relief. “That was cutting it a little close.”

  “We’re not safe yet,” Ivara counseled. “If they have a courier ship available, they can send word ahead of us to any assets they may have in the Mewlon System. Or their warships might be able to jump ahead of us and be waiting there when we arrive.”

  Jalia chewed on her lip. “You might be right about the courier ship, but I doubt those warships are any faster than us. Their drive compartments are too small. They’re designed to be carried around by jumpship for insystem operations, not make intersystem jumps.”

  “Perhaps, but I would not put it past them. They are going to great lengths to catch us. Learn to expect the unexpected.”

  Jalia considered that for a moment then clipped out a short laugh. “Killjoy,” she mocked.

  But she knew the Cres was right.

  BACK IN THE Hellis System, two mercenary frigates on the jumpline in close to the star watched the Resolute disappear from the tracking grid. What appeared to be an instantaneous jump was actually a very fast acceleration, leaving a brief trace on the sensors. The Nevax ships were then able to estimate the power applied, given the strength of gravity at that jumppoint and the engine capacity of that particular class of freighter. Duration of acceleration was unknown, so the Nevax navigators made a guess and plotted their own jump to the Mewlon System.

  The two frigates interlinked their nav comps and made as simultaneous a jump as possible, getting a larger push off the star due to their closer jumppoint. The bulky ships disappeared from the Hellis tracking grid, following the Resolute. They activated their forward sensors, attuning them to their protective shields to allow a certain frequency range to pass through as they looked for the target ship ahead.

  Whether they blew by them en route or lagged behind, they weren’t going to lose their prey. With the insane amount of credits they were being paid to hunt them down, and the much larger bonus for capture, Nevax and dozens of other mercenary groups would be devoting every asset they had to the chase. The frigate captains hoped they’d guessed right and had a chance of a mid-­jump capture, even if it meant bleeding their drives dry.

  They had to be the ones to get to the fugitives first.

  Chapter 9

  JALIA RAN STRAIGHT, a pitter patter of tiny feet impacting against the smooth cold floor of the Resolute’s accessway. She came to the next crate and leapt up over it, pulling her bare legs up almost to her chest to clear the makeshift hurdle. Her equally bare arms went wide to maintain balance as she re-­extended her legs, coming down and picking up her stride with only a small bobble.

  She returned to her gait, heading aft down the 1.2 kilometer long hallway, already six laps into her workout. It was day four of their eighteen day jump to the Mewlon System, which meant a lot of downtime on their hands. On most trips Jalia usually occupied herself with training or study, but at the moment she was too anxious to read through technical manuals.

  Wearing nothing but a scant two-­piece inner liner, the Junta maintained maximum agility and speed, which for her race was several levels above galactic par, and continued down the long open space within the ship towards the next high stack of crates.

  Jalia reduced her speed as she approached, then dipped down mid run and sprung up in a massive jump, landing on the second tier of crates. Quickly she climbed up over the next two levels and dropped down the sheer back side of the pile, landing deftly on her tiny bare feet in a messy bundle of flying headtails as her flexible restraint tie snapped.

  She paused at the base of the crates, mildly frustrated, but decided to ignore it and ran on, shrinking in the distance down to a small dot until she reached her starting point and headed back, starting lap seven. She went through twelve laps before stopping, a standard workout for her, then went back to her quarters and took a quick shower. She dressed in an ankle/wrist length grey bodysuit with a white stripe down either side, but left her feet bare. At the moment they were a bit sore and she didn’t feel like shoving them into shoes just to head down to the galley and grab a bite to eat before beginning her sleep cycle.

  When she’d taken possession of the Resolute, she’d opted not to install private food stores in her quarters and had always taken her meals from the communal galley. Each race had different nutritional needs, but there were some commonalities and the galley was full of as many varieties as Jalia could find. There were a few specifics though, such as her Tilari cakes.

  A delicacy from her homeworld, the tiny black discs held enough sugar and spices for an entire meal, making them unpalatable for most races. Jalia liked them best of all post-­workouts, to help quickly replenish her energy. Junta were by design a high metabolism race, able to work long hours at high output, but requiring a great deal of nourishment in exchange.

  Add in their high reproduction rates, and lack of adequate foodstuffs was one of her overpopulated homeworld’s perpetual calamities. Most Junta were forced to live a sedentary lifestyle to diminish the drain on their food supply, which was one reason why Jalia trained so much. It separated her from her ­people’s debilitating and repressive culture.

  When she arrived in the galley she was surprised to see Ivara with two of the Tilari cakes on her tray, along with an assortment of other small portions. She’d opened her food stores to the Cres, telling them they could eat whatever they liked, but this w
as the first time she’d noticed any of them actually eating.

  Ivara held a half-­eaten cake in her blue, five fingered hand, pausing and looking over at the Junta as she entered. “Sorry. I didn’t realize they were yours.”

  “It’s fine,” Jalia assured her. “I just didn’t expect you to be able to stomach them. Most races find the compact nutrients overwhelming.”

  Ivara smiled slightly. “These are mild compared to our rations,” she said, picking up a small stick from her plate and breaking a piece off. Jalia realized it wasn’t something on her galley’s menu.

  Ivara tossed it to her. “Try this.”

  “Cres food?” Jalia asked.

  Ivara nodded. “Highly compact.”

  The piece she held in her palm was barely the size of her black fingernail, and its polar opposite in color. She bit half of the white, chewy substance off and immediately tasted intense sugar. Chewing more than should have been necessary, she got the cloying piece of food down her throat.

  “That’s really dense,” she commented, popping the other half into her mouth.

  “Saves space when packing,” Ivara explained with a touch of sarcasm.

  “Same with the Tilari cakes,” Jalia said after she finished chewing and sat down opposite the Cres at one of three small tables. “We have small stomachs, but large appetites.”

  Ivara looked at her closely. “Do you know why?”

  Jalia shrugged. “High metabolism,” she said, raising the retractable door on the cabinet beside the table. She pulled out a liquid pack and a brick of Reva bread, then thought twice about it and added two more bricks to the tabletop, forgoing grabbing a tray.

  Ivara nodded. “We have the same high energy requirements.”

  “Where did you store your rations? I didn’t see you bring anything onboard aside from one crate.”

  “It’s segmented,” Ivara explained as she finished her first Tilari cake. “We stuffed as much gear and foodstuffs as we could inside before we fled the dig site with the cargo. Our other supplies were destroyed when the transport blew up onboard the jumpship.”

  “Is there anything else you need?” Jalia asked. “You’re welcome to scrounge around the ship for anything you want. Maybe some extra clothes?”

  “Thank you,” Ivara said kindly, “but I don’t think I’d fit into anything of yours.”

  “No,” Jalia said, almost laughing. She was a stick compared to the sculpted musculature of the Cres, though the woman stood barely two fingers taller than her. “But we have some basic clothing stores you might be able to use, plus whatever the crew has in their quarters. Borrow what you like, they’re not going to need it again.”

  Ivara’s eyelids closed slightly. “You don’t plan on returning for them?”

  “Well, I’m certainly going to track them down and explain things, assuming we survive that long,” she added unnecessarily. “But with the credits they have now, they probably won’t be crewing ships again . . . unless they blow it all, which is a distinct possibility for Hemmer.”

  Jalia sipped a bit of the purple liquid out of the large bag-­like container through a clear straw, then began chomping away at one of the heavy Reva bricks, followed by a long pause in the conversation.

  “Jalia,” Ivara finally said, using her name for the first time. Up until now she’d simply called her Junta. “What do you know about the history of your race?”

  She stopped chewing, looking at the Cres oddly, then swallowed her mouthful. “There’s not much to tell. Cycles of clan warfare, our population dropped to almost fatal levels, then recovered after Itar laid down the Axien Accords. The clans cooperated more, but fought in other ways. Praxion repopulated, too much for the available food supply, so the clans sell off extra population as slave labor to cover the costs of importing food and everything else we can’t produce on our homeworld.”

  “That’s as much as you remember?”

  Jalia shrugged. “Our homeworld is basically the pit of the galaxy. There’s not much worth remembering.”

  “Is that why you left?”

  Jalia put down the Reva bread and crossed her arms in front of her on the table. “What is it that you want to know that you haven’t already read in my mind?”

  “You’re different from the other Junta,” Ivara said bluntly. “Why?”

  “I don’t really care for the clan lifestyle,” Jalia admitted. “Too introverted for my tastes. The others can’t see past our society, past Praxion. Which is probably why we haven’t colonized any other worlds. The others just sit at home, backstabbing each other, trying to become king of the refuse pile.”

  Ivara inclined her head to the side quizzically. “And you want more?”

  “I want to matter,” Jalia said, opening up a bit more than she’d expected. “The others sell our brothers and sisters for a few mics like they’re property, not ­people. Actually, nobody on Praxion acts like anyone is a person . . . not even themselves. Everything is superficial. A giant, pointless game. We have so many problems as a race, fixable problems, but nobody ever rises to the challenge. I left when I could to avoid becoming a marital gift for another clan’s leader, a pawn in their pointless political maneuvering. Out here I earn my own, look after my crew, and set my own course. It’s dangerous, but I’m me, not what Praxion tells me I have to be.”

  “Yet you had us send credits back to your clan,” Ivara pointed out.

  Jalia conceded that with a nod. “I still owed them for my ship. It’s true that I had already saved them more in shipping costs than the price tag for this freighter, but I hadn’t really paid them back enough to say goodbye and good riddance. A thousand credits in their coffers, now that says I was a good investment. It helps the clan with a lot of expenses, and I can finally be done with Praxion.”

  “I understand,” Ivara said, looking down at her half empty tray. “You still care for them, but won’t let them burden you any longer.”

  “I hate going back there,” Jalia confided. “Seeing my sisters, wanting to steal them offworld with me, to escape that lack of life. I know I can’t, at least not all of them. I tried once to talk some of them into crewing for me, but they turned me down. The sorriest thing about it is they don’t want anything to change. They like Praxion the way it is.”

  “No vision,” Ivara said, putting a term to Jalia’s thoughts.

  “Yes . . . exactly.”

  “Perhaps you are the true Junta, and they are not.”

  “I would like to think so, but the truth is I’m the misfit. I’m the only Junta I know of offworld that’s not a slave.”

  “No,” Ivara urged. “The truth is you are more like the Junta of past ages, before your race fell from grace.”

  Jalia’s eyes widened. “What do you mean?”

  Ivara sighed. “Junta are not native to Praxion. It was one of your mining colonies before the fall. All other worlds that you possessed were destroyed. Your race survived on Praxion, but you lost who and what you were.”

  “And what were we?” Jalia asked emphatically.

  Ivara smiled. “An ally of the Cres.”

  Jalia’s jaw dropped. “You’re saying we were . . .”

  “On our level, yes,” Ivara finished for her. “With some variances, of course.”

  “What happened to us? You said there was a fall?”

  “We don’t know everything,” Ivara admitted. “Much information from that time was lost. But we know your race spanned dozens of star systems before being overwhelmed in a war that we know very little about. You were a great race once, but that is lost now. Save for, perhaps, you.”

  “Me?”

  “You’re the first sign the Cres have seen of the Junta beginning to return to form. It is long overdue.”

  “Me?” Jalia repeated incredulously.

  “I’ve looked into your mind, Jalia. First on
the jumpship when you were following me. Your curiosity alone is a good sign. Would any of your kind have even cared?”

  “No, they probably wouldn’t.”

  “When I checked you I did a deep scan, and was surprised by what I found. That is why I sought you out when we required assistance.”

  “I wondered about that.”

  “And you didn’t disappoint,” Ivara noted.

  “Well, the 100,000 credits helped a bit,” Jalia noted humorously.

  “Liar,” Ivara rebuked softly. “You would have helped us regardless.”

  Jalia looked her in the eyes. “Would I?” she asked, unsure herself.

  The Cres nodded. “The credits alleviated your responsibilities to your crew, making your decision easier, but you would have sought to help us regardless.”

  “Are you saying that’s my nature, given our races’ past relationship?”

  “No. I’m saying it’s the nature of a good person.”

  Jalia glanced down at the table, avoiding eye contact. That one compliment meant a lot to her, especially coming from the Cres, whom she’d always admired. Now, perhaps, she had an inkling of why.

  “Thank you,” she said quietly.

  Ivara nodded politely and returned to her meal. Jalia did the same and the two women sat in amicable silence until the Cres finished and left the galley. Once she was finished herself, Jalia returned to her quarters, stripped out of her bodysuit, and slid her nude legs into the covered bottom portion of her sleep pod. The warm material eased the aches from her workout and adjusted to match her body temperature, soothing her red legs and tail. She leaned back, lowering her upper body beneath the energy field covering the top half of the pod and relaxed as the warm interior air soaked into her face.

  She began to drift off to sleep, then belatedly realized that she’d left her quarters’ lights on. Part of her didn’t care and wanted to just let it go, but another part of her was annoyed by the illumination and she knew it would cause her trouble falling asleep, so she regrettably pulled herself out of the warm pod and walked across the cold floor and reached for the illumination panel.