The Silver Liner: Takes Flight!

by Daniel Sullivan

  “Yes, Sir,” replied Stiles enthusiastically. Stiles targeted them carefully, finding that one spot where the torpedo would do the most damage. His targeting computer beeped loudly and the light went from green to red. He fired.

  The only warning was the light on the screen and the com officer looked bewildered and hesitated before sounding the warning, but Keyes did not.

  “Incoming,” she shouted as the torpedo detonated. A thunderous explosion rocked the ship and all power instantly was lost. The auxiliary batteries came on, restoring some light. She made her way to the escape pods along with everyone else. The ship was lost.

  “That was a U.S. cutter!” Verona’s captain shouted this as they made their way to the pods. “Why would they attack us?”

  “No markings, ma’am,” replied the coms officer. “And their transponder didn’t match any U.S. signals.”

  “Then who the hell are they?”

  Agent Keyes’s shout was drowned out as another explosion rocked the ship, followed by several more. The cutter was firing on them. They did not want the ship disabled; they wanted to destroy it. A combination of torpedoes and masers, she thought. They made their way to the pods and Keyes boarded one along with her fellow agents. The pods launched and to the survivors’ horror, the cutter was shooting the escape pods as well. Keyes was certain that this was the end. Terri’s image suddenly came to her mind, making her wish that she had been kinder to the lonely controller. If I make it through this, I’ll make it up to her, thought Amanda as the pod nearest to her exploded, the force sending her own pod askew. She hoped that someone friendly would pick up on her beacon before time ran out. If not, she would simply die in space as air, water and food ran out.

  Aboard the Enigma, Lorgen presided over the massacre. His gunner, Mister Stiles, had eliminated most of the pods; the cutter’s masers causing them to explode on contact. The man was relishing his job. A pay raise is in order, thought Lorgen. Stiles took out as many as he could before they were out of range, as they did not have the fuel to chase after any pods they might have missed. In any case, pods did not have the fuel to make the journey to a nearby planet quickly.

  They would be retrieved doubtlessly, as they had beacons, but retrieval would be time consuming and Lorgen would be long gone by the time any rescue effort was mounted. He picked up the Selene and the wreckage of the Fujin on his sensors and initiated a burn. The Enigma would be upon them soon enough.

  Getting the line across was tricky. Kendrick attached a long bungee line to his suit and took the safety line to the Fujin, using the jets in his space suit to get there. The Fujin crew had quickly donned their own space suits and a sumo-sized man grabbed him when he got to the other ship, steadied him and secured the line to the hooks inside the hatch. Another explosion emanated from the rear of the ship. Time was running short. Fortunately, it did not cause the Fujin to accelerate. Fujita began sending his crew over, women first. Kendrick escorted the first two women, who hesitantly began pulling themselves along the line. Another explosion shook the rope and one of them lost her grip and began to float away. Fujita was clearly screaming, though Kendrick could not hear him. Kendrick pushed off hard and got out to catch her. Glad I bungee jump, he thought. Using the suit’s jets, he brought himself and her back to the ship, by which point the other lady was aboard.

  Kendrick deposited the woman he had caught, then pushed himself back across to the Fujin. He secured the bungee cord to the other side of the hatch so that the crew would come across between the ropes, holding one and using the other for a safety net. Soon, all of the crew was over, even the large sumo. The last was Captain Fujita. He stood motionless in the Fujin’s airlock. “Come on,” Kendrick said, not sure if Fujita was receiving his transmission. Finally, Fujita removed the bungee cord from the hook and attached it to his suit. Kendrick unhooked the safety and took hold of Fujita, using the suit’s propulsion to guide them back to the Selene. As the two captains were making their way back to the Selene, Kendrick noticed a flash from behind them.

  “Torpedo! Heather, reel us in quick!” Kendrick ordered.

  “Aye Sir!” Heather complied with surprising alacrity and the line began moving quickly, bringing them back towards the ship, faster than was comfortable. The torpedo slammed into the Fujin’s remains, the force of the explosion blowing them back into the Selene. Kendrick slammed against the hull while Fujita flew through the door, hitting his head on the edge of the lintel. Kendrick felt a sharp sting in his left shoulder. He looked and saw that the Fujin was destroyed utterly. He scrambled back into the ship, Heather pulling him at the same time, then closing the door behind him. He wondered why his own ship had not been targeted.

  “Get Fujita to the Med-Bay,” Kendrick ordered, motioning to the unconscious Fujita as he hurried to the bridge. The pain in his shoulder was still there and he felt wetness on his back. Not good, he thought. Kendrick immediately took the lift to the central corridor and went directly to the bridge. As he belted himself into the captain’s chair, he felt whatever had hit him stab deeper into his shoulder. He reached behind and felt an object protruding from his shoulder. Shrapnel from the Fujin, he thought. He leaned forward so that it would not brush the chair and push it in further.

  The crackle of the com panel got his attention. Kendrick turned up the volume, adjusting the squelch for a better signal.

  “This is the Cutter Enigma,” came the voice through the speaker. “Prepare to be boarded. Do not resist and you will not be harmed. Over.”

  “This is Captain Kendrick Royce of the S.S. Selene,” Kendrick replied, trying to sound official. “Are you the captain?”

  “I’m Captain Lorgen,” replied a different voice; this one a gravelly baritone. “You have a fugitive aboard your ship. Surrender her to us. We have no quarrel with you personally.”

  “Fugitive? Who?” Kendrick knew that he probably meant Fiona, but he was not certain; Lorgen could be referring to Heather or any one of the Fujin crew.

  “Doctor Joyce Keane,” replied Captain Lorgen.

  “Who?” Kendrick asked the question even though the revelation that Lorgen was after a doctor practically guaranteed that Fiona was the target. He wondered what she had done. But his answer was not going to change. “I got two female crewmembers at this point, none of ‘em named Joyce Keane.”

  “She stowed away on your ship on the OSP,” explained Captain Lorgen. “She’s probably using an assumed identity. She has several and she probably lied to you about her circumstances. It is also possible that she has remained hidden from you on your vessel.”

  “Nope,” he replied. Something told him not to trust Lorgen. “I arrived at the OSP with myself and a doctor. I picked up an engineer on Tranquility Base and she’s no doctor. No one’s hiding out on this ship; after going through everything since picking up your virus, if she were here, she’d have been found.” Kendrick enunciated more than usual; he wanted no miscommunication between himself and this Lorgen.

  “The virus was courtesy of the Alliance,” replied Lorgen. “They want her too, but we’ve tracked her independently. Give her to us and you’ll not only serve your country, but you’ll get to pay those bastards back for infecting your ship.”

  “She Japanese? I just picked up the Fujin’s crew.”

  “No,” replied Lorgen. “She’s Caucasian.”

  “Wonder what she did to piss you guys off,” he said it as though it were an off-hand comment, but he intended to see if Fiona’s story matched Lorgen’s story, assuming he could get her to talk.

  “Sabotage of numerous medical facilities, sabotage of two U.S. genetics facilities, and theft of biological material and intellectual property from said facilities,” replied Lorgen. “We seek only to retrieve her and her stolen biotech. I also have … an offer to extend to you. We have no quarrel with you or your crew.”

  “Why’d you attack us? You could have just rang me up on the com first. Not to mention that there’s procedure you’re required to follow, an’
you ain’t followed it.”

  “The Fujin crew are known criminals and dangerous,” replied Lorgen tersely. “We’ve been advised to fire at will regarding them. Look, Captain Royce, you’re trying my patience. I am not the police and I am not bound by procedure. We are going to secure your vessel now. Resistance is not advised. Cooperation, on the other hand, brings its own rewards. You have sixty seconds to respond.”

  Kendrick was torn. He was half-tempted to just cooperate and get it over with, especially now that stolen biotech was thrown into the mix. He was also curious about the offer Lorgen had mentioned, but something told him not to trust the man and not to turn Fiona over. The Fujin was disabled, and so far as Lorgen knew, so was the Selene. Lorgen destroyed the Fujin to eliminate loose ends. Once he got what he wanted, Lorgen would have no reason to spare the Selene. Kendrick’s thoughts were interrupted when the ship shook violently.

  “Captain,” shouted Heather frantically on the com. “They’re firin’ masers at our engines!”

  Damn, thought Kendrick, that asshole didn’t even give me my sixty seconds! The Selene was well-constructed, but she wasn’t armor-plated. Maser fire, she could resist briefly, but if Lorgen fired a torpedo, they were done for. Lorgen had given him a pretext for resisting that did not require Kendrick to shield Fiona.

  “Well, Lorg, followin’ my instincts brings rewards too,” Kendrick growled, forgetting about sounding official. “And my instincts say, ‘don’t trust no one firin’ masers at my baby unprovoked!’ You didn’t even wait sixty seconds! Too bad for you; I woulda let ya board if you’d actually given me the sixty seconds you’d promised without firin’ on us.”

  The conversation had given Kendrick time to initiate the launch sequence. The Selene’s engines were now fully powered up. He pulled himself forward, grasping the console and initiated a maximum burn in the current direction.

  “Hang on tight,” he announced to his crew and passengers over the intercom. “I don’t think we have much in the way of dampers right now.”

  Selene’s massive engines surged to life. Kendrick nearly fell backwards as the ship surged forward. Thankfully, the ships dampers were on a subsystem that had been unaffected by the virus. He got on the intercom again.

  “Doc, git up here now,” he croaked. With that, he lost consciousness.

  Mister Levin went pale when he realized that the Selene was not at all dead in the water.

  “Captain, the Selene is powered up! I don’t know how, but he has his engines online!”

  “No!” Lorgen’s shout was too late. He felt the cutter shake violently from the force of the Selene’s engines. The soldiers who were making their way to secure the Selene were incinerated. The Selene was simply gone. She did not even fade into the darkness of space; she simply vanished. Such was the power of her engines. So fast, he found himself thinking. “Damage report!”

  “His burn has melted our outer hull plating on the rear port side and damaged our port thrusters,” replied his X.O. “Sir, what the hell does he have powering that thing?”

  “Ion engines from a carrier most likely,” growled Lorgen. “Get those fires under control and the engines back online. I want us moving in one hour!”

  Tracht’s warning not to underestimate Royce echoed in Lorgen’s head. Enigma’s skipper vowed that he would never make that mistake again.

  7

  Fiona went to the bridge as fast as she could, medical bag in hand. She was thankful that she had become proficient floating through the ship’s weightless center corridor as she arrived at the bridge. The doctor found Kendrick at the controls, still strapped into his seat, with red globules of, what was probably, his blood floating around the bridge. Never having worked in disaster relief or in the military, she was mentally unprepared for the scene. Seeing Kendrick in such a state nearly gave her a heart attack.

  “Oh my God, Ken!”

  When he did not respond, Fiona immediately went to him. Finding that he was still breathing, she quickly removed him from the chair and began cutting his jacket off him. The shrapnel had pierced his shoulder, but thankfully, above his scapula. The shrapnel seemed to have missed any major arteries, so she wondered how he had lost so much blood. Then she saw the long tear in his inner pant leg. Sliced open, his leg was bleeding profusely. Fiona hoped that his femoral artery had not been cut. She got on the intercom to Med-Bay.

  “Help!” she cried, “The Captain is down! His femoral artery may be cut!”

  “I’m on my way,” replied a female voice unfamiliar to her.

  “Thank you!” she cried. Fiona, then, cut the pant leg off and dressed the wound. “Don’t worry, Ken,” she cried, her tears now floating in the weightless bridge, “I won’t let you die! I promise!” To her surprise and relief, he stirred slightly, emitting a pained groan.

  “Fi …”

  “Don’t strain yourself,” she ordered, wiping away her tears and enfolding him in her arms. “Help is on the way.”

  He lost consciousness, but was still breathing raggedly.

  Shortly, a Japanese woman and two of the Fujin’s male crew were on hand with the gurney from the Med-Bay to help her move Kendrick., where an I.V. was already set up.

  “I’m the Fujin’s doctor, Yori, Hayashi,” the Japanese woman said. “Help me get him onto the gurney.”

  Fiona nodded, laying Kendrick gently onto the gurney. She noticed that the gurney was not floating as they were, and realized that its wheels were magnetic. They positioned him face down, his head turned to the side to prevent the shrapnel pushing further into his back. Once Kendrick was strapped into place, a male nurse activated the gurney’s motor and it propelled itself down the corridor to the lift, where Heather was waiting.

  “I think it is his femoral artery,” said Doctor Yori darkly. “We need to hurry.”

  Fiona went along wordlessly, holding Kendrick’s hand tightly. Once they were in the lift, Heather began lowering it using a hand crank. The resourceful engineer had learned the ins and outs of the Selene quickly, and Fiona said a silent prayer of thanks for the young woman’s presence. “Just hold on, Ken,” she whispered and as the lift descended, Fiona began praying.

  Colonel Tracht’s fuming image filled Lorgen’s screen, plainly furious. “You blundering idiot! I told you to treat him professionally! Firing on him while they were securing victims from a damaged vessel and then firing on him during negotiations is not professional! No wonder he bolted on you.”

  “I thought that it would be best to eliminate Fujita and disable Royce’s engines,” replied Lorgen, desperate to salvage something from his failure. “I also had no indication that Royce’s ship was still serviceable. I thought that damned virus the Alliance uploaded was supposed to take it out for us.”

  “I told you not to underestimate him,” replied Tracht. “Obviously, he detected it and dealt with it.”

  “We’ll be ready in less than forty minutes,” said Lorgen hopefully. “We’ll catch him and then…”

  “You don’t have enough fuel to maintain a burn long enough to catch him and your engines are incapable of generating a powerful enough burn at one time to catch him. He’ll be at Mars well ahead of you and possibly be gone before you arrive, if he has fully excised the virus. I’ll mobilize our Mars agents and have him delayed. Return to base. Tracht out.”

  Lorgen shook his fists. Royce will pay for the lives of those men, he thought. Lorgen had taken the call from Tracht in his cabin. He had known that Tracht would have harsh words and had no interest in being dressed down in front of his bridge crew. But Tracht isn’t out here, goddamit! We’re the ones in harm’s way, you pompous ass, he thought. And those marines are all dead because of that bitch. That bitch and her new sugar daddy. They’ll pay! They’ll all pay! He stepped onto the bridge and took stock. It seemed that the bridge crew was already onboard.

  “We’re tracking the Selene, Sir,” announced the communications officer. “Normally, we wouldn’t be able to catch her, but Selene is stopped dea
d.”

  “Good work, Mister Levin,” Lorgen praised. “His navigation and sensors are probably still out of commission, which means he’s going nowhere fast.”

  “He won’t be dead for long,” observed Mister Myers, the Enigma’s executive officer. “Once he gets a fix on his position and gets his sensors up, he’ll be at Mach 30.”

  “But we know where he’s going,” countered Lorgen. “He’ll make for Mars once he gets moving, so we need to keep him from doing that. We’ll get him and make him pay for the lives of those marines.”

  “Calling those men … ‘marines’ is a bit of a stretch, don’t you think?” observed Mister Myers dryly.

  “They do what marines do,” growled Lorgen. “And they’re from the same stock, so don’t you go belittling their sacrifice.”

  “Speaking of which,” Myers added, “waiting to fire on Royce until after his sixty seconds was up, might have saved the lives of those men. And I seriously doubt that Royce knew they were hanging out behind his engines; his sensors were down, remember? There’s a reason you shouldn’t stand right behind a horse.”

  Lorgen bristled and got right up in his XO’s face. “You got something to say, you just fucking say it!”

  “I just did, Sir,” replied Myers unflinchingly, as he stood to face Lorgen.

  The two men stood facing each other for a few moments, staring one another down. They were roughly the same size, both just shy of a hundred and eighty centimeters tall, and both trim and athletic. Myers’ dark skin and graying temples were a contrast to Lorgen’s fair, but very rough, complexion and reddish-blond hair. Eyes of onyx locked onto Lorgen’s steel-blue eyes. Surprisingly, Lorgen blinked.

  “Mister Myers, you have the con. I need to pay a visit to engineering.”

  “Yes, Sir,” replied Myers calmly as Lorgen left the bridge and went down to engineering to see what the progress was.