Black Star Renegades

by Michael Moreci

  They were going to have to save themselves.

  “You want to know what this is, Teeg?” Cade asked. “It’s inevitability. Now go, get everyone off this planet.”

  Pacing back as if in a daze, Teeg and his cabal headed off, and Kira sent her squadron to their Echoes. That left the two of them, alone, with both of them knowing that in a few moments’ time they had to part ways.

  A crisp wind blew through the hangar, and Cade blew into his hand for warmth. He looked at Kira, whose cheeks were turning pink from the cold. Before their paths crossed on Aria, they weren’t friends; they were hardly acquaintances. But now, the thought of losing her struck Cade straight to his core, like an abstraction that could be felt more than understood. He wanted to make the idea of losing Kira similar to losing Mig, or even 4-Qel, but he couldn’t. Not that he was ranking his degrees of loss, just that he knew, more than ever, the unique value of what was at stake with the people he cared about. In a short span of time, Kira had come to mean something to him that no one else ever had, and Cade realized, as he held her gaze in an intensely quiet moment, that he couldn’t bear being without her.

  “Kira, I want you to know that I…” Cade stammered, tripping over words that felt horribly inaccurate. But the words, he knew, were true. And they were all he had, so they had to count for something. “I couldn’t have done this without you.”

  “Yeah, no kidding,” Kira said with a playful grin.

  Cade smiled back, and all he wanted to do was take this moment and freeze it in time so he could hold on to it forever—even if forever, he feared, was only a matter of hours.

  “Don’t do anything crazy out there, okay?”

  “I’m pretty sure crazy is the bedrock of what we’re about to do.”

  “Well, yeah,” Cade said. “But, look—this plan can go from marginally possible to suicidal in the blink of an eye. And if it does turn, then you need to get out.”

  Kira smiled and let out a short laugh. She jerked her head back, throwing the dreadlocks out of her face. It was something, Cade realized, she did all the time. “Yeah? And what are you going to do if things go bad?”

  Another breeze went by, and Cade felt its cold pass through his body. He fought off a shiver as he looked at Kira, wanting nothing more than to hold her close and finish the kiss they’d nearly shared on the Rubicon. But as he looked up to the sky and the star that was becoming weaker with each passing moment, he knew this wasn’t the time or the place for what he wanted.

  “Don’t worry about me,” Cade said, spreading a cocksure smile across his face. “I still have a few tricks up my sleeve.”

  Cade knew he and Kira should get moving, but neither of them could turn and walk away. Instead, they shared a quiet moment, neither knowing what to say in the face of the uncertainty and danger ahead. They took each other’s hands and let the silence be; neither felt the need to speak, neither had the words to convey what might be their final good-bye. The presence of each other was enough for them both.

  The moment came to an abrupt end when Cade’s attention was diverted by the sound of footsteps thumping down the Rubicon’s hatch. Both he and Kira turned and spotted 4-Qel, back on his two legs, heading toward them.

  “Looking good!” Kira said, and 4-Qel responded with a twirl that anyone still in possession of their vision would call “graceful.”

  “The koruvite made for an excellent substitute for the material in my knees that’d been destroyed. I feel readier to destroy my enemies than ever.”

  “Then you’re about to have the time of your life,” Cade said.

  “I relish the opportunity,” the drone replied. “Shall we take to the sky?”

  “We shall,” Cade replied, “but let’s do so with no further twirling.”

  Cade smiled as 4-Qel walked by him and slapped his shoulder, harder than he probably intended. His gaze met Kira’s, and he knew it was time. They both had to leave.

  “I’ll see you when this is all over,” he said, and he could only hope his words rang true.

  “When this is over,” Kira replied, her face conveying a steadfast certainty that she and Cade would live to see “over.”

  With that, they went their separate ways.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  The Horizon Dawn’s weapons-lock system activated sooner than Cade anticipated. He was flying just a little bit ahead of Omega Squadron on a course straight for the War Hammer, and he was surprised his control panel registered weapons being locked on his position from as far away as he was. Which was good. Cade and Omega wanted as much distance from the War Hammer as possible, and now they all knew just how far their weapons reached. The bad part was that when Cade’s weapons-lock system became active, it nearly went into cardiac arrest. Cade couldn’t even count the number of cannons, missiles, and torpedoes that were all the push of a button away from blowing him so thoroughly into oblivion that not even so much of a speck of him or his ship would be left behind.

  What a nice way to get this thing started.

  A transmission came through Cade’s control panel, and Cade patched it in.

  “Incoming vessel,” an uptight voice said, coming through the comms. “We have this ship identified as belonging to Cade Sura. Please verify.”

  “Yup,” Cade said. “That’s me.”

  The voice cleared its throat. “I believe instructions were clear for you to arrive at the War Hammer alone to exchange the Rokura for your friend.”

  “I am alone,” Cade replied. “There’s no one in my ship but me.”

  “But, the other ships,” the voice said, getting confused, “they’re with you.”

  Cade smiled, thinking about the eighteen Omega Squadron customized Echoes, centered around the Rubicon, hovering in space behind him. He liked the idea of forcing Praxis to question what was going on right in front of them. Forcing them to feel uncertain.

  “Well, my old friend Jorken and I never discussed the delivery details, so I took the liberty of coming up with my own arrangements. Are you ready to hear them? Do you need to write this down?”

  The voice hmphed. So, Cade mused, Praxis enlistees did retain enough of their souls to still have pride.

  “Convey your terms.”

  “Okay,” Cade said, leaning toward his comms unit, “here’s what we’re going to do:

  “I don’t trust Praxis to make a fair, even exchange. What that means is that once I hand over the Rokura, there’s nothing preventing you from killing both my friend and me, right on the spot. So instead of me bringing the Rokura on board, I’m going to leave it out here with my friends. It’s located in one of these eighteen ships. You don’t know which one, and I won’t tell you. That means, in case you’re not following, if you decide to launch your fighters against my friends, you run the risk of losing the Rokura to the cold, black heart of space.

  “Now, I’m going to fly into the War Hammer. I’m totally alone; you can scan my ship for life-forms and see for yourself. When I dock, I get Mig, I fly out, then we launch a drone containing the Rokura back to the War Hammer. And then, our business is complete. Got it?”

  The voice scoffed, smugly. “And once you have your friend, what’s to say you’ll uphold your end of this arrangement?”

  “Seriously?” Cade sighed. “If I don’t send the Rokura to you, you’ll annihilate my ship and every ship that I’ve come here with in the blink of an eye. Why would I go through all this trouble to save my friend just to get him, my squad, and myself killed?”

  There was a pause, and Cade could almost hear the gears grinding in the head of whoever this voice belonged to as he tried to verify and/or deny his logic. He either surrendered or comprehended, because when he came back, he granted Cade clearance to land in the War Hammer.

  As Cade slowly made his way toward the landing bay he’d been directed to, he angled his viewport to get a look at the War Hammer at work. A massive beam of explosive light was being sucked from Ticus’s sun and guided into the ship thanks to the koruvi
te shielding technology. He watched as the star’s energy crackled and burst in the koruvite chamber that extended from the ship to the star; Cade was awed that such power could be contained. It was magnificent and awful at the same time, and Cade felt a renewed sense of determination as he zeroed in on the War Hammer; only a few precious hours remained before Ticus turned into an uninhabitable rock. It was irrevocably changing every minute, and Cade knew a lot of things had to go right, starting now, if they had any chance at stopping Praxis.

  Cade entered the landing bay—which was like an enormous cavern dug into a mountain, in terms of scope—and he realized that he had no idea what to expect. No one who went into the War Hammer came out again. This was a trip reserved for the worst Praxis offenders—insurgent leaders, political enemies, and other instigators that happened to piss the kingdom off. And Praxis certainly had no defectors who lived to tell the tale of what was inside; you turn on Praxis, you might as well prep yourself for an unfortunate trip to an airlock. Cade was now strategically blind. He had no idea what the ship’s layout was, how many people were inside, or, most importantly, where the holding cells were. It was all okay, Cade reminded himself. He had it covered.

  What he found inside, though, was strangely pedestrian. There were docked ships, technicians working on them, and a control tower hovering in the rear. It was just a hangar. A hangar filled with evil, evil men and women who, at this very moment, were all plotting a way to kill Cade. He was certain of it.

  And he was right. When Cade came down the Horizon Dawn’s hatch, he was immediately surrounded by four gunners. Their weapons were hot, and they all shared a cold, angry mien that assured Cade they were serious about pulling their triggers. As if that was in question.

  A young man in a crisp officer’s uniform—a deep red shirt tucked into pants so stiff Cade was surprised he could even walk—split the gunners, approaching Cade with a look on his face that expressed his complete satisfaction with himself.

  Cade was looking forward to knocking that look right off his face.

  “Did you really expect your little plan to work?” the officer said.

  “So far, so good,” Cade replied.

  The officer narrowed his gaze. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means you’re screwed, jerkface,” Cade replied, his tone buoyant.

  Like a dog catching the shrill call of a whistle only it could hear, the officer upturned his head and conveyed his confusion. But Cade didn’t need to say another word. He let 4-Qel do the talking for him.

  The drone bounded down the Horizon Dawn’s hatch, chewing up the space between him and the gunners.

  “Is that…?” the officer asked, tumbling backward. “Is that a Qel?”

  Cade smiled, taking a moment to enjoy seeing the smugness vanish from the officer’s face. “It sure is. Interesting fact: Qels don’t show up on life-form scanners. Cool, right?”

  The officer was confounded, and Cade was tired of wasting time. He connected a right hook across the Praxis lackey’s face, knocking him off his feet. Meanwhile, 4-Qel made quick work of the gunners. He was on the first two before they could even fire; he smashed their skulls together, and Cade heard a cracking noise that probably spelled a lifetime of meals out of straws for both gunners. The third gunner burst off a round of blasts that 4-Qel rolled under. He sprang up right in front of the gunner, grabbed her by the throat, and her launched her into her only remaining squad mate. Before either could stand up, 4-Qel was on them.

  “Taking my friend was a mistake,” 4-Qel said right before he stomped down on them both. Cade heard more cracking.

  “You’re crazy!” the officer said as he pedaled backward on his ass. Cade, with 4-Qel at his side, kept pace with him. “You’ll never get out of this ship alive!”

  “Oh, I beg to differ, though I’m touched by your concern,” Cade said. “If I were you, I’d be more worried about my own survival. And you can survive this; all you have to do is tell us where our friend is being held.”

  “Never,” the officer snarled, his refusal unconvincing.

  Cade sighed. “Look, I get it. You’re loyal to Praxis. You’re afraid of what they’ll do to you if you talk. But here’s the thing: If you don’t talk to us, the Qel is going to rip out your spine. Slowly.”

  The officer looked at 4-Qel, horrified. 4-Qel was silent. “He couldn’t,” the officer said, turning back to Cade.

  “I just upgraded my legs, and they give me the torque required to hold you in place as I remove your backbone,” 4-Qel said.

  “Red corridor,” the officer blurted. “Take it to the end, then head left. That’s where you’ll find the holding area.”

  “If you’re lying…” Cade said as 4-Qel grabbed the officer from the floor and lifted him over his head.

  “I swear!”

  Cade and 4-Qel shared a look. They were both fairly certain the officer had been sufficiently terrified into telling the truth. “Okay, we believe you. Qel, take his spine.”

  “What?!” the officer howled.

  Cade laughed. “Just kidding. But, for real,” Cade said, nudging 4-Qel, “knock him out.”

  A single head butt was all it took to knock the officer out cold. 4-Qel tossed him to the ground as if he were a bag of rags.

  Cade activated his comms unit and patched into the secure line he’d established with Kira.

  “Kira!” Cade called as he and 4-Qel bolted from the hangar toward the corridor entrance on the far side of the room. “We’re in; you are clear to make your run!”

  “Yeah, I kinda figured you were,” Kira’s voice cracked through the comms. “They just deployed fighters, so expect company coming your way soon.”

  “Don’t worry,” Cade said, a half smile directed at 4-Qel. “We’ve got this.”

  “Same here,” Kira said. “Time for target practice. Over and out.”

  Cade and 4-Qel came to a fork in the corridor ahead and turned right, following the walls painted a syrupy red. As they turned the corner, Cade drew both his sidewinder and shido, expecting to encounter trouble ahead. While he knew fighting his way in and out of the War Hammer was a given—he wouldn’t have smuggled 4-Qel with him if he hadn’t—Cade made the mistake of severely underestimating how prepared the Praxis army would be for a sneak attack. At least he thought it was a sneak attack. But when he and 4-Qel swung around the corner, they ran headfirst into what couldn’t have been less than an entire battalion. Sentry drones and gunners packed the corridor, positioned shoulder to shoulder and five across so they filled every inch of the space from one side to the other. They formed an impenetrable mass—a heavily armed mass—that stood between Cade and releasing Mig.

  “Oh boy,” Cade marveled and came to a stop that was so hard he almost fell over. 4-Qel, a step behind Cade, didn’t even break stride as he came to the corridor. He pulled a small device from his side holster; it was just a small handle, but attached to it was a piece of koruvite, folded into a cube. 4-Qel shoved Cade behind him as he jabbed the cube in front of them both, holding it at chest level. Ahead, the first wave of sentries began to push forward and spray fire across the corridor.

  Not a single shot passed 4-Qel, though. Cade peeked his head around 4-Qel’s torso, terrified that his drone friend was using himself as a shield. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case. The handle in 4-Qel’s grip extended the koruvite to make a protective barrier wide enough to give cover to both Cade and 4-Qel, and its strength wouldn’t allow a single blaster’s fire to penetrate it.

  Cade poked his sidewinder around the edge of the shield and returned fire, downing sentries as 4-Qel pushed forward. The drone kept both hands gripped on the shield handle, keeping their protection straight and steady; while the shield was in no danger of getting breached, each blaster impact threatened to knock their coverage from 4-Qel’s grip, leaving either one of them, or both, exposed.

  “Just hold us steady!” Cade instructed over the screaming blaster fire that relentlessly battered the koruvite. “W
e’ll get through this!”

  It seemed like a thing Tristan would say, though Cade had serious doubts about their chances of survival, let alone getting to Mig. The sentries were pushing forward, collapsing the space between the two opposing sides. As many as Cade shot down, more and more stepped up to take their place. Soon the sentries would be on top of them, and with enough force and enough numbers, they’d be able to overtake 4-Qel’s shield. As the sentries continued to march forward, the barrage of blaster fire pounded the koruvite; every shot exploded a splash of color on the shield, blanketing it in a fiery orange. 4-Qel strained as the force of the assault increased with their proximity to the enemy; he was pushing against an unending stream of powerful resistance, and Cade could tell that it was getting harder for him to maintain his footing.

  “GRRRAHH!” 4-Qel grunted, and Cade could see him straining to keep himself upright as the relentless assault worked to push him back. Just as Cade was about to grab the handle in 4-Qel’s grasp, he heard a gunner ahead yell to his squad mates.

  “Barrage!” he called. “Down!”

  The assault paused, allowing just enough time for Cade and 4-Qel to look ahead and see four rows of drones drop to the floor. Their movement revealed an ion cannon, manned by a single gunner whose entire head was covered by a heavy-duty helmet, broken only by a single, narrow slit for vision.

  “FIRE!” someone yelled, and Cade rushed to 4-Qel’s side. He grabbed the shield’s handle and tightened every muscle in his body, bracing for an impact that, without shielding, would surely blow both 4-Qel and Cade right out of the ship. After shattering every bone in his body.

  An eruption rang so loud through the corridor that it shook the walls and ruptured Cade’s eardrums. The explosive sound was accompanied by what he imagined it would be like to have a starship crash into your chest. He had no way of measuring the impact of the ion cannon’s power other than by depicting the gory mess it would have left of him had he not been holding a slab of koruvite in his hands. He felt the impact in his bones; he felt it in his teeth. He felt it in his muscles as he strained more than he’d ever strained in his life, fighting to resist the cannon fire’s force. Cade and 4-Qel were pushed back onto their heels, but they managed to hold their position. The shielding absorbed enough of the cannon’s power and, somehow, they managed to not end up plastered against the wall behind them.