by Scott Baron
The threat of violent decompression did not sit well with Charlie.
“Well then, let’s get moving,” he replied.
Marban smiled broadly. “Now you’re getting into the spirit, little brother!”
They joined the handful of men charging into the next section and ran headlong into a fierce fight. The captain was already there, efficiently working his way through all who stood in his way. If any had considered challenging him for control of the pirate ship, seeing him in action would immediately quell any such ambitions.
Charlie ducked and dodged a pair of attackers, breaking one’s knee in passing as he moved to choke the other one out. Marban finished the man on the ground with a quick blow to the head. Charlie flashed an annoyed look, then realized the seemingly finished man had pulled a dagger from his belt and was about to push off with his remaining good leg, aiming to put an end to Charlie’s pirating days.
He gave a grateful nod to Marban as the man in his arms slid into unconsciousness. He quickly trussed him up for the others to retrieve, then moved forward.
The fighting continued, but it seemed as if the next section was theirs for the taking, the defenders having fallen back in panic. A pair of men eagerly charged through the short corridor into the unprotected section.
“Wait!” Captain Saramin called after them, but it was too late.
There was no time to save the men. As it was, the captain only barely managed to utter the command while there was still atmosphere to carry his voice, quickly placing a force field across the doorway. A doorway that now opened into the vacuum of space. The last two sections of the ship were broken free, falling into the nearby planet’s gravity. In short order, it would pass into the atmosphere, eventually plowing into the ground below.
“Idiots. Never charge in like that,” he growled, then turned back to his men. “Okay, you lot, we’re done here. They’ve scuttled the rest of the ship, so gather up whatever cargo there is and send the laborers to carry it back to the Rixana.” He turned to Marban and Charlie. “I need volunteers to go to the surface of that planet and see if anything useful survived the impact. You two are it. Go gather some muscle and get to it.”
“Yes, Captain,” Marban said, then took off for the cells on their craft, Charlie following close behind.
“Shit, that was close,” the greenhorn human said.
“That’s why the captain warned us. Those idiots tripped the spell that scuttled the rest of the ship. If the vacuum and reentry didn’t kill them, I’m sure the captain would have.”
The two men quickly made their way through the bustling ranks of men ferrying their plunder back to the Rixana and pulled a half dozen of the strongest prisoners from their cells. They then loaded into the ship’s cargo shuttle with its contingent of a handful of Drooks and separated from the larger craft.
Finding the scuttled ship was easy, Charlie realized. Just follow the smoke, flames, and debris. And of that there was plenty.
As their shuttle grew closer to the crash site, he found that despite the greenery crushed and shattered in the crash, as well as the vast, verdant landscape around the wreckage, he nevertheless couldn’t help but feel a sense of deja vú.
He had arrived in this galaxy in much the same fashion. The crew of this particular ship, however, had most certainly not fared as well as he had.
Chapter Forty-Seven
The two sections the hapless ship’s captain had chosen to scuttle, rather than allow to be captured, had apparently possessed some sort of automatic safeties that kicked in when they neared the planet’s surface. Their rapid descent had not been fully arrested, but the impact had lessened enough that whatever protective shielding had turned on somehow managed to keep the structures largely intact.
The only problem was, they had buried themselves deep under the loamy soil when they crashed.
Unlike the hardpack Charlie’s ship had encountered, causing a long slide as it gouged the surface, this world was softer in that regard. As a result, the speed and angle of approach turned out to be just right for the craft to burrow like a tick on a dog. Only, unlike a tick, this time the entire body was underground.
“Okay, you know what the captain expects of you all. Get digging,” Marban said to his crew of prisoners as they disembarked the shuttle.
He and Charlie surveyed the crash site as the men labored below. It was going to be a long day. “That thing plowed in there good,” he noted.
“Yeah, that it did,” Marban said with a little laugh. “On the bright side, that means we’ll have an extended bit of fresh air down here on the surface, right?”
“But won’t Captain Saramin be a bit anxious for us to get back with our salvage?”
“He will be, but the captain and I have a history. Been with him a long time now, and he knows how I love the more quiet worlds. And just look at this,” he said, gesturing to the vast expanse of utterly quiet forests and fields. “And better yet, once they dig their way underground, even the sounds of their labor will be out of earshot.”
Charlie looked at his unlikely friend with amusement and a bit of wonder. Marban looked the part of a rough and tough pirate, but there was an underlying tranquility the others seemed to lack. Whatever his past life had been, he was definitely far more than merely a thuggish pirate, despite his scarred and rugged exterior.
“You think we’ll find any survivors in there?”
“Nah. Not a chance, little brother.”
“But the ship seems pretty intact. Maybe––”
“Trust me on this one. I’ve seen this sort of thing before, and believe me, it’s not pretty. The ship was scuttled, which means violent decompression. Now sure, maybe some were in sealed compartments away from the breach, but then you have a mostly unshielded atmospheric entry, the temperatures of which would fry most beings, powered or not.”
“That must be horrible.”
“To say the least. Now, suppose those poor souls somehow survived both of those things. Unlikely, but for the sake of argument let’s just say they did. Well, these two segments here were not individually powered by Drooks, which means what slowed their impact was an embedded safety spell, likely put in place by either the ship’s designer, or the party paying for the cargo being transported. In either case, the concern was preserving the ship and its contents. Not the crew.”
“So the deceleration––”
“Would have crushed them to death well before they impacted the surface. All protective spells target the ship’s hull and the cargo. Anyone unfortunate enough to be rattling around inside would be on their own.”
Marban fell silent as he watched the workers below. The only sound in the air was that of the constant digging and a faint wind rustling the leaves of the nearby trees. Despite the horrific details he’d just heard of the crew––and his fellow pirates’––deaths, Charlie couldn’t help but feel some of the stress of captivity seeping out of his body.
He took a deep breath. Then another.
“That’s the way,” Marban said with a tranquil smile. “We have to enjoy these moments of tranquility when we can. It’s a nice respite from the cacophony of our daily life.”
“You really are surprising,” Charlie said. “And I mean that in a good way.”
“Thank you, little brother. As are you. And though I’m sorry for the manner in which you came to join our little group, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t glad for it.”
The two men took a seat and watched the prisoners labor in the sun. The system possessed a yellow dwarf star, and the intensity of the sunlight was relatively mild. If not for the gray complexion of the man next to him, or the far more alien-looking aliens laboring in the dirt, Charlie could almost have felt like he was on a picnic back home.
“You know, this would be so much faster if we had our survey mech,” Charlie said after watching the work for a while.
“Survey mech? What manner of thing is that?”
“Wow, how to explain? Uh, I guess callin
g it a giant robot wouldn’t help.”
“What is a robot?”
“Yeah, exactly my point. Um, let’s just say it’s like a big metal thing, as tall as those trees over there, that’s in the rough shape of a man.”
“A statue, you mean? Yes, I’ve seen many of them at the estates of powerful vislas. Usually tributes given to them by those within the systems under their rule.”
“No, not a statue. A mech moves.”
“Moving statues? I’ve never heard of this magic.”
“It’s not magic, Marban. It’s technology. A combination of hydraulics and gearing, all linked together by a bunch of solid-state components and heavily shielded wiring.”
“Your words make no sense, Charlie. This technology-magic that moves statues.”
“Not magic. Just tech. It’s a power system that runs off of a battery charge. We were actually working on developing a fusion-based power cell, but that’s years from even being tested. Too hard to make them small enough, you see. That kind of power system is pretty much reserved for full-sized ships and whatnot.”
“So you say it is power.”
“Not like you mean. Not your people’s ‘magic’ stuff––and I still don’t know why this translation thingy always uses that word. It’s maddening.”
“Magic is magic. I don’t see the problem.”
“Well anyway, our mech is designed for hard work on Mars––that’s where it was meant for. It’s a planet with an unbreathable atmosphere––we’re talking like ninety-six percent carbon dioxide––plus some pretty drastic temperature and weather conditions.”
“Carbon dioxide?”
“A gas. It’s what we’re exhaling.”
“Ah, I see.”
“So the mech, it has tools built into its arms. Digging implements, drilling augurs, things to move a lot of dirt and soil if needed. If we had that with us, we’d have those access ports uncovered in no time.”
Marban laughed merrily. “Oh, little brother, you have the most amusing stories. Metal men as tall as a tree, moving by tech-magic. Such a vivid imagination. It would be a marvel to see, if only such a creation actually existed.”
“Just because you haven’t seen one, doesn’t mean it’s not real.”
“A valid point, Charlie. But in absence of proof, I shall remain skeptical.”
The better part of several hours passed before the prisoners finally reached a functional accessway into the buried sections of the scuttled ship. Marban rose to his feet, stretching and cracking his back.
“Well done. Get yourselves some water, then join us inside. Whatever is left to salvage will need to be transferred to our shuttle,” he said to the sweat-and dirt-covered men. “You ready to take a look?” he asked Charlie.
“Might as well get it over with,” he replied, not anxious to dig through more death and dismemberment.
They descended into the wreck, and amazingly enough, the lights were still functional.
“Part of the designer’s features,” Marban explained. “Not dependent on the rest of the ship’s functionality. It’ll likely still be illuminated long after we’re done with it.”
The angle of descent into the craft was somewhat close to level, but still rather steep, but that was to be expected given the way it had come to rest there in the first place. Carefully, the two pirates climbed through the outermost wreckage, making their way into the internal cargo hold.
As Marban had foretold, drying red stained the walls where unsecured crew had been flung into them during the crash. It was a telling crimson confirmation that there would be no survivors.
“Now that’s going to make the captain happy,” the scarred pirate said when they finally reached the innermost stowage area. “Nice and safe, and all intact.”
“What is it all?”
“Not a clue,” Marban said. “But so long as we bring the containers to the ship in one piece, that’s enough to put him in good spirits. He always enjoys the opening part. Finding out what exactly we captured. I mean, we know the basics of most shipments from their records, but there are always surprises.”
“And what kid doesn’t like surprises?” Charlie said. “It’s like Christmas, but in space. And with blood, and pirates, and aliens.” He smiled to himself. “Okay, maybe not that much like Christmas. But still.”
“Christmas?”
“I’ll explain it later,” he replied with a chuckle. “Shall we?”
“Let’s get to it.”
The labor team was called in and joined them a few minutes later to begin the long process of hauling the cargo to the surface and back to their shuttle.
“Shall we go deeper and see what’s in the other section?”
“Lead the way,” Charlie said as the pair of pirate spelunkers ventured farther into the metal cave.
Chapter Forty-Eight
“You’ve done well,” Captain Saramin said, eyeing the haul retrieved from the surface.
“I’m sorry we weren’t able to salvage as much as we’d hoped from the frontmost section, but it looked like the protective spells simply weren’t strong enough for the intensity of the impact.”
“It’s to be expected,” the captain replied. “Now go clean up and get some food. You’ve both had a long day of it.”
Marban and his human friend nodded and left the captain to survey his booty.
“He didn’t seem to take the loss of part of the cargo very hard,” Charlie said as they walked to their respective quarters to shed their dirty garments and gather clean ones.
“He’s a practical man. Sometimes ships simply don’t hold together as well as we expect them to. In this case, he was able to keep the majority of the cargo safe and intact, and he got a fair amount of prisoners in the deal as well. It was just the sections that were scuttled that proved troublesome. Hell, he had probably already written them off and was happy there was anything worth salvaging.”
“And there was quite a bit, in fact.”
“Yeah. Fortunate bit of business, that was. All right, I’m going to grab some food. You coming?”
“I’ll catch up. I need to grab a quick shower first.”
“Suit yourself. I’m grabbing mine after. I’m starving. I’ll save your spot. Just don’t take too long. You don’t want the new prisoners to eat before the crew, after all.”
“Of course not. Pecking order and all.”
“Exactly.”
“Cool. I’ll see you down there, then.”
Marban peeled off, heading for the galley to fill his belly. Charlie, on the other hand, freed himself of the uncomfortable pirate raiding gear, grabbing his regular clothes before trotting off to the shower compartment. He was thrilled to find the others had already cycled through hours before. He may have been one of them now, but there was something deeply unsettling about watching the red swirls of blood flowing into the drains––the blood of the men and women they’d killed in their raid, gradually washed from their bodies.
Alone in the hot water, however, Charlie could feel the strain of the day gradually ease from his shoulders and neck. In no time, he was clean, refreshed, and ready for a bowl of whatever the hell that mystery stuff they were serving was.
Clothed in his own attire, he felt surprisingly good as he walked to dine with his friend and recount the day’s adventures. He’d even properly explain Christmas to his alien friend, though the idea of a magical fat man on a flying sleigh would probably seem more rational to him than that of a giant robotic man.
“There you are. I was going to wait, but I figured you wouldn’t mind,” Marban said, tucking into what appeared to be his second bowl of slop. “I got you one, but it was getting cold, so––”
“It’s okay. I’ll go grab a fresh one,” Charlie said with a little grin as he diverted and headed toward the mess line.
He felt his stomach rumble with anticipation as he grabbed a heaping serving for himself, slipping to the front of the line ahead of the prisoners, as was his prerogative now t
hat he’d been promoted to actual crew. Amazingly, the mystery food he had so recently barely been able to get down had become almost appetizing.
Almost.
Just needs some hot sauce, is all, he mused. Going to have to see if a reasonable facsimile exists on one of our next stops.
He carried his metal tray back to his usual spot, a few of the new prisoners throwing a healthy amount of stink-eye at the man who had just cut in line. In his regular attire, he figured it was to be expected. He didn’t look much like a pirate minus the usual accoutrements. It was just one more thing he’d learned to take in stride.
“You see the new batch?” Marban asked.
“Yeah,” he replied as he took his seat. “Seems to be a pretty rugged crew, compared to the last few.”
“Agreed. And they fought well. I know the captain holds that in high regard, despite losing a few men.”
Charlie observed the new group as he ate. It was still an odd feeling, surveying the ‘fresh meat’ joining them on the ship. Captured fodder to replenish the ranks of those killed in the course of their piracy. It was an efficient system, he had to admit, but it was still strange, thinking he was just a labor prisoner a few short weeks ago.
And even though Charlie was officially a part of the crew now, he still wore the collar of Captain Saramin. No matter what anyone said, he was a slave. Just a slave who was afforded a great deal of freedom so long as he was in his owner’s service.
Some of the pirates, however, were not wearing the telltale collars. Truly free men who were living the life of piracy of their own volition. Some had joined up when the captain required specialized crew and offered them enough coin. Others had gained their freedom after years of labor and service, though none would tell him exactly how long he might have to fight for Saramin before he too might earn his for himself.