by Drew Avera
Inside the belly panel, a fully assembled drive was present. Except for layers of dust, it looked nearly pristine.
"Auden, grab the drive while I disassemble this," he said.
Auden pulled the electric drive and extension from the pocket of her cloak and presented it to him with a grin. Then Tara flicked on a flashlight and shone it up into the belly. Kevin didn't hesitate to begin the removal process. His heart beat rapidly in his chest as their escape route came closer into view.
Thank God for small miracles he thought as the final band clamp came loose and he pulled the modules free from the ship. He inspected them with a flashlight and noticed that the blades were fully intact. A small buildup of rust on the edges had begun to form, but that was negligible.
"I don't know how to thank you," Kevin said as he looked at the old man seated on the toolbox.
A friendly smile was returned to him along with a nod. "It's what a friend would do, isn't it?" Chuck asked.
Kevin swallowed the knot in his throat and nodded back. "Yes, it is."
Chapter Eleven
"What do you mean stand down, Captain?" Chief Nesbitt asked as he balanced his rifle over his shoulder. The composite weapon was half the man’s height and made him even more intimidating as he growled. "My men are ready to go."
There was an indignancy to his voice that slammed through any barrier just short of disrespectful, but Captain Dickson chose to let it go rather than be contemptuous towards the combat-hardened sailor.
Dickson new the members of the extraction team bounced from one civil unrest to another, each one tattooing tick marks for their excursions as if they celebrated the hostilities more than they valued their own lives. Dickson did not have to look hard to find Nesbitt’s tattoos blazoned down his bare arms.
"I don’t want to go in guns blazing, Chief. I know that you and your men are efficient but we’re dealing with children who might not respond the same way an adult combatant would. Lethality isn’t the priority for me. I don’t want innocent blood spilled so I'll go down to negotiate his surrender."
"This was not the deal, sir. We signed up to get the traitor, not to sit on the ship and spin on our thumbs because we’ve got nothing else better to do." He glared at his skipper, but Dickson wasn't about to back down.
Not by a longshot.
"You have your orders, Chief. I expect you to execute them until the time arises that a new set of orders is issued. Do you understand that?" Barely contained rage caused Dickson to speak more forcefully than he had in years. With the news cycle constantly dripping with reports about conflict arising across the galaxy, everyone was on edge. But this situation was wholly unlike any of those others. This was one of their own, a man who swore the same oath as the rest of them had suddenly gone rogue, allegedly. Surely there was a way to reason with him, especially with his family's lives on the line.
Chief Nesbitt dropped his rifle onto the steel table between them. The clatter startled Captain Dickson and seeing the red flash in the younger man's eyes did little to persuade him not to be. "Fine, Captain But if you run into something that requires you to shoot your way out of, don't say I didn't warn you," Nesbitt spat before darting out of the armory.
Dickson swore under his breath as he craned his neck, popping the vertebrae to relieve the stress he felt piling up on him. "This better be worth it," he muttered as he lifted the rifle and placed it back into place on the armory wall. He didn't like rocking the boat with combat vets any more than he liked the idea of going toe-to-toe with another capable ship if war truly was to pop off. What made things worse was that everyone on board was supposed to be on the same side. And while he felt like Kevin wasn’t likely to be a traitor, he wondered if he was treading closer to that label as he stepped out of the armory.
"Is everything all right, sir?" Lieutenant Harrison asked.
Dickson stopped in his tracks, not wanting to admit that the lieutenant caught him off guard. He had asked the junior officer to accompany him to help resolve the conflict with the extraction team which mounted after being told to stand down. He had completely forgotten about it as his brain fired off visions of what would happen if the trained killer standing before him decided that the skipper of the warship was his new target.
"It went as well as it could, I suppose. Chief Nesbitt just needs some time and space to cool down." Outside of an airlock would suit him nicely, Dickson thought as he stepped past the lieutenant.
Dickson stalked towards the bridge and Lieutenant Harrison fell into step next to him like a pet. "He seems far beyond the point of simply needing to cool off, sir."
"Excellent assumption, Lieutenant. Still, he needs to understand my position and learn how to take orders. It's not personal. At least not yet. Also, I have more information on Kevin and his headspace, we can ascertain what needs to happen to execute a safe and less deadly arrest. I just don't feel right going in guns blazing."
"But the admiral did say that the traitor should be brought in by any means necessary."
The cold remark struck Dickson and he turned and stared down his nose at the inexperienced navigation officer. he had known the lieutenant less than a year, and in that time he never thought he could pin down what made the man tick. Was he that eager to appease the leadership that he would forgo common sense in the process? It certainly sounded that way.
"What I consider any means necessary might differ from you, Lieutenant. So, when you're the one in charge of the ship, and other people's lives are in your hands, you can have that decision. But for now, perhaps you should learn how to follow before you think you know how to lead."
"I didn't mean anything by that, sir," Harrison replied meekly.
Dickson could tell by the tone in the young man's voice that his comment knocked the young officer down a peg. He didn't have time to feel bad about it. If anything, it would be a growing moment in the other man's career. Dickson had enough of those moments in his life that built his character. It wouldn’t kill Harrison to have a few more before he took command of anything where he had other peoples’ lives in his hands. "Noted."
Captain Dickson stopped short of the bridge and turned to look to the navigation officer. "What inspired you to join the Consulate Navy?"
Harrison shrugged. "I wouldn’t say I was ever inspired, sir. It was simply an opportunity that I saw, and I took it. I hardly knew what the Consulate Navy’s mission was until I was going up for my commission."
Captain Dickson resisted the urge to slap the stupid out of what the lieutenant had just said. Who simply sees an opportunity and jumps on it without knowing what the purpose behind the organization might be? "Would you consider yourself an opportunist, Lieutenant Harrison?"
The lieutenant looked down at his boots before responding, "I hadn’t thought of that, sir."
"Then perhaps you should reevaluate your reasoning for being here," Dickson replied. "Our purpose is in the name. The consulate is supposed to bring comfort to those in its charge. We’re not supposed to be combatants. We’re not supposed to be the enemy delivering violence. We were meant to be a beacon of hope that promoted peace. Somewhere along the line, we seem to have lost sight of that. God help us if we don't rediscover our purpose before it's too late."
Lieutenant Harrison nodded, "I think I understand, sir."
Dickson's lips curled into a faint smile. Perhaps I'm getting through to him after all, he thought. "Good. Prepare the ship to enter Karnack’s atmosphere. We don't have the time to waste."
"Initiate stealth mode," Captain Dickson ordered as the destroyer entered Karnack’s atmosphere with a jolt. He knew the planet based defense systems were largely inferior, and despite the ravages of the past, he doubted the Grotans would fire upon a Consulate ship without some type of warning. What worried him, however, was not knowing the state of Kevin's ship and whether the sensor array was scanning for his presence.
"Our trajectory is set, and our drive is stable, Captain," Lieutenant Harrison said from his console.
That's obvious, Dickson thought, otherwise all of the screens would be flashing. "Maintain course until we’re at an elevation of five-thousand feet. I want to approach the target from the South at a low altitude. Even in stealth mode, he might be able to detect us if the sensor array is tuned to the right frequency."
"Aye, sir."
Dickson settled into his seat, grasping the armrest with an iron grip. He hated flying in the atmosphere on a ship the size of his destroyer. The weapon systems alone made the craft heavier than a scout ship, and this ship’s drive was just a mere thirty percent more efficient.
An old engineering phrase from the early days of human flight came to his mind when he pondered how the ship truly operated: you went with what worked, not because you knew how it worked, but because it was the one design that hadn't failed yet. Yet, was the optimal word and as the ship shuddered against turbulence and gravity he couldn't help but anticipate the impending casualty.
How ridiculous to be the captain of a ship that gets nervous flying in a planet's atmosphere, he mused, more to settle his nerves than to allow the irony of the situation to be any form of enlightenment.
The ship pitched nose up at a steady rate as the lieutenant turned his head to relay the change. "We're leveling out at five-thousand feet, sir. Maintaining the speed of two-hundred knots. Stealth mode is still engaged."
Captain Dickson nodded in affirmation to the young lieutenant, acknowledging him quietly as another rumble of the craft turned his stomach. His eyes were fixed to the viewport as it magnified everything in front of the ship. It was far more efficient than looking out of a small porthole, though it gave him the sense of being a fish looking out of a fishbowl.
Most of the planet’s surface glistened as the overheated sand formed a substance similar to glass. He saw mountains in the distance and in the foreground of those ranges were the remnants of once-booming cities.
That was where Commander Hoyt was, but not for long, he thought while his knuckles grew white as his grip tightened on the armrest. It was just a matter of time until this was all behind them and Dickson mouthed a silent prayer that he wasn’t making a mistake disobeying Admiral Hardak’s orders.
He just hoped a prayer was enough to save him.
The destroyer locked onto Hoyt's ship’s location and initiated the preliminary automatic landing sequence. Captain Dickson used the ship’s sensory array to scan for lifeforms on the vessel and let out a sigh at what he found. "Only one of them is on the ship," he said under his breath. "We might need to wait them out and see if the others return. The ship’s drive is off, so we have plenty of time to engage if they try and escape."
"Why don’t we go ahead and seize the ship? Having it in custody will prevent them from slipping by us." Harrison asked before turning his gaze to the commanding officer.
The young officer had a point, but that wasn't how Dickson wanted to run the operation. The person left on board could be one of Kevin's children, and seizing it would be a traumatic experience for someone who didn't deserve it. He was certain that Admiral Hardak would order the ship seized anyway, but what the Chief of Naval affairs didn't know, didn't hurt him.
"You’re starting to sound like Chief Nesbitt, but we’re going to do this my way. I say we wait them out and see if anyone returns. Keep a few kilometers between us and them so they don't notice us."
"Aye sir," Harrison replied as he plotted the landing coordinates for the ship as directed. The destroyer began its descent while stealth mode prevented them from detection. It was anyone's guess how long it would be before anyone returned to Hoyt's ship, but if Dickson knew anything about Kevin, is was that he was a man of principle and was equally as unrelenting when it came to getting the job done. If the ship needed repair, Dickson could be assured that Kevin was well on his way to doing it.
"What shall we do in the meantime?"
Dickson cast his gaze to the lieutenant, lifting an eyebrow in confusion. "What do you mean?"
"There's only so much sitting around and waiting that we can do before it becomes a waste of time," Harrison said. "At what point do we depart so that we can rendezvous with Admiral Hardak and his staff?"
Dickson hadn't considered that being an option. He assumed Kevin would be on the ship upon their arrival, and that he could coax the commander into surrendering peacefully. If he didn’t have the opportunity to do so, and admiral arrived in the Karnack Sector while the destroyer was on Karnack, then he would have to answer for why he disobeyed a direct order. He groaned at the possibility that this was all for naught. "Ask me again in an hour."
Harrison nodded and turned his attention back to the feed on the wall monitor. Kevin's ship sat in the desert, beaming sunlight as it reflected off the hull as the sun began to lower beyond the horizon. It was a peaceful moment in an otherwise volatile week, the calm before the storm that Will Dickson knew was inevitable.
Once Kevin was in custody then the hard work would begin. Seeing someone he had known for years go down for something uncharacteristic of him was not going to be an easy pill to swallow. He hoped that it was a misunderstanding if nothing more than to give credence to the nagging voice in the back of his mind that what he was doing was wrong.
Perhaps it was wrong, but he would not know until the job was done, and then it might be too late.
Perhaps for both of them.
Chapter Twelve
"What can I offer you in trade for these parts?" Kevin asked after Chuck refused to take his money. Of course, he hadn’t considered where Consulate credits might be spent on a world that resented them.
Chuck looked away, avoiding eye contact with the Consulate naval officer. Something changed after Kevin removed the drive modules from the wrecked ship, and Kevin was trying desperately to make things right, not wanting to take advantage of the older man's generosity.
"I’m just happy to see it go to good use," Chuck replied flippantly. "Besides, I don't have much sympathy for the Consulate and if I can do something to make their job a little bit harder, then I’ll consider that payment enough."
Kevin cleared his throat. "You do realize that I’ve spent the last twenty years serving the Consulate?"
Chuck scoffed at the human’s response. "All of your kind think one-dimensionally," he said. "You think you're the center of the universe. But you’re nothing more than a particle at the whim of the cosmic wind. Your life may have been guided by the Consulate, but like me, you’re its victim now and that does not make you my enemy."
Kevin hadn't thought of it that way, though it did little to encourage him. He felt as if he was about to fight a mountain and the closer that he got to the top the more it tried to shake him off. With his daughters out of earshot, he replied, "I appreciate this, Chuck. I hope that one day I can do something to deserve your hospitality."
Chuck peered over to the teenage girls standing in the distance under the arch. "I used to have children too, but one of the side effects of having your planet bombarded from orbit is that not everyone survives. You don't have to do anything to earn my hospitality, but if you still want to try, keep those girls of yours alive and well. Provide them the future that my children deserved." He stopped talking and sucked in a trembling breath as he turned away from Kevin. "I trust that you can find your way back?"
"We can."
"Godspeed, Commander," Chuck said before stepping into the shadows.
"Why do you want us to stay in a room overnight?" Auden asked as she followed her father down the hallway of the hotel. "Wouldn't it be more efficient for us to help you install the modules so we can leave sooner?"
"your mother thought it would be a good idea for you to have a hot shower and a decent night's sleep. I think the two of you have earned it as well. Besides, your mother can help me install the modules and we can ensure the ship is ready to go at first light. All you need to do is ensure that you and your sister are back to the ship and we’ll take off from this place and not look back."
"I'
m inclined to agree with Auden," Tara interrupted. "This feels more like a waste of time or a distraction because you don't want us on the ship, and you're using this as an excuse to keep us away."
"I hadn’t thought of that possibility," Auden interjected as she glanced suspiciously at her sister.
Kevin stopped walking, turned and looked down at his daughters. "That's not it at all," he said. "What you need to understand is that it's a large risk for us to be out in the open. If the Consulate was to scan this planet for our presence, then it's only a matter of time before they would find us. If they come for us, we won't have time to flee. And if these modules don't fix the ship, then you're at risk for no reason. Do you understand?"
His girls nodded in affirmation, but he still recognized the expressions on their faces that they resented the idea of being left behind, even if it was overnight. "First thing tomorrow, God willing, we’re out of here. All right?"
"All right," Auden said as her sister nodded next to her.
Kevin grinned and turned to face the door to the room. He used the key card to unlock the door and shoved it open for his children. "Use all the hot water you can get and get a good night's sleep. Who knows how long it will be before you get the next opportunity?"
Auden and Tara stepped into the room and doffed their cloaks, dropping them on the bed nearest the door before turning to see the father.
"First thing tomorrow?" Tara asked skeptically.
"He smirked, "first thing tomorrow. Have a good night’s sleep."
"Good night, father," Tara replied.
"Good night," Auden said under her breath, but he still heard it. "See you tomorrow."
Kevin closed the door behind him and took the stairs leading out of the hotel. His rucksack held the modules for the ship's drive and his back was already aching from the heavy load. All he wanted to do was get back on the ship and get off Karnack, but he couldn’t rush the process. He needed the ship to be fully operational if they were going to get off this planet alive.