Silence fell almost instantly, and Captain Walker smiled. “Much better. Now at least we can conduct a civilized negotiation.”
“Negotiation?” the howling captain bellowed indignantly.
Angel thumped him hard enough on the back of the head with the butt of the pistol that his jaw slammed closed with a loud crack. He spun, and she shoved the barrel against the end of his nose, shaking her head. “I do believe Captain Walker has the floor and you are out of order little man.” She reached up with her other hand and swiveled him by the top of his head back toward the front. “Pay attention and save me the trouble of teaching you manners.”
Quinn snorted. “Good idea,” he said, tilting his head and pulling the gun out of the face of the captain he was keeping under control. “Take a seat and be a good boy.”
The man hissed but dropped into his place.
“State your starting position, Walker,” Jetaar said. He took his seat and held his face expressionless.
“Perhaps calling this a negotiation was a bit generous of me. To be fair, what I want is nonnegotiable.”
“Passage home?” one captain offered.
“I’ve already got that,” he said, smiling at the confusion around the table. If he wanted to take what he had, none of them knew what was in the Tacra Un. He let his assertion hang in the air.
“A guarantee of free operation everywhere?” Another of the captains suggested from the far end of the table.
“That’s an interesting thought, but I think even the most flatbrained among you has figured out that I’m not someone to fuck with. So that doesn’t amount to much either.”
Jetaar nodded, along with almost half the other captains. “What is it that closes the deal for you?”
Ethan chuckled and walked over to where Quinn stood beside the bleeding out body of Captain X. He turned and slid his butt up on the table. “What I will have from you, is a seat on this Council.”
Kaycee spun in his direction, shock visibly locking her brain out. He winked, but she didn’t seem to be able to even fit that into reality.
“Over my frakking dead body!” the captain in front of Angel growled.
She cracked him again, and he yelped.
“Rules of order, Crotchbrain,” she said, smiling like she was enjoying herself a lot more than was healthy for his wellbeing.
“That can be arranged, if you insist,” Ethan said, nodding. “Put him on the ice.”
He and his chair both disappeared.
He shrugged, looking down at his hand and picking at his nails for several seconds. “Alright that’s long enough.”
Captain Howling Crotchbrain appeared a meter above the floor in front of Ethan. He slammed face down on the deck. Several seconds later his chair followed him into a hard landing. He rolled over and stared up at the ceiling.
“Now that wasn’t long enough to do you any real damage, but you get my point, don’t you?”
He nodded.
“We can’t let this happen,” the one that Quinn had been intimidating said.
“I can play this game all day.” Ethan looked at Jetaar. “For every time anybody argues with me, I’ll add ten seconds to the time I put one of your captains on ice. I wonder how long it will take you to figure out someone’s going to come back with real brain damage?”
“You did just destroy one of our fleet ships,” Jetaar said, shaking his head. “Not that I’m arguing, mind you.”
“A ship? Maybe you don’t realize that you cost me my ship to get the door open to the Tacra Un.” Ethan’s eyes flashed as he slid off the table and walked over to Jetaar.
The pirate captain leaned back in his seat and nodded. “That’s how you did it?”
“Yah, and I sure as frak wouldn’t have sacrificed the Dawn if you didn’t have my eggs in a vice,” he hissed, leaning forward and putting his hands on the table between them. “So why don’t you tell me how it feels to negotiate with a gun to your head? All I’m doing, is what you already did to me.”
He shoved himself up off the table and stormed back out to the riser in the center of the room, glaring at the crewmembers who were still struggling to get to their feet. As he approached, they retreated, giving him as much space as they could. From their reaction it looked like they expected lightning to shoot out of his eyes and strike them dead.
Spinning and standing in the center of the platform he crossed his arms and stared back at the table. “You’ve got my price. Bag or buy, I’m tired of playing this game.”
No one spoke and Kaycee reached out to grab his hand. Through whatever Constantine had done to her, she’d somehow managed to keep her Urah Un. When it linked to his, he felt the waves of her pain before her voice whispered in his mind. Are you sure this is what you want to do?
He nodded. Ammo told me that the Institute survives because nobody screws with the wizard. Maybe that’s true, but if the Council accepts my terms, at least we’ve got a castle of our own if STI wants to come calling. And now we’ll have the tools to get some real answers.
She thought about it for several seconds and he could feel her rooting around in his mind to see if that was truly why he’d done it. Finally, she nodded and broke the link.
Jetaar understood what they were doing, and he’d waited until they finished before he stood up and looked around at the other Captains. Walking over to the empty place where Constantine had been sitting, he picked the chair up and put it at the table. “Do any of you see a point in arguing about this?”
No one made a sound.
“Then, I think we need to make it formal.” he said, gesturing for Ethan to come to the table.
“I move we elevate Captain Ethan Walker to the Commonwealth Council of Captains,” he said. “Long live Captain Walker!”
“Long live Captain Walker! Long live the Commonwealth!” they all responded in unison. Not all the voices sounded pleased to accept him, but none of them refused to join in.
“Welcome to the Council,” Jetaar said, stepping back to make room. “This seat is yours.”
Ethan walked around the table and stepped over the body of Xavier Constantine. “Somebody needs to clean this mess up,” he said, glancing down at the former captain.
Several of the crewmembers jumped to remove the almost lifeless body. Once they’d cleared him out of the way, Ethan settled into his seat. “Now, I want to talk about my new ship.”
Jetaar leaned toward him and whispered, “You’ve definitely got steel eggs, Walker. I knew there was a reason I liked you.”
THE END
Pick up the Shan Takhu Legacy because you know you love a good backstory!
Thank you for reading Wings of Earth. If you enjoyed the stories, please take a moment and consider leaving a review.
http://ericmichaelcraig.com/review/
Reviews feed the creative souls of all authors and are invaluable in helping readers discover new books to experience.
Thank you. EMC
It waits in the darkness.
Beyond Neptune, a routine prospecting mission explodes into chaos and throws Commander Jephora Cochrane and his crew into a crisis that will test their experience to the limit.
After crash-landing on the surface of an icy asteroid Cochrane’s crew discovers an ancient artifact that may hold the key to stopping a battle destined to shred civilization. Yet an attempt to rescue the crew of the Jakob Waltz brings civil war to the edge of the Solar System and catches Commander Cochrane between an emerging authoritarian regime and a desperate fleet of resistance forces.
Understanding the power of the ancient Shan Takhu technology may be the only hope for the future of humanity, but first Cochrane must defeat the warships that will stop at nothing to control the power of the alien structure they’ve discovered.
With no choices left, they have to keep the exploding war from burying the Legacy of the Shan Takhu back into the ice from which it came.
Come along on the journey and discover how eleven unlikely heroes will have th
e strength to change the destiny of humanity.
Read the complete trilogy of the Shan Takhu Legacy and enjoy a special vignette published for the first time in this set.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Eric Michael Craig is a Hard Science Fiction writer living in the Manzano Mountains of New Mexico. He is the former Director of Research for a private consulting laboratory in Phoenix, where he experimented with inertial propulsion and power generation technologies.
Fascinated with the "cacophony of humanity," he dedicated much of his life to observing society and how people relate to each other and the world around them. Ultimately this drove him to write full time.
When not writing, Eric is active in Intentional Community Design, plays guitar and bass, occasionally dabbles in art of various forms, and designs websites. He also owns way too many dogs.
Eric is a founding member of the SciFi Roundtable. The SFRT is an active online group dedicated to supporting indie and traditional authors by networking them with other writers and professional resources.
Connect with Eric at:
ericmichaelcraig.net
Facebook
Twitter
Author Central on Amazon
BookBub
Sign up for Eric’s newsletter for new releases, updates, and background on his science fiction worlds.
From the Desk of Eric Michael Craig
Other works by Eric Michael Craig
Atlas and the Winds
Book One: Stormhaven Rising
Book Two: Prometheus and the Dragon
Box Set: Atlas and the Winds
Shan Takhu Legacy
Book One: Legacy of Pandora
Book Two: Fulcrum of Odysseus
Book Three: Redemption of Sisyphus
Box Set: Shan Takhu Legacy
Wings of Earth
Book One: Echoes of Starlight
Book Two: Dust of the Deep
Book Three: Chains of Dawn
Book Four: Beyond the Edge
Book Five: Stranger Bedfellows
Book Six: Ghost in the Dark
Box Set Books 1 - 5: Wings of Earth Season One
Short Story
Ghostmaker
Wings of Earth- Season One Page 108