Myra,: The start of a galactic adventure. (Dave Travise Book 1)

by Richard Dee

The priest looked calm, despite the pain from his knee. “Do you think I told you all this so you can go and report back to anyone?” he said triumphantly. “You are about to be surprised. Look!”

  The thrusters howled as I tried to slow us down to land softly. I saw a section of the cliff drop away, and realised that it was only fabric, a piece of camouflage. Behind it was a heavy calibre missile launcher, already pointed toward the Moth. At that range it couldn’t miss, and there was no time to give a warning. With a spurt of flame four missiles were launched; they raced across the gap and slammed into the Moth, which shuddered as they exploded. It split in two as it fell from the sky; flames boiling from the rents in its hull. There were more explosions as the pieces hit the ground, each a ball of fire. The shock waves tumbled our shuttle over and over; I had no reserve power to attempt to control our motion. The troops fell into each other, bones snapping, as we bounced across the ground and into the cliffs. I remember shouting, then one of the falling bodies crashed into me and everything went black.

  Chapter Nine

  Now

  I woke; I was covered in sweat and felt drained. As I stood, the cabin lights came on and I went into the washroom and splashed some water on my face. Looking at my watch I saw that it was just about six in the morning, time to get up and see what my new life was all about. I put yesterday’s clothes back on; I would have to do something about that later.

  I wasn’t the first into the mess room. Tan was there and she muttered a greeting through a mouthful of something. The three that Rixon had described as guns for hire were sat in a close group in the corner facing the door, old habits I guessed. They waved greetings as I looked around. The smell of bacon and coffee made me feel better immediately, and there was another odour that I hadn’t expected this early. Tracking down its source, it gave me a clue as to why the man was called Stu. And I had thought that it was short for Stuart.

  Ardullah saw my gaze and grinned. “It’s all he ever eats,” he explained as Stu shovelled the food in, arm like a metronome. “He got the taste for it in a mining camp; it’s a nightmare because now we have to get the same brand, tonnes of it in ration packs to keep him happy.”

  Stu raised his head and stopped shovelling. “Mornin’, lad, want some?” He waved at his plate. The sight reminded me of Navy food, it had the same consistency but the smell was slightly more appetising. Seeing my expression, he roared with laughter, “Well you can’t have any and don’t let me catch you sneaking a…”

  Mitch slapped him round the head. “He’s new here, don’t tease him.”

  “I’ll stick to the eggs, thanks,” I replied with a straight face, I wasn’t going to get drawn in.

  Just then, Rixon and Myra came in, deep in conversation. Myra was in dirty overalls and had obviously been up and working on something long before I had awoken.

  Rixon called across to me, “Morning, Dave, leave those three for a minute and get over here, we’ve got a day to plan, grab me a coffee on your way.”

  “And me,” said Myra.

  “Make that three,” shouted Tan.

  I pushed buttons on the dispenser and carried the coffee over, the square recycled paper cups making the job of holding four a lot easier.

  “Thanks, Dave,” said Rixon, and the others murmured the same, sugar and creamer were added and stirred, and then we got down to business.

  “Right,” said Rixon, “Griff has found us a job, and as it happens it’s a legal one, he’s off getting us clearance.”

  I sipped my coffee, it was good, real coffee not instant, and better than Navy stores. And the food in front of Tan smelt and looked better than what I had been used to.

  “We do get them sometimes,” said Tan, spearing what looked like a fried mushroom with her fork. Putting it in her mouth, she spoke as she chewed. “Where are we off to then, Boss?”

  Rixon handed her a sheaf of papers. “Here’s the lashing spec, we’re picking up a load of equipment on Wishart, for a mining job somewhere out on the Rim, we don’t get the destination till we’re loaded and away, you know how paranoid the corporations are. Anyhow, we got a few days to get to Wishart, so Dave here can do his Navy thing, plot our route and fly us there.”

  “Sounds okay to me, sir,” I answered. “I’ll get the charts and get started.” I stood up, resisting the automatic urge to salute.

  “Two things, Dave,” Rixon spoke in that lazy, gentle tone. “Firstly, you’re not in the Navy now, so Boss is fine, or Skipper, and second, there’s not the rushing and leaping about here, sit down and have a good meal first, you’ll work better on a full stomach. Now then, Myra, how’s the work going, when will we have engines?”

  He turned his attention away from me and I sipped my coffee as they talked about engines, Tan got up and went off clutching the papers, she called the GFH and they finished up and followed her. I realised I was hungry and went to check out the food situation, apart from the boxes of stew, with a label on the top of the pile reminding everyone that it was spoken for, there was a good selection of ready meals, better than I had expected. I chose one that, according to the box was a ‘Full Breakfast’ and put it in the microwave. The auto-sensor read the chip on the packet and worked out the cooking time.

  Two minutes later I was tucking in to eggs and bacon with mushrooms and various other fried things. It was hotel quality, and I wondered how Rixon managed to afford this sort of stuff when the Navy, with its vast resources and buying power, ended up with slop.

  By the time I had finished, I was alone in the mess, so I tidied my things away, got a fresh coffee and went to the bridge.

  It might have been the same basic shape as the Moth’s but that was where the similarity ended. The equipment was more up to date, and there were several things that I didn’t recognise. It was still split by a half height transverse bulkhead into a wheel-space with a chartroom behind it though, and it was here where I sat.

  I looked for ages for the controls for the chart computer; I couldn’t see anything like it, although the chart table was familiar. I hoped that I wouldn’t have to go and ask; that wouldn’t look too clever on my first day.

  “Where is the bloody thing,” I muttered and to my surprise a female voice came out of the overhead speaker.

  “Good morning,” it said. “I’m Nancy, how may I assist you?”

  The Navy had no voice activated computers; after all they had the manpower to spare, and they were still a new toy, so I was not used to dealing with one.

  I cleared my throat. “Good morning, Nancy,” I answered. “I’m Dave.” I felt silly introducing myself, but didn’t know how else to begin. I was glad that no one could hear me. They probably wouldn’t have noticed though.

  “I know, Dave,” said the voice. “I can read your chip, but you are not the Dave that used to be here, where is that Dave, please?”

  So that explained a few things, Griff’s choice of name, and the pile of things in the cabin, I was in a dead man’s shoes, or at least a departed man’s. The list of questions I had for Rixon was growing longer.

  “I can’t answer that, Nancy,” I continued. “Today is my first day on board, and I need to plot and store a route to Wishart.”

  “I can do that for you, Dave,” she replied. “Any special requirements or just the best path?”

  I didn’t really know; Rixon had not mentioned anything apart from that we had time. “Nothing special, just the most economical, like you usually do.” I waited, expecting a window to open on the chart table so that I could start work. Hopefully the system wouldn’t be too unfamiliar; surely it must be better than I was used to.

  Nothing happened and there was silence for a minute or so, then Nancy spoke again. “All done, Dave. The route is saved as Dave Route One in my memory, to activate it just ask me to execute the route name once we are in orbit.”

  Feeling a little surprised, as I had been expecting a bit more effort to have been required, I wandered around the bridge, inspecting the various bits of equipmen
t. I was surprised at the sophistication of the gear; clearly money had been well spent when the ship had been converted. Unlike on the Moth, where things had been placed for multiple operators, all reporting to an officer of the watch, here things were grouped for single man operation. There was a chair which moved on rails along the front of the console so you could sit and move from one panel to the next.

  Looking out from the wheelhouse, I could see along the top of the hull, with the stub wings on the bow at each side. The engine pods were just level with me with the landing gear on the main wings keeping us balanced as the hull lay flat to the ground.

  I felt a vibration and flipped through the cameras. I could see the stern ramp closing, the pressure seal locking in place. We were now air-tight.

  There was a familiar vibration, and a low whine, which increased in pitch until it was inaudible; the main engines were firing up. I could see lights glowing on the various panels all along the console, and flow charts on the screens showed that power was available. I found myself going through the drill of checking all the readouts automatically.

  The engine room intercom buzzed and I turned without looking and pushed the pickup. Myra’s voice filled the room, “Hello, Dave. How you settling in? Rixon’s on his way to you, you can tell him that we’re ready to launch.”

  Rixon walked into the bridge with Griff and strode over to the console.

  “Hello, Dave,” said Griff and handed me a piece of paper. “Here’s the clearance.” He slapped me on the back, gently for him although it still felt like being hit with a tree trunk. I grabbed the handrail on the console for support.

  “It’s good to have you aboard,” he said. It felt like a peace offering.

  “Good to be here,” I replied.

  Rixon was watching my reaction. “She’s all yours then, Dave,” he said. “Take us out.”

  I slid the chair along to the end of the console, out of my way and stepped to the comms panel. I selected the calling channel given on the clearance and pressed the transmit switch on the handset.

  “Control, this is the…” I was just about to say Moth when I stopped; I was sweating, that had nearly blown it. I realised that I had forgotten the name of the ship I was on. I looked wildly around till I saw it.

  I tried again. “Control, this is the Orca, permission to lift off please.” At their request I passed them the clearance number that Griff had given me, and was given permission to depart. I crossed to turn on the local control but Rixon was there before me. He held his hand over the switch and shook his head.

  “Not this time, Dave. Let’s see if my sources were right about you.”

  I was just going to have to do it the hard way. I opened the manual control panel, revealing the manoeuvring levers below.

  “Engine room,” I used the intercom, “please give me main engine and thrust control.”

  The lights on the status panel turned from red to green as Myra transferred control to the buttons and levers below my fingers.

  Without looking down, my hands moved across the panel and the forward thrusters rotated and fired. As I watched through the port, the nose lifted as the weight of the craft pivoted on the main landing gear. As the angle increased and before the stern could scrape on the ground, I rotated the thrust deflectors on the main engines, and set the flaps on the wings to maximum. Putting the main engine power to five per cent made the body of the ship lift slowly into the air, with minimum forward movement. The nose was still swinging upward under the influence of the thruster as I slowly decreased the angle of the deflectors. The upward movement reduced and forward motion started, slowly at first as we rose into the sky, skimming over the blast walls.

  As I increased the power we started to move faster. The gauges showed a positive increase in altitude along with the forward motion and I closed down the thrusters. They would be useless at this speed anyway. Now that we were gaining altitude I rotated the deflectors back to normal running position and levelled the flaps. The landing gear retracted with a thump, and I realised that I had pushed the button without thinking.

  I called the tower and reported that we were airborne, they replied with a course and a rate of climb for me to follow to clear into orbit. I set these on the control panel and looked at Rixon, he nodded so I finally engaged the local control; it would do a much better job of keeping to our assigned path than I ever could. And the tower could now take over remotely if it didn’t like the way we were flying. In manual control that would be embarrassing and would mean a fine, probably from my wages. That was another thing I had to discuss.

  We banked gently as we settled onto the new course. As we passed through 10,000 metres the safety locks came off and there was a jolt as the boosters fired.

  “Nicely done,” said Rixon, as the sky turned black and the stars came out.

  Relenting at last, Rixon turned on the Nav and Nancy’s voice filled the bridge, quite surprisingly, at least to me, she sounded hurt.

  “Rixon, we are clearing atmosphere, don’t you trust me?”

  “It’s not that, Nance,” said Rixon. “I wanted to see how Dave did.”

  Nancy replied, “He’s not Dave, I know his chip says that he is but you can’t fool old Nancy, where is Dave?”

  To my surprise, Rixon said, “Mode 101,” Nancy now spoke in a flat mechanical voice, “Command.”

  “Delete all references to Dave Travise before today’s date,” he continued.

  “Complied,” said the metallic voice.

  “Mode 101 off. Nancy, who is the navigator on board?”

  “Dave Travise,” she said, back in her normal voice. “He’s new here, I think, I haven’t talked to him before today, he has one route stored in my memory.”

  “Execute Dave Route One,” I said, and we set off for Wishart.

  Chapter Ten

  After lunch, which was another excellent meal, Rixon asked me to come to his cabin, and as I sat in the same seat that I had with Myra, I reflected on the last eighteen hours. Now I was truly free, free of my father’s dead hand, free from the Navy, free to do whatever I wanted, and right now what I wanted was to be here.

  Rixon passed me a glass of juice. “Don’t look surprised, Dave. All the booze is locked up, and will be until we get free time on the ground. Now then, we have some formalities to go through.” He lifted a pile of trans-papers. “But first, can you tell me why you were shouting this morning; was it to do with what happened on Oonal?”

  “How much do you know about Oonal?” I blurted out in surprise, although I suppose I shouldn’t have been. Griff had been waiting for me in that bar, so he must have known I was coming. I wondered who else had heard me shout.

  Rixon smiled again, that relaxing grin, he spoke softly, “Dolmen is a good mate of mine, he called me when they captured you, after the Moth was destroyed. We had a bit of an argument, because I thought that he had gone too far. That’s by the by now of course, but he mentioned you, and how you tried to save the priest from Dror.”

  “I reckoned Dror was overstepping his authority,” I agreed. “I still do, it doesn’t mean that I wasn’t happy after the killing of the first squad, I had good friends there. I just wanted a fair trial, then a just punishment.”

  Rixon didn’t answer that directly. “He told me that the troops in your shuttle were all dead, or so badly injured that killing them was a kindness. You and the two prisoners were the only ones strapped in so you survived. Dolmen thought you were dead and was going through your pockets when you started waking up. Anyway, he found your tags and your notebook. You shouldn’t have been carrying it on a combat drop.”

  Of course; it explained a lot. “Dror put me in the shuttle at the last minute. I had no time to sanitise myself.”

  Rixon nodded. “Dror was a loose cannon, he got everyone so jumpy that protocol went out of the portholes. But as it happened, this time it was a good job. It was what saved you. Dolmen found out who you were. It turns out that he knew your father.”

  So
that was the reason I had been left alive. All I could say was, “Oh.” At least he hadn’t been someone that my father had upset. There were quite a few of those.

  Rixon carried on, “Yes, they had history, or so he said, something to do with the Holy Wars and his family. Apparently your father saved his father or something like it, anyhow that and your actions made him hesitate. He called me like I said and mentioned you. I could see your potential immediately, especially with the problems I had been having. So I asked him to drop you off on Basilan, after putting the frighteners on you.”

  “I won’t give you Navy secrets,” I stood. “I’m willing to work for you, because you gave me a chance, but I’m not betraying anyone or anything.”

  “Sit down,” he ordered, and I heard steel in his voice. “I’m not going to do that, I just want you to know that I know your story, it might help you with the nightmares.”

  “That’s fine then, but I’ve got some questions of my own.” He nodded. “Firstly, who was Dave Travise?”

  “Well you are him now, but before that, he was the Nav here, now he’s a wanted man, a Navy deserter, with a dodgy chip.”

  “What made him leave?” Rixon thought for a moment.

  “We, well Griff actually, found out that he was being less than honest with us, so he had to go. Never mind why at the moment. We got him drunk in a bar on Basilan, Rick fried his chip, and then we kept him here till you had been…” he grinned, “legalised. We had kept him drunk, so when you were on the way here we poured him in a taxi and sent it to the guards. The guards can be stupid but eventually they’ll put the pieces together, a fried chip is an offence anyhow, but thanks to Rick and the way it’s been set up he will never prove he was not Finn Douglas. At least not from the lock up.”

  “And the local guards on Basilan will deal with it?”

  “Precisely, you’re in the clear. Now drink your juice and sign these.” It seemed like Rixon had thought of everything. He passed me the trans-papers, which were an apparently standard contract of employment, declaration of citizenship of the Federation and a couple of other things I didn’t recognise.