The Blackstar Gambit

by Jan Domagala

  “I’m working on it,” he replied sheepishly.

  “Oh my God, you do this every time, you say you have a plan and...”

  “Can we save the domestic until we get off this rock please?” Matt interrupted the two of them.

  “Sure!” Zara said then stormed over the ridge aiming her Remm M25 at the group of figures about to get on board the shuttle.

  “Here we go,” Kurt groaned as he jumped up to follow her.

  Matt stared at the two of them and groaned also. Then, he too thrust his Remm pulse rifle up to his shoulder and followed the two of them.

  Kurt followed Zara over the ridge firing at the group below. Her first salvo caught the closest person standing to Visjic sending him flying backwards in a mist of blood.

  Kurt was just a few steps behind her and running to catch up so he fired and shot another. He was afraid her impulsive act would damn this mission to failure.

  He clearly saw the surprise in Visjic’s eyes as he turned to see who was attacking them. That quickly changed to fury as he recognised who it was.

  Kurt and Zara’s superior reflexes enabled them to move just a step quicker than the Osiris inhabitants so for the first few feet they were safe. Kurt shot three, Zara killed five and Matt was bringing up the rear.

  Kurt saw Visjic try to rally those with him into some form of defence but they struggled to find a target.

  Kurt saw the anger on Visjic’s face as he tore a pulse rifle from the man next to him.

  They were only about fifteen feet away from the shuttle and Kurt was beginning to think they might reach it.

  Visjic opened fire strafing the pulse rifle from left to right in a wide arc of fire.

  Zara was still one step in front of him and he saw her catch the first few plasma bolts across her torso. As she dropped he felt the plasma bolts tear into him too.

  He heard Matt scream behind them as they went down in a hail of plasma bolts; he went quiet.

  Kurt landed on the ground rolling, his Remm M25 falling from his grasp. As he turned he saw Matt lying on the ground behind them, his shoulder torn where he had been hit. Blood covered his arm and shoulder and he lay, motionless.

  He was filled with anger then at Zara’s rash action, which could prove to be fatal. Even though he knew he would probably recover from his wounds it wouldn’t be before Visjic had the chance to do what he wanted with them.

  His eyes wandered over the inert form of the woman he loved but who infuriated him with her rash actions at times. Her struggle to cope with her abilities led them into more trouble than he cared think about and this time could lead to their demise.

  His last conscious thought was that his plan had failed, he had handed Visjic the means to fulfil his own mad scheme. He saw boots walk towards him and heard a voice say, “Bring those two,” just before darkness claimed him.

  03.19 s.e.t.

  Matt awoke to massive pain in his arm.

  “Where am I?” he muttered as the bright lights assailed his vision causing his head to ache.

  “Thank God you’re awake Matt,” Philips said.

  Matt turned his head to see the captain of the Vanguard standing next to him. That was when he realised he was lying down on a bio-bed.

  “You’re in Med Lab,” Philips told him when he saw the confusion in Matt’s eyes. “When we lost contact with the lot of you I sent a team down to the surface. We found a lot of bodies but no sign of Kurt or Zara,” he explained.

  “Visjic has them,” Matt said. All the pieces were beginning to fit into place now as his brain cleared and he began to remember the debacle he had got dragged into.

  “We patched up your shoulder, you’ll make a full recovery but the Doc says you need rest,” Philips said when Matt started to inspect his wound.

  “No time for that, we have to get after them,” Matt said. He got up off the bio bed and looked around for his shirt. Wincing through the pain, he pulled his torn shirt over his broad chest and the captain stepped back as another figure neared.

  “If you insist then you’ll need this,” the figure said and placed an injector on Matt’s neck and pressed the button.

  “Ouch!” Matt cursed glaring at the doctor with hatred in his eyes.

  “That’ll help get you through the next twelve hours, but after that you’ll probably crash. Whatever you intend on doing you have twelve hours to complete it then I want you back so I can finish what I started,” the doctor told him sternly ignoring the glares from his recalcitrant patient.

  As Matt began to feel the effects of the drug he looked at the captain. “Right where did they go? I hope you kept track of them?”

  “No need,” Philips answered.

  Matt looked confused, “Why?”

  “They’re right where they were when all this started,” Philips said, which confused Matt even more.

  “Either that drug is messing with my mind or you’re not making sense,” he said.

  “Kurt instructed me to prevent the ship that came to ferry off the others from the planet from leaving. We engaged them and damaged their engines, they’re not going anywhere,” Philips explained.

  “Kurt and Zara are aboard that ship too, so you can’t destroy her either can you?”

  Philips shook his head.

  “What’s stopping them from destroying us?”

  “In the exchange we disabled their weapon systems, I doubt they’ll get those back online before their engines though. They’re basically a transport ship with rudimentary defencive and offensive capabilities.”

  “I agree. Their priority now would be escape.”

  “It appears we are at an impasse.”

  “So unless we get Kurt and Zara off there once they get their engines back online they’ll leave,” Matt muttered.

  “I’m afraid so,” Philips said.

  “I need to get over there somehow and prevent them from escaping and rescue Kurt and Zara. We can’t allow them to escape with those two on board. The knowledge they have would be disastrous to the Confederation if it ever got out,” he said.

  Philips looked at Matt’s forlorn expression and smiled. “That won’t be necessary,” he said.

  Matt’s expression changed to one of confusion.

  “Excuse me?” he said.

  “There’s something I think you should know.”

  Matt’s eyebrows pinched together in confusion as he said, “Okay, I’m listening.”

  “Not here, in my Ready Room. Helm you have the conn,” he said getting out of the Command Chair and walking towards the exit.

  Matt just stared after him, unable to comprehend what was going on. Clearly, something had been planned and he had been kept out of the loop. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he intended to find out.

  He turned and followed Philips into the Ready Room.

  36

  03.25 s.e.t.

  Kurt came awake with a start.

  He found he couldn’t move, his wrists and ankles were bound and he was held rigid in a frame, arms and legs splayed out like a cross.

  All he could move was his head. He looked around and saw Zara next to him in a similar situation. She was staring at him with tears in her eyes.

  “Ah, the lovers awake,” Visjic said and he sauntered into their line of vision.

  “Where are we?” Kurt asked calmly. He knew that to allow panic inside was the way to defeat.

  “On my starship. Unfortunately though we are incapable of leaving my home world but that is being rectified,” Visjic gloated, a smile breaking across his broad features.

  “What about Matt? Is he dead?” Zara asked, her voice breaking slightly.

  “Who cares, I take it you refer to the other with you?”

  “Yes, I saw him shot,” Kurt said unable to bring himself to ask the question.

  “I’ll allow you this one kindness, I cannot attest to his life but I know his body was removed by a number of men from the ship you arrived in. If I were you, I would concern yourselves with what
I have planned for you. I mentioned to Zara before that I will strip...”

  “Yeh, yeh, blah, blah! You told me already,” Zara interrupted his diatribe making him take a step back in shock at her audacity.

  She smiled at him then looked across at Kurt, winked her eye and said, “Okay, it’s time.”

  As one, the two of them tore their arms free of their bindings and then their feet. Stepping off the tables, they had been placed upon thrust the room into complete chaos.

  The lab technicians milled around as if the room was on fire and tried to escape. Even Visjic was shocked. He stumbled backwards into a table knocking items onto the floor.

  Kurt knew then that Zara’s tears were not for them but for the safety of their friend, Matt. Not knowing his fate filled her with grief and remorse, now though, as she knew he was on board the Vanguard it was time for action and the second part of their plan.

  There were only two guards in the room positioned over by the exit to the lab. Obviously, Visjic thought it unnecessary to have any more seeing as how he had the situation under control. He was beginning to see the error of that plan.

  Visjic stepped forward to block them, all surprise gone from his demeanour now to be replaced with naked fury.

  “I’ll kill you both with my bare hands and then take what I need from your dead bodies,” he snarled as he approached.

  Zara waved Kurt away. “I’ve got this,” she said staring down at the shorter man.

  Knowing not to argue, Kurt did as instructed and picked up a chair and hurled it at the two guards before they too regained their composure. They were attempting to bring up their pulse rifles to aim at Kurt, but the chair that was speeding towards them made them think again.

  The chair smashed into one of them before he knew what hit him and Kurt leapt at the other.

  He tore the pulse rifle from the guard’s grip and smashed the butt into the side of his head sending him to the floor; lights out. Turning, he fired at the other guard who was just recovering from being hit by the chair. The plasma bolt hit him square in the chest sending him back to collide with the wall behind him. As he slid to the floor, dead, his blood left a trail on the wall behind him.

  Kurt turned to see Zara and Visjic locked in combat.

  Visjic charged at Zara but she stood her ground. Kurt watched in horror as the smaller, yet impossibly strong, man picked her up and slammed her to the floor. He was about to intervene when she lashed out with a foot kicking his face making him stumble back a pace or three. She then flipped herself back onto her feet and smiled a toothy snarl at him.

  He could see she was enjoying this. The last time they had met, whether by design or fault of her own, Kurt was not sure, but Visjic had come out on top. Zara, he knew, was about to show him that that would not happen again.

  Visjic was also impossibly fast and Kurt was sure that he was not holding back at all.

  He swung a vicious right cross with enough force to cave a man’s skull in at Zara’s head. Zara rode the punch allowing her face to whip around with the force of the blow.

  Kurt saw a stream of blood whip out where her cheek was lacerated by the punch. She stood her ground and when she turned back to look at Visjic, the cut was already healing. She smiled that feral grin at him again.

  “That all you got?” she taunted.

  Anger bubbled up inside Visjic, and he lunged at her throwing a series of jabs followed by a series of hooks, which she either slipped or blocked on her arms then she saw her opening and took it. She retaliated with a vicious flurry of punches that battered Visjic’s face smashing his nose and teeth as they rocked his head back with every impact. Finishing off, just as she saw the anger in his eyes, she connected with a hooking punch to the side of his head that snapped his head around so hard he left the ground.

  “Come on!” she goaded as he lay on the floor.

  He spun around onto his back sweeping her legs out from under her. She landed heavily on her back, winded momentarily.

  Visjic was on her in a flash grabbing her around the throat in a chokehold. He was pressing his forearm across her windpipe while he held the back of her head with the other hand forcing her head forward onto his arm increasing pressure on her throat.

  Kurt was watching everything. He saw Visjic glance up with victory in his eyes and the look he gave him told him that once he’d finished with her, he was next.

  Visjic’s face was at the side of Zara’s and Kurt heard him say, “I told you before I’d snap your neck like a twig.”

  He looked into Zara’s eyes, saw them begin to glaze over as she struggled to breathe. Another few seconds and she would be out.

  “Zara!” he screamed. The force of his voice carried across to her and she shook off her slump.

  With a heave of her shoulders, she lifted herself and him off the ground to her feet once more. Visjic was clinging on with all his strength trying to force her down again.

  She reached up behind her head and grabbed the hand holding the back of her head. With her other hand she grabbed Visjic’s other hand. With a vicious yank of both arms, she pulled them apart. Visjic’s arms were not built to bend the way she forced them and they snapped with an audible crack that echoed around the room. Visjic screamed his agony and disbelief that this woman could best him in combat.

  Still holding on to his arms she hefted him over her shoulders to throw him on the floor at her feet.

  She grabbed his head in both hands and leant forward to whisper in his ear, “Not if I snap yours first.”

  With a quick movement of her hands, she twisted Visjic’s head around so fast his neck snapped. She released him allowing him to fall forward and as his chest hit the floor his face was turned towards the ceiling, blank eyes staring lifelessly into nothing.

  Kurt saw her look up at him and he was able to finally release the breath he was holding.

  “Let’s get the hell off this ship,” she said with a smile.

  37

  03.40 s.e.t.

  “So how come they told you this, but not me?” Matt asked as he paced around the Ready Room. He had his hands balled into fists and he sorely wanted to punch something.

  “They never wanted you along Matt. They knew it would put you in harm’s way. Their original idea was to go alone but when you said you’d go along with them they couldn’t refuse and they couldn’t risk letting you in on their scheme for fear you gave the game away. They had to allow Visjic to capture them and make it appear authentic. Zara had learned quite a bit about that man’s character during her time on his yacht back on Celeron. She said he was incredibly vain and borderline insane so he had to think he had captured them or it wouldn’t have worked,” Philips explained the best he could. Matt gathered he was not in possession of all the facts, just enough to let him carry out his part.

  “It was a huge risk they took,” he said.

  “One they thought worth taking to get the result they needed,” Philips said.

  “Tell me how were you able to disable a large carrier starship like the one they brought here, the Vanguard is only a light cruiser from what I’ve seen of her?” Matt asked changing the subject. His anger at Kurt and Zara for not trusting him with the facts would wear off, eventually.

  “It may look like a light cruiser but she is a new breed of battleship, she’s a gunship. She’s equipped with double the amount of missile tubes fore and aft. She also has pulse cannons, fore aft and lateral and an array of counter measures. She has triple hull plating with primary and secondary shielding so she’s truly a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

  Matt nodded his head as he took in what the captain said. “Very impressive,” he said finally.

  “Again this was part of the plan Kurt had laid out in secret to General Sinclair. He wanted a smaller craft here to give a false sense of security to Visjic’s transport that he knew would arrive to ferry them off Osiris. He deduced that there was only one move Visjic could make once he knew Kurt and Zara had escaped and that was to get
his people off the planet before we arrived. It was a calculated risk that they only sent one ship to help them. I was on manoeuvres close by and was ordered to help.”

  “So what happens now then?” Matt asked.

  “We wait for them to get back. I’m not sure how they’ll do it, that part I’m not privy to, just as I don’t know why Visjic wanted Kurt and Zara so badly and why his whole scheme hinged on them being captured,” Philips said as he stared into the ice blue eyes of the man before him hoping to be able to read him. Matt gave him nothing though, simply returned his stare and said, “Above your pay grade, same as me I suppose.”

  03.50 s.e.t.

  “We need to find our things or we’ll have to leave here the old school way,” Kurt said as he looked around the lab for his stuff.

  “Old school?” Zara said looking askance at him.

  “Yeah, you know, steal a shuttle and blast our way outta here,” he said elaborating his phrase.

  “Ah, well we’d better get moving then because it won’t be long before they find out what happened here and send someone to check it out,” she said.

  Kurt nodded his head in agreement.

  They began to look for the stuff they had with them when they went down to the planet’s surface – webbing belts that had several pouches that contained all their equipment and a few other things.

  “Here they are,” Kurt said when he found them tossed into a corner, discarded for later. They quickly rifled through the contents until they found what they needed.

  Kurt took out his SUT or Single Unit Transporter, a gadget made by RandCorp. It was a small device worn on the wrist that opened a dimensional rift allowing the wearer to pass through. It was ideal for short hops but with one huge design flaw, it caused damage to the wearer at the cellular level. After three hops, the damage was so severe and irreversible that death was inevitable.

  Kurt and Zara though, because of the changes done to their immune system, were the only people who could use the devices with impunity.

  Kurt snapped his on his wrist and powered it up. He immediately felt the familiar tingle it brought on and smiled across at Zara.