Hometown Space Pirate, page 15
Lois scurried toward the ramp, trying to get past the Scavid, but the one on the ground had just enough reach to grab at her ankle. She screamed and went down in a rush. The Scavid never let go. Lois kicked and thrashed but the Scavid was too strong. He just reeled her in like a fighting fish, then once she was close enough, he closed his arms around her in a sort of bear hug and rolled out of sight between two cars. I panicked and fired another shot but realized I might hit Lois.
The Viraquin cart rolled forward a few more feet but the upward slope of the floor halted its trajectory. Then it began to roll backward into the fray again.
“No,” I cried, then ran for Lois and the cart. I dropped my empty pistol and unslung one of the AR-15s, opening fire on the Scavid in front of me. He tried to make a play for the cart, but my barrage forced him back between the cars. The two Scavid behind me must have feared hitting the Viraquin because they did not fire their weapons. I heard them running at me though, so I turned and shot at them as well. Bullets ricocheted off their heavy exoskeletons, but they managed to dive in behind a set of parked vehicles. As soon as they were out of sight, I turned again, stopping the Viraquin cart with my body as I scanned back and forth for targets.
“Lois!” I shrieked in terror. I looked everywhere but she was nowhere in sight. The Scavid had gone into hiding but I could not leave the Viraquin on its own.
“Advance up the ramp.” Buttercup’s voice sounded resolved and unwavering. “You have no other course of action.”
She was watching everything through my eyes. Buttercup could see and hear the situation every bit as well as me but ...
“Lois,” I shouted. “I can’t leave her.”
“The Scavid are attempting to draw you away from the target. Stay close to the Viraquin and advance to my position. They will not damage Lois if they believe they can leverage a trade for the Viraquin.”
I searched all around the parking garage and saw a Scavid peek his head out from behind a car. I fired at him and hit his reinforced skull. It seemed to have no effect at all. The only way to damage the Scavid was to get a shot between those armored plates.
“Lois.” I fired again and then heard a click as I ran out of ammo. I switched weapons and scanned the garage as I backed up the ramp, tears blurring my eyes. “I’ll find you, Lois. I won’t leave you, I promise.”
I heard a muffled scream from somewhere in the back of the garage and I knew it was her. Buttercup was right. They were trying to draw me off. As soon as they got the Viraquin, they would probably kill us both and be off with their prize to ravage the rest of the universe.
“If you want the Viraquin, you will not harm a single hair on her head,” I cried out, my voice echoing through the garage. I continued to back up the ramp, keeping my weapon trained on the area where I thought the Scavid were hiding. I took three more steps before I realized—I couldn’t leave her. I couldn’t leave Lois to suffer whatever fate the Scavid had in store.
I stopped and looked around the garage trying to decide where they were.
“What are you doing?” Buttercup sounded angry and a little panicked. “Advance up the ramp. I can cover you once you are on the upper level. Do not lose the Viraquin. You must protect her from the Scavid at any cost—any.”
I understood what she meant but the cost was too great. I had to try and save Lois if I could. Maybe if I ran to the top and then came back down ...
Before I finished the thought my choice was taken away from me. Sirens began to wail in the distance. My time was up.
“I have intercepted emergency radio transmissions concerning your weapons fire,” Buttercup said, verifying my fear. “Authority figures are on an intercept course. You have less than one minute.”
A minute wasn’t much but maybe ...
An engine roared up the far ramp in the garage and an electrical repair van appeared. It seemed the Scavid had upgraded from soccer mom to blue-collar worker.
As soon as it was in sight, the side door slid open and a Scavid rose out of the sea of parked cars to throw a limp analog inside the van. I drew a bead on them and got ready to fire but a second Scavid appeared next to him, holding Lois up as a shield. She looked terrified but unhurt. There was no way I could take a shot without risking her life. I took my finger off the trigger and watched as the other Scavid boarded the vehicle behind him. The moment they were all in, the Scavid pulled Lois into the van, then they peeled away, leaving me helpless to do anything but watch them leave.
“Ben.” I barely heard Buttercup’s voice as she tried to regain my attention.
“Ben, you must retreat and save the Viraquin. You only have a few seconds. The Scavid will make contact. We will retrieve Lois later.”
I stared at the exit where the Scavid escaped for a moment longer, then turned to run. I shoved the Viraquin up the ramp toward Buttercup with no other choice but to wait for the Scavid to contact us with their demands.
Chapter Thirty-Three
“What have I done?” I paced back and forth behind the pilot’s chairs on the bridge, running my hands through my hair. We hovered high over the West Coast and held our position there. The Viraquin was secured to the slick blue bulkhead with a strap I had procured from one of the Humvees and Twitch paced back and forth in a mirror image to me along the top of the rearmost chair. It would have been almost condescending if it weren’t so cute.
“I can’t believe we let them take Lois.” My voice still loud and frantic. “We should have gone after them or tagged them ... something. She didn’t have anything to do with this. She was just trying to help, and now the Scavid are going to ...” I trailed off not knowing how to finish the sentence. Or maybe I just didn’t want to.
“Lois joined this mission of her own free will.” Buttercup’s soundwave projected across the vast cloudless sky currently showing on the viewscreen. “She was aware of the risks.”
“That doesn’t make it better,” I said. “The Scavid have her and who knows what they’re going to do with her.”
Buttercup let out a low chuckle that stopped my pacing and I turned to stare daggers at the screen as Twitch did the same.
“What about this situation do you find so funny?”
“I do not understand your irrational reaction to this event. Lois is little more than an acquaintance. Even if she wasn’t, the Scavid are unlikely to harm her. She is the only leverage they have, weak as it may be. They can’t even assimilate her unless she has the unusual ability to interface with cybernated technology like you, which she doesn’t. I would know.”
“First of all,” I ground my teeth trying not to lose my temper to all sense of reason, “Lois is a friend. We may have just met, but she put her life and her career on the line to help us. We owe her nothing less than the same, not that I would expect a computer to understand.”
Now it was Buttercup’s turn to contain her rage. “I will remind you that I am not some computer. I am a living being and I can comprehend loyalty and sacrifice. I also understand the difference between duty and childish guilt. You have beside you, perhaps the rarest being in the universe. We have the chance to save it right now and instead we are hovering above your home continent because a single human could come to harm. You would risk the life of not only the Viraquin, but all those who would die if the Scavid managed to capture it as well.”
I huffed out a laugh of my own. “Righteous words coming from the ship who was about to enslave the Viraquin for her own agenda.”
We were both quiet for a moment then I looked at the screen and sighed. “I’m sorry. I just—”
“You just want to jeopardize us all for the sake of one person.”
I began to get angry all over again but then realized she was right.
“Yes. And I would do the same for you.”
That was enough to set her circuits back a step or two. She remained quiet for several seconds then she came back sounding altogether breathless and panicked.
“I am receiving an incoming transmission. I believe it is the Scavid.”
I fought to hide a grin. For all her talk, she was concerned about Lois after all.
I cleared my throat and took a deep breath to gather myself, then nodded at the screen. “Put them through.”
To my surprise, the viewscreen flickered to a view of another alien ship. It looked like we were communicating bridge to bridge via video Star Trek style. Suddenly I was glad I had taken a moment to gather my wits before the video feed came on.
“Demand exchange.” The Scavid was so close to the camera his skeletal head filled almost the whole screen. “Female human for Viraquin.”
I scoffed. “That hardly seems like a fair exchange. One human for an all-powerful, ultra-rare glow in the dark ocean blob. I could sell this little guy for millions on E-Bay.”
The Scavid stepped away from the camera to reveal Lois, tied and gagged in a big swiveling chair behind him. She looked a bit roughed up, wide-eyed and terrified, but otherwise unharmed ... for now.
A second Scavid reached out and grabbed Lois’s hair, pulling her head up so he could shove one of those U-shaped weapons under her chin. I saw what one of those things could do to a car at a distance, I didn’t want to know what they would do to a human at point blank range.
“Let’s not do anything stupid.” I pulled my remaining pistol from my waistband and pointed it at the Viraquin. I had no idea if a bullet would even harm the creature, not that I would shoot, but I wanted the Scavid to believe I would. Allowing them to think they were in a position of power and control was the only sure way to get Lois hurt or killed. They had no sense of morality or value for life. I needed them to believe I would take away their prize as fast as they would take mine. It was the only way to be sure Lois came back in one piece.
“You want the Viraquin, Lois is to be left unharmed. You will receive the Viraquin the same way.”
Twitch let out an angry chitter from his position on the chair as if he were punctuating my point.
The lead Scavid tilted its head in that way that told me it was computing its odds, then he waved the other Scavid off with his hand. The second Scavid released Lois and she sank back into her chair looking both scared and furious as she stared at me through the viewscreen.
“Transmitting coordinates,” the Scavid said. “Exchange undamaged organic cargo.”
“Organic cargo? These are living beings. A human and a Viraquin. Not some fungus you found on a rock.”
“Affirmative.”
Somehow, I still didn’t think the Scavid saw us as much more than fungus on a rock.
“Confirm rendezvous coordinates.”
“Coordinates confirmed,” Buttercup said, then without another word the transmission blinked out, and our view was replaced with the cloudless, serene skyscape that had been there before.
“I hate it when people don’t say goodbye before they hang up.” I glared at the screen. “Anyone who doesn’t say goodbye is definitely a soulless robot.”
“I do not wish to belabor the obvious,” Buttercup said, ignoring me. “But you cannot go through with this exchange.”
“Of course, we can.” I walked over and leaned on the chair next to Twitch and he scurried up my arm to sit on my shoulder, mimicking my posture.
“This is a Viraquin. You know what it can–”
I held up a hand to forestall her opposition. “Maybe we should ask the Viraquin. Here we are deciding her fate, and she is right here in the room. You know how to talk to her right? So, talk to her.”
I expected Buttercup to refuse, or perhaps flash the interior lights in a lame attempt to say she was trying to communicate but couldn’t. Before any of that happened, the Viraquin’s soft wave of lights became bright and erratic, looking very similar to the ones we saw deep in the ocean.
I waited for a moment while the Viraquin flashed out its message, then its bioluminescent coloring settled back into the hypnotic flow I had become accustomed to seeing.
Buttercup didn’t say anything. After a moment I gave in to the silence.
“Well?”
“It seems there is no need to communicate visually with the Viraquin,” Buttercup said with a sigh. “She can sense soundwaves and vibrations and has understood everything we have been saying.”
“Really?” I peered back at the glowing blue entity floating in its tank. “I’m glad I didn’t talk any crap behind her back ... I mean if she has a back.”
I turned back to the screen and shrugged. “So, what did she say”
Buttercup sighed again. “She does not want to be responsible for Lois losing her life to the Scavid. She not only appreciates her, and our efforts to reunite her form, but also recognizes Lois as one of the only humans who safeguarded her while she was in captivity. She will not repay this kindness by abandoning her. If necessary, the Viraquin will sacrifice her own life to save the one called Lois.”
I spun toward the glowing orb and clapped my hands together, ignoring the impassive way Buttercup had expressed the Viraquin’s wishes.
“If you had lips, I would kiss you right now.”
“Even I think that is disgusting,” Buttercup said. “No offense.” She amended, seeming to remember the Viraquin could hear us.
The Viraquin responded with a quick flash of light and Buttercup laughed.
“What?” I said, feeling left out of the joke.
“The Viraquin agrees that the feel of your lips on its skin would indeed be disgusting.”
I snorted out a laugh. “Okay, so we’re not dating. Maybe we should get back to town. If we’re going to make it to this rendezvous, we need to pick up a few things first.”
“You aren’t going through with this exchange,” Buttercup insisted. I don’t care what the Viraquin says, you can’t turn her over to the Scavid.”
“We are going to make that meeting and we will make the exchange.” I set my gaze on the screen, fixed on her soundwave as a point of reference for my stare. “Lois’s life depends on it. We just have to make sure the Scavid doesn’t walk away with their end of the deal.”
“That is a noble goal,” Buttercup said. “But you are forgetting one very important thing.”
“And what is that?”
“Given the location they have transmitted for their rendezvous. We will not be facing three or four Scavid. We will be facing all of them.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
“What do you mean all of them?” I tried to sound confident but the crack in my voice betrayed my alarm.
“The Scavid has chosen a remote, uninhabited location in the Nevada desert. This indicates they will not be depending on stealth or secrecy. They will arrive with the full force of their Scavid warcraft. I believe I have indicated how our last engagement ended.”
This time Buttercup tried and failed to sound composed. Her own emotions came through in her voice betraying the fear and loss she felt thanks to the Scavid’s merciless assault on her ship.
“Alright.” I nodded and showed her a determined smile. “So, what are we working with. Tell me about your weapon systems.”
“I am armed with a multi-faze energy cannon and a single high burst railgun. I am also armed with Rocket Drones and Seismic Skipper Missiles with interchangeable EMP warheads.”
I blinked at the screen and Twitch peeped on my shoulder.
“I assume energy cannon and railgun are within your vocabulary.” Buttercup sighed. “Rocket Drones are fairly simple. They attach to an enemy hull and wreak havoc on navigation systems. Seismic Skippers are more complex. These missiles carry a seismic or EMP payload, but the actual value is in the delivery system. Each missile is equipped with a miniature warp drive that allows it to skip through space, fooling enemy defense systems and sometimes hiding the missile from detection altogether. It is extremely effective in avoiding countermeasures and intuitive energy shield systems.”
“Wow,” I said. “That all sounds pretty incredible.”
“It would be,” Buttercup continued. Except that in addition to an impenetrable external EMP shield, the Scavid have developed an energy armor that is not intuitive.”
“Not intuitive?”
“Shielding tends to require loads of heavy armor, which is less effective, or vast amounts of power. Ships usually shift their energy shields toward a threat, saving energy. Sometimes they will only activate their shields when a threat is within range. The Scavid have energy armor that requires neither. They can keep their armor activated at all times, only deactivating it when they want to fire their most powerful weapons.”
“So, you have no way through their defenses?”
“Correct,” Buttercup said. “And to make things worse, along with an array of impressive onboard weapons, they possess something known as an FTL cannon. The weapon has been outlawed by the Syndicate, but the Scavid still wield it on many of their war vessels. In essence, the cannon fires a projectile at a speed faster than light. It obliterates anything it impacts instantly. There is no defense, no evasive action, no hope for survival. If they fire that weapon and you are the target, life is over.”
“They must have some sort of weakness.” Twitch crouched down and snuggled in close to my ear and I reached up to pat him on the back. “No matter how powerful something is there is always a drawback.”
“There is. To fire the FTL cannon, the Scavid must power down all systems including their shielding. This makes them vulnerable, but the Scavid seldom needs it to overcome an adversary. Their other weapons systems are more than sufficient. The FTL cannon is a show of power. Only used to punctuate their ultimate superiority when an enemy has been beaten.”
“No wonder the Syndicate wants to wipe them out.” I shook my head.
