Zethernax surveyed his section pleased, rubbing his stone claws together with delight. In the centre of his mass, a sapphire blue orb swivelled, taking in everything it could see. He turned to this counterpart. She looked identical, except her crystal orb was bright emerald green.
“The harvest is looking good this quarter, Verstix. The improvements to the gravity mill certainly are working out,” Zethernax said.
The pile of rocks beside him bowed slightly. “Yes, my lord, they certainly have. Not too soon it would seem, the Council is growing bold of late. Several skirmishes have occurred in the last galactic cycle.”
“Hmph. It would seem they feel empowered since finding this Earth. It is of no matter. They are no match for us. Not whilst we control the secrets to manufacturing anti-matter. Tell me Verstix, when you look out on this station, what do you see?”
“Our largest anti-matter manufacturing facility my lord.”
“Well yes,” Zethernax said. “But I was speaking more metaphorically. This station Verstix, is both our freedom and our weapon. The shield that keeps the rock-mites from the door. If it were down to the Council, we would all be on our knees worshipping their nonsense religion. As long as we control this place, the Council dare not strike against us. It is our greatest achievement.”
“That it is, my lord.”
“And yet, what orders did we receive recently? No need to answer,” Zethernax said holding up the floating shards of sharp stone that formed his arm. “It was rhetorical. These skirmishes have the High-Lords nervous. They have redeployed a third of our defensive fleet. Foolish, and unneeded if you ask me.”
“We are safe here though, my lord. Our defensive stations could handle any Council fleet alone. Even without the fleet, this is the greatest concentration of military force in the explored galaxy. Nothing could happen here.”
Commander Orson leant back in his chair, fingers clasped together, hands raised before his face. On the screen before him, a clock ticked down. The three-minute time limit he had set. The number was blinking red and growing. The three minutes had passed, the clock was now counting the time since.
“Sir?” Said Trooper Johnson. “Your orders, sir?”
Orson sighed. “Lock on target.”
“Locking on target, sir.”
“Let the record show that the Gallant is preparing to fire on the wanted vessel despite the known presence of a human in accordance with standing orders. I don’t think the Council will care, but at least we’re trying to cover our backs.” Orson sat forward in his seat, hands still clasped together. “Lock status?”
“Weapons locked and primed, commander.”
Orson thought it over, for a brief second. “Fire,” he said, making his second poor decision of the day.
A purple beam lashed out from between the claws of the Gallant, springing forth from a cannon mounted spinally to the engine section. It screamed forwards, through the strobing tunnel towards the ship before it. Orson watched on the screen before him, two large circles displaying the ships relative positions. Despite the speed of the energy beam, there was still a few seconds delay before it would connect, a testament to just how deceptive distances in space could be.
“Uh, weapon missed, sir,” said Johnson.
“Missed?”
“Yes sir, the target evaded the shot, just barely.”
“God damn it. Prepare to fire again. We need to stop them before they drop out of jump.” Orson had leapt to his feet, barking the order. The icon on the display before him vanished, winking out of existence.
“Uh, sir, target just—”
“Dropped out of jump, right?” Orson said. Johnson nodded silently in response. “Of course.” Orson slumped back into his seat. “Prepare to exit jump in pursuit.”
As Aileena slammed the ship into an evasive turn a bright purple energy beam sliced past, just feet from the ship, its presence announced by loud blaring warning alarms. It struck the edge of the strange tunnel, vanishing through the edge of the odd reality.
It didn’t just disappear. The jump drive connected two chosen points in space, lacing a route between them through the bizzare alternate reality that existed just below real space. These unnatural wormholes were subject to strange rules, bending and twisting unexpectedly, making the same trip between two points different every time. The tunnels snaked around the galaxy, looping around, sometimes even doubling back on each other, their real nature and rules poorly grasped. The beam breached through the wall of the wormhole, escaping into real space in an impossible to predict location.
Unfortunately for Commander Orson, the odds were not with him, however impossible they were. Fate conspired against him as the beam emerged in an inhabited system. It screamed across space, towards a station held perfectly between two twin planets. At any other time, the beam would have struck one of the many defensive ships that surrounded the area, but on this day a portion of the fleet had begun to move away, the shot screaming past a large cruiser skimming across its surface.
It hit the station, evaporating metal as it continued on its course. It exploded into the central section, hitting a huge walkway where a crowd of indentured workers just happened to be transporting the stations recently constructed supply of antimatter. The beams energy turned the walkway into slag, rupturing the carried silver canisters, releasing the antimatter, which began to react violently, colliding with the matter around it in a reaction of unfathomable power.
The station exploded, a glowing white-hot star radiating outwards, annihilating everything around it, consuming ships, stations and even the planets themselves, a blast that would shine in the night on a thousand worlds for a thousand years, an impossible shot adding a new star to the sky.
Shutters rolled back, unveiling space beyond as the ship snapped back to reality. Michael felt the odd buzzing in his head fade, the strange effects of the jump drive quickly dropping away. The ship rattled, a low groaning noise filling the air as the engines sprang to life, accelerating as quickly as they could.
“That was close!” Aileena said, wiping sweat from her brow. “That shot nearly hit us. Rhythm help us we got lucky with that.”
“They’re still right behind us though!” Michael said, his voice coming out more high-pitched than he had intended. “We need to, I don’t know jump again and lose them?”
“No need, just look ahead.”
Before them was a planet. Or what remained of one. It had been split in two, the halves of the planet falling away like a cracked egg. Between each section was a thick cloud of stone, the guts of the destroyed world. It looked brown and dull, clearly dead. Despite that lights blinked across the surface. Massive metal constructs ran between chunks of the world, connecting fragments. Thousands of massive stations surrounded the cloud, hundreds of ships docked at them. Each station blinked with garish neon colours, studded thick with lights. It had the strange appearance of a thousand Las-Vegas casinos filling the sky.
“Wow,” Michael said. It was all he could say. Lights danced in his eyes. He had always expected alien worlds to be crystal spires and enlightened creatures in togas. Scrapyard casino was an aesthetic he had never considered.
Shadows fell across the control room as a small ship pulled itself alongside. Large threatening-looking guns creeping up to the glass. The communications panel flashed again. Aileena unclipped her belt and strode confidently towards Mellok.
“Let me answer it,” she said shooing away Mellok who unclipped his belt and scuttled away. Aileena flicked the switch, the holographic display blinking alive. “Oh, Greddog, you old pirate. How’s it going?”
The alien on the screen was all double chins and rolls, his fat chunky fingers resting on his chest. He was wearing what looked like a maroon velvet robe. He grunted a series of long low drones. Mellok turned to Michael. “He is… not pleased to see Aileena, it would seem.”