“Proper safety measures is the first step to a job well done!” Skorra said. She smiled, the fur around her cheeks ruffling as she did. Kestok had given her a series of mantras and sayings to learn as part of his training. They were admittedly cheesy, but Skorra had taken to practising them daily.
“Exactly.”
Aileena groaned, her moan echoing around the bridge. It had come out louder than she had expected. “Stay still damn you.” The Substrate dreadnought was still trying to evade her. It wasn’t like the Substrate; they had a reputation for being aggressive and arrogant. She zoomed out on the sensor display, trying to predict the ship’s course. Then she realised. “The other ship.”
“The Shield?” Mellok said, his feathers quivering. He had guessed where Aileena was going. “You think that the Substrate is here for Orson and his men?”
“Would make sense. I think they’re trying to get past us to get at them.”
“Orson did claim to be the Knower. Perhaps the Substrate thinks that they are us. They do seem to be interested in the Knower, and I suspect the last ship we encountered wasn’t able to inform their command about the Sword.”
On the sensor display, the Shield was bringing itself closer to the station. It had held off, mirroring the Sword’s position, but now the Merydian starship had moved away to intercept the dreadnought it had moved slowly towards the orbital construct. It worried Aileena. They still had no idea if Orson was telling the truth.
“Try and contact the Substrate ship. Maybe we can rile them up a little?” Aileena ran her hands through her hair before quickly pulling a piece of elastic from her jacket pocket and tying it into a ponytail. The Sword’s energy shield was an amazing thing, but if no one fired on them the ship was essentially unarmed. “Let’s poke the korix a little.”
The corridors were a maelstrom of people, all jostling for position as they rushed towards the hangar bays. It made sense. Michael wasn’t an expert on space battles, not even close, despite having the dubious honour of being involved in more than any other human. Even to him though, it was obvious the station was an easy target for the incoming Substrate ship. Staying would be suicide.
Despite that, the flight off the station wasn’t organised. People slammed into Michael as they pushed past, forcing him to grip onto Brekt’s arm like a lost child. He dreaded what it would be like in the hangar bay, dozens of ships fighting to escape through the energy field that kept the bay pressurised.
“We need to get off this station,” Orson said. “You don’t want to see one of those Substrate ships in action.”
“Been there, got the t-shirt,” Michael said. “We watched them burn a planet before we were able to put a stop to them. They were after me then, no doubt they’re here to finish the job this time. That’s the problem, see, with being a messiah. More people tend to want to kill you than believe in you. The Substrate, the Council, the Unmind Index. They keep adding up.”
“What the hell is the Unmind Index?”
“You don’t want to know, trust me on that one.”
“Look, if we can get to my ship, we can at least try and fight back. We won’t win, not against that thing, but we can stall it maybe?”
“You really think that?” Michael stopped pushing at the crowd to look at Orson. “You saw them fight, right? You said you were in a battle? How long do you think that ship you have is going to last?”
“Hopefully long enough for my people to get off it, escape in their own ships.”
“If I know Aileena, she’ll already be trying to get in front of that thing. Let her deal with it. Our ship can handle it.”
Orson let out a derisive snort. “Your ship has no weapons, we scanned it. You’re lucky we were willing to talk.”
“Looks can be deceiving. The Sword isn’t defenceless. Anything but. Like I said, we’ve dealt with one of these ships before. Permanently.”
The thrall was shivering a little, dreading relaying the message to its lord. They weren’t known for being kind to messengers.
“My lord,” it said, finally gathering the courage. The thrall had turned as far as it could, its movement restricted by the cabling fusing its body to the console. “We are receiving a message from the unknown ship.”
“I don’t care, they are inconsequential. Continue our course towards the Council vessel.” Abberax leant back in his throne, scratching at his side with his talons. “Former Council vessel,” he said, correcting himself.
“The unknown ship continues attempting to intercept us, my lord. Besides, their message is rather…”
“Rather what, thrall?” Abberax stood up, his impressive bulk shimmering beneath the dull lights of the chamber. “I told you I didn’t’ care.”
Abberax gestured towards the grey-skinned creature, a simple wave of his palm. It began to scratch at its skin, bubbles and blisters forming quickly, rancid boils growing and bursting in moments. The thrall slumped over, killed by the pain, its body held in place by the cabling.
“Not my favourite, but effective. The artisan who designed that death shows promise.” Aberrax turned to the nearest thrall. “You, what was in that message? It cost me a thrall, so I might as well hear it.”
“Yes, my lord. I’ll play it now.”
“Hey, rock face, get the hell away from this planet. You’re not welcome here.” The voice was unfamiliar to Abberax. It sounded female, though he wasn’t sure, he paid little attention to the differences between the organic races. “We took care of your buddies at Cortica, and we’ll take care of you.”
Abberax let out a long laugh. It was a disconcerting noise. His people spoke audibly by scratching their rocks together and his laugh sounded like a landslide.
“How interesting. It would seem we have found the culprit for our missing dreadnought. Or at least someone claiming to be so. And to threaten a Substrate lord. Foolish.”
“Should we fire upon them, my lord?” asked the weapons thrall, a hunched figure, their eyes wired directly into the targeting panel.
“This sounds like a ploy, a distraction of some kind.” Abberax rubbed his claws together as he thought, a smattering of thin dust drifting off them. “They believe they can goad us. Ignore them. This ship is no threat, otherwise, it would have fired upon us already. Continue on our course, bring us into effective range of the battleship and then fire at will.”
“As you command, my lord.”
“They aren’t responding,” Mellok said. “It would appear this particular Substrate commander is more stubborn. What next?”
“I’m thinking,” Aileena said. “Rhythm damn it, who builds a ship and doesn’t put guns on it?”
“It’s a shame we can’t, I don’t know, hold on to the power after a fight?” Skorra said. “Store it somewhere just in case?”
Kestok patted the girl on the shoulder, fur sticking up from between his fingers. “You’re full of good ideas, you know that? It’s not going to help us now, but we could add a capacitor or a battery of some kind for future use. Store some power between fights or find a way of pre-charging the shield.”
“Not a huge fan of the assumption that we’re going to be getting into fights constantly,” Clive said, his form coalescing. “That seems a rather slapdash attitude towards what is, in essence, my body.”
“I think you agree though?” Kestok pointed a finger at the glowing cloud accusingly.
“That’s beside the point.”
“We don’t need ideas for the future,” Aileena said, the frustration obvious in her tone. “We need ideas for right the hell now.”