Chapter 15: Pirate Captain Mitchell

Mitchell and I were up before dawn, dressed and ready to get on the move, but Kayla had to be nudged a bit to get moving that early, and we ended up getting breakfast without her as she took her time to dress and get herself moving. The food selections were limited to powdered eggs and processed oatmeal. Not great, but it was hot and gave us the calories we needed to get through the day, that and the black coffee that tasted more like refined mud than anything else.

The conversation between Mitchell and I was limited to how we were going to find someone who would give us a ride off the moon and to a populated base with a legitimate military presence. That took all of 30 seconds. After that, we just sat there sipping the coffee and downing the food on our trays. If felt like there was more to say, a lot more, but neither one of us wanted to start, so nothing was said.

Kayla emerged dressed and in a heavy fur coat and pants on top of her wool clothes; just as I was pouring a second cup of sludge for lack of anything better to do. She grabbed a pack of the powdered eggs, dumped them in an oatmeal pack, shook it, added some water, threw it in the food preparer for five seconds and then as she grabbed it out she said, “Come on guys, let's go,” and headed towards the exit.” Mitchell and I walked back to the barracks, pulled on our full coverings, grabbed our packs and fast walked to catch up with Kayla.

We headed back towards the trading post hoping to find a freighter captain or traveling merchant who would be willing to let us hitch a ride for a price, but we spotted a problem before we got there. The wind was blowing snow, and the visibility wasn’t much better than maybe ten or fifteen yards. As we got closer to the trading post, we could see a number of the ships that were parked around it. Most were small cargo ships, but one was a Hyperion Private Interstellar Flyer, something not normally seen outside of main transit routes and only flown by those with more money than most people could make in five lifetimes.

“That can’t be good,” Mitchell shouted in my ear to be heard over the wind. I motioned with my hand to head back to the Inn, and no one argued. Once inside we placed our gear on the floor and pulled the fur hoods off our heads.

“What is it?” Kayla asked.

“The only people who travel around in Hyperion Fliers are CEO’s, politicians and very successful criminals,” I said not masking my frustration very well.

Mitchell nodded in agreement and added, “They’re not even putting on an act now. Just coming straight at us. You have any ideas?”

“Only that we can’t stay here. It won't take them long to start searching the place for us.” I said.

“Running blind out into an ice storm with no safe destination…that’s not much of a plan,” she replied.

“Why don’t we just stow away on one of those freighters?” Kayla asked.

“I’m sure that they’ll search them all before they let them take off,” Mitchell said, shooting down the idea.

“Actually, Kayla,” I said as an idea was forming, “We might be able to use that. Mitchell you will need to get eyes on the opposition. As soon as you do send me a secured text to their location and movements. Kayla and I will make arrangements for our ride out of here.”

Mitchell looked at me like she was trying to decide if I was nuts or if she should blindly trust me. I didn’t say anything, just waited for her to make up her mind. I could tell that she didn’t have any ideas to counter with and because of that, she decided not to ask for details on my plan because it wouldn’t do us any good to shoot down any idea, no matter how bad. With a sigh, she gave me a nod of agreement. We pulled the hoods back on and grabbed our gear, heading back out into the storm. As we approached the trading post, we split up. Mitchell moved around the perimeter, keeping herself concealed behind objects and obstacles so that she would see the enemy before they could see her. Kayla and I carefully moved closer to the various ships parked around the main building. Having worked on a cargo ship, we knew which ones were taking on fuel and getting ready to leave. On the far end was a Pelican Hopper, an older class of cargo ship with a hold four times larger than the rest of the ships that only required a crew of four or five to operate. They were loading cargo, and the fueling truck had just pulled away as it had just finished topping them off. The dark clouds and blowing snow gave us great cover to approach without being seen. I was able to crawl under the hover lifter they were using to pick up and move the crate and disable it. As it sputtered and powered off, the two men running it pulled open a maintenance cover and tried to figure out what was wrong with it. That gave Kayla and I the opportunity to run up the cargo ramp and into the ship. Quickly, we moved to the engine room that was luckily empty at the moment. Kayla plugged her palm computer into the system and only had to make a few tweaks to her ‘systems override’ program, and I changed the mix of the fuel to cut its thrust capacity by about 30 percent. I looked at Kayla who nodded to let me know she was done. The two of us headed back out the way we came. Unfortunately, the two men loading the cargo had fixed the hover lifter and were nearly finished. “Damn it,” I said as I didn’t consider that we would need an alternate way off. Kayla didn’t tell me what she was doing. In the corner of my eye, I saw her run a few feet back and plug her computer back into the main console. She then keyed something in and then put her hands over her ears. From the outside of the ship, a loud scream was projected out the ship’s warning systems. Then a voice yelling, “Help me! Help me!”. The two men stopped what they were doing and ran out of the ship to see who was screaming. I looked back at Kayla who was disconnecting her palm computer and heading back my way.

“It’s part of the lifeguard training program, amplified a bit.” She said and then led the way off and out of the ship and back into the storm. We met up with Mitchell at the top of a bluff where we were out of view, but where we could see the entire complex. The ship we sabotaged was the closest to us, and we could see a group of people heading towards it.

“There’s a ‘data troll’ in a suit that’s got at least two dozen goons with laser rifles searching the entire place for us,” Mitchell said as she squatted down next to us. “Whoever is pulling their strings is on that luxury flier and apparently has no interest in showing his face.”

I shook my head as I watched the action below, “Illegal weapons, harassment and unwarranted inspections. How can they be doing all of this? The Alliance military isn’t a police force, but they can’t be turning a blind eye to all of this.”

Mitchell was just as disgusted, “We can only do so much. As long as these criminal organizations can hide behind legitimate governments, we can’t take them all out.”

“Well, at least they're predictable. Looks like they aren’t going to let our friends leave until they do a full inspection.” We watched as four men with rifles boarded the ship and another six took stations around the ship with their guns ready to cut down anyone who might jump out and make a run for safety. After about ten minutes the four goons that went in came out and reported to their superiors that they didn’t find anything. They then joined the other men who moved away but kept a perimeter to make sure no one boarded the ship. After another ten minutes, the ship powered up its engines, hovered off the ground, turned to point 40 degrees up and then hit its main thruster, lifting it up and forward towards the sky. The ascent was slow but steady, and the armed men moved off to regroup with the others and continue to search the complex. I was tracking the ship on my palm computer that could pick up a general broadcast from the public information hub of the complex that included inbound and outbound traffic. A common feature of the public safety services.

“How long?” I asked Kayla.

“It’s set to activate as soon as they hit 10,000 feet,” She answered. I could see they were getting close, so it was time for my last little trick. I ran down the embankment and up to the nearest building. On the outside of each structure was a junction box that all the power entered from and led in to from a fusion plant up the hill. I used my gun to shoot off the lock, and then I simply pulled the large power cable out of the positive junction and forced it into the secondary negative junction; the first thing they teach you in engineering training not to do. An arc of power threw me back about four feet, but then we watched sparks fly all around the complex and then everything went dark. I ran back up the hill and waited with the girls. After a minute we heard the whine of struggling engines as the cargo ship that had just taken off was making an emergency landing back to the same spot it had just taken off from. The cargo door opened, and the same two crewmen came out to inspect the engines for damage. The three of us rushed down the hill with our guns at the ready. We forced them back aboard and closed the latch behind us. Kayla kept the two men at bay as I rushed to the engine room and Mitchell ran to the bridge. I quickly fixed the fuel mix, and she explained to the ship’s Captain and other two crew members that she was taking control of their ship for a while, her gun defusing any argument on the matter. The ship took off, and we were out of the atmosphere in less than five minutes.

Once we were in the clear, we gathered everyone in the ship's galley which was the only crew compartment large enough to accommodate everyone. The Pelican Jumper was crewed by five, Mary Jackson, a petite redhead who was the captain of the ship, Karl Bocken, a gangly dark skinned man who was the pilot, Fawn Chin, a young, but very fit woman who was the co-pilot and also second in command. I wasn’t entirely sure how that worked out, but it had something to do with duties being more managerial than flying. Then there were Jack and John, brothers who were in charge of the cargo and general maintenance. Even though the ship was meant to be crewed by as few as four people, they still seemed a little light in the skill sets needed to run an entire starship. Everyone was clearly pissed, but cooperative, as Kayla, Mitchell and I still had our laser pistols in hand. There were only two entrances to the galley. One let towards the bridge and the other to the aft section. I stood in one archway and Kayla at the other. Mitchell took the lead once everyone on the crew was seated around the community table.

“My name is Captain Julie Ann Mitchell. I’m currently assigned to the JAG office on Lion’s Head. We are very sorry that we had to acquire your ship in this manner, but we had little choice. Mr. Rylie and Ms. Johansson are material witnesses in a case we are building against the London syndicate. Unfortunately, they are doing everything within their means to stop me from delivering them to the authorities. We are going to set course for the nearest Alliance military base, and once we arrive, I will make sure you are compensated for any loss in fuel and business, and then you will be free to be on your way.”

Captain Jackson, whose glare was sharp enough to kill, looked directly at Mitchell and asked, “If you are who you say you are, why don’t you just call the nearest Alliance base for help?”

Mitchell returned the harsh glare and calmly answered, “Because every time we sent a message the Syndicate showed up first. We need to be face to face with uniformed personnel before we tip our hand again.”

Jackson didn’t say anything and didn’t blink for a long moment. Then she turned to Fawn and asked, “Did you send the message?” Fawn nodded. “Damn it,” Jackson said and then looked to Mitchell. “We sent an SOS out that we were being hijacked and included an image of the three of you in the transmission. Just in case you killed us and the authorities needed some solid evidence.”

Mitchell looked over at me and commented on the irony. “As complex and convoluted of a plan you came up with, it didn’t occur to you to disable their communications?”

All I could do was shrug as she pointed out my simple mistake that may have just gotten all of us killed.She turned back to Jackson and said, “You realize that the syndicate will most likely intercept us before an Alliance ship can, and they won't try to board us. They will just fire on this ship until there’s nothing left but dust. Tell me you have some armament.”

Karl, the pilot, decided to speak up, “Just the projection laser for pushing asteroids out of the way. Nothing that can be used against another ship.”

“Please tell me you have a functional QSG drive?” Mitchell asked.

John, one of the cargo crewmen, answered that “Yeah, but we can only keep it balanced for two or three minutes at a time. We haven’t been able to get it running right since Barker died. He was our engineer.”

“How did he die?” I asked, suddenly thinking of all the scenarios that can kill an engineer.

Jackson’s mouth curled with frustration as she said, “He accused a guy of cheating in a poker game and got a blade in his gut for his finger-painting.”

“I’ll take a look at the system,” I said to Mitchell as I crossed over to the other archway to head down to the engine room. When I got there, I found a number of problems, three of the four cooling pumps were barely operating, the fuel filters were clogging up and the liquid balance system that moves water around the ship, in and out of various cavities to keep the weight mass balanced, was trying to pump the water to the needed sections, but nothing was moving. Without it working right the QSG couldn’t maintain a stable tube for very long. I hit the intercom and broadcasted my voice through the entire ship, “It’s a mess down here, I’m going to need Kayla’s help.”

Mitchell looked around and found an intercom switch on the wall and used it to reply. “Give us a minute.” She then turned to Jackson, pistol still pointing at the crew. “I’m sorry, but I have to assume that you would try to take the ship back if you see a chance. So, until we get to where we are going, I’m going to need everyone except your pilot to stay in your quarters.” They weren’t happy, but all of them knew enough about the dangers of discharging a laser weapon on the inside of a pressurized ship in space that none of them wanted to take the chance of her pulling the trigger and firing the pistol in any direction. Kayla helped Mitchell put them into one of the crew quarters, and once they were inside, they pulled the control panel and shorted out the motor that opened and closed the doors. But they could still be opened manually, so Mitchel also decompressed the hallway outside the compartment as insurance that they wouldn’t try.

Mitchell took the pilot to the bridge to have him plot a course to the nearest military outpost, and Kayla joined me in the engine room. We were both in our element, fixing old and worn out ship parts on an ailing cargo ship. The first order of business for me was the mass-balance system. That required Kayla running through the cargo compartment and manually opening and closing valves that the system could no longer control due to rust and lack of proper lubrication of moving parts. I directed her over the PA system and watched her progress on a series of cameras that were already in place around the ship, that I could view from the engineering control station. Her hair was held in a loose ponytail with half a dozen ties she fastened from some string she found somewhere. Before our unplanned adventure, she would always have it braided and secured with a few ribbons. I never considered how much time she took making herself look attractive when we were on the Glacier Runner. Unlike most of the crew, she was always clean and well kept. Not an easy thing to do when your job consisted of crawling through maintenance spaces, often to fix the waste management systems. I myself skipped a shower or two during especially hectic weeks. As I watched her make her way from one level to the next, I was moved at how she was holding herself together through all of this insanity. Mitchell and I had military training and had both lived through the front lines of a war. Kayla lived a hard life, but she had never faced the prospect of death like this. I was proud of her. I still didn’t know if we had a future together or not, but at that moment I was glad to be ‘with her.’

A green light came on the QSG system. That was the first step in getting us on our way. Next, I needed to get the engines up to at least 80% efficiency to get the forward velocity needed to survive in a QSG tube. That took a little more creative thinking and elbow grease as we had to exchange some parts for others, bypass some safety systems and install a couple of things to do a job they were never designed to do. It wasn’t pretty, and it wouldn’t last, but it would get us where we needed to go.

“Ready when you are Captain,” I announced over the PA, referring to Mitchell's rank, but then it occurred to me that we had commandeered this ship and that would make Mitchell a Pirate Captain. The ship lurched forward as the main engines were engaged and a flashing green light on the ceiling of every compartment indicated a countdown for a jump to quantum speed. Then a sound I didn’t want to hear…a pipe that was part of the mass-balance system burst and water began spilling out in the passageway leading to the cargo sections. The computer automatically canceled the jump, and I rushed down the passageway and then down the ladder to the lower deck. It was filling fast, and Kayla was fighting with a large lever to close the flow of water toward the break. Her location was on the floor of the cargo compartment, and it was filling fast. It was at her neck when I got to the far side of the 20-yard long bay. Without even thinking I dove in and swam as hard as I could towards her. She was continuing to try and close the valve as the water was rising over her face. By the time I got to her she was submerged and still fighting to pull the leaver. I grabbed it, braced my good leg on the wall next to her legs, and we pulled together, closing the valve and stopping the flood. We both jumped and swam to the service, gasping for air. Kayla put her arms around my neck and let loose with sobs from fear and anxiety that she had been holding back for days. I didn’t blame her. A part of me wished I could purge my emotions as well, but my nerves were so worn that I doubted I could cry even if I lost my cool. Her weeping didn’t last long, less than a minute, but as she quieted, her arm squeezed me tighter, and she buried her face in my neck, needing a moment of comfort and of feeling safe. I suppose I needed that as much as she did as I wasn’t in a hurry to let go either. We would have probably stayed like that a lot longer if the ship hadn’t suddenly pitched to the port. The water sloshed, and I lost my footing on the crate I was using to keep my head above water. We swam to the other end where there was a ladder leading up to the next deck. The ship pitched hard to the starboard, faster than the gravity-plating could compensate and we both had to find something to hold on to in order not to fall over. I found a comm panel on the wall and hit the button for the bridge. “What the hell are you doing up there?” I yelled.

Mitchells' voice came back on the comm, cool but strained. “We have company. We need to jump now.”

I looked at Kayla, and she was just as aware of the problem as I was. The QSG system would not work until the ship was balanced properly, and with a water-filled cargo bay, there was no way that was going to happen. Normally I would have the water pumped back into the control system, but there wasn't time. We moved into the little room above the cargo bay that is used to control everything from the doors to the environmental systems. I tried to override the controls to the main rear hatch to open it and let all the water out, but they would not budge. Opening them manually wouldn’t work because that would require releasing the latch on the door itself and I wasn't prepared to eject myself with the water.

“I have an idea,” I said, not believing what I was about to do. I checked a couple of systems and then told Kayla to hold on to something and get ready to take a deep breath. I then stepped out of the control room and over to the opening looking down on the bay. The only place to get a good hold was on the ladder, so I climbed down just enough to wrap one arm and one leg around it. Taking out my laser pistol, I pointed it at the door. “Ready!” I yelled. Then I pulled the trigger. A single shot flew out and struck the door dead center. The age of the door and the extra strain put on by the mass of the water contributed to the entire hatch ripping away and everything in the bay, cargo, water, and air, blowing out in a violent escape. I suddenly found myself in a vacuum. Climbing back up the ladder as fast as I could, I got into the control room praying I could hold my breath long enough without passing out. Kayla was holding her breath too as the control room was also compromised, but she was alert enough to push the button that closed the door as soon as I was in and hit the controls to re-pressurize the compartment. We gasped for air again as we could feel everything normalize. I crawled along the floor, shaken and disoriented, but made it to the control station and found the intercom. “Try the QSG now,” I said.

The green light on the ceiling started to flash again. The system required a minimum of 18 seconds to build up a strong enough magnetic field to create the type that allows the ship to jump through space at the faster than light velocity. The ship suddenly shuttered, and a decompression explosion told me that the ship had been impacted by something. The QSG jump canceled again.

“We’re taking fire. I could use your help!” Mitchell’s voice yelled from over the intercom. Kayla and I were trapped in the control room of the cargo bay, and the passageway that led up to the next deck was decompressed. We could see the stars out through the opening where the loading hatch had been, and they shifted in all directions as the ship zagged and weaved to avoid the ship that was chasing us. I called up the menu on the computer in the control station, but it didn’t provide much, mostly cameras around the interior and exterior of the ship and the damage control system. Suddenly I had an idea. I scrolled through the external cameras and found what I was looking for. I looked at Kayla and said “This ship isn’t as old as the Glacier Runner was and they have something that it never had. Repair Bots.”

“How does that help us?” She asked.

“Well, that all depends on if they can accept direction wirelessly,” I said, as I was reviewing the specs in the system. “And they do. I’m going to try something that a friend told me he once tried against the Serkens during the war.”

She looked over at what I was typing into the system and ask, “Did your friend’s idea work?”

“Well, not really, but the Serkens were much better armed than the people who are chasing us, I hope.”

I could see from my camera feed the hatches on either side of our ship open and three repair bots emerging from each opening, They crawled out on the sides of our ship like silver crabs with magnetic feet. I then pushed the intercom button and said to the bridge. Fly in a straight line for about fifteen seconds.”

“They’ll get a lock on us if we do!” Bocken, our pilot yelled.

“Trust me!” I yelled back.

The star field out the back opening stopped blurring and froze in place as we were moving straight and true. The enemy ship came into view as it was matching our direction and accelerating to close the gap.

“Give me a count Kayla,” I said.

“One, two three,” she counted, knowing I wanted to count seconds. I released one of the bots and watched from the camera feed how long it took for it to pass our pursuer.

“Perfect, five seconds,” I said as I keyed in the last part of my command string and released the other five bots. Their little thrusters pushed them out and away from our ship, but five seconds later their magnets kicked on, and they were pulled directly onto the hull of the pursuing ship.

“Reilly,” Kayla said with a confused tone in her voice. “I thought repair bots had a failsafe in their programming to prevent them from being used as weapons.”

“You’re right,” I said. “Repair bots cannot be programmed to destroy. Their core programming is set up to prevent that from happening by accident or by intent. But they do have a program for prepping a ship to install new thrusters, which requires cutting into the hull to remove the old thrusters. So, that’s what I instructed them to do.”

The pursuing ship pitched hard to one side as they lost control over one of their thrusters and then began to spin in an effort to shake off the bots. That gave us a chance to get more distance and set a course toward an asteroid belt. Mitchell thought that would be a good place to hide, but given the limited deflection plating on this craft, I wasn’t excited by the idea. We changed direction again, and I was able to call up an external camera that had a magnification function. It didn’t take me long to zoom in on the enemy ship just as they sent a power surge through the hull, disabling all of the bots. Whoever was maintaining that ship knew their business because it was just a moment later that they regained control of the craft and resumed the chase.

“Damn it,” I said, fresh out of ideas. “You got anything?” I asked Kayla who just shook her head.

“Captain,” I said into the intercom, “We’re trapped in a control room, and I’m out of tricks. It’s all up to you.”

Mitchell looked around the bridge for ideas, but she was out of her element and couldn’t think of anything. At least nothing good. “You know how to access your comm system?” she asked the pilot. He nodded. “Good, switch it on for a full band broadcast.” With one hand still on the stick, he reached over, switched on the comm unit and then handed her the headset. She put it on, hit a switch so that the conversation would also be projected throughout our ship and then spoke. “This is Captain Mitchell of the Alliance Marine Forces aboard… aboard the ship, you are firing on. End your assault, and we will surrender. Reply.”

There was a pause, and then a voice came back, “Reverse your engines and come to a complete stop. Then prepare to be boarded.”

“Your assault damaged our navigation control system. We can cut our engines, but it will take us time to decelerate. Stay on our stern, and we will comply.”

There was a long pause then a reply, “What percentage can you fire your reverse thrusters?”

“I will have to confer with my chief engineer,” she replied. I assumed that she was trying to buy time for some reason so I clicked on the intercom and answered, “We can fire them at 20% for thirty-second intervals,” a believable situation that their engineer would confirm. If we did that it would take us over an hour to come to a stop.”

There was another long pause, and then the enemy commanding the pursuing vessel said: “Put your crew in escape pods, and we will retrieve them.”

She cut off the broadcast and called down to me over the intercom, her voice slightly shaky as her plan was not working. “Reilly, what should I tell them?”

“Well, the truth actually works in our favor,” I answered. “Tell them that their assault resulted in several sections being decompressed and we can’t get to the escape pods. Even basic sensors can confirm that.”

“Okay,” she said and relayed what I told her to our pursuers. After a minute they replied, “Start your deceleration.”

Mitchell replied that she was complying and then turned the communicator off. She then directed the pilot to slowly cut the engines and slow the ship down with the minimum amount of reverse thrust.

In the small compartment where we were, Kayla took a seat in one of the two chairs and said, “Can I ask you a question?”

I was looking through the menu of the computer system hoping for inspiration on a new idea to help us survive this situation. “Sure,” I answered.

“Do you want kids?” she asked as if we were having dinner on a third date.

“You want to talk about this now?” I asked.

“Unless you have an idea how to get out of this room and then away from the people with the working ship out here in the middle of open space, I can’t think of a better time.”

I let out a small laugh as she was right. Our backs were up against the wall, and we were out of options. All that was left was to wait for the syndicate to board the ship and kill us. I took the other chair and thought about the question.

“When I first signed my enlistment I thought I would do the five years, get out with a skill I could find a job with, find a girl, fall in love, settle down and have a couple of kids. But the war went on a lot longer than anyone expected, and after watching so many of my friends die, I stopped making plans for the future. Every time my retirement date came up, I felt like I needed to stay in the fight, so I reenlisted. I was in the service for nearly 18 years. I would still be there if I hadn’t been wounded. Now…” I thought about it and said, “Now, I don’t know. Part of me likes the idea of settling down and living a simple life where the most complicated thing to worry about is finding time for a PTA meeting. But another part of me is scared to death because I can’t imagine where I would fit in, what kind of work I could do as a civilian.”

“You seemed happy on New Harmony,” she said.

“Well, the work sucked. I hated smelling like a sewer when I came home. But I liked coming home to you.”

She smiled, stood up, stepped over to me and sat on my lap. She kissed me and asked, “What else did you like about your life with me?”

“I liked being by your side when we slept. As a matter of a fact I don’t remember being able to sleep through the night before we started sharing a bed.”

“What else,” she asked running her fingers through my hair.

“I like that you like all of my stories. Most of the people I know lived through most of my adventures with me. To you, they were all new and exciting. Kind of made me feel like my life wasn’t a waste after all.”

She put her head on my shoulder and wrapped her arms around me. “I never thought I could live a normal life before I met you. Now it’s all I think about. Even though it’s not going to happen now, at least I know I could have had it. For that I love you.”

I didn’t know what to say after that, so I said nothing. We just held each other and waited.

What I didn’t know was what Captain Mitchell was seeing on her sensor screen on the bridge. 19 QSG tube warnings came on the bridge’s sensor screen indicating that ships were about to appear all around the ship within seconds. Our opponent saw the same thing, but they couldn’t do anything about it, because there were so many ships approaching from such a wide dispersion that space was too disrupted for them to form a jump tube. Suddenly, 18 Alliance fighters appeared all around us and the syndicate ship. They were followed by the T.S.S. Olympus, one of the Alliance Heavy Carriers. When Captain Jackson sent out the SOS, the Olympus picked up the distress call and had begun a search. When Mitchell broadcasted her surrender on the open wideband channel, the Alliance was able to track the signal and locate us. That was the ‘Hail Mary’ Mitchell was hoping for and why she wanted to stall for time as long as she could. A last-ditch gamble that paid off.