Earthman Jack vs. The Ghost Planet (47 page)

“Heckubus, adjust your calculations!” screamed Jack.

“Huh?” perked up the robot.  “For what?”

“For this!” yelled Jack as he corkscrewed the ship, punching
up the acceleration and maneuvering through the tangle of fleeing shards as
they entered the nebula cloud.

“Blast it!” Heckubus cursed as Jack sent the ship into a
dive, narrowly missing the pursuing swarm of space bugs before pulling up in an
attempt to get back to their original trajectory.  “You’re off course!”

“Deal with it!” said Jack, frantically trying to steer the
ship as his missile alerts blared. The menacing red blip on his sensor screens was
getting closer and closer.

“We’re going to be too close to the planet!” said Heckubus.

“DEAL WITH IT!!!” screamed Jack and Scallywag.

By the time they had reached the edge of the nebula cloud,
Jack had fixed the ship’s trajectory.  However, as soon as they exited, the ominous
missile that was dogging them followed.

“I can’t hit it!” screamed Scallywag, frantically trying to shoot
down the encroaching projectile.

“DO IT!” cried Jack.  “HYPERSPACE!  NOW!!!”

After a quick re-calculation, Heckubus activated the Earthship’s
Brane Accelerator to open the hyperspace window. 

Now, this was the tricky part – the plan was to enter
hyperspace and then exit behind the shield surrounding the Ghost Planet,
effectively bypassing it, since the shield itself had no gravitational presence
in hyperspace. 

However, in order to do so at this close of range to the
planet, the exit window would have to be nearly on top of the entrance window,
and as most hyperspace engineers know, a typical Brane Accelerator is not built
to do that type of thing.

Of course, after some adjustments to the Earthship, Heckubus
was able to account for its limitations and push the Brane Accelerator to pull
off this rather admirable feat – even though Heckubus himself would have to
handle the bulk of the navigational calculations and timing for the execution
of the maneuver (a feat he boasted was mere child’s play to one as brilliant as
him).

No sooner had the hyperspace window opened than Heckubus
immediately called up the exit, materializing it an impressive 20 micrometers
away from the initial opening – about the diameter of the average human hair - just
as Jack barreled the Earthship through.

But even though this maneuver was very impressive and
successfully executed, there were a few things Heckubus did not count on
occurring.

The first was that the strain from opening two hyperspace
windows almost simultaneously so close to each other effectively shorted out
the Brane Accelerator, causing it to stop functioning completely.

The second was that the missile from the minefield was close
enough to the ship to successfully follow it though the hyperspace windows
before they closed.

The third, and probably the most worrisome, was that because
they had to make the jump outside the very edge of the nebula cloud, they
exited from hyperspace far closer to the ground of the Ghost Planet than anyone
had anticipated.

Thus, they found themselves speeding directly toward
impending doom, followed closely behind by even more impending doom.

“PULL UP!” squeaked Scallywag.  “PULL UP!!!!!”

Jack braced himself and frantically pulled on his ship to
correct its flight path as warning alarms blared and the pale, unforgiving
surface of the planet rushed up to meet him in the viewscreen.

The ship groaned and shook as Jack pulled it in a tight arc,
the maneuver leaving his stomach behind him like the most intense
roller-coaster ride he had ever experienced.  He managed to level out the ship
mere feet above the surface, the energy from the Earthship’s engines flaying up
a sharp cloud of dust and an angry bombardment of pebbles as it rocketed across
the landscape.

No sooner had the Earthship narrowly missed crashing, than
the missile following it through its hyperspace jump slammed into the ground
behind it, helped along by the accelerated force of its hyperspace maneuver.

A raging cloud of fire and smoke erupted from the point of
impact, the explosion rippling out a circular shockwave which was close enough
to hit the rear of the Earthship, knocking it off-kilter and sending it
skidding across the ground.

The ship rumbled as its belly met the surface below, causing
the entire bridge to shake and vibrate as alarms blared, and its occupants held
on for dear life.  Jack gripped the ship’s control orbs, doing everything he
could to keep the ship from spinning out of control.

In the viewscreen, a small outcropping of tall rock
formations was rushing up to meet them.  Jack threw his thrusters into reverse,
slowing the ship and causing his stomach to lurch forward so intensely he
thought he might throw up.

The ship skidded to a slow halt, stopping mere inches away
from the sharp, cold rocks waiting patiently to impale it.

“Warlord Abraxas,” called out the Acolyte from his control
panel.

Abraxas approached the Acolyte, his heavy footsteps echoing
throughout the cavernous control room of the Deathlord Mothership.

“What?” the Deathlord growled.

“Our scans have picked up an explosion, a few miles to the
east of the ship,” the Acolyte reported.

“An explosion?” mumbled Abraxas to himself.  “On screen.”

The bridge’s viewscreen switched to an image of the planet’s
surface.  In the distance, a plume of smoke billowed out from the ground,
twisting up into the sky.  Abraxas squinted at it, wondering if it were some
type of unknown defense measure the Heretics had hidden on the planet.

“Should we report it to the Supreme, Warlord?” the Acolyte
asked.

“No,” replied Abraxas.  “The Supreme is en route to the central
chamber with the girl.  His task is too important to be disturbed with
something like this.”

“Then what are your orders, Warlord?”

Abraxas glared at the smoke of the explosion for a moment,
mulling over his options.

“Send a patrol to investigate,” he said finally.

“Right away, Warlord,” the Acolyte replied.

“And tell them after they send in their report… they’re to
destroy anything they find.”

Jack blinked his eyes open, his mind
still hazy from the rough landing, and looked around the bridge.  Nothing
looked too terribly damaged from what he could tell… at least, not compared to
what the ship had been through before.  As his companions began to stir, Jack
called up a systems report on his holoscreen in order to get a better sense of
how damaged his spaceship might be. 

“Great landing, lad,” said Scallywag, picking himself out of
his chair and giving his back a nice crack.  “Very smooth.  Couldn’t a done it
better meself.  Oh, and in case you couldn’t tell, I didn’t mean any of that.”

“Hey, we’re alive aren’t we?” grumbled Jack.  “What more do
you want?”

“Some bloody certainty for one thing,” Scallywag replied.  “The
Ancients could create a sodding planet, you’d think they could invent shields
that wouldn’t die on ya every five minutes.”

“Considering everything we just went though,” said Jack
after seeing the ship had sustained only minimal damage during the landing, “I
think the shields we had held up just fine.”

“Frankly, I think we’re doing splendidly,” piped up Heckubus
as he picked himself up off the floor.  “I fully expected at least one of you
to have died by now.  By my estimation, we’re ahead of the game!”

The group all squinted at Heckubus.

“What?” asked the robot.  “That was meant to be
encouraging!”

Grohm lumbered up beside Jack.  “Location?” the Rognok
inquired.

“Good question,” said Jack as he called up his sensor
readings on the main viewscreen of the bridge so everyone could get a look.  A
3D map grid appeared, marking the location of their ship and the location of
the Deathlord Mothership some distance away.  The group all looked at the
readout and grumbled.

“Hmmmm…” said Heckubus.  “It appears we’re a couple miles
away from our target.”

“Can we still teleport down to where they have the
Princess?” asked Scallywag.

“No, the sensors aren’t picking up anything below the
surface.  We’re too far out of range to see where she might be,” said Jack.

“Well, could you fly us into range?”

Jack shook his head.  “The ship’s thrusters took a bit of a
beating from the missile explosion.  We can’t go anywhere for now.”

“Fan-tastic,” muttered the pirate.  “Anyone care to take a
stroll on the life-sucking dirt?”

“Could be worse,” said Grohm.

“Really?” said Scallywag.  “We just crash landed on an
inescapable planet, with an army of Deathlords all around, a swarm of
omnivorous space bugs in the sky, and magical-mystical ground that’s supposed
to kill ya the moment ya touch it between us and our target.  What, in the name
of Jerrimour the White, could be worse than that?”

“Having a whining Visini around who doesn’t stop
complaining,” grumbled Grohm.

Scallywag’s eyes narrowed.  “I liked ya better when ya
didn’t talk so much.”

“Don’t worry, Scally,” said Jack as he tapped on a few of
the buttons on his command chair.  “Plan B is in full effect.”

“Plan B?  What’s Plan B?”

“The plan where we use the ship’s ability to make anything
we want to help us get across the death-dirt and rescue the Princess,” said
Jack as he hopped out of the chair and turned to Heckubus.  “Try to get as much
repaired as you can while we’re gone.  When we come back with Anna, I expect
we’ll have to make a hasty getaway.”

“But of course,” drawled the robot.

“And no trying to reprogram the ship into an evil death
machine,” said Jack as he walked up to the teleportation platform. “Save the
schemes for after we’re out of danger, yeah?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” replied Heckubus, sounding only
slightly disappointed.

“Oy, how come the rustbucket ain’t coming?” grumbled
Scallywag.

“What’s he gonna do?” asked Jack.  “Condescend the bad guys into
submission?  It’s better to have him here repairing things and prepping for our
getaway.”

Scallywag scowled at Heckubus, who gave him a cheery wave
good-bye. “Toodles!” sang the robot.  “Have fun storming the Death Planet!”

Jack, Scallywag, and Grohm appeared on the teleportation
platform of a large room, facing an even larger door taking up the entire wall
before them.  A large diagonal crevice slashed across its face where the two
ends of the door met.

“Where’s this now?” asked Scallywag.

“The cargo bay,” said Jack.  “At least, I think that’s what
it is.  What do you call the bay where you store a bunch of cargo?”

“Seriously, why am I following ya into battle again?” asked
Scallywag.

“Don’t be hating,” smiled Jack.  “Especially once you see
what we’ve got behind door number one…”

Jack gave the command to the ship to open the door, the back
of his head tingling in response.  A dull
KLANK
heralded its unlocking
as the two sides of it began to slide away, revealing a large room beyond.

The room was oval shaped, with catwalks and rafters with
cranes attached for picking up cargo.  In the center of the room was a
selection of small vehicles that resembled motorcycles, only these had no
wheels.  Instead, they had small discs that faced the ground, two in the front,
and one in the back, and heavy engines on their tails that looked like
something that had been transplanted from a fighter jet.

Grohm grunted when he saw them and Scallywag gave a low
whistle.  “What be these funny lookin’ things?” he asked.

“
Hoverbikes!
” said Jack with more than a hint of
pride.  They were based on one of the racing games Jack had for his
Gamerbox
3000
.  He’d asked the ship if it could make something like that, and he was
excited to see it could.  “Fast, maneuverable, and best yet, they don’t touch
the ground!  Totally sweet, huh?”

“Grohm can eat them?” asked the Rognok.

“Uh, no,” said Jack.  “I just meant they’re really neat,
right?”

“I guess they’ll do,” said Scallywag.  “Woulda liked
something with a bit more protection on it.”

“I figured speed was more important for this stage of the
rescue,” said Jack.  “Here’s where protection comes in…”

He pointed at the wall beside them where metal panels
flipped around, revealing racks of weapons and armor of all shapes and sizes.  Plasma
guns, plasma rifles, thermal grenades, and various other gadgets and doohickeys
abounded.

“Now that’s more like it!” said Scallywag, who immediately
grabbed two new blaster pistols from the rack and gave them a twirl.

Grohm grunted in approval as well and went about collecting
his arsenal.  Each of them put on armored breastplates, along with shoulder pads,
knee pads, and guards for their forearms and shins.  The armor was lightweight
but was made of what appeared to be metal.  Jack could only assume it was
totally awesome, though he hoped he didn’t have to test it.

Grohm picked up a large club of smooth white steel, with
three black rings circling around its head.  When he gripped it, the rings
sprung to life with a crackle of electricity.  He grunted in approval and slung
the club across his back before picking up a massive shotgun the size of his
arm.  He slung that across his back as well.

Jack grabbed a blaster pistol and several grenades, which he
strapped to his belt.  They were small cylinders, so he was able to fit a lot
of them on his person.  Finally, he grabbed a communications unit, with an
accompanying earpiece, and strapped it to his forearm.

“Heckubus, can you hear me?” asked Jack into the headset.

“Yes, yes, loud and clear,” replied the robot.

Scallywag and Grohm both activated their headsets as Jack
hopped on his hoverbike and hit the ignition button.  The bike came to life
with a slight vibration and a low hum as it lifted a good three inches above
the ground.

Scallywag slipped onto a thinner bike than Jack’s, with a
longer chassis.  Grohm straddled a much bigger bike, more suitable to his
size.  It had a low seat and large handlebars that shot up from the front,
which almost met Grohm at his chest.  Jack mused that Grohm looked like a
member of a biker gang whereas Scallywag looked like he was getting ready to go
racing.

With a mental command to his ship, the wall to the cargo bay
before them suddenly transformed into a door and opened, part of it breaking
off into a ramp leading out onto the ground. Jack edged his hoverbike forward toward
the ramp and stopped.

He looked down on the chalk-white terrain before him.  It
was dusty and rocky, like crushed bone.  The sky shimmered a brilliant gold,
almost like there was a sun, and the air tasted stale and lifeless.

Jack hesitated, his stomach a knot of apprehension, like the
kind he got right before the first drop on a roller coaster.  He stared at the
ground, wondering what was going to happen the minute he embarked across it.

“What is it, lad?” asked Scallywag.

“The ground,” replied Jack.

“What of it?”

“Well, it doesn’t… I mean, it just looks like normal dirt,”
said Jack.  “I was thinking it would look a bit more… I dunno… evil?”

“Take a look around, lad.  It’s light out but there’s no
sun.  We can breathe, but there’s no atmosphere. You really gonna question
whether the ground can kill ya or not?”

Jack chewed on his lip.  “Good point,” he said.

“When it comes to the Ancients and their creations, the
greatest minds the universe has ta offer can’t make heads nor tails o’ ‘em most
the time,” said Scallywag.  “So regarding a race of beings who can get away with
ignoring the laws of anything that makes a bloody lick of sense, I say we play
it safe, savvy?”

“Savvy,” replied Jack, making a mental note not to tempt
fate by trying to touch the ground to find out if the whole death-dirt theory were
true or not.  “You two ready?”

“Aye,” said Scallywag.  Grohm grunted and nodded.  Jack took
a deep breath and looked out across the first alien planet he’d ever been on.

“Let’s do this,” he said, revving the engine of his bike and
taking off, his two companions following him.

Jack’s bike sped across the ground, the stale air of the
planet turning into a pleasant breeze as he moved.  The engine of his hoverbike
purred as he pushed it to go faster, its hovertreads kicking up a small amount
of dust as he did so.

Scallywag and Grohm fanned out beside him as they adjusted
their course toward their destination.  Scally’s engine had a high whine to it,
while Grohm’s was low and rumbling, as if it were complaining about the weight
of its passenger.

Before them the Deathlord Mothership loomed in the distance,
menacing and magnificent.  The dark claw contrasted against the stark dirt rock
of the terrain as it dug its talons deep into the ground like an angry spider,
its green and purple veins pulsing slightly as though it were a living thing.

Jack squinted at it as he sped along, the stagnant wind of
the Ghost Planet rippling through his hair.  The starship was slowly growing as
he and his companions sped toward it. Its image was hazy, like a great mountain
that looked small and scalable from a distance but grew bigger and more
oppressive as one approached it.

The sight of the Planetkiller made Jack’s stomach clench.  Suddenly,
he could feel his heart pounding against his chest, spurred by an injection of
fear and doubt.  Memories of recent events flooded into his head like a shoebox
full of photographs being spilled onto the floor:  the terrors of the Pit, the
endless winding hallways with the Dark Soldiers who marched through them
relentlessly, and the way the arms of the ship curled as they released their
ghostly weapon to consume his planet.  But most of all, he remembered the
horrible red eyes of the Deathlord Supreme, burning through him with a hate and
malice on a scale he had never known was possible.

And here he was, rushing back toward it, his hopes pinned on
a crazy plan, two aliens, a snooty robot, and a spaceship in need of repairs.

It’s just like a game of Arena Deathmatch
, he
thought. 
Only here, you die for real
.

Jack glanced beside him at his companions.  Grohm straddled
his massive hoverbike, his hands, the size of hams, clenched tightly around its
handles.  His red and black eyes narrowed, his huge jaw set like stone. 
Scallywag leaned forward, hunched low on his bike, like a cat ready to pounce
at the first sign of trouble.  Pangs of guilt began to grip Jack’s chest.  If
he were feeling this nervous, he could only imagine what they might be feeling…
and they were there because of
him
.

When he led his team into battles on his Gamerbox, he knew
just what to do.  But there was never anything at stake there – nothing but a
score on a stupid leaderboard.  Not this time, though.  This time, they either
succeeded, or they died.

Jack glanced at the readout on the dashboard of his bike. 
They were making good time and had covered almost half the distance to their
target already when Jack’s communicator came to life.

“Come in, simpletons.” Heckubus’s voice squawked over Jack’s
headset.  “Simpletons, come in.  Do you hear me?”

Jack hit the response button on his communicator.  “Simpletons? 
Really?” he said with a hint of annoyance.

“I am fully prepared to refer to you as dullards, inferiors,
or ninny pickers, if you prefer,” said Heckubus.

“How about just calling us Team One?” suggested Jack.

“Sorry, that is not one of the choices I recognize,”
responded the robot.

“Oy, Robot,” chimed in Scallywag over the comms.  “Ya got a
reason for calling other than to annoy the lot o’ us?”

“Of course, I do!” responded Heckubus.  “You think I enjoy
talking to you socially?  Hardly the case.  Hardly.”

“Then what do you want?” said both Jack and Scallywag.

“Long-range sensors are picking up three contacts heading
straight for you,” Heckubus said.  “Energy signatures are in-line with those of
Deathlords, so just FYI.”