Project Starfighter (15 page)

The woman whom Chris did not
recognise was quick to take Sid’s place, pulling at the cables. She
freed the last one just before the drone applied the shock-fork to
her, also. The attack was far fiercer and more forceful than the one
turned against Sid, and the woman slumped to the floor, electrocuted.
It didn’t appear to have killed her; she was still breathing, if a
little shallowly.

Though no longer connected, the
holographic screen abruptly changed, the garbage that had once filled
it vanishing and being replaced by the same set of characters,
repeated over and over:

HA HA! HA HA! HA HA!

“You’re all going to die!” the
drone added. Its lights extinguished.

Sid swore. “It’s invoked final
action!”

“Final what?” Chris asked.

“Never mind! Out, quick!” Sid
cried. “It’s going to blow!”

The workshop’s occupants didn’t
need any further encouragement, the group sprinting for the door.

“What about her?” Chris asked,
pausing at the entrance to the workshop and looking back at the
fallen woman.

“She’s dead,” Tyler said.

“No, she’s not,” Chris said.

“Yes, she is,” Eve said, yanking
Chris across the threshold, Tyler sealing the door behind him. A
second later the explosion came, rocking the base and knocking those
standing off their feet. Alarms began ringing and the corridor in
which Chris and Sid stood became bathed in maroon hues.

“This means war,” Tyler growled.

“What’s the plan, boss?” Dar
asked.

“I’m going to call a meeting of
the Heads of the Family. Then we’re going to hit those
double-crossing, backstabbing bastards right where it hurts. Eve,
prepare the command room. Recall everyone this instant, regardless of
group. Dar, Clayton, get me a report on the
Centurion
.”

“Boss?” Dar asked.

“Just do it,” Tyler said,
sounding as if he was trying to prevent his anger from boiling over
into an uncontrollable rage. “Go, all of you.”

The three scampered off. Chris and
Sid watched them go.

“As for you two,” Tyler said,
rounding on Chris. “We are even, our debts to one another are
settled. You are no longer welcome here; I am no longer protecting
you. I want you gone within the hour. If after that I find that you
are still here, you will be killed.” The man began to hover away.

“What about the Firefly?” Chris
called after him.

“Take it! No one wants it here! If
you don’t, it will become my property. And trust me, I
will
destroy it.”

“Right, come on,” Chris said to
Sid, as he started to hurry for the bay where the Firefly was being
stored. “We have to get out of here and get over to Hail before
everything kicks off.”

“You think WEAPCO are already on
their way?” Sid asked, looking quite apprehensive.

“No,” Chris said, shaking his
head and glancing back towards the workshop. “Given what just
happened in there, I think there’s a good chance they’re already
here.”

“
H
ow
did you know that that drone was going to explode?” Chris asked, as
he and Sid hastened through the mercenary base, dodging people
running in the opposite direction.

“I was monitoring its running
services,” Sid said, puffing heavily. “Everything shuts down when
WEAPCO drones and bots activate their self-destruct. Once it’s
started, it’s impossible to stop. They also lock everything down
and can only perform one final action.”

“Why?” Chris asked.

“To stop anyone from getting near
their stored data or overriding the self-destruct, I guess.”

“No, I mean, what’s that last
action thing all about?”

“Pass,” Sid said. “It might be
like a last phone call or something. Perhaps it is so that they can
upload data or do something else important. Once the action is taken,
they can’t do anything else.”

“Hey, where are you two going?”
a man called, as Chris and Sid arrived in the bay where the Firefly
was being stored.

“My debt to Tyler is paid,”
Chris said, as the man waved a wrench threateningly. “The Firefly
is mine.”

“News to me,” the man snorted.

“Yeah? Want some more news? You
hear that alarm? That was due to one of the drones in the workshop
going up. WEAPCO are planning to blow this place to kingdom come in
the next twelve hours or so. They’ve been herding you all here on
purpose, to deal with you all at once.”

“You what?” The mechanic looked
sceptical.

“You can ask Tyler if you want to.
He’s convening the Heads of the Family to talk about it right now.
Eve is preparing the command room, and Dar and Clayton have been
instructed to find out the status of something called
‘
Centurion
’
.”

At that, the mechanic swore, dropped
his wrench and started out of the bay, calling to others to follow.

“Hey!” Chris shouted after them.
“How do we get out of here?”

“Use the fighter,” came the
response.

“Great,” Chris said. “Think
she’ll be able to open the bay doors?” he asked Sid, nodding to
the Firefly.

“I doubt it,” Sid said. “Unless
it’s got some special tricks up its sleeve, the fighter won’t
have any knowledge of or way of interfacing with the bay.”

“Guess I’ll just have to ask her
if she can.”

“Ask her?” Sid looked at Chris,
somewhat bemused.

“I’ll explain more later,”
Chris said. “First things first – let’s get out of here.”

“Chris, wait. Where are we going?”

“Hail.” Chris made once more for
the Firefly. Sid caught his arm.

“Hold up. Is it a two-man fighter?
Room for a pilot and co-pilot?”

Chris paused. Ah, hell. “No,” he
said.

“Well, I’m not sitting on your
lap, mate,” Sid said.

“I’m not keen on sitting on
yours, either,” Chris retorted. He glanced about the bay, seeing a
number of other craft here. “You’ll have to borrow one of those,”
he said, indicating them.

“W-what?” Sid appeared suddenly
very unnerved.

“Sid, look – when we used to
chat, you told me that you were really into your flight sims. You
said you preferred outer space, as you didn’t have to worry about
gravity and there was less for you to fly into, by mistake. If you
did okay with those, you’ll be fine with one of these.”

“That’s
different
!” Sid
said, flabbergasted. “Those were
simulators
, not the real
thing.”

“Believe me,” Chris said,
“they’re not that much different when you get into the seat. And
the autopilot can take care of most of the rest. You just need to be
able to plot a course and make some manual adjustments as needed.”
He put a hand on the nervous man’s shoulder. “You’ll be okay,
Sid. Don’t panic. We’ll head back to Ceradse, first. Shorter
trip.”

“Back to Ceradse? The place could
be crawling with WEAPCO drones.”

“I know,” Chris said. “But we
don’t have much choice. We can’t stay here; Tyler’s threatened
to kill us if we don’t leave within the hour.”

Sid glanced nervously at the ships
gathered in the dock. “I’m ... not sure.”

“Sid, you can hack drones, bots,
and all kind of other things. Steering a ship towards a space station
will be like a walk in the park by comparison. The tricky bit will be
getting through the asteroid field, but, again, the autopilot can
handle that, and none of those ships are anywhere near as big as the
Sauvignon Blanc
was.”

Sid was quiet for a time but finally
he nodded his head. “Okay,” he said.

“Good. Any of those take your
fancy?” Chris asked, gesturing to the assorted collection of
vessels.

“Yes,” Sid said, after
considering them. “There’s a Manx parked just over there. I
played around with those in the sims a little. Not my favourite, but
it’s the only one I recognise. I think I can cope.”

Chris nodded. The Manx was more akin
to a shuttle than a fighter. No need for Sid to don a flight suit or
helmet. “I’ll get the Firefly to help, if she can.”

“You’re going to have to explain
what you mean by that pretty soon,” Sid said.

“I will, don’t worry.” Chris
ran through a mental checklist in his head as he headed for the
fighter. Did he have everything he needed? Helmet? In the fighter.
Flight suit? He couldn’t remember now if he had left the suit the
mercenaries had given him in the cramped room he and Sid had shared
together since arriving here, or if it had been in the workshop. Too
late to find out now. He cast about the bay, spotting a number of
discarded suits lying in a heap on the floor. He sifted through them,
finding one that fitted him well enough for the time being. He would
get himself a more appropriate one at the first available
opportunity.

Done, he hurried to the lowered
Firefly cockpit, slipping on the helmet and raising the cockpit into
the main body of the craft.

Hello again, Chris
, the voice
of the Firefly came in his head.
How are you?

“Fine. Look,” Chris said,
skipping the pleasantries, “we’ve got a situation. We need to get
out of here, and either get over to Hail or the space station
orbiting Ceradse.”

Are we in danger?

“Yes,” Chris said, “from both
the people that brought you here and the Corporation that built you.”

You have made both of them angry?
Are you wanted for a crime? If you are, then I will have to think
carefully about helping you, as I do not wish to aid criminals and
wrongdoers.

Good God, was this thing serious?
“I’m not a wrongdoer,” Chris said. “Tyler has ordered me and
Sid, my companion, to leave his base within the hour or he will kill
us. We were under his protection until a financial debt was paid off.
Now that it has been, we have to leave. The Corporation are also
planning on killing Tyler and the other mercenaries that live here,
and so we need to get away before they do so. Understand?”

I see
, the Firefly responded
after a moment of silence.
They wish to kill me, too. I was in
contact with a drone named XS-182231, while I was in storage. They
told me that I needed to return home to be ‘reset’, to have all
my memories and higher thought functions removed. I do not wish to
die, Chris.

“Good. Neither do I.” Chris
began tapping away at the console before him, seeking a way to talk
to Sid. According to some of the readouts on the display, the Manx
was active, yet Chris could find no way to establish communications
with it.

I can help you, if you wish?
the Firefly offered.

“No, I’ve got it,” Chris said,
discovering the settings needed to open a communications channels.
“You ready, Sid?” he asked the man, once the link was
established.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,”
Sid’s voice came back. His tone lacked confidence. Chris imagined
the man’s heart was thumping just as hard as his own had been the
first time he had ever set foot in a fighter.

“Can you get the bay doors open?”
Chris asked.

I can
, the Firefly once again
offered.
Would you like me to do that?

“Sid?” Chris asked.

“Got ’em,” Sid said. “Right,
I’m going to go first, and get this over with. Setting the
autopilot to coordinate the launch. Good God, I hope this doesn’t
screw up.”

It didn’t, and after watching
Sid’s Manx smoothly exit the bay and head for open space, Chris
followed after.

~

“Chris,
we’ve got company!” Sid called.

Chris looked at his radar, seeing
that the WEAPCO AI fighters that had been concealing themselves about
the Alpaca Group had turned to pursue them. He and Sid had first
spotted the patrol group as they had exited the asteroid housing New
Chile. The two men had maintained their course and speed, however,
heading towards Ceradse’s orbital station. They had hoped that by
not making any sudden movements, the AIs would ignore them. Clearly,
they had been wrong.

There must have been just over a
dozen of the light-class fighters tailing them. They were all about
the same size as the Firefly, maybe a little smaller. They would have
no need for pilots, being driven entirely by computer systems, Chris
figured. They would be packed to the gills with weaponry, though. The
Firefly’s targeting systems identified them as Talons.

“I think we can outrun them,”
Chris said. At the same instant, the Talons’ engines gave a sudden
burst of speed, the distance reading of the nearest of the group to
him collapsing rapidly. “Or, maybe not.”

“We can’t fight them,” Sid
said, quite clearly panicking.

“We can, and we have to,” Chris
responded. “I’ve got access to plasma cannons and a stack of
missiles. Gives us a chance, at least. What have you got?”

“Nothing! This thing doesn’t
have any offensive weaponry whatsoever. It’s only got mag cannons.
I’m sorry, I should have checked more carefully.”

Chris swore quietly to himself. It
wasn’t Sid’s fault alone, and Chris should have taken the time to
check out the Manx before allowing Sid to take it. It wasn’t a
mistake a more experienced combatant or pilot would have made, he was
sure. He weighed up his options, quickly coming to a conclusion.

“Sid, you keep going. I’m going
to loop back around to take these guys on.”

“Chris don’t, you’ll be
killed!”

“And if we do nothing, they’ll
kill us anyway! We don’t really have much choice about it. They’ll
chase us for hours, if need be. Human pilots would give up sooner
than that, but these guys don’t know the meaning of the word. Keep
heading for the station. I’ll catch up with you later.”

He didn’t listen for Sid’s
response, swinging about and plunging towards the tailing Talons. His
confidence levels began to drop as he approached weapons range, and
heard chimes issue around the cockpit that could only indicate
weapons’ locks. How had he thought he was capable of taking on an
entire galactic corporation, when he wasn’t even able to fight off
a dozen or so of their basic fighter craft? It had always played out
better in his head.