Beauty and the Fleet (Intergalactic Fairy Tales Book 2) (22 page)

"What the hell are they doing?" shouted Hands.

"They're trying to save the hive," replied Beatrix, continuing her circuit around the disturbing structure. "Shoot it with everything you have. Aim for the center. That's where the queen is."

"Unloading into the belly of the beast," replied Hands, and again the drone of automatic fire filled the cockpit. "It would be easier if we weren't bouncing up and down like a basketball."

"Sure, I can do that, but then we'll all die," said Beatrix, dodging two ships that dived at the same time. "So, are you sure you want this to be easy?"

"I guess they do say that hard work always pays off in the end. Hard it is."

Hands continued firing into the center of the hive and it wasn't long before the Anthrak responded. They were much more versatile in their tactics than the Raptor pilots ever had been. Now, the Anthrak ships had divided themselves into two groups; one was still dive-bombing their ship, the other was surrounding the hive and mostly just taking hit after hit, using themselves as shields for the hive. Unfortunately, both Anthrak groups kept growing as more ships arrived on the scene. It was only a matter of time before Beatrix's ship sustained a critical hit. "Hands, I'm going to come in straight and slow. I need you to concentrate your fire in one area. I want a hole as big as this ship in the side of the hive."

"You got it, Sting," said Hands. "One big-ass hole, coming right up."

Sometime during the battle, Gadget and Pickle had crept up behind them. It was a stupid move with all the wild maneuvers Beatrix had been pulling, but she couldn't blame them. There was no way she would have stayed in the passenger area and missed all the action. Gadget said, "That's stupid, we're going to get blown out of the sky."

"Hopefully not before I can park this baby." Beatrix patted the ship's console. "You can hold together for me that long, can't you, girl?"

"Park it where?" drawled Gadget.

"
In
the hive," said Pickle, a note of wonder in her voice.

"That's pure madness," retorted Gadget.

"Sometimes you have to embrace madness if you're going to win," said Pickle.

Beatrix finished her realignment and squared off, facing the most damaged part of the hive. "I'll keep her as steady as I can, Hands. You make the hole."

Hands let out a whoop and opened fire on the guards in front of the hive. They fell quickly, leaving the pulsating grey flesh exposed. Hands aimed all four of the ship's guns at precise intervals and turned on the auto-fire. Huge chunks of the hive rained down as other ships sought to close the gap. With all four guns concentrating in one area, none of them could make it in. They gave up after four ships fell, and resumed their dive-bomb routine.

Beatrix was moving slow and steady in an effort to give Hands as much time as possible, so the Anthrak scored several indirect hits to the body of the ship. As long as they didn't damage too many of the thrusters, they would make it. Maybe.

Gadget could be heard back in the passenger area, yelling at Torch to order Sting to break off her direct assault. Stupid baby. Torch was yelling back just as fiercely that Sting knew what she was doing and that this was her mission.

Beatrix grinned. Without her even realizing it, Torch had handed this mission over to her. She was in command and she was going to make sure that it succeeded. "Hands, you need to hurry it up, because we can't take many more hits like this." It was all Beatrix could do to keep the ship straight any more. There were so many gouged panels on the hull that it was like flying a brick.

"I'm on it," said Hands, flicking the various switches that controlled the guns. "We're almost out of ammo."

The entire ship rocked to one side with the force of a blow that Beatrix never saw coming. "Shit, one of them came at us from the underside. They took out more of the port thrusters. I'm going to veer hard to starboard to try and give us a chance at hitting the opening you made. Do what you're going to do, Hands."

The ship grew eerily quiet as the sound of the guns cut off. "Keep all hands inside the vehicle," shouted Beatrix and pulled the control stick hard to her right. They veered wildly off their original course with only a few seconds until they made it to the hive. The ship continued to drift to the port side. It was hard to tell if they would drift too far. It was really more of a guessing game than anything.

"We're drifting too far to port," said Hands.

"No we're not," said Beatrix, her voice calm. "Just watch."

Hands gripped the arms of his chair and let out a low moaning sound. "Too far, too far," he muttered.

Beatrix diverted all the power she could to the port thrusters and the ships lateral movement slowed. If she pulled any more power from the starboard thrusters, the ship wouldn't be able to stay in the air. She pulled the nose of the ship just a bit higher than perfect alignment with the hole just as another ship hit them from below. It nudged them up even higher. If Beatrix pushed the nose down she and Hands would probably die in the impact, so she cut the thrusters and let the ship glide the rest of the way.

"Oh shit," said Gadget. "She cut the engines; we're all going to die."

"Brace for impact," shouted Beatrix.

The ship drifted into the hive of the Anthrak and was swallowed by complete darkness. A moment later there was a jarring impact as the belly of the ship hit the floor of the hive. They skidded for what felt like a thousand meters, but it was oddly quiet after the initial crash. Beatrix had expected things to go much more roughly, possibly with the ship tumbling end over end.

The lights in the ship were out. Beatrix could hear Hands panting in the seat next to her. Everyone else was a mystery. She was in command, so she should do something.

"Is everyone alive?" called Torch, his cool head prevailing as usual. "Sound off."

Everyone called out, one by one. Woolly and Arryn both snarled the whole time. They had all survived the crash. "Everybody sit tight, I saw an emergency box on the wall up here somewhere. I'll see if I can find a light in there," said Beatrix.

After a few minutes of groping in the dark, she found the box and pressed a button on the side of a cylinder inside. It was a heavy metal flashlight. There were three others in the box, along with some basic medical supplies. Hands peeked over her shoulder and grabbed one of the flashlights and some bandages. "Right, you see if anyone needs medical attention. I'll see about getting off the ship and hunting down that queen," said Beatrix.

She grabbed the other two flashlights and stepped into the passenger area. Hands was already busy wrapping a bandage around Gadget's head. Pickle watched Gadget with a sour expression on her face. Torch was turned sideways with Woolly's rifle pointed in the general direction of the two Leothen. Beatrix handed one of her flashlights to Pickle as she passed, and gave the last one to Torch. "We need to move quickly. It won't be long before somebody gets here to give us a warm, welcoming dismemberment."

"I agree," said Torch, setting down the flashlight long enough to fish Woolly's pistol out of his pocket and hand it to her. He kept the rifle for himself. "I say we take Pickle with us and leave the other two here to babysit."

"Hands won't like that," said Beatrix.

"He doesn't have to, that's the one good thing about command. Pickle seems to be in her element here." While they were speaking, Pickle had wandered to the back of the ship and was peering through the gap around the dock door. "She wouldn't take off her helmet on the Colarian ship, but now she's ready to run headlong into the bowels of the Colarian hive. She's a weird one."

"I think the helmet thing was about one specific fear. The girl's always been a little bit weird. That's what I like about her." Beatrix walked to the front of the passenger bay and delivered the news to Hands. He grumbled a bit to himself, but didn't argue until she handed him the gun. "Take my pistol. You'll need something to protect yourself in here."

"No, you have no idea what you're going to find out there. You'll need it," said Hands, trying to push the pistol back into her palm, but she pulled away.

"We have to be able to defend ourselves," said Gadget. "They have the rifle. They're bound to find some weapons out there once they get going."

"Fine," agreed Hands. He slouched back into his seat. "But if you're not back within an hour, we're coming out after you."

"Good enough," said Beatrix. She didn't bother to add that if they weren't back in an hour, they were all going to be dead. From the grim expression on Hands' face, it didn't need to be said, and she knew no orders would ever get him to leave them behind.

When she stepped back over to Torch, he handed her another pistol. Beatrix scowled at him. "There was a third gun? Where did it come from?"

"I found it on your Colarian friend when we chained him up," said Torch.

The look on his face told Beatrix he was particularly pleased with himself. "So, why didn't you give it to Hands yourself?"

He grinned at her. "I wanted to see what you would do."

"You were testing me?" growled Beatrix. "Here?"

"A captain's work is never done." He squeezed her arm. "You'll see when I recommend you for your own command."

Her ideas about her place in the universe had changed substantially since she was captured by the Anthrak. She wasn't certain where she saw herself going after this, but it wasn't a command position in the Crown Fleet. It wasn't the time or place for that kind of conversation, so she didn't respond. There would be plenty of time for that kind of talk when the Anthrak were no more. "Let's head out," she said, turning to Pickle. "We've got a queen to dethrone."

"I've waited a long time for that opportunity," said Pickle, a wicked grin on her face.

"We need to have a long talk about your past when we're done here, lady," said Beatrix.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

The outside of the hive had looked like organic matter, but it was still weird to find that the inside was made of sponge-like material as well. Every step felt like walking on a firm mattress. That soft grey material had probably saved all of their lives; slowing the ship down much faster and gentler than a hard surface would have. There was a deep furrow behind the ship for about two hundred meters, where it ended in the gaping hole they had shot in the hive.

The floor spread out all around them with no visible means of traveling between levels. They decided to explore the front of the ship since there was no telling how stable the damaged part of the structure was. That meant they would be exploring in the dark—a loud yowl echoed to their right—and they would have company.

As one, they turned the beams of their flashlights toward the sound. The creature shrieked and jumped back into the shadows. What Beatrix had seen of it wasn't pretty. There was a mostly humanoid torso and at least six legs with multiple joints. It would have looked like an insect if the whole thing weren't covered in sickly white skin. The spongy floor muffled sound extremely well, so there was no telling where it had skittered off to. They couldn't find it with their flashlights.

Torch set them into a formation with their backs forming a triangle. They slowly rotated as they made their way toward the outer wall of the hive structure. Once they made it away from the area the ship had destroyed there were corridors and rooms made out of the same grey, spongy material. There were no doors, so there would be no warning if something wanted to come at them. "Keep your eyes peeled. We need to find Pickle a weapon."

"Yeah," said Pickle, placing a hand on her hip. "I'm feeling a little exposed."

A screech sounded from the room to their left and one of the spider creatures lunged out at Beatrix. She put two bullets in its head and it crumpled to the floor, its strange legs curling up underneath it. Strangely, there was no leech on its head. "All clear," said Beatrix scanning the rest of the room. It was completely empty of furniture or decoration just like the others. Her flashlight glinted off metal as she passed it over the creature one last time to make sure it was dead. "Hold on, this thing was carrying something. It looks like a sword."

Pickle rushed up beside her and snatched the sword off the ground. She held it up like it was the most amazing thing she'd ever seen. "It's no vorpal sword, but it'll do," she said. She swung it around her in an intricate pattern and then jabbed the spongy wall a few times. "Yes, this will do nicely."

"If you say so," said Beatrix, shaking her head. "At least you've got a weapon now. Just make sure you don't cut either of us with it."

"I know what I'm doing," said Pickle.

"Get back into formation," said Torch. "I think we're almost to the outside wall. Hopefully there will be some stairs there."

They got back into their triangle formation and continued down the hall. Within a few meters they hit the outside wall, and just to their left were a pair of ramps. One led up to the next level and the other led down.

"The little bit of Anthrak in me says that we go up," said Beatrix.

"Up it is," replied Torch. "Watch your heads. I have a feeling we're going to find more of our many-legged friends upstairs."

They made it up the stairs and found themselves in an entirely different world. Almost the whole space was open, with just a few columns to support the floor above. It was lit by an eerie green glow, emitted from disk-shaped creatures that crawled slowly across the ceiling. As her eyes adjusted to the murky light Beatrix realized that not only were the ceilings covered, so were the floors. The creatures on the floor were Anthrak. There was no getting around them. They covered every centimeter of the floor and in some places were piled several high.

"Do we keep going up, then?" asked Torch.

"I wish I could say yes," said Beatrix, pointing toward the center of the room. "If you squint, you'll see a circle of big creatures. I think they are likely to be heavily armed because they are protecting the queen."

"Do we think there are other things lurking in the shadows around here?" asked Pickle.