Reaper Inc. (6 page)

"Lorelei,
ahead 50 percent, let them get closer then increase speed and keep us
equidistant for at least 12 hours."

"How far
apart?" Lorelei asked.

"Three
times weapons range and look for a good location about 12 hours from here to
see if that captain is any good."

"E'Aria,
you ever play chicken when you were a kid?" Ben asked.

"Why would
I act like some creature your species love to consume?"

Ben looked at
her then the light went on. "Yeah, guess you’re right. It’s a game of
nerve, let me explain it to you."

                                   
****

Captain Stren
walked on her bridge to relieve her XO. She had slept four hours, showered and
ate. She was going to take the next 8 hours.

"Captain
on the bridge," the marine at the door announced.

"At ease,
everyone. XO, anything to report?"

"No
Captain, they are still exactly the same distance away as they were at shift
change. Who are these people Captain? Who is on that ship?"

"Commander,
I wish I knew. Maybe we will find out when our marines are kicking their doors
in," Captain Stren answered, trying to mask her lack of information.

"Captain,
you have the bridge," XO said for the record.

"You are
relieved, Commander. Get some rest, eat something. See you in 8." Captain
Stren sat down in the captain’s seat and transferred everything to her up to
the second. She adjusted herself in her chair, trying to get comfortable. She
looked at her bridge crew. Even though they were all supposed to start at the
same time, they made sure they were in their seats before her and on their
game. Five seconds into her watch, she could ask them a question and they had
the answer.

                                   
****

Ben stood on
the bridge in a four way conversation about how best to deal with the war ship
following them.

"I know
the Captain of that ship," Andrea said. "She will follow orders and
play it all by the book. She will also underestimate us and try and disable
then board us."

"I still
say we play chicken with them. Once we are past them, we come in behind before
they can turn around and blast their drives. We can wave bye as we head on to
the border."

"No!"
Lorelei said. "I am not piloting into a head on collision."

"Well, I
hope not. You turn away at the last possible second while Andrea is blasting
and disabling their weapons."

"No, she
is not!" Andrea added in support.

"Maybe she
is," E'Aria said

The two women
looked at her like she was crazy. Natalia was listening but didn’t care as long
as they did something to kill the boredom.

The schematics
of a colonial corvette appeared on the screen. "This right here,"
E'Aria pointed out, "is where the long-range transmitters are located. The
short-range are on the other side. It is housed in the tunnels. That’s what we
used to call that area of the ship. Instead of their weapons, let’s disable
long-range com and the drives. We will leave them with weapons and short-range
coms. This way they can't contact the rest of the group until they are very
close and by then, we should be in Trillond space."

"What if
they try to contact the corvette and it isn’t answering? Don’t you think they
will hurry to find out?" Lorelei asked.

"No, I
don’t think they will. They might pick up the pace but they won't race to find
them. I don’t want to kill them or us, but I really would like to shake them
up. What did you say earlier, scare the piss out of them?"

"I think
that’s fair. They would be doing a lot worse to us if they caught us," Ben
said.

"Lorelei,
turn us around and proceed at full power," E'Aria ordered.

Ben sat down at
an unused console on the bridge. E'Aria had three or four hats on and the data
for each coming to her console.

"Grubb,
report to engineering," E'Aria announced. "Attention passengers,
secure yourselves. In three minutes, we will engage the colonial corvette who
has followed us from Anubis." Grubb would keep an eye on the drives and
generators and report anything to E'Aria or make adjustments she may need. She
hoped the Trillond Navy would be generous with the loan of the crew.

                                   
****

"Captain
Stren! The alien ship is changing course."

"Put it on
the screen, lieutenant."

"Look at
how it maneuvers, it has turned completely around and is heading towards
us," the lieutenant commented out loud.

"We can
see that, lieutenant," Captain Stren's tone sounded amused.

"Ensign,
sound battle stations. Lieutenant, bring power up on all weapons and shields.
When she is within range, fire a warning shot. Helm, prepare for evasive
maneuvers."

"She is
coming fast Captain, a lot faster than her previous speed."

"Evasive
maneuvers," the captain yelled.

"Aye
captain, evasive maneuvers initiated."

"She
changed her heading and is still on a collision course, Captain."

"Captain!
Firing warning shots. No damage recorded."

"She is
returning fire."

The XO ran to
the bridge. He entered his password for the doors. During battle stations, the bridge
was locked down. The doors whooshed open and he immediately glanced at the
large screen and the ship approaching.

A blast from
the oncoming ships laser cannon hit the hull just below the bridge. Then it hit
again and again. Commander Langley was on his back looking up. He could see the
ensign who was currently the com officer on the floor. He got to his feet and
helped the ensign back into her chair.

"My God,
they are going to destroy both ships," the commander yelled. The captain
looked over at him, then back to the screen. The commander ran and threw
himself on top of the captain to shield her from the impending crash. Everyone
screamed and the lieutenant fainted and pissed himself.

It was only a
few seconds but seemed like an eternity with the commander smothering her.
"Get off me, commander!" The ship shook and the captain knew they had
been hit. The commander stepped back and looked over his shoulder at the
screen. The two ships must have passed within 50 feet of each other. He could see
the rear of the ship in the distance.

"Damage
report! Commander, take the lieutenant’s station, please. Medical to the
bridge." The captain fired off her orders.

"They are
turning around, I mean turned around, they are coming back for another
pass," the commander yelled.

"Commander,
let's see if you can do better than the lieutenant at evasive maneuvers."

"Aye
Ma'am." He started to maneuver the corvette into a hard turn, stressing
the hull. "They just fired something at us. It looks like a ball of
fire."

"Brace for
impact," the captain yelled over a ship-wide announcement. The ship
bucked, shuddered and shook, then went dark. Momentum moved it along but
gradually slowed till it finally came to a stop. The emergency power came on
and the bridge lit up. Only critical systems received power.

"Captain,
it’s coming around again." Commander Langley spoke, dragging everyone's
attention to the screen.

"What have
we got, Lieutenant?"

"Captain,
shields at 25 percent, no laser weapons, torpedoes if the men load them
manually."

"Captain,
incoming com from the alien ship."

"Here we go. Let's see what
they want." Captain Stren released a long exhale.

The screen
flashed to show an attractive woman wearing a captain's uniform sitting in her
chair looking like she was having a really bad day.

"Captain,
what is your name?" E'Aria asked taking control.

The captain
stiffened up. "Why do you want to know?"

"Because
we are going to be leaving shortly and if we run into someone who can help you,
we will provide the coordinates and your name."

"Why would
you want to help us? You are obviously not friends," Captain Stren asked.

"Captain,
if we wanted to kill you and your crew, you would all be dead now. Surely you
understand we just disabled your ship instead of blowing it to pieces."

"E'Aria,
that is Captain Marilyn Stren," Angela said from the sideline.

"Captain
Stren, you have been warned. Stay where you are and repair your ship then go
home."

Ben got up and
walked over next to E'Aria. "Captain, what I want to know is how many of
you pissed your pants? Tell the truth or we are going to play again and I think
it will be even less fun for you people if we do."

"Are you
kidding me?" Captain Stren exclaimed.

"Unfortunately,
he is not kidding, Captain," E'Aria explained. The Captain looked at Ben,
then back to E'Aria.

"I only
know of one who fainted and pissed himself."

"See I
told you. I bet even the Captain there wet herself," Ben said stifling a
laugh.

"I most
certainly did not!" The captain was visibly getting angrier.

"Ok
Captain, calm down. You do look like you are pretty tough."

"She is
and we need to get going." Andrea cut Ben off from teasing the captain
further.

"Who are
you people?" the captain asked flustered.

"Captain,
we are Reaper Inc. Didn’t they tell you who you were shooting at and chasing
across the galaxy?" Ben asked.

"Smugglers
using an alien starship is what we were told."

"I see,
hold on a second, Captain."

"Natalia,
mute the audio," Ben asked.

"Prime
Minister and Senator Sims, report to the bridge please." Ben paged
ship-wide.

"Ok
Natalia, audio please." A minute later both individuals walked onto the
bridge, taking in the scene.

"Captain
Stren, I would like you to meet Prime Minister Alona Aok of the Trillond Empire
and Senator Thurmond Sims of Athena." Ben smiled at the recognition on the
captain's face.

"Captain,
I am going to transmit a document to you." E'Aria touched her screen.
"That is a diplomatic writ signed by the president of the alliance. For
your information, we transmitted that to Captain Mahajan who evidently chose
not to share it with the rest of you. Congratulations, you and the rest of your
captains have attacked a diplomatic transport. Endangering the lives of two
very high-ranking officials should carry some pretty grave consequences."

Ben said.
"We will be departing now. I hope you understand how lucky you are that we
chose not to retaliate. We are leaving you with weapons, shields and one of two
drives intact. Goodbye, Captain."

"Natalia,"
Ben said and she cut the com.

The Claymore
maneuvered away from the Dagger to continue on its journey towards the Trillond
border. They were eight hours out from the Asmoss asteroid belt. If all went
well, they would have the much-needed additional crew on board within a day.

Ben said,
"Natalia and I can watch the bridge. Why don’t you three grab a meal and a
shower, even some sleep, before we rendezvous."

"You would
have all three of us off the bridge at the same time?" E'Aria asked.

"Just a
suggestion. I think after our scheduled stop, the three of you will be needed
here most of the time and will have to work out a rotation. If not, then I will
and my head is still sore."

E'Aria pressed
the screen on her console. "Buddy, Grubb, come to the bridge." They
walked in two minutes later.

"Yes
Ma'am," Grubb said as they approached. Grubb was more of a talker and
tended to make most of the decisions for the two of them.

"Monitor
tactical and the helm. We will relieve you in the next four to eight hours. It
will be boring. I am setting all the primary functions on auto. You will just
need to notify us of any alarms. I have set all sensors to max so there should
be hours before we would make contact with anything that appears on your
screen." The three women were up and moving even as E'Aria explained.

"Natalia,
you don’t need to stay dear if you don’t want to. You can come with us,"
Andrea said looking at Ben. Natalia didn’t respond. She just stood up and
walked out with Andrea. They walked side by side, Andrea with her arm around
Natalia giving her a motherly hug.

The hours
passed; nothing but war stories and talk of women, some of that was like a war
story. Grubb and Buddy were a number of years older than Ben. They seemed to
have a girl or two in every port back in the day.

Grubb looked
like he wanted to say something then changed his mind. Ben saw it on his face.

"What were
you going to say?" he asked.

"Nothing,"
Grubb answered.

"Bullshit,
you were going to say something. Your mouth was hanging open."

"Well, you
have these beautiful women all living with you, are you. . . you know with all
of them?"

Ben laughed.
"No Grubb, Andrea and I are together. I have never even tried to be with
any of the others."

"You’re
shittin’ me."

"No, truth
man, I never have. Thanks for the thought, though. I can tell you thought I was
just living it up."

"Why the
hell they staying with you then?" Grubb asked.

"That is a
good question. I really thought a couple of them would have left by now but
they haven’t. I did give them a good salary and a job and a free place to live
so I think that may have a lot to do with it."

"Yeah, I
can see that. Do any of them have a man somewhere?"

"Not that
I know of. You looking for a woman, Grubb?" Ben asked smirking. "My
friends are a handful. If you want to give it a shot with one of them, go
ahead, but do so at your own risk."

"You don’t
mind?"

"Grubb,
you are all my friends. Just don’t ruin that. If she says no you better respect
it. We might get a Trillond female or two when the crew comes aboard."

"Like your
little green girl?"

"Probably
not just like her, but similar."

Buddy was
soaking in the whole conversation. "Lorelei is a very pretty woman. She
has a bit of an edge to her," he said.

"She does
at that. She used to be the first officer on a pirate ship."

"That
would explain how she lost a finger or two," Buddy said.

"Ah no,
not in her case. I cut her finger off and almost took a second one off except
the captain of our ship  stopped me. She was on the pirate ship that
Natalia was a prisoner slave on." Both their eyes got big. They had never
heard the story because no one ever talked about it.

Ben decided to
give them some details. "I'll give you the short version. We came to the
aid of a disabled freighter. Pirates attacked. Bad move on their part. The navy
captain wanted some of the pirates alive to get info. I found Natalia abused
physically and mentally, locked in a hole in the floor. I was seeing red, to
say the least, and interrogated Lorelei and her captain. She held out till I
cut off her finger and started on the second one. Her captain wasn’t so lucky.
He insulted the captain of our ship, calling her a whore. I cut off his balls,
shoved my knife in his throat and then in his heart. No more hurting little
girls or anyone else."

Buddy sat
really still. "Why is she with you? You would think she would want to be
as far away from you as possible."

"She says
it was all like a religious experience. I let her live mainly because she had
done what she could for Natalia while she was on their ship. It wasn’t just her
fingers, she heard her captain screaming while I worked on him. She found out
what I did to him. Long story short, the navy captain let her go on my ship
when I left. I feel she and I are friends. I think she has a better life now
and she can leave or stay as she chooses."

"Hey Ben,
it looks like there are three starships on the other side of the belt about two
hours from here," Grubb interrupted.

"I will
notify the captain. He tapped the console and slid his finger across the
screen. A diagram of the Claymore appeared. He tapped the room that belonged to
E'Aria and Natalia. He sent a notification from the bridge. Five minutes had
passed and still no response. He started to send a second with voice, when he
heard footsteps coming towards the bridge. More than one person, he just waited
to see who.

"Huh um,
you are in my seat," he heard at his shoulder.

"My
apologies, your highness. Did you get up on the wrong side of the bunk?"

"No, it is
my own fault. I was worried about leaving you three here. My subconscious was
monitoring for any issues. There were no issues, as you know, but four hours of
your exploits with your human females was more than I could take." Buddy
and Grubb slipped out of their seats, quietly hoping to make it to the door.

"Where do you
two think you’re going. Get back to your stations until your reliefs show
up." E'Aria wasn’t even looking at them but then turned her head quickly
in their direction, giving them the look. Poor guys couldn’t even pretend to
act like they were working. They couldn’t read the damn consoles.

"We are
sorry, captain, if we kept you up. Was just some lyin’ and bragging. There
t’weren’t a bit of truth to it," Grubb stuttered.

"Grubb, I
believe there was quite a bit of truth to it. There is no reason to say otherwise.
It was quite educational." She turned and looked at Ben. "But you, on
the other hand, were quite boring. I am surprised, given all that has happened
in the past months."

"Sorry to
have disappointed you, captain. I will work on my carousing and debauchery. Now
you need to get to work flying my starship and don’t hit anything!" Ben
said, walking off the bridge.

"He didn’t
mean nuthin’ by it, captain. He isn’t much for words," Buddy said.

E'Aria studied
Buddy for a second. "I know, his conversations are usually very short and
end with someone bleeding."

"Or
dyin’," Buddy added with a grin.

"Oh, we
know captain. The night he fought the spacers at Gus's, he didn’t talk to them
at all. He just commenced to punching and them to falling," Grubb said

"This is a
diplomatic mission and I may need you two to help with him if something arises.
I don’t believe he would hurt either of you, so you shouldn’t be worried."

Grubb shook his
head. "Captain I don’t believe he would hurt you. Us, I wouldn’t bet
on."

Andrea and
Lorelei walked in about that time. The conversation halted. Although no one had
said anything untrue, the two old sailors were a little bit afraid of Andrea
and didn’t want to get on her bad side. Buddy took a few extra seconds to stare
at Lorelei before following his brother off the bridge.

"We have a
couple hours before our rendezvous with the Trillond navy. Let’s go through
some system checks. Where is Natalia?" E'Aria asked.

"She will
be along in a few minutes. She wanted to talk to Ben about something,"
Andrea answered. "He probably has some new weapon for her."

E'Aria thought
out loud. "He had ordered two training swords last month. Maybe he will
give her some instruction during this trip. We should all take some time
everyday to train. If nothing else, it helps with the fatigue of being in space
for a long period of time."

Lorelei had a
gleam in her eye. "I think I will find Adam and see if he wants to train
in my room. That is my kind of training. I am sure he will be fatigued when I
am done with him."

"Just
don’t piss him off or hurt his feelings. I don’t want to have to eat burnt
garbage for a month," Andrea responded, checking her targeting systems.

"Plus, he
might poison you if you piss him off. Never anger the chef," E'Aria added.

"Where do
you think the Warhammer is at?" Lorelei asked.

E'Aria thought about it.
"She did not have to travel this route to get to Trillond space and it
would be smart not to. Hopefully, she is safe and in hiding somewhere across
the border."