The Space Pirate 1 (18 page)

The transport soared through the mesosphere and broke orbit with a minimum of fuss. The vessel’s trajectory took it to the far side of Danderly. The Galactic Academy was nowhere to be seen, in synchronous orbit on the other side of the planet. She could see the speckled cloud of junk in the distance. That must be the debris field. The transport approached at cruise speed for several minutes. Vin seemed tense and nervous, probably just as much as Charley was. She hoped he knew what he was doing.

The pilot turned and spoke to the pair.

“This is it for me,” he said as he pulled an oxygenator over his nose and mouth. “I’m not getting any closer to that field.”

“Understood, and thanks,” Vin said, gripping the man’s hand. “I’ll make the final transfer later today.”

The pilot snorted, as if that probability was around 50/50. That did nothing for Charley’s confidence.

The airlock door opened and with a shock Charley realized she was staring at naked space. She froze for a moment, not knowing what to do. Her body felt weird, not having gravity to anchor it down. Vin tapped her on the shoulder and indicated he would retrieve her jet pack first. He seemed to move well in zero gravity, which made her feel a little better.

Vin fitted Charley’s jetpack then did his own. He looked at Charley with a smile and a wink and pushed himself confidently through the airlock, his jetpack already flaring.

Charley stood on the edge of the abyss, her mind racing. Vinnie was moving the steerage bars that trailed down from the jetpack. Charley gripped hers tightly.

Vinnie said over the com.

Charley pushed off from the airlock, her heart in her mouth. She could hear the vessel pulling away behind her. She seemed to be heading toward Vin, which was a good enough start.

Vin said.

It was sound advice. Charley moved her steerage bars a little, experimenting with lateral and forward movement. She found that the further she moved a bar, the greater the surge generated by the jetpack. She also worked out that she could move up or down depending on the tilt of the steerage bars. Before long she was executing semi-competent maneuvers and almost felt like she could get from A to B without too much trouble.

said Vin.

Vinnie, spinning gently only ten yards away, produced a baton no longer than his forearm. He extended it out into segments. At its longest it was about seven foot long.

He handed the now rigid pole to Charley, who was only just learning how to stay in a stationary position in zero gravity.

he said urgently as he extended his own rod.

Charley had no argument against that. The debris field was a hazy, multi-colored cloud. She couldn’t even see the ship they were looking for.

She followed Vin as he propelled himself toward the debris field. Chunks of scrap metal from the doomed chemical freighter’s hull drifted past them, some of them at surprising speeds. At first the density of objects was reasonably low, and the pair had plenty of warning for approaching objects as well as ample space to move into. As the minutes dripped by, however, and they sank deeper and deeper into the field, Charley knew would soon be needing their poles.

Vin drifted under a drum that was slowly spilling its contents into the vacuum of space.

he warned.

Charley said nervously, watching as Vinnie pondered which way to thread through a massive hull sheet with multiple gouges. The pair could either go all the way around or simply slide through one of the holes. The problem was the hull sheet had been strengthened with a lattice of steel cable which now jutted out at crazy angles. Charley wasn’t keen on impaling herself on the end of one of those.

Vin hovered near one such hole and carefully picked his way through a forest of steel cable. Her heart thumping madly, Charley tried to follow in his footsteps and almost cornered herself in the maze of twisted steel. Eventually she made it through, beaming at Vin as he turned to congratulate her. Her smiled faded when she saw the toxic drum coming up behind him, spinning end over end in deceptively fast rotation. She accelerated forward, pole extended like a lance, and jabbed at the drum savagely. The pole broke through the brittle material and jarred against the far side, sending ripples of pain up Charley’s arm. She held firm, sternly turning the drum away and out of danger. The leaking drum left Vin in a cloud of yellow-green vapor. He surged free of the cloud quickly, but Charley could see the toxic vapor had instantly burned his suit. Her anxiety rising, she checked Vin’s air suit and eventually gave him the all clear. The material had been scorched but not ruptured. That was too close.

Vin breathed a deep sigh of relief and continued on his way. he muttered as he powered away. Charley wondered if she’d offended his sense of manliness by saving him. Men could be so stupid sometimes.

The pair worked slowly through the debris field, painstakingly turning drums away and assessing the toxic risk of the surrounding area. It was pathfinding at its purest. A wrong turn could easily see them smack in the middle of a toxic funk with the potential to corrode their air suits within seconds. It didn’t matter what their suit specs claimed, this stuff was industrial-grade sludge. Charley cursed herself for not asking for more money.

At length Vinnie paused and produced a pair of field nocs from his utility belt. Grinning, he handed the nocs to Charley. At first all she could see was junk, but there, behind a blood red veil of toxic vapor, lay a small ship. The scout. The nocs had picked up the outline using radar waves. She handed back the field tech.

she asked, glad to finally be near the end of their torturous run through the debris field.

Vin said with a slightly crazy grin.

Charley replied.

Vinnie checked his wrist pad nervously. “< got word that the salvage freighter is approaching Danderly quicker than expected. Damn thing could be here any second.>

Charley considered the situation. To go around that toxic plume would take at least twenty minutes. In the end she nodded, but only because she suspected Vin had already made his mind up.

he said.

Charley felt a little better with that, but the gallantry didn’t sound right coming from Vinnie’s mouth.

Vin said as he tossed his pole away.

the ex-pirate said with a grin.

26

It was the first time he’d ever used her name. It gave her a weird thrill, no matter how many times she told herself he was a grumpy, taciturn loser.

Vin surged toward the toxic plume, his jetpack flaring white and blue with bursts of power. And then he was through, his body indistinct through the haze. Charley waited until she couldn’t see him anymore before setting off. She let go of the pole reluctantly, steadily building speed. By the time she hit the plume she was flying. She didn’t dare slow her mind to rational thought as she hurtled through the kaleidoscopic nightmare. There were drifing corpses in that cloud, people asphyxiated by their fall from the freighter. Charley tried not to dwell on their presence as she made for the far side of the plume.

came Vin’s voice over the com. Charley obeyed, alarmed at how close she came to barreling straight into a razor sharp hull fragment. She continued on, aiming for the blinking light she assumed was coming from Vinnie’s jetpack. She found her comrade staring in awe at the vessel before them. Drifting on its side, the scout looked in near pristine condition. An amazing sight in such a lethal debris field. She could tell it was a long range craft from the warp propulsion unit at the rear. Otherwise it just contained a small living area mid deck and a two-man cockpit. There were two lasers mounted underneath the hull but they looked fairly useless.

Vinnie mused, continuing Charley’s train of thought.

Charley said in a flat tone, put out by his use of the word ‘I’. Seems like he really did want to go his own way after this operation was over.

he said.

Charley followed Vinnie to the rear of the craft where he found a rectangular panel under the fuel cell array. Sliding the panel open revealed a keypad. Vinnie placed a small cylindrical device above the keypad. It began scrolling through reams of data on its digital readout.

Vin explained.


Charley held her tongue. Vinnie was clearly skilled in areas that could really help her new Pirate Guild. If only he wanted to join.


He watched the unscrambler as it revealed the hatch code number by number. In normal circumstances the scout would’ve registered a breach of security to the mother freighter and a team of mercs would be inbound to cut Vinnie down. Out here in the middle of a toxic debris field the cheap security system wasn’t going to stop them from commandeering the vessel.


The keypad glowed green. Vinnie pointed to the roof and they climbed up a service ladder. The top hatch was invitingly open. Vinnie climbed through and lifted Charley down. He closed the hatch and they both removed their helmets. Vinnie looked at Charley with pure joy. Right then he looked like a kid in a candy store. Caught up in the moment, he planted a hard kiss firmly on Charley’s lips. It was an innocent kiss, one of relief more than anything else, so Charley knew she didn’t need to respond. But the truth was she wanted to. She wondered what Vinnie would think if she did. Letting the moment pass, she let Vinnie have his moment of victory and sat beside him at the dashboard.


“These lasers might be fucking lame,” he observed, “but we blast our way out with them.”


Charley grinned as Vinnie blasted away a thick hull sheet for kicks. He accelerated slowly, weaving in between pieces of gnarled junk and staying away from the toxic plumes. On more than one occasion he blasted a chemical drum out of the way. The scout responded well to Vinnie’s movements. It was a fluid and agile ship. If Vinnie could kit it out with weapons, Charley could see that it would be a handy vessel to travel in.


The scout emerged from the debris field in under ten minutes. It was such a luxury to leave in the vessel rather than jetpacking their way back through the hazardous field.


“How much air did we have in these suits?” Charley asked.


Vinnie grinned. “If we couldn’t break in to this thing, we’d be in serious trouble, darlin’.”


Charley didn’t know whether to be impressed or annoyed. “You’re a confident man, aren’t you?”


Vinnie snorted. “Look at my old man. It runs in the genes.”


Charley had to agree there. She settled back in her chair as Vin plotted a course for Danderly’s northern hemisphere.


A ping resonated from the ship’s nav system. Charley immediately had a bad feeling.


“What is it?” she demanded.


“Bandit vessel, inbound at 453-95. Fucking Night Runners.”


Cold fear grasped at Charley’s throat. Instinctively she drew her blasters.


“Think we’re gonna need these,” she said.


Vinnie nodded in agreement. “They would’ve been watching us. Waiting on the edge like fucking hyenas. They’ll be looking to board and claim this ship as their own. They know there’s only two of us.”


“And two blasters,” Charley added, trying to make light of the situation. She was immensely glad she brought her pirate gear. She lined up a series of colored pellets on the dashboard.


“Are those Silverton’s?” Vin said, his eyes lighting up. “You really are old-school.”


“I got a plan, too,” Charley said. “It’s a long shot, but you only live once, eh?”


Vinnie looked Charley in the eye. She felt as though he was truly seeing her for the first time. “Now you’re beginning to talk like him too,” he said softly.


“Not just a pretty face?” Charley asked, feeling a new tension between the two of them. It was a feeling she liked, and hoped to cultivate further if they ever got out of this mess.


“Listen,” she said. “I don’t know much, but I do know that a pirate never surrenders.”


“Damn straight,” Vinnie said, sneering at the thought.


“So we need to blow this scout up ourselves,” Charley said. “Two of these incendiary pellets should do it.”


Vinnie looked at her with wide, incredulous eyes. “After everything we did to net this thing? Are you fucking crazy?”


“Maybe a little,” Charley admitted. “How many bandits you think are on that ship?”


Vinnie consulted the nav projection. The bandit vessel was a modified heavy fighter, called an Armadillo across most of the galaxy. It had all the brute firepower a military fighter did, but two extra storage bays down back for loot. It scored highly on most counts, being tough, agile, powerful and loot-capable. The only things it lacked was genuine speed and enough bulk to allow for proper combat shields. Still, it was a formidable proposition and way beyond the modest fighting abilities of the scout.