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#2
AUG 10 |
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Into the Unknown, Part Two:
“Deus Ex Machina”
Onboard the remnants of an orbital mining station, Milky Way Quadrant 4701...
Fear; pain and fear were all she sensed.
Z’Cann, the young leader of the Skrull group Cadre K, reached out with her mind, probing for any life signs.
“Anything?” asked Corsair. If the human was nervous he didn’t show it; she respected that.
“There are people on board, I’m just having trouble getting a fix on their location…they’re so afraid.”
Her team mates were somewhere in this section of the shattered space station, she was sure of that at least. It had been a taxing twenty four hours, escaping from a Brood attack then nearly suffocating in her crippled ship before the Starjammers rescued her, with very little rest between then and now. Her body was fatigued but her mind was sharp, determination to save her comrades drove her on. Reaching out mentally, she focused her mind on the first flicker of thought she sensed.
Oh please, oh please, oh please, not like this... But her focus was interrupted.
“Uhhh captain,” crackled Ch’od’s voice in their earpieces, from the Starjammer, “we have a sslight problem. Three Acanti are headed our way, and a whole lot of baby ssized sshipss, too.”
“Dammit,” cursed Corsair. “Z’Cann we need to hurry up.”
She concentrated once more and this time easily found the person’s mind, though their thoughts were strangely blocked from her.
“I've got someone,” she said. “Follow me.”
She took off at a run down a narrow passageway with Corsair and the cyborg Raza hot on her heels. The Captain was speaking into the transmitter installed in the helmet of his spacesuit.
“Ok guys; keep those bugs distracted for as long as possible. Waldo should have some fancy maneuvres in his databank for a situation like this. Teleport us in when I give the word. Over.”
“Yess, Captain.” The Saurian didn’t sound too pleased with this plan.
Z’Cann lead the other two onwards, ducking fallen debris and leaping over the squat alien corpses that littered the station. She urged the group onwards as she could sense the mind she was tracking was fading.
Around a sharp corner they went, Z’Cann slipped in a puddle of maroon coloured blood but easily turned her fall into a roll and kept moving until they reached a large metal door. The controls beside the door were fried so Raza was forced to slice the door open with his incredibly sharp sword.
“Probably dulled the blade,” he muttered to himself as he looked the sabre over, before kicking the door down. The trio stepped through the threshold into a dimly lit room.
“Hello?” asked Corsair, “Anybody here?”
Something moved on the far side of the room, in the darkness, and all three promptly sone their lights in that direction. Before them, stood a Brood.
The Starjammer
Ch’od sighed; machines were his strong suit not strategy.
“Ok Waldo, you heard the Captain, distract them,” he said.
“Request clarification of orders,” came Waldo’s monotone voice in reply.
With an aggravated snarl Hepzibah threw her arms in the air and snapped, “Have to do everrrything around herre, do I?” With a few taps on her console, the fiery Mephistoid sent a volley of missiles towards the enemy fleet.
“Waldo, take us strrraight at the big fishie.” She had a feral smile, if there was one race she hated as much as the Shi’ar, it was the Brood.
With a 'woooosh' the Starjammer took off directly towards the lead Acanti, the creature’s maw, which was big enough to swallow their ship, drew very close very quickly. The enemy fleet had scattered when Hepzibah had fired her missiles, so the space whale they were headed towards was on its own. It certainly wasn’t defenceless though, a row of laser cannons, all fused to the poor creature’s flesh fired upon the sleek craft.
“Initiating evasive manoeuvres,” said Waldo.
With sickening inertia, the ship rolled to the left, avoiding the majority of the fire. Some shots still found their mark though but thanks to Ch’od’s quick thinking the shield were increased on the right side, preventing any damage.
Hepzibah couldn’t help but revel in the adrenaline rush, all feelings of anger towards Corsair for leaving her on the ship were forgotten, this was much more exciting. She was slightly surprised by how well her strategy was turning out; turns out she’d learned more from Corsair than anyone, including herself, thought. Looking to see they were in the right spot, she released a trio of quantum mines. Ch’od looked at her questioningly, there was no reason to deploy mines as no one was on their tail.
FUH-WHHHHOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!!!!
“What the…” looking at the viewing screen as the Starjammer sped away from the Acanti, Ch’od could see that Hepzibah had launched her mines directly into the creature’s eye. The Brood vessels usually felt little pain, due to their bionic implants and lobotomies, but an exploding eyeball would cause an excruciating amount of agony, enough to temporarily overwhelm the Brood control. The massive, red, whale-like creature was now violently shuddering, as if trying to shake loose some giant barnacles.
“Impresssive,” said Ch’od in admiration.
“We got lucky. Arround you must bring us, Waldo!”
“Affirmative, Mam’selle Hepzibah.”
Turning around in a wide arc, the Starjammer quickly headed back towards the rapidly reforming fleet. The Brood were now between them and the massive green gas giant, no longer facing the broken space station.
“Keep them facing this way we must ,Waldo; do not drraw their attention to where Kreestoffer and the others arrre,” ordered Hepzibah.
The owner of a rather irritated voice chose this moment to interrupt the Mephistoid’s thoughts.
“I must insist someone tells me what is going on at once! I’ve been tossed around like a moth in a cyclone down here.”
“Shut up, bug brain!”
“Now’ss not a very good time Sssikorssky,” replied Ch’od more diplomatically.
“But I deserve an expl--”
An annoyed Hepzibah slammed her fist down on her console, ending Dr. Sikorsky’s communication.
“Give these bugs a distraction we will.” She smiled viscously.
The Space Station
The Brood hardly seemed to notice them as they entered the room; or rather it seemed to look straight through them. It was a fairly moderate size for a Brood, not much bigger than Corsair, one of its six insect-like legs was snapped in half and it seemed to be having trouble standing up.
“This is what you sensed?” asked a surprised Raza, he raised both swords. “Stand back while I kill it.”
“No!” Z’Cann grabbed Raza by the arm. “It’s already dying.”
Upon closer inspection, the trio realized the alien was skewered on a large metal girder through the midsection. Z’Cann almost felt pity for it as it moaned quietly in pain. She could sense the creature was still very young.
“All the more reason to put it out of its misery, Z’Cann.” It was clear Corsair was eager to get moving, as time was of the essence.
“You don’t understand,” she crouched down and looked the Brood in its blood-red eyes. “We might be able to learn a few things from it.”
“Ok, but make it quick.”
Never had she looked into a mind so alien. It lived to serve the Queen but there was a measure of free will buried deep within the layers of consciousness. It did not want to die, that thought was overwhelming all the others.
I don’t want to dieeeeee!
Like Professor Xavier taught her, she blocked out the mental noise and peeled back layer after layer of the creature’s mind. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for the creature’s life; it had no name, its only goal in life was to follow the Queen’s telepathic orders, never had it felt love or compassion, such a bleak existence.
She probed on, putting her sympathies aside for the sake of the mission, and found some interesting memories; a fleet of great, black, needle-nosed ships, seemingly made from crystal, raining destruction upon a Brood world. The Brood had been building their forces in a nearby solar system when these mysterious aliens had struck, three quarters of their fleet had been destroyed, the rest fled.
This dying Brood had come in a scout ship with its clan, when they saw the unprotected space station their hunger got the better of them. Z’Cann felt the insatiable hunger like it was her own, the inescapable desire for flesh and the warm coppery tang of blood; it nearly made her gag.
Suppressing the urge to vomit, the telepath pressed on to the memories she wanted to see the least but needed to see the most: what happened once the Brood were inside the station and the slaughter began.
The Starjammer
We got bugss on our tail!” cried Ch’od.
Two Brood controlled vessels, a Shi’ar scout ship and a Kree craft, were in hot pursuit of the Starjammer as it sped away from the Brood fleet.
“One thing at a time!” yelled Hepzibah back.
“But they’re locking…”
“Oh fine!” the cat-like alien pushed some buttons at her controls and a bevy of cluster mines destroyed their pursuers. “Happy?”
“Well I would be if it wassn’t for the Acanti that’sss locking us with itss tractor beam.”
The pair were violently tossed from their seats as the tractor beam halted their progress. Cr+eee, Ch’od’s little white pet, skittered away under a console to hide. Slowly, the tractor beam pulled the ship backwards, back towards the space-whale’s gaping maw. Quickly, Ch’od diverted all energy to the shields, before a veritable storm of weapon fire struck the now-vulnerable ship.
“What do we do now?” he asked.
“I have an idea. Waldo, give maximum thrrust when I give the worrd.”
Corsair won’t be happy, she thought as she chose to fire their only gravgon. A very rare weapon, the gravgon created an artificial gravity well upon impact, drawing all nearby ships and debris into it. The missile fired and the Brood, not realizing what it was, shot it down.
“WALDO NOW!”
As the gravgon detonated, the Acanti was suddenly drawn towards it, breaking the tractor beam. Many nearby vessels were pulled it the gravity well and slammed together, except for the Starjammer, which was quick enough to avoid the weapon’s pull.
The Space Station
While Z’Cann probed the dying Brood’s mind, Raza and Corsair stood watch, feeling highly on edge. The pair had served with a telepath before, Charles Xavier, so they both understood the need to keep quiet.
Raza couldn’t help but feel awkward as he looked over at the dying Brood; his strict honour-code dictated he should put the creature out of its misery with as little pain as possible, and yet they were forced to prolong its suffering to learn the fate of the station’s survivors.
Bionic implants within the cyborg’s ears picked up erratic footsteps heading their way. They were bipedal, so it wasn’t a Brood. With a few quick hand signals to Corsair, the pair took up defensive positions, shielding Z’Cann from harm; the owner of the footsteps might not be a Brood but it was possible they were hostile.
A Skrull stumbled into the doorway, clutching his side, which was gushing blood.
“Help…me,” he managed to say before slumping against the doorframe.
Raza took a step forward to help him but was stopped when someone suddenly shouted “No!” and fired a laser blast inches from the Skrull’s head. Z’Cann stood behind the two men, aiming her weapon at her wounded comrade.
“Z’Cann…what…” said the Skrull weakly.
“No Fiz, please don’t make this any harder than it has to be.” Tears welled in the young woman’s golden eyes.
“Z’Cann, what exactly is going on?” asked Corsair, though he was quickly putting the pieces together in his mind.
“The ship that attacked this station was a scout vessel for a much larger Brood force,” she explained, not lowering her weapon. “On the scout ship there was a minor queen. Seeing the vulnerable space station she jumped at the chance to increase her own clan and gain a bit more power before the rest of the Brood arrived. When the rest of the fleet arrived they realized immediately what was going on, that’s why they destroyed the station.” The tears were running freely down her face now, “Every survivor in here is infected with Brood embryos!”
“Sikorsky might be able to save them, Z’Cann,” said Corsair.
“No, Christopher, it’s too late.” She looked Fiz in the eyes. “There’s nothing left of you is there? The metamorphosis hasn’t taken place yet but that monster inside has taken complete control!”
A look of confusion swept over Fiz’s face but when it appeared Z’Cann wasn’t buying it he smiled wickedly and dived out of the doorway.
“Dammit,” cursed the Skrull woman as the shot she fired missed.
Corsair was yelling into his com-link, “Ch’od, Hepz, teleport us out of here right now! Just us three.”
“Coming, keep your sshirt on,” crackled Ch’od voice. “Jusst got ssome bugss in the way.”
“Corsair, we have to kill Fiz and the others!” The pain nearly choked Z’Cann as she said this.
“They were your teammates,” said Raza, incredulous. “Let the Brood out there deal with them and their traitorous queen.”
“But can we risk them escaping? Think about it: how dangerous would a Brood be if it got its tentacles on a Skrull’s shape shifting? They could hide anywhere! And what’s worse is Cadre K all have extra powers to go along with our natural shape changing.”
“Agreed,” said Corsair, “but I’m not letting you do the deed. Once we’re out of here I’ll blast this piece of station to pieces.”
“Ok.” She couldn’t help but feel relieve at the thought of not having to kill her own friends.
“Shh, someone’s coming” whispered Raza.
Another Skrull, this one with a much larger frame than Fiz, stepped into the doorway.
“Hello, sweetie.”
Corsair didn’t hesitate in firing both his pistols at the Skrull, whose name he remembered to be Spunje. The Brood-infected alien stumbled backwards as both shots struck his chest. The blows, which should have killed him, merely made him laugh; both his fists were glowing orange. Raza, remembering that Spunje had the power to absorb any form of energy and redirect it, swung his sabre in a lightning quick movement, severing both the Skrull’s hands.
“Aaaaaaiiiiiiiieeeeeeee!” The energy backlash sent Spunje flying backwards into the hall with blood spurting violently from the stumps where his hands used to be.
“Dammit, Hepzibah, where are you?!” Corsair yelled into his com-link.
The Starjammer
“Dammit, Hepzibah, where are you?!” came Corsair’s voice over the intercom.
“Not exactly taking a strroll thrrough the Pink Nebula, am I?!” she shouted back.
The Starjammer had taken a dangerous course, ducking and weaving among the larger Brood craft in order to get close enough to the space station wreckage to teleport in their team mates. They dived low, avoiding the massive fin of one Acanti before swerving right to avoid colliding with a large, saucer-shaped vessel, coming so close they could actually see the Brood skittering about through the windows. All the while they were taking multiple hits, though none had managed to punch through the shields...yet.
“We have misssiles on our tail,” said Ch’od. “Three to be exact.”
Without a word, Hepzibah released a tonne of chaff, metal garbage, with which the missiles collided and detonated. For good measure, she fired off a mirror-thrower too. Ch’od smiled; mirror-throwers had served them well in their battle with the Uncreated a few years ago. Simply put, the devices created a force field in the shape of the Starjammer and then threw a hologram over it, producing a realistic decoy.
As the Brood fleet focused their fire on the holographic decoy, the real Starjammer flew out of the smoke from the explosion at top speed. It wasn’t long before the Brood figured out what was going on and turned their fire on the escaping ship. Most of the energy for the shields had been diverted to the engines so several blasts managed to punch through and hit the vessel directly, but none stopped its momentum.
“Coming to you we are, Kreestoffer, hold on!”
“Who’ss going to hold on to us?!” yelled Ch’od as the ship hurtled directly towards the space station debris.
The Space Station
Hepzibah had said something over the com-link but he missed it over the racket. Over a dozen Brood-infected alien workers, as well as the three uninjured Cadre K members, had come charging down the corridor, trying to get into their small room.
The trio held them at bay with laser blasts and slashing blades but they kept coming. Corsair shot another dwarfish, pig-nosed alien between its black, bug-like eyes when a green skinned hand grabbed him by the throat. The arm that the hand was attached to was extended over ten feet long. One of Cadre K had the ability to stretch, but he couldn’t remember if it was Fiz, R’Tee or Nuro, not that it really mattered at the moment. Z’Cann and Raza were too occupied to notice someone was choking the life out of him; his vision was beginning to darken.
Suddenly, the growing darkness was replaced with piercing golden light.
The Starjammer
Ch’od barely managed to duck a slashing sword as Raza materialized before him; with a sheepish grin Raza apologized. Meanwhile, Corsair was on the ground gasping for air. After a few second he regained his composure and leapt into the captain’s seat. Without a word he fired a single missile, demolishing the piece of station holding they had been on. Tears ran down Z’Cann’s green face.
“Waldo, engage hyperspeed now!” he ordered.
“Negative, Captain...hyperspeed is non-functional.”
“One of thosse blastss must have knocked out the hyperdrive,” said Ch’od. “I can fix it but it will take hours.”
“Ok, Waldo, take us into that asteroid field now!”
Waldo flew the Starjammer better than any living pilot could of, ducking and weaving all the enemy attacks until they reached the thick belt of asteroids between the second planet and the emerald gas giant.
The crew’s nerves were strained as the ship navigated between gigantic rocks, many of which could grind them into pulp.
“There, that one,” said Corsair, pointing at a particularly large asteroid with a gaping hole in its surface. “Fly into that hole.”
“Affirmative, Captain.”
Corsair couldn’t help but feel that he’d seen this in a movie as the ship drifted silently into the crater and came to rest deep within the rock, he shook of the feeling and set to work.
“Ch’od, get to work repairing that hyperdrive, we can’t stay hidden forever. Raza, keep an eye out for any hostiles, passive sensors only. Z’Cann do the same with your mind if you can.”
After roughly half an hour, Ch’od’s voice crackled over the intercom, “Itss a real mess down here, Captain, I’m going to need some partss that we don’t have.” Everyone’s hopes fell dramatically.
“Just do what you can, Ch’od.” said Corsair, with no real conviction. “We’ll get out of this somehow.”
No one seemed to notice as Hepzibah excused herself from the bridge; she had an idea that the others might not like, especially Corsair. The lift carried her down several levels to a little used corridor, where the air had a stale scent and the minimum lighting was used down here to help conserve energy. Several steps from the lift was a door labelled ‘Communications Room’. Presumably, when this had been a Shi’ar vessel, the crew would use this room to contact their families a friends. Sitting down at a console, she began reconfiguring the settings.
The Swooping Talon, in orbit around Hala
General F’Dor sat in his chair on the bridge, looking down upon the cesspool of a planet called Hala. How he hated this position, he was a warrior not a prison guard; lesser men could guard planets, he was destined for greater things before the Starjammers ruined everything.
“Sir, we’re receiving a distress signal,” said an officer. “It’s the Starjammers!”
F’Dor was out of his seat and by the officer’s side in a flash; it was like the gods were granting him his greatest desire.
“What does it say?” he asked, barely hiding his eagerness.
“Just that they were attacked by Brood and their ship has been crippled. I have co-ordinates; they’re in the Milky Way galaxy, quadrant 4701, sir.”
The fools think we’ll take pity on them because they’re been attacked by Brood? he thought as he smiled wickedly. Lilandra’s protection is useless if she thinks they’ve been infected.
“Reprogram our hyperdrive for the warpgate nearest to that location; we’re going to catch some traitors.”
The Starjammer
Many tense hours passed as the Starjammers waited. Ch’od had given up all hope of fixing the hyperdrive without the necessary components, so the crew waited in the hopes that the Brood would give up on searching for them, or else assume they’d been killed in the asteroid belt.
So far none of the small shuttles the Brood had sent in to find them had come near their hiding place yet, but they couldn’t hide forever.
Beep, beep, beep! An alarm went off on Raza’s console. "Captain, we have another vessel leaving hyperspace,” he said. “It’s an Apocalypse Class Shi’ar Destroyer!”
“It has to be F’Dor,” said Corsair calmly. "H must of followed us somehow.”
“The Brood are firing upon them.”
“Kreestoffer, ourr chance to escape is now, while the bugs are fighting the Birrdies,” sated Hepzibah.
“No, Hepzibah, no matter how much of a bastard F’Dor is, his crew don’t deserve to be killed by the Brood. There has to be something we can do.”
“We need to leave now! Orr as dead as the Birrdies we’ll be!”
Corsair tuned out Hepzibah’s ravings and wracked his brains for an idea, some non-suicidal way to save the Shi’ar vessel. If only Hepzibah hadn’t used their only gravgon. Suddenly he remembered a seemingly irrelevant, throwaway line Z’Cann had said after she had first been rescued.
“Z’Cann, what did you say your team was doing before you heard the space station’s distress call?” he asked.
“We were monitoring Phalanx movent in the next Quadrant, why?”
“I have an idea.”
It took less than a minute for the captain to explain his plan and another few minutes to prepare for it. Z’Cann and Raza were both doubtful the idea would work, while Ch’od couldn’t keep the grin off his face.
Meanwhile, Hepzibah seemed to be downright furious. "You arre wasting ourrr only chance to escape!” she screamed. “Foolish man!”
“Hepzibah, sit down, shut up and man those weapons, we may need them!” He didn’t have time for his lover’s melodrama. “Raza, is the signal working?”
“We think we found the correct frequency, Captain,” replied the cyborg. “Do you really think this will work?”
“Let’s hope so.”
Meanwhile, the Swooping Talon was taking heavy fire. It was still managing to hold its own though, as evidenced by one of the Acanti ships was floating towards the gas giant, totally lifeless. The ship was extremely powerful, but too slow to escape the armada without serious damage; F’Dor must have realized this as the Shi’ar vessel stood its ground.
Corsair couldn’t sit by and watch any longer; he had to do something to help.
“Keep transmitting that signal, Raza,” he ordered. “Waldo, take us out of the asteroids and towards the Brood. Hepzibah, lock onto the nearest Acanti and fire some quantum missiles.”
The feline woman looked as if she was going to refuse Corsair’s order before she muttered, “Yes sir,” and worked at her console.
With a wooosh the Starjammer ejected out of the asteroid belt, lasers blazing, a pair of quantum missiles flew from the ship, following their preset path towards the massive Brood vessel. As the explosives struck a large number of ships turned their attention towards the sleek orange ship.
“As if we haven’t been fired at enough today,” groaned Ch’od as laser fire rained upon them once again.
Beep, beep, beep.
“Multiple vessels exiting hyperspace…” Waldo’s computerized speech was interrupted as the ship shuddered violently. Once again, energy briefly sparked from their consoles. “We’re doomed! Dooooooommmmmmed…error 221.”
“No, no, no! I jussst fixed you!” yelled Ch’od.
“Yeah, you would say that wouldn’t you…system error 288.” Though Waldo’s voice was monotone, the crew sensed the slight surliness in the A.I.’s voice.
“Ssshut up, you wasste of microchips!”
“We have no time for this!” Corsair took over the flight controls are steered the ship away from the battle as quickly as possible.
Their plan had worked: a fleet of Phalanx vessels were exiting hyperspace practically on top of the battle. The Brood, thinking they were more attackers, had opened fire immediately, creating a new and much deadlier battle.
When the Phalanx start to assimilate a planet with their transmode virus, they are instinctively driven to contact their 'parents', the Technarx, who then consume everything that’s been assimilated. Other Phalanx are also instinctively programmed to try and reach the source of this signal, in order to help speed up assimilation. With this knowledge, the Starjammers had managed to trick the Phalanx Cadre K had been monitoring in the next Quadrant with a false signal.
Corsair only waited long enough the make sure the Swooping Talon was escaping to safety before flying the ship as far away from the dramatic battle as it could take them without hyperdrive.
As the ship speed towards the edge of the solar system, the crew couldn’t help but feel a rush of excitement at surviving what seemed like an impossible situation, all except Z’Cann, who thought sadly of her dead team mates, the only family she had ever really known.
“I shouldn’t have doubted you, Captain,” said Raza glumly. “I am afraid I have done you a dishonor.”
“Oh, shut up, Raza,” smiled Corsair.
“And whichever sside comess out on the winning side of that battle, we’ve sseverely weakened two very dangerouss powerss in the galaxy,” said Ch’od.
Z’Cann could help but remember something as Ch’od said this; a fleet of black, crystalline ships with needle like tips destroying the Brood fleet like they were nothing.
The End...
Previous Issue | Next Issue
Fear; pain and fear were all she sensed.
Z’Cann, the young leader of the Skrull group Cadre K, reached out with her mind, probing for any life signs.
“Anything?” asked Corsair. If the human was nervous he didn’t show it; she respected that.
“There are people on board, I’m just having trouble getting a fix on their location…they’re so afraid.”
Her team mates were somewhere in this section of the shattered space station, she was sure of that at least. It had been a taxing twenty four hours, escaping from a Brood attack then nearly suffocating in her crippled ship before the Starjammers rescued her, with very little rest between then and now. Her body was fatigued but her mind was sharp, determination to save her comrades drove her on. Reaching out mentally, she focused her mind on the first flicker of thought she sensed.
Oh please, oh please, oh please, not like this... But her focus was interrupted.
“Uhhh captain,” crackled Ch’od’s voice in their earpieces, from the Starjammer, “we have a sslight problem. Three Acanti are headed our way, and a whole lot of baby ssized sshipss, too.”
“Dammit,” cursed Corsair. “Z’Cann we need to hurry up.”
She concentrated once more and this time easily found the person’s mind, though their thoughts were strangely blocked from her.
“I've got someone,” she said. “Follow me.”
She took off at a run down a narrow passageway with Corsair and the cyborg Raza hot on her heels. The Captain was speaking into the transmitter installed in the helmet of his spacesuit.
“Ok guys; keep those bugs distracted for as long as possible. Waldo should have some fancy maneuvres in his databank for a situation like this. Teleport us in when I give the word. Over.”
“Yess, Captain.” The Saurian didn’t sound too pleased with this plan.
Z’Cann lead the other two onwards, ducking fallen debris and leaping over the squat alien corpses that littered the station. She urged the group onwards as she could sense the mind she was tracking was fading.
Around a sharp corner they went, Z’Cann slipped in a puddle of maroon coloured blood but easily turned her fall into a roll and kept moving until they reached a large metal door. The controls beside the door were fried so Raza was forced to slice the door open with his incredibly sharp sword.
“Probably dulled the blade,” he muttered to himself as he looked the sabre over, before kicking the door down. The trio stepped through the threshold into a dimly lit room.
“Hello?” asked Corsair, “Anybody here?”
Something moved on the far side of the room, in the darkness, and all three promptly sone their lights in that direction. Before them, stood a Brood.
The Starjammer
Ch’od sighed; machines were his strong suit not strategy.
“Ok Waldo, you heard the Captain, distract them,” he said.
“Request clarification of orders,” came Waldo’s monotone voice in reply.
With an aggravated snarl Hepzibah threw her arms in the air and snapped, “Have to do everrrything around herre, do I?” With a few taps on her console, the fiery Mephistoid sent a volley of missiles towards the enemy fleet.
“Waldo, take us strrraight at the big fishie.” She had a feral smile, if there was one race she hated as much as the Shi’ar, it was the Brood.
With a 'woooosh' the Starjammer took off directly towards the lead Acanti, the creature’s maw, which was big enough to swallow their ship, drew very close very quickly. The enemy fleet had scattered when Hepzibah had fired her missiles, so the space whale they were headed towards was on its own. It certainly wasn’t defenceless though, a row of laser cannons, all fused to the poor creature’s flesh fired upon the sleek craft.
“Initiating evasive manoeuvres,” said Waldo.
With sickening inertia, the ship rolled to the left, avoiding the majority of the fire. Some shots still found their mark though but thanks to Ch’od’s quick thinking the shield were increased on the right side, preventing any damage.
Hepzibah couldn’t help but revel in the adrenaline rush, all feelings of anger towards Corsair for leaving her on the ship were forgotten, this was much more exciting. She was slightly surprised by how well her strategy was turning out; turns out she’d learned more from Corsair than anyone, including herself, thought. Looking to see they were in the right spot, she released a trio of quantum mines. Ch’od looked at her questioningly, there was no reason to deploy mines as no one was on their tail.
FUH-WHHHHOOOOOOMMMMM!!!!!!!
“What the…” looking at the viewing screen as the Starjammer sped away from the Acanti, Ch’od could see that Hepzibah had launched her mines directly into the creature’s eye. The Brood vessels usually felt little pain, due to their bionic implants and lobotomies, but an exploding eyeball would cause an excruciating amount of agony, enough to temporarily overwhelm the Brood control. The massive, red, whale-like creature was now violently shuddering, as if trying to shake loose some giant barnacles.
“Impresssive,” said Ch’od in admiration.
“We got lucky. Arround you must bring us, Waldo!”
“Affirmative, Mam’selle Hepzibah.”
Turning around in a wide arc, the Starjammer quickly headed back towards the rapidly reforming fleet. The Brood were now between them and the massive green gas giant, no longer facing the broken space station.
“Keep them facing this way we must ,Waldo; do not drraw their attention to where Kreestoffer and the others arrre,” ordered Hepzibah.
The owner of a rather irritated voice chose this moment to interrupt the Mephistoid’s thoughts.
“I must insist someone tells me what is going on at once! I’ve been tossed around like a moth in a cyclone down here.”
“Shut up, bug brain!”
“Now’ss not a very good time Sssikorssky,” replied Ch’od more diplomatically.
“But I deserve an expl--”
An annoyed Hepzibah slammed her fist down on her console, ending Dr. Sikorsky’s communication.
“Give these bugs a distraction we will.” She smiled viscously.
The Space Station
The Brood hardly seemed to notice them as they entered the room; or rather it seemed to look straight through them. It was a fairly moderate size for a Brood, not much bigger than Corsair, one of its six insect-like legs was snapped in half and it seemed to be having trouble standing up.
“This is what you sensed?” asked a surprised Raza, he raised both swords. “Stand back while I kill it.”
“No!” Z’Cann grabbed Raza by the arm. “It’s already dying.”
Upon closer inspection, the trio realized the alien was skewered on a large metal girder through the midsection. Z’Cann almost felt pity for it as it moaned quietly in pain. She could sense the creature was still very young.
“All the more reason to put it out of its misery, Z’Cann.” It was clear Corsair was eager to get moving, as time was of the essence.
“You don’t understand,” she crouched down and looked the Brood in its blood-red eyes. “We might be able to learn a few things from it.”
“Ok, but make it quick.”
Never had she looked into a mind so alien. It lived to serve the Queen but there was a measure of free will buried deep within the layers of consciousness. It did not want to die, that thought was overwhelming all the others.
I don’t want to dieeeeee!
Like Professor Xavier taught her, she blocked out the mental noise and peeled back layer after layer of the creature’s mind. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for the creature’s life; it had no name, its only goal in life was to follow the Queen’s telepathic orders, never had it felt love or compassion, such a bleak existence.
She probed on, putting her sympathies aside for the sake of the mission, and found some interesting memories; a fleet of great, black, needle-nosed ships, seemingly made from crystal, raining destruction upon a Brood world. The Brood had been building their forces in a nearby solar system when these mysterious aliens had struck, three quarters of their fleet had been destroyed, the rest fled.
This dying Brood had come in a scout ship with its clan, when they saw the unprotected space station their hunger got the better of them. Z’Cann felt the insatiable hunger like it was her own, the inescapable desire for flesh and the warm coppery tang of blood; it nearly made her gag.
Suppressing the urge to vomit, the telepath pressed on to the memories she wanted to see the least but needed to see the most: what happened once the Brood were inside the station and the slaughter began.
The Starjammer
We got bugss on our tail!” cried Ch’od.
Two Brood controlled vessels, a Shi’ar scout ship and a Kree craft, were in hot pursuit of the Starjammer as it sped away from the Brood fleet.
“One thing at a time!” yelled Hepzibah back.
“But they’re locking…”
“Oh fine!” the cat-like alien pushed some buttons at her controls and a bevy of cluster mines destroyed their pursuers. “Happy?”
“Well I would be if it wassn’t for the Acanti that’sss locking us with itss tractor beam.”
The pair were violently tossed from their seats as the tractor beam halted their progress. Cr+eee, Ch’od’s little white pet, skittered away under a console to hide. Slowly, the tractor beam pulled the ship backwards, back towards the space-whale’s gaping maw. Quickly, Ch’od diverted all energy to the shields, before a veritable storm of weapon fire struck the now-vulnerable ship.
“What do we do now?” he asked.
“I have an idea. Waldo, give maximum thrrust when I give the worrd.”
Corsair won’t be happy, she thought as she chose to fire their only gravgon. A very rare weapon, the gravgon created an artificial gravity well upon impact, drawing all nearby ships and debris into it. The missile fired and the Brood, not realizing what it was, shot it down.
“WALDO NOW!”
As the gravgon detonated, the Acanti was suddenly drawn towards it, breaking the tractor beam. Many nearby vessels were pulled it the gravity well and slammed together, except for the Starjammer, which was quick enough to avoid the weapon’s pull.
The Space Station
While Z’Cann probed the dying Brood’s mind, Raza and Corsair stood watch, feeling highly on edge. The pair had served with a telepath before, Charles Xavier, so they both understood the need to keep quiet.
Raza couldn’t help but feel awkward as he looked over at the dying Brood; his strict honour-code dictated he should put the creature out of its misery with as little pain as possible, and yet they were forced to prolong its suffering to learn the fate of the station’s survivors.
Bionic implants within the cyborg’s ears picked up erratic footsteps heading their way. They were bipedal, so it wasn’t a Brood. With a few quick hand signals to Corsair, the pair took up defensive positions, shielding Z’Cann from harm; the owner of the footsteps might not be a Brood but it was possible they were hostile.
A Skrull stumbled into the doorway, clutching his side, which was gushing blood.
“Help…me,” he managed to say before slumping against the doorframe.
Raza took a step forward to help him but was stopped when someone suddenly shouted “No!” and fired a laser blast inches from the Skrull’s head. Z’Cann stood behind the two men, aiming her weapon at her wounded comrade.
“Z’Cann…what…” said the Skrull weakly.
“No Fiz, please don’t make this any harder than it has to be.” Tears welled in the young woman’s golden eyes.
“Z’Cann, what exactly is going on?” asked Corsair, though he was quickly putting the pieces together in his mind.
“The ship that attacked this station was a scout vessel for a much larger Brood force,” she explained, not lowering her weapon. “On the scout ship there was a minor queen. Seeing the vulnerable space station she jumped at the chance to increase her own clan and gain a bit more power before the rest of the Brood arrived. When the rest of the fleet arrived they realized immediately what was going on, that’s why they destroyed the station.” The tears were running freely down her face now, “Every survivor in here is infected with Brood embryos!”
“Sikorsky might be able to save them, Z’Cann,” said Corsair.
“No, Christopher, it’s too late.” She looked Fiz in the eyes. “There’s nothing left of you is there? The metamorphosis hasn’t taken place yet but that monster inside has taken complete control!”
A look of confusion swept over Fiz’s face but when it appeared Z’Cann wasn’t buying it he smiled wickedly and dived out of the doorway.
“Dammit,” cursed the Skrull woman as the shot she fired missed.
Corsair was yelling into his com-link, “Ch’od, Hepz, teleport us out of here right now! Just us three.”
“Coming, keep your sshirt on,” crackled Ch’od voice. “Jusst got ssome bugss in the way.”
“Corsair, we have to kill Fiz and the others!” The pain nearly choked Z’Cann as she said this.
“They were your teammates,” said Raza, incredulous. “Let the Brood out there deal with them and their traitorous queen.”
“But can we risk them escaping? Think about it: how dangerous would a Brood be if it got its tentacles on a Skrull’s shape shifting? They could hide anywhere! And what’s worse is Cadre K all have extra powers to go along with our natural shape changing.”
“Agreed,” said Corsair, “but I’m not letting you do the deed. Once we’re out of here I’ll blast this piece of station to pieces.”
“Ok.” She couldn’t help but feel relieve at the thought of not having to kill her own friends.
“Shh, someone’s coming” whispered Raza.
Another Skrull, this one with a much larger frame than Fiz, stepped into the doorway.
“Hello, sweetie.”
Corsair didn’t hesitate in firing both his pistols at the Skrull, whose name he remembered to be Spunje. The Brood-infected alien stumbled backwards as both shots struck his chest. The blows, which should have killed him, merely made him laugh; both his fists were glowing orange. Raza, remembering that Spunje had the power to absorb any form of energy and redirect it, swung his sabre in a lightning quick movement, severing both the Skrull’s hands.
“Aaaaaaiiiiiiiieeeeeeee!” The energy backlash sent Spunje flying backwards into the hall with blood spurting violently from the stumps where his hands used to be.
“Dammit, Hepzibah, where are you?!” Corsair yelled into his com-link.
The Starjammer
“Dammit, Hepzibah, where are you?!” came Corsair’s voice over the intercom.
“Not exactly taking a strroll thrrough the Pink Nebula, am I?!” she shouted back.
The Starjammer had taken a dangerous course, ducking and weaving among the larger Brood craft in order to get close enough to the space station wreckage to teleport in their team mates. They dived low, avoiding the massive fin of one Acanti before swerving right to avoid colliding with a large, saucer-shaped vessel, coming so close they could actually see the Brood skittering about through the windows. All the while they were taking multiple hits, though none had managed to punch through the shields...yet.
“We have misssiles on our tail,” said Ch’od. “Three to be exact.”
Without a word, Hepzibah released a tonne of chaff, metal garbage, with which the missiles collided and detonated. For good measure, she fired off a mirror-thrower too. Ch’od smiled; mirror-throwers had served them well in their battle with the Uncreated a few years ago. Simply put, the devices created a force field in the shape of the Starjammer and then threw a hologram over it, producing a realistic decoy.
As the Brood fleet focused their fire on the holographic decoy, the real Starjammer flew out of the smoke from the explosion at top speed. It wasn’t long before the Brood figured out what was going on and turned their fire on the escaping ship. Most of the energy for the shields had been diverted to the engines so several blasts managed to punch through and hit the vessel directly, but none stopped its momentum.
“Coming to you we are, Kreestoffer, hold on!”
“Who’ss going to hold on to us?!” yelled Ch’od as the ship hurtled directly towards the space station debris.
The Space Station
Hepzibah had said something over the com-link but he missed it over the racket. Over a dozen Brood-infected alien workers, as well as the three uninjured Cadre K members, had come charging down the corridor, trying to get into their small room.
The trio held them at bay with laser blasts and slashing blades but they kept coming. Corsair shot another dwarfish, pig-nosed alien between its black, bug-like eyes when a green skinned hand grabbed him by the throat. The arm that the hand was attached to was extended over ten feet long. One of Cadre K had the ability to stretch, but he couldn’t remember if it was Fiz, R’Tee or Nuro, not that it really mattered at the moment. Z’Cann and Raza were too occupied to notice someone was choking the life out of him; his vision was beginning to darken.
Suddenly, the growing darkness was replaced with piercing golden light.
The Starjammer
Ch’od barely managed to duck a slashing sword as Raza materialized before him; with a sheepish grin Raza apologized. Meanwhile, Corsair was on the ground gasping for air. After a few second he regained his composure and leapt into the captain’s seat. Without a word he fired a single missile, demolishing the piece of station holding they had been on. Tears ran down Z’Cann’s green face.
“Waldo, engage hyperspeed now!” he ordered.
“Negative, Captain...hyperspeed is non-functional.”
“One of thosse blastss must have knocked out the hyperdrive,” said Ch’od. “I can fix it but it will take hours.”
“Ok, Waldo, take us into that asteroid field now!”
Waldo flew the Starjammer better than any living pilot could of, ducking and weaving all the enemy attacks until they reached the thick belt of asteroids between the second planet and the emerald gas giant.
The crew’s nerves were strained as the ship navigated between gigantic rocks, many of which could grind them into pulp.
“There, that one,” said Corsair, pointing at a particularly large asteroid with a gaping hole in its surface. “Fly into that hole.”
“Affirmative, Captain.”
Corsair couldn’t help but feel that he’d seen this in a movie as the ship drifted silently into the crater and came to rest deep within the rock, he shook of the feeling and set to work.
“Ch’od, get to work repairing that hyperdrive, we can’t stay hidden forever. Raza, keep an eye out for any hostiles, passive sensors only. Z’Cann do the same with your mind if you can.”
After roughly half an hour, Ch’od’s voice crackled over the intercom, “Itss a real mess down here, Captain, I’m going to need some partss that we don’t have.” Everyone’s hopes fell dramatically.
“Just do what you can, Ch’od.” said Corsair, with no real conviction. “We’ll get out of this somehow.”
No one seemed to notice as Hepzibah excused herself from the bridge; she had an idea that the others might not like, especially Corsair. The lift carried her down several levels to a little used corridor, where the air had a stale scent and the minimum lighting was used down here to help conserve energy. Several steps from the lift was a door labelled ‘Communications Room’. Presumably, when this had been a Shi’ar vessel, the crew would use this room to contact their families a friends. Sitting down at a console, she began reconfiguring the settings.
The Swooping Talon, in orbit around Hala
General F’Dor sat in his chair on the bridge, looking down upon the cesspool of a planet called Hala. How he hated this position, he was a warrior not a prison guard; lesser men could guard planets, he was destined for greater things before the Starjammers ruined everything.
“Sir, we’re receiving a distress signal,” said an officer. “It’s the Starjammers!”
F’Dor was out of his seat and by the officer’s side in a flash; it was like the gods were granting him his greatest desire.
“What does it say?” he asked, barely hiding his eagerness.
“Just that they were attacked by Brood and their ship has been crippled. I have co-ordinates; they’re in the Milky Way galaxy, quadrant 4701, sir.”
The fools think we’ll take pity on them because they’re been attacked by Brood? he thought as he smiled wickedly. Lilandra’s protection is useless if she thinks they’ve been infected.
“Reprogram our hyperdrive for the warpgate nearest to that location; we’re going to catch some traitors.”
The Starjammer
Many tense hours passed as the Starjammers waited. Ch’od had given up all hope of fixing the hyperdrive without the necessary components, so the crew waited in the hopes that the Brood would give up on searching for them, or else assume they’d been killed in the asteroid belt.
So far none of the small shuttles the Brood had sent in to find them had come near their hiding place yet, but they couldn’t hide forever.
Beep, beep, beep! An alarm went off on Raza’s console. "Captain, we have another vessel leaving hyperspace,” he said. “It’s an Apocalypse Class Shi’ar Destroyer!”
“It has to be F’Dor,” said Corsair calmly. "H must of followed us somehow.”
“The Brood are firing upon them.”
“Kreestoffer, ourr chance to escape is now, while the bugs are fighting the Birrdies,” sated Hepzibah.
“No, Hepzibah, no matter how much of a bastard F’Dor is, his crew don’t deserve to be killed by the Brood. There has to be something we can do.”
“We need to leave now! Orr as dead as the Birrdies we’ll be!”
Corsair tuned out Hepzibah’s ravings and wracked his brains for an idea, some non-suicidal way to save the Shi’ar vessel. If only Hepzibah hadn’t used their only gravgon. Suddenly he remembered a seemingly irrelevant, throwaway line Z’Cann had said after she had first been rescued.
“Z’Cann, what did you say your team was doing before you heard the space station’s distress call?” he asked.
“We were monitoring Phalanx movent in the next Quadrant, why?”
“I have an idea.”
It took less than a minute for the captain to explain his plan and another few minutes to prepare for it. Z’Cann and Raza were both doubtful the idea would work, while Ch’od couldn’t keep the grin off his face.
Meanwhile, Hepzibah seemed to be downright furious. "You arre wasting ourrr only chance to escape!” she screamed. “Foolish man!”
“Hepzibah, sit down, shut up and man those weapons, we may need them!” He didn’t have time for his lover’s melodrama. “Raza, is the signal working?”
“We think we found the correct frequency, Captain,” replied the cyborg. “Do you really think this will work?”
“Let’s hope so.”
Meanwhile, the Swooping Talon was taking heavy fire. It was still managing to hold its own though, as evidenced by one of the Acanti ships was floating towards the gas giant, totally lifeless. The ship was extremely powerful, but too slow to escape the armada without serious damage; F’Dor must have realized this as the Shi’ar vessel stood its ground.
Corsair couldn’t sit by and watch any longer; he had to do something to help.
“Keep transmitting that signal, Raza,” he ordered. “Waldo, take us out of the asteroids and towards the Brood. Hepzibah, lock onto the nearest Acanti and fire some quantum missiles.”
The feline woman looked as if she was going to refuse Corsair’s order before she muttered, “Yes sir,” and worked at her console.
With a wooosh the Starjammer ejected out of the asteroid belt, lasers blazing, a pair of quantum missiles flew from the ship, following their preset path towards the massive Brood vessel. As the explosives struck a large number of ships turned their attention towards the sleek orange ship.
“As if we haven’t been fired at enough today,” groaned Ch’od as laser fire rained upon them once again.
Beep, beep, beep.
“Multiple vessels exiting hyperspace…” Waldo’s computerized speech was interrupted as the ship shuddered violently. Once again, energy briefly sparked from their consoles. “We’re doomed! Dooooooommmmmmed…error 221.”
“No, no, no! I jussst fixed you!” yelled Ch’od.
“Yeah, you would say that wouldn’t you…system error 288.” Though Waldo’s voice was monotone, the crew sensed the slight surliness in the A.I.’s voice.
“Ssshut up, you wasste of microchips!”
“We have no time for this!” Corsair took over the flight controls are steered the ship away from the battle as quickly as possible.
Their plan had worked: a fleet of Phalanx vessels were exiting hyperspace practically on top of the battle. The Brood, thinking they were more attackers, had opened fire immediately, creating a new and much deadlier battle.
When the Phalanx start to assimilate a planet with their transmode virus, they are instinctively driven to contact their 'parents', the Technarx, who then consume everything that’s been assimilated. Other Phalanx are also instinctively programmed to try and reach the source of this signal, in order to help speed up assimilation. With this knowledge, the Starjammers had managed to trick the Phalanx Cadre K had been monitoring in the next Quadrant with a false signal.
Corsair only waited long enough the make sure the Swooping Talon was escaping to safety before flying the ship as far away from the dramatic battle as it could take them without hyperdrive.
As the ship speed towards the edge of the solar system, the crew couldn’t help but feel a rush of excitement at surviving what seemed like an impossible situation, all except Z’Cann, who thought sadly of her dead team mates, the only family she had ever really known.
“I shouldn’t have doubted you, Captain,” said Raza glumly. “I am afraid I have done you a dishonor.”
“Oh, shut up, Raza,” smiled Corsair.
“And whichever sside comess out on the winning side of that battle, we’ve sseverely weakened two very dangerouss powerss in the galaxy,” said Ch’od.
Z’Cann could help but remember something as Ch’od said this; a fleet of black, crystalline ships with needle like tips destroying the Brood fleet like they were nothing.
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The End...
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