"Yeah we can. Point the nose at that dark spot."
So Katy slowed down the ship and eased towards the black hole between the two mountains. As she got closer the crack grew larger, but still, it was a tight fit. Koba said nothing, but gripped the edge of his console. Soon, the Jessica's proximity warnings started to sound.
Koba couldn't stand it any longer, he had to say something. "Captain, we only have about 18 meters on either side."
The moment the ship moved past the hole, the crevice grew deeper and wider the further down they went, extending out several kilometers. Katy looked up at Jolo and he just smiled at her.
"I've been here before," he said, and then added, “I think.”
"Confidence inspiring, Captain,” she said. “So is this a solid memory, or just one of your feelings?" she said.
"A little bit of both. Head that way and look for another dark spot about 300 meters off the bottom on the left."
"Where we going, Captain?" said Koba. "This may be a pirate nest, we just don't know."
Katy guided the ship downward and even though the walls of the crevice expanded outwards, it was still tight and she was starting to sweat. Sure enough, 1 km north and about 300 meters off the surface there was a hole on the side of the ravine. It was just a dark spot and no one would find it if they weren’t looking for it. Katy slowly guided the ship in that direction.
Jolo got on the comm and called the Greeley brothers. “Y’all get suited up and ready.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Guns?”
“Yeah, but don’t start shooting unless I give the word. One of y’all get topside. You know how to work the boots?”
“Affirmative, Captain,” came the younger Greeley’s reply. The magna-boots held crew members firmly to the side of the hull, and were usually used for emergency repairs in space, but were just as good in a pinch for putting another set of eyes on the top of the ship in a dark crack between two sheer cliffs half a kilometer below the surface of a dusty planet.
“Stay low and use the safety line just in case. We’re gonna stick our nose in a hole and see what pops out.”
Then he called down to Hurley. “We got enough juice for forward shields and a few bursts from the cannon?”
“Yeah, barely, but if yer wantin’ to go toe to toe with a BG boat I’d suggest we head back to Sol for a recharge. I’m sure they’d love to see us.”
“Roger that. We just need enough for show.”
“This don’t sound good, Captain,” said Katy.
Jolo gave her a nod and tried to look cool and collected, but he was worried, too. Something was pulling him here and he was going to find out. He was on alert, like he was heading right into a trap, but for some reason was okay with it.
Katy put the nose of the Jessica 15 meters from the entrance to the hole. It was like a wide cavern that opened on the side of the shear cliff face. Inside the floors were smooth and Jolo thought he could make out a fuel cell recharger near some chains hanging on the wall. The space was plenty big enough to hide the Jessica, but whose secret cavern was this? he wondered. It smelled like pirate, and Jolo knew it, but for some reason he wasn't afraid.
He got on the comm and called up to Greeley, "Are you topside?"
"Yeah, Captain, nothing up here but the blue sky."
"Captain," said Koba. "We got a bogey 30 meters south, directly under us."
"What is it?" said Jolo.
Koba stared at the screen, his eyebrows furrowed. "It's gone."
Jolo told Katy to raise the shields, then told Greeley to check the bottom of the boat.
Suddenly the shields went down and the power to charge the guns went offline. A few seconds later auxiliary power came on, but Hurley called from engineering. "Captain, we're dead in the water. We got juice to fly, but barely. I don't know how it happened. I thought we had more. We’re gonna have to set her down in a hurry."
Greeley called in on the comm. "Captain, there's something funny hanging off the bottom of the--" and then his words were cut off.
"Greeley, are you there? Greeley?" But there was no reply.
Suddenly from either side of the cavern, trapdoors opened and two chains shot out and attached themselves to either side of the Jessica. The magnetized couplers hit the hull twice in the front and then two more from the back from the other side of the ravine. The sound inside the ship was deafening. It was like being inside a drum. Everyone instantly put their hands to their ears and the Jessica lurched forward towards the cavern entrance.
An old man appeared from inside the hole in the cliff face holding a rifle. He reached to his left and pulled the comm off the wall. "Federation got no business here. I thought I had an arrangement with the Valhalla. So y'all better have a good story or I’ll bury your ship so deep no one's gonna find it and don't even think about trying to make a call back to Sol. I'll catch every transmission sent. Now I got one of your boys hanging upside down from the bottom and I got me a new Fed issue energy weapon, of course they ain’t worth a shit anyway."
At that, he raised his own rifle which Jolo could see was not an energy weapon. It looked old. Really old, like his gun. The man fired a shot straight at the porthole window. Jolo ducked down, just like the green captain did when Jolo shot the port screen on the Jessica before.
"Those energy shields don't work too well, now do they?" the old man said, smiling, clearly having fun.
"I ain’t
