“Engineering,” said Jolo into the comm.
“The Emperor’s Guard will perform a security check momentarily. I pray you fools have not forgotten your access codes. Who is this?”
Jolo paused. He had one good option and he went for it. “This is Commander Swisher, no need for a security check, or your attitude. Engineering is fine. We are in lockdown. If you must, you can check after.”
“The Emperor will not wait. Especially since I’ve just found a man locked in a storage room claiming to be Commander Vincent Swisher.”
Jolo swallowed hard, reached up under his arm and felt the hard wood handle of the Colt. He looked over to Katy and smiled.
“He’s an impostor. We’ll need a few more minutes to swap the filters. Swisher out.” It was the best he could have done. Now what? Jolo thought. The options were getting fewer by the moment. Katy still had that wide-eyed frozen stare thing going. And then her head swung towards the main entrance door to engineering: the heavy, mechanical CHUNK CHUNK CHUNK of a BG warrior moving through the halls of the Corsair, and getting louder.
Suddenly there was a BOOM! and the heavy door that led into engineering, a door that was designed to protect the engines from outside attack, was bent inwards in the middle. Dust and bits of metal fell down from the supports on either end.
Jolo pulled out his gun and strolled to the center of the room. He looked over at the door holding the engineers, fired one shot at the tiny outer lock and out spilled the three men in black coveralls.
“No time to argue,” said Jolo. “The BG are coming and they aren’t going to play nice. You have to hide. Now!” Another bone jarring boom and the door was now bent into a cone shape. The edges had pulled away from the wall and through the gap Jolo could see the shiny black mechanical legs of at least two warriors.
“Run!” yelled Jolo. He grabbed the brave one from earlier. “If you want to live, find a hiding place. And take her with you,” he said, pointing to Katy. Jolo nodded at Katy and she ran towards the rear of the room where the energy core fed into the main engines, and following the engineer, crawled under a heat shield, heading deeper into the Corsair’s engine, where only smaller humans could fit.
One more blast and the door, now a strange cone-shaped piece of broken metal, flew into the room, sparks spraying out as it slammed against a logic array on the far wall. Two BG stepped into the room, bending down so their heads did not hit the ceiling. One of the engineers ran to them.
“No!” Jolo screamed. But he didn’t listen.
“It was him,” the engineer yelled, pointing at Jolo. But the closest BG swatted him away like a bug and he flew across the room and bounced off the jump drive, slid to a stop and did not move—a trail of blood on the white floor.
Jolo stepped back towards the center of the room where the ceiling opened up forming a giant heat vent 50 meters high with logic arrays and control boards lining the inner rings.
Jolo’s mouth went dry as he slowly eased back under the heat riser. He momentarily held the gun in his left so he could wipe his right on the commander’s pants. It was a calculated risk, and the two warriors did not strike at that opportunity, but continued to flank him. Just like his last moments on the Jessica, Jolo’s thoughts turned to Jaylen. She was there, always there in his mind. She spoke to him without a word, her large brown eyes—come to me, she seemed to say.
Jolo could not take them both at the same time, especially coming from two opposite angles. So he took a few steps to put one between himself and the jump drive. As soon as he raised the gun both of the black mechanical beasts turned on their force fields. The air tingled and hummed around them. Each step, every subtle movement, a whirring, spinning drone of actuators and gears, amplified by the buzzing electric field surrounding them. They each stepped in time, closing the distance on the tiny human with the tiny ancient weapon.
Jolo knew they did not fear him. And he supposed this was a good thing. They stood in the open, confident in their high-tech force fields. He shot the closest one in the center of its alacyte chest plate and the worm inside screamed, a horrible screeching wail. The other leaped onto the jump drive and suddenly the red end of its energy blade swung down faster than Jolo had expected. He ducked and felt the hot end sear the commander’s jacket, but Jolo stood up in one piece. By then the first BG had regained his composure and now both were in striking distance. He could not shoot both at the same time. And suddenly two red energy blades were sweeping down from on high and just as he thought this was the end he realized he had one move left.
He jumped as hard as he could, and just like the fall from the Jessica, he discovered something else he could do. He flew 30 meters up to the first ring of the heat riser and now was looking down at the warriors. He fired three shots in succession at the first warrior and it went down but by then the second had leaped up to first ring. It held its staff out over Jolo so he could not make another jump and it leaned over him, the worm inside screaming. Jolo raised his gun again but the warrior knocked the Colt out of his hands with the unlit end of his staff and it bounced along the
