Family Dysfunction

Rugburn had found us and was heading straight for the ship. I was sure that we'd eluded him; that he wouldn't follow us into this nebula, but it appears he's revealed his resolve for our capture by coming in after us.

He was about two hours outside of visual range and Evah was already quick to work at the back of the bridge where a large metallic brick of an island lay. The top was semi-glossy and was smudged up from people using it constantly. Pockmarked beverage rings stained the surface like two dimensional craters. Under the flat surface was a brilliant light that made the surface glow a soft orange and as Evah danced her fingers over an attached console a wiry orange hologram resolved in the air.

I walked over to the island opposite of Evah and looked upon the data that floated before me. There was telemetry information and other data that I wasn't recognizing right away. Evah was busily absorbing what the computer had to offer in hopes that she could find a solution to the coming problem.

“This Rugburn- you don't know if he has weapons equipped on his rig do you?” she asked while studying the ghostly tables and diagrams.

“No, I don't. While Jan and I were aboard he never used them. His crew was armed though,” I replied promptly. I wanted to be as of much assistance as I could.

“We'll have to assume his ship is armed then,” she quipped, “better safe than sorry in Outspace.”

She paused for a moment and stared into nothingness while she tickled her chin with her thumb and then craned her head up at me.

“What do know of this guy? What's he like? I want to know if he'll blink if I bluff him.”

I folded my arms as I turned my mind backwards to the time I spent on his vessel. “It's hard to tell, honestly. I didn't have a lot of time with him, and when I did it was all business. He wasn't interested in the slightest for small talk. I do remember that was considerate but in hindsight that was probably to passify any desires Jan and I had to escape.”

“All business, eh?” Evah huffed.

I nodded.

For a moment only the moans of the Gossamer Willow were audible. Occasionally a computer console would chirp and bark notifications. I impulsively checked the time on my tRib. Only a few moments had passed but knowing there was an inevitability to this situation made me fidgety.

I turned my head over my shoulder to the screen at Heik's console that displayed the mooring work on the Morningstar. The Helthex busily zipped back and forth in their EVA suits and Jan was busy with a spanner on one of the locking mechanisms. “I hope they finish soon,” I thought.

My attention was brought back to the holograms as Evah spoke. “Looking over these calculations, Rugburn's ship is faster than mine. We're going to have to find a way to slow him down so we can gain an escape advantage. If we outright run for it, he'll catch us within another forty five minutes.”

“Have any ideas?”

Evah's brow furrowed a little. “Mmm.. we'll, I have one idea but it won't be effective until he's right on top of us; it'll be cutting it close.”

I smirked a little, “Why does it always have to be close...”

“Hah- you'd think we were in a movie,” Evah chuckled. “Strictly speaking, my optimum choice would be to have a long distance solution- but given that I'm not armed. My options are limited.”

The ship lurched to the stern abruptly and the Willow's superstructure moaned as welding points and bulkheads contorted. We had to hang on to the bevel of the island for balance.

“What was that!” Evah shouted.

Hoc, deftly plied his controls. New information popped onto his screens. “Captain, there's been a minor gas explosion in the processing bay. No casualties, but they are requesting your presence below.”

“Alright, tell them I'm on my way.” Evah made her way for the exit of the bridge. “Jack, pay attention to what's goin' on up here,” she ordered as she stepped out.

My tRib began chirping soon afterward. I knew who it would be.

“Jan, how's everything?”

“What the hell was that? This whole ship listed fifteen degrees.” Her voice popped and crackled over the communication channel.

“There's been an explosion in the processing bay. Evah's gone below to take care of it.”

“Holy shit!” Jan shouted, “Is everything alright? How far out is Rugburn?”

I took a quick glance at the telemetry feed displayed in one of the holograms before me, “You've still got about ninety minutes left; you're good so far.”

“Alright,” Jan answered, “Out.”

I shoved my tRib back in my coat pocket and attempted to make sense of all the glowing data before me.

During the time Evah was below ship helping repair whatever damaged had occurred, I had caught up on the situation at hand the information about Evah's ship. She was right- there wasn't much we were going to be able to do in regards to Rugburn. If he's got weapons we were in pretty much deep shit. At the minimum, he could board the ship. Although part of me relished the thought of those Ibzaan trying to take down husky Taurbeshi crew we have here.

Out of curiosity I began to search the manifest list of the gases that Evah's crew had been trawling. Turns out there was quite a bit of hydrogen that was listed to be converted to deuterium. There some other gases of no real interest that had been gathered that I figured had some worth since Evah seemed to know what she was doing. What did get my interest was that one of the tanks held quite a good supply of Galanthium.

I had a pretty good grasp of the behaviors of the stuff and an idea had sparked in my head. I wasn't quite sure what the exact figures where of the energy yield of the mineral so I quickly accessed the Accessible Information Open Database, or AIOD for short. It's a little archive the Commonwealth has been setting up for cultural and academic enrichment for their civilian population.

I was able to look up Galanthium rather quickly and recorded the information I required. I switched back to the other hologram of a database window where I was putting in some calculations. It'd been awhile since I'd done mathematics this complex so having the computer handy was advantageous.

The ship board communication channel opened with a pop. “Jack, how's the situation?” Evah asked. There was a lot of background noise in her part of the ship and she was shouting to be heard.

“Ok I guess. Rugburn is still on intercept.”

“Alright. I've been trying to think up some alternate solutions but the repairs here have been keeping me busy.”

“Is everything safe down there?” I asked.

“Oh yes, it's fine. A heavy manifold exploded, nothing life threatening. Ships are always trying to return to their component parts,” she added with a chuckle. “Alright, I should be up there in another twenty minutes or so.”

I'd almost forgot to ask Evah something, “Hey, one thing-”

“What's up?”

“What's the pressure tolerances of your containment pods?”

“Uhh... they're reinforced titan-dualinide composites.” There was a suspicious pause, “Why?”

“Would they contain an explosion of a thousand metric tons of Galanthium?”

“What are you doing??” Evah shouted back in a bewildered and confused voice.

“I've got an idea. Oh and you'll need to sacrifice one of your drones.”

“I'll be up in twenty minutes.” The channel popped to a close.

I wasn't sure if she was entirely cool with this plan so far, since she was the one who was gonna lose out on some equipment. I went ahead with it anyway since we only had forty five minutes left.

A few moments later Jan pinged me. “What have you got?” I asked as I continued to work on my plan.

Jan sounded spent but she was a diligent engineer. “We've got all but one moor locked in and that one is nearing completion. We should be good to go in the next few minutes.”

“That's perfect, Jan! Get back in here ASAP.”

“Like I'm gonna hang out here and admire the view, Jack.”

I laughed and was about to cut the channel when Hoc interupted. “Jack,” He said via his gruff translator, “I've received a recorded message from the Ibzaan vessel. It's directed to you.”

“Oh?” I wasn't sure what Rugburn had to say, but I knew it'd be interesting. I left the channel with Jan open so she could listen in.

Hoc threw some switches and the familiar, sand paper voice of Rugburn filled the air of the bridge. “Jack Spenn. I give you more credit than I had originally. I had always thought the Belkuri were gullible; easy to manipulate, but you proved me wrong. I'm coming for my ship and the bounty on your head.”

The message whistled out as the channel ended.

“Sonofabitch. He's such a racist prick!” Jan shouted.

“Just get the job done, Jan and get aboard. Oh and get Chalk up here. I wanna talk to him.”

“Sure thing.”

Looks like it was back to work with me. I had better have this plan of mine figured out before ol' lobster head showed up.

I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was Chalk. Had time flown that fast?

“Chalk? Is Jan finished?”

“Yes. Your ship is successfully moored to this ship's hull.” He replied plainly. “She said you wanted to speak with me.”

“Yes. Yes, I did. I need to ask you a few questions about Rugburn's ship. You were an engineer, do you know of any weak spots that may be especially sensitive to high energy discharges?”

Chalk's buggy eyes wiggled around for a moment. I guess that's what he does when he's thinking.

“Yes, now that I recall. Why?”

“Take a look at this idea I've got.”

it seemed like no time at all had passed before we could see Rugburn on visual. Seeing that ship again made me feel pissed and and scared at the same time. I can't say it was a comfortable sensation.

Evah had returned to the bridge just moments before and had grilled me on this crazy, insane plan, as she put it. She wasn't too keen on the idea of foregoing her supplies like that but as crazy as the plan sounded she admitted it might actually work and it was better than her's.

Rugburn was fast approaching and he'd be on top of us at any moment. This was it; now or never.

“Distance, Heik,” I asked.

“The ship is slowing to four hundred KPH and is bearing out at ten thousand meters at zero-nine-two degrees.”

“Alright. Helm, our engines nice and warm?”

“Yes. Idling and ready for full power. Escape course is plotted.”

Evah looked over at me with an anxiousness in her eyes. “You know this is a class D neb, right? It crawling with Rhodite.”

“I know that. I've plotted a course to the nearest pocket in the nebula with the lowest concentration of the stuff.” I tried to be as reassuring as possible given the obvious dangers we were facing.

“The outside vessel is at seven thousand meters and slowing,” Heik growled.

“Okay, Hiek, release the mooring locks on the forward tank number three-A. Afterwards pilot the drone to connect with the tank and reorient it's axis to these new coordinates.” I had them written on a piece of scratch paper and placed the wrinkled piece on Heik's console. He gave me this look as if I was supposed to send them over via computer. His large hand grabbed the scrap and slid it over to where he could see it the numbers better. A subdued growl silently echoed deep in his thick neck.

We looked out the window in front of the bridge as the drone slowly pushed the tank free from the holding calipers of the ship. So far everything was going smoothly, and I hoped, for all our sakes this goes the way I hoped it would.

“If this works I'm getting a really big beer afterwards,” Evah stated flatly.

“If this works I should be a math professor,” I dryly replied.

“The tank is in position,” Heik huffed aloud.

Chalk leaned over to me, “you do realize that Rugburn will be trying to anticipate what you're doing.”

“I know,” I nodded.

“They're at five thousand meters.”

I took a big breath and stared down the tank. “Okay. Do it.”

Hiek worked his controls and the drone began to open the seal on the tank and then maneuvered inside. There was a strobe like flash of white blue light and then a brilliant violet blue column of plasma at least sixty meters in length erupted from the small opening in the tank. The light bathed the bridge like a supernova had gone off.

“Helm now! Execute! Execute!” I shouted.

The nose of the Gossamer Willow began to lurch away to the right. As I squinted my eyes I could see the tank rocketing off toward the anticipated position Rugburn would be. I could see his ship attempting to maneuver out of the way but his freighter was just as lumbering as Evah's. Before we lost sight of the view I saw the tank smash right into the sensor array of the ship. The tank exploded in a shower of plasma and sparks.

Apparently there was enough constituent gases in the nebula to carry a blast wave towards us. The ship rocked gently while we pushed away from Rugburn at full power.

“Heik, put on the aft cam,” Evah ordered.

On the main screen suspended above the bridge a view of Rugburn appeared. His ship had been put into a slow, rolling list and the impact point left a charred deformed depression in the hull. Arcs of excited rhodite danced across the damaged ship and a trail of sparks left a path of destruction.

“Ha! It worked,” Evah gasped.

“We're not done yet,” I continued, “we still have to get to the extraction coordinates for FTL.”

“The Ibzaan ship is hailing us,” Hoc interupted gruffly.

Evah peered over at me with an expectant look on her face. “You want to answer?”

I thought about it for a moment. Should I gloat? Tell that lobster head to go to hell? I'm not the type. But I was curious about what he had to say. I imagined he was pissed.

I motioned for Hoc to open the channel. And it popped to life. Immediately the sounds of klaxons blaring and crew shouting in their native dialect showered the background.

“It looks like you win, Jack. My ship is crippled and adrift. Interesting how fate has switched our roles.”

Wait he's crippled? I only wanted to take out his sensors. I looked over at Chalk who folded his arms and stared me down. “That spot we targeted wasn't the sensors was it, Chalk?”

He was silent.

“Ha!” Rugburn cackled. “Chalk. I never should have let you come along. The moment you boarded the ship I could smell your stink of resentment all over the halls.”

What the hell? I was always curious as to why Chalk was so eager to get off that ship. It seemed the answer was at hand.

Chalk remained still with his arms folded and he stared out of the window at the nebula ahead. “I have nothing to say to you.”

“I should have made your Mother abort you.”

Whooaa. I spun my head over at Chalk. I wasn't expecting that one at all. “Is he your... Father?” I silently whispered.

Chalk eyed me subtly with his eye stalks and then turned and left the bridge.

The comm channel was becoming increasingly difficult to hold. All I could do was stare at screen. Watching that ship tumbling on fire in space; I wasn't sure what to feel about Rugburn now. I knew he was a bastard to me but what kind of dynamic did he and Chalk have that caused such a rift?

The ships comm array auto-killed the channel when it degraded too badly. And the bridge was once again quiet.

“We're nearing the extraction point for FTL,” The helmsman stated.

Evah stepped forward and killed the aft cam and the screen flickered back to ambiguous data. “Helm when you're ready engage the drive, input new coordinates and prepare for FTL. Engage at will.”

The ship came to a stop and the familiar drone of the massive FTL drive could become felt through the vibrations of the ship. They weren't using a conventional Metaspace drive because we were in Outspace, so I was curious to see what this would feel like. The hair on my arms began to stand up and I got goose bumps all over my body. It must have been the electrical reaction to the drive generating some kind of FTL field.

“Engaging.”

I was expecting some great flash or an event of equal panache but instead the view outside when to black. Inky black. It was like all the stars in the universe just blinked out of existence and there was nothing but an endless void outside.

“Uh.. are we FTL?”

Evah turned and sighed a heavy breath of relief. “Yes, finally.”

“It's completely dark outside. Where are we?”

“I have no idea. Anyone who travels Outspace calls it The Ink.”

“Where are we going?”

Evah paused at the bulkhead leading out of the bridge. “Teague's Doorstop.”

J.