Commercial hangar, Kentro City, Dasos, Prasinos system
‘Shiiiit,’ he bellowed, shutting his eyes as the hoard pounced down on him.
A sudden and complete silence descended on the hangar. Terrified, Andy lay totally still, frozen in place, the coldness of the floor and his ankle complaining bitterly the only sensations he had. No attack. No limbs being ripped off. Just silence.
He tentatively opened one eye. The wall of bugs were two metres from him and slowly backing away as if he had suddenly become toxic. He opened his other eye and lifted his head up. A pair of red lady’s high-heeled shoes stepped into his peripheral vision as the bugs continued to back away.
He glanced up, following a pair of shapely legs to find a familiar face smiling down at him.
‘Hello, husband,’ said Rayl.
‘What the fuck?’ he stammered
She lifted an arm and pointed at the hangar door.
‘You will all exit the building immediately,’ she ordered, surprising Andy with an air of authority he hadn’t seen in her before.
The bugs all turned tail and as one trotted back towards the door they’d just entered through.
‘For fuck’s sake, how the hell are you able to do that?’ he asked, watching them leave as if nothing had changed. He slowly, with help from Rayl, stood again. She glanced at his leg and raised an eyebrow.
‘Walked into a door,’ he said, noticing the look.
A low whine sounded from the starship, catching their attention.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Rayl. ‘The admiral’s got quite a reception for this ship as soon as it’s in space.’
They spun around as the main door began closing again.
‘Oh, shit,’ said Andy, tugging on Rayl’s arm and dragging her towards the back door. ‘She’s not planning on flying out at all.’
They both began running as the starship’s jump drive charged. Pyriaeus appeared in front of them, waving his arms for them to get down. As the charging whine reached a crescendo, Andy and Rayl flattened themselves on the ground. Pyriaeus knelt, placed his hands above his head as if holding up a heavy weight and gritted his teeth.
The passenger starship disappeared with an ear-shattering clank, like a large cracked church bell being hit with a sledge hammer. The huge void and displacement of air collapsed in then burst outwards. The entire hangar exploded, sending huge sections of composites and carboncrete spinning hundreds of metres in the air, smashing into and onto many of the ships parked out on the apron. Secondary explosions followed. Lumps of the building and nearby ships crashed into the ground all around them.
Andy hugged Rayl close and once debris had ceased raining down, Pyriaeus dropped the shield he’d held over them and stood again. He glanced ruefully at where the starship had sat moments before.
‘Menka hasn’t changed in all that time,’ he said, with a sigh. ‘I’m always the optimist and had hoped she might’ve seen the error in her ways after so long. To be honest, I think she’s worse.’
‘You had no idea it was her destroying your world on Tessamaine?’ Andy asked, as the two of them stood up.
‘I had no clue,’ he said, as a flurry of snow blew around their feet.
‘You just had a chance to get your revenge, but let her go?’ Andy said.
‘It’s against our accords to take the life of another of the twelve.’
‘She was prepared to kill you.’
‘Menka always was the odd one out,’ he said, staring off into the distance. ‘Her ideas about inventing other forms of sentient life went against the accords we set out right at the beginning.’
‘What was the betrayal stuff about?’
‘Ah…’ Pyriaeus sighed. ‘At one time we had a bit of a thing going. We were young. It was before we even left our doomed planet. By the time we left and set off on our voyage it had fizzled out, but when a while later Neferuptah and I got together, it suddenly became a big issue and she was the first to go her own way.’
‘And holding a grudge by the sound of it,’ said Rayl.
‘Yeah…’ he said, going quiet and sighing again.
‘Can we go somewhere warmer?’ asked Andy, changing the subject quickly. ‘I don’t know about you but I’m bloody freezing?. He hugged Rayl close. ‘How did you get down here, by the way?’
Almost as he said it, the sound of antigravs in the distance blew in on the breeze and one of the Gabriel’s shuttles appeared through the snow clouds, long vortices curling off its winglets.
‘Did you really shut yourself in an airlock because of me?’ Rayl whispered in his ear.
‘Err…yeah,’ he replied, a little shamefaced.
She pulled him in even closer.
‘You really did love me didn’t you?’
‘Still do,’ he said.
The shuttle screamed in overhead, making further conversation impossible and blowing snow in all directions. Cleo just managed to set it down amongst all the rubble and burning clutter lying around. They hurried over, slipping in the snow and avoiding anything still burning. Andy was very relieved to clamber awkwardly up the steps and into the warmth of the cockpit.’
Cleo grinned at them and closed the airlock doors.
‘I love you too,’ Rayl whispered in his ear as Cleo lifted the ship and headed back towards space and the Gabriel.
Andy sobbed on her shoulder all the way.