The First Nova I See Tonight by Jason Kilgore (best ereader for pdf and epub TXT) 📗

and bubbles of broth spreading out. Chopsticks followed, turning lazy somersaults.

Dirken glanced around the corner and fired. The shot blasted a hole in a wall next to a human crewman's head. Dirken glanced to his partner. "We need to get to the bridge."

"I have a better idea." Yiorgos holstered his weapon and floated over to a computer terminal. He plugged in the cord at his wrist. Soon his head tilted, eyes fluttering, as he entered their computer system. He sighed, mouth parting, as his mind fully integrated with the system.

The crewman fired, his laser burning a line in the wall. Dirken fired again, this time hitting the crewman in the arm.

The ship's engines suddenly thrummed and Dirken felt a lurch in his guts as the craft went into some sort of rolling maneuver. Then came a reverberation of the ship's cannons firing.

Yiorgos partially came out of his trance. "It's a United Worlds patrol ship. They opened fire when they realized 'TakTrak has a warrant for his arrest on Earth. Feleesha just disabled the patrol ship, but…." He went silent as his head tilted again, exploring some other part of the computer.

Dirken looked around again. The crewman was joined by another, a Rigellian with a pulse rifle, and they were floating toward them. Stupid, really, Dirken though, since you can't dodge while floating in zero G. He fired, hitting the wounded human crewman in the chest and flinging him backward, dead before he hit the bulkhead. A stream of blood flew out of the wound, forming spiraling lines of blood bubbles as he turned end over end without gravity. The other crewman pulled himself back into cover.

"But what?" Dirken said to Yiorgos.

"But we're damaged. Half the thrusters are offline. We're entering Earth's atmosphere."

"So? It's equipped for aerial flight."

Yiorgos shook his head. "One of the aerial engines was damaged, Dirk, either back at the comet or during the dogfight with the UW patrol ship."

Dirken gulped. "So, we're going down?" Memories rushed unbidden through Dirken's mind of his last ship, the Brilliant, tumbling through the atmosphere of Rorgos, engines down, and slamming into the barren, volcanic surface. Marooned. Injured. His crew dead or dying.

"Not if we can get back into orbit, or Feleesha can pull off a miracle. But the nav charts say we're still headed to coordinates on the surface of the planet. I guess she thinks she's a miracle worker."

"Or 'TakTrak is getting paid enough to make him risk it. He already risked coming to Earth and a firefight with the patrol. Other ships will be coming."

The ship vibrated in waves. Red light flashed in the corridor. Panicked voices echoed from other corridors.

'TakTrak's voice came over a speaker system. "Dirken, Yiorgos, my friends, this will be a bumpy ride. I fear even Feleesha's expert abilities may not compensate. Give yourself up to my crew now and they will escort you to a crash room."

"That's it," Dirken said. He blasted the speaker, then pulled himself around the corner. Pushing off with his legs, he flew down the corridor, blaster forward.

He caught the crewman off-guard. As the Rigellian raised his rifle, Dirken shot him almost point-blank in his pear-shaped head. Yellow blood and tissue splattered onto the wall behind and floated off in all directions in globules. Dirken continued forward. Looking behind, he saw Yiorgos following.

"Are you mad?" the cyborg said.

"The bridge!" Dirken said. "He's trying to land us. We need to stop it."

The ship shuddered and bounced. Dirken and Yiorgos passed a side room, the door ajar. Inside, half a dozen crew were strapped into crash seats. Dirken turned to fire but held off. These crewmen didn't seem interested in the fight. Their eyes rolled with fear of a different kind.

Dirken passed the gangway. He continued forward toward the bridge, Yiorgos following. Gravity was returning, and not in a good way. He was pulled back toward the deck, but the ship heaved and threw them both to the floor.

"We need to strap in somewhere," Yiorgos said.

"Yeah. In the bridge!" Dirken yelled. He hauled himself up and toward the bridge door, struggling to stay upright as the ship careened into the atmosphere. Setting down the duffel bag, he reached out and activated the door console, but it flashed red and stayed shut.

"Yiorgos, the door."

The servos in the cyborg's legs whined as he pushed forward against gravity. Dirken was flung against the wall, barely catching the duffel as it slipped past. Yiorgos's robotic legs held him steady as he reached the door and started to plug into the console, but then seemed to think twice. He pulled out his mini blaster, put the emitter against a circular pad connected to the readout. "Turn your head," he warned, then fired. When Dirken looked back, the console was in fiery shambles and the door slid open.

Immediately a green laser cut across the hall from the bridge. Dirken raised his arms just in time for the beam to reflect off the mirrors on his forearms and off to the wall. Then he fired, killing the crewman with the laser.

But others fired and Dirken ducked back behind the door frame.

The ship bounced and jostled. Through the doorway he saw the bridge windows bathed in flame from the re-entry friction. They had hit Earth's Kármán line and turned into a man-made meteor.

"Watch out!" someone called from behind.

Dirken turned in time to see a blur of smooth skin and blond hair leap and roundhouse kick the craven Pleiadean crewman from earlier, knocking him out cold.

"You!" Dirken said.

"I told you, I'm not here to hurt you." Andy glanced through the doorway, narrowly missing a hit by a blaster bolt. His slim muscles tensed. "We aim to protect you… and that." He pointed to the duffel with the Heart.

Another bolt flew through and grazed Andy's arm. He grimaced, then ran through the door into the bridge, screaming.

"He's insane!" Yiorgos exclaimed.

They looked through and watched in amazement as Andy leaped and whirled, kicking a crewman in the face, then swinging around and chopping