The First Nova I See Tonight by Jason Kilgore (the false prince .txt) 📕

"I think I'll hold on to it, thanks," Dirken said.

He turned back toward their objective. Eow stood watching them. "If you boys are done playing, we've got a ways to go yet."

They glanced at each other, then followed her across the hull. "Playing!" Dirken muttered.

He continued lumbering along for what seemed like an interminable stretch, wondering all the time what the pirates were planning. Surely, he thought, they know we're out here. What kind of ambush are we walking into? This may not have been a good plan.

They had to make a slight detour around an area that had been blown open by bombardment, the hull blackened and twisted inward in wreckage. Jagged shards of metal as large as he was were bent around and threatened to snag and rip their suits if they got too close. He didn't want to be freeze-dried in space.

They passed various portholes. One of these looked in to an aquatic environment. As Dirken gazed down into it, the pale white face of an Argulan suddenly appeared out of the greenish water and looked back at him, its sucker mouth growing wide in reaction. It then swam away in haste, pushing a webbed hand against the porthole to launch itself. The tip of its eel-like tail slapping the window as it propelled itself away.

"Crap," Dirken said into the mic. "A crewman saw me through a porthole."

"Well," Yiorgos responded, "I'm sure they knew we were out here, and they probably have guessed where we're headed, anyhow."

At last, as they passed around a gravwell panel that looked like it had been stolen from some freighter, the hangar came into view. He thought about sabotaging this important piece of equipment, but it would take too long. Just another couple minutes to the hatch off to the side of the bay door.

Then a compartment opened over the bay.

A swarm of "flea" drones came zooming out and arced toward them.

"Shit!" they all three said in unison.

"Run for the hangar!" Dirken said, suddenly not noticing his tired legs. His hands were full with the Heart. His blaster was inside the suit.

But Eow had her pulse rifle handy. She turned and fired several bursts at the fleas, hitting two of them. One exploded. The other drifted off into space, disabled.

The fleas were black and ovoid and festooned with sensors, grappling legs, thrusters, and a laser. They had seemed so small and insignificant from far away, but up close he realized they were large enough he'd hardly be able to wrap his arms around one and massive enough that it probably weighed almost as much as he did.

Yiorgos grabbed Dirken's arm to pull him along.

Eow fired again as the swarm descended upon them. Two more fleas exploded.

They were almost to the hatch.

A flea slammed into Eow, knocking her back, but one boot stayed adhered. Then two fleas fired on her, narrowly missing. She swung her rifle like a club and hit one of them. It went twirling off at an odd angle.

Dirken and Yiorgos passed her and reached the hatch. He felt the reverberation of rifle fire through his boots.

The cyborg grabbed the rotating handle of the hatch and turned it, but then ducked as laser fire cut an arc across the hatch.

Another flea slammed into Dirken, and he almost lost the Heart again.

A sputtering sound, then Dirken's suit deflated with a whoosh. He realized with a horror that the flea had punctured the flopping back of the suit. He tried to cry out, but the air rushed out of his lungs.

It was his EVA nightmare — for real this time.

He shoved Yiorgos in a panic, just as the hatch opened, revealing the airlock inside.

His partner turned, saw what was happening, grabbed and swung him into the airlock, then following him in.

Dirken let go of the Heart, turned, and bunched up the suit to try to block the leak, wherever the hell it was. His vision was clouding over. He could feel the surface of his eyeballs freezing.

Eow plowed into the airlock with a flea on her heels. The robot ricocheted off the walls of the airlock, firing its laser in seemingly random directions and burning lines across the panels.

Dirken was losing consciousness. His eyes felt like they were being pulled out of their sockets. He couldn't catch a breath. When he opened his mouth in an unconscious action, the saliva vaporized, popping on the inside surfaces of his mouth.

Then Yiorgos slammed the hatch and latched it, hitting the red "atmosphere" button.

CHAPTER TWELVE

HANGAR BATTLE

The atmosphere slowly returned.

Eow grabbed the flea by its back, turned, and aimed it at the inner airlock door as it continued to fire.

Dirken twisted and ripped off the helmet, gasping for breath, even before the atmosphere was back to Terran-normal. He was covered in beads of sweat that had frozen to little spheres on his skin when he had lost life support. Now they were thawing, dropping off of his brow like a mini rain of hail.

The inner hatch to the hangar opened…

…and the flea's lasers burned through two pirates on the other side as Eow guided it. The human and Proximan pirates screamed as the laser cut across their chests.

Dirken gratefully unlatched the stupid centaur suit and stepped out, his legs wobbly and coated in sweat. At last he pulled his blaster.

Yiorgos threw off his helmet. He picked up the Heart, tucking it under his left arm, and activated his plasma saber with the other.

"Go!" Eow yelled, slamming the flea into the wall until it sparked and fell silent. Then she picked up the plasma rifle and started firing and advancing through the airlock into an open space that he assumed was the hangar.

Dirken's vision was still fuzzy from the suit breech, but he aimed as best as he could at any moving figures he saw. He fired off three shots. Two figures fell.

"This way!" Eow yelled, having discarded her helmet. They raced toward the far end.

Dirken ducked as a plasma bolt