Fan Fiction ❯ The Nexus Files. ❯ Chapter three. Not a power play. ( Chapter 3 )

His green hair spilled over the captain’s chair in a luxurious wave of… well, hair. He reclined lazily, one leg tossed over the arm-rest, the other tapping the ground lightly to the sound of his brother’s music. He made an alluring picture, he knew. And half the bridge was drooling over him, he knew that too.

It was a glorious sort of power, that; to know that everyone in the room wanted to follow him back into his quarters and bow before his whim. And he loved power. Power was the ultimate form of currency for him. The more he had the better. Oh sure, people talked about power corrupting you, but he was a pirate, there wasn’t much of a hole left for him to sink down into.

The techies from the repair station were being escorted around by some of his crew to make sure they didn’t sabotage his ship. That said most of his crew knew jack all about fusion uplinks or system bypasses. But they were intimidating enough that the techies probably wouldn’t think too heavily on the idea of screwing him over. That said; this was costing him a small fortune to get the new slightly illegal upgrade the station was offering. Bastards knew him too well.

He’d have to put some fear back into the captain.

“Sir, the blueprints have arrived for your inspection.” Frexi murmured, passing him the data chip.

He nodded, taking it out of the Saoen’s hands and clipping it into his vid-display. The hologram appeared before him, outlining the new ship.

“If I may ask, sir… why the change of name?”

He sighed. “What fear does the Phatomonia bring anymore? People think we’re just a legend. A myth. Its time for me to make a grand re-emergence. Strike some new fear into people’s hearts. At first they’ll think it’s a brand new pirate group. Until we stake out some pirate wannabe’s and sign it off with my logo.”

“But I still think that the Phantomonia is more traditional, sir.”

“Frexi?”

“Yes?”
< br> “What is my name?”

“Ray Nexus, sir.”

“Who am I?”

“The most feared, legendary space pirate in known existence… sir.” The Saoen paused, almost forgetting he was answering a direct question. Nexus was being positively loud today.

“Exactly. And I was the one who made the bloody tradition. So shut up and don’t question my orders.”

Frexi almost whimpered under the single crackling red eye. The temperature on the bridge was rising to an uncomfortable degree and the other occupants were shifting uneasily. “Please forgive me, sir.”

Nexus turned his eyes away, sitting up and curling his legs under him. It was so hard to be a pirate captain; people were always giving him problems.



~.~.~.~
Chapter Three. Not a power play.

~By Sweetdeily.

~.~.~.~

After a week of painful repairs to the Giant and another three days of satellite tracking, I managed to get a fix on Ray Nexus. High Councilmen, you’d think it would have been harder. Perhaps I came at a good time; his ship had been forced to pull in for repairs at a less than reputable station and someone had actually recorded the shape and statistics of his ship.

My research on Nexus had led me to the conclusion that one reason no one in the UGF had ever caught him was because of how prissy they could be. As a pirate he should have been popular in the slums and undergrounds of the worlds but most searches for him were among the rich citizens. This wouldn’t work if I expected to catch up with him. I needed to think like a lower-class UGF citizen.

This meant illegal things.

Like assassination contracts.

Apparently assassins didn’t have a hard time tracking Nexus down and the assassins’ guild on Terra Delta had several contracts signed for varying amounts for the death of Nexus. Some were over five years old, but there were a few new ones out. Most of which had been placed by UGF officers. A few of the names I was able to place as members of High Commander Gern’s squadron. I couldn’t blame them. If I was as well liked as him, I would have a lot of people trying to avenge me too.

Our ship was dashing along at full speed in pursuit of my calculated positioning for the Phantomonia currently; we’d been going as fast as we could for three days now after my initial hit on where he had been.

Horus was on his sleep cycle when I finally received a small beep from the radar. The crew jumped on it.

“Sir… it’s them…. It’s the Phantomonia.” A lieutenant informed me.

The bridge held its breath.

I’d taken the liberty of telling almost all of the classified information contained in the Nexus file to my crew. There were two fairly decent common-sense explanations for this. The first was that I thought telling people what we were looking for and dealing with might help a tiny little bit in actually succeeding. The second reason was that I wanted my crew to be working at the same speed as me. It was fairly useless me just sitting there knowing everything that the ship was capable of and then my crew making a tactical mistake because they didn’t. sure, I could be pulled up on charges for it, but I wasn’t going to make the mistake of failing at my assignment and drawing attention to this detail.

I leaned forward and demanded the details.

“They’re on our outer radar; their ship is cruising along at flank speed. They might not have noticed us yet.”

“Raise the floating colony codes.”

“Yes sir.”

“Sir, I am currently making a lock on their engine systems and fuel signature.” My favourite lieutenant Larry informs me from the information helm.

I nod. “Continue forward at a drift pace. I want to get close enough to hit them with the tractor beams.”

“Sir! They’ve powered up engines. I think we’ve been spotted.”

“Drop the pretense then, power to the engines, catch them if you can.”

“Sir, they’re coming toward us.”

“What? Why?”

A wave of data comes through to my data-pads; information on the Giant’s responses to my commands.

“There is another ship attacking them from behind. The Phantomonia has been hit, her shields are down.”

The vid-screen flickers to life to show me the battle between the Phantomonia and her assailant. The other ship is a small assault vessel.

“Get the specs on the attacking ship, maneuver to catch the Phantomonia in our docking bay. Prepare the docking bay for an electromagnetic pulse- pulse dampener.”

“Yes sir.” Someone answered. I have so many voices on my ship I only try to memorize the ones I hear often enough to be of note.

On the vid-screen the Phantomonia lost an engine and spiraled around almost within reach of the Giant’s tracking beams. Gaining control again the Phantomonia fired up her main guns and let loose a battalion of photonic blasts. The assault vessel evaded them and fired off another volley into the pirate’s ship.

“Sir, the ship attacking the Phantomonia belongs to the UGF. It’s registered under Councilwoman Solar; its code is sixty-five-alpha-niner-eight-three-william-cork.”

A William Cork was one of the new prototype fighters that the UGF had been testing out in combat situations. It was extremely maneuverable, fast and its main weapon was a beam canon. On top of that, its stealth was something that made me drool in my sleep. It was also capable of being remote controlled, which would mean that pilots wouldn’t be dying like flies all the time. There was a slight problem with its maneuverability however, that meant it wasn’t completely ready to be set up on the assembly line.

The Phantomonia took another hit and I saw the blue lights along its rim power up. They collected at the stern of the Phantomonia and a blast drove straight into the William Cork. The ship exploded into tiny pieces and shrapnel reigned down on our outer shields.

“I don’t think he ejected.” Someone murmured in horror.

I nodded mutely. “Alright, remember our original goal. Get the Phantomonia locked on.”

“Sir, they’ve just scanned the ship. They’re powering engines.” A fresh voice informed me.

“Take out their engines. Two shots!”

Their remaining engine blew and I saw several smaller explosions as a result.

“Sir! The phantomonia’s life-support system has been damaged. It’s going to explode.”

“Open up the coms.”

“The com is open sir.”

The vid-screen changed to the communication vid of the Phantomonia, I could see the bridge. People were running toward the exit, the whole room was flooding with noxious gases.

“Attention crew of the Phantomonia. You are all under United Galaxy Federation arrest for crimes against peace. Surrender now and I will save your lives.”

No one looked back at the vid screen; they were all getting the hell off the ship.

“Sir, their life-pods are being launched. I estimate fifteen minutes until they blow.”

“Get a smaller ship out there to pick up the life-pods as they launch. These men are all wanted criminals.”

I turned my attention back to the video screen, catching a flicker of green. The captain was still on the deck, he was pushing aside debris covering one of his personel. “Jason…?” The captain’s cold voice inquired of the man he was holding.

There was no response. The pirate was probably dead.

I watched as Ray Nexus sighed, shrugged and walked calmly out the door. Before the vid-screen was destroyed I got a last flash of the middle finger.

What a man.

“Have we got locks on those escape pods?” I turned to my informants eagerly. This was going to make my career.

“No, sir. The pick up ship is reporting that they can’t be tractored in.”

I cursed and punched my arm rest. “What about manual grappling?”

“They’re too quick. Sir! The Phantomonia!”

I turned my head back to the vid screen and saw the ship blow up, the last escape pod riding the edge of the explosion and getting caught on the tail of it. The pod drifted helplessly in space.

“Get that pod, I think it’s been damaged.”

The pick-up ship moved into view and pulled the pod in, before going after some more of the other fleeing pods.

“Sir, we can’t get them no matter how we try to suck them in. the only pod we have acquired won’t open from the outside. Your orders?” The lieutenant on the pick-up ship asked, his face appearing on my view screen. If memory served I could place his name as Sudo something.

“Fire tracking bullets onto as many as you can. I want to know where they go. Someone prepare a team to follow the pods and capture the occupants. Bring me whoever was in that last pod.”

“Yes, sir.” Several voices told me at once.

~.~.~.~

The day had not been a total waste. I had destroyed the legendary Phantomonia. Captured one of its crew and was on the tail of the rest of the occupants. I only hoped I hadn’t caught the bloody janitor.

When I was a little kid, I had entertained dreams of the grandeur I was sure to receive on this mission. But now I felt all the old glee coming back to me. It was like Giving Morning, and the whole UGF was my family. I just had to be expecting a rocket up the ass instead of a thank you and bigger budget because it was the UGF in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, I’m working for good people but they’re stingy bastards all the same.

I wanted to be present when the pod was cracked open and I was walking into the docking bay with a contingent of privates at my back. Everyone was armed. I usually don’t get into close range firing quarters, but I wanted to gloat.

I walked up into the open hanger of the pick-up ship, saluting the lieutenants who jumped to attention as I entered.

“How is it going?”

“We’ve just found the right combination now sir, we were awaiting your command to open the pod.” Sudo informed me, saluting and standing completely at attention.

I nodded and indicated to the men to draw their weapons. “Let’s open this treasure up.”

The hacker at the door hit a button on his little pad that he’d wired to the pod and the pod’s door opened nosilessly with a rush of oxygen.

A small rabbit hopped out.

Some stupidly jumpy idiot fired at the thing and I watched it vaporize in front of my eyes. Who the hell gave their pet its own escape pod?

“You son of a bitch, that was the only one I had left of that species.” Ray Nexus’ voice growled out from inside the pod.

I looked into the pod, and sure enough the pirate captain was sitting lazily in the plush interior.


~ To be continued…


Sweet notes: Detta. Hmm, I changed my original direction of this. Anyway, what did people think of it?