Tech Scavengers [Humorous, Action-Packed Space Opera]

MIRI's voice came over the shipwide comm.

"Three heavily armed ships have risen above the horizon and are headed towards us."

Jeridan's heart did a somersault.

"E.T.A.?"

"Four minutes."

"Let's get to the bridge," Nova shouted, trying to rush past him.

Jeridan hooked an arm around her waist and stopped her.

"You're not going anywhere!"

Negasi cut in. "Later. If it's the Syndicate, we need all hands to get out of this."

Jeridan hesitated for a moment, cursed, and said, "Come on. But this isn't over, Nova."

They rushed down the corridor. Negasi veered off to the turret, still carrying Nova's gun. Good. Jeridan had secured the armory with a captain's emergency override. She and that data hacker couldn't cause any more trouble than they already had.

Jeridan got to the bridge, unlocked the door, and went in.

Mason was still sitting there, right where he had left him.

"Are you all right?" Nova asked, clasping him.

"Yes, mom. I'm sorry, but I don't want to—"

Whatever he said got cut off by an incoming hail. It was from the archaeologist's ship.

"Antikythera, this is the Karnak. We'll be there in two minutes," a male voice said.

"Just in time to flank them."

Jeridan did a scan of the ships, which were just coming into visual range. He zoomed in and saw three midsized ships bristling with weapons.

"The Karnak can't measure up to any of those ships," the captain of the Karnak said. "We'll do what we can, though."

"Don't worry, I'm the best pilot in the Orion Arm, and my gunner isn't bad either." Jeridan felt better now that he was in familiar territory. Facing impossible odds was something he was good at. Facing a kid with ghost in his head and his psychotic mom? Not so easy.

He glanced in their direction. Nova was stroking Mason's hair and whispering something soothing, almost like a … mother, but the kid sat slouched and wouldn't look at her.

Negasi's voice came over the comm. "Correction. I'm the best gunner in the Orion Arm, and once I hit him so hard with a right cross that he peed himself."

"That was drool on my shorts!"

"Both of you shut up. They're coming in!" Nova shouted.

The three Syndicate ships approached in a triangle formation. Just before getting into range, the two flanking ships spread out wide to come in on the Antikythera at an angle. The middle ship looped around and sped toward the planet to cut off the Karnak.

"Looks like you're on your own, Karnak. Play it defensive and we'll come get you in a minute," Jeridan said.

"Will do."

"We're turning on the profile obfuscator. We won't be able to communicate with you when it's on."

"Roger."

He switched on the profile obfuscator, making them difficult to see or hit. That made him feel a bit safer.

"OK," Jeridan said, checking his controls. "We'll do it like we usually do it. I'll work some magic at the helm while Negasi mans the turrets and Nova launches torpedoes. Agreed?"

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"Agreed."

"Helen, could you … "

He looked over his shoulder and found Helen wasn't on the bridge anymore. Neither was Mason.

"Cack! Where the hell did—"

The opening salvo from the two Syndicate ships kept him from finishing his sentence. It was at a long enough range that he dodged easily, but now he had to focus on what he was doing.

But he swore, if that half-human did anything to Mason, he'd shoot her soul and her hard drive right out of her body.

The Syndicate ships closed in from both flanks. Jeridan hit the speed and shot for the space between them, angling to the left to get closer to that ship.

The goal was to get between the ships so they couldn't fire at him without risking hitting each other.

Of course they saw this. It was the oldest trick in the book. So they took evasive maneuvers, trying to keep the angles they had on the Antikythera.

He took care of that with the Antikythera's extra speed. The two Syndicate ships, modern all-purpose designs, were fast and maneuverable, but nothing compared to this ship. With a bit of zigging and zagging, he got between the two and stayed there.

The firing slacked off, and Jeridan sped toward the left-hand ship, turrets and torpedoes blazing. The Syndicate pilot was good and dodged all the major ordnance, but the distance between them shrank with every second.

The Syndicate ship changed tactics. It turned and sped away, trying to increase that distance, firing as it went. The righthand ship pursued.

That was exactly what Jeridan wanted. He swung around to face the pursuing ship. The Antikythera turned on a dime.

That was an ancient expression. Jeridan didn't know what a dime was, but it couldn't have been much bigger than a dinner plate because thanks to the Antikythera's accurately turned thrusters, that's about as sharply as it turned. The inertial dampeners strained to compensate and Jeridan felt the crash webbing press into his chest.

Then the ship was shooting right for the pursuit vessel, leaving the one they had been chasing far behind.

Negasi and Nova let loose with everything they had.

The Syndicate vessel tried to evade, but they had been caught by surprise and the ship shuddered as it took two torpedo hits and a hail of explosive slugs.

A warning light told Jeridan the other ship had gotten back into the game. It had swung around and launched four torpedoes right at their rear end.

While the profile obfuscator would mess up their aim, four at this range meant at least one would probably hit, and they looked like heavy duty models.

Jeridan waited, still closing distance between themselves and the wounded vessel. The torpedoes closed the distance, four menacing points of lights rapidly growing larger.

Just before they slammed into the Antikythera, Jeridan swerved to the right and they hit the Syndicate vessel instead.

It detonated with a spectacular fireball.

"Woohoo! Just because they're dangerous doesn't mean they're intelligent."

"You're the living embodiment of that, buddy," Negasi said.

"Very funny. Fire at the survivor."

Negasi already was, and soon Nova was launching torpedoes at it too.

The Syndicate ship jerked in all directions to avoid it, firing as it approached. Jeridan saw a few yellow indicators come on from minor hits, but so far nothing big had gotten through. Negasi focused on shooting down all the torpedoes they launched.

That kept them safe, but the Syndicate gunner was doing the same thing with the torpedoes Nova was launching. Neither side was getting any real hits.

Negasi changed that when there was a brief pause in the enemy torpedo launches. They must have been using an old launch system that had magazines that needed to switch out rather than a continuous feed. Of course, those magazines could switch out in less than two seconds, but that's all Negasi needed.

He sent a hail of flechettes and explosive rounds at the enemy turret and took it out. An instant later, the Syndicate ship launched a new salvo of torpedoes and he had to go back on the defensive.

It didn't matter. Now that the enemy turret was gone, leaving only a few automatic guns, Nova was able to send a swarm of six torpedoes at it. The auto guns took out half, but the rest made it through.

One, two, three. The enemy ship shuddered and sparked. Suddenly it wasn't launching anything anymore, only trying to swing around and run. Nova and Negasi finished it off.

Jeridan swung around the help the Karnak, and found the lesser-armed ship in a slug match with the remaining Syndicate vessel. Neither had the upper hand and both were moderately damaged.

He changed the equation by flying at an angle, Nova and Negasi both holding their fire until they got to close range.

They never got to. The Syndicate ship veered off and began to retreat.

"Oh, no you don't!" Nova said.

She launched a salvo of torpedoes and the Karnak did the same while gunners on both ships put a hail of projectiles around the fleeing enemy. The fleeing ship tried to evade, got hit by the flechettes, ducked in another direction, and took the lead torpedo in its port bow.

That must have taken out one of the side thrusters because suddenly it lost maneuverability. The rest of the torpedoes closed in for the kill.

In a moment, there was nothing left of the ship but a blooming fireball and an expanding halo of wreckage.

"Oh, hell yeah!" Negasi cheered. "3-0!"

"That was too easy," Jeridan said.

"Not when you have me as gunner."

"No, I mean, where are the Dragonflies or the heavy ships?"

"We're too remote," Nova said, ruining his mood with the mere sound of her voice. "They probably couldn't get ships here in time, and they probably weren't expecting us to be here. More will come, though. You can bet on that."

Jeridan spoke. "MIRI. Anything on the long-range sensors?"

"Negative."

"Keep maximum available power on those sensors. If a comet so much as sneezes, I want to know about it."

"I will, Jeridan."

Jeridan drew his pistol and trained it on Nova.

"Now then … where were we?"