with apologies to justNibblin:Part 3
Chapter 3
There weren’t any life signs aboard the Planet Express Ship. Fry ran the scan three times.
“I’ve got to go over there.” Shielding his eyes against the glare of the nearby star with one hand, he tried to peer into the other vessel’s darkened bridge. All he could make out were the vague silhouettes of some of the equipment. Nothing moved.
Chelsea was already hauling spacesuits out of the storage locker at the rear of the cockpit. She tossed one in his direction and then grabbed one of the fishbowl helmets for herself. The garments were surprisingly flexible and easy to get into- not at all like the old, bulky suits he’d used at Planet Express. Fry reached past Chelsea and picked up a helmet. When the helmet’s rim touched the ring seal at his suit’s neck there was a hiss of suction. Fry’s nose immediately caught that unique, metallic smell of canned air.
When they’d both finished putting on the suits, Fry nudged their ship against the derelict Planet Express Ship. Their vessel shuddered slightly when the airlocks mated. Fry double-checked each of Chelsea’s seals, and the two humans squeezed into the tiny airlock.
A buzzer sounded back in the cockpit. Grumbling, Fry awkwardly extricated himself from the airlock and strode the few paces to the pilot’s seat. The ship’s computer was trying to warn him about a ship that was bearing down at them.
“A ship just showed up.” He called back to Chelsea. “They’re hailing us.” He started to work the controls on the console in front of him. “Could you answer them? I’m going to start getting the weapons ready, just in case.”
Chelsea slid back into the copilot seat and looked around her. She couldn’t find anything that was obviously a radio amongst the knobs and dials that were spread before her. You’re in the future, she reminded herself. Think Star Trek. “Uhh, on screen?” She was only marginally surprised when the video screen came alive with a hiss of static.
A squat, leathery creature dressed in a grey uniform glared at her from the screen. “You are in restricted space.” The creature growled. “Power down your engines and open your outer hatch. Prepare to be boarded.” The image disappeared.
“Did you hear that?” Chelsea asked.
Fry looked up from his console and nodded. Of course he’d heard it; he just wasn’t particularly surprised. That kind of dialogue was typical bad guy stuff. You got used to it after working in space for awhile. “Yeah, I heard. He fiddled with a knob and an image of a spaceship filled the screen. For a minute he just stared at the stocky white alien vessel. It practically bristled with weapons. Alright, Phil. He told himself. What now? He didn’t know enough about spaceships to know whether he could outrun them, or even what affect his ship’s defensive laser would have on the other vessel’s armor-plated hide. But if he surrendered, he might very well suffer whatever fate had befallen Leela, Bender, and Amy. It suddenly seemed incredibly foolish to have gotten himself into this situation. What the hell was I thinking coming out here? I’m just a dumb kid from the stupid ages!
“I- I don’t know what to do now.” He admitted.
Chelsea looked at him as if he had spoken in Greek. “What do you mean?” She asked. “Now we fight.”
He shook his head. “But I’ve never flown a ship during a battle before. All I ever did when I was working for Planet Express was fire the laser, and I don’t know anything about tactics or stuff. I’ll just end up getting us killed.”
Chelsea put a hand on his shoulder. “If we surrender, they’ll do to us whatever they did to the others. We don’t have a choice; we have to fight.”
“But-”
“You just worry about making sure we don’t crash into anything.” Chelsea said, cutting him off. “I’ll take care of the rest. Just tell me how to make this thing shoot lasers.”
Fry regarded her for a long moment. His brain told him that fighting wasn’t the answer. He just didn’t think there was anyway they could win, not with an inferior ship. But Chelsea seemed confident, as though she had access to some knowledge that was hidden from him.
“Right.” She said.
Fry blinked. “What? I didn’t say anyth-”
“No, I mean right. Move the ship to the right!”
“Well, it’s actually called starboard when you’re on a ship…”
“I don’t care what it’s called. Move the fucking ship. Now!” Chelsea grabbed the wheel and gave it a hard twist. An alarm blared as the seal between their vessel and the Planet Express Ship was broken. The little red ship rolled right and over the PE Ship’s hull. The torpedo that had been meant for them sailed under their bow and detonated astern, sending a massive concussion reverberating through the ship.
“Ow!” Fry yelped as his head smacked against the wheel. He sat up and winced. “I guess they got tired of waiting for us to make up our minds.” He looked over at Chelsea to make sure she was ok. She was rubbing an elbow that she’d banged against the hull, but seemed otherwise unhurt. Also angry.
“You alright?” He asked.
“Just tell me how to run the laser.” The fire in her eyes made it clear that there would be no argument.
Fry pressed a button that was mounted on the ceiling and a blank panel on Chelsea’s console slid away. A black joystick and a small video screen rose out of the console. A field of stars was displayed on the screen, with a large set of red crosshairs painted at the center. Chelsea grabbed the stick and gave it an experimental flick to the left. The stars flew across the screen from left to right, and the laser turret hummed as it rotated overhead on its track. In a matter of seconds she had the enemy ship centered in the crosshairs. She nodded at Fry.
Fry took a deep breath and threw the throttle forward. The enemy ship responded immediately, letting loose a barrage of violet plasma fire. Most of it passed overhead, but a stray shot glanced off the shields. Their own weapon responded with a staccato burst of green light. The first few volleys were nowhere near their target, but Chelsea soon had the hang of the controls.
When the first rounds splashed against the enemy’s shields Chelsea let out a whoop. “Take that, jackass!”
Fry hazarded a glance in her direction as he made a sloppy series of barrel rolls. To his utter amazement, Chelsea seemed to actually be enjoying herself.
A loud thump shook the ship. “They’re behind us!” Chelsea yelled, and then let off another barrage of laser fire. Fry tried to lose them, but he proved no match for the trained enemy pilot.
“I can’t shake them!” Fry yelled in desperation as a wave of plasma washed over the shields.
“Pull back on the stick, then cut the engines!” It was an order. Fry obeyed, and the enemy ship rocketed by underneath them. Fry throttled up the engines and slid in behind them. Chelsea didn’t fire. She was looking at something at the top of the joystick. She gave it a flick with her fingernail and a plastic covering fell away, exposing a little cavity. In the cavity was a big red button.
“Huh.” Chelsea pressed it.
The engines died without so much as a cough. Systems throughout the ship turned themselves off. “What-?” Fry said as the artificial gravity quit. It was suddenly dark and eerily quiet. Not even the throbbing of the ship’s life support systems could be heard. “What did you do?!”
“Well that’s just great.” Chelsea was saying. “Who the hell puts a surrender button on a weapons system anyway? The French?”
Fry was about to say something when he felt the slightest vibration in the armrest he’d grabbed as the closest available anchor for his freefalling body. Chelsea felt it too.
“Uhh, what is that?” She asked as it started to build. A high-pitched whine began to fill the ship.
Fry’s first thought was that it was some kind of suck ray, which Leela had told him was the technical term for what he’d always called a tractor beam, but the enemy ship, which he could still see through the front viewport, was too far away to be using one on them. In fact, they weren’t doing much of anything, just sitting idle. Maybe they’re as confused about what’s going on as we are. He thought.
The whine increased in intensity until it was at a level that was barely tolerable and the vibration increased to the point that it became difficult to hold onto the armrest. Then both abruptly stopped, and all was still.
“Okaaay-” Chelsea began. Something tore through Fry’s body like a million shards of hot glass. He had the crazy idea that his body was flying apart in all directions. He and Chelsea both started to scream, but the sensation was already gone.
As Fry tried in vain to slow his heart rate he could hear Chelsea in the background swearing up a storm. When he finally had calmed himself to the point that he could meet her gaze he found her grinning like a maniac.
“A goddamned quintessence bomb.” She laughed. “I don’t even believe it.”
She must have seen that he was looking at her as if she’d just sprouted an extra head, because she visibly made an effort to get herself back under control. “Sorry.” She said. “I guess I’m a little high on adrenaline.” Another laugh. “A quintessence bomb.” She shook her head. “Who would ever have thought?”
When all she got as a response was a blank stare, she tried to explain. “The rental agency guy said that the ship was powered by a quintessence engine. I didn’t think about it then, but that’s a fancy word for dark energy. Do you know what that is?”
Fry shook his head.
“Dark energy is the stuff that causes the universe to expand. I guess you could say that it makes space bigger. I didn’t even think it was possible, but I guess in the future scientists know how to use the stuff to expand and contract different parts of the universe. That’s how the ship gets from one place to another, by shrinking the space in front of it and expanding the space behind. I think that, when I pressed that button I told the ship to take all the energy it had available and use it to lob a chunk of dark energy at that other ship.”
Fry, suddenly remembering that they were in the middle of a battle, searched frantically for the enemy ship in the viewport.
“Don’t bother trying to find it.” Chelsea said, waving casually in the general direction of the ship’s last position. They’re probably stuck behind their own event horizon by now. I wonder what it feels like to have your body disassembled piece by piece right down to the subatomic particles?”
Fry thought about that for awhile. “So, we won?” He asked cautiously.
Chelsea grinned at him. “Oh yeah. We won. We totally kicked their ass-” Something hit the ship. Fry and Chelsea were thrown roughly back into their seats.
Fry tried to read his instruments, but they were all still dead. There was another series of loud bangs, followed by the sound that space travels dread above all else, the peculiar whistle of rushing air.
“They’re shooting at us again!” Fry yelled.
“No shit!” Then: “We’re leaking oxygen!”
Silently Fry thanked whatever supreme being that happened to be listening in that they were both still wearing their spacesuits. The emergency hatch closed inches behind Fry’s head. The hiss of escaping air died immediately, but now he and Chelsea were locked on the bridge of a nonresponsive spaceship under fire. We have to get out of here. Fry realized. A green form in the viewport caught his eye.
Chelsea saw it too. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”
Of course! The Planet Express Ship!
The enemy ship fired again. The rounds impacted in the stern. Strangely, there was no explosion this time. When Fry hit the emergency hatch release it immediately became apparent why. The whole rear half of the ship had been sheered away. Bits of rapidly cooling metal and miscellaneous detritus were floating out of the slowly retreating aft section like blood seeping from a wound. The senseless destruction was, Fry had to admit, incredibly cool. But there wasn’t time for that now.
The redhead grabbed Chelsea around the waist and fired a burst from the thruster pack mounted on his suit. The ruins of the ship began to recede. Fry fired again, and the Planet Express Ship swung into view, as did the enemy vessel. It wasn’t the same ship that had attacked them the first time. This one was bigger, and had a large ‘M’ emblazoned on the underside of its hull. At no point in his life had Fry felt so vulnerable as he did at that moment, hanging as he was in the middle of space with nothing to protect him from a well placed plasma round than a tenth of an inch of glass and fabric. He just hoped the enemy gunner wasn’t a good shot.
As it turned out, he needn’t have worried. The enemy vessel didn’t shoot.
Fry and Chelsea made it to the Planet Express Ship’s airlock. He just prayed Hermes hadn’t gotten on the crew to change the access code every month like they were supposed to. The airlock light turned green. Yes!
Inside, the ship seemed physically undamaged, although life support and artificial gravity were apparently offline. When Fry and Chelsea stepped out of the airlock, the ship’s lights turned on automatically. Fry began propelling himself down the hallway in the direction of the bridge.
As soon as they entered the compartment they felt the tug of gravity pull at their bodies. Fry’s ear caught the whir of a ventilation fan. The bridge’s emergency power generator was still operational, then. He removed his helmet and tossed it aside. Chelsea waited to make sure he could breathe before following suit. “So this is the famous Planet Express Ship, huh?” Her eyes took in the sleek bridge. “Impressive.”
Fry didn’t respond, but instead took his old place at tactical. He tried not to think about the gruesome scene he’d been half-expecting to find on the bridge. The console came alive when he sat before it. A complex wave of emotions washed over him as he was confronted with the memories that accompanied that chair- that ship. He forced himself to suppress them. The console was advising him that there was a ship coming alongside. Fry’s eyes went wide and he bolted from the seat.
“What?! What’s going on?!” Chelsea demanded as Fry bolted across the bridge. The redhead dove into the Captain’s seat and twisted the key that was still in the ignition.
The ship shook. Chelsea almost lost her balance, but grabbed the monitor that hung from the ceiling to steady herself.
An alarm sounded somewhere belowdecks. One of the first things Leela had done after being appointed Captain of the Planet Express Ship was to force Fry to memorize the sound of every alarm that the ship possessed. It had proven a daunting task. There were a lot of things that could go wrong in space, and each of them had its own alarm- even decompression. This one was a low wail, almost solemn in its timbre. It quickly crescendoed to a climax and then slowly faded to silence before repeating. That meant-
“We’re being boarded!” Fry exclaimed
Chelsea swore under her breath. “What about weapons? Do we have laser guns onboard or something?”
Fry shook his head. “No. Leela was afraid that Bender would try and hijack the ship if she kept guns around. She probably had one hidden onboard somewhere in case of an emergency, but I dunno where.”
“Well, it probably doesn’t matter anyway.” Chelsea replied in resignation.
“Huh? Why?” Chelsea nodded toward the rear of the bridge. Three spacesuited figures floated through the hatchway and landed lightly on their feet as the artificial gravity caught them. Each of them had nasty looking laser rifles clutched in their ungloved hands.
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big-time reveal in the next update. This hasn't been beta'd (soory JN. I got impatient. I know you're busy), so please take pity on my spelling mistakes.
Oh, and THM, you still interested in beta-ing for me? I think I've scared my previous two beta readers away. (by which I mean real life has stolen away all of their free time)
[This message has been edited by soylentOrange (edited 05-02-2008).]
Planet Express Employee Lounge
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posted 04-17-2008 22:46
