Читать книгу Adventures of Space Cadets 101: Space Pirates, Allies and Aliens - Darryl Dean Wright - Страница 8

Coming out of the asteroid belt, the pirate ship, Beowulf, was heading back to the Cross now that E.D. had left.

“Captain, should we shoot at the ship hooked up to our prize?”

Captain Oron, sitting in his chair said, “Patience, Little One, the bullets would just bounce off of their ship while they are stationary. We will have to wait till they fire their rockets. That way their speed combined with our speed and the bullets' speed will cut through them like a hot knife through butter! Besides, I need E.D. to be further out.”

When Beowulf was closing in on the Cross earlier, they had noticed two ships headed towards them quickly. Beowulf’s radar was enhanced; it was better than most E.D. ships. The pirates didn’t want to take Earth Defense on in a fight that could be avoided.

There were twenty-eight mean, nasty pirates on the ship. They would outnumber, cheat, or attack, innocent ships to kill and loot.

Pirates, space pirates, who could have imagined in this day and age? But it was a business these days, and business was good.

They were rebels and terrorists from the first colony on Mars, but no one knew that there were survivors, and that they and their descendants were the space pirates of the day. They had been living in space and on asteroids for over a generation.

Kirk onboard the One-Oh-One, had just pulled a bullet out of the android with needle-nose pliers. He looked at Will then ran up front with the evidence and asked his father if there were any firearms on the Cross.

All four adults turned to look at Kirk, and Austen answered, “No. Why?”

JR took the slug and said, “That is from an A.K.266.” Derek told his son that there were only two lasers onboard the Cross.

Tim was figuring out what the captains and their brother already knew. “You’re telling me someone took out that ship with a rifle?” He could not believe it.

JR said, “It looks like … why should we care?”

Austen gave his brother a disgusted look and said, “Maybe it’s not such a mystery how so many ships disappear out here in the frontier.” He took the slug from JR’s hand and looked it over.

Derek said, “This is a first.”

Austen said back to him, “Everything in space is a first, out this far, astronauts and a Neanderthal.” JR knew he had just been insulted so he stepped closer to Austen and frogged his arm, then he frogged Derek’s arm for laughing.

Kirk got them back on subject by asking them what they were going to do. Derek said that he was going to put some ice on his arm. Austen said, “I’ll get it, be right back,” and he left.

Derek then said to his son more seriously, “First, we’re going to take whatever we can off the Cross - food, water, and oxygen lying round, then we’re going to sit tight.” Kirk asked him why, but before he could answer his son, Austen was back.

Austen returned with two ice packs and said to his nephew, “Physics! If we don’t move, any bullets would just bounce off of us instead of breaching the hull.”

“Captain, it has been sixteen hours; how long do we wait?” The young pirate in Beowulf was getting impatient, and he was already getting on his captain’s last nerve. “There’s not going to be anything left on that ship but dead bodies.”

The pirate captain stood up, took two steps down from his chair and put his short beefy index finger into the mouthy pirate’s chest and said, “Dim-wit, no matter what they took off one ship, we’ll just take it off their ship when we kill them. If I hear one more word out of your whinny mouth, I swear I’ll put a bullet in your head … You got that?!” Silence came over the bridge like an orange sky over Nebraska right before a tornado.

Tim said, “Ready, Captains.” Austen nodded at him and Tim sent a compressed message to Houston Inc. back on Earth in Texas. Austen then told Tim to open a channel to whoever was out there.

“Open, Sir,” Tim said.

“This is Captain Austen of the One-Oh-One, to the pussies that kill like cowards. We know you’re hiding like chickens. We know that you have guns trained on us, and we know that you are very bad people!”

The pirates just stared at their captain who was fuming and wide-eyed mad.

“We have also called for the return of the E.D. ship to clear you out of the way.”

“Captain Oron, it’s true. They have sent a compressed signal to the E.D. ship. We have to leave and we have to leave now!”

The captain pulled out his sidearm and shot the loud mouth pirate in his forehead! He was dead before he hit the deck floor. “Anyone else want to tell me how to run my ship? It’s not like I didn’t warn him!” No one moved or made a noise. “Radar, can we still see the E.D. ship?”

The young man was called Radar, because that was the job that he did. “Yes, Captain, but they are not turning back our way!”

Captain Oron said, “Ha! They are bluffing, but why wouldn’t they want E.D. to come back? Maybe they did find treasure on that derelict ship.” He scratched his chin and said, “I don’t even think they know where we are … Cut engines, we will wait some more, and jam their radio!” Radar did what he was ordered.

Two earth days later, Kim and Terry had taught Morse code and sign language to anybody that didn’t know it. The One-Oh-One had an enormous computer system, and everyone except JR had laptops. The captains had told all of the cadets when they were back on Earth before liftoff that everyone was going to learn on the trip as much as they could stuff in their brains. Study all kinds of courses. JR refused classes so he was the only one that was bored - idle hands, idle mind … pranks!

JR asked his brothers how long they were planning on just sitting there? Derek looked to Austen and said, “At least he didn’t ask, are we there yet?”

Austen asked JR, “Why, you have a date or something?” and JR reached over and punched Austen in his chest taking his breath away. Austen had difficulty breathing, but he managed to say in between coughs that they did need a plan.

JR agreed, “Alright then, let’s do it!”

Noah and Will came onto the flight deck, and as they entered, Noah had finished their conversation by calling Will a geek. That got everyone’s attention. Noah asked what was going on, and his father filled him in. Noah said, “That’s bull!” The sixteen year old said to his dad, “You need to call back the Obama now!” He looked at his Uncle JR and said without any guilt, “I’m sorry Uncle, but they’ve already looked for you, so they probably won’t board us again, and even if they do, just do what you did last time. We need E.D. Besides, it is their job to protect us and arrest whoever did that to the Cross. I know that this is a Texas thing, but get over it!” Noah was too young, so JR thought about hitting Austen again, but he let it go.

Austen looked at Derek and said that they were responsible for the ship and crew. Will stepped up and said, “I concur, Sirs.”

Derek said smiling, “Out of the mouths of babes.” He looked to Austen and between the two there was an understanding. Austen nodded at Tim, so Tim turned around in his seat and started working the radio, and set into motion what he was ordered without words. JR wasn’t happy, but he also wasn’t worried.

Tim’s eyebrows turned up in frustration. He started touching every dial on the console, but it was no use. He turned to Austen and said, “No can do, Sir. They must be jamming or scrambling our transmissions. All thirty channels are nothing but black noise. It’s not a bad transistor because we just used it. Even E.D. checked it out.” Derek told him to run a diagnostic and calibrations test to check it anyway. JR looked at Noah and told him that he could always scream at the E.D. ship.

Will butted in and said, “There’s no sound in space, Sir.”

JR said that children shouldn’t be allowed on the flight deck! Noah gave his uncle a dirty look. JR said, “Don’t look at me in that tone of voice, Noahito.” This time he did hit Noah’s father for Noah’s actions.

Derek laughed and said to Tim, “We got what we could from the derelict. It is now slaved to our ship’s computer, so let’s go forward using their ship’s rocket fuel instead of ours. It’s not like they’re going to be using it now. When the snake shows its ugly head, we’ll separate and release. We’ll shove the Cross right up their bow!”

Austen told Noah and Will to go aft and tell everybody to put their helmets on and strap themselves into their harnesses just in case of bullet holes, but not to mention anything about bullet holes.

The bridge crew put their helmets on. Five minutes later Tim cut the gravity and gave Derek the go ahead sign. From his seat, Derek hit a program on the ship’s computer and the Cross’ engines ignited. The takeoff was similar to the launch from Earth. It took several minutes before anyone could move their necks. Once again some astronauts enjoyed the speeding up