Although she didn’t show it Malena Endia was very relieved when Pulsat Rad announced in the mess hall “Engines fixed”
She had been a part of the Tornado’s crew
for many years and felt at home and the thought that she would have to leave
the comfortable cocoon she had inhabited for so long terrified her, she knew
that Merri had been worried about it for weeks but she never shared her fears,
not with Merri at any rate, and she didn’t have to with Shiyne as she was a
telepath.
Malena Endia was from Obgaron Prime in the
Alandis system which was now deep in the heart of the Mehreen Empire, though
she, like many of her species fled into Legion territory after their world was
invaded, but many of her kind died after the invasion and she wasn’t sure
exactly how many were left because they weren’t easily recognized as they were
a race of shape shifters.
The Mehreen were a brutal regime who
conquered world after world without warning, either for tactical and strategic
reasons or for want of the planets resources, but in the case of Obgaron Prime
there was no strategic value and it was poor in minerals and Orr, their
destruction was for a very different reason altogether, fear.
The mighty Mehreen Empress feared the
Obgaron because of a long held prophecy that the Empire would been brought down
by beings who could transform themselves into Mehreen High Councillor’s and
seize power unnoticed, so they thought those beings were shape shifters, so
they slaughtered every one they could lay there hands on without mercy.
The Obgaron were a peaceful insular people
who had had minimal exposure to the universe outside their own system so the
majority of the inhabitants weren’t fearful of an impending invasion.
Malena however was not among them and fled,
stowing away on a deep space exploration vessel with a few of her like-minded
people and slipped through the Mehreen net by transforming.
Though she could change form at will she
could only transform into a being she had touched.
Only the briefest moment was required and
then it was in her memory banks and could be recalled whenever required.
But that need to touch a subject in order
to shift cost many more lives during the invasion among the Obgaronian’s who
had no suitable form to shift into to when the time came, in order to evade the
Mehreen hordes.
The form Malena took was that of a 27 year old
human whom she met on a remote mining colony when she first entered Legion
space, that was more than 20 years earlier and she still looked exactly the
same.
It was on another mining planet 12 months
later that she first met Ben Strong and joined his crew aboard the Tornado
where she quickly proved herself to be invaluable, firstly as just one of the
crew but she soon showed a natural gift for navigating and she also excelled as
a nanny to 9 year old Merri.
Over the years, as the Tornado plied its trade,
crew members came and went but she remained loyal to the Strong’s and in the
three years following Ben Strong’s death the bond between Malena and Merionwen
strengthened and she loved her like a best friend, mother and a sister.
When she knew the 9 year old Merri she was
indeed old enough to be her mother and now appearance wise at any rate they
were the same age.
The relief was palpable among Merri, Malena
and Shiyne, the day after Pulsat and Vanzyl had repaired the engines, and there
was a distinct air of optimism on the Tornado with two new engineers aboard and
even better than that, Visitor Parham had joined the crew, and he could cook.
And as their departure from Alwi was now
expected in the following few days Merri was keen to take the Tornado off world
to test drive the engines and find out if their engineers had done as good a
job as they thought they had.
So with Merri piloting and Malena in the
co-pilot seat and Pulsat and Vanzyl monitoring the engines the Tornado’s four
vertical take-off jumper engines were engaged and the Tempest Class freighter
lifted off.
It wasn’t a huge ship as freighters go but
pound for pound the Tempests had the highest freight to fuel ratio yield of
their class.
The front section comprised of a sizable
pressurized hold for large freight accessed via a front loading ramp, above
which was the flight deck, living and sleeping quarters, mess facilities and
bath rooms, at the rear was the main propulsion and amidships were the
universal pod bays, which allowed for a mixed cargo option, which allowed for
quick inspection and loading, although sometimes pods were sealed which meant
it was either very valuable or very illegal, either way Merri didn’t mind and
transporting sealed cargo paid much much better.
The Tornado always flew with at least one
pod but then that was because it was where they stowed their gear and where the
hidden compartments could be found, or not, which was where they hid the
contraband, when necessary.
After watching the ship take off, Clergyman
come cook, Bagg went into town in search of provisions, which were seriously
depleted on board while Shiyne went to see if she could secure them a cargo.
Merionwen took the ship effortlessly out of
the atmosphere and into space and then said
“Well so far so good”
“Yes but we need to go a bit speedier than
that if we’re going to cross the system without being trashed by raiders”
Malena pointed out
“We had better put the pedal to the metal
then” she retorted and flicked on the comms to the engine room
“Pulsat I’m about to put the engines
through their paces, let me know if there are any problems”
“Engines good” Pulsat said
“I know, but let me know, if engines bad”
Merri said
“Engines good” Pulsat repeated and she
rolled her eyes
“Ok here we go” she said and slowly
accelerated
“Wow they’ve never been that smooth before”
“Everything’s good on the monitors” Malena
said
“Give them some more”
So Merri smoothly took them up to maximum
speed and they ate up the space as they left Alwi and headed towards Aragon
which was the planet that Alwi orbited.
“Engines good” Malena said and they both
laughed
They spent the next hour putting the
Tornado through speed and manoeuvring trials in their small corner of the
Cammaratian System, which was of was moderately sized, comprising of 7 planets
and some seventy moons, only one of the planets was an M class, Lazarion, the
fourth planet, all of the others were either gaseous, volatile or just plain
unpleasant.
There were various mining operations in the
system mainly on the numerous moons, the largest of which was on Alwi the
fourth moon of the seventh planet Aragon.
The trials passed largely in silence until
Merionwen said
“It is so nice to get back out into space”
“You mean it’s nice not to have to swear at
the engines” Malena said and laughed
“Very funny” Merri retorted and then Malena
noticed some unusual readings on the monitors
“I’m picking up something on the long range
scanners” she said
“What exactly?” Merri asked
“I don’t know, get us a bit closer and I
might be able to identify it, head towards Zandros”
“Ok here we go” she said and made a bee
line for the coordinates Malena gave her, which was in close proximity of the
second planet in the system and a few minutes later she added
“It’s a distress call, a freighter, a Scav
Raider attack”
“How many?”
“Two for sure, maybe three” Malena replied
“Any ID on the freighter?”
“Only that it’s an Omega class”
Omegas were very common freighters less
than half the size of the Tornado and were unarmed so with three raiders
attacking them they were in deep trouble so Merionwen squeezed every ounce of
power from the engines and then a few minutes later Malena said
“Oh no”
“What? What?” Merri snapped “What is it?”
“It’s the Phoenix” she replied gravely as
they knew the Phoenix well and the Skeet brothers who owned it.
“Shit” Merri said
Apart from being in the same trade and
often competing for cargo the Skeets were friends, so it was a bit of a shock.
“We had better go and rescue your
boyfriend”
“He’s not my boyfriend” Malena said
“Not for the want of it on his part” Merri
pointed out “Or yours”
“Don’t exaggerate” Malena snapped although
she could not deny the truth of it to herself.
She really liked the younger brother Zerrad
but she had long since decided that there could never be any kind of a
relationship for a number of reasons and although she was attracted to Zerrad
she saw no reason to change her policy.
Apart from the fact they were on different
freighters and their paths didn’t cross more than a handful of times a year,
she was sixty years older than him and a different species entirely.
He was attracted to 28 year old slender
brunette and not her natural Mercurial form of liquid silver glass.
But regardless of her misgivings she still
found herself thinking
“I hope we can get there in time”
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