In the Name of Earth

Chapter 22: Lightyears Away from Home

Qui’Mal was still passed out, which meant his body was still radiating heat like a bloody furnace. Ludwig and Alexa were sweating their faces off, stuck in the pod with the sleeping alien, but at least that allowed less energy from life support to be directed to thermostats. Not that life support would do any good for acute dehydration due to sweating. The best Lud could do while tinkering with their emergency broadcast antenna was distract his fellow human with the stories of their adventures post Deven.

“Let me see if I got it…” Alexa wiped her forehead. “Almost everyone we knew in the EDS is dead, Marvin is Chief-Ambassador and has started a kettle-corn smuggling ring, and an alien species wants to exterminate humanity to turn Earth into a luxury resort. That right?”

“Ja,” Lud said while prying open the main cabinet of their communicator unit. “And no, it’s not a heat hallucination.”

“Could’ve fooled me,” Alexa shifted so she could spy through the tiny escape pod viewports. “It’s funny. When I was little my dad would take us sailing. I hated it! Loved the sea, but hated sailing, being stuck on the boat for the whole day…”

“Oh, you poor thing,” Ludwig rolled his eyes. “Bet you’d rather spend your day waiting for your dad in a circus backstage reading math books.”

“I didn’t mean it like that… When we went sailing, I was always bored, so I fantasized about an adventure! A shipwreck! How cool it would be to become a survivor, like in the movies. A castaway! Surviving off fishes and rain until your lifeboat washed ashore on an unmapped island. And now here I am. A castaway in space. Just no fish, rain or unmapped island. Lightyears away from home.”

“If it’s any consolation, I think I just boosted our comms,” Lud offered the woman a microphone. “Want to send out your S.O.S?”

***

Marvin and Jade were crouching side by side behind a rock formation overlooking the northern beach of their mysterious island. The pirate ship, where they expected to find Marvin’s father and all his friends, was parked all the way down the sandy strip. The other ship, with the golden hull that had just flow over the humans’ heads, was landed all the way across the shoreline.

Both vessels were locked on an inanimate staring contest, soon to be resumed once the airlocks to each of them opened for their respective crews.

From the great black battle cruiser, a full troop of dark-armored pirates filed out with their rifles at hand.

From the opposing ship, an entire assembly of Nikal of various colors, most of which carrying shiny blades that went all the way up to their elbows, protruding a good feet past their fists. The only exception were the two pink Nikals leading the group, both of which were unarmed and dressed in only a ceremonial metallic headdress that went all the way down to their backs, lining the brighter strip on their back fur.

“Nikal…” Jade whispered from their hideout. “Lud did suspect a Nikal was behind all this, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, but Qui’Mal was with my father back in Deven. Maybe this is a hostage situation. He is a member of their nobility, one way or another.”

“Well, if that’s the case, I have bad news for our pirate friends,” Jade nodded up.

In the blue skies, partially fogged by the atmosphere, a gigantic warship awaited in orbit. The design was not that different from that of the golden ship on the sand, just infinitely larger and with much heavier weapons.

“The Nikals won’t attack,” Marvin muttered. “Deals are sacred to them. If they came to an agreement, they’ll honor it, and I’m guessing the pirates demanded safe passage off system.”

“Okay, makes sense,” Jade pondered. “The actual question is… Who are the Nikals buying? Their prince boy or our Chief-Ambassador.”

“What?”

“Think about it… If they’re in league with the Globians, if they executed everyone in Gaia Station, they’re probably in on the Deven attack too.”

Marvin hated to admit it, but it did make sense. And now would be the handoff. Exchange the human Chief-Ambassador and his aide, Alexa, to the bad guys. Marvin had to wonder if Qui-Mal had even been captured by the pirates to begin with. The bastards were in league.

Several meter beneath the humans, the two delegations met on the sand. The two Nikals leaders ceremoniously bowed, but the pirates did not move.

“We are ready to fulfill the Pact,” the foremost Nikal announced.

The pirate captain’s response was a series of senseless babblings.

“What is he saying?” Jade asked. “Sounds like a bunch of bullshit to me.”

“Causers communicate a great deal through pheromones. We’re probably too far to… smell… their words,” Marvin shivered at the thought. “Just focus on the Nikal.”

“We promise your safe passage under a Sacred Pact,” the Nikal said. “As long as you fulfill your end of the Pact, no harm will befall you.”

The pirate leader babbled an order to his compatriots just as another pirate left the ship running. The lonesome pirate crossed the distance between the warship and the two groups with long armored strides and, panting, pulled his captain aside. This time not even the verbal portion of their language reached the humans as he whispered something to his commander. However, even if the Nikal couldn’t hear the whispers, they could certainly smell part of them.

Squinting their single eyes, the two unarmed Nikals took a step back and waved their guards ahead. With a leap, the long blades running up the hairy arms chopped the pirates to pieces.

“s**t!” Jade scurried away from the edge. “They’re tying loose ends! I knew it! We need to get out of here now!”

Marvin absolutely agreed with her, but he could not leave. Not yet. As the Nikal warriors stabbed and sliced through the criminals, the dark pirate ship fired up its engines, leaving the ground and raising a curtain of sand on its wake.

Some of the pirates rushed into the sandstorm in an attempt to return to their vessel. Others tried fighting the alien berserkers only to be quickly cut down and a few dashed to the heart of the island, realizing they would not reach their ship in time. Marvin immediately pulled Lud’s infopad from his backpack, the tracking software already running. He scanned the pad for the tracking collar and verified the reading was moving away from the beach.

A quick glance down showed the young pirate they had tricked back in The Tipsy. He was not onboard the ship, and neither was the tracker. If the pirates left, they would be gone forever. Gone with Marvin’s father, Alexa and Lud in their holding cells. He could not allow that.

“We need to get to that ship!” he said, finally pushing away from the rocks.

“What? Are you insane? We’re bailing!” Jade barked, then reached for her comms. “Reel, come in! Reel, do you copy! Marvin, wait!”

He could not wait. The pirate ship was slowly rising from the bridge, but it was still within jumping reach from the edge of the rocky formation they were over. Marvin just had to make a run for it!

“Marvin! Stop!” Jade ditched her laser rifle and took off running after the madman, but Marvin only ran faster.

The pirate ship was already edging to the sea, probably too far to reach in a leap, but Marvin kept running.

“Reel!” Jade screamed again, still in pursuit. “Reel, where are you? Reel, we need to…”

The hail was cut short by a blue laser beam descending from Nikal warship in orbit, aimed directly at the pirate vessel. The result was a blinding explosion over the seas and a shockwave that sent Marvin and Jade flying several meters back.  

With his eyes burning, ears ringing, body aching and head spinning, Marvin pulled himself to a sitting position against a nearby boulder. The world around him was blur, the battle on the beach nothing but a muffled noisy mess. Jade had fallen off the rocks and now laid face down on the sand.

But the most terrifying sight was at sea. The source of the explosion, the pirate flagship, wan now nothing but a wreck of twisted dark metal sinking to the depths of an alien ocean. No one could have survived that explosion. If by a miracle someone had, they would drown.

Be it pirates or prisoners.

They were gone, all of them.

As the ship sunk into the ocean, Marvin sunk to darkness, all senses fading.

The last hope of humanity had just lost all hope.