EndWorld

Chapter 3: "Let's Get You Out of That Thing"

Derek stared at the speaker, he couldn't believe his ears. Was that a human voice?

He wet his lips and asked, "Who are you?"

The voice responded steadily, “I cannot tell you until you answer the question.”

He looked out the cockpit window at the shuttle’s broken wing and realized he didn’t have much time to play games, “I am the escaped human, my name is Derek Canto.”

He steeled himself for all of this to be a trick for a Veshnu to suddenly reply and for him to be blown up right now.

All his fears were suddenly squashed with a few simple words, “Good, my name is Bretna Vet, let’s get you out of that thing.”

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Jort was sitting at the Warden’s chair looking down the barrel of his blaster, wondering if that might be the swifter end than waiting for the commander to arrive. There was a knock at the door that knocked him out of the waking nightmare he was dreaming. He laid the blaster down on the desk and shouted for the person knocking to come in.

It was one of his lieutenants, “Captain, I found the two guards that were assigned to guard the explosives storage.”

Jort smiled, “Bring them in.”

They were two of his worst and he knew this, but he never expected them to screw up this big. He stood up as they walked in and pulled his knife off of his belt. A serrated piece made from refined Gertinium.

He approached them, “Alright men, let’s begin your debriefing.”

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It took them far longer than Bretna liked to find a suitable planet to tow Derek’s shuttle to. They had to make sure it had a decent atmosphere since both shuttles would be temporarily depressurized. They started by just heading directly out of the Drakkna system first and foremost, then realized they couldn’t jump to another system while towing a craft. They did find that in the system the Drekk had a partially terraformed planet, they tested the atmosphere from orbit and it was okay, not ideal.

They had to make it quick.

They landed Derek’s shuttle first and then as carefully as possible landed the Vehnuan shuttle next to it with their doors facing each other. Then the human who had passed out earlier, who said his name was Grit, got out to go over and assist Derek out of the shuttle. Went pretty smoothly aside from a little stumbling since his cane sucked. They made it to the shuttle and were only a little out of breath from the short jaunt over.

They also took it as an opportunity to rid themselves of "dead" weight and pushed the Drekk and Veshnu out of the shuttle.

All in all a success.

Bretna then flew the shuttle out of orbit and completed the first of 12 jumps to a s*****y-free system.

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Derek quickly made introductions with everyone, there was Grit, Bretna, and Hut. Not a bad bunch he didn’t think. They kept asking him about how he escaped, but he pointed to his leg, “Look I’d love to tell you all, but I am in a lot of pain is there a medical bag on here or something?”

Grit and Hut started scrounging around the shuttle for one while Bretna stayed in the cockpit to make sure the path forward stayed clear.

Eventually, Grit and Hut found a small first aid kit with only vials in it. They kept looking but only found that. They all looked at the vials and realized there was an injector too.

"Maybe it's pain medication?" Derek suggested.

Grit and Hut shrugged and Hut drew some of the liquid out of the vial and into the injector. Hut then stabbed Derek in the thigh with the injector and pushed the plunger down.

Within a few minutes, Derek's leg went completely numb. He poked it a few times and just decided to let it be, at least he could focus now.

Bretna finished up looking at the trajectory map and then walked back to join the rest of the group. She sat down in a seat and looked over at Derek, "Alright, you tell your story and we'll tell ours, deal?"

Derek nodded, but first motioned at a barrel, "Is that water?"

They checked its contents and determined it was in fact water, so everyone got a cup or bowl, they just found random objects to drink from, and then sat around to hear Derek speak.

Derek swallowed down half the cup and then began telling his story. The others looked at him with great interest and visibly reacted at parts, especially when he killed the Warden, Derek felt somewhat empowered as he shared his tale even with it having been such a recent event. When he finished, there was a hush in the shuttle. Everyone was absorbing all that they had heard.

Then Grit and Hut looked at Bretna and then at each other. They all had such similar stories that none of them knew who should tell it, finally, Grit began.

Derek, being unable to hear news of the full extent of the different things humans were used for, was entirely unprepared for the story he heard. He visibly grimaced when he heard of the limb removal and the intense pain they went through to have the machine interfaced with their nervous system. He was intrigued by their ability to take out the Drekk and Veshnu. He too then was silent when they finished their tale.

He took a deep breath, "What's our plan then?"

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Jort had just finished cleaning the blood off of his armor when things started shaking. He looked up from his cleaning area and saw a large ship had just entered orbit.

He sighed, "That is not good." He quickly began putting his armor on.

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The Drekk High Admiral Frot was very displeased. Two escapes in such a short time frame, both of which had Drekks involved. It was not a good look. He was here in Drakkna orbit to speak with whoever may be currently in charge and get some questions answered, quickly.

He sent a shuttle down with men to pick up the acting Warden and bring them up to the Bridge. He insisted he not be forced to wait long.

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Bretna realized that they have a problem. They don't have enough fuel to make it from where they currently are to a free system, they'd have to stop and buy some, in a Drekk system. The Drekk system was 2 jumps from the free system meaning they need only just enough fuel and could maybe steal it. The biggest issue is just getting on the planet to do so. Then they would have to locate it and bring it to the shuttle. This also presented problems.

She leaned back in the pilot's seat and tried to think of any other options.

One thing was certain to her now though, they were about to begin the most dangerous part of their journey to true freedom.

Staying free.