Close Encounter
06 Aug 2017Evgeniya Asimova
“What the hell are you doing out here?”“Looking for something, girlie.” A deep laugh came through the channel and made Evgeniya shake her head with disgust, while her eyes remained fixed on the dashboard and the view through her canopy. Her handsome face was distorted as she wrinkled her nose. “But as with everything out here in the ink, something interesting crop up to distract me.” Again the laugh.
“Let me guess. You were hunting for aliens?”
“Evi, Evi, Evi....” She could imagine him shaking his head as he spoke, his boyish smile, his bloodshot eyes. “It's none of your business, what I be doing out here. But I'm very interested to know what you are up to, Dragonfly.” Dragonfly had been her father's nickname, and by extension it had become one of the names she was known by in some quarters.
“By Achener, you worm-booted space scum, why are you following me?” she replied. She glanced at her radar, and could see that his ship had moved into position behind her, as if he was going to try and interdict her ship and pull her out of her cruise. Interdiction technology was common in this time amongst vagabond pirates such as him. It could be used to wrestle unwary ships into closer proximity so that they could be threatened and looted more easily. In fact, Evgeniya had one herself, although she had not used it for a long time; it was sitting in her workshop in Can Qing.
She began to plot a course, so she could jump on to the next system before he came in range. She had not struggled through 102 jumps in her injured craft to get into a fight now. If her cannons and thrusters had not been damaged, she might not have been so worried. But she felt oppressed and the only thing to do was run. Apart from anything else, she had a fortune banking on her safe return to Can Qing.
The atmosphere of the Pleiades always felt strange to her anyway. All those bright constellations, all that fine blue light. It was beautiful, but there was something supernatural about it. No wonder there was all this mass delusion about aliens amongst pilots who travelled out there. Her father... okay, I know this story is not about her father, but he was a very important part her life, and his influence constantly affected her. Old Afanasy Asimova had been one of the first to make significant discoveries in that region. He made several voyages out there, and a lot of the data he returned with had been used when people began to build settlements in the place. When space stations being there was still a dream, he had charted all those giant white spheres in detail, stirring the next generation to follow in his path. He had told her many inspiring stories about this when she was a child. And some terrifying ones too. They were just space-farers' folk tales, of course. Although it was certainly true that other intelligent races than the human had existed in the galaxy in eons passed, there was no evidence - as far as she was concerned - that any of them were still around. Just folk-stories, delusions, and wishful thinking.
“Khypraze just wants to catch up with his old friend. See how she getting on these days. We seem to be connected by an invisible cord, huh? There is like some crazy string that reach from my heart to yours.”
Khypraze was a smuggler who counted amongst his employers the so-called 'Gold Council' of Can Qing, who were a bunch of rag-tag anarchists. He usually flew around with his crew in a heavily engineered and excessively armoured Anaconda, a large and powerful ship called The Emerald. But here he was in a little one-man fighter. He and his crew were famous for the way they ruthlessly chased after illegal ways to make money; they were equally famed for their superstitious pursuit of any evidence of fabled higher intelligence or alien relics – they wasted most of their profits in such fruitless pursuits. Evgeniya and Khypraze went back a few years. In her earlier career, before she was established in the Empire, she had worked for the Gold Council on some illegal activities (I will not shame her by saying what). She had also been roped in to helping Khypraze search for a 'super-intelligent entity' which was believed to be around 500,000 light-seconds journey from Tejat Posterior B in the direction of Maia (coincidentally). All they found was an oort field and a burned out comet surrounded by glowing dust – but that is a story for another time. Their relationship had deteriorated after that. No doubt all these bullshit rumours about Tharg activity had brought him out to the Pleiades. No doubt his crew was not far away either.
“How sweet,” she said calmly. He was catching up with her, but she was still far enough ahead of him. She had plenty of time to make her jump. She looked at the crack on her windscreen. “Things are ticking over.”
“I still owe ya one, girlie,” he replied. “A big one. So why don't you pull over, so I can pay back everything I owe you? Hmm? Once and for all?”
“You always were a flirt,” she said after a pause.
He was getting close. But something made her want to listen to him. She was quite excited. Adrenaline was rushing through her. She only needed to press the button to jump.
“I always knew how to pull your strings, huh?” said Khypraze. A warning flashed on Evgeniya's HUD: *Interdiction Detected*. “Gonna clip them dragonfly wings, girlie!” There was a vindictive glee in his voice.
The jump to Maia always seemed like a long one, whichever direction you were travelling from. It took several seconds longer than a comparable jump to a different system. Evgeniya touched her brow as dust whirled around her ship at an incredible pace, flashing and dancing. Boy, she would be glad to be back in a space-station. She started to feel relief as she got closer. But then her ship said something very strange:
“Warning! Hyperspace conduit unstable...”