Stealing Light

‘Nice try.’ She smiled sadly. ‘But I don’t think the human race should have the drive at all.’

‘You’re condemning the whole human race to an eternity of despotism!’ Corso bellowed in frustration. ‘We’ll always remain at the mercy of the Shoal.’

She shook her head. ‘No. That’s not so bad if the alternative is extinction.’

Even as they spoke, Dakota could sense the urgency within the derelict’s thoughts. She could almost feel the near-invulnerable flesh of the ship being abraded away by the constant, high-energy assault of plasma rushing away from Nova Arctis’ core. It was as if it were her own skin being burned away.

The Piri Reis’s engines began to blast intermittently, then fell dark and silent as the last of its fuel was gone. Despite the shelter afforded within the derelict’s spines, its hull was begi

Chunks began tearing away from the hull of the Magi ship. Much of the hull coating had already been eroded from the spines, till they had become entirely skeletal in appearance, like slender bony fingers reaching out to grasp the Piri Reis.

Vast plumes of light began to radiate outwards from the derelict, almost indistinguishable from the burning plasma that roared past on all sides.

They waited in silence while Dakota slid rapidly back into her fugue state. But the moment he so much as twitched a muscle towards her, she became suddenly alert again, the tiny weapon aiming towards him.

Corso shrugged and relaxed again. Her eyes subsequently unfocused once more and she went back to wherever it was she went at such times.

And even if he’d been able to gain control of this situation, what then? He himself wasn’t able to communicate with the derelict. And even if he had been, he was pretty damn sure it wasn’t going to go anywhere he wanted it to go. No, Dakota had the upper hand-had always had the upper hand. She had always been the key to this whole operation.

Corso gave himself up to the inevitable. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘at least tell me where we’re going.’

She snapped back out of her fugue instantly and focused on him. ‘I don’t know.’

‘You don’t know? I thought you said you were that thing’s pilot.’

‘We can’t jump this soon without taking some risks. But we don’t have any choice either. If we wait any longer, any minimal protection we have against the nova will be lost, and we’d be dead in an instant. So we jump now, but where we end up… hard to say.’

Corso took a deep breath. ‘Frankly, I’m surprised we even got this far.’

‘I just wanted you to know before-’

He raised a hand. ‘I appreciate it. Really. But after we get there, can you let me off at the next stop?’

She laughed fiercely at that. ‘I don’t want to be enemies,’ she said.

‘Neither do I.’

Dakota felt the Piri Reis rumble beneath her. At the same time, she saw her ship from the outside, smashing hard against one of the white-hot spines, the confining cables whipping about.

The derelict surged forward, crashing against the Piri’s engine block, sending it spi

If they didn’t jump now…

The derelict with the tiny ship cradled in its spines flickered out of existence, and fires unimagined even in hell filled the void where it had been.

When the plasma shockwave reached Dymas, the outer layers of the gas-giant’s atmosphere were stripped away within only hours. The planet was literally smeared across the face of the Nova Arctis system.

As it shrank, the gas-giant’s gravitational grip on its satellites-including Theona-weakened, and these worlds spun away into space, burning and boiling under the lethal assault of the dying star, their rocky cores vaporizing over the following hours.

Vast streamers reached out from where a star had once been. If anyone had been there to witness it, they would have recognized that they were witnessing the birth of a nebula.

It was over.

Dakota crawled through the darkness until she found Corso’s warm body. She put one hand on his chest and felt it rise and fall. Then she let her head fall against his chest and wept.

After another little while, the lights began to flicker back on.

‘Piri?’

‘Dakxxx-’

She tried again, rerouting her ship’s language circuits. They were still ru

But they were alive… and somewhere far, far away from Nova Arctis.

Corso was badly concussed, constantly slipping in and out of consciousness. The medbox had given her some of the necessary medication, but it was still going to be a while before he made a great deal of sense.

‘xxzzz-ota. Dakota.’

‘Piri, good to hear you.’

‘Our stellar maps appear to be out of context with the observed local area,’ the Piri advised.

Dakota patted the console. ‘Yes, Piri, that’s right.’

‘We also appear to be attached-’

‘No more questions, Piri. We’re safe, at least for the moment, and that’s all that matters. I know we’re out of fuel. How are we tor everything else?’

‘There are sufficient supplies for another one hundred hours,’ Piri stated, ‘at normal rates of consumption by one person.’

Not so great then, and now for the important question. Dakota licked her lips, and felt her heart hammering as she asked it.

‘Where are we, Piri? Do you have any matches in your stacks for where we are just now?’

There wasn’t any sign at all of the burgeoning nebula where Nova Arctis had once been, and the last time the derelict they were lassoed to had travelled through this part of the Milky Way had been long enough ago for its own stellar maps to be wildly out of date.

‘I have found a match,’ Piri declared after a few moments.

‘You’re shitting me,’ she mumbled. ‘Where?’