“Good boy,” I praised the rhino, causing him to wag his tail. “Demo all the walls between here and the stockpile. Crush any Zatrathi you encounter.”

  I turned to the Qualian.

  “Sebastian, get ready. It’s time for us to do some larceny and thievery. Brainiac, grant him pilot access to his armor suit.”

  Surprised by my offer, the thief instantly became excited and jumped to his feet. “Excellent! What are we going to steal?”

  “Anything that’s not bolted down. We’ll start by ransacking the crew cabins. Anyway, it’s not for me to teach you. Kiddo, marines, how’s it looking out there?”

  “They’ve stopped shooting torpedoes at us and the fighters have retreated too. Everything’s quiet, though they’re holding their lines,” reported Marina.

  “Minor local resistance,” replied the assault leader. “Slugs and a couple of warriors. Nothing serious, we are clearing the corridors. The layout in this place is incomprehensible.”

  I could get behind that. Judging by the map Brainiac had sent me, the marines had delved fairly deeply. The corridors were constantly looping, crisscrossing and diverging. The levels kept overlapping and then splitting again. As a result, the marines had to pause and clear out the pockets of resistance they encountered. Leaving enemies behind your back was stupid and dangerous.

  “I cannot gain access to this compartment’s mainframe,” Brainiac suddenly declared. “There seems to be an advanced anti-intrusion system in place. I would need to connect directly to the control circuit. Warning, I am detecting movement at the sector’s perimeter. Five hundred warriors. They are moving along three decks at once.”

  “Roger! Thank you!” answered the assault leader, who incidentally had never introduced himself to me. “How long do we have before they get here?”

  “About five minutes if they follow the corridors. About thirty seconds as the crow flies,” I reckoned.

  “As the crow flies?” the marine asked.

  “Through the walls. If you ask me, it’s faster to demolish them than to go around.”

  “Well, we have a lot of numbskulls here, but no sledgehammers,” the officer replied. “Blasters won’t do it.”

  “Pity. It’s a good idea. If you come across something you can use, try it. You have guests on the way, over and out.” I disconnected. It was time to check out the tunnel the rhino had made and come up with a reasonable explanation for this and other holes. No doubt the grunts will have some questions. No one’s seen the rhino before. Although…I can just order the gunner to blow up the deck and that will be that. No deck, no questions.

  Sebastian jumped out of the ship, approached a wall and began touching it confidently. Out of curiosity, I also approached. In some way known only to him, the thief determined the exact location of the cache and, prying off a barely visible panel with the blade of his knife, tossed it aside. A small safe stood behind the panel. I whistled with admiration. Sebastian unceremoniously yanked the steel box out of the wall, set it on the floor and with a hefty blow, dented one of its edges. The metal cracked, allowing the thief to insert the knife into the slot and enlarge it to a decent size. Squatting down, the Qualian ran his hand inside and pulled out three sparkling crystals.

  “Anything valuable?” asked Sebastian in bewilderment, handing me his find.

  I took the crystals and shrugged. I’d never seen items like that before. Brainiac ran a rapid analysis and determined that they were made of ordinary glass. No inscriptions, no codes or anything like that—just faceted glass crystals. They were at first, and even second glance, no different than cheap plastic trinkets.

  “Let’s move on. Maybe we will find something valuable further on.” I had no idea what to do with this kind of loot, so I tossed it in my inventory. Just in case. Sebastian showed no interest in these ‘treasures’ either. The next room was an exact copy of the previous one, only with less destruction. This time, the thief carefully tapped the walls, found another safe, and added two more crystals to my inventory. I even felt a little bad, considering the possibility that these ‘crystals’ could be the Zatrathi crew’s savings.

  “Brainiac, send two droids to strip the furniture from the Zatrathi ship,” my pirate’s conscience did not allow me to leave empty-handed. Then again, the furniture here looked so odd that I couldn’t even be sure that it was furniture. At first glance, I couldn’t identify the purpose of many things here, so I would just have to hope that the droids didn’t pick up a toilet in the process. Who knows how the slugs handle that business. And I wouldn’t put it past the devs to put a clip together and call it ‘The Heist.’ Either way, it was a risk I was willing to take to avoid passing up something interesting!

  I had just approached the next breach in the wall when the rhino’s satisfied mug popped up in it. Having gotten soused to his nostrils on raq, he had returned to unload the loot and was on his way back. I checked the logs: Twelve slugs had breathed their last breath under my marine’s feet. He didn’t even have to shoot—he just trampled anything without armor as he went.

  “Brainiac, is there anything valuable at all in this spire? Beside the stockpile you found earlier, I mean.”

  “Negative. These are the crew compartments for the maintenance personnel.”

  “Ah, all right. Have you noticed any technical gadgets? Maybe someone took their work home with them?”

  “I have only been able to access the cameras around the spire’s perimeter. I obtained the schematic from the internal network. I have no other means of surveying this vessel’s interior. It is not even known how many living enemies are in this compartment. I am hampered by my lack of knowledge about Zatrathi shipbuilding practices.”

  “Have you been talking to that snake again? Stop moping. Remind me, do we have a holding cell for a hostile prisoner? I want to try and capture a slug. Can you provide him with living conditions so he won’t die right away?”

  “The answer is affirmative. The Zatrathi eating habits are known. Warlock’s microclimate will permit us to sustain one specimen.”

  “Good. Order the marine to take one slug prisoner. Have the droids do the same. They should avoid killing anything unless they have to, and call me immediately if they succeed.”

  “Understood.”

  “How are the repairs going? Is there any estimate about how much longer they will take?”

  “Two hours and thirty minutes,” the snake joined the conversation. “During this time, I can launch the ship and safely send us to the base. It will not be possible to repair it completely.”

  “The hard part will be getting out of here,” I muttered and returned to the adviser. He had remained standing beside the ship. “You wished to examine the Zatrathi ship? We have cleared the defenders from this area.”

  I added this detail on purpose—our assault force had wiped out all of the Zatrathi warriors. The players were currently celebrating like kids (many of them were, after all), collecting the golden tokens they had earned. They were especially happy that they didn’t have to waste time gathering loot from a myriad crates. All a player had to do was open one and he would automatically receive his share of the reward for killing five hundred Zatrathi.

  I couldn’t help wondering whether I could get some too if I hurried over to where they were. Judging by the map, they weren’t that far, so maybe it made sense to go get some tokens. I’ll ask Kiddo what they’re worth at some later point…

  I pulled out my manipulators and lifted a massive construction that resembled a bed into the air. I wanted to make an appearance in front of the marines. Hadn’t they said that they didn’t have anything to knock walls down with?

  Swinging the bed back as far as the room allowed, I slammed it against the wall. The manipulators fell silent as the ‘furniture for slug lewdness’ shattered into pieces. Let’s just say that this wasn’t the saddest possible ending for a bed and we can even rejoice that it didn’t go in vain—a small hole had appeared in the place where I had struck the wall. I couldn’t wriggle through it nor make it larger, but I refused to despair.

  “Engineer, drop everything and make me a good battering ram from some raq. It has to be light enough for the manipulators to pick it up and heavy enough to bust down the walls around here.

  “Why even get your hands dirty, Cap’n? Give me a sec and I’ll make you a ram with its own thrusters. All you have to do is aim it and the devil will do everything on its own.”

  “That a snake! How long will it take?”

  “Ten minutes. It’s not complicated. Let’s see—I assume the demolished area has to be large enough for your armor suit to pass through? Did I understand correctly? We have enough raq and I have some mini-thrusters here. I was just racking my brain for what I could do with them. It’d be a pity to throw them away. Now they’ll come in handy. Just wait bit! It’ll be ready to go in a jiffy.”

  “I don’t understand. Why go through such difficulties?” the adviser stopped beside me watching the snake work. The engineer had set up outside of the ship so there would be less work getting the ram out later. “Why can’t we walk down the corridors?”

  “Because no one keeps their treasures in public passages. And it’ll be faster this way too.” I explained and received a look of approval from one side and a look of disapproval from the other. Sebastian silently agreed me, while the adviser muttered something disparaging about pirates. I forced myself to keep my mouth shut about the Precian’s hypocrisy. When the matter concerned traveling aboard a pirate ship to the Zatrathi, his attitude was quite different.

  The snake did not let me down—ten minutes later a demonic battering ram named ‘Knock Knock’ hovered before us. The short time available for building it had affected the ram’s outward appearance. Crooked, it bobbed in the air, firing its thrusters and waiting to be pointed at some wall. I turned it in the right direction and pressed the control button. Ba-da-boom! My ears rang from the crash. I appraised the new hole in the wall. It was just the right size. I climbed through first and patted the battering ram, which fired its thrusters in anticipation of further action. It’s true what they say about appearances being deceptive.

  “Hang on just a minute.” The engineer slipped busily behind me and circled around her creation, meticulously inspecting the dents. “I suppose I am willing to give you a warranty good for four hundred blows. After that, it’ll need repairs. The engines are welded in there. I won’t be able to extract them later. So use her for all she’s got, Cap’n. No need to be sparing.”

  “Understood, thanks. Get back to the ship repairs. It’s time!” I ordered and stepped back to let the snake go and let Sebastian in. When the thief found the next safe with a glass crystal, he grew despondent. The heist seemed to be boring him.

  “Let’s go that way,” I checked the map and began calculating a route to the marines. They had managed to come very close to where the spire we were in joined the rest of the Zatrathi fortress ship. There wasn’t any chatter on the open channels—the party had switched to a third party voice chat, making it impossible to intercept their communications in-game. Obviously, no one thought of inviting me to that group.

  Over the next seven rooms, I received a small but welcome gift—an enemy slug of my own. An engineer, he had no weapons or shields and had camouflaged himself to blend in with the interior so effectively that if it were not for Sebastian, I would never have seen him. I aimed my manipulators and levitated my captive into the air.

  Closely examining the prisoner, the adviser said, “Are these the terrifying invaders of Galactogon?”

  “Not quite,” I replied. “This is an engineer. There are also warriors and a mysterious black fog among their ranks. Typically, these fellows only deal with repair and maintenance, but they can sometimes help the warriors too. They’re slow but industrious. Back at the orbital station, the warriors used them like sappers to drive me out of cover.”

  “We heard that the Delvians captured a couple of warriors, but they did not have time to share a description or image with us. The aliens attacked the planet where the prisoners were being held and severed the lines of communication. Until now, we have not known what our enemy actually looks like. Thus, today is a landmark day for the Precian Empire: The enemy has finally revealed its face. Tell the Black Sails that I will expect all their battle recordings with Zatrathi warriors aboard this ship. For a reward, of course.”

  I sighed enviously. Gammon was simply rolling in the bacon. His rapport with the Precians will go through the roof and the ten mill I charged him will seem like spare change in retrospect. A real bargain. I should have asked for fifty.

  Thinking such morose thoughts, I returned to the ship, holding the slug in front of me. Brainiac assigned the prisoner a compartment and administered a sedative just in case. We had no way of knowing the effect it would have, but thankfully the devs didn’t come up with any surprises when it came to racial pharmacology. The slug went limp instantly and I loaded him into the cell. He can sleep tight until I find a willing buyer for him.

  “We’re at the entrance to the spire,” the marine officer said over the comms. “The doors are locked from inside the main compartment. We are expected and not welcome. How are things going outside?”

  “There are a lot of fighters circling around the spire, but they are not trying to attack,” Kiddo replied. “Can you knock down the door or demo it?”

  “We’re about to try it. Hang on, I can hear a strange noise from the other side. Captain—it sounds like sawing.”

  “Blast! Guys, they are sawing the spire off! The fighters are there as a screen—so we wouldn’t see anything.” Marina veritably erupted in anger. “Oh those sly Zatrathi bastards! I’m going to let them have it! Hang on a moment!”

  The news made me hurry up. The assault force was trying to blast the doors down with their blasters while Marina concentrated on the fighters in an attempt to interfere with the work of the engineers as much as she could. The comms went silent for a minute in anticipation of the resolution.

  Checking the map again, I aimed the ram at the next wall. As we bashed our way towards the marines, we encountered another slug that I dispatched with a shot from my blaster. A silver token and a piece of raq were my loot. It was time to move on. Sebastian had no reason to hurry. He tarried behind me, exploring the crew’s quarters, pilfering the glass crystals from the safes as he went. As for me, I needed to get to the marines as fast as possible. Although, that’s not true. First of all, I needed to reach the place where the marines had killed the five hundred warriors. The marines had sounded too satisfied collecting their loot.

  Twenty demolished walls brought us to our destination. The crates flickered, waiting for me to open them. Without further delay, I opened the closest crate and my UI went nuts with system notifications. There were so many of them that for a second I thought that Galactogon might not cope and crash. Reflecting whether to contact technical support or not, I scrolled down to the bottom of the log where the totals would be printed:

  New items: Gold token (500)

  New items: Raq (350)

  New items: Powercell (120)

  New items: Armor shard (37)

  New items: C-class Zatrathi combat blaster (5)

  New items: B-class Zatrathi combat blaster (2)

  Was this junk worth all the hype? I’ll try and remember to write to the devs. The functionality for picking up multiple items clearly needed fixing, since it was clearly designed for small quantities. When it came to large volumes, the interface glitched and confused the players.

  The tokens, the raq and the powercells went into my inventory, while the armor and blasters remained where I found them. My current carrying capacity was only one thousand one hundred kilograms, and eighty percent of that was already occupied. There was physically no place to store further weapons and armor and I didn’t need to anyway. These items’ class was shamefully low.

  I moved further down the corridor. The map indicated that there was a right turn a dozen meters ahead. Reaching the location, I ordered:

  “Everyone move away from the wall. Stand by the door to the central compartment. Raise your shields just in case too.”

  The marine officer ordered his men to comply in a slightly ironic voice. I couldn’t care less about the irony as long as he did not ask any questions.

  The ram slammed into the wall, blasting a big old hole in it. I stepped through it, smiling triumphantly and relishing the effect on my audience. Two players had suffered collateral damage despite my warning—in the cramped room there was simply nowhere to go. Somehow I did not consider that, but both were alive and could continue on.

  “I told you to hurry up,” I said and began moving through the squad, getting them to clear the way. The marines stepped back from the sturdy and tightly locked doors. Judging by the burn marks on it they had tried in vain to punch through the doors with blasters and beam cannons. Alas, the blast doors had been well designed. If I tried to demo them directly, my ram would simply break. It seemed more sensible to try to go around through the wall.

 

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