Chapter 13: The Pirate Strike

― Dan Chaon, Await Your Reply

The Cruise Ship ‘Dream Queen’:

Restaurant, The Golden Room

“Hi Yvonne, how are you this morning?”

“I am fine Annie, I had a wonderful time with Donnie after we all left the nightclub. He is a fabulous dancer. I am going to miss this cruise ship so much. I have had such a good time, it is such a pity that we have to get back to Cassiopeia. This has been a great vacation. I don’t know which planet was my favorite, I would be happy to go back and visit all of them.

“I am looking forward to spending some time with my aunt Janet. I’m lucky to be able to stay with her boss. His house is right next to the University. My Aunt is now a general in his Marines. Janet is my favorite aunt,” said Yvonne.

“You are so lucky. Lord Kargo is a real dreamboat and you will be in his house and you can pounce on him. Maybe you will even meet the Emperor, isn’t the Emperor his uncle?” Annie asked.

“My aunt got her claws into him first. She is going to have a child with him. She says that he is a real ladies’ man and is going to have zillions of children with lots of different women. She says that he is fabulously rich, but he is not up himself. She has got leave for a couple of weeks to help me settle in.” Yvonne Malone replied.

The Bridge

Captain we are being hailed by three pirate ships. They are an old frigate design and they demand that we surrender or they will fire on us.

“Lobos, prepare our missiles for rapid fire. The company has instructed us to fight back. Send out a Mayday call we may get lucky. We passed a patrol an hour ago.

“Cornelius, let us get everyone to their rooms. Use the alarm and then broadcast a message that everyone needs to return to their own cabins. Tell them that we will be under attack and this is not a drill like the last one.” Capt. Alex Wessels commanded.

“Mortlake, please ensure that the crew are fully informed of what they are to face and are armed and ready. We had a briefing from the Navy just before we left. The vice admiral said that the pirates are not holding people hostage, they are selling them to the Coven and they believe, we will end up in the hands of the Ghouls. I have a cousin from Beeliar who tells me the Ghouls suck out your lifeblood.

“I suggest that you tell the crew to fight to the death, because if they take us, we die in unpleasant circumstances. We might as well die fighting. Ladies and gentlemen, I wish you the best of luck and I hope we survive this encounter.” Capt. Wessels said. “Prepare for emergency jump, Lobos they are in range, fire missiles!

“They are firing on us. Try and evade, bear starboard, McGregor.”

The lights flickered then went out. The siren died away. After a few moments the lights returned but were much dimmer than previously.

“Sir, they have hit our engines and engineering. Sadly, we are not going anywhere. From what I can see we have disabled only one ship. I think we hit one of the others, but with the power out we only launched three missiles. Capt. the sensors show boarding craft are heading our way and I can see two large tugs in the distance moving towards us,” Lobos said.

“The patrol has replied to our Mayday, they can be here in sixty-five minutes, I fear it will be too late for most of us. With your permission sir I would like to go and help Mortlake, there is not much I can do here.”

“There are three boarding craft in contact with our hull. I am indicating the location information to Mortlake.” Lobos said. “Sir I suggest we get our weapons ready, but I don’t think that our crew will offer much opposition to heavily armed and armored pirate boarders. I am streaming the information as it arises directly to the patrol and I will leave the channel open. The pirates are through the hull in two positions with the third very close. They are now through and our people are engaging them.” Lobos said.

They sadly watched the massacres close to the boarding positions. Minutes later they heard an explosion close to them. They raised their weapons as fragments of the door to the bridge fell around them. Seconds later without either of them firing a shot they lay dying on the floor.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is your new pirate captain. Please remain in your rooms. If you leave your room for any reason you will be shot. If you don’t believe me try it. There will be no second warnings. Your crew sadly are no longer available to help you, they obstructed us and they are no more. You will reach your destination within two hours. At the other end I would suggest that you leave the ship in an orderly and disciplined manner. I will brook no resistance.”

The Cruiser ‘Empress Alana’:

“Captain we are still receiving the signal, we are fifteen minutes away. The Pirates have taken over the ship and they have killed the crew. We heard tugs were approaching. By now they must’ve attached as the signal is slowly accelerating away. The longer the signal remains on the more likely we are to know their precise direction. We heard the pirate say it would take them two hours. We are looking at what is in the two-hour radius. There are no substantial systems we can see two hours from where they are. We may be talking about an asteroid or another ship for a rendezvous. The pilot is attempting to plot an interception point.”

“Well done, carry on, excellent work so far, let’s see if we can catch these scum. Do you know how many people were on board?”

“Captain that class of ship carries eight thousand people of which half are crew. Many of the crew are AIs.

Archduke Jason Kargo’s Home, Laomedeia:

“Hi Janet, what’s the trouble you’re looking distressed?” Jason asked.

“My niece Yvonne was due today. I was really looking forward to her staying with us. Her cruise liner was attacked by pirates. The Navy contacted me to say that they are trying to intercept the Pirates. This all began to evolve an hour and a half ago. Fortunately, there was a patrol nearby. One ship went to the interception point and they are boarding an old frigate that was damaged. The other ships have fanned out to try and intercept the two remaining frigates, the cruise ship and two tugs. The ship left on the communication signal which is broadcasting all conversation on the bridge, not that there is much of it they said. They know the pirates are aiming for a point, two hours from the starting position. There is nothing in that position.” General Janet Malone said with a catch in her voice.

“Are we close enough that our fleet could be of any help?” Jason asked.

“Yes they were ninety minutes away when the pirates hit the cruise ship. I don’t think there’s much more that we could do even though I would like to send everything we could,” Janet said sadly. The Navy added two cruisers and sixteen destroyers to join in with the pursuit. “Jason you need to head off. The dogs are ready to run. If there is any more news, I will let you know.”

“If there is any possible help that we can give them do it without any hesitation, Janet. You can call me at any time.”

Janet looked woebegone. Jason scratched his head.

“I have changed my mind. Let’s be proactive. Every ship counts in a search. I think you should join with the search, it’ll do you a lot more good to be actively involved rather than sitting and worrying here all day. The fleet is available. Our ships are faster than nearly everything else and we have much better sensors. Take every available ship. Just do it!” Jason insisted.

Jason ran with the dogs and Aylot and eventually reached the gym, where he met the group, they did their usual routines and enjoyed breakfast before meeting Beth.

Intelligence meeting room-University of Cassiopeia:

The two groups trooped into the room to find that Beth’s team had been joined by a general who was sitting tapping her fingers on the table.

“This is General Patricia Maxwell, she would like to say a few words,” said Beth sounding unusually formal, while carefully watching the general as she spoke.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I have heard so much about all of you and your excellent work. We have broadened the investigation beyond the Empire to include The Collective, and most recently the Jumo Empire. As a result of your work and with the help of Porquenta all of us had a productive first day. Our surveillance was also initially fruitful and we were able to pick up many infiltrators. Our interrogations of the infiltrators we captured were also productive and led to further arrests. We are, however, dealing with a cunning and very determined enemy who has started thwarting our every move, the databases have been sabotaged and our secondary data inquiries have been stopped. The opposition has been less determined, sophisticated and capable in the Collective, but their intelligence services also have more experience than we do. Intelligence services in the Jumo Empire have also been highly successful. I can say that Etta Panella is a formidable antagonist and I regret to say we are now completely stuck,” said Maxwell.

“The enemy has struck back and has us very much on the back foot. As some of you may know we have had a pirate attack early this morning. They have captured a cruise liner and eight thousand unfortunate souls are likely to become husks in the hands of the Ghouls. There is a great sense of urgency to try and save these people and those of the other most recent pirate attack. Both of these audacious attacks occurred within a few hours of Cassiopeia. We are attempting to track the pirates and the captured ship. We have captured the pirate crew of a frigate the cruise liner struck with missiles. We hope to find information that will lead us to their base of operations. A team of interrogators from the Collective will be in place to assist us within the hour. They are also sending two scout ships with advanced sensors to help in the search.