Moving quickly down the hallway, which is clear for the time being I find the back stairs. I look in carefully; spotting the guard on station I see that he is alone, so I decide to just walk up to him. This takes him somewhat by surprise. "Long night isn't it?" He doesn't seem to understand me, so I shrug my shoulders and start to go down. He says something , but I ignore him he then reaches out grabbing my left shoulder pulling me! Using that momentum I turn and knife hand him in the throat! He gags and I follow through sweeping his leg from behind with my left leg pushing with my left arm.
He hits the ground hard with the back of his head. He try's to get up, however I stomp on his head and he stops moving. I check him; he's still breathing, but when he gets up he's going to have a hell of a head ache.
I move on till I reach the lower level. There I see another guard, but he turns and open a door and I see the security system. This is what I need to take out to cripple their response time. It has the same same type of locking system that Jahní's thinking room uses, so the only way to unlock it is to get the guards hand on the pad.
How do I distract the guard? The building rocks with an explosion; the guard in the security room comes out and I kick him in the gut, but he takes it and recovers better than I thought he would. He charges and I fade to the right turning using his own movement slamming him into wall head first. He knocks himself unconscious. I drag him to the pad unlocking the door with by placing his hand on the pad; stepping into the room I see the building lay out, that's when I spot the location of the main comms array.
If I can take that out they won't be able to contact anyone that could be a potential threat to us. I drag the guard into the room and I head out to hit my target. It's taking longer than I thought it would because troops are everywhere now, but I now see it in front of me. My comm unit vibrates and I trigger the ear piece. "Go head."
[Hotel six, Mike three whisky ten.]
"Mike three, hotel six Comms array." I watch the guards and these guys are alert, so the tactics I used before won't work. "Mike three in need of a distraction."
[Roger that Hotel six.] I here the wine of an engine from some where. Suddenly the skiff plows through over head firing at the guards; for a second I'm stunned then I come to my senses and I run right over to the array, attaching the C4 jamming in the trigger! I run to the open field behind the barracks. kneeling I watch the skiff peel in my direction, so waving my arms once it comes down right next to me. I jump in and Hal pulls me on board! I punch the trigger and the array goes up in a ball of fire!
We roar off towards the port and the Morning Star and off this ball of dirt. It will take them some time to regroup and reorganize, so they won't be giving chase for now. I look to the front and Jahní is flying this thing and I stick my head in between the seats. Jahní glances in my direction and smiles. Hal has his hand on Lahí's shoulder, she holds on to his hand with her left hand. She has a rifle in her other hand prepared to use it if needed.
I point spotting to the Morning Star. "Hang on!" jahní say as she banks the skiff hard to starboard. With in moments we are literally landing at the foot of the ship. We all jump out of the skiff and get on the lift that takes us right to the hatch of the Morning Star, and Lahí touches the pad opening the ship. We enter and one of the engineers watches, as we quickly get in shutting the hatch.
Lahí speaks to him in their language and they talk back in forth for bit, then she turns around looking at us smiling. "The ship is ready to depart right now."
Jahní sighs. "Then let us do so." Heading to the bridge we take our places. The only reason I think this stunt worked is, they were not expecting us to do anything. Or maybe they let us get away and this is all part of an elaborate deeper plot. Oh hell! I need to stop. "the Moores are release and I feel the ship rise.
That's when we spot another ship off to the port side already airborne, and by all appearances waiting for us. It's not much bigger than the Morning Star and it's painted red. It kind of resemble a giant conch shell. Jahní punches the thrusters hard that we're pushed into our chairs. Our ship responsed really well as we aim for the stars at such speed.
"We are being followed!" Lahí reports. Damn these guys were waiting for us to show up, and now we got to run.
"Hold on!" Jahní practically goes vertical with the Morning Star shooting right out of the planets atmosphere. "We fold in one minute." Jahní gives me the numbers, which I enter into the navigation computer. As soon as the coordinates are confirmed she hit the fold engines on, causing the space in front of us to explode tearing a hole open. We enter through it and wind up on the other side in second, at that tropical world.
I smile recognizing that peaceful place and I relax now that we made it, to our true destination. We close in and we prepare to land on the surface. The alarms suddenly go off! Lahí checks her instruments, her eyes opening wide. "We were followed!" Jahní does a crazy maneuver flipping the ship around facing our pursuers, as Hal preps the weapons for combat. The comm starts to beep. "It's an incoming message from the pirate ship. They're asking for a truce."
Jahní is intently studying the ship and her body stiffens. "Great Creator!"
"What is it!" I ask concerned at her reaction because of this ship.
"I know him. He is Jobahars a pirate, rouge and womanizer to no end." How does she know him? She looks at me. "He wanted to steal me away and pledge to me, but I refused him."
We all just stare at Jahní. "Let me get this straight; he is a pirate who tried to kidnap you then wanted to marry you!"
"He managed to take me thinking of getting a great ransom for me, but Father was faster than he thought." She shakes her head at the memory. "My Father chased him around the ends of the galaxy, until he finally surrendered and returned me unharmed."
Lahí starts to laugh at the memory of it. "You should've seen his face when he saw Father in full armor!" She covers her mouth. "I think he wet himself!" I start to laugh a bit myself just picturing his reaction at meeting the King face to face.
"I can only imagine that he wanted to tear that guy apart." Jahní looks down trying not to laugh herself, but she can't hide the smile spreading across her face. A chirp gets our attention.
Lahí checks the instruments in front of her smiling. "It seems that our esteemed pirate wishes to make contact with us." I glance at Jahní and she sighs unhappily at the prospect of meeting with her kidnaper, from years ago.
"Put him through. lets see what he has to say." Jahní requests. Lahí responds to the hale and she is speaking in Majah-tu, and I have a hard time following it. Though she is quite animated, while speaking with the voice on the other end. She looks at Jahní. "He wants to meet in person. What do you think?"
Jahní sits there considering the possibilities of meeting with him; turning to me. "What would you do Ant?"
I sit back a bit shocked that she needs my opinion. "Well," I'm not sure of what to say here, but I'm a ships Captain as well. "We should meet in a neutral location, so he is unable to gauge our true strength in personnel. If he sees our small crew he might get the idea of trying to take you, Lahi or both."
Lahí nods in agreement. "I think we should even the odds by meeting on the surface getting the security forces involved."
I hold my hand up. "We don't want to make him feel skittish." They all look at me like I'm out of my mind. "Don't get me wrong the security forces will be near by, but I want him to speak freely. Don't you agree?"
Jahní smiles at my suggestion seeing the plan, as a way to let him act or not act. "Yes, lets do that your way, since there are four battle cruisers in orbit. It would make him think twice before doing something stupid." Exactly.
This Jobahars accepts the conditions in which we will meet, and we wait for him at the appointed spot. A small shuttle comes in fast pulling some hard Gs in order to stop, but fortunately it does. Landing rather softly for all it's speed, which is impressive I have to say.
It has a strange shape. like it was put together from a hodgepodge of different ships, to be honest I don't know how it's flying. The hatch on the side opens and down steps on of the most colorfully dressed character I've seen in my life. He's wearing tall blue boots with red and white striped pants, blue shirt with a dark red over coat. He looks just like a pirate. His skin is red with white hair to finish the picture.
Behind him comes out a tall Majah-tu woman. Beautiful as they are, with long silvery hair and pale blue eyes. She wearing a very short grey skirt with a white cut off shirt, and tall black boots. They casually walk up to us and Jobahars exaggeratedly bows to Jahní then to Lahí. He barely acknowledges the Gunny and me. "It has been to long my dear Jahlahin-jahní."
Jahní inclines her head. "Jobahars, welcome." He smiles looking at her belly with a slight frown forming on his face.
"Allow me to introduce Nahaní-Mohatah my pilot." Nahani bows elegantly. She then stares at me without blinking and I start to feel like the star here. She seems to just fixate on me.
Jahní takes notice of this and takes hold of my hand. "This is Captain Antonio Valdez of the United Earth Alliance and my pledged." Nahani blinks turning her gaze to Jahní filled with shock. Jobahars now does take notice of me giving me a curious look mixed with hate and jealously. So, he hoped to find her still single. I look at Jahní and her hair is near the nape of her neck now, and as beautiful as ever.
Jobahars suddenly smiles broadly. "Well, this is wonderful news! How happy I am for you my dear princess!" He bows to me now. "Most excellent to make your acquaintance Captain, and you do not know how fortunate you are for you have pledged to the most beautiful Majah-tu woman that I know!"
"Actually, I do know how lucky I am to have found her in this vast galaxy." He nods looking me up and down sizing me up.
Nahaní steps from behind Jobahars standing right in front of me. "I want you to come with me." I look at her stunned at her boldness.
Jahní practically jumps in front of her! "You dare!" I can feel jahní's anger at this woman. "He is my pledged and you still try to lay a claim that is not yours to have!"
"Oh my the Princess has teeth, though in your present condition you won't be able to fight me." She smirks which make Jahní furious, but Lahí puts a hand on Jahní.
"She cannot fight, however I can and I will if that's what you want." Lahí is shorter, but I know what Lahí is capable of doing. "When do you wish for this to happen?"
Now Nahaní seems to have second thoughts, but pride will always get the better of you when you least expect it. "In one hour we meet here." Nahaní turns walking back to their shuttle.
"I am sorry my dear Princess for this." Jobahars bows and turns walking to the shuttle as well.
Jahní turns facing me and I can see the sadness in her face. "listen baby, she is pretty, but beauty is only skin deep and you hold my heart in your hand." I take her hand that has the pledge ring on. I kiss it and she smiles putting her arms around my neck. "I won't leave you not now not ever."
Lahi is having a meeting of the minds with Hal who's not so thrilled about the whole affair, and I don't blame him about the way he feels. It's not that I doubt that Jahní can fight, but the idea of her fighting just... well lets just say I'm not excited for Lahí ether.