The crew spent several minutes digesting what they’d just learned. It was a lot to take in. Axchxairx simply waited for someone to speak. Finally, Remi did just that.

“Well. This has been an interesting conversation. I think we’ve all gained quite a bit of knowledge,” he said in a forced bonhomie. “While I’m sure there are still plenty of topics we could cover, I really only have one last question.” He leaned in, their respective postures almost intimate. “... where is it?” he asked the scientist.

“That information would not aid you,” Axchxairx said derisively, “even most members of the Troika do not possess that data. Besides, we would destroy you long before you could approach the system. Since your previous mission, we have increased the size of our pickets to ensure that your kind never gains access.”

“In that case, telling us costs you nothing,” he pointed out.

“It also gains me nothing,” the alien responded. “We have worked far too diligently at keeping you Terrans away from its location for me to assist your efforts.”

Sighing, Remi picked up the wrench. “Do we really need to do this again?”

Axchxairx blanched. “We had an agreement,” he snapped.

“So we did,” the captain acknowledged, “and I kept up my end. We even treated your injuries.” He tapped the heavy wrench against his palm with a meaty smack. “But that deal said nothing about the planet’s coordinates, now did it?”

“This is extortion,” the alien snarled, his mandibles gnashing in anger.

“If you think a little name-calling will stop me, you couldn’t be more wrong,” he said menacingly. “Besides, there isn’t a crime I’m guilty of… and I’m guilty of quite a few… that the Troika hasn’t committed in the name of power a thousand times over.” Glancing down, he said, “I think I’ll start on your legs this time…:”

“Enough!” Axchxairx roared in fear and fury, before rattling off a set of numbers, giving him the system’s ascension and declination. “Now I demand that you release me, as you have sworn.”

Remi glanced over his shoulder. “Xuilan. Does that match up with what we already know?”

Pulling out a tablet, she double-checked the data. “It’s in the same ballpark we got from Tsvetanov’s transponder,” she confirmed. “I think it’s legit.”

“There. I have done what you asked. Now release me!” the scientist commanded.

Setting the wrench down on the table, Remi rose to his feet and began untying him. “I’m a man of my word,” he said, as he helped Axchxairx to his feet. “Can you walk?” he asked.

“Well enough to leave this ship,” the scientist snapped. “I will contact my superiors and have them retrieve me.”

“Fine. You do that,” the captain said affably, escorting the alien away from the galley, aft toward quarters and the cargo area as the crew trailed behind them. “There’s plenty of other questions I wouldn’t mind asking, but I doubt either of us would enjoy it.”

“Of that I’m sure,” the Eleexx insectoid snarled. “You have no concept of just how galling it was to profess friendship with creatures such as you.”

“Oh, I think I have some small inkling,” he smiled, coming to a halt. The alien turned, looking at him with confusion and disdain… only to struggle in his grip as Remi punched the airlock control and threw him inside. Caught by surprise, the scientist stumbled and fell to the deck, staggering back to his feet as the hatch cycled shut.

“What is the meaning of this!” Axchxairx shouted. “I demand you release me at once!”

His smile widened. “My thoughts exactly,” the pirate captain replied, as the airlock’s outer door cycled open. The scientist screamed, his voice ripped from his chest as vacuum sucked the oxygen from his lungs, the escaping atmosphere hurling his body into space. He jerked and twitched frantically for several seconds, until his limbs finally went limp, his body slowly tumbling away as Remi closed the hatch. The crew watched in silence before Mairead finally spoke up.

“Wasted half a tube of good epoxy on him,” she grumbled, before spitting on the deck.

----------------------------------------

“Now that we have that out of the way,” Remi said affably, “it’s time to make plans. I think we have to assume that someone will come looking for him eventually, so I think it’s best if we’re not here when they do.” He paused for a moment, regarding his crew. “Nor do I intend to leave Tyr behind for them to find.” Fixing his attention on his engineer, he asked, “What will it take to reactivate her?”

Mairead tugged on her ear as she considered the question. “Well, since the computer shut everything down, and with nothing major popping up on the diagnostics I’ve run so far, with a little luck we should be able to restart the engines and power back up.”

The captain started to respond when the Tinker held up her hand, cutting him off. “But,” she cautioned, “there are still a thousand things that could be wrong with her. She hasn’t had any maintenance for over a century, for starters, and who knows what hyperspace or subspace or whatever-space did to the old girl. She needs to be thoroughly inspected from top to bottom, and in case you hadn’t noticed… she’s a big damn ship.”

Remi nodded, taking that in. “How long?” he asked her.

“A year?” she estimated. “Maybe?”

“We don’t have a year,” the captain informed her. “Try again.”

Mairead sighed. “Look Cap’n, anything I tell you now is just gonna be a wild-ass guess. I get this is a rush job, but even with all of us working on her, it’ll take as long as it takes.” She shrugged in defeat. “Sorry. Best I can do.”

“I suppose we can’t expect any better news, for now at least,” he conceded. “But we need to put a rush on this, so keep me updated.”

If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” she agreed, albeit reluctantly.

“In the meantime, is there anything else we can do to speed things up while Mairead gets her running again?”

“Well, we could do something about the bodies,” Slavko suggested, wrinkling his nose in obvious distaste.

“Not till the ship warms back up,” Isi cautioned them. “Right now they’re blocks of ice frozen to the deck. Removing them before they thaw means chiseling them off, and I really don’t want to do that. You have any idea what kind of mess that’ll leave behind?”

Remi held up his hands. “Agreed. When she warms back up, then we can start recovery operations. But let’s not forget who and what they were. They deserve our respect, and we are going to give it to them. When the time comes, they get a proper burial.” Considering that for a moment, it forced him to relent somewhat. “Though the services might be a little rushed. And crowded. And we might have to skimp on the details.”

The crew nodded in agreement. “Xuilan, any problems with updating her navigation database?” he asked the pilot.

“Shouldn’t be,” she answered. “I’m assuming she uses the same hardware as Freya. That’s where I got the downloads from initially.”

“Might be some software issues,” Mairead pointed out. “There’s been a few updates over the years. I’ll check into it.”

“Keep me in the loop,” the captain prompted her, before turning to his next victim. “Slavko. Weapons systems. I want them operational ASAP.”

The gunner rolled his eyes. “That’s a big damn job, Cap’n,” he groaned. “She’s sporting torpedo bays, railguns…”

“Hey, anytime you want to swap duties, you just let me know,” Mairead said crossly. “You think you got a lot on your plate?”

“I don’t want to hear excuses, Slavko, I want to see results,” Remi fired back. “Get it done.”

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” he sighed.

“Isi,” he continued, turning to the purser, “I want a full inventory of foodstuffs, spare parts, supplies, you name it. What can we salvage, and what gets tossed. And once that’s done, start transferring what you can over from Gyrfalcon.” They all looked up sharply at that. “As of today, we are officially transferring our flag. Tyr is our home now, so start getting used to it. From here on out, think of Gyr as a runabout and treat it accordingly. Questions?”

“No questions, Cap’n,” Isi responded. “I’m on it.”

“Now, when you have a free moment from all of that,” he smiled thinly, “you are to check in with Mairead and see what she needs done. She’s got the biggest… and not to belabor the point, the most important… job out of all of us, so she gets priority over our spare time… myself included.” Glancing back at the engineer, his tone softened slightly. “I know you already have plenty to do but start thinking about what you can pawn off on the rest of us. It’s the only way this all gets done.”

“I will gladly dump the grunt work on the rest of you,” the Tinker agreed, “but even if we can get all of that done in time, even if everything breaks our way… and since when has that ever happened to a Terran?... none of that addresses the biggest problem we’ve got facing us.”

“Which is?” Remi prompted her.

Mairead just shook her head. “Cap’n, Freya runs with a standard complement of about a thousand. In a pinch, they can get it down to a skeleton crew of a couple hundred if they shut down nonessential systems and evacuate most of their personnel.” She paused for dramatic effect. “Us? We’ve got five. Five people, to operate a battleship.” Fixing her gaze on her captain, she shook her head once more. “Even if I automate everything I can, tie command links into the Bridge and Engineering, there’s no way we can operate her at anything resembling peak efficiency. Fly her, maybe,” she allowed, “but fight her? Forget it. We go up against any halfway competent enemy and they’ll cut us to fucking pieces.”

“I am aware of the difficulty,” the captain growled, “but my orders stand. So stop thinking about ways to wriggle off the hook and start focusing your efforts on actually making it work.” He stared at each of them in turn until they flinched or looked away. “Are we clear?”

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” they mumbled.

“Glad to hear it,” he snapped, already turning his attention to the next order of business… only for Xuilan to derail that particular train of thought.

“At least tell us why,” she pleaded with him. “I get Tyr is something special, and Terra knows we could use her, but why can’t we park her somewhere safe and double back to Freya for a crew? The Admiral would absolutely give us the bodies we need. Doing it this way just seems, well… a little crazy, Cap’n.” She tried smiling to soften the blow, but one look at her commander’s face shattered that fragile hope as Remi rose to his feet.

“Why? Were any of you paying attention just now?” he demanded. “After all this time, we finally have the coordinates to Terra Nova, not to mention an idea of the security forces surrounding it. No one else has that,” he hissed, as they fidgeted beneath his gaze. “But eventually even the Troika is going to figure out that Axchxairx has gone off the grid, and considering what he knew, you can be damn sure they’re wondering if he talked. If we wait, they’ll beef up security, and we’ll never get in.”

“You want to use Tyr to make a run at the Precursor homeworld?” Slavko said in astonishment. “With just the five of us? Cap’n, that’s nuts!”

“Crazy or not, we’re still doing it,” he fired back.

“Can we divert somewhere and bring on more crew?” Mairead petitioned. “There’s bound to be a couple of ships nearby we can make a deal with. At least some more Tinkers,” she pleaded with him.

“If we stumble across another Corsair ship, I’ll consider it,” he answered, “but we are not going out of our way. Your orders are to get the reactor and engines back online, find a quiet corner of the nebula to make repairs, before making our run on Terra Nova. We’ve got one chance at this, and we are going to take it.”

“And what happens if we fail?” Isi asked quietly. “You said it yourself. We’re the only ones who have the coordinates. If the Troika destroys us, what then? We’re right back where we started, without a clue. Getting ourselves killed without figuring out some way to pass that data on is…” He paused, swallowing as he faced off against his captain. “It’s damn near treason, Cap’n.”

His nostrils flared with barely controlled anger, but the purser had raised an excellent point. Losing the planet’s location now would be an enormous setback, one they could ill afford. “How many message drones do we still have aboard Gyr?” he asked.

“Six,” Xuilan answered immediately.

“Reprogram five of them,” he ordered. “Set them for a thirty-day delayed activation, random dispersal pattern. Download everything we got from Axchxairx, including the coordinates.” He glanced back at Isi. “That enough insurance for you?”

“Aye aye, Cap’n,” he readily agreed.

“As for the rest…” his voice trailed off, when an odd expression came over him. “Tyr isn’t just a battleship,” Remi declared, “she’s a symbol. She’s a metaphor of everything we’ve lost as a species, and finding her again after all these years? I don’t think any of you realize just how significant that is, especially now.” Gripping the table, he solemnly proclaimed, “Tyr means hope to our people, the second chance we’ve all been fighting for, ever since we learned about the Precursor homeworld, and this weird connection we have with it. If we can find it, flying this ship?” His eyes seemed to burn with intensity as he stared back at them. “We give the clans, all the clans, something to rally around. This is the best shot we’ve ever had to save our people, and I will not give it up without a fight.”

His crew stared back at him, stunned, but he wasn’t finished yet. “This is it. I can feel it. Finding Tyr is the sign we’ve all been waiting for, whether or not we realized it. So we will get her running again, we will take her to the Precursor homeworld, and we will claim that system for all Terrans.” Taking a deep breath, he fought to calm himself, before delivering the coup de grâce. “Or we’ll damn sure die trying.”

Resuming his seat, he crossed his arms. “That’s how it is people. Anyone who has a problem with that? Get over it.” He jerked his head towards the corridor.

“Now get to work.”