October 17th

“Everyone, get to your stations. We have reached the gateway system. Harry, pilot the ship. Gruma, grab your poleaxe and guard the living room. Scarlett, assist Gruma. Malgorth, you’ll be the messenger between the cockpit and the living room. Our communicators have a chance of being hacked, so let’s not take the risk. I’ll help Harry navigate. Got that? Good! We need to get on it,” I quickly announced, making everyone take up their positions. Failure wasn’t an option.

As we exited the hyperlane, Harry and I noticed that we weren’t the first ones there. To our left, we could see a fleet of Tellos Republic ships flying in. It was apparent that they valued quantity over quality. Most of their ships were small, probably only corvettes. To our right, we could see a few Qarri battleships fly in. There were five of them and I knew there had to be more strikecraft hidden on them. As they approached each other, I already started plotting a course for the gateway. It was on the Qarri side, meaning we had to carefully pass the massive ships without being detected.

As I was relaying my plan to Harry, the screen received an incoming signal. Harry accepted it, making the screen display a Qarri representative. Unlike the others, he was very thin with scaly skin that seemed more blue than gray. “Attention interlopers, we have… Harry, is that you?” the representative said as he looked at the cyborg.

“Alive and in the flesh. At least as much as your kind left me with,” he replied as he crossed his arms and stared at him.

“Anyways, we will like it if you immediately surrender to us. There’s no need to fight. Rest assured, you’ll be domestic servants to our Great Leader,” the Qarri said with a vicious smirk. I wanted to vomit at that statement. The gall of these aliens to believe we would willingly become slaves had to be something else.

I was going to talk back to him, but Scarlett barged into the room and walked up to the screen. She flipped him off, shocking all of us since she never cursed nor made obscene gestures before. “Tell your army they can go f*** themselves! I’ll never be a slave to you again!” she screamed as her fur bristled. A snarl formed on her muzzle as she glared at the representative.

“Ah, M734. I must say, you gained weight since you left us,” the representative said before looking at me. “Is he your master?”

This time, I decided to interrupt. “No, she’s not our slave. She’s our friend. Unlike your kind, I firmly believe stealing away someone’s free will and personhood is evil! Utterly reprehensible! It’s one thing to be a tyrant to your own people. It’s another to steal the freedoms of those outside your borders!”

“Insolent humans!” he shouted before looking back at me. “Do you wish to turn into a freak like her?” He pointed at Scarlett.

I shrugged and said, “If that’s the case, so be it. I’d rather lose my human form than lose my humanity.” I didn’t want it to happen, but I knew several worse fates that could happen. Hopefully, we would be able to get out of this without that risk.

“Very well then. Any last words,” he snarled as it was clear he was done trying to convince us.

“On the off chance that you win, my favorite animal is a gray wolf,” I said with a smirk while tapping my rifle. “What’s yours?”

“Don’t worry. When you’re captured, I’ll make sure you and M734 are sold as a group,” the representative growled before turning off the communication.

Scarlett tapped my shoulder and asked, “Are you really okay with that? I don’t want anyone else to be a freak like me. Maybe you should’ve asked to be a cyborg.”

I turned to face her with a smile. A genuine one, not a smirk. “Scarlett, if we’re to get enslaved, I want to make sure you’re not alone. They were going to turn me into some sort of freak, so I figured another canid would give you some company. Granted, I don't intend to let them do that,” I explained. I turned back to the screen and noticed another communication come in. Harry opened it up.

The screen changed to show some strange avian alien on it. It had four eyes, two sets of wings, and tiny talons. The creature flapped its wings constantly, trying to stay in flight. It was tiny, making me think it was evolutionarily similar to a hummingbird. The avian chirped, “Human, you have committed a crime against the people of the Tellos Republic. Explain yourself.”

I leaned back in my chair and said, “Self-defense is no crime. Your killer robot attacked me, so I killed it first.”

“You will answer before the Central Syndicate. Terminate connection.” The connection was ended, leaving us to quickly think of a plan.

While the two fleets were flying towards each other, I could see a few strikecraft of both armies flying towards us. I got up and shouted, “Change of plans! I’ll join Gruma and Scarlett in the living room. Malgorth will help you navigate. Let’s go!” With that, Scarlett and I ran out as the demon-looking alien ran in.

As we reached the living room, the ship turned on its side, tossing all of us against a wall. Laser shots rang out from outside along with exploding missiles. While neither hit the ship, a few hit the shields. I looked at my SAD to display the outside of the ship. It didn’t look good. While ship and shield integrity were high, several enemies’ strikecraft and a corvette were flying towards us. While we had some cover due to Gruma and Scarlett moving couches in front of the hallway door, the swerving of the ship sent items shuffling about each time.

After a few minutes, I heard a sound that could only be described as space warping itself. Sure enough, I watched as five of the avian aliens materialized in front of us. I attempted to shoot them mid-teleport, but it seemed that they were intangible until it was over. Once the teleportation finished, one of my shots actually hit the head of one of the aliens. I crouched behind the cover as I heard a popping sound. Blood splattering against the wall informed me of the alien’s fate.

The aliens fired several laser shots at us. I could hear them scorching the walls and furniture as they hit. I watched as Scarlett jumped up, shot her pistols, and crouched to avoid counterfire. The sound of a body hitting the ground confirmed that she killed another alien. “Three more to go,” she said before jumping up again. This time, I noticed she jumped far higher than humanly possible. Does that term really apply here?

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Her moves were nothing short of spectacular. In the blink of an eye, she fired four shots in quick succession. Like before, it was inhumanly fast. When the enemy shots got close to her, she disappeared in a glow of green light. Immediately afterwards, a glow of green light deposited her on the ground next to me. It was clear to me what happened. It was psionics. She used the psionic jump I used on the junkyard and used other psionic abilities to complement it.

As three more bodies hit the floor, I heard the sound of more teleports. Before we could react, several feet slammed against the ground and several more flapping noises could be heard. My blood ran cold as I felt like it was the end. Scarlett and I activated our armored spacesuits only to hear shots ring out. Not against us, but the opposing walls. I peeked up to notice that we were boarded by both the Qarri and the Tellos Republic’s soldiers.

As the two enemies fought each other, I formulated a plan. It all depended on who won the shootout. Which currently looked to be in the Qarri’s favor. Their large size made it easy for them to simply crush their tiny opponents with their hands, stomping on them to make sure they were dead. Several of the repto-mammals died, but not as much as their opponents. Their rivalry had to run deep considering that they attacked each other before they attacked us.

“Scarlett, let’s shoot those guns out of their hands,” I said as I pulled my rifle out. She nodded back. We jumped to our feet and started firing as the Qarri neared victory. Our shots mostly hit the weapons, destroying them. The few that missed bounced off their armor. It was then that I noticed that there were twenty Qarri left, all wearing some sort of armor. Even without their weapons, they were a considerable threat.

“Quentin, my guns are almost out of charge,” Scarlett explained as she showed their capacity. They’d only be able to fire off two shots each before they were empty.

“Stupid future tech. If we had bullets, we could’ve had several rounds to go,” I replied as I noticed my own gun was out of charge. Seeing this, I handed my pistol to her and said, “Use the charge carefully. You’ll need to hit their weak spots to make the most of it.” I turned to Gruma and ordered, “Show the Qarri what Taraxian Fury is!” She nodded and pulled out her laser poleaxe.

Gruma jumped over the couch barrier and shouted, “Qarri, you shall face the might of a Taraxian! Urrag!” She charged at our enemies, giving Scarlett the opportunity to sneak around. The vulpine shot one of the Qarri in a weak spot, killing them instantly. There were only nineteen Qarri left.

Gruma watched as three aliens converged on her. She smirked as she jumped back and swung her poleaxe. The laser combined with her superhuman strength cut them in half, leaving sixteen aliens to fight.

I jumped over the couches to watch as six aliens tried to attack her at once. Those odds didn’t seem beatable. Luckily, Harry flew the ship in a roll, sending everyone into the ceiling before slamming us onto the floor. The opening gave me an opportunity to slam the butt of my rifle into one of the Qarri’s head. As he recovered, I kept slamming it into his head. Before I could escape, he grabbed my rifle and snapped it in half. I jumped back, allowing the psionic powers to push me further than normal. With the added boost, I avoided a counterattack.

Now there were two Qarri focused on me. They tried to charge me, making me jump behind the barrier again. There wasn’t much time. Two tall and strong aliens were charging me down, ready to rip me to shreds.

Before I could act, Harry and Malgorth entered the living room. The former looked at me and explained, “I parked the ship next to the gateway. I need you to quickly fly us into it once we place the plasma capsule in.” The two of them jumped over the barrier and started engaging the aliens.

I ran to the cockpit, ignoring the blood splattering the walls. I strapped myself in and listened as aliens were mowed down by Harry and slaughtered by Gruma. The two of them were an unstoppable team. It shouldn’t have been a surprise that Scarlett barged into the room and shouted, “Get in gateway!”

She quickly strapped herself as I unparked the ship. Putting as much fuel as I could, I turned the ship around to face the gateway. If someone wondered what an interstellar gateway looked like, it was colossal. Several miles apart, it was large enough for a battleship to fit through. The material it was made out of was perhaps the most durable looking metal I’ve ever seen. It was colored cyan, assumedly to stand in contrast to the surrounding space. The portal within the gateway was bright white. The layout was octagonal with the plasma capsule input at the bottom.

For the wonder that it was, we needed to get going. The portal was already shrinking, threatening to waste our capsule. Without further instruction, I set the afterburners on and shot the spaceship into the gateway. Scarlett and I were slammed into the backs of our chairs as the G-force reached dangerous levels. The ship flew through the portal and to the other side.

“Recalibrating galactic position,” the ship announced as our position on the galactic map jumped. To explain how massive of a jump it was, it would be good to provide an analogy. Imagine the size of a grain of sand compared to the ocean. Now compare that grain of sand to the observable solar system. The first sector of our journey was that grain of sand in the second scenario.

“I think it’s over. Harry and Gruma defeated all the Qarri,” Scarlett said as she unstrapped herself and looked at me.

“Let’s go check,” I replied as I unstrapped myself. We walked to the door, only to be interrupted by a missile strike on the ship. It shook, sending us to the floor. The fall was a little nasty, giving me a bruise. Scarlett held her nose in pain, which wasn’t surprising. Having a snout meant it had a high chance of getting injured before the rest of the body.

We entered the living room to see several corpses on the ground. Several Qarri were torn to shreds by bullets while others were sliced in half. Note to self: never anger those two.

As we surveyed the damage, Harry limped towards us. I could see that his left arm was ripped off along with a serious dent in the robotic half of his head. He was covered in red blood, staining the metal. “We got lucky. If you two didn’t destroy the rifles, we’d be ashes in space,” he said before walking to the medical bay.

“Are the others okay?” I asked as I walked towards him.

“They’re healing up in the med bay. They have some scratch wounds and bruises, but they’ll be fine. Gruma was the best we could’ve asked for. She could take three Qarri on at once.”

“I know,” I said before reentering the cockpit, my vulpine friend following after me.

We sat down in the chairs again, but this time Scarlett was the one to communicate with the ship. “Anymore enemies?”

“No, Miss Campbell. The missile got through, but the ship that shot it didn’t. Now you are several thousands of lightyears away,” the ship explained as it redisplayed the galactic map. Scarlett smiled as she looked at it.

“Chart a course for the Farz system. There’s something there that’s important to me. Then look for some plasma capsule and another gateway,” she ordered as a smile graced her muzzle.

“Plotted. You should be through the gateway on March 1st. After that point, Besmen is less than a month away. Be careful. Once you’re through the gateway, there’ll be no refuel point. Store extra fuel on the ship in order to make it back to Earth,” the ship continued.

My heart was filled with joy as I heard it. The way back home was already charted. In under a year, I’d be back with my family. It was a comforting thought. But there was one problem. I turned to face Scarlett. She still looked like a fox. A beautiful, anthropomorphic one, but still a fox. Her parents would probably reject her if they saw her.

“There’s a surprise I have in store for you when we reach the Farz system. Just wait and see,” she said before winking at me.

Whatever the case, we were ever closer to Earth. There was only one problem that bugged me. It was that we couldn’t fight enemy spacecraft. We were able to dodge attacks and fight off boardings, but those were only because of evasion and luck. It wasn’t something we could count on. We needed to add weapons to this ship and repair my gun. Otherwise, we could forget ever going home.