Modius

The Astaroth flew side by side with the Asmodeus, the older ship slightly ahead of the younger, like a mother guiding her daughter through her first steps. That wasn’t entirely accurate, Asmodeus had been operating solo for a while now, and her crew were old salts from the other ships mixed with some talented fresh-faced sailors. But this was the first time the Asmodeus worked in tandem with another ship of the fleet, and it was the eldest Archdevil cruiser to boot. So Astarte reveled in her own personal simile for these two ships.

The business of rescuing slaves wasn’t usually a fruitful endeavor, not unless the slave in particular was worth something to someone. Astarte had only dismantled Gaw’s slaver empire here in Orion so that her own freighters wouldn’t need to worry about raids, she even got a small protection fee from other freighter companies as well. Hellworlder slaves were worth a lot, and freighters made easy prey.

This time though was the exception. She had returned the Torweni sailors as a personal favor to Modius and Bones, but the return of long-gone sailors abducted long before first contact by an alien race resembling the ‘sea spirits’ of old had stirred up a frenzy of furious reporters and news anchors. Demanding their elected officials do something about it. The government of Torwen publicly reached out to the Union, and the Union characteristically responded with indifference. They weren’t a Union planet, so why should they waste their resources on them. The Union was so used to being the only major government in the Milky Way that they didn’t really understand the finer arts of foreign diplomacy. As far as they were concerned Torwen would one day join the Union, it was inevitable, why give away their services to a planet that hadn’t joined yet. It was arrogant, but not entirely wrong. One way or another the Union would do what it could to add Torwen into their grand Union of species.

Thus came the Torweni bounty on every returned citizen, a means of reimbursing the Union for their troubles. But the bureaucratic cogs of the Union moved slowly and was no match for a fleet of opportunistic freelancers ready to jump on the offer. Or at least that’s how it was supposed to look on the surface, in actuality Astarte had a long-standing relationship with Torwen that she didn’t want the public knowing about.

And so the Astaroth and Asmodeus hit station after station, like clearing away the Kruhur like a termite infestation. They made a pretty penny, earned fleet experience, and generated Torweni interest in her weapons manufacturing. She had already secured a very lucrative deal for building advanced monitoring stations on Torwen, and the military had ordered ten interplanetary Javelin missiles from Pandemonium Arms Co and a few hundred Bodkins for defending against hostile ships.

The hunting the voidlings had been good while it lasted, but now the last Kruhur station was in sight of the hyperspace radar, the largest one so far. The attack would need the fire power and marines from both ships, and would likely be their most lucrative attack so far.

“Station is in sight Sir, looks like there are several freighters in system along with warships.” Kat called.

“Looks like they’re trying to pull out of Orion” Karega offered rubbing his chin.

“Indeed, send a message to the Asmodeus, ‘destroy any warships, disable the freighters, then we will send in the marines.’ End message.” Astarte ordered as her whole body began to tense for battle. She had forged herself into a great captain, but a part of her felt useless just sitting in this chair staring at monitors while far more competent crew members went about their jobs. But she couldn’t let anyone know that; her serene and stern voice was what held the bridge crew together, and she wouldn’t really be much help on the ground or in the engine rooms. Still she hated it.

“Thinking about claiming the freighters?” Kar asked conversationally, he had noticed her tension and decided to relieve it with some light conversation.

“Not really, but it will be easier to steel their supplies if we use their own ships though. Plus they’re likely to have slaves packed into those tin cans. We can scrap the ships after we’re done with them, viodling construction is notoriously shoddy.”

“Except their warships, the few wrecks the snipes have searched are built as tightly as the Astaroth.” He countered.

“Yes, but that’s the problem right there, the scrapped remains we searched appeared very well prepared to repel boarders, internally armed to the teeth. These small ship aren’t worth the cost in blood it would take to claim them. Now if there were a few Voidling cruisers or battleships I’d consider it.”

“I’m not sure we could handle cruisers and battleships on our own, not with that station assisting them at least” he commented while resting a hand on his blade, Kimi. A habit both he and Aster shared.

“Indeed, move to condition three” The captain said as the ship moved into past the five-minute mark.

Claxons blared and the steady voice of the bridge talker called “Battle-stations, Battle-stations” as her ship soared into battle.

~~~*~~~

Modius sat in his command chair, fully relaxed, or at least he was on the surface. He had trained for years to join the navy and worked his way through the ranks so that he could use his rank to eventually help his brother become elected Grand Chancellor. Instead he left the navy as a young officer and joined the pirate crew of the Beelzebub, eventually working his way up to the position of Lieutenant-commander until he was offered a smaller ship of his own. A Destroyer named Moloch.

He excelled as a captain and proved to the Hellworlders that he deserved a Archdevil Cruiser of his own. One that had been laid out to Karega’s specifications. Karega had based the external design after a class of ship that was never built, the USS Montana. He offered her to Modius, and he instantly fell in love with her. Her construction was foreign and beautiful to his eyes, and the fact that she was based off a ship that was theoretically more advanced than the Missouri filled him with little satisfaction. He knew that in terms of ability his ship was only slightly better than the seven-year-old Astaroth, but he couldn’t help but feel a little smug about that edge.

Aster had been the one to recruit him into her fleet of pirates, and in many ways he looked up to the woman, he may have even had a little crush on her. But any more than a casual sort of relation was off the table for her, and he respected that. Instead of feeling snubbed he turned his attention to his fierce competitive heart and worked hard to rival her in any way he could.

And now they were moving into combat together, it was his chance to show how well his new ship and young crew preformed.

“Message from the Astaroth sir, she says ‘disable the Freighters, destroy the warships, then send the Marines’” the red skinned black horned bridge talker Aibus called.

“Roger, move to condition three” he ordered.

Claxons blared and he called battle-stations, the tension on the bridge visibly thickened as they watched the clock tick down. They watch the monitor and saw a ship warp out of the region, only moving at a 2.2 kilolights. Likely a freighter.

He frowned, any freighter that left was likely packed with materials and captives, “Send word to Moloch, ‘follow and disable any freighter that flees the scene, then alert the Astaroth” He ordered, when he was given the Asmodeus he promoted his own lieutenant-commander to captain of that ship and used it to extend their operations. Now it followed the two Archdevils into battle as a support ship. Smaller and faster than the cruisers it would handle any Kruhur that fled.

Moloch sped up and rounded the exterior of the stations distortion-well to chase its quarry. Modius sat back and watched as the destroyer rushed forward and came to a sudden stop along with the enemy freighter. He returned his attention to the station they were rapidly approaching and watched the remaining seconds tick down. Until all of a sudden the saucer shaped station came into view, a void dwelling habitat that housed factories, hydroponics, slave pens, and ship building facilities. Many sections of the saucer looked unfinished, with raw expose metal and wires floating through space. Moving a massive object like this would have taken an enormous amount of energy and would only have moved at most a tenth of a kilolight. Instead the Kruhur were trying to evacuate via smaller ships, and if the Hellworlders had been half a day slower they would have escaped into the intergalactic blackness between sectors. They may have already gotten some ships out already.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

He felt a stab of pain in his heart for the people they could never rescue, now lost into the inky black abyss where these creatures dwelled. He did his best to smother the guilt, his job was about saving as many as he could, he didn’t have time to think about the ones he could have saved.

Shields flared to full and pulse cannons fired in full force on the smaller warships, they got lucky and overwhelmed the shields of the first ship they hit and turned it into a floating hunk of molten slag that broke in the middle. Milliseconds after the cannons the two ships launched a barrage of Bodkin missiles at the engines of the enemy freighters, explosions lit up their sensor arrays, and he watched with pain as two shoddily built ships combusted into the void, killing both crew and captive. The Bodkins didn’t have the power to do that kind of damage unless the crappy reactor overloaded, ‘oh well, save as much as you can Modius, then thank the gods for the lives you did help’ he thought, wondering when he had truly begun to refer to himself as Modius instead of his birth name.

Astaroth launched four long range Javelin missiles against the further and larger war ships. Two weathered the blast while the other two had their shields broken and were then ripped apart by the explosion. Astaroth and Asmodeus took stock of the field and began to make an ark to the station’s port side to chase down the remaining ships and hopefully remain out of the stations reach. A few freighters tried to flee the station’s docks, but a few well-placed shots prevented them from leaving by damaging the blast door’s opening mechanism. As they closed in on the five remaining ships the enemy lobbed a volley of a missiles then let loose with their cannons, the cannon fire hitting first in an attempt to break their shields. The shields held and the bright flash of energy faded away as the missiles exploded uselessly against the shields.

Cannons on the station began to swivel around and focused in on the two Hellworlder ships. Asmodeus moved closer to the Astaroth and the shields of both ships linked up into a stronger field. When the next dual volley of missiles and cannon fire hit they bounced off the shields harmlessly. They identified the two ships who had weathered the earlier javelins and focused fire on either, the ship that the Astaroth hit weathered the blow again, but the other had a heat sync failure and lost power to their shields. Before they could fix whatever had gone wrong aboard, Bodkin missiles hit the vulnerable cannons and declawed the ship in a flash of fire.

He watched on the viewing monitor as that ship suddenly flared up and lost all power, then gas and ice rushed out through a hull breach as the ship vented atmosphere. Seconds later bodies were thrown out the hull breach. Completely disabled while retaining structural integrity, great. His sensor techs tagged it with a beacon as possible salvage.

As the Archdevils closed in on the remaining four ships the enemy pulled back to gain distance, instead of chasing they turned their cannons on the station. Pulse fire broke the shielding and missiles took out any point defense. Under the safety of their cloaks five dropships snuck past the remaining defenses and latched onto the on the station like gripper bugs, before the shield snapped back into place. He knew that in under ten seconds marines would be storming that station, killing any voidling on sight, charging their way to the command deck where they could then locate and isolate any remaining hostiles and take control of the weapon systems.

Their Marine contingents now in action, the two Archdevils moved out of the stations cannon range and attempted to flank the remaining ships. The enemy, no longer needing to defend the freighters, moved into a tight formation and linked shields. What ensued was a brutal slugging match between the two forces, with the enemy trying to lure them back into the stations cannon range, and the Archdevils cutting them off at every turn. Their cruisers were far more maneuverable than the Kruhur destroyer sized ships, despite out-massing them.

The battle stalled into a stalemate for close to ten minutes until Moloch reentered the field, rather than rejoin the cruisers, Moloch flanked the enemy and enhanced their ability to control the enemies movement. Several minutes later they got a ping from the Marines, station controls were in their hands. Astaroth immediately ordered a change in tactics, and they instead began to drive the enemy toward the station. The enemy, rather than see the trap for what it was, moved gladly towards the station. The enemy lined themselves up for a combined barrage of both ship and station cannon, only to be shot in the back by their own station. The surprise friendly fire hit their unshielded flanks and did near catastrophic damage, whatever chance they might have had afterwards was smothered by a full force barrage from the Hellworlders.

Everything went quiet until a cheer rose from his bridge crew. Modius smiled to himself and let them celebrate a moment longer. “Alright move us back to condition two”

“Yes sir!” they shouted

“Message from the Astaroth sir, ‘good work, we’re calling in the freighters’” Aibus said.

“Understood, please inform the Astaroth that I am laying official claim to that destroyer class ship we sunk.”

“Yes Sir,” he responded before turning back to his instruments. “They say she’s all ours, do you have any names in mind for it?”

He paused, he planned to add this ship into his strike group to expand operations, but it would be a while until she was fully refitted and safe to use. But still, it wouldn’t hurt to name her now. “I’m thinking…Grehur” he said.

His crew smiled at the name. Grehur was the king of the sea devils who tormented his people centuries ago, he was akin to the lesser devils the Terrans named their destroyers after, so it felt fitting.

Medea, Arachne, Atalanta, and Echo warped into the system and moved to take position over a freighter to both clear and claim the ships. Soon they would be clear of Kruhur and strapped tightly onto the metaphorical backs of the Hellworld freighters. They would likely sell them as scrap to his home government. Maybe they could learn something about their systems before they were melted down.

A request for a private communication pinged on his PA, he checked his wrist and saw that it was from Astarte. He excused himself and retreated into the private quarters behind his command chair and entered his room and activated the viewing screen.

“Good work out there Modius” Captain Astarte said by way of greeting. She wore her maroon armor as she always did no matter what the situation was.

“I should say the same, your Marines took control of that station just in time.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, Moloch was the real deciding factor. We might not have tricked the Kruhur into retreating towards the station if Moloch hadn’t been there to harry them. On that note, your new Destroyer, the um…Greyhurr”

“Grehur, he was the legendary evil king of the sea devils. Since it turns out the sea devils are just Kruhur I thought it was fitting.” He explained with a wave of his hand as he realized he just killed demons like the heroes of old. He smiled at the thought ‘now all I need is a proper sword and a damsel to rescue’ he glanced to the Terran blade on his wall, a British officer’s cutlass, an old and traditional raiment of command. Bell had presented it to him when he was promoted to her lieutenant-commander. He felt very proud to hold the weapon, but was pretty sure these were meant for infantry officers, not navy.

“Ah clever, where were you planning to take it?” she asked, breaking him out of his daydream.

“I figured my people would benefit the best from working on a ship like it. I know we aren’t as technologically advanced as you Terrans, but we’ve been sending rockets into space for a while now, we know enough to get by on a small destroyer like this.”

“I meant no offense Modius, you are perfectly correct, your people are more than competent enough to fix her up, but it will take time for you to build the make the tool that make the part for the new machines that you’ll need just to repair simple systems. I thought to offer up my own facilities for the job. We can bring in a full crew of Torweni engineers on one of the freighters and match them with some people who will teach them how to use all my fancy toys and machinery.” She said that last part with a wink.

He thought for a moment, she was right as always. They didn’t have the fine precision equipment needed for warp capable vessels; Asmodeus had to put into Mars for all her little repairs. Something as big as taking apart and then reassembling a space destroyer would be a momentous task, as grand in scale and development as Torwen’s early nuclear programs, and just as deadly. “By facilities, do you mean MDY?”

“Actually no. MDY just finished work on Sol’s first out of system Drive yard, Pandemonium is now the proud home of Temple Drive Yards. It’s got just enough capacity to work on a destroyer like this, and I would like to incorporate as many extraterrestrial engineers as possible. It would be a win-win.” She explained as she pulled up an image of a terrestrial dry dock with massive step pyramids in the background.

“Win-win huh, and how much would you charge me?” he asked dryly, a little glimmer in her eyes told Modius that he had caught her red handed.

But rather than get embarrassed or angry she just smiled. “For a friend like you, half off. Which would be ten time cheaper than if you tried to do this yourself.”

He pondered the idea, it was a good price, and if it was Pandemonium then he would be able to keep the secret of Torwen’s space fleet a little longer. “Deal, we can pick up the engineers after we unload the captives. What are we going to do with the station?”

“Too big for us to use or move unnoticed, we’ll strip it of valuables and then auction its location off to a scrapping company on Femeri. We can split salvage and sale fifty-fifty.”

He nodded “That sounds good, any plans going forward?”

“Nothing yet, we’ll probably split ways after this. I need to make my way back to Femeri for a few appointments.”

“That sounds good. Now on to more personal matters, how’s my sister doing, I heard about her on the news, is she settling into the ‘pirate’ life?” he asked jokingly. He always enjoyed the irony of his position; he had joined the Torweni navy because he used to love pirate movies and wanted to sail the ocean. And when he had joined the navy he spent half his time hunting pirates and the other half deep underwater in submarines. Now he was the first ever commissioned officer of the Torweni navy to be committed to acts of piracy by orders of the Grand Chancellor. And the first to command a spaceship, but that was more awesome than ironic.

A complicated expression crossed Aster’s face “Ah… she’s fine. All settled in and enjoying her work. Highland tells me she’s befriended some of our Marines, and even has a date on Femeri. We’ve been working her pretty hard, but she seems to thrive under those conditions. All in all I’d say she’s fine.” She said, grasping for words.

Her reaction confused Modius, Astarte rarely ever faltered. She always spoke with confidence and passion. “Well that sounds good, would you mind if I came over to visit her?” he hadn’t seen his sister Alwen in years, always too busy with the ship. But he had remained in contact with her via email and phone calls, and when he had heard how badly his other sister had treated her he reached out to Astarte and convinced her to hire Alwen.

Aster grimaced “About that, I can’t let you come aboard. Your sister signed on, but refused to take the mark. She doesn’t know the truth about our operation. As far as she knows we’re all greedy, blood thirsty pirates.”

He blinked in surprise “I’m sorry, she did what?”