CHAPTER THREE

  All he could muster was a blank stare. It was a name Soran had heard in passing, whispered in dimly lit halls to elicit a cheap scare. A myth forged in antiquity, its flames fanned for the better part of a century by what remained of the pirate loyalists. Those who sought to keep the embers of their wretched legacy smoldering for a little longer, a tale of hope for the hopeless. Soran wasn't buying it.

  With their pageantry concluded, the men lowered their heads and shuffled away. The Captain excused herself, marching the pirates back to her ship. Foreman Zyre made an abrupt turn to face the crowd.

  "Thanks to the fine work of the Captain and her men, we've managed to avoid a possible tragedy. Let's show some appreciation for their service." He began to applaud, and the crowd needed little motivation to follow suit. The Captain didn't seem to notice, boarding an elevation platform and ascending to her ship. The attack on the Hyacinth was a mere distraction to her, more of an annoyance than a mission. Her manicured fingernails ran through a white mane of unruly hair, revealing a concealed strand of perfect gold, a remnant of a previous life that, by the look on her face, was a past she longed to forget.

  Soran had never precisely seen eye to eye with how the Navy conducted its business. Still, he had unwavering respect for the strength demonstrated by its higher ranks. The Naval Captains he had witnessed passing through the station were impressive enough, clad in immaculate white attire that oozed authority. However, the boy longed for, above all else, to see an Admiral in the flesh. Accounts of their prowess were legendary, especially among his friends growing up. Exactly where reality blurred into fabrication was never established. The more fanciful rumors were that they possessed unnatural abilities. They were touted as invincible warriors, impervious to harm, and imbued with the strength of an entire legion of soldiers. A more grandiose theory was that they had unlocked the secrets of immortality and remained unaffected by the passage of time. These were a few of the claims he had heard while skulking through the Hyacinth late at night. Despite the tales of mythical heroes, joining the Navy never appealed to him as it did to others. Many of his friends saw it as a way to escape the mundane reality of station work, a path to make something of themselves. Yet Soran felt obliged to stay and learn everything he could from Lanic. No one knew ships like him. He knew them all inside and out, from solo pilot vessels to the Citadel class Navy battleships. It wasn't the most glamorous work, but at least it was honest. As the years passed, he realized the same couldn't be said about most occupations in their corner of the galaxy.

  "Everyone down to level nineteen now. Those savages blew holes in the hull and were close to losing atmospherics. Get to it." Foreman Zyre barked before scurrying back to his quarters.

  "That's our song, kid," Lanic said, stepping onto the freight elevator that sat in the central area of the hangar. Soran was still curious. Why the pirates had chosen to attack the Hyacinth was beyond him. This station was almost exclusively a rest stop between the Lunar colonies and Valaterra. So far as he knew, she contained nothing of any real value. That withstanding, the pirate's theatrics had gotten under his skin. He figured Lanic was hiding something, but now wasn't the time to delve deeper.

  He was shaken from his thoughts by a tug on his overalls as Lanic exited the elevator. The two of them were taking a quick detour before heading down to do their work.

  Squeezing through a maze of tight alleys and past heaps of piled scrap, Soran detected a hint of a familiar, unpleasant fragrance drifting through the air.

  "Snaggleroot," he sighed, knowing exactly where they were going. They turned the corner at what, from a distance, appeared to be a dead-end and emerged in the busiest sector of the entire station, the Umbra Market. Hundreds of stalls traded in everything one could imagine. Delicious cuisines, illegal weaponry, and some of the most peculiar creatures found anywhere in the galaxy. Soran rarely came down to this zone as the noise level teetered on deafening. The market appeared almost unaffected by the recent events. If a disturbance had been felt, it had already become a distant memory.

  The Hyacinth was located in the Tantalos cluster. Floating amongst its stars were most of the galaxy's remaining habitable planets. It was, therefore, always bustling with passers-by, looking to unload their wares and make a quick slate or two off unsuspecting punters. Lanic pulled Soran through the crowds to a less hectic side alley. They passed under a set of thick curtains that were imbued with the stench of smoke and liquor. The pair sat down, and Lanic swiftly flagged down a stout old man.

  "Must be peckish after our little ordeal, right kid?" Lanic asked with a relieved tone. Although the fear had faded from his eyes, Soran could tell the experience had shaken him.

  Their food arrived, and this time, it appeared to be edible. A more important feature was that their dishes were no longer breathing. They tucked into the aromatic roasted meat without hesitation. Relaxing like this was a luxury, and they would savor every sweet second out from under the boot of the Foreman.

  After scraping their plates clean of the last morsels of meat, Soran plucked up the courage to probe deeper into the evening's events.

  "Are the stories true?" He asked with a hesitant stammer. "Talas, I mean."

  Lanic stopped eating and stared into his bowl. He was unsure how to answer his apprentice's question, desperate to avoid the discussion but unable to invoke a plausible excuse.

  "Sometimes we forget the past for a reason. We bury it deep enough that it can never be found, and we forget," Lanic said, pushing his bowl aside and lighting a cigar.

  "Those pirates haven't forgotten. We could have been killed! You don't need to hide everything from me, Lanic. Preparation is half the task; you taught me that." Soran said, looking to appeal to Lanic's honesty for answers.

  Lanic breathed a deep sigh and turned so the two were face to face. "I don't think anyone knows the full story, just fragments of a tale that's been told a hundred different times and ways. All I can tell you is what I know, and how much of that is true is for you to decide."

  This was the first time in a long time that Lanic had opened up. He told him about the time he worked for the Navy as their Chief Engineer. The most outstanding achievement of his life occurred during that time; the flagship Eureka. She was a Citadel class battleship, faster and more powerful than anything created before and, for that matter, since. He explained that the ship was high-jacked, pried from his grasp by a particularly cunning pirate Lord. Their sole purpose was an all-out attack on Golgotha, the crown of the maximum-security facilities.

  "It's said that in the volcanic chasms of Golgotha dwells the most infamous of all criminals. A villain to many but the only pirate to ever sail under the title of King. Talas, leader of the pirates and the only man that ever came close to dismantling the Navy." Lanic paused and took several puffs of his cigar. His hand shook as he pulled the smoldering stub toward his lips, uncomfortable retelling this tale.

  "Don't go letting your imagination whisk you away, kid. Those pirates were crazy, and who knows what goes on in that hellhole of a prison. Talas or no Talas, it ain't for us to worry about."

  Despite his mentor's objection, Soran was enthralled. What had been a bedtime story to keep him in his room was becoming a reality. He thought mystery and discovery had vanished from the galaxy, a cluster of decaying stars and ruined planets all that remained. Hearing that a secret this big still dwelt amongst the stars had rekindled a fire of adventure inside him, he thought long burnt out. He had to know more.

  "And what happened next? Did they reach the Golgotha? Did they free Talas?" Soran tripped over his flurry of questions without even a passing thought of trying to mask his excitement.

  Lanic sighed again, exhaling a thick smoke plume onto the counter in front of him. "They sent everything at the Eureka, soldiers, scientists, engineers, and even... civilians. Any ship with a functioning weapon was sent on a collision course with the deadliest military warcraft ever constructed. The fighting lasted six long days until, with the combined might of the three Admirals, the Eureka was finally brought down. No loss too great if it meant stopping the pirates from reaching that prison." Lanic's hand brushed his head, moving his wispy hair to one side.

  "The name still has weight and can get you into real trouble in the wrong company. Best not to mention it in public, eh." Lanic extinguished his cigar on the ice in his drink, wondering if he had done him more harm than good in telling the boy those fantastical tales.

  Soran nodded and slurped down the last of his meal before leaving the bar. The pair retraced their steps back through the bustling market streets to the elevator shaft. While they endured an endless wait for its return, the boy peered over the edge into the void below. Visions of the pirate King swam in the emptiness, beckoning him to dive deeper into the mystery.

  Huge pipes descended into the blackness of the shaft, the faint murmur of machinery drifting up from the station's core. The Hyacinth was an older design, commissioned by the Navy almost two hundred years ago. Due to the crew's near-constant maintenance and convenient location, the powers that be had seen fit to keep her operating. The core was powered by Niobium rods, siphoning power from the ceaseless stream of solar energy collected at the rear of the station's host asteroid. The gentle hum they produced had always relaxed Soran. While performing repairs on the lower decks, he had, on more than one occasion, had to shake himself awake due to their soothing melody.

  A series of clicks rose from the depths, signaling the elevator had begun its ascent. Lanic let out a loud yawn. By this point, the pair could have enjoyed a long nap and made it to the platform on time.

  "The joys of working on an old piece of junk," Lanic said, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

  "Careful, she'll hear you." Soran looked around and chuckled at his mentor.

  Without warning, the entire station trembled with a violent rage. Soran managed to grab the railing next to him, narrowly avoiding a fall into the elevator shaft. He looked over at Lanic, who had all four arms in a desperate embrace of a pipe on the shaft ledge.

  "Told you she wouldn't like that. Any ideas?" Soran joked through an expression that showed he was anything but relaxed.

  "A possible malfunction in the lower decks. Could be due to the earlier explosions. Likely a problem with the core or the gravitational stabilizers." Lanic wracked his brain for answers, the least desirable unfortunately the most plausible.

  Another tremor rippled through the station's hull. Bolts and plating rattled with unwelcome intensity. Steam poured from burst pipes and filled the walkways with an acrid mist. The lights dimmed around them, gradually sinking the area into total darkness. Still clinging to the rail, Soran clenched his fists to slow his desperate breathing. He needed to focus, to figure out what was happening. But before he could compose himself, the deafening tone of the alert system began to blare, and a hymn of crisis chanted through the loudspeakers. Foreman Zyre's voice chimed in over the alarm, "The station is under attack from an unknown source. Heavy damage has been sustained on multiple levels. Proceed to the evacuation vessels and abandon the station immediately."

  Soran's eyes darted to Lanic, their faces illuminated only by the crimson emergency lights. Lanic's mouth opened wide with panic, but Soran couldn't make out his words over the thundering alert tones. Lanic pounced away from his fixture, grabbing the boy and bolting through the adjacent hatch. They snaked through the blackened corridors, praying they could make it to the evac-point before it was too late. Lanic oozed fear, and it washed over the boy in uncomfortable waves. Looking around at the mass of fleeing bodies, he wondered if this was the end. Would this be his final day aboard the Hyacinth?