Remove these ads. Join the Worldbuilders Guild
Fri 22nd Apr 2022 12:01

Saved by ..... Armand

by Khadyr Sabah

Well that wasn't a smart move. Getting into an area with a high level of radiation. I found myself not only contaminated with radiation but the guards also found us and took us back to our cells. First we were allowed to take a shower to clear ourselves of this radiation, but then the locked us up and said that if we were found wandering of again, it would be solitary for us.
 
Shamus and I felt very depressed. We were not even near of finding Armand and we had know idea how to get out of our predicament. Suddenly we heard a noise on the other side of the wall. Like something was trying to get through. The noise was getting louder en louder. Suddenly the wall crumbled and in front of us stood two droids, behind them we heard the voice of Armand. Man was I happy to hear him. We had no time to talk he told us to that he found an escape route. We followed the droids through tunnels not knowing were we where end up. But we trusted Armand. We were not out of danger yet, because we were followed by armed guards. One of the droids started shooting, keeping them at a distance until we arrived at some kind of outpost from a long long time ago.
 
A third droit called Vera took some well aimed shots and made the tunnels cave in. Armand had managed to get his hand on Carl, an Artificial Intelligence. Carl gave Armand all kind of information. At the outpost Armand found a shuttle that could get us out of this place. He even had HEV suits that we could put on. After plugging Carl into the Shuttle terminal, the shuttle came to live, and just in time the shuttle blasted of into space. Morji was getting smaller every second.
 
Armand told us a little bit about what had happened to him, but we didn't have much time. We new that they would follow us, so what now. Carl was communicating with Armand and told him that the next stop would be "the Mothership". Armand seemed to trust Carm, but Shamus and I were scaptical. Could we trust this Carl. Where was Carltaking us.
 
Suddenly we saw a little shimmering light in the distance. As we moved closer saw it was hidden in the Asteroid belt around Xirhaa. When we got closer we indeed saw a rusty spaceship. Carl told us that this was the mothership, a Class III Bhamut ship, PRe-Zenethian, so very old. As we got closer the hangar opened and the shuttle landed inside the ship. It was dark inside. We used our headlights and the lantern so we could see our surroundings. Carl gave us a schematic of the ship and there was ladder and elevator to bring us to the upper level. There was no power so the elevator didn't work. We had to take the ladder. It seemed that the shit was slowly coming to live. More and more lights went on. It was a big ship.
 
We decided to go to the bridge, hoping to find the power. In the meantime Carl was asking, or better saying commanding us to connect him to the concole of the ship. Because we were stil suspicious of Carl, we put a firewall between him and the console. We couldn't read the language so we didn't understand anything. Shamus found out some of the controls, but nog what was what exactly. Carl urged us to take away the firewall. The ship could fly but needed some repairs.
 
As we suspected we were followed and a destroyer and it was getting loser by the minute. Carl said that no one of us could fly the ship. Our only hope was to connect him directly to the console. We hesitated, but when the destroyer locked on to the ship with torpedo's we knew we had no other option then to remove the firewall. Immediately CARL took control of the ship and within seconds the ships flew off. Shamus quickly tried to occupy the captains seat, but I kick him of, telling him to get his but into the pilot seat. We moved quickly through the astroids shaking of the destroyer. Out of danger Carl told us the ship would take us to a hidden space station for repairs.
 
While flying through the astroids we had a change to think about everything that had happend. Happy en releaved we were save and together again. Together but nog complete. Jezebel was still at Suhra, and so was our personal stuff. Our next mission was to get this ship repaired and then .........