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Chapter 121: Piloting is Difficult
🕑 Added 2023-02-28 17:36:00 +0000 UTC“In the name of the Animal Kingdom, surrender Jack Rust!”
The voice echoed through the starship, commanding authority and arrogance. But who could blame them? There were three immortals hovering before the Trampling Ram. Three!
Inside the starship, everyone swiveled to look at Jack, then at the captain.
“Sons of bitches,” Dordok cursed. “They sent out Hounds to hunt a mere child!”
“Hounds?” Vlossana asked, her eyes forming into wide circles. “Woooow.”
“Hounds, Captain?” Jack risked a question.
“The hunters of the Kingdom. The terror of the constellation.” Captain Dordok gritted his teeth. “But they only wear green veils. They have to show me respect.”
“Captain,” Bomn said in a warning voice, but Dordok raised an orange palm.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “My strength matches theirs, and we done nothing wrong yet. They will not attack.”
Jack watched their exchange with wide eyes. Just a moment ago, he’d revealed the truth to everyone, and he was so glad about it. If he hadn’t, there was no way he could survive this.
However, also a moment ago, the captain had said they wouldn’t commit suicide for him. And contradicting the Animal Kingdom sounded a little too much like suicide.
Thankfully, it seemed the captain had a way out of this.
“We have no idea who that is,” the captain spoke in normal volume, yet his voice crossed the void to reach the Hounds, carrying the full force of a high D-Grade immortal.
“Come out immediately!” the voice responded.
“One moment.”
The captain then turned to everyone inside, speaking quickly. “The glass windows have obscuring properties when in space. They cannot see us. Listen closely. I will go out there and delay them for as long as I can. I will pretend to be angry and stubborn, as people often accuse cyclops of being, and I will also block their spiritual perception. Jack, you grab Brock, take one of the escape shuttles, and run to the planet.”
“But they will see me.”
“No. You will drive the shuttle away from the planet first, in such a direction that the Ram is always between you and them, so they cannot see you. Once far enough, you circle around and approach from a distance. The Amethyst Mountain is where the two continent cross. You can’t miss it.”
Unprompted, Achilles stabbed another syringe into Jack’s thigh. Jack felt the pain recede even further. He was still injured, and he sure as hell couldn’t fight, but he could walk.
His heart was filled with warmth. He had tricked and lied to these people, he had used them, and they were still willing to help him. His gratitude for them was so suffocating that he felt the need to hug them all one by one.
That feeling was immediately overshadowed by guilt. Even if he escaped…
“Focus, boy,” Captain Dordok said with increasing urgency. “We’ll be fine. Even if they catch you, we’ll say we knew nothing. You were Jared and Monk to us. They cannot prove anything if you don’t speak, and galactic law protects us until we’re proven guilty. Even if—”
Glass moaned. The entire starship jolted to the side. Everyone looked towards the Hounds, and they saw that the massive, thick glass walls had been dented by a powerful strike, almost breaking. The entire wall was so fractured they could barely see outside.
The Hounds had attacked the Trampling Ram.
Dordok went silent. As he stared at the fractured glass in disbelief, Jack felt something give way inside the captain. He had fought a battle and almost lost a crew member. Two more had been injured. One had been injured and confessed to lying to them all along.
Throughout all that, the captain had been calm and reasonable. He was the strong person. Even under increasing strain, he had kept a level head and made good decisions one after the other.
But every man’s patience had a limit. And Captain Dordok’s had just been reached.
“They touched my ship,” he muttered, still unable to believe his eyes. “The Trampling Ram… They…”
His wide eye narrowed slowly. His large fists balled. His entire body arched and tensed, his mouth forming into a vicious snarl. He reached out, and the steel greatclub flew to his hand, shaking the air where it passed. He held it in a death-grip.
“HOW DARE YOU!” he roared. He disappeared. In the next moment, he was outside, facing the three Hounds from thirty feet away—barely an inch to an immortal. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he screamed in their faces.
“Show respect to the Hounds,” the middle Hound commanded. These three didn’t have an apparent leader.
“Show respect to my ship!” Dordok retorted. He sounded furious, as if his anger was barely kept at bay. Jack didn’t know how much of that was fake, nor did he have time to ponder. “Thank you for everything,” he said quickly, swiping his gaze around the room. Bomn and Achilles met it, nodding. Vashter looked the other way. Vlossana smiled and waved. Count Plomer glared at him.
Grabbing Brock, Jack quickly ran to the far right door and smashed it open. He had never been here before. He never expected to come alone.
Two small, oblongs shaped waited for him; the escape shuttles, each waiting in front of a sliding door that led directly to space. They were also pretty tiny; he could barely fit in them without ducking, and they were made to host two people. He opened the door of one of them and barged in.
And there came the problem. He had no idea how to drive this thing. He looked around in haste, cataloging everything. The shuttle was only a few square feet in size, its walls reinforced and with one small window on each side. The front was occupied by a control panel, where Jack rushed.
A small helm—similar to the starship’s but without the ram-shaped head—dominated the panel. There was a lever, a big green button, a big red button, as well as an inactive sonar. There were also a dozen other buttons, flicks, switches, displays, and light bulbs, all inactive.
“Fuck my life,” Jack muttered, slapping the green button. “Green means go.”
The shuttle came to life. The control panel lit up like a christmas tree. The light bulbs switched on in random colors, the displays showed graphs and statistics that Jack couldn’t understand, and a low hum came from under his feet.
The top of the helm glowed green. There was an item embedded there; a transparent, veined stone. Jack had no idea what it was. A power source? Was there a similar one in the bridge of the Trampling Ram, just hidden under the helm’s ram-shaped head?
He had no time to care.
Mechanical sounds came from all around as the doors in front of the shuttle opened, revealing a dark, empty nothing. “Okay,” Jack said, “but how do I activate this thing? If you have any ideas, Brock, now is the time.”
He had only been to the bridge for a few moments, and it was mid-battle. He didn’t remember much besides the helm. Thinking up to there, he grabbed the helm and inched it forward. The shuttle tilted downward an inch, but it didn’t budge.
“Goddammit!” he cursed.
Brock made monkey noises, grabbed the lever next to the helm, and gave it a good push. The shuttle bounded forward like a wild horse. Jack flew backward, still holding onto the helm, and the shuttle’s nose turned upward so hard that they began spinning over themselves. Thankfully, Brock had been drawn back too, releasing the lever and stopping the ship.
“SHIT!” Jack shouted. They had only traveled a few feet, still hidden behind the Trampling Ram, and they were spinning in place. There was no inertia in space to stop them.
He pushed through the centrifugal force, reaching the helm and tilting it forward. The shuttle’s rotation decelerated, leaving them facing away from the Trampling Ram. Meanwhile, a terrifying clash reached their ears and shook their shuttle. He knew this feeling. Captain Dordok was fighting. That wasn’t part of the plan.
The captain had said the Hounds would not attack. Something had gone wrong. But no matter what, the greatest help Jack could offer was not getting captured.
“Brock!” he shouted. “Grab the lever. You control speed, I control direction. Ready? Go!”
Brock bounded forth, grabbing the lever and titling it gently. The shuttle barely moved. He tilted it harder, and they shot forward so hard that they almost revealed themselves from behind the Trampling Ram. Thankfully, the starship covered a lot of space.
Jack was struggling with the helm. It wasn’t as simple as pointing it where they wanted to go. The helm controlled the shuttle’s rotation speed, so if he tilted to the right and then let it rest dead-center, they would keep spinning right for eternity. He had to control it very carefully, struggling to cancel out their rotation so they wouldn’t overextend. Moreover, the helm was very, very delicate. Every tiny movement had great effect.
It was like playing a badly-designed video game, and having a second person control the speed wasn’t helping, but it was the best they could do right now. Jack couldn’t spare the concentration to control both things at once. Thank God they were two.
Brock was struggling in his own right. The ship had been designed to achieve great speeds, so keeping it slow enough for Jack to maintain control was nearly impossible. He had to minimally nudge the lever every time, and just the slightest overextension would send them bounding forth like rockets.
“FUCK WHOEVER MADE THIS SHIP!” Jack shouted, glad for once that sound couldn’t travel in space—not his sound, in any case.
They were darting left and right like a drunk fly. Their speed was increasing and decreasing randomly, and they were turning in all directions at once. They barely managed to remain in the shadow of the Trampling Ram. They must have looked ridiculous.
Moreover, Jack’s hands were still seriously injured. The only reason he could operate the helm at all were the two shots of anesthetic Achilles had jutted in his thigh. The regeneration brought by Iron Fiend Body was superb, if the captain’s surprise was anything to go by, but E-Grade bodies were difficult to repair. Even after almost an hour of rest, he was only barely functional.
Very slowly, even moving as haphazardly as they were, they managed to make some distance. The shuttle didn’t have outside lights—Jack had checked before boarding—and the interior was dimly lit, so from this distance, they would seem like a star unless someone paid attention for long enough to notice them moving.
Hopefully, even immortals couldn’t stargaze mid-battle.
“Let’s circle around, Brock!” Jack shouted. “I’m turning right!”
“Bro!” Brock responded. He did his best to maintain their speed constant, but it was a struggle. Jack suspected that the lever was as unwieldy as the helm.
“Why in the world would they make such terrible ships!?” he wondered out loud. He turned bit by bit, not daring to make any large movements lest they find themselves spinning again. Space turned in his eyes until the corner of a blue planet appeared in his vision.
“That’s it!” he shouted in joy.
He couldn’t see the battle from the front window—it was fairly limited in width—but he could still feel the shockwaves. Captain Dordok will be fine, right?
The captain had said he’d play it stubborn. Perhaps a few warning shots, a demonstration of his power, was part of the show. Besides, he’d said it himself. Unless Jack gave them away, nobody could prove that the crew of the Trampling Ram knew anything.
Jack shook the thoughts away. He couldn’t afford distractions with this blasted helm. They had to reach the planet as fast as possible while circling far around the battle. Then, they could—
A knock on the glass drew him out of his thoughts. Jack turned to the side in mounting horror.
Gan Salin was floating right outside the window, wearing a protective helmet. He was holding onto the shuttle and drifting along. He waved cheerfully.
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Author's note:
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Comments
I fell like Gan could be like Ogras from DoTF.
LoBoS!993
I kind of want Gan to join Jacks little crew. Jacks crazy enough, only fitting he gets someone who’s Dao is being crazy.
