Disclaimer:Okay, okay... I broke the word limit with this one, I admit it! You can probably tell.
Really sorry about that, I swear. I couldn't come up with a way to get it all out without extending it a bit though. Hope you all give it a read and a consideration regardless. Thanks for hosting the contest. This helped me break a stint of writer's block.
Cheers
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Just Like Old Times
=====================It is calming to awake suddenly into one’s own mortality. Hellstrom’s breath slowed. His cold hands relaxed their sweaty grip.
Warp Drive Offline, whispered the familiar robotic drone. Systems collapsed around him. He felt the frigate’s heating unit shudder one last time, and it too, fell into deep silence. A stray shot must have punctured the capacitor during the final, desperate dogfight through the asteroid belt. It was now an iced-over tomb in his cockpit, so cold and so very quiet.
It reminded him of the primordial crypts of the zealot kings that he had once braved as a boy on the Prime. He closed his eyes and listened to the pounding of his heart. So, too, would Duke Hellstrom come to rest in his steel tomb atop a steel throne. It was the one thing left in his control. He sat up straight and proud in his pilot’s chair. What had he to fear now? His last breathes misted before him against the steamed glass. The distant star systems he would never again see twinkled one teary goodbye, and then the menacing shadow blotted them out of his existence. It was all over. For there it was.
That wretched Omen, the cat that had stalked him across the lonely Derelik expanse these past few months, purred leisurely before Hellstrom. It dominated his vision. The triumphant beast wanted to play with its prey, it seemed, and Hellstrom had no choice but to humor it. With a sigh, he released the unresponsive warp drive (he had still been clutching it), and surveyed his spent silos. His kingdom for one last Cruise Missile, thought he. But no, what half-blown panels still shone all glared back at him, frightfully red. The hunt was over. His engine lay dead; his warp drive scrambled; his missiles exhausted. The mouse had been caught.
The grim-looking Omen with its byzantine appearance and personality bankrupt fitting winked at him. Sheathes of nailed plate armor reflected the orange sunlight into his eyes; the packed-in batteries of mammoth laser turrets all grinned toothily, less than a kilometer away, as they charged up their utterly efficient channels of streamlined death.
His cockpit lights flashed once and went dark. The laser batteries that stared at him through the glass began to hum a melodic hymn. Somewhere out of the corner of his eye, Hellstrom noticed his starboard wing give one last whimper and shiver off into space towards the backdrop blue planet, a giant of a world still slumbering beneath its waves. Yes, he would die here; here, in this nameless system, somewhere beyond the pale of the Amarr Empire. This would be his fate, come at last to sing him to sleep. Yes, he would perish here; here in this pathetic, nameless system with its pathetic, nameless planet and its pathetic, nameless civilization who, even as they dreamt their primitive dreams of fire and tinder, could never dream the saga of Duke Hellstrom the Blood Raider and Lord Korazen the Grand Inquisitor as they tread the jeweled stars like pebbles of warm sand sinking through sandaled toes.
The coms channel flared to life. Hellstrom diverted what little power he had left into maintaining the weak signal. His old friend, his bitter enemy, would suffer him a few parting taunts, it seemed. So be it. Duke Hellstrom would never submit without a fight, even if his last breath of missiles had failed him. Empty words would have to do instead. He rubbed his brow, and cast back the shadowed black hood. He had grown to loathe words. The signal crackled to life.
‘You’re a damn good pilot, Hellstrom,’ laughed the capsuleer’s voice on the other end of the coms. ‘You would have been one of the Emperor’s best.’
Hellstrom did not laugh. He harbored a special disdain for pod pilots, and he especially disliked this one. ‘I’m
very proud of you, Korazen. It seems the third time’s a charm.’
‘Unfortunately for you, us eggers are like cats.’ The voice paused. ‘Special cats with infinite lives. It’s the clone technology, you see. Those magnificent Jovian bastards…’
Hellstrom sighed. ‘So Korazen, life as the Ministry’s Grand Inquisitor has not dampened your famous sense of humor. I’d have thought the public executions and trial-by-fire’s would have burnt the soul out of you.’
‘And I’d have thought, old friend, that life as a swarthy pirate would have you floating arse upwards through space in a CreoDron trash compactor by now. Surely you’ve upset some drug magnate with that wicked tongue?’
‘You’re not the only one trying to kill me, friend,’ he snorted. ‘You’re just the closest.’
‘Just like old times,’ noted the voice, a somberness sinking into it. ‘It’s been what… nine years since the Academy?’
‘Ten,’ corrected Hellstrom. ‘If you count the half-a-year prior to my hasty departure.’
A tired sigh. ‘When you shot your way out of the Imperial Hangar Bay? It must have slipped my mind. You never could be a good little boy like the rest of us well-mannered disciples, could you, Hellstrom?’
‘The best tend to have that notorious rebellious streak. That’s what makes them the best,’ he said. ‘And I was the best, Korazen. I was the
best.’
‘Yes, and I was second best. It took three tries, three different Navy ships, three hundred million ISK, but all said and done, I’ve got you here at last. And even if it took three hundred tries, even if it took three thousand tries: no matter how many times you bested me, you cheeky bastard, I knew I’d nab you in the end. Capsuleer technology and all. Magnificent stuff, really. If only you stuck around for final exams…’
Hellstrom bit down his tongue. He felt tired. The shadowed planet and its blue, sparkling oceans struck him out of the corner of his eye. No one would remember him, he knew. Not even these savages. How would they know to look up into the night sky and bear mute witness to his passing? They would dream on, stirring sometime on the morrow to fight their wars of spit and stone, utterly silent to the vast universe of stars spiraling around them. He had been like that once, a wide-eyed boy crossing through the black gates of the Academy, long ago. But now he knew no one would sing of Duke Hellstrom.
‘Open fire already,’ he said. ‘End it. I have made my peace.’
Another faint laugh. ‘So resolute? Well, I hope you’ve given Him a friendlier audience than you have an old friend. Not much of a talker these days, are you?’
Hellstrom gritted his teeth. ‘I know where and when to waste my breath. I do not beg mercy of Ministry slaves. I pray only that the higher lord offers me fair trial.’
‘A fair trial for shoving our teachings in His face and trading friends for Blood Raider scum? As one whom once called you my brother, Hellstrom, I only pray He doesn’t offer you fair trial.’
A long silence settled over the coms. Hellstrom watched as the opposing lasers, all seven of them, climaxed into a soothing orangish glow. Half-charged, they were, yes; but enough to melt him down into dust and ash and burnt sticky salvage for the dusty warehouses on ashen Amarr Prime. From dust to dust, he supposed. Such was life. Nothing more than a flipped toggle, a gasp of breath, and then the flash of light washing over him. He had abandoned the Academy, had fled from the Ministry, ignored all the hypocritical teachings. But they would damn him in the end. He always figured they would. This was the fate of all heretics; this would be his fate, too. Hellstrom cursed himself as the shiver slithered through him. Why could he not at least stare his death in the eye like the unwritten, unsung thousands before him?
‘Any last words?’ resumed the voice of his former classmate, now Grand Inquisitor Korazen. ‘For old time’s sake.’
Hellstrom shook his head, and then remembered himself not on Amarr Prime, in a cluttered dormitory somewhere. How it seemed so familiar. He paused, then added into the coms: ‘I knew that I would meet my fate somewhere among the stars above, my friend. I expect nothing less.’
And indeed, nothing else would be given. Above all else, the Royal Navy did not teach mercy; they obliterated it from all consciousness. Remorse became a sin, friendship a business tool, conformity a crusade. The arm of Amarr stretched far, very far, and an arm stretched beyond its reach must crash down hard on those that tire it. Dogma decreed it; such would be his fate. Hellstrom was an enemy of the state, a state that knew naught of quarter. How much brainwashing had Korazen suffered through the years? Enough to be a Grand Inquisitor. There was his sinister Omen, bearing the gray and gold battleflag of the Royal Navy. It carved through the black twilight of space, a sword aflame. The stars glistened as they swam behind it; they began to blur like fogged glass in the heavens beyond… or maybe that was merely Hellstrom’s clouded eyes. Such a beautiful sight was space, truly. That’s what he’d miss most about it all.
He wiped a tear away. It unmanned him. ‘Overload your batteries,’ he said. ‘If it would please you, my friend, I’d like to go down in flames. Like the heretics of old.’
A tired sigh crackled on through. ‘You’re a damn good pilot, Hellstrom. A damn good pilot.’
Hellstrom said nothing. What could he say? He felt the pulsating stress of Korazen’s arrays as they heated up beyond capacity, even through the thick sheets of rolled tungsten and the thousand-some meters of empty void that gulfed the two. Only a thousand meters, true enough. One kilometer, but it felt half the universe away.
‘I know I’m about to regret this,’ came the far-away voice.
Hellstrom’s eyes were closed.
‘You’re a damn good pilot,’ continued the voice. ‘A damn good pilot.’
Yes, he knew he was. And the best pilots die doing what they love.
‘I’m going to regret this. I know I’m going to regret this. The Ministry of War will have my ass.’
Hellstrom blinked. He was a sworn enemy to the state; a pirate of the Blood Raiders.
‘Well,’ decided the voice, ‘to hell with the Ministry of War.’
Hellstrom blinked again. He began to speak, but Korazen interrupted him.
‘Congratulations, mate; ten years too late, but congratulations all the same.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Hellstrom.
‘We’ll have to throw you a graduation party,’ continued the voice, firm now. ‘Yes, I’m taking you aboard the ship of the Grand Inquisitor… which happens to be my ship.’
A pause. ‘Aiding and abetting a known heretic, Korazen? The Emperor himself would have a fit.’
‘The Emperor has fits over his wardrobe and pleasure slaves, not trivial matters of empire security and human rights. Let me think. How does Navigator Second Class sound?’
‘It sounds made up,’ said Hellstrom, wary as always. ‘Serving the Inquisitor with honor, though? How could I refuse? The cream of the Academy would be jealous.’
‘Serving the Inquisitor, my slow-witted friend?’ laughed Korazen. ‘No, no… I am afraid you won’t be serving the Emperor much. Neither will I, sadly. We’re both traitors now; we’re in this together. I figured I’d have to first beat you down before you’d ever suffer me to tag along.’
‘They’ll dismantle your clones. If you were to die...’
‘I’ve realized, Hellstrom, that sometimes it’s worth putting life on the line for the proper cause. And you’ve made me realize that three times now. Third time’s a charm, indeed.’
The blue oceans sparkled in the corner of his eye. Hellstrom couldn’t help but smile. He was glad the lightless void of his shadowed cockpit concealed it. Someday he knew he would walk that planet. Not now, perhaps, but eventually.
‘Just like old times, Korazen.’
‘Just like old times, Hellstrom. Welcome aboard.’
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