Reawakening

         The small storage room was cramped, and the faded scent of cleaning products and burnt oil clung stubbornly about the place. The metal walls were bare of any adornments, be they cosmetic or functional. The only exit was a two inch thick door of solid ithidium, a metal that was nearly indestructible. In one corner of the room sat a droid that had malfunctioned several days before. Against the opposite wall lay the still form of a man, about six feet tall and well built, though obviously malnourished. Clasped around his wrists were shackles attached to chains which were bolted to the wall against which he lay. The chains allowed him only enough slack to reach halfway across the room to the droid, and that at the expense of lacerated wrists from the shackles digging into his skin.

         Lying helpless in the storage compartment of a passenger liner, the Noc’Tar’El known as Falan woke from a deep dreamless slumber to find himself still chained to the wall of a storage room. Stretching his sore muscles as best he could, he looked longingly at the droid across the small compartment from him. With but a piece of its wiring, he could pick the archaic lock on the manacles, and effect his escape. It was just as this thought crossed his mind that the entire ship lurched, accompanied by a screeching sound. The room’s occupant recognized the sound.

“Blaster fire, of all the luck,” grumbled Falan."Must be pirates. How the hell am I going to get out of this mess?”

         The ship lurched from another hit, and the droid toppled over, sliding within Falan’s reach. With a shout of joy he fell to tearing the droid apart to get to it's inner workings. With a piece of stripped wire, he quickly picked the locks on his manacles. Digging into the droid components, he found a power cell with a three-quarter charge, the droid’s welding laser rod, and several parts he could use as tools.

         Wielding the welding laser adeptly, he soon had a panel off the wall by the door, revealing the electronic locks circuitry and wiring. Studying the layout of the wires inside the wall, Falan found the leads to the locking mechanism, and pulled the primary power wire. As it was designed to do in case of emergency, the door slid open and Falan stepped into the hallway, ready to use the welding laser as a weapon if need be.

         Looking up and down the curving corridor, he saw no one. It looked as if one of those blasts had hit right here. The walls were scorched and blackened, and at his feet lay the charred body of one of the ship’s soldiers, but there was no hole to show where the blast had entered the ship. Falan puzzled over this as he briefly searched the soldier. Most of the equipment on his belt had been melted together, but his blaster, which had been in his hand for some reason and dropped at the moment of death, lay some three meters down the corridor, where it had slid against the bulkhead. Upon closer examination, Falan descovered the remains of an improvised explosive device.So, it wasn't a laser blast that killed this guy after all,Falan thought to himself. It was sabotage.

         Checking the charge in the blaster, Falan found it at full capacity and began stealing quietly down the corridor. He had a vague idea of the layout of the ship from his time as a passenger, before his identity had been discovered, and thought he was headed toward the rear of the ship, where the reserve escape pods were located, as well as one emergency vessel that had hyperdrive and supplies on board. The pods were a last resort; he was after that ship.

         As he moved down the corridor, he came to a door that looked like it might open onto an equipment compartment. Keying the door pad open, he raised his blaster as the doors swished apart, sliding into the walls. He quickly scanned the room, finding no enemies, but several crates of supplies, and a few equipment lockers.

         Among the crates, he found fresh clothes, and opening several emergency water packs, he filled a small bucket and began to clean himself; he had been more than three weeks locked in that cell with only enough water to survive on.

         His race, the Noc’Tar’Elwere so very like humans in form and anatomy as to be almost indistinguishable, except for a few cosmetic features. The Noc’Tar’El were a tall, statuesque race, with clean, strong limbs and a lithe grace about them. Falan’s hair was shimmering silver, though most of his race had white hair. His ears were slightly pointed, owing to his mother’s royal blood. The deep-set, sharp eyes were a brilliant green, flecked with gold.

         There was a raw, almost feral look about him, as there was about many of his race. He had feared that he was the last of his kind, but if he had been recognized and captured so quickly, that meant there were probably still other Noc’Tar’El out there, fighting to survive. Perhaps he could find them, he thought as he used a scarf to scrub the grime of confinement from his powerfully muscled body. His was a race of natural warriors and athletes. Their bodies seemed naturally formed for physical exertion, and just a little exercise revealed magnificent results. Falan had been able to do little more than a few press-ups while chained in the storage room, though his magnificent physique showed little deterioration, even with the lack of sufficient food or exercise.

         Among his race, those who pursued the arts of warfare were true artists, above and beyond warriors of most other races. They had been looked on with awe and no small amount of fear for generations. They had been the protectors of the people, roaming the starways, seeking out crime and injustice; they had been the Galactic Rangers, and they had watched over the peoples of the galaxy for thousands of years. Many Rangers had lost their lives defending the various planets over the centuries; they had fought in wars and settled disputes, serving as judges.

         And then, seventy-five years ago, one of the Rangers fell from grace, turning to a life of crime as a hired killer and terrorist. An expert saboteur, he destroyed many ships and installations that he visited under pretext of his identity as a Ranger. This had been the worst insult to the other Rangers, one they had truly despised the traitor for.

         Unfortunately, the traitor had been spreading his sedition among the Rangers of other quadrants, and these had all sworn to follow the traitor into battle against their brethren. The traitor convinced them that the only way to truly keep peace in the galaxy was to dominate it and rule it themselves. He said it only seemed right that the ones with the ability to take control do so, and end the suffering brought on by war and trade disputes.

         Many Rangers flocked to his banner, and war was waged across the galaxy, Ranger against Ranger, and many cities, and even a few planets, were laid to waste in the terrific battles fought amongst this awesome warrior race. It was after the traitor had been defeated and executed, and as the surviving Noc’Tar’El were nursing their wounds at home, when the giant fleet of ships had come out of hyperspace and surrounded the planet of De’Fell, the home world of all Noc’Tar’El. They were the ships of thousands of planets, all once protected by the Galactic Rangers, now terrified of the possibility of another future war among the race that had nearly devastated the galaxy.

         It had taken three days for all of the ships to arrive, and most of them couldn’t even enter the planet’s orbit, as the skies were already crowded with as many ships as were safe to be there. The fleet had sat silently above as the Noc’Tar’El had prepared for the worst. The warriors that remained were preparing to launch their own assault against a few of the ships in orbit above their home planet, when the bombardment began.

         Massive laser cannons mounted on the home defense ships of a thousand different worlds began to pelt the surface of the planet. Very few had escaped the wrath of that attack, in a few ships that miraculously made it through the blockade. The entire planet of De’Fell had been laid to waist, nothing left alive anywhere on the surface, though a few survivors did crawl from caves to die on the barren earth.

         Falan had been one of the few to make it off the planet and through the blockade of enemy ships. He had been nursing a broken leg from the last battle of the war, having just enlisted into service at that time. Before, he had been a private body guard, working for high profile politicians and bureaucrats. Though he looked only to be in his late twenties, Falan was actually two-hundred and twenty two years of age; his people often lived to be eight or nine hundred years old, barring accidents and disease, which they were remarkably resistant to.

         After the attack on De’Fell, the Noc’Tar’El scattered throughout the galaxy, though they were always being hunted by various beings; it seemed that some anonymous figure had placed a large bounty on all Noc’Tar’El, dead or alive. The bounty hunters that captured live Noc’Tar’El, instead of dealing with a hologram, was granted a visit aboard this mysterious figure’s space yacht, where they were richly rewarded by a figure they never were allowed to see.

         Falan had picked this information up fifty years ago, at the end of the war, right before he went into exile to stay alive. He had no idea why he had decided to return to civilization. He had been living on an uninhabited, unnamed planet of deserts and grasslands. His ship had crashed there and, unable to fix it, he had stripped it to build a shelter. For almost fifty years he had lived alone on that planet, hunting its strange game and fishing in the purple rivers, though he knew not to eat the things he caught in those rivers. They were some of the strangest organisms he had ever seen, and when he tested them with the small portable lab kit that he had, they had turned up poisonous, as had the purple water. Luckily, all the inland lakes and ponds seemed to have been unpolluted fresh water.

         So life had progressed for fifty years. When a small scouting party landed on the planet, he had approached them, bartering passage off the planet with some rare gems he had found on the edge of the desert. Traveling with the crew of the small ship, he worked alongside them until they reached a metropolitan world known as Shenhaar, where he had boarded the passenger liner. It was aboard this ship that a few retired mercenaries had recognized him for what he was and the ship’s captain had him locked away, planning to turn him in for the bounty that still lay on the head of the entire Noc’Tar’El race.

         Now, as he finished bathing, he donned a set of the clothes he had found in the crates; mostly rugged clothing for the colonists that the passenger liner was freighting to one of the new settlement worlds on the outer rim. The military/survivalist style would suit him well for the time being, and the boots he found to fit him would last for years of use on and off planet. Rummaging through equipment chests, he put together a survival pack with several days’ water and rations, and a few medical supplies, as well as a small hatchet and a vibro-knife. Several hundred feet of a small but very strong fibermesh cord were coiled atop the small pack, along with a hand-held welding laser and several spare energy cells. The improvised welding laser he had scavenged from the droid he left lying on a shelf.

         Spotting a high security storage locker built into one wall, he examined the electronic locking mechanism, and decided to give it a try. Once more using the pieces of the junked droid, he managed to short circuit the lock, and the locker door sprang open. Falan’s heart almost leaped from his chest at first sight of his discovery. Inside this closet-sized storage locker were the weapons the colonists would use for protection and hunting on alien worlds. From this selection he chose two small, light laser pistols, a laser rifle built for hunting with a multi-optics scope mounted on it, a flechette gun built like the old Earth shotguns, and a vibro-saber. The pistols went into his belt, the rifle strapped to the side of his pack, and the saber at his hip. Kneeling for a few moments, he loaded as much flechette rounds and energy magazines for the weapons in the pack as he felt he could safely carry and still be able to move quickly and silently as possible.


         As he finished tying off the last of the ammo, he heard the sound of armored foot falls in the corridor outside, drawing nearer. That they were the enemy went without saying. This was a charter passenger liner; it had no troops or heavy arms and armor aboard. At most the captain and crew had a few stun weapons and maybe some light armored jackets.

         Falan slipped behind a stack of crates beside the door. As he waited, an armored figure walked into the room, looking around. Seeing the opened weapons locker, the figure approached it, and Falan struck. Not wanting to alert others that might be nearby, he drew and struck with the vibro-saber in one motion; the armored trooper’s head fell to the floor, followed by his body. Falan had noticed the neck joint of the armor had been nothing more than fibermesh, which was easily sliced through by any vibro-blade.

         Checking the corridor, he found it empty and began to make his way toward the reserve escape pods. As he rounded the corner, he heard the screams of a woman in terror, and against his better judgment, he ran recklessly into the open door he saw ahead of him. Inside were five armed and armored troops, standing around watching another soldier. This soldier's helmet and lower armor had been removed, the woman who had screamed now visible beneath him as he violated her body. She writhed in agony at every thrust of the savage warrior.

         Death burst upon the watching warriors in the form of the Noc’Tar’El. Before they had a chance to react, two of their number were down, killed with blows from the vibro-saber humming in his hand. The faint humming sound was the tell-tale sign that this weapon, when drawn from the sheath, began to vibrate at an extremely high frequency. This vibration set up an energy field around the blade, allowing it to slice through almost any substance with little or no resistance. One of the soldiers tried to bring his plasma assault rifle to bear, but before he could level the barrel, the humming blade severed the energy canister powering the weapon, and everyone was thrown to the ground by the blast as the unexpended energy cell
exploded. The soldier who had been holding the plasma rifle had been vaporized.

         Lurching to his feet, Falan aimed a mistimed blow at the head of another soldier trying to rise to his feet. As the blow swept harmlessly past the man’s armored head, Falan caught sight of the rapist aiming a heavy laser pistol at him. Dropping and rolling to the left, Falan dodged the blast, which tore through the armor and body of the rising soldier.

         Dropping the humming saber and bringing up the flechette shotgun , Falan fired, sending thirty steel spikes into the face of the rapist, who still had not donned his helmet. Two more shots put sixty spikes into the remaining soldier as he reached for a grenade from his belt.

         Retrieving all the grenades from the soldiers’ bodies, Falan ignored their other weapons. Then he remembered the girl. When he checked her, he found her to be dead, probably from shock. Covering her body with a sheet, he left the chamber and continued aft. The sounds of fighting he had been hearing had begun to fade into the distance as he entered what seemed abandoned territory.

         Turning one last corner in the corridor, he found what he had been looking for. Along the left side of the corridor were lined the reserve escape pods, and to his right, on the inner side of the corridor, stood a door that led into a small flight hangar, just large enough for one small shuttle for emergency repairs and such. But Falan knew that these repair shittles always had hyperspace capabilities, in case of emergencies.

         Shorting the door lock, Falan was dismayed to discover a sabotaged shuttle; it seemed someone on the inside was working with the troops that had invaded the vessel, whoever they were. It appeared that the stabilizers on the shuttle had been blown to bits sometime within the last hour. With no other alternative, Falan turned to the escape pods.

         The soldier came out of nowhere, a large plasma axe swinging in wild arcs around his head. Falan leapt back, drawing his vibro-sabre in mid-air as the large soldier first appeared, and met his foe blade to blade.

         The sabre seemed to sing as it sliced through the air. Though it couldn’t harm the stabilized plasma of the axe blade, it did considerable damage to the soldier’s armor, and he was soon bleeding profusely from a myriad of small gashes that had reached through the armor. As the soldier’s strength began to flag, Falan parried a high blow and spun, his left hand flashing toward the soldier’s midsection, vibro-knife humming fiercely in his fist.

         The soldier felt the edges of his sliced armor scraping against his raw intestines as they tried to slide out of his stomach. Blood poured from the cut in his armor and soaked the front of his armored legs. The greater quantity of his lost blood remained in the armor with him, and just before he sank to his knees, he had the unique experience of feeling his toes squishing in his own blood.

         As the soldier dropped to his knees, Falan beheaded him. Cleaning his blade with a fibermesh cloth, he stepped up to one of the escape pods and keyed the lock, praying that the invaders hadn’t yet gained control of the ship’s systems.

         As the airlock door to the escape pod swished open, he breathed a sigh of relief and stepped inside. The door sealed itself shut behind him, and the capsule door opened, revealing a capsule large enough for eight people, if they were all relatively human sized.

         Stepping in, the door sealed shut behind him, and a hologram of a pretty blonde human girl began giving instructions for use of the pod. As the recording droned on, Falan secured his equipment and weapons, and strapped himself into one of the acceleration couches. When the hologram was finished, an explosive charge blew the capsule away from the ship. Falan was rocked from side to side as the capsule used its maneuvering thrusters to guide itself away from the battle, where the capsule’s simple radar had been overwhelmed by the mass of ships it had been asked to identify.

         As the capsule hurtled away from what seemed to be an intense battle waging all around the passenger ship, Falan hoped that no fighters decided to blow the stray pod out of the sky. Holding his breath until he was out of range of the weapons of the capitol ship that he saw, Falan finally relaxed and began looking toward his destination rather than his origin.

         Now that the large escape capsule had righted itself and was speeding safely through space, Falan removed his safety harness and left the acceleration couch. The escape pod appeared to be one of the new marvels of technology that had cropped up while he was in exile. It was large and spacious, with a high quality waste recycling facility onboard, for use in emergency situations. He found several large storage compartments, packed with enough food and water to last him months, as well as other survival gear like portable lights, thermal blankets, candles, and several flares. Opening another panel, he discovered a small console, with limited controls for the pod’s systems, “In Case Of Long Term Occupancy”, according to a sign on the top of the screen.

         At this console, Falan was able to access the navigational charts and plots, and saw that the ship was heading not toward the nearest inhabited planet, but toward the nearest major nexus of hyperspace routes; a journey of six to eight months, where he would be picked up by the stars knew who. This meant that he was no where near a populated planet.

         Falan didn’t want to go into exile on a forgotten world again, but that was better than being picked up by mercenaries or such, and turned in for the bounty on the heads of his entire race. Using the welding laser, he cut himself an access panel into the wiring of the console, which was connected to the pod’s primary controls.

         It was a lengthy process, trying to figure out which wires controlled what by trial and error. But finally, after nine hours and two meal breaks, he had the wires sorted and bunched. Taking apart a datapad, he scavenged the keyboard from it, and wired the control wires to the keyboard, by means of the console screen. With these rudimentary controls, he was able to reset the navigational coordinates to a planet the charts said were nearby, and habitable, if uninhabited. The planet’s only name was its astrogation nomenclature, PX328-C. This designation sounded very familiar to Falan, as if he had heard of it sometime before, long ago. But things like that happened a lot in a lifetime as long as that of the Noc’Tar’El.

          Travel time was an estimated four hours, so Falan decided to get some rest on the way, and lay down on one of the acceleration couches, attempting to sleep until the alarm told him to strap in for landing.

         When the alarms sounded for approach to the planet, Falan rose and secured himself. Allowing the pod to use its programming to select a suitable landing site, Falan waited for the bump of the landing gear touching ground before he unsnapped the safety harness. Arming himself from his stores, he keyed the hatch at the end of the pod. The door slid open to reveal a grassy savannah sweeping away before him, from the river at the foot of the hill upon which the pod rested. The river was broad and slow moving, and twisted away into the distance.

         Turning around, Falan saw that behind the pod rose the vast green wall of a dense forest, stretching away in both directions for as far as the eye could see. Deciding to save exploration of the forest until he had observed the ways of the planet for a while, Falan turned and walked down the hill to the river. It was sparkling clear, and he saw large, alien fish swimming in small schools within its depths, for, though he could see the bottom clearly, Falan had the impression that the river was much deeper than it appeared.

         Following the river’s course southward, he saw large beasts grazing on the plains off in the distance. As the river bent around the base of another hill, a loud squawking noise drew Falan’s attention upwards, where he spied a large flock of brilliantly colored, reptilian flying creatures.

         Rounding the bend in the river, he came unexpectedly upon the remnants of a crashed ship, half submerged along the banks of the river. It appeared to have been some sort of scout ship, but the erosion of centuries of weather marked its hull, and the cockpit lay beneath a half a ton of earth. Walking around the vessel, Falan spotted a closed hatch about three feet off the ground. Without even trying the lock, he dropped his pack and pulled the welding laser from it. He was thankful that he hadn’t left the pack back in the escape pod.

         As he cut the bolts securing the hatch, the heavy, pitted steel door fell inward with a loud clanging noise as it hit the metal deck of the ship. Peering into the hold he had cut into, he saw that the ship would be nearly impossible to see in, and quickly jogged back to the escape pod to retrieve one of the portable lamps.

         With the rechargeable light in his left hand and a laser pistol clenched in his right, Falan entered the old ship. He doubted anything was alive on board, but he didn’t feel foolish for the caution he was taking. Too many times caution had barely saved his neck.

         Approaching the submerged forward part of the ship, Falan had to cut his way through another hatch, this one leading into what appeared to be the ship’s galley. There was no food left in this ancient kitchen, only the skeletal remains of the cook, who stood impaled to the wall by a snapped support rod. Exiting the galley through an open door, he continued his search of the ancient vessel. Most of the chambers told the same story as the galley; regular ships quarters, littered with the bodies of the crew, who had been struck dead by various ways, most occurring from damage done to the ship by what appeared to be an intense space battle.

         Locating the captain’s cabin, he found the remains of the captain sitting at his desk, the jeweled hilt of a dagger protruding from his breast. Perhaps a mutiny had caused the crash of the ship. Searching the captain’s quarters, Falan found a case of Iroborian wine dating back to the Fyrith War five hundred years ago. If it hadn’t spoiled, it would be worth a fortune, let alone being some of the best wine in the galaxy. The vineyards of Irobor had been destroyed along with the rest of the planet more than two hundred years ago, in a forgotten conflict with a more powerful neighbor.

         Opening the ancient chest at the foot of the captain’s bunk, Falan made a marvelous discovery. Lying in perfect condition atop a rotted blanket was a pair of Fyrith pistols. The rare weapons, made by the Fyrith race for their war against the religious separatists known as the Kra'Vek, were some of the most powerful light energy weapons in the galaxy, with enough power to punch through most types of armor. Picking up the matching pistols, Falan felt the magnificent balance that could only be attained by a true master of the weapon making arts. The energy magazines were dry, but even five hundred years before there had been a galactic standard for energy cells, and Falan knew the ones he had in his pack and pockets would fit the two fine pistols.

         Lifting the remnants of the rotten blanket, Falan made another wonderful discovery, for beneath the decaying remains of the blanket lay a full suit of Fyrith assault armor. Laying the pistols aside, Falan removed the chest piece of the armor from the chest and donned it to check the fit. It seemed to fit him perfectly, and he soon had donned the entire suit of full-environmental body armor.

         With a core of durasteel mesh sandwiched between two plies of ceramic polymer armor plates, radiation shielded and covered with a laser-reflective finish, the armor provided extraordinary protection from most forms of damage. The helmet, which fit as well as the rest of the armor, had a heads-up display that was advanced compared to today’s, much less those of five hundred years ago. The armor also featured an automatic, climate controlled closed environment, protecting the wearer from any toxic fumes or gasses in the air. There was a reserve oxygen supply that would last the average person about twenty minutes, if filterable air is not available.

         Built into the left forearm was a mini-computer which was currently programmed to display all information in To-Vesh, the common trade language of the galaxy. The computer monitored all life signs of the wearer as well as gave the ability to compute all forms of data, and had several plugs on retractable wires that could jack into a variety of different computers built by several different races.

         With the armor on, and the heavy blasters strapped to his hips by means of the gun belt he had found, Falan removed the helmet and continued his brief search; a ship captain that had a suit of Fyrith armour probably had other wonderful finds laying around. Looking beneath the bed, Falan saw an oblong bundle, and drew it out. It was a piece of solar sail cloth, and wrapped up in it was the one item that wouldn’t fit in the chest; a sleek, deadly Fyrith assault rifle.

         The Fyrith had been a warrior race, tens of thousands of years old, and regarded as the finest warriors in the galaxy. Many wars did they fight, for many masters, for the Fyrith were a race of mercenaries. Eventually, however, the Fyrith became feared and hunted, just as would happen to the Noc’Tar’El in later years. Falan had studied the warrior race called the Fyrith when he was younger, and remembered the tales that they were even greater warriors than the Noc’Tar’El.

         Leaving the captain’s cabin, he headed strait for the bridge, intent on seeing if there were any power aboard at all. The bridge was a scene of death; it seemed that everyone on the bridge had been annihilated by some sort of intense heat, as all the skeletons were blackened from fire, though there were no scorch marks on the decks or bulkheads.

         Sitting at a vacant terminal, Falan keyed it up, and was overjoyed when the screen lit up and main power was reported at seven percent. This much power allowed him to access the ship’s logs, though they only told of droning days traveling through hyperspace on the way to some meeting. The captain never said who they were meeting, or what they were meeting about, but Falan got the impression that the captain had been nervous about the whole thing.

         Exiting the logs, Falan swiftly searched the names of the listed files, and out of curiosity, checked a file called Operation Fury. The file was encrypted. Copying this and many other interesting-sounding files to perfectly preserved discs he had found, he packed them and a dozen blank discs into a composite case. Returning to the escape pod, Falan saw that the sun was setting, and named the direction west, in the habit of his people, though on some planets the sun rose in the west and set in the east.

“It’s as good a name as any,” grumbled the weary warrior.

         Entering the pod, he sealed the door behind himself and began to take off
his armor. Placing the armor neatly on one of the eight couches in the pod, Falan then sat down and opened some of the rations and a bottle of the wine. The rations were excellent to his ravenous palate, but the wine was the most magnificent thing he had had in more than fifty years, or so he swore aloud to the silence of the empty planet.

         Finishing his meal and the wine, he opened another bottle and began drinking it as well. As he became more heavily intoxicated throughout the night, he thought of all the other Rangers he had served with in the war and before. The Rangers had been broken after the war, hounded by their conquerors, scattering to the four winds just to stay alive. He had not seen or spoken to another living Noc’Tar’El since the end of the war, when the great hunt began on his people. He had run like the rest of his people; had run to the outer fringes of chartered space and crashed his ship on a planet he had been happy and willing to spend the rest of his days upon. He had been happier on that planet than ever before, but when that scout ship had landed, giving him the chance to leave, he had to leave to see the galaxy after fifty years of change. He had felt drawn back to civilization.

         And now, here he was, trapped on an uninhabited planet again. It seemed his luck was still running in the same direction as usual. He’d get off the planet somehow, he just didn’t have a plan yet. After all, he had just escaped a veritable prison and assured execution. Perhaps it was time to take a small vacation from his tour of the galaxy.

         The next morning brought a fierce rain and thunderstorm, the mighty clashes of thunder echoing in his head like the drums of a great army. The wine he had found had been even more potent than he had thought; he didn’t even remember going to sleep.

         Climbing from the acceleration couch which reclined into a bed, he found that he hadn’t gone to sleep after all. If he still had on his boots and clothes, he must have passed out. Stripping off the sweaty, grimy clothing, he grabbed his rifle and keyed the hatch open. He hadn’t seen any signs of danger the day before, but he didn’t know the planet yet either.

         As the hatch slid open, cool rain slashed into the pod, driven by the wind. Scanning with the thermal setting on the multi-optics scope, Falan saw nothing but some herd animals clustered together off in the distance. Peering around the side of the pod, the wall of forest yielded no clues as to what might lie in its heart, but neither did it give any sign of danger. Leaning the rifle against the wall of the pod near the door, he strapped the pistols around his naked waist and went out into the rain to wash the filth of travel and rough living over the past few weeks completely from his body.

         After a laughing run through the pouring rain, which quenched the pounding headache he had awoken with, he washed away the last remnants of his hangover in the river. Returning to the pod, he keyed open the hatch, and looked in surprise at the primitive figure perched upon one of the acceleration couches. Clothed in loose, roughly tanned lizard hides, covered in dirt and with a long, thick mop of matted hair, Falan was amazed to realize that the fierce, savage creature before him was a human female, though a more feral one he had never seen.

         As Falan began to make soothing sounds, he edged closer, taking care of the weapon clutched in the girl’s hand, which looked like an archaic vibro-sword. Taking a chance on alarming the girl, Falan loudly ordered the voice activated lights to maximum intensity, and as the girl whirled in surprise with a startled oath, Falan slid forward and tapped her on the side of the neck. Her figure crumpled limply to the floor, unconcious but unharmed.

         Binding the girl with cord, Falan brought her around by splashing water on her face. She immediately went berserk; finding her arms bound firmly to her sides, she tried to tear him with her teeth. Grabbing a handful of her hair, he held her head steady and stared into her eyes, seeing fear, anger, and curiosity all struggling for control. Looking into Falan’s eyes, the girl seemed to relax, and began to settle down. Opening a packet of rations, Falan pulled the protein bar from its pouch and took a bite, chewing audibly and making exaggerated sounds of enjoyment. After another bite, he offered it to the girl’s mouth. She hesitated, looking at him with suspicion, but finally gave in and took a large bite of the bar.

         Shock registered on her face at the first taste of the fruity flavor of the bar, and she quickly swallowed. Carefully feeding her the rest of the bar, Falan pulled out the main entrée of the ration packet; a large slice of preserved, sealed Hargoth meat. Opening this pouch, he offered it to the girl, but she refused, turning her head away from the food.

         After several more failed attempts to get her to eat the meat, Falan struck on an idea. He got the girl’s attention, and tore a piece of the meat off with his fingers. Placing it in his mouth, he made more sounds of enjoyment and tried not to look disgusted; he hated Hargoth meat with a passion typically reserved only for his worst enemies. Feeding the girl with one hand, he forced down the meat in his mouth and pulled the vibro-knife from his boot top with his left hand. While the girl was absorbed in her meal, he sliced the cords binding her arms. She instinctively reached up to take the food package from his hands before stopping in astonishment. Falan saw in her eyes the struggle she waged against the instinct to flee, but after a moment, she calmed and settled back onto the couch she occupied, contentedly eating her meal and watching Falan closely, especially the vibro-knife still clutched in his hand. Seeing her eyes drawn to the deadly, humming blade, Falan quickly slipped it back into his boot top and sat on another couch a few feet away.

         As she finished the meat, she looked at Falan, her eyes squinting and her forehead wrinkling in deep thought. As Falan remembered his nakedness, he quickly stood to grab his clothes, which lay nearby, only to drop them as he heard, from his left, the savage young woman speak.

“More, please?”

Spinning around, Falan said, “You can talk!?”

The girl had to concentrate very hard to reply.

“Only little. It’s been big long time.”

She stumbled over some of the words, the ones with more syllables mostly, but her speech was clear and understandable.

“Where are you from,” asked Falan.

“We came in big ship, me and mama and dada. And brudder Thom.”

“Where are your mother and father, and you’re brother?”

“Mama die soon after landing. Big bug bite her. Den dada, he take care of me and brudder. Den, two, mebbe tree winters later, dada went huntin’ for food, cuz we was starvin’. But he never come back. Brudder die while we look for dada; big snow cat got ‘im. Now me all ‘lone.”

          Her speech seemed to improve as she spoke with someone, and Falan wanted to keep her talking. Perhaps, with parts from the pod, he could get her parents’ ship running, or at least the radio, so they could call for help. Of course that could get him tangled in another mess like the one he had just escaped, but he couldn’t just stand by knowing that this girl might have family out there, grandparents or something, that though she was dead. He had to get the girl off the planet, even if it was bad for his health.

         Falan knew that many people would take advantage of the naïve girl, or at least just leave her abandoned on the planet, but he just couldn’t do that to someone. He had been a Galactic Ranger once, patrolling the space ways and protecting the innocent, bringing the guilty to justice. It may be true that his fellow Rangers, and every member of his race, were hunted because of the fear of those they had once protected, but that couldn’t stop him from doing what was right, no matter what dangers he might subject himself to in the process. Such was the vow he had taken upon becoming a Galactic Ranger, and no one had ever relieved Falan of that vow. He would not break it, under pain of death. Watching the girl devour the rations, a sudden thought struck him.

“How long ago did you come here,” he asked the girl.

She looked at him thoughtfully, as if unable to find the words she needed.

Falan saw her dilemma, and said, “How big were you?”

         He held his hand a little below his shoulder, assuming the girl had been stranded on the planet for no more than six or seven years at most. The girl held out her hand. The size she indicated was that of a child, probably no more than eight or ten years old. Falan stared in awe at the young woman who sat before him.

         She looked to be in her early to mid twenties, despite the dried mud that caked her limbs and face; Falan assumed the mud had served as some sort of camouflage. If the girl had been ten when the ship had crashed, that would mean she had spent twelve to fourteen years on this planet, apparently without another human being for the majority of the time.

}indent}Falan asked how big she had been when her parents and brother had been killed. The girl held out her hand only a few inches higher than before.

That settles it, thought Falan. This girl has spent entirely too much of her life alone on this planet. Asking if she still knew where her parents’ ship was, the girl replied with a vigorous shake of the head.

“You want me take you there?”

“If you could,” Falan replied, “I might be able to get us both off this planet. Do you have any family anywhere?”

“Dada’s mama had died, and since we were the only family left, we were moving to a colony. We were going to be farmers.”

          Falan stared in astonishment at the girl. At that moment she realized what had happened, and her mouth dropped open as she looked in surprise at Falan. She had spoken plainly, with little childish slang, as if she had been doing so for years.

“Say something else, keep talking,” said Falan.

“My mother’s name was Atria Sevarah, my father’s name was Davris Sevarah, my brother’s name was Thomaas Sevarah, and my name is Mira Sevarah.”

         As she finished, Mira burst into tears, throwing herself into Falan’s arms. He held her long into the night, while she cried away the unshed tears of many years; tears that she had been unable to shed for the sheer sake of survival. Falan sympathized with her. His race was a long lived one, and in his decades of service as a Ranger, and the decades since as an exile, he had seen many atrocities and tragedies. His heart always went out to one in such spiritual and emotional pain.

         Finally drifting off to sleep, Falan held and comforted the girl through her restless night, never once taking advantage of her. The next morning brought a clear, sunny day with a steady cool breeze blowing from the north. As Mira awoke, realizing herself in Falan’s arms, she leapt away from him, settling on a couch a few feet away. Looking down at the dried mud crumbling off her body, she told Falan she was going to the river to bathe, and that she would take him to the ship afterward.

         Falan cleaned the remnants of Mira’s mud from his clothes, and prepared his pack for the journey to the ship, which he suspected lay somewhere in the forest. The rifle he strapped to the side of the pack. He left the other supplies he had thrown together on board the doomed starliner in the pack, including the ammo. He was well rested and fed now; he could bear the load for as long as he needed. He'd rather that than get stuck deep in the forest without enough ammo or supplies.

         As Mira returned, clean and running her fingers through her untangled, auburn hair, Falan saw her in a new light. Thick, rich auburn hair cascaded down bronzed, muscular shoulders, and bright, clear green eyes glinted from a heart-shaped face of surrpasing beauty. Her body, adapted to a life of survival on a hostile, uninhabited planet, was slim and corded with tight muscle that many people on populous worlds spent thousands of credits per year at health clubs to attain. Falan tossed her a rumpled jumpsuit he had found in one of the small supply lockers aboard the escape pod. She looked at the garment in confusion, and Falan asked what was wrong.

She asked him quizzically, "How does it go on?"

         Trying not to look amused, Falan explained the operation of the simple, one piece soft suit. Falan waited outside with his pack on his back, pistols and saber on his hips, and flechette shotgun propped nonchalantly on his shoulder. When Mira emerged from the pod with her father's vibro-sword in her grasp, Falan noticed that the jumpsuit was actually a lightly armored pilot's flight suit. It would do well for protection should they run across anything dangerous.
Mira had told him last night, between tears, that she had found the vibro-sword in the forest one day, several years ago, when she had taken a journey deep into the forest, and found a large metal structure. The vibro-sword had been lying at the closed gates of what she believed was an ancient city. She took the weapon but ran terrified back into known territory and the dangers she had lived with for years.

         After her acquisition of the old vibro-blade, she had become a more dominant creature in the forests in which she lived, using her parents' old ship as a home. Falan had been glad to hear of this, for it meant that the ship hadn't been turned into an animal's den or some even worse circumstance.

         Leading the way, Falan told Mira to stay behind him and direct him from there, but to keep quiet unless absolutely necesary, so as not to draw attention from any large predators.

"Oh, there's nothing to fear but snakes during the day. It's at night that you should worry in the forest. That's when the big predators come out; the Cats, Horrors and Phantoms."

Falan raised his eyebrows at the names of the two latter creatures.

"Horrors and Phantoms?" he asked.

Mira shrugged, "Well, those are the names I gave them. Horrors are kind of like bears, but they’re about twenty feet tall, and they have a sort of lizard tail and a long, pointed snout. The Phantoms are these lizard-things. Their about four or five feet long, and they can turn invisible, except it's really more like blending, I guess. They blend in with the background, but there's this shimmer, kind of like the heat waves coming off a rock in the sun. That's how I always avoided them. That or learn where their territory is and stay away from it. They live in one area and don't like to leave much. I don't know why."

         As Mira finished her speech, Falan found himself highly impressed. That this girl, orphaned and left alone on a hostile, uninhabited world, learned to survive to such an extent that she learned the ways of the animals of the forests, though they were alien to her. It was at this moment that Falan decided that, when they got to a decent spaceport, he would offer the girl a chance to go with him. He thought he might know what her answer would be.

         As the boughs of the trees soaring above closed in around them, the bright light of the morning was reduced to a greenish twilight, the rays of the sun unable to penetrate the canopy to any great extent. After struggling about fifty meters through the dense undergrowth, they struck upon a trail beaten into the brush. Surprised at this sign of life, Falan accepted it when Mira told him that this was her path to the river, which was the largest source of fresh water for several miles in any direction. She had been coming to retrieve water from the river the day before, when she had stepped out of the forest and saw Falan's escape pod resting on the savannah.

         Following this trail deeper into the forest, they made good time, as Mira had used her father's vibro-sword to clear a broad path that three armoured men could have walked down abreast. When asked, Mira explained that she had done so to limit the possibility of ambush by one of the forest's many predators.

"Even the little Scamps will attack you if you're alone and they have numbers," she said.

Falan looked at her inquisitively, "Scamps?"

"Yeah, these little furry things, about two or three feet tall. They're kind of like a mix between monkeys, lizards and rats. They're incredibly fast, and can use their feet and tail like they do their hands."

"I think the word you're looking for there is prehensile," said Falan.

"Is that the one? I never really had a chance to learn much more than I knew when we crashed here."

"Speaking of the crash, how bad was it? How damaged is the ship?"

Mira thought for a moment. "Well," she began, "It wasn't really a crash; we just had to make an emergency landing for some reason, but before dada could get the ship fixed, he was killed. I think the Phantoms got him."

"Well, maybe your father got most of the work done, and I'll be able to get it running pretty quick. Let's move on, we're losing daylight."

         With that, Falan started up the path, Mira following closely and keeping a careful eye on the greenery walling them in on each side, as well as turning every so often to see if anything might be sneaking up on them. It was day time, and most of the big predators were sleeping, but some of the smaller ones could be just as dangerous if they caught you off guard.

         As the day grew longer and the light beneath the canopy of trees began to grow dim, Falan had a sudden thought. If the old man hadn't crashed, but simply made an emergency landing, why did he choose the forest for the landing sight instead of the plains? For that matter, where in this massive forest did he find an open place to land? Just as he turned to ask Mira this very question, she pointed up the trail ahead of them.

"We're here," she said.

         Turning, Falan saw a sharp bend in the trail, and turning it beheld a sight he had least expected. Before him, the forest opened up into a circular, open plain a mile across. Encircled by the forest, it would have made an excellent target for a desperate pilot with a failing ship and his family as the cargo. Sitting almost dead center in the field was a battered light cargo freighter. The design of the ship was unfamiliar to Falan, though in his time as a Galactic Ranger, and later during his travels as an exile, he had seen thousands of types of ships. Furthermore, with his near photographic memory, he could remember virtually every one of them. This one struck no familiar chords in his memory.

         Approaching the ship, Falan looked west. The sun was a sliver of blinding light above the trees. As they got within a hundred yards of the ship, a wild chorus of howls shattered the silence of the plain. Whirling in alarm, Mira looked in stark terror at the cat-like reptilian beasts flowing across the grassy plain toward them. Falan merely yanked the Fyrith laser rifle from his pack, dropping the flechette gun, and took aim on the lead beast.

         His finger lightly tapped the trigger, and a beam of cohesive light a meter in length lanced into the howling beast, continuing through it to hit another behind. The second beast dissipated the last of the laser blast's energy; its heart vaporized, it collapsed in a heap, and several of its brothers pounced upon the corpse, devouring it in great rending bites. The first beast had fared no better, having a hole bored through it's body and cauterized. He made several more leaps forward, and fell, convulsing in death. Another well placed shot dropped another, and then they were too close for the long-range rifle. Dropping it and scooping up the flechette gun, he turned the choke to its tightest pattern, and started firing at the oncoming beasts. Mira put her back to Falan's in case the beasts tried to circle them.

         Six shots brought down six beasts, the last going low as the creature leapt, sailing through the air toward Falan, a lightning blur of brown and green, the colors of the beasts scaly hide. Reacting faster than the eye could follow, with an almost preternatural alacrity, Falan dropped the flechette gun and drew the twin Fyrith laser sidearms at his hips. Bolts of solid light ripped through the body of the leaping beast, exiting its back in a spray of vaporized flesh and bone. The creature bowled into Falan, sending both he and Mira sprawling. Mira sprang to her feet, spinning wildly, green eyes searching for another of the beasts. Falan stood more slowly; he knew he had killed every one of the attacking pack. As Mira became aware of this fact, she looked at Falan with a new respect.

         Continuing to the ship, they reached the loading ramp just as the sun sank fully below the line of trees. Reaching beneath her new jumpsuit, Mira pulled out a small metal plate on a leather thong. Looking curiously, Falan saw that the metal plate was actually a key card for an electronic lock. As Mira slid this card through the loading ramp lock console, the ramp began to lower. Mira turned to Falan.

"My father didn't think I would be able to remember the voice code for the door, so he made me this card, and told me to wear it always. I've never taken it off," she finished.

"It's just a good thing he thought to do that, otherwise you may have gotten locked out at an inopportune time," replied Falan.

"Well, come on in," offered Mira as the end of the loading ramp thumped the ground.

         Following her up the ramp, Falan observed the current state of the vessel. Habitation had made cleanliness necessary, and this had kept everything in decent condition, if not exactly pristine. The loading ramp was located on the starboard side of the ship, and opened into the cargo bay, which would hold a decent amount of cargo for a light freighter, but was currently empty. To the left, set in the rear bulkhead of the cargo bay, was the door leading into the engine compartment. A door directly across the bay from the ramp led into the main hold, where there were a few chairs bolted to the deck around a small entertainment center consisting of a circular table with multiple control panels distributed around it. This table was a staple of many ships regularly taking long galactic runs. It featured a holographic board game projector, holo-vid display, a personal comm unit with light speed communications capabilities, and a holo-vid recorder as well as a computer console that was tied into the main ship's systems.

         Across the hold was a door leading to a small bunkroom that slept six, and at the rear of the compartment was the door to the refresher unit, which had shower and waste disposal equipment. Heading to the cockpit, which sat forward and center of the box-like ship, Falan seated himself in the pilot's chair, and studied the controls of the unfamiliar ship. Although the exterior of the ship was unfamiliar, the cockpit controls were very similar to many ships Falan had flown in his career. Joining him in the cockpit, Mira sat in the co-pilot's chair as Falan found what he had been looking for.

         Powering up the ship with the main power switch he had just located, he waited for the system to power up fully and ran a diagnostic on all ship's systems. After a long wait, information finally began spilling onto the screen in front of him. Hull integrity was at ninety-eight per cent, Hyperdrive motivator operating normally, and all other ship systems operating fully. The only problem the ship registered was low fuel cells.

         The small fusion reactor would allow the ship's systems to operate continually for more than fifty years, but the large engines that propelled the vessel through realspace and the atmospheres of planets, were fueled by energy cells that had blown upon exiting hyperspace, according to the captain's log Falan found in the computer files.

         Going into the engine compartment, Falan removed the blown energy cells. He studied the shape of the cells, and thought that the cells from the escape pod might fit and allow him to power up the ship. If he knew anything about the fusion generator, he would try to rig it to the engines instead, but he wasn't crazy enough to mess with something with that kind of power. As he powered down the ship's systems and stood, he told Mira of his discovery. She followed him into the crew cabin, where she picked up an object from the holo-table.

"Here, I wanted to give this to you. It was my father's but I don't know how it works."

         Mira held something out to Falan, and he smiled at her, and then looked to the object she was proffering. Falan couldn't believe his eyes. In her hands she held the weapon of a Galactic Ranger! It was an armored bracer with a built in dart launcher. It had been one of the backup weapons of the Noc'Tar'El for generations, and this girl's father had possessed one! Unwilling to push the girl for information which might dredge up painful memories, Falan decided not to raise the issue.

"Thank you," he began, "but I think it's time we got in bed. We need to get an early start tomorrow if we want to get those energy cells back here."

         With that, he went into the bunkroom. It was a short, narrow room with three small beds set into the wall one above the other on each side of the room. Falling into one of the lower bunks, Falan turned the dart launcher about in his hands, mind straying into decades long past. It was a long while before he drifted off to sleep.

         Mira went into the main hold and sat at the holo-table. She wondered what it would be like to finally get off of this planet and re-enter society. Eventually, she made her way into the bunk room. By this time, Falan was sound asleep, and she climbed into the bunk across from him and fell into a dreamless slumber.

         Awakening many hours later, Falan was dismayed to discover that it was already late morning. This destroyed their chances of making it to the pod before nightfall. After a quick discussion with Mira, whose judgment about the planet he trusted, Falan decided to spend the day in the ship checking various mechanical parts, lubricating many with oil found in a storage closet. It seemed to Falan that the ship had remained in fairly good condition considering how long it had sat unattended.

         Sending Mira to try to find a delicious little lizard she had discovered nearby, Falan wondered how she had managed to discern what was edible and what wasn't on an alien planet, at such a young age. Opening the service panels inside the cockpit to check if all the wiring was in place, he discovered a small ebony box. Inside were twelve universal credit cards; Mira's father's personal fortune. Pocketing several of the cards, Falan replaced the box that held the remainder, burying it deeper in the wiring, and bolted the panel back down, noting that the wiring was in excellent shape.

         Later that night, when Falan slotted each of the cards in his datapad, he found that the total balance of the twelve cards was two hundred twenty five million credits! It was enough money for anyone to live like a king for the rest of their days.

Of course, with the kind of people that kind of money might draw, the end of one's days might not be too far away, thought Falan.

         The next morning, they left the ship just at dawn, hurrying to make it to the pod to retrieve the energy cells. They would carry the cells back as fast as they could, but the heavy cells would slow them, and night would most certainly fall before they made it back to the ship. Mira had disapproved of the plan, but Falan insisted that there was no other way, and that he had an ace up his sleeve to deal with any beasts that might molest them.

         The trip down the path was over with quickly, and when they reached the last vestiges of forest closing the path off from the plains, Falan and Mira used their vibro-blades to finish clearing the path. They didn't want to have to fight the energy cells through two hundred feet of dense vegetation on the way back.

         Quickly locating the access panel for the engine compartment on the outside of the escape pod, Falan used his vibro-saber to hack through the panel's retaining bolts. No need to waste time on finesse, he just wanted to get started back to the ship as soon as possible. When the access panel door fell to the ground with a thud, he was already moving to the opening to check the energy cells.

"Damn it," shouted Falan. The pod's energy cells were a completely different configuration than those of the ship. Reigning in his temper, Falan leaned in to get a closer look at the cells, eventually pulling one out of its slot to examine it. He was sure that he could adapt the cells for use in the ship, but it might take time. Of course, time was the one thing he had plenty of.

         Calling Mira, he began to fashion a sled out of the panel door, using one of his sidearms on its lowest setting to bore two perfect holes through the thick Cerasteel door. A length of fiber cord laced through these formed a simple harness with which to pull the sled. Mira came around the corner of the pod with a large bundle strapped to her back.

"What the hell's all that," asked Falan.

"I didn't think you'd want to abandon everything you had in here, so a made a bundle of what I thought you'd want to save most," she replied.
         Shrugging, Falan said that was fine with him, and thanked her.

"We'd better get started. Let's not go too fast, I don't want to tire myself out in case I need to fight something."

         Mira looked at him for a moment, thinking of bringing up her reluctance to get caught in the forest at night, but resisted the temptation and nodded her agreement to him, walking alongside him as he started down the forest path.

****

         The trip through the forest had been an amazing journey for Mira. She had stood aghast as the forest's fiercest creatures had shown up to challenge them. But all along, no matter the ferocity or vileness of the beast, Falan simply recited a short chant in a language unknown to her, and the beasts would whine for a moment and then disappear back into the forest's shadows. Mira didn't question this unusual ability in the man she hardly knew. Many years of isolation had given her a deep respect for giving other creatures their space.

         They returned to the ship shortly after midnight, and Falan had worked through the rest of the night, laboriously wiring the ten year old energy cells into the engines of a hundred year old ship. It had been a tedious process, but in the end, Falan had proven successful.

"Well," he told Mira, "Nothing left but to fire up the engines and see if they work."

         Mira followed him to the cockpit, where he slid into the pilot's seat. Mira slid into the co-pilot's station, and watched closely as Falan began to flip switches, activating different ship's systems. He did this ever so slowly; this ship had been sitting in this dank forest for years, with only minimal life support and lights being used. No need to overheat the circuits by activating all the systems at once.

         Being extra careful, Falan decided not to activate some systems at all. There was of course no need for shields or the meager weapons systems of the ship. Keeping life support at minimal levels, he brought up the primary systems, and then slowly brought the engines online. There appeared to be a problem when the "engine overheat" light began to flash, but Mira reached over and tapped it lightly a couple of times, and it switched back to a steady green light.

"I remember my father doing that a lot," she said as Falan looked at her, his left eyebrow raised quizzically.

         As the systems slowly came back online, Falan inched the engine power up in small increments. It was past noon before he had gotten the ship's full systems completely online, including shields and weapons. Mira had surprised him again there, when she had reached under the console in front of him and pushed a small knob, which activated "secondary" weapons systems, which consisted of two heavy plasma cannons hidden on the sides of the cockpit, a light Ion cannon for disabling smaller ships, and a small mini-missile launcher, with twelve missiles remaining of an original payload of fourteen. Further inspection revealed the shields to be military grade, and capable of repelling anything less than a direct hit from a capitol ship, except an Ion blast. Mira also took him into the cargo compartment and showed him the removable floor plates, and the large smuggling compartments hidden beneath. Mira didn't know if her father had smuggled cargo or people on his ship, for he had retired from the life of a "spacer" before she had been born.

         Testing the controls for the maneuvering flaps, Falan assured himself they would work; he had inspected the exterior of the ship as diligently as the interior, and found nothing greatly wrong, though he had used much of the oil supply on the exterior mechanical parts of the ship, including the landing gear.

         The ship rose slowly off the ground, trailing vines that had grown over the
landing gear and struts over the years, though Falan had cleaned off much of these. Though at first the ride was a little shaky, it soon settled, and Falan decided to take it on a test run across the planet first. Climbing to a thousand feet, Falan and Mira watched the landscape speed past beneath them. The planet appeared to be nothing but forest and plains, until half an hour later, when they spotted a low range of mountains ahead of them. Recording the position of this mountain chain, Falan decided to use it as a landmark and increase his altitude. Flying in a wide circle around the mountains, the ship circled slowly upward, eventually breaking into a low orbit. After more than two hours orbiting the planet, the ship had proven its stability. Leaving orbit, Falan headed out of the system, checking the navigational computer for nearby hyperspace routes or populated planets.

         The navigational computer was the original, and though it had received many upgrades, the hundred year old relic was slow when plotting courses. After more than fifteen minutes, it finally located a hyperspace route nexus within six hours travel of their current position. They would have to make the journey at sublight speeds, because the navcom wouldn't calculate for micro-jumps. Falan decided to stretch the trip out to fourteen hours. He set the course and speed, locked in the coordinates, and armed the shields at full strength. Telling Mira what he had done, he went to the crew cabin to get some much needed sleep.

         Mira sat in the cockpit, watching the brilliant, mottled colors of hyperspace flowing swiftly past the ship. It was almost hypnotic, and Mira found her thoughts drifting to her family, and their many travels together in this very ship. It was so strange to once more be traveling through space in the Vagabond, without her family to share the adventure. Twelve hours later, while Falan had strange dreams of flame-enshrouded enemies, Mira decided to make her savior her new family; Falan of the Noc'Tar'El would be her new big brother, no matter how long it took her to convince him of the fact.

         Finally they arrived at their destination, in the midst of a pitched battle between what looked like pirate forces and a well-protected convoy of frigate-sized cargo freighters. It appeared that the cargo freighters and the small one-man fighters they carried were doing well holding their own, except for three of the six ships in the convoy, who had somehow drifted into an encircling group of pirate corvettes, and were under a massive barrage of light laser cannon and Ion fire, which their shields and Ion dispersal systems were having a hard time shrugging off.

         Making decisions on the fly, Falan threw the Vagabond into the fray, attacking the corvettes that pummeled the three trapped frigates. The heavy plasma cannons spat large globules of plasma energy, which hit their target, clinging and burning through. In moments, with twelve well placed shots from the plasma cannons, three of the corvettes were flying erratically from multiple depressurized decks and engine damage.

         Four blasts from the Ion cannon disabled another corvette completely, just moments before the second largest of the pirate ships, a three hundred foot Carrack-class assault frigate, exploded in an expanding ball of flame and debris, consuming two of the freighters' escort fighters who were unable to escape the blast in time after making the killing shot. After the loss of the powerful assault vessel, the rest of the pirate vessels turned and fled into hyperspace, the massive battleship that had gone unnoticed during the battle lingering to the last.

         The battleship was the center of attention when it was spotted. Painted as black as the space around it, it reflected little light, and would vanish from sight within a blink of an eye. It was seemingly invisible to radar, as none of the vessels had detected it before or during the battle, until it had shown itself in retreat.

         The battleship was of alien design, cylindrical in shape, with five plasma thruster engines for subspace propulsion. Over eight hundred feet long, it held two wings of fighters, and its cylindrical body was designed so that nearly the entire surface of the ship could be covered in offensive and defensive weaponry. The captain of the vessel, and commander of the pirate forces, had discovered the ship drifting dead in space, with all reserve power focused into the repulsor shields. The ship had seemingly been set adrift on purpose within a large asteroid field near the Seracinth Nebula.

         It had taken four years for the Lyyrskaa pirate captain to figure out all the ship's systems, but it would have taken anybody else a lifetime or more. The Lyyrskaa race was blessed with an incredible intelligence, surpassing nearly every other race. Some theorized that this was because the Lyyrskaa were a reptilian race, and therefore logically centered and emotionally cold, unswayed by base instincts and emotions.

         The large pirate ship didn't leave with the usual leap into hyperspace in a bright flash of light. It seemed that the space in front of the vessel folded in on itself, and the ship just vanished, the warped space snapping back into place. Falan had never seen a stardrive like the one those pirates had possessed. He felt an urge to track them down for their transgressions and crimes, but knew that the task was beyond him; he was vastly outnumbered and outgunned.

As the frigates drifted back into their convoy positions, the radio crackled to life, startling Falan out of his reverie. The commander of the small fleet of cargo frigates was inviting Falan to dock with his command ship, in order to receive a reward for his help in driving off the pirates, who would have left none alive as witnesses had they gotten the upper hand.

         Falan released control of the ship as the magnetic tractor beams from the cargo freighter pulled the Vagabond alongside it, coordinating with the smaller ship's computers to align the airlock hatch with that of the large frigate. Once the airlock had been cleared and pressurized, the door swished open and their host stood there, a tall wolf-like being with a cybernetic right eye and arm, wearing light battle armor and holding a disrupter rifle, which would throw the neural system of organic targets into chaos, while being completely harmless to armor, vehicles, and other inanimate objects. These weapons were used frequently in space, to avoid depressurization of ship cabins.The wolfish being rested his rifle on one shoulder and offered his right hand to Falan.

"Name's Brennon. I'm the one you spoke to on the comm. I'm leading this little group of storage boxes to Ibar Prime. Now, they told me we were hauling emergency supplies for refugees of some disaster, but that doesn't explain why we've been attacked by pirates six times in the last thirty-two hours. That's why I came down here alone, without any guards to back me up. I wanted to talk to you in private before you came aboard. I have a proposition for you, if you're interested."

         Falan looked into the creature's eyes, and saw there what he had hoped for most, and expected least; honesty. Taking Brennon's hand and shaking it firmly, Falan introduced himself and Mira.

"What, exactly, is your proposition, Brennon," Falan asked the powerfully built alien.

         The large wolf-like being looked up and down the corridor he stood in, then motioned Falan and Mira back into their ship, following them into the small hold.
Nervously, he began.

"Last night I broke the seal on one of the cargo bays, and found it held weapons and munitions. I had a couple of loyal crew members help search the rest of the bays on this ship, and they were all the same. Every one of them was filled with weapons, armor, and even some droids of some sort, though they weren't activated."

         At this point, Brennon stopped his story, his head jerking sharply in the direction of the airlock, his sensitive ears perking up as they detected the sound of footfalls in the corridor leading to the hatch.

"Long story short, I want to ditch this suicide run. I've raided the holds for a stock of excellent weaponry, as well as several armor suits and one of the droids we found. I would like to sign on under you, but I can't leave my comrades behind. However, I can vouch for them as crewmen of the highest caliber. A little unorthodox, but the best I've ever seen in their respective professions."

         Brennon finished his speech in a rush, hoping for an answer before the guards arrived to ensure his safety.

Falan thought quickly. "What are their specialties," he asked.

"Fe'Xel is a genius with computers and claims to be some kind of scientist, and if there's a machine built that Dho'bra can't figure out, I've yet to see it in seventeen years of service with him."

         Just as Brennon finished and right before the guards entered the hold, Falan nodded his head in agreement and briefly shook Brennon's hand as a show of faith.

"Everything alright, sir? We expected you back with the prisoners sooner," stated the lead guard, a man in hard combat armor, with a heavy disrupter rifle held at the ready.

"Everything's fine, Corporal. And there won't be any prisoners. It turns out this is an old friend of mine, and his ship's needing some maintenance. After all, he did help us repel those damned pirates," Brennon's brow drew together in a disapproving grimace, and his lips twitched, as if he was holding in a snarl.

"I'm just glad that we came along in time to be of service, especially now that I've found an old friend aboard," Falan played along with Brennon's story. "How long has it been, Brennon? Twenty, twenty-five years?"

"I think closer to thirty, Falan," Brennon used Falan's name familiarly, and it seemed to convince the suspicious Corporal, who ordered his men back to their posts to await their next summoning.

         As they were heard to enter the lift, Brennon thanked Falan for his part in their success, and Falan complimented him on his fine job of subterfuge. "And now, I think we should go meet our two new crewmembers, if it's possible. It seems the lot of us have many things to discuss and plan."

"I agree," said Brennon, "The most likely place to find both of them is in the garage and maintenance bays, which are only separated from each other by a thin sheet of cerametal, which Fe'Xel put up for privacy. I can have us there in about three minutes. Follow me."

"Hold on," said Falan, "I want to do something real quick, first."

         Going into the cockpit, Falan keyed in several commands at the security console, activated the passive sensor systems, and flicked a switch hidden beneath the pilot's seat. Mira's father had been no fool, and had taken precautions. Mira had showed each and every one of the ship's secrets to Falan, and he had committed each, and its operation, to memory. All this ship needed was a little upgrading, and it would beat some of the best in the galaxy. What they needed was a place to lay low a little while they had the modifications done.

         Returning to Mira and Brennon, he motioned them off the ship, and then turned to close and lock the loading ramp. After he punched his security code into the keypad, he held the three, six and nine buttons down together and pressed the one key, then released them all. Everyone noticed that, as Falan leapt back from the ship, a slight blue glow had arced across the vessel's surface. When asked about it by Brennon, Falan just said that anyone attempting to tamper with the ship would find it a painful process.

         Leading them down a short corridor to a ladder leading down to the next deck, Brennon grabbed the sides of the ladder and slid quickly to the bottom, his thick fur protecting his skin from the friction. Falan reached the hole in the decking, and dropped through it, ignoring the ladder altogether. His legs bending to absorb the impact, and hands ever near his weapons, Falan surveyed the level he had dropped into. It appeared to be a massive cargo bay, complete with dock doors, though it had been halved by a sixty foot tall, eighty foot long sheet of cerametal armor plating, effectively dividing the massive bay in two.

         On the side the ladder entered, there stood many workbenches and lockers against the walls, and in the middle, supported on a gantry, was a small one man starfighter, badly damaged, and in the process of being scrapped. The creature doing the scrapping was unlike any Falan had seen before. Standing several inches shy of five feet, Dho'Bra was at least half as wide, with a massive span of muscular chest and back, sprouting long, powerful arms, thick as a normal man's torso, all situated atop a pair of legs that resembled knotty tree trunks, ending in a pair of broad feet. The head was very much like that of a man, though in place of eyebrows and hair, there were bony ridges projecting through the skin, those on the head being thicker and higher, topped with sharp ridges of bone. These bony projections also showed along the backs of the hands and arms, on the legs and knees, at the shoulders and elbows, across the chest and back, with thinner plates covering the stomach.

         This was Dho'Bra, the mechanical genius. Seeing that he had visitors, Dho'Bra immediately joined them. They saw him reach to a band on his left arm, and he simply vanished, reappearing in front of the party. Everyone was startled, until Brennon explained the device Dho'Bra had used.

"It's something Fe'Xel picked up in the Deraveen Nebula. Some sort of alien technology that lets you teleport to anyplace within your line of sight. Fe'Xel is trying to figure out how to engineer one," Brennon finished.

         As Brennon introduced Falan and Mira to Dho'Bra, Falan studied the mechanic. He wore a leather coverall, though the top had been ripped off, and the bottom fit like a second skin. Strapped around his waist, Dho'Bra wore a tool belt that held a large number of completely alien items, as far as Falan was concerned. And Falan had been all across the known galaxy, and seen many, many things.

         Brennon explained that Dho'Bra came from a planet with a very heavy gravity, and all its natives were built in such a way, and all had incredible strength on planets with lesser gravities, though they had to take care, for many did not know their own strength. The bony protrusions were of a much denser mass than the rest of Dho'Bra's bones, which were much denser than a human's, and served to protect the denizens from the jaws of the predatory beasts on their planet, which would not hesitate to attack heavily defended cities.

         Dho'Bra joined the group as they moved into Fe'Xel's workspace, which was filled with computer and laboratory equipment, as well as several work tables and large containment units. In one of the units was a large insectile beast with red, multi-faceted eyes and a black exoskeleton. It scrabbled at the glass with its claws, but the glass was built of densely packed molecules layered in opposite directions, providing incredible strength.

         Standing at a large computer console overlooking all of the containment units was another insect-like being, though this one seemed much more intelligent than the one in containment.

"Hey, Fe'Xel, I want you to meet someone," Brennon yelled as they entered.

         Fe'Xel turned away from the computer console and came to meet them. As the alien neared, Falan saw that it was humanoid, though its body was covered in a hard black chitinous armor. The head was shaped much like that of a preying mantis, and it had large, black, multi-faceted eyes, which gleamed with intelligence. It's arms, though they looked very powerful, ended in long, delicate human-like hands, covered in a softer type of armor shell.

         As Brennon introduced them, Dho'Bra told them they had little time to talk before they arrived at the next route they would jump from, before arriving at their target destination, which Brennon was now determined not to accompany the fleet of weapons carriers to. He, Falan, and the rest would abandon these doomed ships in a little less than three hours.

         Falan, instinctively taking charge, began informing everyone of their duties, but Fe'Xel interrupted him. In a voice like the sound of dry leaves rustling, the tall, insectile alien began to speak.

"Does your kind have a ship with which to carry us away?"

"Yes," answered Falan, and briefly told Fe'Xel about the Vagabond.

"Not good enough, Justarius," said the alien, calling Falan by a name he had not heard in many years. The insectile race known as the Vek had called all Galactic Rangers by the title of Justarius, which in one of their ancient languages meant "law giver".

"Well, under the circumstances we don't have another choice, unless you think we can take over this whole cargo freighter," said Falan.

"In that case, I must gather some things. I will not leave my creations behind," said Fe'Xel.

"Very well, but be quick about it. We have to retrieve the supplies that Brennon has stockpiled. We'll meet you in the landing bay," said Falan.

         Brennon, Falan and Mira went after Brennon's pirated ordnance while Dho'Bra and Fe'Xel quickly gathered what they could, and hurried to the landing bay to meet the others. When they arrived, they found that the others had already loaded their cargo and begun the preflight checks for takeoff. Stowing their gear, Fe'Xel and Dho'Bra joined the others in the cockpit, strapping themselves into the acceleration couches. Brennon remotely keyed the bay doors to open immediately after the ship exited hyperspace, having to use a command override code to do so.

         The companions settled into their chairs, awaiting the countdown to exit from hyperspace. Time seemed to creep slowly past. Finally, the fleet began to exit hyperspace in their planned trajectories. As soon as the flagship leapt from the alternate dimension, the bay doors began to open, and Falan raised the Vagabond off the deck. As soon as the doors had opened wide enough, Falan shot through the opening into space, the thrusters on the cargo shuttle scorching the paint on the cargo freighter as it blasted away. Turning in a long loop, Falan began plotting the coordinates for a jump to hyperspace. Suddenly the radio crackled to life, those aboard the cargo vessels wanting to know how they had gotten the codes to the landing bay doors, and demanding that they return to the ship immediately.

         The navcom on the Vagabond was slow, but luckily they were in a region of space that saw much space traffic, and the computer quickly spat up the coordinates for an independent space station, little more than four hours away. Bringing the ship around to the proper heading, Falan keyed the hyperdrive, and with a burst of light the small cargo freighter vanished.

         Immediately afterward, while the crews of the cargo frigates were wondering what had happened, and those on the command vessel searched in vain for their commander, the ships of a large pirate fleet burst abruptly from hyperspace, quickly moving to surround the frigates, and demand their surrender. The individual captains each knew they had only one true choice. They all surrendered their ships, and many cursed the captain they felt had abandoned them.

         Aboard the Vagabond, the crew gathered in the main hold to get acquainted and discuss their goals. Fe'Xel swore his service to Falan for rescuing him from a journey he had considered a death sentence. Dho'Bra thanked him profusely for allowing him to join Falan on his journeys through space. He said he had always worked on merchant vessels, and had seen little of what the galaxy was really like, and itched to explore. Brennon said he just wanted to serve under a worthy officer, and he saw Falan as such. Mira told him he already knew her reasons, and Falan nodded in agreement.

Mira brought up a subject Falan had assumed was a tender one for the girl. "I think we should see about acquiring a larger ship, with better engines and shields. Not to mention a hyperdrive that doesn't take a week to calculate a jump."

Falan agreed. "We should see about getting something with enough room for Fe'Xel to have a laboratory and Dho'Bra to have a decent sized garage, as well as plenty of cargo space. We'll also need hydroponics chambers and recycling units. And full hygienic facilities."

Brennon spoke up. "It should also have some decent armoring and weapons systems. You never know when a good gun will come in handy."

"I hate to interrupt," began Fe'Xel, "but I believe that if we but found the materials and a bay large enough, Dho'Bra and myself could build this craft ourselves."

"How long would it take the two of you to build a ship this big," Falan asked, amazed that two people thought they could build a ship by themselves. Surely it took hundreds of workers to build a space-going vessel, he thought.

"If we found a fully equipped construction bay, we could have it finished in about three weeks, and that's with inferior equipment," replied Dho'Bra.

Falan thought for a moment. "Well, first let's see if they have a complete bay at this space station. If not, then we'll start looking for a good ship to buy. I think I can afford a new one, as well as some modifications."

         The others agreed, and they settled in to talk while the ship hurtled through hyperspace.

****

         Fe'Xel told of his childhood on his home planet, which lay on the edges of the Amerses Nebula. His race was called the Vek, and were normally a reclusive people, tending to keep to themselves. However, when a trader ship had landed on his planet with engine troubles, Fe'Xel had felt compelled to approach them. Offering to help repair their ship, he did so quickly, and the captain offered him a berth on board. Fe'Xel had bid farewell to his home planet and traveled into the stars with the strangers. These had proven deceitful, and had drugged the young Vek and soled him into slavery. He had managed to unlock his shackles with a piece of wire filched from a worksite, and escaped into a city on the planet Torth. Fe'Xel had run into an alley looking to elude his pursuers, and stumbled upon three gang members surrounding Brennon with chains and clubs. As the gangers attacked, so had Fe'Xel, striking the thugs from behind with lightning quickness, causing them to abandon their prey and flee. Offering aid to Brennon, the two had become friends and had worked and traveled together ever since.

         Dho'Bra had been exiled from his home planet for holding views contrary to those of the rest of his people. Namely, he wasn't a bloodthirsty maniac bent on the conquest of the galaxy with a brutal campaign of attrition. In accordance with ancient law, he had been subject to the most horrible punishment his people could fathom; banishment from his home planet. His people were an arrogant race, and believed their planet to be the shining jewel at the center of the universe, which they felt they should be the rightful rulers of.

         They had locked him inside a simple space craft, launching him into space. The ship was equipped with one of the warp drive engines his people had just created, and was programmed to use this to send him far from his home system before stopping. It had taken more than three days of constant travel at maximum warp before the craft had finally stopped, and Dho'Bra's shackles had been released.

         Pleased to have escaped his planet so easily, Dho'Bra had gloated, for he had copied the plans for the warp drive and his peoples' newest weapon designs, and erased all copies of them from the society's linked computer system. Perhaps the scientists would be able to reconstruct the proper plans, but that would take years if not decades. Meanwhile, Dho'Bra had the only set of plans for the newest form of space travel in the galaxy, as well as quite a few innovative weapons designs.

         Mira told of how she had come to be stranded on the planet where Falan had found her, as well as his arrival there and how he had rescued her.

         Brennon told of being the smallest of a litter of seven pups born to his mother. Fighting his brothers and sisters for the right to eat had been one of his earliest memories. Many runts died young, but though Brennon had been small, he had not been weak. He had fought for every year of survival, and by his coming of age had proven himself throughout his peoples' village, both as a hunter/tracker and as a warrior in battles against rival tribes.

         When slavers had come to his world, he had gone to fight, only to become one of the first to be enslaved. He had spent fifteen years as a slave in the spice mines of Syytheriin, deep in Sethriil Confederation territory, where he had gained his magnificent physique. Fighting for extra rations, he had worked and fed his body, building muscle mass that he hoped would one day be used to facilitate his escape. Such was the case, two years later, when he was designated to be moved to a lower security section of the mines; he had been a slave so long that the overseers saw little chance in an escape attempt. Such was standard procedure in the mines, which had been in operation for more than four centuries.

         It was from here that he made his escape, breaking the necks of his two lightly armored guards and procuring their weapons. Making his way to the hangar, he had stolen a small passenger shuttle with a primitive hyperdrive, and fled to the other side of the galaxy. This is where he had become a crewman on his first vessel, six years ago.

         Falan knew well who the Sethriil Confederation was; the Galactic Rangers had fought them on more than one occasion, always to great losses on both sides. He had listened for several hours to what his new companions had had to say about their own lives. They had bared their lives to him, and it was only right that he do the same, he thought. So without preamble, Falan launched into the story of his birth two-hundred and twenty two years ago, on the Noc'Tar'El homeworld of De'Fell, and told of his childhood, learning the ways of the warrior from the time he could walk.

         He told of the traitor, and the war that followed his ascension to power. He told of the devastated cities and planets, the thousands of innocents slain in the many battles. He told of the final battle, in the skies above Octuris. He helped them envision the massive space battle, more than ten thousand ships battling in orbit above a helpless planet. He described in detail how the sky must have seemed to burn to the inhabitants of the planet below, as hundreds of ships fell into its atmosphere, burning up on their journey to the ground. That planet had received the worst punishment of any in the war. The shattered energy cores that fell to the earth poisoned the soil and water with many toxins and forms of radiation, killing plants and creatures alike. Within seven years, the planet would be a lifeless ball.

         Well before the final death of Octuris, the Noc'Tar'El had returned to their homeworld, greatly reduced in numbers, to lick their wounds. It was only a few days later that the massive fleet had arrived to destroy his people and planet. Those
that had been off planet and a small few who made it past the huge blockade scattered to the far reaches of space to escape persecution, surviving on their own, living with the pain of the damage they had caused, but longing to return to their former roles as protectors of the galaxy. Most of the Rangers lived for their jobs; to protect and defend the helpless, bring justice to the lawless, these were the driving forces behind a Noc'Tar'El's existence. Falan told them of how he had heard of other Rangers, driven mad with sorrow, or who had taken their own lives in an inescapable depression. He told briefly of his years wandering the back roads of space, living off the land or, occasionally, hiring on as a guide or tracker for hunters. Few had recognized him for what he was, and even fewer had cared. All respected the skills of the Noc'Tar'El, regardless of how they saw the race. He described the day that he had been discovered by bounty hunters, and how, fleeing in a small, damaged shuttle, he had come to be trapped for almost fifty years on a desolate, uninhabited planet, and his subsequent escape from that planet with the crew of a trading vessel.

         He ended with his escape from the passenger liner, and his landing on another uninhabited planet, blending his story into what Mira had already told, and awaited a response from the group around him. All seemed to think for a while on what he had revealed, except Mira, who looked at him with a peculiar new look he hadn't seen before.

Finally, Brennon shook his head and stood. "I can't say I'm not shocked a little at that story, but it seems to me that you come from a past no darker than any of our own. You saved my life when you got me off that suicide command of a frigate I was on, and brought my friends to boot. As far as I'm concerned, I'll follow you into to hell, sir." With that, he saluted to Falan, slamming his fist onto his chest above the heart, and bowing slightly at the waist, then sat.

Dho'Bra stood, and said simply, "Wherever Brennon goes, I go. I respect what you Rangers stood for, unlike the rest of my people, and I'm proud to be serving under you."

Fe'Xel stood and looked from one member of the group to another, his gaze lingering on each for long moments. When finally he had looked at Falan for quite a long time, he spoke. "I do not believe I've told you that, with our faceted eyes, my people see in many more spectrums of vision than do most other races. I see about each of us an aura I have never before seen around another. I do not know what it means, but I intend to stay until the mystery is solved, and perhaps beyond. I feel I will experience great things while traveling with this party." With that, the insectile being sank into an egg-shaped chair that he had brought on board with him, built to fit one of the Vek race specifically.

         Falan looked long at each one, who looked back at him openly. These people were willing to follow him, probably into danger, for the memory of a legend. The whispered remembrance of a people who were outcast and hunted throughout the galaxy.

"I thank all of you for your confidence and honesty, and not least for accepting me, knowing that my race is wanted by most of the galaxy. I vow to uphold your faith in me, and to follow the ideals which have ruled my life thus far. With your aid, I hope to begin to heal the galaxy of its maladies. It will take much work, but I think that, in the end, we will triumph." Falan finished his impromptu speech, and suggested they discuss their plans, as they would reach their destination in little more than an hour.