Excerpt

“Lemme shoot this filthy pirate, Sir!” Zamika growled with pure menace and venom. Her laser rifle was cocked and aimed right between Brackens’ eyes. The atmosphere in the docking accessway was becoming violently intense with the tall and muscular dark-skinned woman’s threatening request.

“Call off your Amazonian beast-woman here, Wakefield. I’m already under arrest,” said Captain Brackens in a sarcastic but slightly nervous tone as he stared down the barrel of the gun. He raised his manacled wrists for emphasis.

And it wasn’t the smartest thing he could’ve said or done at the time. The five security guards that escorted him with their side arms drawn, each took one nervous step forward with the pirate’s sudden movement. Zamika didn’t bat an eye, though. The end of her rifle quickly closed the distance between the two and ended up stuck into one of the pirate’s nostrils, rather brusquely.

“We prefer the term, ‘African,’ you disgusting pig!” Zamika growled.

A wincing expression and an audible “humph” in pain was all Brackens could manage in reply. His eyes bulged out of his dirty, hairy, sweat-streaked face, and his body went rigid, but then began to tremble in pent-up rage.

“One shot and I change the color of the bulkhead behind you, dirt bag,” she said, icily.

Richard slowly but firmly took hold of the barrel of the rifle that was threatening to enter the pirate’s sinus cavity and pointed it down towards the deck.

“Now, now Lieutenant,” Richard calmly said. “Captain Brackens here has his rights. Not many, but he does have a few left. Just because you had to waste six of our birds to stop his ship from escaping doesn’t mean he deserves a new hole in his head.”

“Six, Sir, six! And I had to intentionally ram two of them up his engine pipes! What a waste!”

“You see, Brackens,” Richard said smugly. “And I’ll call you Brackens from now on without the prefix 'Captain' since the only thing you’ll be captaining is your own toilet in the brig. Lieutenant Umbada here is a little protective over our equipment. And after being jumped in a bar by your monkey boys on Heka-four last year, well, she’s just a tad bit vengeful.

“XO, is the Rat’s Nest totally evacuated yet?” Richard asked over his shoulder.

“Yes, Sir. They’re all under security wraps in the hold on C-deck,” said Lt. Moore from the back of the accessway. And she said it just a little too cheerfully for Brackens’ tastes.

Richard activated his collar-com as he spoke into it, “Lieutenant Dubois, are the shields all down on the Rat’s Nest?”

“NO!” cried Brackens.

“Aye-aye, Captain,” replied Lt. Dubois from up on the bridge, “She’s wide open, Sir.”

“NOOOO!!!” screamed Brackens, who now had to be physically held back from charging at Richard by the five security guards.

“All Mass Plasma turrets, lock onto the Rat’s Nest,” Richard ordered. “Move the Argo back three-hundred klicks away from the blast radius.”

Brackens began panting like a starved Heka tiger, ready to pounce on a prey animal. Richard walked slowly and bravely up to his face. He had to look up as Brackens was easily a foot taller than him and twice as wide. Secretly, he was very nervous being this close to the pirate. It was one thing to be behind the thick hull of a starship and fight with weapons, but he didn’t ever want to meet face to face with the likes of this monster in some dark back-alley. He knew his limits. But he couldn’t let it be known that he feared the pirate all the same. His eyes set into a deadly stare as if lasers could shoot out and strike Brackens down on the spot if he so much as moved.

Brackens trembled in rage more than ever and whispered threateningly through his clenched teeth, “I have my rights.”

Richard calmly whispered right back at him with the same tone. “You’ve plundered goods from hardworking people. You’ve kidnapped for ransom. As a mercenary, you’ve killed to make yourself a quick credit. You are the scum of the galaxy. Being the head of the largest pirate gang in Federation space also makes you KING of the scum of the galaxy. The only right you have is the right to breath air and you’re lucky I don’t take that away from you too, you insignificant piece of blowfish excrement.”

The tension in the accessway was thicker than the hull plating of the Argo. No one moved and no one made a sound.

Richard lowered his eyes and turned away from Brackens until his back was facing him. He de-activated his collar-com and slowly walked away towards the door leading to the lift at the end of the accessway.

Brackens released the breath he was holding in and shouted, “Coward,” at Richard’s back. He started to grin in victory and stroked the long braids of his beard with his manacled hands.

Halfway to the lift, Richard re-activated the collar-com on his uniform and commanded loudly in a fierce clipped tone, “FIRE!”

From a small viewport built into the accessway, all eyes turned to witness the Argo’s Mass Plasma cannons spitting out a single devastating salvo of pure white annihilation at the Rat’s Nest and in the next instant, the Nest was a huge cloud of fire and debris, reduced to its constituent atoms. The fireball soon dissipated and then there was nothing left but empty space where Brackens’ ship had sat mere moments before.

Brackens screamed in dismay, “NOOOOOOO!!!!!!” as he was held back from lunging at Richard by the security guards.

Richard said over his shoulder indifferently as he continued to walk away, “Call me what you will. You, like your ship, are now history.” Richard smiled in satisfaction as he strode into the lift. He sighed and softly remarked, “That felt quite good.”