Chapter 16

            Removing the wires proved as easy as standing up, as Tom did the moment the announcement came over the speakers.  The Beagle rocked again from another hit, nearly throwing Tom off his feet.  Will clung to the armrest of his chair, waiting for the shaking to stop.

            "We must get to the bridge," Dr. Ruff said.

            They followed Dr. Ruff through the winding maze of corridors, Will having to run at full speed in order to keep the doctor in sight.  Only Jessie managed to stay with him, her legs pumping easily and gracefully.  Tom looked back at him, managing enough breath to say, "You'd better hurry up or we're going to leave you behind."

            A second later the ship shook again, this time part of the ceiling caving in.  Will threw himself to the deck, landing next to Tom.  After the creaking and shaking stopped, Will looked up to see the cave in had blocked the corridor, separating them from Jessie and Dr. Ruff.  Will picked at a fallen chunk of debris, but it didn't budge.  "What do we do now?"

            "Are you guys all right?" Jessie said.

            "We're fine, but you'll have to go on without us," Tom said.

            "We're not going to leave you."

            "There's not much choice.  We'll find another way around."

            "Stand back, please," Dr. Ruff said.

            Will looked to his brother and shrugged.  He took a step back just as the debris blocking their way groaned.  A hole opened up in the debris, the hole widening until there was enough space for Will and Tom to crawl through.  On the other side, they found Dr. Ruff pushing the junk aside as if it weighed nothing.  "That is amazing," Will said.

            "Cybernetic enhancement, a feature of the Mark 4," Dr. Ruff said.

            "Let's get moving," Jessie said.

            They didn't need to be told twice.  Dr. Ruff and Jessie took off at a brisk clip again, with Tom and Will struggling to keep up.  When more debris blocked the way ahead, Dr. Ruff simply ran through it at full speed, clearing a hole wide enough for the humans to slip through.  The doctor kept going, seemingly oblivious to what he had just done.

            A short flight of stairs led up to a red door.  This parted to reveal the bridge of the Beagle.  It looked as Will had imagined, with stations arranged in a circle, at the center of which was the captain's station.  At the moment a golden retriever sat in this chair, punching furiously at buttons.  The retriever's tongue lolled out of its mouth.  "Dr. Ruff, thank goodness.  I thought you might have been injured."

            "I sustained minor damage to my exterior," Dr. Ruff said.  "The Creators did not suffer any major damage as well."

            The golden retriever leapt up to snap a military-precise salute.  "Commander Nina Barker," she said.  "It's good to meet the Creators at last."

            "At ease, Commander," Dr. Ruff said.  "What is the situation?"

            "Three Black Ship frigates are on attack vector.  The radiation from the nebula interfered with our sensors, so we never saw them coming."

            At the station to Nina's left sat Heather Catt.  The white cat had grown to five feet, but she maintained the same look of hatred in her eyes.  "Our weapons systems—such as they are—are inoperable," she said.

            "Hyperspace engines are offline as well.  Lieutenant Barker estimates it'll take two hours before they can be repaired," Ricky said from a terminal in front of Nina and Heather.

            "By then we'll be dead," Tom said.

            "It would seem that way," Dr. Ruff said.  On the forward computer monitor, three of the boxy Black Ships formed into a triangular pattern.  They dove ahead at the Beagle.

#

            Will followed Jessie's lead in taking a seat by an unoccupied terminal.  He strapped himself into the seat, wondering if the Beagle had escape pods.  Then, remembering the video Ricky had shown him, he remembered what the Black Ships did to escape pods.  Either way they were going down with the ship.

            Dr. Ruff took Nina's station, the silver tentacle snaking out again to plug into the computer terminal.  He made what sounded like a concerned grunt.  "The situation is more serious than I thought," he said.

            "You mean we're screwed," Tom said.

            "Commander Raccoon, jettison the engine blisters," Dr. Ruff said.

            "Doctor?"

            "One more hit and the engines will explode," Dr. Ruff explained.

            "Jettisoning the blisters," Ricky said.

            "Now we're dead in the water?" Tom said.

            "Not entirely.  We still have maneuvering thrusters."  Dr. Ruff turned to Ricky.  "Use these to put as much distance between us and the engines as possible."  The ship moved forward, though even Will could tell it was painfully slow.

            The Black Ships had no trouble keeping up with them or adjusting their attack profile.  The ship rattled from another string of hits, throwing Will against his safety harness.  The lights on the bridge flickered and then went out completely.  Dim blue lights came on, giving the bridge an eerie moonlit glow.

            In this glow, Will saw Jessie with her eyes closed, deep in thought.  "Are you praying?" he asked her.

            "No.  I'm trying to will them to go away."

            "It doesn't seem to be working."

            "Maybe if we all try it will."

            Will closed his eyes, wishing the Black Ships would disappear from the screens.  He imagined them flying away from the nebula, becoming little more than another dot in the backdrop of space.  When he opened his eyes, though, the Black Ships remained on the screen, turning for another pass.

            "Weapons have been partially restored," Heather said.

            "Wait until they make their next approach to fire," Dr. Ruff said.  He turned in his chair to Nina.  "Were you able to transmit a distress signal?"

            "For about ten seconds before they took out our communications array."

            "We'll have to hope it was enough."

            The Black Ships swung around for another pass, maintaining their precise formation.  As they swooped down on the Beagle, Heather stabbed a button on her console with a clawed hand.  Blue lasers lashed out at the Black Ships, but the enemy vessels easily shrugged these off to continue plunging towards the Beagle.

#

            The Black Ships didn't open fire.  Instead, they spread out to surround the science ship.  Dr. Ruff ordered Ricky to stop the maneuvering thrusters.  Then silence came over the bridge until Tom asked, "What are they doing?"

            "I'm not sure.  Black Ships have never let us surrender before," Ricky said.

            "They know we have the Creators," Dr. Ruff said.

            "Us? How could they know that?"

            "That is the question.  Perhaps their sensors have picked up your life signs."

            "What do they want with us?" Jessie asked.

            "Most likely to study you as I intended, though perhaps in more invasive ways."

            "Invasive?  You mean like they'll cut us up?"

            "Entirely possible."

            "So what do we do?" Will asked.

            "We wait."

            They didn't have to wait long, as a minute later a saucer-shaped piece fell off one of the Black Ships.  When an orange glow came from the bottom of the saucer it became clear it was a landing craft.  Nina said over the loudspeaker, "Attention, attention, prepare to be boarded.  Repeat, prepare to be boarded."

            "Good," Heather said.  She rose from her seat to take a pistol from her hip the size of the plasma thrower she had worn on Earth.  Will wondered if it packed the same punch here.

            The saucer attached itself to the wall of the bridge like a parasite.  The wall began to glow red from heat.  Will released the straps of his safety harness, bracing to dive for cover.  He knew Heather was a ferocious fighter and Dr. Ruff had the strength of a dozen dogs, but he didn't know if it would be enough.  And even if they held off the boarding party, what then?  They still couldn't escape from the nebula.

            The bridge wall finally dissolved into a puddle of liquid metal.  Through this opening came humanoid-shaped beings dressed entirely in black armor, a half-dozen in all.  They carried snub-barreled rifles, though before they had a chance to aim these, Heather was upon them.

            The cat was shorter and lighter than the Black Ship fighters, but she made up for this with agility.  She sprang from her bridge station into the midst of the Black Ship warriors.  In midair she fired her pistol, the shot taking the head off one opponent.  Once she landed, she went into a frenzy of martial arts moves, laying out one Black Ship fighter with a spin kick before whirling around to punch another in the neck.  The enemy warriors did not so much as grunt from this, the only sound from their armor rattling on the deck. 

            They immediately picked themselves up to come at Heather again, including the one without a head.  Ricky and Nina produced pistols and opened fire, taking care when they aimed so as not to hit Heather or blow a hole in the ship.  The Black Ship warriors fell again and again only to get right back up until Heather began to tire.

            Dr. Ruff rose from his chair to wade into the fray.  Using his cybernetic muscles, he literally tore the Black Ship warriors limb from limb.  Once these limbs hit the deck, they twitched for a moment and then evaporated in a cloud of smoke.  A minute later, nothing remained except black smudges on the deck.

            "We taught them a lesson," Heather said.

            "Yes, I believe we did."  Dr. Ruff motioned to the screen, where six more of the flying saucers were detaching.