Darkside Dreams (Darkside Dreams - Series 1) by A. King Bradley

Author:A. King Bradley [Bradley, A. King]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-12-07T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 9

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Dr. DuVernay entered the command deck and tried her best to look like she belonged, moving among the bridge crew terminals, ducking to watch them at work. The officers mostly ignored her as they continued to buzz about the bridge and focus on their assigned duties.

Finally, Tira reached Captain Grisham. He was reclining in his cushy Captain's chair, rubbing his temples and squeezing his eyes shut tightly.

"How can I help you, Doctor?" he said, in a clipped voice.

"Just trying to see if I can contribute anything," she answered, holding her data slate at her hip and feeding text instructions to Maestro. The AI got the hint, and replied in a quiet voice through Tira's earpiece alone.

"The captain is displaying the normal signs of stress," said Maestro. "His brainwaves are excited, but otherwise normal. No current signs of disordered thinking."

Tira nodded and moved away. Climbing the dais, she strode across to the viewing bubble. She touched one area of the screen, one facet in the subtly honeycombed surface. This brought up a small overlay, which allowed her to look through the eyes of various cameras across the hull of the freighter.

In a moment, she found the view of the standoff happening outside the cargo bay. She was just in time to watch as ten of the pirate fleet's fighters suddenly swarmed in like an angry hive of hornets, surrounding one of the convoy assault ships on all sides. The pirate strike crafts were close enough to fire upon the assault ship without the risk of hitting the freighter's cargo bay.

Tira heard frantic radio communication echoing out of the captain's terminal behind her. Asher's voice was in there, issuing orders, but the crew on the swarmed assault ship had little time to carry his orders out. The pirate strike crafts melted through the hull of the surrounded assault ship, tearing the vessel to pieces in a matter of seconds.

Asher continued shouting. One of the other assault ships under his command opened fire, but a quick order from Asher made the firing stop. The enemy fighters all departed after that, flying dutifully back toward the Phantom.

Tira turned and ran to an open terminal, a barebones spare for use by non-bridge crew. She found a second earpiece and put it into her open ear. Now she could hear both Maestro and the radio comms across the entire convoy.

"...not retreating." Asher's voice was saying. "It’s a scare tactic. I’ve seen this style of piracy before."

“I can still take out those fighters, Sir. Maybe even a few of their assault crafts,” a stern voice called out from one of Asher’s assault ships. “Just say the words and I’ll—"

"That’s a negative Sergeant Stiles. If you did that, we'd all be dead in seconds,” Asher warned.

"Understood. Awaiting your orders, Sir," Stiles begrudgingly replied.

An awkward and tense silence ensued. All Tira heard was some heavy breathing and a few whispered expletives. She had no idea who these sounds came from.

"Comms handshake coming in," Tira heard a voice with a slight Hindi accent say.

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