Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 51862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 259(@200wpm)___ 207(@250wpm)___ 173(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 51862 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 259(@200wpm)___ 207(@250wpm)___ 173(@300wpm)
“Hm,” I muse to myself. “Not the best idea. Not the best idea.”
“Is something wrong?” Emily appears by my elbow.
“Always,” I say.
“Is something specifically worse than usual, aside from the fact that we’re fleeing our world and being chased by the army?”
“The good news is that we are no longer being chased by the army. The bad news is Wrathelder just abducted the army. Which means they have a human army complete with weaponry and vehicles.”
Emily frowns slightly. “Sounds like a problem for later.”
I agree. For now, I am much more interested in putting as much distance as possible between ourselves and the Wrathelder ship.
These vessels were designed as freighters, and ours has no weaponry and relatively little shielding besides that which is required to withstand planetary entry. Our shields make human weapons look weak, but the other Wrathelder ships however, having been deployed in the wake of the loss of this one, may very well have weapons systems…
BOOM!
They have weapons systems.
Wrathelder opens fire with no regard for reclaiming their ship or preserving the lives of the humans aboard. They want to blast us into space dust and smear us across the face of eternity. This is personal to them now. But they’re late to the party, because this has been personal to me. I wish the ship was empty besides myself. I’d turn around and take the fight to them without weaponry of any kind. We’d see how eager they are to embrace death.
But the ship is not empty. The ship is packed full of humans dependent on me for their survival, and it contains my precious pet, the love of my life.
In spite of the threat of future punishment, Emily cuddles up beside me. She is soft. She is warm. She is trusting. She knows we are in danger. There are bursts of light visible through the main screens, and frequent shudders as weapons hit home. Though this must be very frightening for her, I sense no tension in her. She trusts me.
She trusts me with her life, and she trusts me with the lives of all those she has ever loved. That means I cannot be the wild, unpredictable brutal creature I once was. I have to be someone worthy of her trust. It also means that for now, I am not able to fight. Not even my greatest, oldest, most terrible enemies. To keep Emily and her people safe, I must turn tail and run.
Every instinct I have tells me to whip this ship around and face them, turning myself into a missile of annihilation. Instead, I have to bear the shame of cowardice. I can imagine how Wrathelder are laughing at me now. I can practically hear their mocking voices, their taunts, the cheers that must be going up on their bridge as I set the ship to the fastest speed possible and make good what little escape we have.
They give chase, of course. The bolts of destructive energy flying by the ship’s windows do not abate in frequency. They are stuck behind me, traveling at the same speed as me. Neither one of us can go any faster because we are already at maximum power.
At this stage they are as keen to destroy me as I am to destroy them. This should be a pitched battle with only one survivor, but I will not fight. For the first time in my life, I am making a safe, sane decision. I know I will not regret this. I know it is the right thing to do — but every fiber of my being still resonates with furious resistance.
At first we seem to be making somewhat good of an escape. Though we are not putting much in the way of distance between us and those who pursue us, we are at least in motion and not being gained upon. I am not well versed in the art of running, and so it takes several minutes for me to realize that we are in the worst possible position.
The shields are taking damage. Not a lot, but enough. Over an extended period of time, I am certain that they will destroy us simply by sheer persistence. How ironic. Humans are persistence hunters. They are capable of following much faster, stronger animals across vast distances, running them down until the beast is too tired to escape and must simply submit to death.
We will not tire as a hunted animal does, but our shields are limited. Eventually those shields will diminish and their weapons will begin to destroy the hull that prevents the outside from becoming the inside, and at that point we will either detonate or simply be sucked from the belly of this great beast of a ship into the uncaring cold void of eternity. I see no way to avoid this fate. This is why I do not like to run. This is why I wanted to stay and fight, but I made the sensible decision and now we are all going to suffer for it.