Star Raiders and the Lost Expidition (16 page)

“
Sir, you are not going to attack them?” CRAIG warned as he turned the ship about.

“
You ever seen a Felinis fight?” he asked as he flipped a switch on his console marked weapons when he noticed that nothing happen, “Crap!”

“
What?” the android asked.

“
Weapon’s malfunction,” he replied, “Well, I think I can out run then. Can you set the NavComp for Felinoron?”

“
It should not be a problem,” he said as he was already entering the coordinates in the computer.

“
Good, I’ll try to out maneuver them without being blasted.”

Xman took his flight stick again, yawed it to the right, and increased his thrusters. The B’tars got in range and started to fire its laser guns at them. Xman did his best to avoid them. He tilted the
Thunder Claw
left and right. CRAIG told him that the coordinates were set and locked in as all Xman had to do, was position the Claw and line it up on HUD.

“
Got it!” he said as he pulled the leaver.

The
Thunder Claw
sped in to Hyper Flight. Xman sighed once more, this time he was relaxed. He thought of his father and his sister and could not wait to see them again. Five minutes had passed when the ships alarm rang. Xman opened his eyes and franticly looked about to see what was wrong.

“
What going on?” CRAIG wondered.

Suddenly they heard a small explosion coming from the ship. The shipped slowed gradually as they exited Hyper Flight. Xman studied the controls. They heard a hiss as Xman knew that the computer activated the cooling systems to eliminate any fire that was onboard.

“
Damn, the Neoxite crystal over heated and blew,” he replied as he cut down the power. Xman then explained, “Can’t go in to Hyper Flight without it. Gotta replace it though, but first we gotta find out where we are.”

CRAIG was on the computer’s navigation system and replied, “Sir, it seems that we are between the Norma and Crux System.”

“
Great,” he said, “Out in the middle of nowhere. Maybe I can radio some help.” He pressed a button that had the initials LDRT (Long Digital Radio Frequency) and entered a frequency number he knew. Static only came back. He frowned wondering what would be next. Unexpectedly the radio came alive over the Short Digital Radio Frequency and a bored female voice boomed.

“
Welcome to Space Port 88, please give me your ship name, cargo number, and destination please.”

Chapter 8

The Star Hawk Returns

Sheriff Morgan showed Mike and the others the flight pattern that the
Hades
traveled to. It struck oddly to Mike that the battleship was heading deeper towards the center of the galaxy. Why would they go there? Then Mike remembered Uno’s expedition and wondered what the Empire was up to. Whatever it was, it was not good. He thanked Morgan and asked about getting another ship. Morgan told the trio that he did have a ship that they could borrow, if they would return it. They entered an old service elevator, probably there when the station was in construction, and descended. They arrived at the bottom of the shaft, but Morgan paused before opening the door.

“
Now, before I open this door, let me warn ya a couple of things,” he started as they listened, “She gets crappy fuel mileage, weapons don’t work right, and the Hyper Flight system is shot, but she’s all I got.”

He finally opened the door and they saw it. It looked like an old rustic ship gathering dust inside the service area. The large room like any other garage you might find in a local service station except for its huge size. Tools were hanging on the walls, engine parts strewn bout and some dismantled wings, from old ships hung from the ceiling. There were also a torn old leathery couch by the wall and an old working digital Entertable with two iron chairs next to it. Justin did not believe it, but Mike’s eyes widened in awe at the ship as Tygla looked at curiously. Mike knew that it looked like an earlier version of the
Condor
, but it was smaller in size. The ship had a wingspan of fifty feet across and it had and extra tail on the back instead of one. He also noticed that cockpit was slimmer almost as a fighter jet that Mike saw in his history book.

“
There she is,” Morgan said, “The
X50 Star Hawk
. Beauty ain’t she?”

“
Sheriff this better be a joke,” Justin commented sarcastically.

“
Joke my butt, Justin,” said Mike admiring a rusty space ship in the middle of the room, “This is a classic 2030 X50 Star Hawk. This thing has Hyper Flight level 2, dual laser capability, deflector shields, a cloaking device, this thing had it all.”

“
Well, not all the trinkets work on it, but she can fly,” Morgan said as they walked towards it. “I know because I flew in it.”

Tygla looked the sheriff in confusion and said, “I thought you said you don’t fly?”

“
I don’t, she flew,” He replied as he nodded to the ship, “It has one extra feature on it that the other Hawks didn’t have, an Automatic piloting system.” He looked to them and slightly frowned curiously, “Now don’t tell anyone about this. People around here will be down on my back faster than a mongoose on fire if they knew I had this ship.”

“
If it had automatic piloting system, why didn’t you use it to go after that Felinis?” Tygla asked.

Morgan looked at her and replied, “I’m not flyer. Don’t like flying, never did. Had this ship when I was in the Great War, back on Earth,” they then all looked at him confused by his words, “I was mechanic in the motor pool on a military space port. I was workin’ on her, when the Xatu decided to attack the port. Everyone scrambled everywhere, as it was a surprise attack. Their B’tars destroyed most of the ships, with the pilot still inside. I then saw a giant beam like laser hit the earth from the sky far into the distant. It must have been their plasma drill and their B’tars flew off. I didn’t know why they were going, but my instincts told me I had to get out of there. So I just quickly got into the cockpit, turned her on her engines, and she did the rest.

“
I’ll never forget what happen after that. The ship got into orbit as a thousand Xatu crafts surrounded me. The APS has an emergency program and it rocked us passed them as laser bolts flew every which way. They got a couple of hit on us and damaged the weapons systems. Then I heard the loudest explosion I ever heard, just before I went into Hyper Flight. I knew then, that I lost my home.”

Tygla said unhappily, “That is so sad.”

He nodded briefly and continued, “That is when the Star Hawk brought me here. It must have had a preprogrammed flight pattern. When I arrived, I thought that this thing saved my life, so I kept it for nostalgic reasons. Brought it down here to work on it from time to time with little I got, due to being sheriff an all.”

They were in awe of the story. Mike turned to Justin as he caressed the hull of the ship and asked, “Well, what do you think Justin?”

Justin remarked calmly as he looked at his friend, “You’re not seriously considering going against the Empire in this thing, are you? Mike, this thing is a junk heap. It couldn't do mach 4 without breaking up.”

“
Whelp, I better get back and finish up some paper work,” Morgan said as he started for the elevator, “If ya’ll need help, you know where to find me.”

“
Will do,” Mike said wavering, “And thank you sheriff for everything.”

“
My pleasure,” he replied as he tipped his cowboy hat, “Oh,” he dug in his inside pocket and handed Mike a piece of paper, “One more thing. I made a parts list a long time ago. Didn’t have the money or time to get them before, so there ya go.”

Mike thanked him again as the sheriff headed towards the elevator, closed the door and ascended back to the mall.

Mike Turned to his friend, back hand him on his shoulder lightly and said, “What wrong with you? Insulting him like that. He’s a veteran. Show some respect.”

Justin frowned and apologized, “Sorry, but come on Mike. It isn’t too late to find a transport back to Felinoron or Cian and get a much better ship than this.”

“
Justin, A we don’t have the time, and B this thing is a beauty, besides you Tygla,” Mike said as Tygla blushed, “Besides, the
Condor
was like this when we first brought it, remember?”

“
Yeah I was against buying it then,” Justin shot back.

“
Right, but you loved it when we restored it. It’ll be just like old times. And, if we restore it fully, we can run rings around Drax and his Empire.”

“
Or have them die laughing when they see it,” Justin Commented as Mike frowned in disappointment.

“
That’s the beauty of it,” Mike told him, “They will never expect it. Come on buddy,” Justin just looked at him, “Ok, so it’s not like the
Condor
, but it’s the next best thing. Come on don’t you wanna see Morgan’s face when he see it fully restored?”

Justin looked at the old ship and sighed. Mike was right. Justin did respect the sheriff, and said dejectedly, “All right.” Mike and Tygla smiled at him as he said unsurely, “But this had better work.”

“
It’ll be better,” Mike replied confidently padding on his shoulder. He looked at the ship and asked, “How long do you think we can get it fully working?”

Justin looked at it and he knew that it did need a lot of work and answered, “I don’t know, eight maybe ten hours.”

“
Ok good, you start working on it,” Mike told him, “Tygla and I will start searching for parts. There’s gotta be a ship repair shop in this port.”

Few moments later Mike and Tygla were back in the mall. After they gotten the parts list from Morgan, they started to walk around. They had come up to the jewelry stall where they saw Hazu.

“
Mike look,” Tygla pointed out, “There’s Hazu,” They went over to him and introduced themselves, as Tygla said to him, “Hello Hazu, remember us?”

Hazu looked up from his pad. The store looked like a mess as they saw glass and a few jewelry pieces scattered everywhere. Hazu saw them standing here holding hands.

“
Yeah I remember,” he replied. “You were in Sheriff Morgan’s office, weren’t ya? And you,” he pointed to Mike, “You were in jail. How did you get out?”

“
It’s a long story,” Mike said, “But it’s ok, I’m legit.”

“
That’s right, he was innocent,” she said, “Look, we are so sorry what happened to you. If it will make you feel better, we’ll help clean up this mess for you.”

They bent down and started to pick up stuff. Mike carefully picked up a piece of sharp glass as Tygla found a beautiful pendant. It was a raindrop shaped, pendant with a red incrusted jewel in the middle of it. She looked at it admirably.

“
Don’t touch anything,” Hazu said as he swiped the pendant from Tygla as she jumped in surprised, “I am still trying to assess the damage.”

“
What is that?” Tygla inquired pointing at the ornament in Hazu’s hand.

Hazu replied, “This is the Pendant of Pocen, or least a genuine reproduction of it. It is said that the original pendant gave its user courage and strength.” They both stood back up. He looked at it for moment then said, “Then again, it was just a myth.”

“
How much?” Mike asked curiously.

“
For you, five hundred Galatical dollars,” He replied.

He saw that Tygla admired the pendant wanted to buy it for her, but when Mike and Justin got in trouble with their former boss Mama’Halb, they decided not to waste money on frivolous things until they paid her back. On the other hand, he wanted to do something to make things right for Hazu. He felt so sorry about what happened to him.

“
Ok, we’ll take it,” he said as he dug into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He took out a few translucent bills and handed it to him. “Here’s a thousand.”

Tygla eyes widened as she saw the money. She did not know he had that much on him. She was more impressed that he brought the pendant for her.

“
Ok I’ll get your change.” Hazu said smiling as he started his way to the cash register.

“
No, keep it. It’s that least I can do as after what happened. For damages.”

The shopkeeper eyes widened and said surprisingly, “Why thank you, but if really want to make it up. You can find that stupid Felinis.” He looked to Tygla, “No offence miss.”