Brevan
The speeder banked hard into the first canyon. Rock walls rose on both sides. A narrow passage, barely wide enough for our hull.
I’d taken control from Carys as soon as we cleared the villa.
She was competent, but this kind of flying required years of combat experience I didn’t have time to teach.
Flinx was a silent lump in her lap, his optics dark.
He was still rebooting from his fight with the villa’s lockdown protocols. We were blind.
“Carys, weapons,” I ordered. “Port and stern. They’re coming.”
“I’m on it.” She moved to the weapons station, her hands moving over the controls. She learned fast.
The tactical display lit up. Three contacts. Tarsus’s private pursuit craft. Fast, armed, and closing.
“Can we outrun them?” Carys asked.
“In open sky? No. Their crafts are military-grade. Ours is civilian.” I pushed the speeder deeper into the canyon. “But they can’t maneuver like we can. Not in terrain this tight.”
The canyon narrowed further. I adjusted our angle. The hull scraped rock. Warning indicators flashed.
“Brevan—”
“I know.”
The passage opened into a wider valley. Badlands stretched ahead. Broken terrain. Jagged rock formations. The kind of landscape that made navigation difficult and targeting nearly impossible.
Perfect.
I dropped altitude, skimming low over the ground, using the terrain as cover.
The pursuit crafts appeared behind us. Sleek. Predatory. They split formation. One high. Two flanking low.
“They’re in firing range,” Carys said.
“Shields?”
“At sixty percent. The hangar escape damaged the generators.”
Not good. But survivable if we stayed smart.
The first pulse came in. I jerked left. The shot went wide, scorching earth where we’d been.
Carys fired back. Our weapons were lighter, shorter-range, but she anticipated the lead. The pulse caught one pursuit craft’s shields. They flared but held.
“Nice shot,” I said.
“I missed.”
“You made him adjust course. That’s good enough.”
Another energy bolt. This one closer. I rolled right. Dove into a ravine. The walls pressed close. Barely room to maneuver.
The pursuit crafts followed. But they were slower here. More cautious. One wrong move and they’d hit rock.
I took advantage. Pushed our speed higher. The speeder’s engines screamed in protest.
“Engines at ninety percent capacity,” I muttered, reading the console. “Any higher and we risk burnout.”
We burst from the ravine into open badlands again. More rock formations. More cover. But also more exposure.
All three pursuit crafts opened fire simultaneously.
I dove. Twisted. The speeder responded sluggishly. The damage from the hangar escape affected the handling.
One shot clipped our starboard stabilizer. The speeder lurched. Alarms blared.
“Stabilizer damage,” Carys reported. “We’re losing maneuverability.”
The tactical display updated. Three more contacts appearing. Tarsus was sending his entire private fleet.
“We can’t take six of them,” Carys said, her voice calm. Steady. Not panicking despite the obvious conclusion. “What do we do?”
I didn’t have an answer.
The comm crackled. Different frequency. Encrypted channel.
“Brevan Korven.” The voice was smooth. Familiar. Valdorian. “I believe you could use some assistance.”
Valerius.
I switched to the encrypted channel. “Senator. This is an interesting time for a social call.”
“Indeed. I’m watching your current predicament with great interest.” His tone carried amusement. “Tarsus has mobilized his private ships. Very impressive. Very expensive. And very much against several port authority treaties regarding armed civilian craft.”
Another pulse seared our shields. They dropped to forty percent.
“I appreciate the commentary,” I said. “But unless you have something useful to offer—”
“Oh, I do.” His voice shifted. “You embarrassed Tarsus tonight. And you stole from him. That’s worth something to me.”
“How much?”
“Enough to make a few calls.” A pause. “You see, Tarsus may own those ships, but he uses the public planetary comms grid to coordinate them. And that grid is... regulated. I’m filing an anonymous complaint about ‘unauthorized weapons discharge’ in this sector.
It’s going to flood his comms with static and automated legal inquiries for about ten minutes. ”
The tactical display flickered. The three new contacts vanished. They’d been recalled. The three original ships broke formation, their flight paths suddenly chaotic.
“Why help us?” Carys asked. She’d been listening.
“Because watching Tarsus lose is worth the political cost.” Valerius’s voice carried genuine pleasure.
“He’s been insufferable for years. Tonight he staged an elaborate trap, mobilized his security, and still lost his prize.
I want him to know I helped you escape. I want him to understand that his control isn’t absolute. ”
“You’re creating an enemy,” I said.
“I already had one. Now I’m making sure he knows it.”
The comm channel went dead.
The remaining pursuit crafts were scattering. Confused. Their comms were jammed.
“Now,” I said. I dove toward a cluster of rock formations. The damaged stabilizer fought me, but I forced us into a shallow canyon system.
A pulse struck our port side. One persistent pilot, still tracking us by sight.
Carys fired back. Three shots. The third caught the craft’s engine. It spun out. Crashed into a canyon wall.
“That’s the last one,” she said.
Flinx’s eyes suddenly glowed, a dim blue. He was back.
“Flinx, find me somewhere to land,” I said. “We’re losing power.”
His voice was weak in Carys’s comm.
“Guide me in.”
We dropped into the canyon system. The speeder’s damaged stabilizer made handling difficult. The engines were failing. Temperature critical.
“We’re not going to make another flight,” I said. “This is it. Once we land, we’re grounded.”
“Then make it count.”
The cave entrance appeared ahead. Natural formation. Wide enough for the speeder but barely. I adjusted the approach angle.
The speeder scraped through. Hull grinding against stone. More warnings. More damage indicators.
We were inside. The cave opened into a larger chamber. I brought us down. Not gently. The landing gear deployed but the damaged stabilizer made us lurch sideways. Metal screeched. The speeder tilted. Then settled.
Engines powered down. Systems failing. Red indicators across every console.
We were down. Safe. Grounded.
I checked the sensors. No pursuit.
Tarsus’s voice came through the open comm. Broadcasting on all frequencies. Raw fury. “You can’t hide forever. This planet is mine. Every kilometer. Every cave. Every rock. I will find you. And when I do, I will make you beg for death.”
I switched off the comm.
Carys was breathing hard. Not panic. Just adrenaline wearing off. She looked at me. Her hand went to her throat, to the platinum collar.
“Get this off me,” she said. Her voice was quiet, but it was an order.
“I will.” I moved to her. I’d seen the bracelet on her arm, the one I’d given her. “The slicer spike.”
She unclasped it and handed it to me. I took it and examined the collar’s locking mechanism. A biometric seal. High-grade.
“Flinx. I need a schematic for this lock. Now.”
Flinx jumped onto her shoulder, his eyes glowing brighter. He projected a tiny, complex schematic onto the speeder’s dark console. “Biometric lock. Encrypted. But the power cell is exposed. Right... there.”
I positioned the bracelet. “This will be loud.”
I activated it. The spike whined. Carys didn’t flinch, didn’t even blink. If it had been anyone else’s work, the spike wouldn’t have stood a chance.
Good thing this was a device designed by the Sovereign’s Hand.
The lock sparked, sizzled, and died.
I pulled the two halves of the collar apart. They fell from her neck, clattering to the metal floor.
She stared at it. Then she bent down, picked it up, and looked at me.
“How long do we have?” she asked.
“Before Tarsus mobilizes ground forces? Maybe an hour. Maybe less.”
We scrambled out of the smoking wreckage of the speeder, coughing in the dust. She walked to the entrance of the cave, looked out into the darkness, and threw the collar as hard as she could. It sailed into the black and was gone.
She came back, rubbing the raw skin on her neck.
“Flinx,” she said. “Find us somewhere to hide.”