Jessica awoke suddenly. She could vaguely
sense the sounds of the storm around her. The smell of smoke met her nostrils,
and then she realized that there was a fire burning very near by. Fighting to
keep her consciousness, she reached under the panel in front of her to grab the
extinguisher that she remembered was kept there. She felt for the latch and
found it. She pulled on the panel, and the extinguisher clanked to the floor.
Picking it up, Jessica turned towards
“Jessica? Jessica. How are we?”
“We-Norman! Your face is burned!”
“Don’t touch it,
“It’s nothing
“I think so. I’ll-ouch! My leg! Jessica, I
think it’s broken.” Jessica had a small amount of first aid training, and she
felt
“Oh no. This is terrible. How are we going
to get to safety now?”
“We’re McKinleys. We’ll figure something
out.”
“I have to look for a place outside. It’s
going to be painful, but if I find a place I have to get us to it.” Jessica
opened the door once more and walked around to the other side of the wreck.
Proceeding through the storm, she could barely see through all the dust that
was swirling around. Another bolt flared across the sky. Jessica pushed on,
straining to make out any kind of rock formation. Thirty seconds later a lull
in the wind suddenly revealed a ridge. She scanned the surface of the ridge,
and her eyes lit on a small alcove. It looked wide enough to climb into. “Yes!”
she thought to herself. She quickly turned and ran back towards
“You won’t believe it, Norm! I found a
cave in a ridge a few hundred feet south. We can make it. Are you ready to
move?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be, I guess. I just
hope the pain doesn’t kill me before the storm does.”
“That’s you,
She then placed one of
“It’s okay sis. I wasn’t your fault. Just
get me back up quick.” Jessica knelt beside
“Don’t panic, Jessie. Just look carefully,
you’ll find it.” Jessica scanned further and then she spotted it a few feet to
their right. “I’ve got it!” They hurried to the cavity and crawled inside.
Jessica looked and saw that the alcove went deeper. She pulled
“A most enthralling lecture, if I do say
so myself, Professor McKinley,”
“Alright wise guy. Let’s just have a nice,
long moment of silence for the Flier, okay?” They both relaxed, staring at the
ceiling. Jessica had never known the full fury of an ion storm before.
As she lay there, she thought, “Even in
this advanced age, humans still cannot control the power of nature. I always
feel so safe under the protective force field that engulfs me during these
storms, yet it is still just a manmade object that only deadens our senses to
the outside world. Yet it cannot lift a finger to control nature, only cover it
up.” She also began to respect more the work of azurestone miners and the
potential dangers that they have to face everyday. “What if someone gets burned
badly by a fusion cutter overload or a storm comes up suddenly and the workers
have no time to prepare? So many things could go wrong. I live such a sheltered
life, I do. Although the air of pirates has opened us up to the harsh realities
out there within the last few years. Pirates have always been a problem but I
have become increasingly aware of their activity lately. It’s scary.”
Jessica was mentally silent for a moment,
then her thoughts traveled to Base Camp 3 and her loved ones waiting for her
there. “I wonder if Mom and Dad know that we’re not coming home on schedule. I
wonder if any of
* * *
Peter McKinley sat in his easy chair
reading a book when Carol ran into the room, visibly disturbed. Peter was
startled by her sudden appearance, but immediately jumped up and ran to her
when he saw the look on her face. “What is it? What happened, honey?”
Carol paused to catch her breath. “It’s
Jessica and Norman, Peter. They were caught in an enormous ion storm!
“An ion storm? Another one? Where?”
“
“Can we go in and look for them?”
“No,
the forecast says that it’s not going to end until morning, at least.” Peter
stood there staring into his wife’s frightened eyes, feeling utterly helpless
and lost.
* * *
A draft of cool morning breeze trickled
into the mouth of the fissure, waking Jessica from her deep sleep. She rubbed
her eyes, yawning, and left
“Did you have to wake me up so early?” he
asked, not quite awake yet.
“By the looks of the sun I’d say it’s
about
“Yeah, that’s what I said; this early.” He
stretched and tried to wake himself up to listen to his sister.
“Okay, I think first what I have to do is
try to get some water for you. Seeing how long it took us to get out here, I
would think that it ‘d take me almost two full days at least to get back to
BC3. I wouldn’t want you to get dehydrated while I’m gone.”
“How are you going to find some water? I
haven’t seen any oases around here.”
“Neither have I, but I did see a negiar
herd when we were in the Flier, so there must have been a watering hole
reasonably nearby. After I bring you the water, I’m going to try to get home
and bring some help.”
“That’s wilderness out there, Jessie! How
are you going to survive?”
“Don’t worry Norm, we’ve both taken a
survival training course, you know that. Besides, if we stay here we’ll die for
sure.”
“I just don’t want to lose you, Jessie.
Not after I got us into this whole mess.” Jessica looked at him intently.
“What do you mean,
“No Jessie, you don’t understand. I didn’t
tell Mom or Dad exactly where we where going.
“YOU WHAT?”
“I know! I told them that we were going to the Azural Plateau not past it.”
“Why did you do that, Norm?”
“I could tell that they were still a
little bit jumpy about the pirates and all so I thought that they wouldn’t let
us go this far.”
“Well there’s nothing we can do about that
now, Norm. I’ve got to go, don’t let it get you down so much that you die on me
before I get back, okay?”
“Okay Jessica. Good luck.” Jessica walked
out of the cleft once more.
“Now, what can I use to get
water with?” she thought. She made her way to the remains of the Azura Flier
and began to rummage through the ruins, looking for anything that could hold
water. “Why in the world did we leave our water bottles at Castle Rock?” she
thought as she looked. She checked her side of the Flier and saw the
extinguisher bottle lying on the floor. “Hey. I’ll take the top off and see if
I can use the extinguisher. Hmm…I’ll have to empty it first, though. Where’s
the emission hose? Oh well, it must have fallen of after I used it. I can still
use the hole that it left, though.”
She pointed the bottle towards the sky and
pressed down on the button. Milky extinguisher fluid sprayed full blast right in
Jessica’s face. Coughing and sputtering, she dropped the bottle and stumbled
backwards. She wiped the fluid from her face and stood there puffing. She
walked over and picked up the bottle again, noticing that the hole had not been
pointing towards the sky as she had thought. “Wake up Jessica, you’re not in
“Let me see…
“We started at Castle Rock and went west,
so by the rising of the sun, I know where east is, and that is the direction
that we came from. I hope this is the right way.” She marched forth, bottle in
hand into the vast wasteland. She walked for about ten minutes, looking for any
other landmarks that would point her towards the negiar herd. Then she spotted
a long, narrow depression in the plane. It stretched as far as she could see in
both directions. “A dry riverbed! If there is a riverbed here then it had to
have started from somewhere. With any luck, this should start from the mountain
that was behind Castle Rock. I didn’t see any other mountains when we were in
the Flier. Well, nothing for it.” She followed the dusty riverbed until it
turned sharply to the right. “Well, it starts going south here. I guess we spun
a little more than I thought. This is still my best bet, though. Heaven help me
if I’m wrong about this river.” She continued to follow it for twenty more
minutes. The sun had risen higher in the sky now, driving away the coolness of
the morning, replacing it with warm air currents. Birds started circling in the
sky far above.
“I would be able to get lots of water if
only this wasn’t the middle of the dry season.” As she was thinking this, she
stopped at the base of a steep hill and thought she heard some noises on the
other side. Cautiously, she walked to the peak of the hill and looked out over
a large, level plain. She was overjoyed at what she saw. A large flock of
negiar ran across the plain. They were medium sized, antelope like quadrupeds
with short golden-yellow fur. They had large rounded ears and two knobby horns
on their brows. Hefty tufts of darker fur adorned the shoulders of their
muscular front legs while the smaller hind legs had the shortest fur. Just
behind this group was a large watering hole. Behind that, in the distance, was
the very mountain that had been behind Castle Rock.
Jessica spotted several tightly packed
negiar family groups drinking at the water. She moved closer. The closest
negiar spotted her and tensed up, staring at her. The negiar let out a series
of high pitched “barks”. The other looked up to stare at her too. “Oh no,”
Jessica thought. “They’ve spotted me. How can I get them to move away from the
water so I can get at it?” Jessica knew that negiar were usually not dangerous
but they were still wild animals to be wary of. “Umm…Excuse me folks but could
I borrow some of your water please?” she asked politely. The negiar continued
to stare dumbly at her. “I don’t see any bulls around so this shouldn’t be too
hard.” Jessica untied the jumpsuit from around her neck and raised it into the
air. Brandishing the suit, she ran at the negiar, shouting and yelling. The
drinking animals scattered in all directions. Jessica reached the watering hole
and knelt down to fill her bottle. Then she heard a splashing noise and quickly
looked up.
There, not but three feet in front of her
was a large bull negiar. He stamped the ground with his front hooves, shook his
head at her and snorted angrily. “Uh-oh,” said Jessica. “I didn’t see that guy.
I hope he doesn’t decide to charge.” The negiar was only about up to Jessica’s
chest but he could still bruise her badly with those horns. “Oh h-hi,” she said
sheepishly, slowly backing up. “L-look buddy, all I want is to get a little
water. Y-you don’t mind, d-do you?” The negiar stamped again and shook his
horns furiously. Then he charged. Jessica looked for a place to run to. She saw
a sloping rock just behind her that was just high enough to climb on to. She
ran for the rock while the bull continued to charge. Jessica quickly jumped on
to the boulder and ascended to the highest point. The bull stopped at the foot
of the rock, looked up at Jessica and sorted. “Back negiar! G-good negiar! Let’s
not be too hasty n-now.” The brute stamped the ground once more, turned and
walked back towards the group under his protection. Jessica stayed there for a
moment to gather her wits. “This is pathetic,” Jessica thought. “I don’t have
time for this;
She carefully alighted back to the ground
and inched towards the precious water once more. Then she broke into a run,
heading straight towards the unsuspecting bull. She ran into the bull full
force nearly knocking him to the ground. The stunned bull looked madly back and
forth as Jessica continued to run past him. The bull, now angrier than ever,
charged again. By this time Jessica had reached the water hole again, and was
filling the bottle as quickly as she could. She looked back and spotted the
bull coming. “Come on, come on!” she said, returning her attention to the
bottle. The seconds seemed like minutes as she watched the water ‘seep’ into
the bottle. The bull was almost to her now. “There!” she said, lifting the
bottle out of the water. It was filled to the top with refreshing water. She
looked up to the see that the bull was right on top of her. She nimbly shot
between the bull’s legs, coming out on the other side, and headed back towards
the sloping rock. The surprised bull slid headlong into the water and fell
over. He righted himself again and resumed the chase. Jessica had almost
reached the rock, but the bull was gaining fast. The bull caught up enough with
her to hook at her legs with his horns. The left horn caught Jessica’s ankle
and she tripped and fell. After hitting the ground, she rolled onto her back to
face the bull. She took her jumpsuit and threw it over the bull’s head.
Blinded, the bull tried to get the suit off but it was caught on one of his
horns.
Taking advantage of her clever maneuver,
Jessica lifted herself to her feet and stumbled on to the safety of the rock.
She knew that she could not outrun the negiar if he was able to free himself.
She climbed to the highest point of the rock and sat there. The water bottle
still clutched tightly in her hand. “Oh great,” she thought. “Now I’ll never
get that suit back. It a good thing that Azura’s atmosphere blocks out twenty
five percent more of the sun’s radiation than Earth’s, or I would be deep fried
before I got half way home.” The bull finally threw Jessica’s jump suit aside
and looked around to see where she had gone. He spotted her atop the rock and
ran to the base of the rock. He waited there, panting, for the troublesome
intruder to make one false move. “Ha! You’re vanquished, fiend!” Jessica yelled
at the exhausted bull. “Unfortunately for you, I have the water and all you
have is my jumpsuit!” She sat glaring at the bull for about fifteen minutes
until he decided Jessica wasn’t a threat any more and moved off. She dared not
move until the bull was a safe distance. At length she carefully climbed to the
ground and sneaked away, leaving the negiars to graze.
Following the dried river back to Norman
and the wrecked Flier, Jessica entered the cave and arrived by
“Close,” Jessica replied. “Actually I had
a run in with a particularly nasty bull negiar. He chased me up a rock when I
tried to get the water. But I outsmarted him eventually, although I lost my
jumpsuit in the process. But here’s your water Norm.” She handed the bottle out
to Norm.
“A bull negiar? What was he going to do?
Maul you with his stubs?”
“This bull was the biggest I’ve ever seen,
Norm. And he seemed unusually aggressive. Besides, those “stubs” really hurt.”
There was a hint of annoyance in Jessica’s tone.
“It’s nearly half empty.” Jessica jerked
the bottle back.
“Look buddy, do you want the water or not?
This time Jessica was angry.
“Okay, okay. I’m sorry. I was just toying
with you.”
“Yeah well, I had to do more than ‘toy’ to
get this water. Be a little more grateful, will you?”
“I am grateful, Jessica. Sorry for the
quip.” Jessica’s expression lightened.
“Forget it, Norm. I forgive you. Maybe I
shouldn’t have taken it so personally.” She handed the water back to
“I’d better get going, Norm.”
“I’d say you’re right. Goodbye Jessie.”
“Good bye, Norm. Jessica returned to the
open air. With a sigh, she started southwest: the way home.
* * *
Jessica stood on the edge of a large
precipice, staring at the rocks thirty feet down. She had run straight into a
large canyon that she had not seen before. It had been nearly two hours since
she left
When she hit, the rock quavered slightly,
nearly throwing her off balance. She caught herself and stood up straight. She
looked down to see a slab of rock precariously propped against another rock
jutting up below it. She estimated it was about five feet down. With no other
possibilities anywhere in sight, she had not choice but to go for it. She
fearfully lowered herself off the boulder down as far as she could and dropped.
The moment she hit the slab she heard a cracking sound. “Oh know!” was all she
got out before the support rock split, sending the slab sliding down the
sloping edge of it. She hung on for dear life as it plummeted ten feet to the
canyon floor, kicking up a cloud of dust as it hit with a crash.
Jessica opened her eyes. Amazingly, she
was not hurt. She looked over her arms and legs for bruises or cuts but she
found none. She rolled onto her back, panting at her close call. She jerked
herself up to her feet at the muffled sound of a hoverjet engine somewhere far
above her. “Hey!” she screamed at the top of her lungs. HELP! I’M DOWN HERE!
PLEASE HELP ME!” She stopped herself. “What the heck are you doing Jessica?”
she asked herself. “They can’t hear you if the engine is on, and they especially
can’t find you if you’re down in this cursed canyon!” Jessica scrambled up the
slope that she had found earlier and emerged from the canyon. She looked back
and forth through the sky but saw nothing. The cloud cover was rather thick
during this time of mid afternoon. It looked as if there would be a rare dry
season shower. “Darn! I’ll have to wait until they come for another pass! He
must be in the clouds. Hmm…hoverjets don’t usually fly that high. It must be a
skiff. That’s even better!” Jessica trudged on for another two minutes and then
she heard the skiff again. It emerged from the clouds behind her, leveling out
at a ground- hugging altitude. It seemed to be flying on past her. Jessica
threw her hands into the air wildly, shouting and jumping up and down. The
skiff changed course and started towards her. She smiled profusely as she
waited for the skiff to rescue her. The skiff rapidly grew closer.
Suddenly Jessica turned deathly pale and
her mouth dropped open in horror. There, emblazoned across the side and on the
wings of the skiff were four upside down red stars in a row. Jessica knew that
insignia anywhere. It had been the terror of many a person on Azura for many
years. It was the pirate flag. Jessica turned to run, but she couldn’t see any
place to hide. Several blasts of red energy erupted from the four guns mounted
on the wings. Several shots hit at Jessica’s feet. The skiff swept so low
overhead that she was thrown to the ground. She could hear the volley of shouts
and yips from the rowdy bunch of scoundrels who hung out of the skiff’s open
side door. Jessica got up again and tried to make towards a ridge that
contained many overhanging rocks. Now that the pilot had seen her, she couldn’t
stop him from calling for reinforcements, but she could at least evade the
lasers. The skiff made a large loop around behind her, and started towards her,
a little bit slower this time. “What’s he slowing down for?” Jessica wondered.
A hoverjet and another skiff appeared out of the sun. They were also heading
her way. The hoverjet came down in front of her and hovered there, blocking her
way. Jessica turned to her right and began to run, but the other skiff now
loomed in front of her. The first skiff came down, covering her back exit. The
three craft were now in a triangle formation around her. She started to run out
of one of the gaps but a loud voice boomed over a loud speaker attached to of
one of the skiffs. “Stop right there,” it commanded. Jessica stopped and looked
up to stare into the muzzles of seven cocked rifles. “Its over!” Jessica
groaned inwardly. The three craft settled to the ground and turned their
engines off. The pirates began to pile out of them. Some wore mixed civilian
clothing and military uniforms and some wore mining uniforms. Almost all of
them wore old battered helmets and caps on their heads. The front two
approached Jessica, grinning sinisterly.
“Hey-hey! What have we got here, boys!”
one of them said. He wore a black leather jacket and gray camouflage pants.
There was a red band around his head with markings on it that appeared to
signify some kind of rank. “It’s a little girly!” His partner snickered. He
then spoke to Jessica. “What are you doing way out here, girly? Did you lose
something? Or did you get separated from your mommy and daddy and now you’re
all lost?” Jessica said nothing. “Ah at a loss for words, I see. People usually
are when they finally meet the members of ‘The Four Corpses’ face to face. Hey
you’re kind of cute!” The pirate reached out and pinched Jessica’s shoulder.
She jerked away in fright. All the pirates roared with laughter. The pirate
reached out again, this time grabbing Jessica’s arm tightly. She winced with
the pain. “Well you’re going to fetch us a lot of money, girly. Just you wait.
Clinch!” he barked, to the other pirate.
“Yes lieutenant?” Clinch answered.
“Go check the database. Let’s see if she’s
the daughter of anybody important.”
“Yes sir!” He hurried off towards the
skiff.
“And tell Boss that we have a hostage!”
The lieutenant turned his attention back to Jessica, still clutching her arm.
“Well, m’ names Simon Cartwright, Boss’s
first lieutenant. And what would your name be?”
Jessica scowled at him as she answered.
“I’m not telling you my name Mr. Cartwright. I’m not giving you any information
that might help you exploit me. How could you have a database with all the
mining personnel in it anyway? The files are encrypted by a computer and only
accessible with authorization. I think you’re just trying to scare me.”
“Very true, girly. But let’s just say that
there are certain people in Holocomm’s information department that are more
than willing to accept 100,000 dollars more than they can get on Holocomm’s
puny payroll. Like I said, you’ll fill our pockets yet.”
“A bribe! Our personnel don’t take
bribes!”
“Oh yes they do. So are you going to tell
us who you are now or are you going to let us wait a couple of minutes and find
out anyway?”
“I’d rather keep silent.”
“Oh well, then is there anything we can do
to make you comfortable as we find out everything about you and your family?”
“You can let go of my arm Mr. Cartwright.”
“Oh yes. I seem to have forgotten my
manners.” He let go of Jessica’s arm. “And I suppose you would like some water
as well. We don’t want you to dehydrate before we can collect our ransom. Come
into the skiff, and let’s check you out.” Jessica followed the lieutenant to
the skiff, the expression on her face full of skepticism. “They probably only
have bits and pieces of a faulty database that they extracted themselves.
They’ll match my picture up with the closest match, who will be the wrong
person, and then they will contact my supposed parents, they’ll deny everything
and then these vagabonds will be in a real fix,” Jessica thought to herself.
“We found her, Lieutenant,” reported
Clinch, smugly. All the pirates were crowded around a computer in the four-seat
skiff.
“Pull it up then and let’s see,” ordered
Simon. Clinch pressed a button on a keypad, and brought up Jessica’s exact
profile. Jessica was speechless.
“Ah, good, let’s see,” Simon said. “Your
name is Jessica McKinley, age seventeen, the daughter of Peter and Carol
McKinley. Peter is…excellent! The District Manager! Hey boys! We’ve got the kid
of the boss of an entire base camp!” The rest of the pirates cheered and jumped
up and down. Some ran outside, throwing their helmets and caps into the air.
“How did you…you can’t…how…” was all
Jessica could get out.
“So you’re finally coming to realize that
your life is in our hands,” Simon beamed.
“I-I can’t believe it! You actually have
an authentic data base,” Jessica exclaimed.
“I love to say I told you so. So…I told
you so. Okay enough nonsense! We’re taking you back to our camp and holding you
for ransom. Boss will be very happy.”
“But wait! He’s still out there! Please, I
have to get…” Jessica stopped herself suddenly realizing that if the pirates
knew that her brother was out here it would all be over for sure.
“Eh? What’s that? Is there someone else
out here that we can take hostage?” Jessica thought quickly.
“Uh…my pet negiar! I lost him out here and
he’s our precious family pet! My parents will kill me!”
“Hey, you hear that, boys? Girly’s lost
her little pet. Aww. Isn’t dat sad?” Chuckles rang out once again. “You’re just
going to have to say bye-bye, girly caus’ we’re not coming back.”
“My name is Jessica!”
“Oh I’m sorry girly. We must remember to
call her royal highness by her real name. All right boys, we’re going! The
pirates all climbed back into their vehicles with more yipps and began taking
off. Jessica stared in anguish at the ground as it moved farther and farther
away from her. The image of her brother, her parents and everything she held
dear passed before her eyes. She whispered