Ace and The Space Pirates

by K. A. Williams

After a month, I had finally made it off the space station onto a transport liner. The Seeking Star, carrying passengers and cargo, was bound for settlements in the outer worlds.

Exciting adventures were awaiting me. One day I would be captain of my own ship, sail into unknown regions, discover new alien species and—

“You missed a place,” said an authoritative voice snapping me out of my reverie. “And you need to hurry up if you don’t want to miss your lunch. The cafeteria is only open another half hour, and I wanted you to finish the rest of the blue corridor before you go.”

Lieutenant Gray, in his immaculate uniform, no stray hair out of place, stepped around my waxing and buffing machine and me, careful not to slide on the newly polished floor, and hurried off.

“The rest of the blue corridor,” I repeated to myself. I glanced at my wrist. According to the display on my timepiece, it had taken me an hour to get this far. I couldn’t see around the corner to tell how much hallway was left, and I just knew I was going to miss lunch. I sighed.

This was the only way I could get passage, though, I wasn’t smart enough to be an officer or rich enough to be a passenger. At least I wasn’t one of the service workers assigned to clean the landing bay area. That would have been worse.

Although I pushed myself, it took forty minutes, the cafeteria must have closed ten minutes ago. I needed to know where it was located anyway, and there was a map on the wall in all the corridors. I looked at it. The cafeteria was in the white corridor, at the end of the blue corridor, which was at the end of the green corridor. I was close to it, but I had to take the floor machine back to its room in the green corridor, so by the time I did that and returned to the cafeteria, it was twenty minutes past closing time.

Since the doors were still open, I went inside even though the cafeteria seemed to be empty. One food container was still steaming, I picked up a tray and stood in front of it. I couldn’t tell what it was because of the mist on the glass but I was hungry.

“Hello? Anyone there?” I called.

“Coming,” answered a voice.

A woman appeared in the open doorway behind the serving containers. She was tall.

“Is that any good?”

She shrugged. “Most of the customers liked it.”

“I’ll take it.”

She spooned a glob of the food on a plate and handed it to me. It looked like macaroni and cheese, my favorite. I hoped it was that and not some inedible alien cuisine.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Drinks are at the end of the line,” she said. “Along with the utensils.”

I went to the end of the line, grabbed up a spoon and regarded the bottled drinks. I selected the only one I was familiar with, then handed her my voucher. She scanned it on the machine in front of her and gave it back.

There were a lot of tables, and they had been cleaned already. I sat down at the closest table, and the cafeteria lady came out from behind the serving line and joined me. “New here?” she guessed.

“I am. My name’s Chris.” I tasted the food. “It’s delicious. I love macaroni and cheese.”

“I’m glad you like it, Chris. You couldn’t pronounce my name. Everyone just calls me Blue. I was hired because I’m familiar with human language and food. As you know, the crew and passengers are mostly humans, so the macaroni and cheese was well received, but I made more than was needed. I had cleaned the tables and was about to put the remainder of it into the refrigerator when you came in. You look tired.”

“Lieutenant Gray had me waxing and buffing the floor of the entire blue corridor.”

She nodded. “I know him. Don’t like him much.”

I smiled. “Me either. He didn’t seem to care if I got lunch or not.”

“Some of the officers are like that on this ship.”

She reminded me of my mother; her personality, not her appearance. This woman had four arms, which must be useful if your job was cooking and serving food, and cleaning tables. Her skin was blue, and so was her hair.

I’d seen aliens before, of course, just not any with four arms. I was hoping to see a lot more aliens on this trip, and I was rather disappointed that most of us on this ship were humans.

Suddenly the ship rocked violently, and my empty plate crashed to the floor along with my drink. “What was that?”

“Probably pirates. I overheard Captain Sterling at lunch today when he told Lietenant Gray about reports of space pirates in this area, but because this is a shorter route, here we are.”

“What do we do?” I asked, afraid. “Do you have any weapons? Will they kill everyone on board?”

She actually laughed. “Relax. Not us. Maybe a few of the officers if they’re stupid enough to fight for the cargo. That’s what they want. Go back to your room and wait there. When they come in, just hold your hands up and surrender. They’ll release the passengers and ship once they’ve looted her.”

I was shaking. She patted my arm. “You’ll be all right if you do what I told you.”

I ran out of the cafeteria. Where was my room? I had only been in it once to put my bag inside, then the lieutenant had me working ever since. Where were the service quarters? Weren’t they in blue corridor? Or was it green?

Shouting echoed in the distance while I stepped in front of all the doors in blue corridor but the retina scan never matched mine.

On to the green corridor. One door opened immediately for me, and I rushed inside. This wasn’t my room, it was the storage room that contained the waxing and buffing machine.

I heard running footsteps and backed up until I reached the rear wall of the room. The lights weren’t turning on automatically for some reason, I had noticed that each time I was in there, but I had light from the corridor then. The automatic doors closed in one minute unless someone was standing in the doorway. After the door shut I was in total darkness. Maybe I could hide behind the floor machine so no one could see me if they came inside.

I groped around in the dark. There was some kind of lever on the back corner of the wall. When I tugged on it, the rear wall opened. I stepped into another room behind this one, and the wall closed with me inside the hidden room which was also dark.

Trembling, I just stood there in the silent darkness for a long time, before I heard voices in the room I’d just been in.

“Yeah, like I told you, there wasn’t any resistance except for the captain, his security team, and a few officers. The pilot and navigator have locked themselves on the bridge, so they’re out of the way. The other officers are being held captive in the cafeteria with the rest of the crew and passengers. There’s one crew member missing,” said a voice.

“It’s dark in here, I can’t see anything. Hand me that light,” said a second voice. There was a brief silence. “There’s nothing in here. We’ll go report to our captain, and you can explain to her why you thought it was a good idea to open the landing bay doors and release the vacuum seal while the captain and his security team were still inside. The ship’s captain was probably the only one who knew if there was any valuable hidden cargo. Let’s get out of here.”

There was silence again. At least I was safe here, but I wanted to rescue the others. Yet what could I do alone? I started exploring the new room, carefully with my hands out, since I couldn’t see. Suddenly I touched something, was that an arm? Were they hiding, like me?

“Is there someone else here?” I asked.

“Yes,” came the answer.

“I’m glad I’m not alone. Those pirates were talking about holding the passengers and crew prisoners in the cafeteria. I wish there was something we could do to help them.”

“There is,” answered the male voice.

“Good. My name’s Chris. Help me find a way out of this room and tell me how we can fight a bunch of pirates.”

“Okay,” he said, and I heard a noise and the sound of the wall opening.

“Great, can you find the door to the other room too?”

I saw the light from the corridor. “All right,” I said. “Now tell me your plan.”

“My plan is to use my stealth mode to disarm the pirates while you stay safe.”

“What stealth mode? Are you an android? I don’t hear anyone in the corridor, let’s go out so that I can see you.”

We left the dark room, and I studied him in the light. He looked like an ordinary human male, with brown hair and brown eyes, dressed in casual clothes.

“Stealth mode, huh? You’re no android.”

“I’m an experimental prototype designed to appear human with stealth capability and built-in weapons.”

“What kind of weapons?” I didn’t believe him, androids never looked this human.

“Non-lethal weapons such as electric shock.”

“Really? Show me the stealth mode.”

He did. “Wow! You’re invisible.”

“Not invisible. Camouflaged. I’m the exact shade of green as the walls and floor.”

“Do you have a name?”

“My designation is Alpha Camouflage Electric-shock.”

“Oh,” I said, “I’ll just call you Ace. Let’s go.”

“Do you have any weapons to defend yourself?”

“Well, no.”

“I am programmed to protect humans. You must wait here, Chris, and stay safe.”

“I don’t think so, Ace,” I disagreed. “Lead the way to the cafeteria.”

Ace didn’t respond, he’d already gone on without me. Maybe I could find a weapon in the utility room I’d been in.

I went back inside, searched by feel, and discovered a long thin cylinder with buttons which I pressed at random. Suddenly a beam of light shot out, and the room got brighter. That was a great find. I used the light to look around, saw some antiquated equipment, I think they are called mops and brooms, and I was thankful the lieutenant hadn’t made me use them to clean the corridor floors.

I searched behind those, found a long narrow black case and opened it. A thin silver object that resembled a sword with no hilt was inside. Just what I needed, a broken sword, yet it gleamed and looked sharp. I touched it gingerly, and the blunt end shivered and crawled up onto my wrist attaching itself. I’d heard of sentient swords before but had never seen one. I wondered whose it was and what it was doing here. I’m sure its owner wouldn’t mind if I borrowed it.

By the time I reached the cafeteria, six pirates lay on the floor twitching. The only pirate standing held a sword at Lieutenant Gray’s throat. “We got the guns, but there’s always some valuable hidden cargo. Tell me where it is,” he said.

When I entered, the pirate turned his attention and sword to me. He had a sentient sword like mine. We parried and, thankfully, the sword knew what it was doing, because I didn’t.

We fought until my sword disarmed his, and I put my sword against his chest the way I’d seen it done in old movies and said, “Do you yield?”

The pirate hesitated, and the sword pressed harder against his chest of its own accord. “Yeah, yeah, I yield.”

“Drop your sword,” I ordered him. It clattered to the floor.

Lieutenant Gray grabbed it up and, after it attached itself to his left wrist, he pushed that pirate over to stand with the other pirates. Then Lieutenant Gray saluted me and said, “I see you found my hidden sword.” I tried to take it off and give it to him but it wouldn’t let go. He laughed and shook his head. “That thing never did like me. Consider it a gift in exchange for the rescue.” He waved his new sword at me. “Besides, this new sword does like me.”

“Thanks, Lieutenant Gray. Where is Ace?”

“Ace?”

“The android.”

“So that’s what stunned those pirates. The one with the sword attacked me when the pirate captain ran out, probably heading back to the landing bay where her ship landed after our shields failed. I assume Ace followed her. Captain Sterling told me about the android but not where it was hidden. I guess he didn’t trust me, I’ve only been on the ship a month. How did you find it?”

“He was behind the wall in the utility room. I, uh, hid there when I couldn’t find my room,” I admitted.

“I don’t blame you,” he said. “Besides settlement supplies, the ship was carrying stun weapons. We were going to open a box and use them, but the pirates overpowered us before we could. You’re a real hero. I’m sorry I was rough on you earlier.”

“It’s all right,” I said. And it was; he’d given me a wonderful sword.

The passengers and crew were sitting at tables. Blue waved at me and smiled. “I’m glad you’re okay,” she said.

I smiled back. “I’m glad you’re okay, too.”

The lieutenant removed the things stolen from the passengers and crew by the pirates and dumped them on one of the tables. Everyone was reclaiming their jewelry and other items when Ace returned to the cafeteria with the pirate captain walking meekly in front of him. The lieutenant pointed his new sword at the captain and motioned her in the direction of the other pirates with it.

“You were supposed to stay safe back at the utility room,” Ace said to me.

“I found a weapon.” I indicated my sword. “You can go into rest mode now,” I told it. The attached tendril slid from my wrist to my waist and wrapped itself around it. The blade became a dull gray when it grew a protective coating over its sharp edges. Then it rested, waiting to be called back into service.

Lieutenant Gray said, “Since I’m now the highest ranking surviving officer, I’m captain of this ship, and I’d like to offer you a position.”

“Really? But I don’t know anything about starships.”

“You’re brave, and you cared what happened to the crew and passengers and risked your life to save me. The pirates killed the captain, other officers, and our security chief and her team. I’d like you to be my new security chief.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I’m sorry about the death of the captain and the others.”

“I didn’t know them well,” Gray said. “We will have a memorial service for all of them tomorrow.”

“What happens to Ace?”

“He can be your security team. He’s all you’ll need.”

“Won’t his manufacturers try to take him back?”

“The space battle must have jarred him, and switched him on prematurely. I’m sure he automatically sent a signal of some kind to his manufacturers when he was first activated, so they’ll know he failed to reach his destination beforehand. Only Captain Sterling knew the android’s destination, so I couldn’t deliver him if I wanted to. They won’t bother you because they would assume the powerful android is under someone else’s control now. They’ll just cut their losses and try again with a newer model.”

Ace looked at me. “What do I do now?”

“We help the new captain lock these pirates up somewhere safe until we can turn them over to authorities on the next planet we come to. Right, Captain Gray?” It was my first act as security chief.

He smiled in approval. “And then I want you to get some help and get our stolen stun weapons and supplies off of the pirate ship.”

“Yes, Captain,” I said. When I looked in the direction of the space pirates, I saw their captain whispering to them with a smile on her face.

I walked over to them and flexed my hand. The sword understood, reattached itself to my wrist and resumed its gleaming silver color and sharpness. I pointed it at the captain. The sword strained to reach her but I held it back. “As you can see, my sword is ready for action,” I said.

She flinched a little. “I’m unarmed.”

“Yeah, I don’t think it cares. I want to know why you’re smiling when you’ve lost. How many pirates are in your crew?”

She looked around her. “Just these.”

“I don’t think so. I think there’s at least one more.”

Captain Gray looked at me and nodded. “I should have thought of that.”

I turned to the android. “We’ll go search the pirate ship. Don’t run on ahead and leave me. This time I have a weapon.”

I also had a new job and a new friend. My adventures weren’t awaiting me, they had already begun.