In the 5th or 6th grade (circa 1995/1996), I wrote a sci-fi novel(la) entitled Renegades. It is more or less a blatant rip-off of any sci-fi or action movie or book I had consumed up until that point in my life. It definitely reads like the work of a 5th-grader, and I’m fairly certain I introduce a new character with a semi-unpronounceable name every few paragraphs, only to kill them off shortly afterward. Having recently recovered this work of art from floppy disk (!), I plan to serialize it here over the coming days. Enjoy (?).

RENEGADES

… Continued from Part 1.

Part 2

Eight months passed after the fate of Jack Decartier and she had heard nothing, it was very late that night of December 21 when a E-mail came through. The loud beeping awoke her in her antechamber. The computer screen had lit up and a large window reading ‘you have mail‘ over and over. She stepped out of her bed, still with the jeans and T-shirt she had on from before, all she recalled was just dozing off at eight o’clock after some party the evening prior. Putting on some shoes, she brushed her hand through her long, dark hair. Claire Yulin, a former recruit of the Alderian military, approached the monitor and viewed the mail. There was only one message, a simple and short one. It was from Johnathan Decartier, her boyfriend’s brother. What would he want?

She read: Claire, it’s Johnny. Where are you? if you’re anywhere around Alamine or Exotia, come and meet me on Exotia station as soon as you can, it is very urgent, I need your help.

*  *  *

A glass dome and mile-long hotels, Exotia was as space holiday station, not for war or experiments, but for pleasure, it was not as big as the Comachen spaceliner but still, it was big enough. Johnathan Decartier was only there for an hour, until he had a sudden urge to go back to the best restaurant and bar in the sector, Kullin’s Pub it was called, and his brother had taken him there when he was twenty, and the first time, he had loved it, mostly for the view of the red gas giant planet, Alamine, and it’s four moons, which were also colonized. He had hoped that Claire Yulin had lived on one of them, but when he had sent the E-mail, he only had the name of her and not any address, so her residence was anonymous. Or maybe she was dead, he thought. No, it can’t be. The last time he had seen her was at the Alderian council two years ago where he had met Neill Othan as a cargo carrier pilot and was laid off by budget cuts. Claire had disappeared after Jack became wanted or rejected by both empires, and only contacted him once after the council.

He was now at the pub, boy oh boy, had he missed this place, and the view he had not seen in three years. The tables sat in place, still for rich gamblers who had stayed at the station or poor drunks that could not resist the alcohol. The huge bar was still there as he remembered, Liol Kullin still serving as barkeep and owner for twenty years. John stepped into the restaurant, no one he knew was there except Kullin, but even he would not recognize John, therefore, in that eight months, had grown a short, black beard and his hair was now in a long pony tail. Luckily there was no Comachens in the room, but he had seen a patrol throughout the station. His pace was normal across the tiled floor towards the old-fashioned bar table that was always packed with people. This pub was in the center of the hotel and rises to the top of the station. Robot waiters skid from the bar to several tables every couple seconds. He now wore a black leather jacket along with matching black baseball cap. He was sure that no one would notice him except Kullin and Claire (if she was here.)

When he was just about to sit down at the bar, he was tugged on by his too-large jacket from the side. He looked over and it was a man clothed totally in black and he could not see his face that was covered by a black ski mask. “Are you Alderian?” The man asked.

“Yeah” John said.

“Jonathan Decartier?”

John nodded. Who was this guy? The man now signaled him to sit down. Jonathan remained standing.” What do you want?”

“I’m from Claire Yulin, she sent me to rendezvous with you.”

Jonathan Decartier sighed and finally sat down at a chair facing him. “Why didn’t she come herself?”

The man signaled to another man dressed exactly the same at the doorway. “Because she’s dead.”

Jonathan knew the man was lying and something was wrong. The man at the door was now giving orders in a com-link, and suddenly, a group of more guys in black suits surrounded them from above on the catwalks with machine guns. “We’ll give you one minute to evacuate!” The man at the door yelled to the employees and citizens in the restaurant. There was a frenzy of shoving and pushing to get out the doors.

“Who are you working for?” Jonathan demanded.

“You, Mr. Decartier.” The man paused while pulling out a machine gun from under the table. “And we’ve got to get you off this station.”

The people were now almost fully out of the room. “What?”

The man was not paying any attention to him. “Klorry, take him to the docking bay.”

The guard at the door ran over and took Jonathan from behind and shoved him towards the door. “It’s for you’re own good.” The man announced as he was leaving.

Jonathan was then shoved through the kitchen doors and towards the docking bay.

* * *

Liol Kullin was stopped by a Comachen patrol. “What’s goin on in there?” The guard asked.

“We were overtaken by a group of raiders,” Kullin replied. “Their probably equal force to you’re patrol.”

The guard armed his machine gun. “Were goin in.”

“Sir, they have guns.” Said a man behind Kullin.

The Comachen guards stormed into the restaurant, guns blazing taking out the man who was talking to Jonathan and several others on the catwalk. Two Comachens fell but within a minute or so the raider party was dead.

“Two of ‘em escaped, sir.” Said a guard. The guard turned to face him.

“Well go get ‘em.”

“Yes, sir.” and the guard took four others to find the two that escaped.

“Oh, and Lieutenant,” the guard added.” Don’t shoot anyone till I arrive.”

* * *

The second band of guards left the room and was now after the two renegades. They ran through the station so quickly no one had a chance to stop them or talk to them, the guard was running ahead with a tight grip on Jonathan’s right wrist, tugging him along. Jonathan was full of questions but he would not ask now in public space, he would wait till he got to the ship. Were these strangers Alderian? Were they raiders? Lit up signs hung from the ceiling with arrows pointing to locations, The docking bay was forward, but the guard released his grip and ran off to the right, signaling for Jonathan to come with him.

The raider finally spoke. “There on to us.” The raider took off the ski mask to reveal an dark-skinned face and short black hair. The man was sweating heavily, and after a short break, he started to run through the corridor again, and Jonathan ran with him. He finally reached a ladder up into the thirteenth floor and higher. The man started to climb and up through the ceiling and the ceiling after that. Jonathan was not as quick or athletic as the man but he still kept the raider in view. They rose up the station fairly quickly until they reached the twenty first floor, the tower room. On top of the dome was a to were and the tower rose until it shaped into a disc-shaped docking bay. One side was a window-wall and the other was an airlock similar to the one on the Comachen Spaceliner.

After about waiting and panting for five minutes a ship appeared, a four person shuttle-craft armed with two rotating Gatling machines on either side. The ship was approaching the airlock very slow, and they could see the pilot clearly enough to see the wrinkles on his face and the smoke rising from his cigarette, and he dressed nothing like the raiders. There were no emblems or inscriptions on the exterior of the shuttle-craft. The ship was about to dock when another ship came up from behind and was flying towards the shuttle at a fast rate, finally Jonathan realized what had come, a Comachen 2204 attack ship. In a split second fire blazed from the attack ship and the shuttle-craft disintegrated before them and now the attack ship was docking…

The raider armed his gun, and pointing at the airlock. Jonathan crouched back into the corner. A thump in the airlock. The door on the other side was opening. Suddenly the airlock opened and fire came burning through the doorway. The pilot had a flame-thrower! The pilot still had his flight mask on, melting the raider. The Raider had died immediately and the metal floor scorched. Jonathan still in the corner staring at the pilot.

The pilot the spoke. “Put you’re hands in the air and stay where you are.”

Jonathan did so, and he would not gain anything by being melted. Then another Comachen guard party stormed up from the ladder-way guns pointed at Jonathan.

Now, there was no escape, and he’d either be tortured or put in prison.

A prison shuttle was there within the hour…

* * *

Liol Kullin was now stepping through the massacre in his bar. “What a mess.” He said in his old, deep voice. Some of the employees now were there too, one of them fainted. Some of his alcohol was spared but some all over the floor and their bottles in shards. Only two Comachen officials were down in their beige uniforms and red caps or helmets. Guns lay on the floor and one young employee took one up and gazed upon it. The gun was as long as his leg and had a zooming lens and laser aiming system, this was a Comachen-made gun but he found it with a body of a raider.

“Put that thing down Brett.” The barkeep yelled at him.

He was startled by the yell but he did follow his command, he put it down beside the guard, the picked it back up again. ” No one should know what happened here.”

“What?” yelled another waiter.

The gun was now pointing at Kullin. The barkeeper’s hands were up in the air and giving the waiter a strange look.

” Allow me to introduce myself, I am Rian Broman, Comachen mercenary, and I am in pursuit of the only man who escaped this incident, Jonathan A. Decartier, and you Mr. Kulin, are going to help me find him, even if it takes years…”

* * *

Claire Yulin had just arrived on Exotia five minutes ago and now in the main shopping plaza and bazaar. But how would she find Jonathan in a crowd? People were everywhere and pushing and shoving. Suddenly a ship zoomed over the dome roof of the shopping center and it caught her eye. That was a Comachen prison shuttle, that gave her the feeling, that Jonathan was not here anymore…

* * *

“Sortak in range. Code clearance: F4NBV9.” Jonathan heard from inside the tight security of the shuttle. The prison was called Sortak and it was Eight miles below the surface of the moon of Sortak. The prison was a mine until the Comachens took it over in 2201 and most of all their convicts or soldiers were sent their to be killed or to be forgotten, he had heard rumors that at Sortak they erased your identity and leave you in a oubliette to rot alone in the dark with no food or water. The ship was now entering the tunnel to the prison where possibly hundreds of people were dying. A number of landing platforms stood high on titanium stilts and ranged from fighter ship size to a large cargo cruiser. The prison was like a tree, they were now entering the trunk and branches led off in every possible direction leading to smaller branches full of prison cells, the main corridor was about a mile in length and about a quarter of a mile in width and a huge bridge in the center led to all the dark branches.

The lighting was poor and the sound of suffering and death rang in his ears as he was tugged out of the ship. He was now escorted out of the shuttle and onto a flight of stairs down to the bridge that was crowded with prisoners. Other landing platforms were around too with people being led off by guards and into the crowd, each group being led off into a branch of cells. They were then broken up into five-person groups per every prison cell. After five minutes had joined the handcuffed crowd being led by large grim-looking Comachen guards. On either side of the bridge every two metres was one of these guards watching for trouble. Far below the “bridge” they were on was a large mineral excavation full of hard working slaves.

Suddenly, as he looked down, a slave abandoned his work and approached a guard… He threw the first punch, and like chain reaction, others began doing the same. Bullets were fired and a number of bodies fell to the ground. The same prisoner who attacked the guard found himself impaled to a wall with a mining drill and died seconds later. He was shocked to see this, and he found himself lucky to go to a cell and not the fury below. The guards on either side looked very unhappy wearing black Comachen uniforms and crowd control plastic helmets and some with battle suits and grenades strapped to belts. They all carried assault rifles with 4″ laser aiming lens.

When the bridge split into the cell veins, superior lieutenants stood there waiting, one in charge of each prisoner group and a escort of six guards. Everyone looked so hopeless while watching their feet, not daring to look up, but Jonathan was very curious. Suddenly he was nudged from beside him by a man in his early thirties and was in a Alderian Neutral zone uniform. (The border space around the Alderian system was the Neutral zone and patrolled by Alderians and small stations). The man was very tall, almost a head taller then the 5 foot eight Jonathan. He had no facial hair and had dark brown hair covered in dirt and dust.

“Who are you?” John asked the man.

“I’m a friend.” He replied. “Stick with me and we could get out of here, I know this place like the back of my hand.”

“Why do you want to help me?”

“You’re Johnny Decartier? The Black Rangers are after you.” The man said.

“You mean those guys in the ski masks?” Jonathan asked. The man nodded. “Who are they?”

“The Black Rangers are Alderian secret service and working under the command of the three Alderian admirals and are extremely skilled and talented.” The man explained. ” They knew you were on Exotia and they knew it was a trap, they came to save you, and unfortunately only one of them escaped and is somewhere on Sortak, or is on their way here, but I don’t know where.”

“But why would they save me?”

“You have that info disk, don’t you?” The man asked.

“Yeah, but they took it from me where I was caught.”

“Drat!” The man stammered. “Because without that Alderia is doomed.”

Jonathan then realized that Alderia could not survive without that critical enemy information. He was now at the end of the bridge and was being led down a very dark cell vein with a Lieutenant and a party of guards, the three other prisoners other than the man he had just met were not as grim looking as the rest of the crowd, one was in a Alderian engineer suit and the other two were ordinary prisoners, dressed in rags, scars on their faces and bare footed. It was getting darker as they went and they could not see five metres in front of them but at that moment, the lieutenant switched on a light on his Gatling canon (a weapon used in eliminating crowds and very lethal and illegal in most parts of the known systems). They had now reached the end of the tunnel where a airlock door marked B-22. After a series of code inscriptions the door opened leading to a room sunken about four feet with a brown-dirt filled floor and a single light panel on the roof an a small fan, the room was pentagon shaped and there were no beds and no hospitality. They were all shoved in immediately and the guards disappeared as the air- locked door closed, everyone was either on there backs or rubbing their sores, no one spoke, it was if they would be forgotten and die very soon…

The ongoing serialization of “Renegades” will continue in the coming days. Please stay tuned.

Read Part 3.