Page 10 of Kidnapped By the Alien Chieftain

Chapter 6

Krogoth

Swarmed

The door whizzes openas I burst through the command bridge.This is bad, only four hands on deck. I carefully set Pebbles down before I leap to the central control station. I check the visual display. “It’s a Seeker Swarm. They’ll intercept us any second.” I clench my fists.

“Send out a ship wide call to war. You are acting helmsman,” I demand, pointing at the warrior on my left.

I turn to the warrior beside me. “Go find Xandor,” I command, “and tell him to assemble a war band in case any of those bastards make it through.”

“Yes, Chieftain.” He salutes, then runs out of the room.

The lights in the ship change to a deep red. I feel the excitement building in me as the steady and rhythmic wardrums echo throughout the ship. All aboard will know a battle will soon commence.

“You two,” I nod at the remaining two short-haired warriors, “Prime the forward arc cannons.” I point to the two cannon controls.

“I’ll take the starboard quarter.” Looking around, my body tenses up.There’s no one left to control the port quarter.Too few of us!I snarl, running over to the cannon controls.

“I can help,” Pebbles says with a smile that is contradicted by a trembling hand raised.

My heart swells with pride.Gods protect my brave fierce Pebbles.“No, it’s too dangerous.”My gaze bores into her.

“Glare all you want, Korgy. But I’d rather help fight the Sillyheads than do nothing,” Pebbles snaps while grabbing the cannon controls in her tiny hands. “How do they work?” she asks.

I rush over to her, my heart pounding as I guide her soft, trembling hands with mine. “You move the controls like this,” I say, demonstrating how to maneuver the targeting system. “Line up the reticle on the display, and then squeeze the trigger to kill the bastard Scythians,” I say, noticing her sweet scent intoxicating me even amongst such danger.

“Chieftain, they have requested a comms channel,” the newly appointed helmsman announces levelly.

The Rush is building faster now. I feel the blood whooshing in my ears. “On screen.”

The central console flashes to a visual display of the stern of the ship. The Seeker Swarm has formed into a menacing face made up of thousands of individual attack drones. They are a sea of metal orbs with a red lens in the center, glittering menacingly against the bleak, empty void of space.

Sudden loud garbled audio static of machine code assaults my ears. The swarm moves to mimic the mouth movementsof speech.The Scythians always were masters of psychological warfare, but I feel only a burning hatred where my fear should be.

“Chieftain, they request we power down our shields. They wish to scan us,” the helmsman reports.

“Send back we are a Klendathian war vessel seeking repairs to re-join the Nebian war effort.”

The display shows the Seeker Swarm face forming into a snarling roar. They fill the room with more garbled machine code audio, which assaults the senses.

“Chieftain. They threaten to destroy us unless we comply within 30 seconds.”

“Cut the comms.” I look over at Pebbles, nodding. She tries to smile and mask her fear, but I notice a flicker of horror crossing her face as she struggles to regain her composure. “All guns open fire!” I roar.

Turning my attention to my cannon control display, I can see the swirling mass of Seeker drones still forming a face. Aiming the targeting reticle directly into their center, I feel anger now, hot and heavily pouring into my veins like boiling oil. I pull the trigger.

The array of starboard cannons explodes into life, hurling a volley of super charged plasma into the swirling mass. They instantly melt straight through. Seeker drones hit, their shields no match.

The swarm quickly responds, breaking formation into a dispersed group of thousands. They descend upon the ship, weathering the constant barrage of arc cannon fire. Now within range, thousands of Seeker drones unleash plasma projectiles, crashing into the ship’s shields. The ship rumbles as it absorbs so many continuous hits.

“Shields at 90%. Taking evasive maneuvers,” the helmsman states calmly.

I almost lose balance as the ship tilts to one side. I whip my targeting reticle around, attempting to keep the most quantity of Seeker drones on target. It proves difficult as they are extremely agile, able to change direction abruptly. They dance outside the ship, moving like tiny red lights, as we endlessly blast them with the heat of a thousand suns. Still, they come.We can’t evade them.

“Shields at 70%.”

Several Seeker drones crash, exploding into the ship’s rear, which lurches to one side. The dazzling blue flames of the impact rip along the stern, causing the shields to ripple like waves. I feel a surge of adrenaline at the beautiful chaos unfolding in the void.

---