Jake's Fortune Ch. 07

"When Jake Evans appeared, we knew we had to do something."

-- Lindsey Z. Edelin,

Secretary of Defence,

United Earth Front,

Addressing the United Earth Senate,

April 2178

***

His uncle had almost managed to convince him to stay when they arrived.

Five military Hunter-Killers were right on their tail. The fast ships were coming in hot from the direction they'd just come from, decelerating and broadcasting demands of surrender. They were only three light minutes away. It would have taken them five hours to shed their speed and brake their velocity enough to intercept them.

"Uncle, there's no time. I have to leave, now." Jake said with urgency.

"Son, if you leave for the colonies, you know we'll never..." his uncle started.

"I know, but I can't stay here. You knew this would happen." he interrupted him.

His uncle sighed.

"I'm sorry, uncle. I'll miss you too." he said with sadness in his eyes.

"What are you going to do?"

"Just give me the Silvertip and I'll be on my way. I'll try to hide in the Oort Cloud for a while, and if they decide to come after me, I'll head out to Gliese 667."

The Silvertip was his uncle's most prized possession. A decommissioned military scout. Slightly battered, indeed she was; but she was fitted with a mass drive and was a very fast craft for her class.

"I don't care how far you go. If you break her, I'll come after you." said his uncle as he tried to cheer him up.

They went to the shuttle bay, and he barely had time to gather some supplies and some of his belongings. He bid the crew farewell and was uploading his AI to the ship's core when he saw Hannah coming into the shuttle bay with a duffel-bag.

"What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm coming with you."

"No, you're not."

"Jake, I can't let you face this alone."

"This is not your fight."

"It is now." she said with conviction.

"Hannah, why are you doing this? I don't understand."

"Because I have to. Someone has to." she paused "And because I care about you."

"For our entire lives, you've been there for me. And when our parents died and we were lost, you stood by me. Even when we grew up and drifted apart, I could still feel it. You care about me, Jake. You're just afraid to admit it."

He stared at her in silence.

"Don't you understand? I have no one left. No one but you." she said as she held his gaze.

He was at a loss for words. He tried to say something but his voice failed him. He silently got into the ship and started the reactor. She followed him inside.

His uncle approached him and handed him a pulse rifle and a big case.

"What is this?" he asked his uncle as he looked at the case.

"You keep it, and only open it when you're in danger. It's my powered-armour, I have no need of it." his uncle said.

"Thanks uncle." he said with emotion as they embraced.

***

They undocked as soon as they were ready. The ship was strangely silent as they left the shuttle bay and quickly accelerated into the Oort Cloud.

Two of the pursuing ships veered off on a different vector for an intercept with the Silvertip and gave chase. Luckily for them, it was immensely difficult to detect, much less intercept a moving object through the field of ice before them, and they broke off from their pursuers with ease. They drifted along with minimal power, and blended in with the cloud of debris.

It was two weeks later and Jake was getting restless. He'd spent some time with the ship's lone fabricator, making some modification to his uncle's armour. He'd also spent a long time talking with Hannah, telling her about Siren and how they'd met, and what she told him about the universe and herself. Although they avoided the topic of her joining him and why.

"It's about time we went somewhere, don't you think?" Hannah prompted him.

"Yeah, I was getting tired from all of this sitting around and talking. You do talk a lot, you know?"

"Only when I'm nervous!" she defended.

"Yeah, right." he replied with a grin.

"Well, let's get back to the topic at hand and consider our options. We could go back to Liberty and try to link up with the Metanoia, or we could head out for the colonies." she said.

"I think I'd rather take my chance at Liberty. I'm not ready to leave everything behind yet."

"It's your call, I personally think we should get out while we can. We don't know what's waiting for us there." she warned.

"I can't stand the thought of not seeing uncle again. It would crush him."

"I understand, but you should consider your own survival. There are two possible outcomes: you either get away, or they catch you. Which outcome do you think he would prefer?"

"I think he'd prefer the first option. But I'm more worried about their fate. I know that uncle can handle himself in a tough situation, but I'm not so sure about the rest of the crew. Can you raise them on the FTL comms?"

"No, we're running on minimal power. Should we power up the reactor?"

"Yes, I think we've been hiding long enough."

They powered up the reactor, and tried to hail the Metanoia with no response.

"Jake, I'm worried about them, do you think they hurt them?"

"Let's go to Liberty and find out." he said stubbornly.

***

They found the Metanoia docked with the station. The station's umbilicals were attached to the ship and nothing looked out of the ordinary. Until they radioed in.

"Jake, get the hell out of..." he heard his uncle start, before static greeted him as the connection was cut.

"Hannah! I think they're in danger!" he said as he frantically set a course to dock with the ship.

"We should go, now. If we're out of their reach they won't have use for any hostages." she tried to reason with him.

"I can't leave my uncle like this!" he shouted as he unstrapped himself and started putting on the powered-armour.

Minutes later they docked and exited the ship, and into the Metanoia's shuttle bay. They looked around at all the weapons trained on them.

"Welcome home, Jake. We've been waiting for you."

***

"Name's lieutenant Richard M. Cole of the UEAF, and I'm here to escort you back to Luna, where you've made yourself quite popular."

"After what you did to the dome, bad move by the way, you're the most wanted individual in the UEF. After Michael Cromwell of course."

"Your uncle and your crew are safe at the moment, this is subject to change based on your actions today. If you come with us without making a fuss, we'll ensure their safety. If not, things you might not like will befall them."

"Now, what say you? Should we get out of here?"

"I'll come with you if you promise not to hurt anyone." Jake replied.

"Jake, no!" Hannah exclaimed.

"I'll be fine, Hannah, don't you worry about me."

"I told you we should get out of here, they would have gained nothing by holding them hostage if we'd fled to the colonies." she said in a low voice.

"Smart girl! You should have listened to her." lieutenant Richard said in amusement.

"What's done is done, do we have a deal?" Jake crossed his arms.

"I won't harm your crew. Now power down your armour." the lieutenant replied.

He did as he asked and two soldiers approached him, they made sure his armour's power supply was unplugged. He was now imprisoned in his own armour. They immediately relaxed and lowered their weapons.

"Get the girl too, she might come in useful." the lieutenant ordered.

"What? No! You promised not to harm anyone!"

"I promised not to harm them, but she's an accomplice! She will be charged with abetting a criminal like the rest of them. You see, I'm not harming anyone. I'm simply bringing them to justice."

Jake struggled to move and protect her, but his armour wouldn't let him.

"As for you, you've got a bright future ahead of you. Sadly, you won't be enjoying it much."

"Bring them in, move it!" he ordered his men.

His soldiers bolted into action and started herding the crew into the shuttle bay. They looked battered and bruised all over. It looked like they had fought for their freedom and failed. Except for Anton who seemed to be faring better than most.

As his uncle came into view. He could see blood sticking to his head and that he had a dislocated arm. He seethed with anger and tried to move again to the same effect.

"You motherfuckers hurt him and I'll gouge out your eyes and paint my ship with your blood!" his uncle shouted as they dragged him in.

"Shut the fuck up." one of the soldiers struck him with the butt of his rifle.

"You promised not to hurt them!" he screamed. Electricity crackled from his fingers as he tried to move, and still his armour wouldn't budge.

"I'm not hurting him, one of my soldiers is. Nice sparks by the way." lieutenant Richard responded with a leer.

"You son of a bitch! You lied to me!"

"No, I tricked you. There's a subtle difference, but it's there."

His eyes glowed with unprecedented intensity and he felt the electricity sizzling down his spine. It found the inlet of his armour's power supply, and he felt the nanotubes in the arms and legs of his armour shudder and flex. He jolted into action.

He struck at them in a blur. Electricity arced out of the electrodes he'd installed on his armour. They aimed and shot but his armour shrugged off the blows, and every soldier he touched shuddered and collapsed. When he was done, they lay unconscious before him.

Luckily for them, most of the electricity went into powering his armour, and what charge was left wasn't lethal.

Lieutenant Richard was looking at him in shock, he tried to move but Jake pointed a finger at him.

"One move and I'll fry you alive. I've had enough of your shit for one day." Jake shouted in anger as he tried to fight off the fatigue.

The lieutenant flipped the safety on his pistol and pushed it away.

"Restrain him." he told the crew. Someone brought some cuffs off an unconscious soldier, and as they restrained him tightly. Aisha punched him in the face and gave him a blossoming bruise that rivalled her own.

Jake felt himself calm down and the energy seeped from his body. He suddenly couldn't move again and felt drained. Hannah reattached his power supply and kissed him on the cheek.

"Thank you." she whispered.

They finished restraining the rest of the soldiers and the crew gave him grateful looks of admiration. He was starting to hate those looks.

"What will we do now?" nurse Ruiz asked.

***

They handed the helpless soldiers to the station's occupants, and they received them with jubilation. They're going to have a field day. Jake thought.

Then they set a course for Gliese 667.

At a distance of twenty-two light years, and thanks to relativity, the journey would take them only three months, and yet twenty-two earth years would have passed to the rest of the universe.

Hannah came to him as he hopped into the acceleration pod, she looked him in the eye and kissed him again, this time on the lips. "For the journey." she said before she blushed and hurriedly went for her pod.

He was wondering what got into her when he received the injection from the ship's AI and drifted to sleep.

They spent ten days accelerating to near light speed, then they exited the acceleration pods for a coasting period of two and a half months.

***

"Okay, EVA. Time to upgrade this armour." he said to his AI.

"What would you like me to do?" it inquired.

"Let's start by installing a new breastplate. I want a superconducting covellite coating and a flexible nano-lattice."

The AI queried him for the exact specifications and started calculating the materials required.

"Starting fabrication sequence." it stated.

The fabricator hummed as it started producing the components. Jake couldn't help but be fascinated by the process. It took humanity almost a century to build the first fabricator, but once it was built, they used it to build more fabricators and the technology was readily available to everyone.

The fabricator worked by gradually assembling complex molecules from their component atoms. Given a blueprint, it could assemble anything from water to complex proteins and carbon nanotubes. The first corporation to develop it had tried to charge for its use, but the economy almost crashed when people started fabricating diamonds.

Two hours later. He installed the new breastplate and started testing it.

He spent weeks installing new systems and replacing old ones. When he was satisfied with the result, the armour looked considerably different from what he started with, and when he showed it to his uncle he scowled at him and asked him why he broke it. He laughed.

***

It was late in the night, ship-time, when Hannah came to visit him in his workshop.

"Hi, Hannah. Is there something you need?" he asked her.

"I just wanted to talk." she said as she closed the distance.

"What would you like to talk about?"

"About us." she replied.

"What's there to talk about?" he wondered.

"It's you, Jake. You've been distancing yourself from me. I'd like to know why." she said in frustration.

"Look, I just have my problems, okay?" he said as he ran his hands through his hair.

"And what kind of problems would those be?" she asked.

He hesitated.

"I just... I feel like everything is collapsing around me all of a sudden. My old life is shattered. I'm a fugitive, and things aren't looking too good right now."

"Jake, we're all in this together. If we stick together, nothing will bring us down. But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about you dodging me all the time. It's like you're deliberately avoiding contact with me. Why is that?"

He stared at her in silence. She looked him in the eye.

"You have no idea why, do you?"

He finally sighed and said "I don't know."

She moved closer and held his hand.

"Jake, I..." she began.

Suddenly their thoughts melded, and she understood, he understood. Their emotions collided as they connected on a level so deep, they could feel each other's emotions and fears.

"Do you see now?" Siren whispered to both of them.

"Oh my god!" Hannah said as she jerked her hand away.

"What did you do, Siren?" he asked, perplexed.

"For a split second, I bridged your minds." she whispered.

"What did she say?" Hannah asked him.

"She said she bridged our minds." he said in bafflement.

"She can do that?"

"I guess she can."

"I've never felt anything like it." she said as her eyes welled.

"Neither have I. It was... odd."

"I understand you now, Jake. You don't have to fear it. There's nothing wrong with us being together if we both want it. Screw everybody else." she said with tears in her eyes.

"I understand you, too. I never realised it felt so lonely. I'm so sorry." he said apologetically.

They embraced and their thoughts melded again. She cried on his shoulder as he tried to soothe her.

"I'm so sorry."

***

He spent the rest of the coasting period training with Siren, and he gradually felt better as his control improved. She also taught him how to organise his thoughts and control his impulses.

Hannah avoided him as much as she could, and she wouldn't say why. Then it was time to get into the acceleration pods again, and begin the long braking manoeuvre. Which took ten more days.