Empress Fallen (Through Darkness Book I)

Chapter Four: A Tyrant Spell: Part 1

Chapter Four

A Tyrant Spell

The night is darkening round me,

The wild winds coldly blow,

But a tyrant spell has bound me

And I cannot, cannot go.

Spellbound, Emily Bronte

i. Insidiae

Miriam felt the sweat gathering on her forehead as she closed the aft viewport on the side screen and gripped the control sticks on the central column, falling back into her seat. Another blast shook the station as the Eagle-Class Imperial frigate's electrolaser turrets spewed a channel of searing white light at their hull, the plasma ripping through their unshielded starboard side.

'Another thruster's gone,' Miriam cried, eyes flicking back and forth between the controls and the Imperial frigate looming through the window. Its sweeping black wings dwarfed the station, like a screaming Tyrannian hunter eagle over a crippled insect. 'If they get a chance to activate that antimatter canon we're dead.'

Hadrian staggered over to Luana as she cycled through the countless damage reports from all eight levels, leaning heavily on her chair as the station bucked and jerked.

'Can we charge the Quarter engine at this low a speed?' he coughed, doubling over.

'Thrusters now only at 10% of maximum and decreasing,' Miriam called.

'We'll be ripped apart if we go to quarter light speed now let alone –' Luana cried, before Miriam cut her off.

'Either that or we'll be obliterated by that antimatter canon, personally I would rather be ripped apart a thousand times than give them that chance.' But then relief surged through her voice. 'Quarter engine online.'

'Attempting to initiate antimatter drive,' Luana said, her voice charged with anxiety.

'Is the gravity field generator functioning?' Hadrian yelled suddenly, leaning over the screens. 'Is the generator damaged?'

'We'll be crushed,' Luana cried in panic, but Miriam quickly accessed the generator's systems, diverting auxiliary power to its fuel cells.

'It's fully operational. Inputting the Dragonfly's coordinates ... Now.'

Hadrian glanced at the frigate again as it came ever closer. Their Quarter engine could just be seen powering up at the bottom of the aft viewport, reddening and increasing in intensity rapidly as the engine lasers fired electrons into the Arcanum nuclei. The frigate's white nose glided left and right as it shadowed them.

'They're going to track our destination. Faster, faster,' Hadrian groaned. The station vibrated slightly. A flash of white shot across the viewport.

'They're trying to take out the engine,' Luana yelled. Miriam flinched, but then the frigate, the brown curve of Sanctus, and the thousand watching stars all vanished as the Quarter engine engaged. The station leapt from almost a standing start to a quarter of the speed of light, matter and antimatter colliding and burning as gravitational forces tore at the hull.

Miriam was vaguely aware of a loud cranking noise echoing from the station. She could smell a hint of burning, the damage to Level II sending tentacles of smoke through the passages. Her hands were clutched onto the edge of the console, her eyes closed. She took several deep breaths, a warm realisation cleansing her nerves.