DarkLight

Part 11: Clandestine Activities

Soran stepped through the crumbling ancient arch, and there it was: an intact ULF, down in the long-forgotten ancient city. A stark contrast of a steel steel construct amongst the stony, earthy ruins all around him. The cone-shaped cockpit resting snugly between the massive boxy drive modules, which also mounted the multi-torpedo launcher. The fusalage, which housed the cockpit, continued past the end of the drive modules ending in an elegent, aerodynamic double-finned tail. Because of the massive drive modules, the what would be slender, aerodynamic craft looked boxy and almost comical, but this was Soran’s key out. 

There was another tremor from above, the ground shook again and from a distant place, he heared an all mighty crash-something had given way under the unnatural earth movement. He couldn’t risk staying here for long, this new danger of collapse was all around him.

He moved forward, feeling along the smooth scorched alloy surface of the fighter for the small access hatch. Finding a panel that stuck out slightly, he pushed it inwards, making it pop out and reveal a small computer terminal, a small lever and some kind of socket. Pulling the lever, the massive cockpit hood sprung open, letting out a rancid stench which was added to the stale air around him. The body within the cockpit was in a state of mid-decay, leaving residue all around the nerve centre of the fighter. Recoiling, Soran grabbed the former Utopian under its arms and lifted it out of the seat, throwing it out of the fighter with a nausiating crunch. Ignoring the lingering smell, Soran jumped into the seat of the fighter, tapping several touch-screens and gaining readings from the fighter.

“Shit” He said aloud as he read the ships technical details. Three of the four drive pads were operational, but couldn’t be powered due to the ships internal clandestine generator being offline, even though undamaged. Tapping the consol a few more times, Soran opened the drive hatch at the rear of the ship, under its tail section. He climbed out once more and inspected the small generator-it was completely dead.

“Ok, I’ve done this once today-why not twice?” He thought to himself, placing his hand on one of the two disks which were connected to a central cube. He once again concentrated all of his energy into his hand, causing the blinding headache to return but causing his hand to feel warm and tingly. There was a bright spark and a thud and the disks of the generator began to move again, kick started by Soran’s energies. 

“Haha!” He laughed, slamming shut the access hatch and running back to the cockpit, now alive with flashing lights and green screens. He jumped in once more and closed the canopy, sealing himself in. His consols were reading power pumping throughout the ship, and he relayed this energy to the drive pads, causing three of the four circular pads on the bottom of the ship to glow blue and start to raise the ship off the ground, repelling from the planet’s magnetic field. 

“Here we go” Soran said, grabbing the manual conrols for the ship and slamming his foot on the pedal, causing the small thrusters on each side of the ship to burst into life and fling the entire ship into the air towards the continental plates. Pressing the red button on top of the conrol stick, Soran fired a barrage of torpedoes into the colossal metal plate in front of him, blasing a new hole to freedom.