Faster than the Stars

Chapter 1: They Don't Know

This is now:

The engine compressors are quickly and noisily retracting from the ship's thrusters to advance to hyperspace, the Terram Anguis is gaining on us at frightening speeds. The noise from the thrusters warming up would be almost deafening to human ears, which might be why Sheir is wearing those noise squelchers on his long ears. Both him and the human woman are manning the asteroid blasters mounted on the side of the ship. The electric bolts fire from the cannons constantly, but the shocks don't even affect the snake. Judging by its gaping mouth it's only getting annoyed by our attempts to hurt it. Hiath is pushing the ship to its absolute limits, pushing the throttle forwards until it no longer does so. I'm holding onto the built-in bunk beds on the wall. I can hear Haith saying those horrible human slurs that they often use when they're frustrated.

"Stop shooting at the damn snake and get to the bridge!" Hiath yells into a radio that is mounted on his chair. The two drop down from the ceiling and start running over to their commander.

"What is it!?" The woman asks frantically.

"We're going to cut off all power to the artificial gravity generator and the lights!" Haith replies, "Hold onto something quick!"

Sheir turns around immediately and runs past to me, grabbing onto the ladder up to the mounted asteroid blaster.

"Why the hell are we doing that?!" She demands, but still running to grab something.

"I'm going to slingshot us around the sun to kick start the jump drive!" As he says that, I feel myself getting lighter.

"Seriously?!" She says with unfounded surprise as the lights shut off.

I wouldn't blame her for being surprised, the sun would burn us to a crisp if we tried anything like that. I was about to protest as well, but the jump drive beats me to the punch. The sudden jump makes my fingers feel like they would snap in half like twigs, but soon enough I see a light that blinds me along with a wave of heat. It's so intense that I let go of the bunk to shield my eyes, and then I'm flung into a corner, or at least from what my back and tail is telling me from being squished against something. I can feel myself being crushed against the corner as we accelerate further. It feels like an eternity of heat, yet the sensation stops.

I slowly slump down to the floor into a mess. The white spots slowly fade away from my vision, my eyes ache from what must've been the sun cooking them. The lights are slowly coming back on, I hear the whirl of fans turn on as well. My entire body aches as I stand up. I look over to Sheir, he is on the ground stumbling from all the commotion. The woman is rubbing her forehead, and muttering curse words as she walks. But above it all I can hear Hiath laughing hysterically.

"I can't believe that actually worked! Jesus, that was the most gutsiest move I've made in a long time!" He beams, turning his chair around. He's looking straight at me, and his joyful expression is melting away to a more serious one. This can't be good.

"Now you're going to make that trip worthwhile." He says, his soft voice seemingly disappeared on those words, "You're going to get us some new ship parts, got it?"

I slowly nod, and walk towards the ship's console. The red screen shows the entire sector, showing all of the different systems within the three dimensional axis. I see a particular system, one that I've been meaning to visit for a very long time. I tap the keyboard repeatedly to zoom in, then I click the mouse and the coordinates are set for Kawl system, which is only roughly four light years away from Sol system.

I knew at least there I could keep up this charade.