Hunter Legacy 5 Hail the Hero (29 page)
Read Hunter Legacy 5 Hail the Hero Online
Authors: Timothy Ellis
Tags: #Science Fiction & Fantasy, #Science Fiction, #Exploration, #Military, #Space Fleet, #Space Marine, #Space Opera, #Teen & Young Adult, #Metaphysical & Visionary, #Space Exploration
The girls came out of the Care Units at
eight the next morning. Jane had let me sleep through the jump into Cobol,
which hadn’t needed my attention, especially since we had real time ship
movements there. She bellowed me out of bed with enough time to shower and make
it down to the Medical Bay to greet them as they emerged.
Jeeves was on hand to give them pain shots.
Petersen was embarrassed to find herself topless in my presence, but the girls
helped her to laugh it off, as they all compared bruises. I pointed out their
new scooters to them, and left them there to get changed into clean underwear.
We all met in the Dining Room for
breakfast. I still didn’t feel like eating, but forced down what Jeeves put in
front of me without asking.
We were all moving tentatively, and I had
trouble meeting their eyes.
“Stop it Jon!” said Amanda.
“We all screwed up. We all paid the price for rushing in blindly. We knew
better, but we did it anyway.”
“It was nothing at all to do with
you,” added Aleesha.
I looked troubled.
“Jon,” said Walter. “Their
right. Even I didn’t think twice about it. Admittedly, it’s been a while since
I was in a combat situation, but I have the experience to have known better
than to walk into a classic trap. So stop beating yourself up.”
“We all screwed up,” said Aline.
“But after that, you did everything right. We watched the ambush feed
before we left the Medical Bay. You did exactly the right things, and got us to
medical as fast as possible. We survived, and that’s all that matters.”
Meow?
Angel was sitting on the table, and none of
us had noticed her come in. We all laughed, and hands stretched out to pat her.
I left them there, and headed for the Bridge.
By nine, we were through into the Midnight
system, and heading in to dock with Hunter’s Redoubt. John Wayne and two
Guardians had the jump point staked out, but were well clear as we came
through.
David Tollin met Walter and I at the
airlock, and buried us in catchup work for the next three hours. I’d rather
have been in the spa with the girls, but duty calls. Especially since I owned
this part of space.
The most urgent of matters were laws to be
put in place. The station had been operating under Australian sector law, but
without any real authority behind them, other than I had the last say, while
not being here to say anything.
After some discussion, I decided to
implement Outback law rather than Australian sector law. The former hadn’t
changed much since Outback was colonized, where the latter changed all the
time. Outback didn’t have politics in the normal sense, so its laws had none of
the stuff competing political parties added into laws, and then had modified by
the next government. The basics were the same in any case, so most people
wouldn’t notice any difference. Customizing the law was something I’d do once I
had an entity in place, and received the benefit of a lot of legal expertise.
We returned to BigMother for lunch, where
we were joined by the 266 pilots, and O’Neil and his wife.
I formally gave the station to O’Neil to
command, and bid him talk to Walter for Militia information, since he’d be
acting as head of my mini-sector’s Militia in this system.
By two, David and his people had moved onto
BigMother, and we undocked to head for Nexus.
David kept me busy all afternoon, and I was
glad to escape to dinner.
The girls dragged me along to the communal
spa after we finished eating. I hastily turned my arousal suppressor back on as
we stripped. I was about to get in after them, when a voice came from behind me.
“Can I join you?” asked Amy.
I looked over my shoulder to see her
looking at my butt. I hastily eased myself into the water, and turned to watch
her come in, closing the door behind her.
“Sure,” said Amanda. “No
clothes though.”
Amy giggled, and stripped. She slid into
the water next to me. There was another round of compare bruises, with a lot of
giggling. I still won with my down the left side mottled yellow, although they
all had purple ones where I no longer did.
By nine, we were all in bed. In our own
beds.
I lay there for a long time, patting Angel
and pondering things in general.
It was ten weeks since I’d left Outback as
an apprentice. Now I owned three systems, and apparently ruled Outback as well.
I had my own fleet, stations and shipyard. Someone still wanted me dead, Walter
dead, and my team dead. Everything had changed, and yet nothing had changed.
Angel was fourteen weeks old tomorrow.
Maybe that was a good reason for a party.
Jane let me know we were jumping into Bad
Wolf, and I watched the forward view on a wall screen as we did. The pop-up
closed, and I dimmed the lights again.
I dreamed of naked beach babes.
I slept through the jump into Nexus 618,
but was up in time to be on the Bridge as we approached the center of the ring
of jump points just before seven.
Hunter’s Haven was dead center of the ring.
The distance to each jump point to the Australian systems varied, but not by
more than ten minutes. The Shipyard was positioned well below the station. Jane
informed me a connection tube was being designed to link the two.
There was substantially more traffic moving
between the jump points than when I’d left the sector. It moved in both
directions around the ring, and crisscrossed between them all.
The others joined me on the Bridge before
we started the docking sequence, and Annette welcomed us home.
BigMother docked, and I sighed.
Home sweet Home.
I grinned around the Bridge, and was about
to stand, when Abagail spoke into the silence.
“Boss,” she said. “You know
that email problem?”
I nodded. She indicated Amy, and I looked
back and forth between them.
“I think we cracked it!”
Jonathon Hunter
will return
in
Hire a Hero
Once again, a big thank you for Helen
Ellis. My editor, sounding board, ear that listens, and experience which talks.
Also thanks to Egosoft, for allowing me to
use photos from their games, to make the cover of this book.
Special thanks to ‘
pref’
from the Egosoft forums, for the specific image used for this book cover.
I’ve had a lot of fun writing this novel.
There is still a lot of story to come, and I invite you to come along for the
full journey with me.
If you have enjoyed this novel, I hope you
will take the time to leave a review on the Amazon site. All reviews are
greatly appreciated, as they help assist purchasing decisions by other readers.
Sales and reviews will help me to focus on the next book in the series, which
impacts how fast the next installment is released.
Please join me on the series Facebook Page:
https://www.facebook.com/TheHunterLegacy
Feedback is welcome on my Games Forum.
http://apricotmappingservice.com/X3forum/viewforum.php?f=46
If you would like to be kept informed of
new eBooks, updates and information from The Hunter Legacy universe, join the
mailing list at
http://eepurl.com/bqMgVz
The Apricot Mapping Service exists as the author’s personal in-game
entity, for the computer games in the X3 series, by Egosoft. John Slice and
other AMS characters, were originally used in fan fiction for mods, walkthroughs
and guides for the games.
http://apricotmappingservice.com
The Egosoft website is at:
Thank you.
Timothy Ellis
These Kindle eBooks can be found on Timothy Ellis’
Kindle Author page
.
These links can also be found at
TimothyEllisAuthor.com
.
