Black Hole Guns For Hire
Captain Bho's privateer vessel escapes a hostile takeover by space pirates only to witness a targeted United Earth cosmic assault on civilians. Captain Bho leads her crew in a bid to escape the black hole, relying on her gutsy crew of ragtag rebels to pull together against the most powerful entity in the universe. Meanwhile, in the dying light of the star Chief Zuri and the Captain reignite an old romance, but is it doomed just like this star system?
What is this book?
That last cigarette after a gunfight.
Your last chance at love in a doomed star system.
The last thing you wanna do to prove you're not a goddamn coward.
Preview:
321 Unification Declaration. DL-820, the "Altarri" system.
Get on your feet.
It was a hell of a shit sandwich to eat. An ass kicking in front of her crew was about as far as Lina Bho could fall from the Captain’s seat. She would have preferred just getting shot. Instead of that mercy, piss and shit leaked out of her torn compression suit. Her cuffed hands slid in the mud as she pushed herself onto her knees again. Maybe the slop stuck to her face would wash off in the rain.
The muddy clearing was filled with crates and equipment, illuminated by the dim cargo bay lights of her transport ship The Galley. Shadows hung over her from every direction, looming shapes that judged her perilous and pathetic position. A few of her crew in wrist cuffs were looking prepared to scrap. Only two pirates were assigned to watch the captured crew. The rest were presumably in the process of looting the ship.
The one lording over her now was a gap-toothed Sergeant At Arms of whatever opportunist crew they belonged to. Pirates were not uncommon, but they were especially pronounced at the frontier where the Anti-Federalist Alliance fought the United Earth. Deserters of the UE military often became pirates. Lina was a privateer and she was currently working for the AFA. But that didn't absolve her of anything.
Would have been less work for the captor to discharge a 1mm round into her skull and be done with it. Instead, he shot her in the back. Boom. Whatever aspirations she had about getting up were crushed as she was flattened by a bullet. She stopped moving. It was nice to just lay here and soak in the pain knowing it would all be over soon.
Lina's major complaint was that she would end up dying on a planet similar to Thruul, the nightmare unending. This island in the archipelago was humid, filled with insects, and contained the largest predator xenos she'd ever seen. Just like Thruul. There was not a week that went by without her time on the front of the imperial advance haunting her.
The Marines she let die by her inaction. Her inexperience. Her ego.
Erased were their names and the way they laughed. Their dreams were exciting and lives to return to optimistic. Propaganda had been poured into their cups until they spilled from their mouths the poison of their master: The divine right of expansionism.
Being a Marine was being the boot. No one told them they would be stepping on faces. In the name of the United Earth, they trampled through the galaxy. It was too late to save her if she were to be put on trial. It was a mercy to be murdered by some mediocre pirates who were just as self-interested as she had once been.
Regrets came.
Lina pitifully rolled onto her back to stare up at the bearded man who had her by the balls. She spit out one of her canines that had been knocked loose in a sputter of pink juice.
“Spineless,” she cursed.
The man’s lips quivered in rage. He bent over and grabbed her by the scruff with his wiry arm, pulling her up to shove her against a metal crate. She was easy to toss around. Lightning flashed across the magenta sky as the pistol came to rest under her chin, pressed there by a sadist clearly enjoying this. Just as the barrel began to dig deep into her neck meat, something predictable happened: Connor talked.
“You’re the softest piece of shit on the ladder, huh? Must be! To leave you out here in the piss with us.” The Marines caught on and began to laugh, albeit forced. Sergeant Tyson Connor was always running his mouth, especially when he drank. He was only twenty-four, he didn't know any better. This time it helped, for once.
That pistol moved from its place held against the Captain and started to swing over at the prisoner in question, surely an easy kill. Lina braced against the crate and with no fucks left in the tank, shoved both arms up catch his wrist with the handcuff metal. His arm flew up so quick it was clear he wasn't expecting resistance. She kicked him.
The man's ankle snapped like a branch as her boot went through, bringing him low, where he belonged. His pistol discharged into the sky. The illusion of his control was shattered. He screamed and dropped the weapon. Lina grabbed behind his head with both palms and leapt to smash his nose with a knee. A thump of knee to soft facial tissue and the spray of blood was her prize. He gushed red on her leg.
Connor and the junior Corporal Wesfield tackled the other guard into a slimy melee. Soon the rest of her crew were stomping out the pirate before he could get a shot off. Thump thump thump. A pack of wolves devouring an old deer. They should have cuffed their legs, too. Idiots.
Body pulsing with adrenaline just heavy enough to forego the agony, the Captain of the captured vessel bent over to pick up the pistol buried in the mud. It was a second-rate piece of junk. This will do the job.
Lina looked down into the shocked eyes of her torturer kneeling before her. He held up his hands, screeching a cry for mercy. His last act was to beg. It wasn’t heard over the blast of three rounds to the head. Job well done. His corpse hit the mud with a splash.
The group got busy breaking each other out of the cuffs with crate pry bars used for loading. A Marine came over to do just that for the Captain. She was fixed in place, staring at the ruined mess of brains and skull. Sergeant Connor scooped the Captain under the arm to prop her up. He asked, “Solid, Cap?”
Her vision swirled. “Solid.”