Chapter 13: Grafael’s Search

Hopefully, I can keep this whole fiasco out of the hands of the media, but there’s only so much my government contacts can do.

“Gumar gra ka cho?”

“Nope. The Elementals already checked that sector, Gumar,” Sharon said as she observed the scanner. “No sign of any distress signal. There aren’t even any life signatures detected. That world’s another dud.”

Grafael growled, bending the metal armrest in his chair as he rose. “Well, maybe they missed something! We should doublecheck just to be sure!”

The Troll, Gumar, put a large, stone-like hand to his mouth at the Saurian’s rising temper. Sharon just gave Grafael a flat stare with her arms crossed.

Grafael took in a deep breath and spoke more calmly. “I’m sorry for raising my voice. Can we please just doublecheck? There is some radioactive interference from a nearby nebula. Your scan might not be completely accurate.”

Sharon shook her head, turning back to the scanning device on the console. “Sorry to tell ya, but the Elementals took that into consideration and adjusted the scan to compensate. From the data they’ve sent us, all results are turning negative. Now, stop breaking stuff when you get bad news, will ya? It might just be a chair, but this is one of Jimmy’s favorite ships. Anything you break, he’s gonna give me an earful when we get back.”

Grafael sighed and nodded. “I apologize. I will ... refrain from more emotional outbursts.” Grafael slowly made his way to his private console on the other side of the bridge and began typing at the silver keyboard as he searched through all their previous leads, checking to see if they might’ve missed something. He tried to keep his rising temper under control so he didn’t break the keys again. To distract himself, he thumped his blue-scaled tail across the floor while he worked.

The pirate vessel Legacy was a fine ship, all things considered. Though Saurian vessels were usually built a tad sturdier out of necessity, James had been true to his word when he said it was his fastest ship. Captain James had it custom-built from scavenged parts from various species including Harpies, Dwarves, and Elves. It was shaped like a rocket, as were many of the ships in James’ fleet. The hull was dark gray, nearly black, and the tip was curved downwards, almost resembling a beak. At about a hundred and fifty feet long and fifty feet wide, it wasn’t very large, but neither was it that small, allowing plenty of room for its thirty or so occupants to move freely, though Grafael’s quarters were a bit cramped. On the sides of the tube-shaped vessel were two long, thin bladelike wings curved frontwards used to cut into opposing vessels for raids. The twin engines in the rear fired two powerful beams of blue flames of plasma, allowing the vessel to attain incredible speeds to cross the threshold of a whole galaxy in the span of a week, and it could do so without using the highways of Gateways throughout the universe.

The box-shaped bridge was near the center of the rocket with the wings built on either side. There was a long, reinforced window that covered the front and sides of the bridge, allowing the occupants to see nearly everything ahead of them, as well as the right and left sides of the ship. Consoles were lined beneath the window along the sides of the bridge with about a half dozen technicians working them. Grafael, Gumar, and Sharon comprised the commanding staff on the bridge. There was a captain’s chair near the center of the bridge which Grafael would occupy regularly. He asked Sharon if she wanted to sit in the captain’s chair since she was technically the commander, but she was too nervous to do so. Grafael had been tempted to punch a hole in the bottom of the captain’s chair for his tail as they did on Saurian ships, but he thought that would probably be rude, so he just sat in it like he did any non-Dragon chair with his tail sticking out uncomfortably to the side.

At that time, not including the ten or so crewmen working the engineering sector near the engines in the back, most of the crew were either sleeping in their quarters or enjoying leisure time in the galley. For more than two months, the ship had gone none stop from planet to planet within the Elementals’ search parameters. They traveled so far into deep space, even exploring a few uncharted galaxies, that they put themselves out of immediate communication range with the other rescue vessels in the search. Grafael did intend to turn the ship around and coordinate with the other rescue ships soon. However, they had recently picked up on an ion trail near some of the uncharted galaxies that could’ve indicated an emergency jump from a Gateway, so they held their course for the time being. Still, Grafael knew he was pushing the crew hard. He had to be patient. Ryan and Éclair had survived this long, he knew they must have, otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many ships still looking for them. The Thinkers and the Seers back at the Fire Ministry had probably determined they were still alive, allowing the search to continue. All Grafael needed to do was find planets within range of their Gateway that could support life. That was the only explanation. They must’ve made an emergency jump through the Gateway with an escape pod and landed on a world with a breathable atmosphere. Although, if the Commandment exploded before the jump finished, it could’ve sent the Gateway into disarray, sending them outside the normal range of the interstellar highways; but surely not that far out of range, not if his calculations were correct.

Grafael paused a moment to look out the window in front of his console, white dots of stars blazing before his vision as the ship continued at hyper-speed outside the Gateways. I will find you. Lady Éclair ... Little Brother Ryan ... I will find you both and bring you home.

Grafael felt the floor tremble slightly as Gumar approached. The nearly ten-foot Troll towered over Grafael with his large, powerful body, big, droopy ears, trunk-shaped arms and legs, and gray, stone-like skin. Gumar just stared at Grafael silently for a few minutes. Then the Troll put up a massive hand that nearly covered Grafael’s whole shoulder.

The Troll gave a cheerful nod and a goofy smile, saying, “Gumar gog Grafael. Gumar va tro Ryan shaz Éclair.”