Forerunner

Forerunner

“Alina Bell, you are hereby under arrest for your various crimes against the citadel, and the theft of a priceless artifact!” shouted a deep voice.

Alina scowled beneath her mask, information streaming across her eyes as it relayed her surroundings to her. The high-tech mask cost a fortune, but it was essential for her “work.” Alina tucked the small bundle further into her belt, praying it wouldn’t be jostled loose in the action. She kept running, a standard level exosuit making it all the easier. She had to get back to her ship, the Forerunner, and make it off this wretched planet.

She turned a corner in the thin alleys of the city and ran straight into a contingent of guards fitted in dark grey exosuits. Reflexes trained by years of combat meant her twin pistols were in her hands almost before she could think to draw them. They were military class railguns, able to punch holes through steel.

She aimed with practiced ease, felling several soldiers in quick succession before she had to dodge out of the way of their own projectiles. She ducked behind a stack of crates, breaking line of sight. The soldiers kept firing, but only held stunning rounds. They wouldn’t pass through the wooden crates even if they shot at them for hours.

Alina unhooked a small capsule from the strap across her chest, and pulled the thin pin at its base with her teeth. She threw it over the boxes, and black smoke billowed out from the capsule, filling the small space in seconds. She stood, dashing back into the fray. Soldiers to her left and right coughed and sputtered, waving their hands around blindly. Her mask filtered the smoke, and she could see through the cloud of black smog like a foggy window.

In seconds, she breached the edge of the cloud of smoke and ordered her mask to give her information on the location of the Forerunner. In a breath, an icon appeared in Alina’s vision showing her the exact spot her ship sat. With another command, she ordered the ship to ready for takeoff, and it automatically began to plot a course through the star system.

With a jolt, she realized the Forerunner was being impounded by the soldiers, a giant cargo ship carrying the vessel. Her ship came into view; a sleek silver and black starship with every amenity she could afford.

Alina ran faster, using her suit to jump to a small ledge and onto one of the flat roofs of the city’s buildings. She changed her course to meet the impounding ship, a plan suggested to her from the mask. It was reckless, but what wasn’t nowadays?

A grin spread across the young girl’s face.

As she was about to intersect the two ships, she thrust her hand out and a grapple of thin wire shot from her wrist. A personal modification to her exosuit, and one she had grown fond of. The grapple hit the ship carrying the Forerunner, and the powerful magnet on the tip locked into place. It would take a meteor’s worth of weight for that magnet to release.

Jerking her hand back, she activated the grapple’s pull mechanism, and she shot towards her target. Landing upside-down on the cargo ship, she pulled one of her pistols she had sheathed moments before, taking steady aim at the magnet that was holding the own ship. If she missed this shot, her projectile could puncture the Forerunner, causing lethal damage. As her only escape, she knew she couldn’t miss.

With a vwip, a bolt shot from her pistol, and clean through the magnet’s main mechanisms, harmlessly falling out the other side. Alina allowed herself a short cheer before she realized her ship was taking off without her.

A brief jolt of panic shot through her before she remembered her mask. She relayed commands to the ship, telling it to slow its ascent. The cargo ship, however, was slowly chugging off in a retreat. The pilot wasn’t even armed, she knew, so there was no sense in going after it for revenge sake. They were just doing their job, that was all.

Releasing her grapple, she readied a shot again, steadying her wrist. She fell through the air, twisting so her target was in view. The door of her vessel opened, and she struck true, directly into the small cargo bay. With one last command to her exosuit, she launched herself into her ship, and the ship in turn launched into the darkening sky. Her mask linked with the ship, showing the general radar. A small fleet of combat ships tried to follow her, but nothing was faster than the Forerunner.

Breathing heavily, Alina sat down at her seat at the front of the sleek ship, unwrapping the item she went through all this trouble to steal.

As cloth fell away, a deep black and blue oval the size of her open hand fell into her awaiting palm. It pulsed with light like a heartbeat, and was warm to the touch. The surface was rough, but manageable. Alina smiled, still nearly heaving for air, as she appreciated her prize.

This was no artifact, she knew, but an egg. An egg that, at the right place and right time, could save countless lives.

Alina placed the egg back into its bundle, turning to her controls. Still smiling, she took off her mask, setting it to the side. It could do this for her, but it was always more fun to do it by hand. With a deep breath, she wrapped her hand around a lever, and pulled.

Her ship gained speed, and she reveled in her victory as she shot into the awaiting dark of space.