Lying there. No blood, no lost teeth, no fight or gunfight signs. Nothing. I was just there with arms and legs wide open. The power armor was preventing me from feeling the cold metal of my ship’s floor and my helmet was somewhere else. She left me to rot. In the everlasting night of space, she just took a life-saving capsule and left. The only trace of her was a mail in my computer: “I left for the best of us. I am still your friend but we couldn’t go on like this. Until we meet again champ.”

All the good moments and the good memories, all we did together, the raids on the pirate bases, the satellites we stole, the money we earned, the love we made. All forever lost in that moment. How could she do that? I couldn’t stop thinking and just felt dominated by it.

I finally got up. My head was crystal clear. I clumsily sat in front of the computer and wrote the command to request her live-saving capsule orbital data. Copied it to the mainframe computer and requested the ship to run it. While I heard the thrusters fire a couple of times, the ship said “New orbital data inserted. Privateer Messiah aligning orbital plane to 23.0 degrees. Target periapsis, 300 kilometers. Target apoapsis, 400 kilometers. Time to next orbital alignment, 4.6 hours.”

I got up nervous, but there was nowhere to go to and no lips to kiss. I had a contract to deliver a nuclear satellite in a week to the USS Navajo, but they could wait. I spent the whole time in the narrow cockpit, looking outside the window. The whole realignment process took about 12 hours, but it seemed like a lifetime to me. There should be a logic reason to this. There was, in fact, a ship navigating in the vector she took. Maybe she was kidnapped or something. I fired the main engines to gain speed towards the unknown ship and then loaded the plasma rifle and picked up a few extra cells if things got nasty down there.

The other captain broke radio silence: “This is Privateer Goliath, please identify yourself and state your intentions.”

“Greetings. I’m Captain David Firestone from the Privateer Messiah. You might have something that belongs to me…” I said.

“What?!” I heard in the background.

“Allison? Are you there? I’m coming to get you.” I said. Normally one shouldn’t say things like this. A private war ship would start firing right away, but they must have noticed the enormous radiating warheads I had in the hangar. They didn’t want to shoot a bomb that was likely to explode in their faces, so I was going to board the ship invited or not.

After dressing and packing, I went to the airlock and into outer space. With the help of the small thrusters in the power armor I got hold of their airlock’s door. Opened the port to the door mechanism and connecting the cable, started decrypting the lock with my illegal lock picking system. Once inside the shootout started. It was a lot of fun, they weren’t prepared at all. I wondered if they even got the proper training to hold those small laser pistols. I eventually got the Bridge corridor where two men were guarding the door. They didn’t shoot, just ran away to the Bridge and closed the door. I thought I saw a glimpse of Allison inside, behind a daring figure of a man. I used the lock picker again and opened the Bridge door.

“Dave! What the heck are you doing?” Said Allison.

“I’ve come to save you.”

“Save me? Are you out of your mind?!!”

“Just go away.” Said the captain aiming his rifle at me.

“I’m with him.” She replied. “I was pretty safe until you came in here shooting our crew.”

“What? Why? How?”

“Just go away mister.” Said the captain. “Before I blow your head. She doesn’t want you.”

“This is not happening! How can you abandon me like this? After all we…” the guards dragged me out in complete shock.

“What were you expecting Dave? We weren’t going anywhere together.”

I got back to my ship. I didn’t know what to do or where to go. It always happens like this, they always go in the end. I always accepted with great cost the departure of all my friends and lovers, but not Allison’s. That could not happen. I opened a communication channel to the Privateer Goliath.

“I want to talk to Allison in private.”

“You again?”

“I want an explanation at least.”

“You want no explanation. You want me back, and that’s not going to happen. Dave, I’m still your friend and I don’t want to hurt you.”

“But you already hurt me. How do you think I’m feeling?”

“Dave… crrkkk… I’m losing you… csssssskkk…”

I stared to their new ship by the window with my head blanker than Antarctica. Then the world just fell over me. Allison left me for a better guy with a better ship and a better gun. How could she say she’s still my friend abandoning me and avoiding communication?

The Privateer Goliath engaged full thrust and at first I thought about leaving them, but I wanted to prove my love. I engaged full thrust and followed them. My Messiah could be old, but she surely could follow a bigot. “Allison you idiot! I hate you! Arrogant, spoiled and ungrateful…”

I looked twice to the projection of our vector. They were going to the Moon, recently overrun by Basiliskan aliens. Only transnational war fleets could handle going to the Moon now and we were just two small ships. The war was almost over. They chased us around our own star system but now they say we can keep the Earth while the rest of the solar system is theirs. Still, they will fight unprovoked. Anyway, I didn’t left Goliath’s trace because there was nothing to lose.

The journey took enough time to breed more hate in me. Space travel can be awfully long and a man’s head is not iron made. I was just too damn blind with Allison in my head and I was prepared to die, if not for her, for my own sake.

I saw the Moon approaching slowly and voyages like this were much faster when I could sleep. When the first red dots in my tridimensional radar appeared I realized I was awake for at least 48 hours. Then visual contact was made, a shiver ran through my spine. A full Basiliskan war fleet was waiting for them. I could count at least two destroyers and a battle cruiser, but no carrier. Looks like Allison’s new boyfriend was a spy for the lizards. My first reaction was to engage the retro-engines to lose speed and let Privateer Goliath go first. Then I opened the bay doors and used the mechanical arm to put the old satellite out.

I smiled, quite proud of myself for weaving a Gigaton human made weapon. ‘They will shoot,’ I thought. A weary Basiliskan voice uttered some warning in their language sending more shivers through me. So I happily decided that if Allison wouldn’t talk to me one last time, I would open a can of worms on all of them. Communication refused, so I opened the failsafe and locked random targets within the fleet with my conventional weapons. Communication refused once again, so I opened the failsafe and programmed the destination of the warheads. One was at least for the Privateer Goliath and the others were to distribute first by the bigger Basiliskan ships. Fortunately, I haven’t faltered when issuing the Execute commands. At the same time I launched everything I got, a few missiles were shot in my direction. I avoided them with a few correcting maneuvers, engaged the stealth system and never fired the main engines again.

My warheads were on their way and it was just funny how they tried to shoot the warheads with their petty laser cannons. Everything burst into flames. Large destroyers were thorn open and a swarm of life-saving capsules were fired away. A lot of ships were taken down hit by debris. I even didn’t see where was Privateer Goliath in the middle of the fireworks. Finally I put on my helmet and fastened the seatbelt. “Ladies and gentlemen, brace for the trip of your lives.” I said to myself.

Firmly holding the flight stick I avoided the debris and with a little help from the Messiah’s computer I was good for the first half of the trip. The Moon was really close on the side of the ship and the debris were going by me at tremendous speeds. I got hit once and then twice by very small debris. An engine was completely wacked but I could still fly. I didn’t even close the front window, it would take away all the fun. I got hit a third time by the tip of a large debris, but I got through. I think I lost a thruster on that one. My hangar could not maintain the atmosphere because one of the bay doors wasn’t there anymore. When the slalom ended all I heard were warning signs and saw warning lights. I turned the ship forward. I’ve met my direction vector and sighed. I got through and even had enough energy to get back to Earth. I could send a distress signal once I got to low Earth orbit. I could go on with my life, the fire was over. I asked myself if the only stand I could make was with hate and destruction.

I still had no clear answer when I got rescued by the JS Naginata. The fear was stamped on the crew’s faces, So they showed how my selfish fireworks tipped the scales of the war against us. The face of the Basiliskan Emperor was all over the Internet cursing and dooming humans to extinction.

At least I had chicken for lunch and the military awarded me a medal and a new ship.

The End