Star Hopper Chapter Four
#4 of Star Hopper
Chapter four of my novel "Star Hopper." I've been writing this for two years off and on and am very excited to say that it's actually done. Well, I've had to edit it myslef so there are still typos probably littering it but please look past those and enjoy the book. It will be avalible on Lulu.com to buy after all the chapters (17 of them) have been uploaded here. I hope you enjoy chapter four. BTW: All the chapters will get shorter from now on, 1-3 were crazy long.
4
Bot stood up on the foxes shoulder, "You know, maybe people around here know of a wolf with a scar across his face. I'm pretty sure that's not common, especially when it runs the length of the entire face."
"Yeah, you're right." He replied in a saddened tone, "they can't get far!"
His face lightened up, "We can't give up."A surge of assurance filled within him.
A smile emerged from his mouth "I know where to go."
Bot hopped back down to the ground as Ian twirled back around to the opening of the building. A small gaggle of people had gathered around a smoking hole where his plasma bolt had impacted the dust building but other than that it looked the same dirt everything. Winding around the loose crowds and venders brought him to a pub that looked shadier then the entire planet. He moved the curtain that the pub used for a door and entered it. It was sad, a hellhole the drinks themselves looked like urine. The people sitting at the tables looked like people who had hit rock-bottom, they all had wicked smiles.
"Here we go." Ian said observing the place.
Bot didn't understand, "Why in this place."
"This is where all the best info hangs out."
Ian didn't waste time, he walked up to the dusty counter and ordered a drink. The tender eyed him, took a bottle and pored the liquid into a dirty glass and presented it to Ian.
"Thanks."
Ian sat down at the bar next to two evil looking wolves, both eyed him with death.
"So guys do you know anything about a wolf with a long scar running from his forehead to neck?"
Again they eyed him like he was on fire.
"Why do you want you to know foxy boy."
A little anger swelled up in his stomach but Ian kept calm, it's the best way to deal with stuff like this.
"Well, he took somebody close to me and I want to get her back!"
The two wolves finally looked over and smiled a little bit,
"Awww, the little foxy boy wants his friend back?" He spoke across to his friend, "hey, maybe if we help we can see some action!"
Ian couldn't take it anymore he balled his paw and nailed the wolf directly in the cheek, he was on the floor in a second blood gushing from his nose. Ian knelt down next to the wolf as he oriented himself,
"Like I said, did you happen to see another wolf with a long scar on his face?"
He placed his finger on the top of his forehead and drew an imaginary line down to the neck.
The wolf scooted back and got into a sitting position, "Look even I knew, what makes you think I'll tell you!"
Within a second Ian dashed at the wolf, pinned him and placed his drawn pistol at the wolf's temple.
"Because if you don't tell me, the sand isn't going to be the only thing covering the floor!"
By now everybody that was in the tavern was trying to get a look at what was going on. The wolf chuckled, "You wouldn't dare, foxes don't do that type of thing and what about the king!"
Ian chuckled back, "You really think the king has jurisdiction here? Or was that a plea to get this pistol away from your head? Because I think it was."
The wolf tried to get away from Ian's grasp but had no success,
" I'm not a fox!"
Without any type of hesitation Ian pulled the trigger, the plasma bolt went through the wolf's head like nothing, when it exited it took half of his face with it leaving a mangled corpse. Everyone in the tavern just watched quietly as he got up and grabbed the other wolf by the collar.
"Now do you know where this person is?!"
A tear emerged out of the wolf's eye in terror, "I think so." He began to quiver. "He has been 'around the galaxy' a few times supposedly."
"Now where would I meet this person?"
His voice began to crack, "edge of town, that way." He twitched his head showing the direction. "In the hut, you can't miss it!"
Ian released the wolf, he fell to the ground in a mess and a little puddle of liquid appeared around his legs. People were already starting to get back to their things, Ian pulled out the cash he had gotten from his sale and placed it on the counter.
"For the drink and the garbage."
Calmly he walked out the door, everybody inside the room was already back to talking and drinking this sort of thing was quite common. Bot bounded after Ian,
"What was that?"
He snickered, "oh that was nothing, you never saw me before when I had my crew with me."
Bot jumped from the ground onto Ian's shoulder, " I mean, you didn't hesitate to kill him, I've never seen you like that. What's up, I...I...I haven't seen you kill without cause before!"
"There was a cause, I have to find Colleen."
King Raidon nearly fell from his seat when the news came through. Caption Daysus stood on the screen in front of him. He was speaking from his ship, the Apex after getting back on from the mysterious space dock. In his paw he held the white dress that Colleen had worn when she left Drey. Only now there were large splotches of red liquid strewn all over it.
"wh...where did you find it?" The king asked, his voice trembling.
Daysus sighed, he didn't want to tell but it felt like his duty.
"We found it on a computer console, in a pile with the shoes thrown in different directions."
Raidon was close to totally breaking out, he almost couldn't take another word of this torture but he had to know. "Do you know what happened?"
"Look your highness," Daysus said, "Do you really want to know?"
"Yes, Damn It I want to know!"
The wolf almost jumped back with the kings response, "ok." He readied himself.
"We believe suffocation, no stab marks in the dress and no burns from plasma. It also didn't smell like plasma had been shot."
Plasma was a substance that stank to high heaven when shot at a high velocity and it lingered.
"The body was not found."
The king really did drop to his knees this time, his voice was gone.
"After that he probably dumped her into space, we'll never find her."
King Raidon wanted to punch the captain in the face and watch him wither just because he told him the news, he didn't even know what he was going to do with Black Son. Raidon rested his head on his paws and began to silently cry, nothing prepares you for something like that.
Captain Daysus closed the comm to the Supremacy, it was the worst news he'd ever had to relay. The dress that lay in his hand was clumped into a heap, he couldn't stand it and threw it across the bridge. It hit the wall and fell in a heap.
" Dallas, take us out to the brink. He might be hiding out on one of those planets."
He started to mess with the touch panel and eventually it said that the coordinates were ready and Dallas turned.
"Locked and primed sir, waiting on your mark."
"Hit it."
He thrust the throttle down and the ship hit warp within seconds, leading them to the outer edge of the universe.
The Brink, as everybody called it, was the edge of the universe and beyond the jurisdiction of the king, it's the armpit of the galaxy filled with drugs, scandals and sex. Every planet on the brink was either really dry or wet due to the position of the planets and no rotational spin. All of the planets were originally loners drifting around in space beyond galaxies and suns until technology was able to capture them and bring them to one place, it was an experiment that failed horribly and so it was forgotten to the pirates and whores of the universe who made it their home. These facts ran though Daysus's head as The Apex warped though space, he was planning on visiting all five planets that made up the Brink, Gurdran, Faitrus, Aleendro, Lendin, and Trysconny. He could feel Black Sons head in his paws, he could taste his victory.
Ian san uncomfortably on top of one of the rickety buildings, using it as a vantage point on the hut the wolf in the bar had told him about. The thing that had made him one of the most successful and feared pirates in the known universe was his observation, Ian made a habit of carefully reading up on his targets and spying on them from so he knew as much as possible. The hut itself was in a mess, it looked bad even for the planet, junk scattered all around it
"Bot can you see anything inside, he boarded up the windows and is probably expecting me."
Bot had been trying to use his x-ray vision the entire time they'd been sitting up here, which was the better part of the day, but the sand blowing made the picture grainy and unable to read.
"Look, if he's expecting you then why all this? What's the point? Look he also probably knows you're up here."
Ian set his binoculars down, "That's the part that scares me and the reason why we have to stay vigilant."
"Ian, didn't you give Colleen a gun?" Bot asked.
He shook his head, "No, I didn't. I gave her a flare gun, if she had a gun she would have used it the first time she got and I know she will. But if I gave her a real plasma pistol she would of shot her captor and then be lost in this world without knowing where I am and unable to find her way around."
Bot butted in to finish, "so you gave her a flare gun so you could find where she was and save her. Smart."
Then as if on cue, a loud pop came from the general direction of the hut, and light bled though any cracks on the little hut, Ian hopped down from his vantage point and raced toward it.
"Another thing about that, it that the flare is crazy bright, they're going to be blinded for like five minutes."
The fox pulled his plasma pistol and reached the hut in seconds immediately followed by the kicking of the door which blew of the hinges.
Inside, it was a one room type of thing with the scarred wolf on the floor covering his eyes wriggling around and Colleen standing there flare gun still pointed in the direction she shot in a complete trance here eyes as large as plates. Ian hopped on top of the wolf with the pistol digging into his temple, then his face came into view.
"Trent?" Ian said and fell off him and passed out on his floor.