Deathstalker 01 - Deathstalker

of the law.
    Hazel d'Ark looked around her at the waiting body banks and shuddered, not entirely from the cold.
    What am I going to do? What the hell am I going to do?
    Lights flared around her as the ship's alarms went crazy. Hazel winced away from the sudden blare of sound, her hand dropping automatically to the gun at her side. Her first thought was a hull breach, but she quickly realized that if there'd been an explosive decompression in any part of the ship, she'd have felt its effects long before the sirens went off. She accessed the emergency channel through her comm implant, and a babble of voices filled her head. It only took her a moment to pick out the phrase battle stations, and then she was off and running. Someone had pierced the Shard's cloaking device, and that was supposed to be impossible for anything less than an Imperial starcruiser. And if the Empire had found them, there was a very real danger that Hazel d'Ark's career as
    a clonelegger was over before it had even begun.
    Just my luck, thought Hazel bitterly as she ran out of the cargo bay and headed for the bridge. Just my luck to get picked up for one of the few crimes I haven't actually committed.
    "Hannah, talk to me. How deep are we in it?"
    "I'm afraid you couldn't get much deeper without crouching," the AI said calmly through her implant. "An Imperial starcruiser has dropped out of hyperspace and taken up orbit around Virimonde. Their sensors brushed aside our cloaking devices in well under a second, and it didn't take them much longer to issue a challenge. I'm currently lying through my electronic teeth, but there's a limit to how long I can hope to bluff them. And I have a strong suspicion it isn't going to be anywhere near long enough for us to raise enough power to escape into hyperspace."
    "Couldn't we make a run for it in normal space?"
    "This is an Imperial starcruiser we're discussing. Hazel. They don't come much more powerful than this. They'd blast us into tiny glowing fragments before we even left orbit."
    "We've got shields."
    "They've got two hundred and fifty disrupter cannon and power to burn."
    "Can we fight them?"
    "If you really want to annoy them."
    "Dammit, there must be something we can do! You're the one with the immense intellect; think of something!"
    "You could always surrender."
    Hazel would have laughed sarcastically, but she was too short of breath. She
    pounded down the steel corridor, head I aching from the clamor of the alarm siren, and finally burst r onto the bridge and threw herself into her fire control seat. Whatever was going on, she was sure she'd feel a damn sight more secure plugged into the Shard's two disrupter . cannon. Theoretically, the AI was far more capable of aiming and firing the ship's disrupters, but what one AI could plan another could anticipate and match. Human unpredictability provided an edge no AI could deal with. Which is why there were always human gunners on every ship.
    Hazel meshed her mind with the computers through her implant and spread out through the fire systems, running quickly through the warm-up routines. Computer displays sprang up all around her, and a steady stream of information flowed through her thoughts. Hazel got her first real look at the starcruiser, and her heart sank. The Empire ship was a thousand times bigger, dwarfing the Shard like a minnow f next to a whale. The AI ran quickly through a list of the Imperial craft's capabilities, and Hazel's heart sank even further. Disrupter cannon, force shields, assault torpedoes… the Shard wouldn't stand a chance, but then, she'd always known that. The only thing big enough to take on a starcruiser was another starcruiser. Hazel swallowed hard and let her thoughts move cautiously through the two fire turrets. The cannon stirred restlessly at her touch, picking out targets of opportunity on the Imperial ship.
    Hazel's breathing had almost slowed to normal, but her anger took it away again as she studied the starcruiser. What the hell was it doing here? There wasn't one due for weeks, officially. It couldn't have come looking for the Shard; a handful of cloneleggers on a pirate ship weren't that important. Which was all very fine and logical, but the Imperial ship was still there, large as life and twice as deadly, its ranked cannon no doubt locked on the pirate ship and ready
    to fire at a moment's notice. Hazel scowled fiercely. They couldn't run, they couldn't fight, and they didn't dare surrender. Maybe they