Captain of the Monte Cristo: a space opera retelling of the classic tale (Classic Retellings Book 1) Read online

  CAPTAIN OF THE MONTE CRISTO

  A space opera retelling of the classic tale

  Sarah K. L. Wilson and John Gunningham

  All rights reserved. Aside from brief quotations for media coverage and reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced or distributed in any form without the author’s permission. Thank you for supporting authors and a diverse, creative culture by purchasing this book and complying with copyright laws.

  Copyright © 2017 by Sarah K. L. Wilson and John Gunningham

  Interior design by Pronoun

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Eighteen years later...

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  About the Authors

  The Captain of the Monte Cristo

  John Gunningham & Sarah K. L. Wilson

  To My Family

  -John Gunningham

  For Scotland, because I wouldn’t know

  anything about gaming if he wasn’t my brother.

  -Sarah K. L. Wilson

  CHAPTER ONE

  SCORCHED CIRCUITS AND THE TANG of human blood were all Lieutenant Edmond Dante could smell as he clung to the grips on his command chair.

  “Helm, turn her two-point-five-four degrees. Alpha missiles launch on my mark. Five, four, three, two, launch!”

  Dante’s holoscreen showed the missiles screaming into the pirate ship, but the Dauntless was already floundering under the pummeling she’d received.

  “Helm is sluggish, Lieutenant.” Rogers’ tone was tight as he worked the data streams coming from the helm.

  Edmond swallowed hard. The Captain had come in fat and lazy on a predictable sector approach and this is what had greeted them: pirates. He should have known, but there was no time to think of that now.

  “Incoming at a vector of zero-point-nine-two.”

  “Evasive maneuvers, deploy counter-missiles!” he barked, but their ship was already bucking under enemy fire multiple soundless firecrackers in the vacuum of space. Clouds of gas streamed from the punctures in the hull before the auto repair systems could seal off damaged sectors.

  “We’ve done all we can, they’re still closing. They’ll be boarding us soon.”

  Edmond struck the arm of the command chair hard with his fist before he glanced at the pale Captain as hthe medical officer, Mercedes, did her best to stop him from drowning in his own blood. The ship’s engineer, Fernand, frantically tried to get his attention over Edmond’s implanted comm unit.

  “Edmond, they’re hailing us,” he said urgently in the Lieutenant’s. “You need to come to engineering.”

  “One moment,” Edmond said, putting his finger to his jaw to speak to Fernand before dropping to his knees beside Mercedes. “Will he make it?”

  She wiped the sweat on her forehead, heedless of the blood she smeared there. She was working on the floor where the Captain had fallen with her kit spread out beside her.

  “I don’t know. If that first salvo hadn’t ruined my medical station, I’d say yes without a doubt. With only three field kits, though…” her voice trailed off. “He needs a real medical center, but I’ll do what I can,” she finished firmly.

  “I know you will—you always do.” There was no time for the embrace Dante wanted to give her, but he prayed there would be time later. He clasped her shoulder instead.

  “Edmond, they’re coming, damn you! The Captain can die well enough without your company!” Fernand insisted.

  Dante found his fist clenched tight and forced himself to loosen it. Fernand was not wrong, despite his lack of tact.

  “Coming,” he said over the comm.

  “Be safe,” Mercedes said. Her eyes spoke volumes before she turned back to her work.

  Dante nodded once and then was off, hurtling through the narrow corridors of the ship. It was a short way to go; the emergency protocols had locked down a large portion of the habitable space as soon as the first cannon had been fired. It was only good fortune that none of the crew had been blown into space outright. It had been poor fortune that shrapnel had found the Captain as he’d rushed to sound general quarters.

  He again felt his anger rising as he passed the damage. These pirates would pay!

  “There you are, and nearly late!” Fernand looked up from his holographic data stream. He was uncharacteristically filthy, having had to perform emergency repairs manually, as several of the ship’s self-maintenance protocols had failed. He wore a bulky atmosphere suit with the helmet’s visor pushed up as he gestured to the hatch in front of him. “They’re forcing their way in here, I’m sure of it. They’ve already attached their ship’s docking mechanism—I saw that much before the cameras went dead. Here, you’ll need a suit.” Fernand pulled one from the rack and thrust it at Dante.

  “You think they’ll vent the air? Kill us all?” He struggled into the space suit even as he heard the hard, metallic sounds of tools forcing entry into their ship and violating her locks.

  “Oh, I doubt that’s their intention, but it is mine.” Fernand brandished his fist inside the data stream with an evil grin. “When they connected with us, I managed to get inside them.”

  “You’ve taken control of their ship?”

  “I’m an engineer, Dante, not a hacker, but I was able to gain access to their environmental controls.” Fernand pulled his helmet down and his voice took on the filtered sound of all electronic communication. “It’s about to get very cold for our pirate friends.”

  “You’ll kill them!” Dante exclaimed.

  “That’s the point. Better them than us,” Fernand said. “I thought seeing the Captain would have made that extremely clear. These men will kill us for our cargo without a second thought. Think of yourself, man. Think of Mercedes!”

  “Think of your conscience!” the Edmond countered. They couldn’t be having this conversation! “You’re talking about mass murder!”

  “In self-defense,” Fernand said with a shrug. Ahead of them, the door creaked and groaned. The pirate boarding party was nearly through. “Get your suit and let’s finish this quickly.”

  “This is wrong and you know it,” Dante said firmly. “I can’t condone it!”

  He looked Fernand in the eye as he deliberately set his helmet on the floor.

  “If you go through with it, it will be my life with theirs.” He was proud that his voice didn’t waiver much when he spoke. “I won’t allow any such actions until we’ve exhausted negotiations.”

  Fernand stared blankly as the loc
ked door lost the last of its resolve and was pushed inward by three men and a woman wearing mismatched gear. They carried weapons which looked to be in poor repair. Dante stood firm and exposed.

  “Ah, you’ve saved us the trouble of finding you,” the first man said over the built-in speakers in his suit. He didn’t remove his helmet or show his face, but his voice had the resignation of an older man.

  “We’re here to accept the terms of your surrender,” Edmond responded, trying to sound like he was in command.

  “Well, look at the balls of brass on this one, eh, lads?” the pirate boomed. “Full points for bravado, boy, but you’re in no position to make demands. We’ll be the ones taking your surrender,” he laughed as their weapons were primed and pointed.

  “Listen carefully, because I will only say this once: we’ve gained access to your environmental controls and can vent your ship’s atmosphere whenever we choose,” Dante said. “Now, throw down your weapons and surrender your ship.”

  Please listen to reason. No one else needs to die here.

  “You’re bluffing,” the pirate said in disdain after a moment of reflection.

  “Not at all,” Fernand said, stepping closer. He keyed a quick sequence in his data stream and smiled like a fox. The boarding party responded almost instantly to what must have been an outburst on their comm channel.

  “Only enough for a show of force, Fernand, nothing more,” Edmond said quietly. “I beg you.” The Lieutenant couldn’t be sure, but he thought he felt the air grow thin, even here.

  “Of course,” the engineer said, tapping his controls again. “Only enough for a scare.”

  “Still think we’re bluffing?” Dante called out.

  In response, the boarding party tossed their weapons aside and showed their empty hands.

  CHAPTER TWO

  “IT WAS ENOUGH THAT WE threatened them!” Edmond said again as he paced back and forth on the deck of the officer’s mess where Edmond had called the meeting of officers.

  “It would have been better to just flush the atmosphere. Now we have a ship of pirates to deal with—to feed and police.” Fernand carefully dragged a hand through his hair, trying not to muss it too much. Edmond frowned. Was Fernand so much of a peacock that he cared what his hair looked like at a time like this? “We don’t have the space to keep them all, and with a second ship to pilot as a prize we’ll need to split off crew to cover her stations. If we didn’t have prisoners, this wouldn’t be a problem. You haven’t been down there, trying to repair the automated systems, like I have. We were almost destroyed in the attack!”

  “Could we cannibalize the pirate’s ship for parts and leave her here?” Edmond said, looking out through the officer’s mess window at their prize. Her running lights were lit at regular intervals along her hull; for a pirate’s rig, she was well-built and maintained. “Either way, we must make our decision quickly. The Captain won’t last much longer.”

  “We can’t leave the ship,” Villefort, the ship’s purser, spoke for the first time since they’d shut themselves away from the crew. “If it’s a choice between the prize and the pirates, it must be the prize. We all have the debts of our commissions to pay, and the prize will almost cover those.”

  Edmond grunted. Of course the purser was worried about money.

  “Grunt all you want, Edmond. Some of us want to buy back our indentures.” Villefort said.

  “Some of us have a few extra debts to settle, eh Villefort?” Fernand nudged him with an elbow.

  Edmond frowned as Villefort brushed Fernand’s elbow away. It was no secret that he was hilt-deep in debt. Was that clouding his judgment? Surely, they couldn’t both be heartless enough to see their fellow men flushed out the air locker.

  “Regardless, our employers will not be pleased if we lose the ship.”

  “It’s worse to lose the lives of the men who crewed her,” Edmond said, rubbing his chin.

  “They’re pirates, Edmond—the company might even praise us for ridding space of the vermin,” Fernand stood and stretched his back. “They’re criminals—human trash—and your ridiculous sympathies are wasted on them. My vote is to send them out the airlock. It’s an easy, cheap solution. We can then check in at the closest planet and get the old man some medical care.”

  “Captain Moreau can’t go to the nearest planet. None of us can. It’s Elba. You know who’s there… and why. Just entering orbit is almost enough to be accused of treason.” Villefort sounded aghast.

  “Medical Bay to First Officer,” the overhead comm chirped.

  “First Officer,” Edmond responded, holding his finger to his jaw bone. The implanted mic read his sub-vocalizations and needed no assistance, but he’d never been able to shake the feeling that holding his finger there made it clearer.

  “Edmond, we need to get Captain Moreau to a full medical facility as soon as possible. Where are we on that?” Mercedes’ voice was tight on the comm.

  “Working on it.”

  “Work faster!”

  “How long can you keep him stable?”

  “The nearest planet might not be close enough, but we’d better head there now. Edmond,” she paused, her voice hushed, “he’s hemorrhaging to death.”

  “The closest planet is Elba, Mercedes.”

  “I don’t care if it’s Hell. If you want him to live, you’ll take us there.”

  An alarm whooped in the medical bay and her signal cut off. Edmond rubbed his forehead. What to do? Going to Elba was close to treason, but the Captain’s life hung in the balance. If only he hadn’t been suckered by the pirates.

  “Is the medial station in the pirate ship working?” he suddenly asked.

  “Negative—it’s as trashed as ours. If we go to Elba, we definitely shouldn’t take the pirates,” Fernand said. “Mercedes’ diagnosis settles it. I vote we get rid of them.”

  “Get rid of them?” Edmond asked, “Like bed bugs? They’re people! I vote we turn them in to the authorities. We’ll go to Elba for the Captain and we can turn the pirates in to the garrison there.”

  Fernand’s jaw clenched stubbornly, and Edmond turned on his last potential ally.

  “Tell him, Villefort! Tell him we can’t just kill people!”

  Villefort tapped the table with his fingers. “What about the ship? Our prize?”

  “If I promise to find a way to keep them both, will you agree to my plan?” Why couldn’t they see how inhumane they were?

  Villefort hesitated.

  “Oh, for crying out loud, Edmond!” Fernand’s expression was all hard lines and frustration. “You’d risk treason and mutiny just to salve your precious honor?”

  “You’ll keep the prize and we’ll sell it?” Villefort verified.

  “Yes! How many times must I say it?” Edmond asked. If only he could pull rank. The regulations, however, were specific that, in a crisis of leadership, he needed a quorum of the surviving officers.

  “I’ll vote with you, then.”

  “I won’t set foot on that ship,” Fernand said, “and I won’t serve brig duty. If you do this, you do it on your own.”

  “You won’t have to,” Edmond said. “I’ll brig them on their own ship and crew it myself. We can tow our ship with theirs, slave the computers, and pilot them in tandem from Dauntless. I’ll be the only one at risk. If there are any problems, you can cut me off and leave.”

  “That means I’ll be piloting both ships,” Fernand said with a smile on his lips. “You have that much faith in me?”

  Edmond nodded, “I do. Get us there safely and quickly. You heard Mercedes: the Captain’s life depends on it.”

  He slapped the door release panel and waited for the locks to withdraw. He’d brokered a deal for the pirates’ lives, but could he pull it off? Crewing a ship using captives wasn’t going to be easy – especially out here in the boundary planets. They were lush, to be certain, but the law barely reached them, and there would be no one to call on for help if violence broke out again.


  Fernand laughed. “Don’t worry about me—worry about yourself. If your new friends mutiny over there, I’ll flush the breathable air... whether you’re suited up or not.”

  “I’d expect nothing less, Fernand.”

  “Medical Bay to First Officer.”

  “Edmond,” Mercedes’ voice was even tighter, “are we moving yet?”

  He had to hurry—she wouldn’t sound so raw if she wasn’t afraid of losing a patient.

  CHAPTER THREE

  EDMOND WATCHED THE BLUE AND green planet come into view with an involuntary shudder—and he wasn’t the only one.

  “I’ve heard stories of Elba,” the young pirate handcuffed to the co-pilot’s chair next to Edmond said. “None of them end well for anyone.”

  Edmond pursed his lips. “You don’t know the half of it,” he murmured as he glanced at the boy. He’s so young. Pirating must be all he knows.

  “Jack, right?”

  The boy nodded without taking his eyes off the planet below.

  “Normally I wouldn’t condemn anyone here—not even pirates—but we have no choice. It was this or a short walk out an airlock. Do you understand?”

  Jack didn’t say anything as he stared at the planet with what must have been a thousand stories of infamy running through his head. Edmond scrubbed his hands over his tired eyes. Well, this was what happened to pirates, wasn’t it? Surely being incarcerated was better than death. Edmond tried to clear the thoughts from his mind, as there were other important matters to attend to.

  He steeled his resolve and opened a channel to Elba.

  “This is Company ship 60-215 Dauntless requesting clearance to land. We have a medical emergency and require immediate aid.” For a moment, there was no response. He repeated himself into the abyss. Did the planet lack basic communication as part of its quarantine protocol? It took another tense minute for a reply to come.

  “Dauntless, you are in direct violation of Company directive and quarantine protocols by communicating with this planet. Do you understand?”

  He closed his eyes, memories of the Captain and all his mercy flooding through his mind.