8. Gromnyr

CHAPTER 8

GROMNYR

" M y king, there seems to be a disturbance on level six."

Disturbances are the norm on a pirate vessel. Orcs follow a very simple rule: The strong lead. If a leader falters, there's always someone ready to take their place.

That is how I earned my seat on the helm of this massive pirate fleet. I am the Alpha. The strongest and smartest orc around in all the known universe. I took down the previous captain in hand-to-hand combat. The spilling of his blood signified the start of my reign.

"So?" I ask my assistant Grull. He wants to take my spot more than anything, but he knows his place. "As long as the integrity of the ship isn't in danger, it'll sort itself out."

"I believe that this is the work of your, uh, new bounty, sir. The human. I thought you might want to know."

My pointy ears perk up. "The human? Are you sure?"

"See for yourself, sir."

He hands me a tablet showing all the camera's placed around the ship. The sixth level is pure pandemonium. There are several electrical fires, and thick smoke fills the hallways. Battle-droids parade through the halls, firing on everything that moves. Orcs yell and scream like scared children as they flee for their lives. Through the scenes of chaos, I spot her.

It's easy to miss the small, crouched figure of the shapely human in all the commotion, but my well-trained eye spots her figure moving through the halls stealthily.

Resourceful. I left Claire alone for, what? Less than an hour and she's already managed to turn a whole section of my ship into a flaming hellhole.

I'm so proud of her.

I flick through the footage and pierce together her plan. She snuck out of my personal quarters and stalked the halls for a while, checking out all the rooms without being spotted to formulate her escape. Once she stumbled upon the supply room with the decommissioned battle-droids, she got to work.

Those droids are Federation tech. Heavily encrypted. My smartest minds haven't been able to crack it, which is why they've been stuck in storage for months, gathering dust.

But this little hellraiser managed to crack the encryption in a matter of minutes, and set them loose on the ship, using the distraction to head for the escape pods.

She shows a lot of promise.

"Are you not going to do something about it, sir?" My assistant asks.

"Soon," I answer. "I want to see how far she gets first."

The more damage she does to my ship… the more I will get to punish her.