Some Kind of Hero
(From Mercedes Lackey, Live!)

 

Will you do me a favor, piano-man, please
I want you to write me a song
Cause they call me the hero of Antelope’s Run
And I gotta show ‘em they’re wrong.

You see, it all started a week before,
In the bar down on corridor three
There was nobody there but us regular bums:
Two losers, the barman and me.

Knockin’ back booze in the north corner booth
Was an old man they called Captain Jed
Cause he owned the tramp freighter the old Antelope
A ship that like him was half dead.

  Molly they say was a crack pilot once,
A gal with a brilliant career
But then she started dopin’ on Regulus I
And finally washed out down here.

Then there was me: I wanted the Navy, bad,
But it seems that they didn’t want me,
So I stopped chasin’ stars, started sweepin’ up bars
For bed, board and all my drinks free.

It was quiet that night with the docks closed down
There was nothin’ due in for a week
Not a ship was in port but the old Antelope,
When the ‘Red Alert’ started to shriek

And the whole station shook like a hurt, living thing,
And the lights dimmed and faded away,
And the gravity went, and the air pumps cut out,
And the bartender started to pray.

“Ah, stow that bilge! Head for the Antelope now!”
Jed’s voice cut the dark like a knife,
“The station reactor’s gone critical load,
So run to the docks for your life.”

When we got to the docks we found waiting out there
Every soul who had been left alive
And they begged with their eyes for old Captain Jed
To tell ‘em all how to survive.

“Go break out the suits,” said the Captain to them,
“Cause it’s dark, and it’s airless, and cold
But I swear I can get you all out of here safe,
Packed into the Antelope’s hold.”

“Molly, my girl, can you navigate?”
“Aye, but who do we have for a crew?”
“Well the Antelope only needs three hands,” he said,
“And I think our young friend here will do.”

Well the confident look that he flashed at me then,
Made my heart fair turn over with pride,
And I never once thought about backin’ away,
I think I would rather have died.

Two hundred alive in the Antelope’s hold,
And the Captain, and Molly, and me.
We slammed the locks just as the station blew wide,
Jed hit the main jets to get free.

Now that kind of G-force, it’s rough on the heart,
Too much for the old boy to take.
So when we came around and we saw how he lay,
Well we knew Captain Jed wouldn’t wake.

So I took the com and the engineer boards,
While Molly took helm and the nav,
With the manual spread out all over the deck
And her mind for what they didn’t have.

She worked at that comp like a crazy machine
Though her hands shook like grass in the breeze.
But her skills were still sharp and she jumped us three times
Never minding the shakes and DeeTees.

It was three jumps made clean, only one more was left
When the ship’s alarm started to blast
Her old, worn-out seals had come loose in the stress,
We were losing our heat and air fast.

On the bridge there was only one vacuum suit left,
Well they say Lady Luck is stone blind.
“Heads or tails?” was the question I started to ask,
When I felt myself hit from behind.

When I came to again, I was sealed in the suit.
She was belted down tight in her chair.
With her hands on the console, a smile on her lips,
And ice crystals frosting her hair.

“Here’s the instructions to get us all home.”
I saw she had left on the screen.
“And if any old shipmates should ask after Moll,
Just tell ‘em she finally died clean.”

Well I made that last jump, just like she’d told me to
And I brought the ship in like she’d said,
And they call me a hero now for what I did,
But they don’t mention Molly and Jed.

So you write me that song now, piano-man, please
And sing it out often, and loud.
So they all know the story of one kind of hero,
The kind to make anyone proud.

For some kinds of heroes are lunkheads like me
Who only do what they are told
And some kind of heroes are out for the glory,
They’re heroes on purpose, and cold.

And some become heroes from bravery, sure,
And some, just because all is lost.
But a few are the heroes like Molly and Jed,
Who just give without counting the costs.

[back to lyrics]



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