“We got shocked,” Eske answered quickly.
“Yeah, I put that together. What I meant was, why the heck were we shocked?”
“I don’t know,” Eske said as she helped Bahn to sit up.
“I do.” I looked at my friends uncertainly, as if I wasn’t sure whether I should deliver another blow to their morale, but I wasn’t much for keeping secrets and they deserved to know. “Mari betrayed us.”
“What? Little Mari who follows you and Mimi around like you’re gods?”
“Yeah, that little Mari. She said she had been planning this for four months and then threw some sort of electrical bomb onto the ground.”
“How did she not get shocked by it?” Bahn asked. “I seem to recall that she was fine, but I can’t tell. My memory is quite…hazy.”
“She had made her outfit from rubber insulation in the rec hall.”
“Wow,” Ciangi muttered. “So, she really did plan this. I… I honestly don’t know what to say about that.”
“I do,” I said, lips forming a frown. “Where’s Mimi?”
The others looked around like they hadn’t noticed, all with varying expressions of worry on their faces.
“That’s not good,” Ciangi said, eyebrows knitted together.
“No, it’s not,” I agreed. “And I’d like to know how to find her.”
“I have the feeling that she’s most likely in some sort of container similar to what Giomatti once tried to hold her in, except perhaps modified to fit her current power levels,” Bahn thought aloud, rubbing at his temples as he did.
“Do you think that the humans have technology capable of that?” I asked, turning the idea over in my head. “Mimi has gotten a lot stronger than our Giomatti days.”
“Yes,” Bahn said, “but if Mari was in touch with them then they probably have more recent reports of her actual power level.”
I took a deep breath. “That’s discouraging.”
There was a murmur of agreement amongst us and the conversation stilled. We sat there, in silence, before the door slid open.
I was unsurprised to see the commander, still flanked by soldiers. “You are the one they call Higgens?” he said, addressing me.
“You tricked us,” I said, lips pulled back with a snarl. It wasn’t like me to be so aggressive, but they had managed to push just about all of my buttons.
“We needed to contain you and bring you in. You and your fold are a looming threat to humanity that would have been dealt with eventually. We just lucked out that one of your own recognized the danger that you were and turned you in.”
“You’re not actually Earth Gov,” I said as realization dawned on me. “You’re part of the coup. Geez, how many of you guys are corrupt?”
“Is it corrupt to want to throw off the shackles of a power system that is failing so many of its citizens?”
“When you’re doing it by breaking treaties, stealing technology, and locking up innocent people, I’d give a resounding yeah.”
“None of you are innocent. You’re all traitors to your kind that have abandoned the world that needed you so much.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Ciangi cut in. “Bloviate all you want, buddy, you’re a pawn just as much as we are. What we wanna know is where Mimi is and what you’re planning to do with us.”
“She is contained. As for the purpose of your presence here, that is not for you to know. Be satisfied that your value has temporarily suspended your punishment for betraying Earth Gov. But press us, and you may outlive your usefulness sooner than calculated.”
With that, he turned on his boot and headed out, leaving me to wonder what this whole show was about anyways. It was only after he was gone that the soldiers dropped four ration packets in front of us and a single canteen of what I assumed was water.
Well, at least they weren’t trying to starve us.
Without a word and with their packages set down, the soldiers headed out and closed the door behind them, leaving us alone.
Eske was kind enough to open each of the packets for us and hold them up to our mouths. How we would have eaten without her, I didn’t know, but maybe it was another method of torture to put food in front of us that we couldn’t reach.
The joke was on them, though. Just like Eske working around the cuffs, we would find a way around our imprisonment. We’d never been beaten before, so we certainly weren’t going to start now.
…I hoped.
6
Zero Star Accommodations
Time moved painfully slowly within the ship. There was no way to tell when it was night or when it was day, or even if any hours were passing at all. We had each other, and that helped, but the thought of what was coming and what could be happening with Mimi made every second painful in its passing.
It took two weeks to get back to Earth at the highest of speeds without a break, and I wasn’t sure we could last that long. Sure, while they brought us food and water occasionally, they made us wait a painfully long time before letting any of us relieve ourselves. Even then, they took us out of the room one at a time, taking us to the lavatory but never allowing us to shut the door or uncuffing our feet.
At least none of them were being directly violent with us like the guard that had tortured Gonzales, but they weren’t exactly nice either. If any of us took too long, they’d often shove us forward, and if we rationed our water too efficiently, they would take the still partially-full container and dump it out in front of us.
It was awful, more mentally than physically. All of us were growing more and more irritable, and the term ‘short fuse’ came to mind. The same day in and day out was definitely getting to all of us.
The door opened, much sooner than it normally would, and we all sat up to see several soldiers at the door, all of them armed again.
“Come with us,” one of them said. They were pretty much impossible to tell apart, all being male with the same military-grade haircut and square jaws. Or maybe I had just spent too much time around the mimics and had forgotten how to distinguish human features as well as I might once have.
“Which one of us?” I asked, since the rest of us were all just blinking at him with wide eyes. Apparently, our time in captivity had not exactly been kind to any of our social skills.
“All of you. And if you try anything, we will open fire.”
“Why? Where are you taking us? Are we at Earth?”
Before I could even blink, one of them slammed the butt of their gun into my side and I went toppling over. The rest of our little quartet surged onto their knees, ready to defend me, but the soldiers swarmed us and got us to our feet. They unlocked the shackles around our ankles, but left our hands bound, making me wonder what we could possibly be doing.
By the time I caught my breath, we were marching through the door. We passed the bathroom without a second’s hesitation, and suddenly, we were in a part of the spaceship we had never been before.
None of us said anything, but I got the feeling it was because we were all frantically taking in everything we could, hoping that there would be some sign of how we could escape or even finding Mimi.
The halls were much less winding than a lot of other ships I had been in, even our warship, which made me wonder if Earth Gov had improved it designs or we were just in a particularly efficient model.
Not too much later, we were shoved into a large, empty room. I couldn’t quite place what the purpose of it was. There were drains in the floor and handles against the wall, with strong lights all above. There was a spout at one end of the room, a considerable distance away from us, and the one door, but that was it.
“What’s the point of all this?” Ciangi asked, holding Eske’s hand since the athlete was still without her goggles. “Wanted to take us on the least scenic tour known to man?”
The soldiers didn’t say anything, but rather stepped out of the doorway so that the commander could take their place.
“You’re all filthy. No soldier should have to be stuck on a transport with any of
you, considering how foul you smell.”
“Gee, its almost like when you make people wear the same clothes for days on end without cleaning themselves they start to get a little rank.” Ciangi’s already short patience had grown even smaller during our captivity, but I couldn’t help but agree with her assessment.
“Noted. Prepare for decontamination.”
“Decon—”
The door closed before I could finish my word and then we were alone. For a moment, everything was quiet. Then the spout at the end of the room opened and pushed forward, increasing in width until it was about as wide as a hand.
“I don’t have a good feeling about this,” Bahn managed to get out before we were all blasted with a large, freezing cold jet of water.
Once more, I couldn’t breathe. My whole body locked up from the cold. The water hurt, like someone spraying sandpaper all over us and rubbing our skin raw.
The spray moved down my body, knocking me to my knees. The others weren’t doing much better, and we ended up huddled together on the floor to try to protect each other from the blast.
I had no idea how long it went on, my mind a haze of pain, but eventually, the water cut off and we were left panting and shivering on the floor.
“Apply the cleanser.”
I didn’t need to ask to know that I wouldn’t like that, so I pressed my face to my shoulder as several panels in the ceilings opened to reveal sprinklers that sprayed down something both foamy and floral-smelling.
At least that part didn’t hurt, but it wasn’t that great either. I was never much one for the scent of lavender or any strong smells really, and I knew that the layer of suds would eventually have to be washed off.
“I’m going to need all of you to stand up and make sure the cleanser is worked into all of your clothing and body.”
“Why on Earth should we cooperate with you?”
“Because if you don’t,” the commander’s voice said over the com, “we can’t be assured that you were properly decontaminated. Which means we’ll just have to cycle this process again and again and again until we are satisfied that you are thoroughly cleansed.”
“Well, that’s a reasonable enough argument,” I said with a sigh, struggling to my feet. “But you wanna explain how we’re going to do that with all of our hands behind our back?”
“Fair enough.”
There was a slight buzz and then I felt a sort of magnetic pulse rush through the room. A second later, all our shackles fell, and for the first time in days, we were unchained.
I rubbed at the tender skin of my wrist, hardly believing that my restraints were gone. The flesh that was under the bonds was definitely not happy, with some of it being rubbed raw while other parts were bruised and rashy. I had a feeling that it would take some good antibiotics to heal, but the commander probably wasn’t interested in giving any to us.
They gave us maybe a minute to lather up before I heard the spout fire up again. I barely had enough time to put my hands over my eyes and turn my back before we were blasted with the stinging spray.
It hurt just as much as last time, but it was far less shocking. In a way, it almost felt nice to be clean, but I could think of a whole lot more relaxing way to scrub up.
The spray lasted longer than last time, scouring us until there wasn’t a sud on any of our bodies, and then it finally shut off. The four of us stood there, shivering, until more vents opened in the ceiling and warm air started blowing down onto us. It almost made me laugh, the absurdity of it all. It was one thing to torture us with cold blasts of water and stinging spray, but it was another entirely to blow dry us after the ordeal.
But that was exactly what they did, and about five minutes later, we were all fluffy-haired and mostly dry.
“Put your restraints back on, inmates,” the commander’s voice came over the comms. He sounded almost amused. He probably enjoyed making a fool of us from his perspective.
We did as he asked, but the advantage of us doing it was that we all put the cuffs on in front of our body. They lit up as soon as they touched our skin, then tightened around our wrists until they were almost too tight.
Almost.
Then the door opened and a soldier stepped in, gun pointed at us, and gestured for us to exit.
We did, of course, and trudged out only slightly damp. Once we were out, they didn’t lead us back the way we came. No, instead we were being shuffled toward another entirely new part of the ship.
What could be going on? We certainly didn’t need any more showering, but it wasn’t like the commander or any of his crew was going to explain. So, we all marched along, observing as much as we could, until we were in a landing room, full of chairs and harnesses.
“Sit down,” one of the soldiers ordered.
We complied, each going to a different seat and allowing the soldiers to strap us in. I felt the slightest bubble of hope in my stomach. If we were in a landing bay, that meant we had to be at Earth, and being at Earth meant our surroundings were definitely going to change. But for the worse or for the better? I supposed there was no way of knowing.
Once we were all properly secured, the soldiers settled themselves. The commander wasn’t present, but I was guessing that he wasn’t going to go through the landing with his underlings. The perks of being a high-ranking military member in an illegal coup.
The rumbling started up soon after, interrupting my thoughts. Their entering the atmosphere was far smoother than that of our warship, but I didn’t know if that was because the ship was smaller, or if their technology had progressed that much since we had left. I supposed I would never know, but I decided not to think about that. This couldn’t be the end of us. I refused to believe it.
Whether I believed it or not, however, the one thing I noticed was that Mimi was conspicuously absent. That was less than ideal. But where on Earth could they have her? While the ship was bigger than a fighter, or a small-team fighter vessel, it was definitely a fraction of the size of our warship. I couldn’t imagine them having a secondary brig or cleansing area.
The rumbling and shaking was starting to end, but a quick movement from Eske caught my eye. I glanced over to her, to see her gently sweeping her foot around. I didn’t know what she was doing for a moment, until I realized that—with her limited vision—she was feeling out for where the soldiers were.
Oh. Her feet were free. Even with her hands restrained, Eske was more than capable of kicking some serious behind. But I was worried her movement might draw attention. She needed a distraction, just to be safe.
But what could I do? I certainly didn’t have any amazing martial art skills to call upon or great skills with people. So, I just started coughing.
Well, perhaps hacking was a more accurate term. I really gave it my everything, pretending like I was hawking a loogy, and I felt all of the soldiers looking at me with either concern or disgust.
But that was all Eske needed. She flipped her leg up from her seat, her shin slamming into the head of the soldier next to her. In one fluid motion, she unbuckled herself from the harness and rolled forward, diving into another soldier with both feet slamming into his chest.
Suddenly, the landing room erupted in chaos. The three of us unbuckled ourselves as well, throwing ourselves into the fray.
By throwing ourselves into the fray, I mean we focused on the two soldiers that weren’t grappling with Eske, trying to grab their guns and prevent anyone from being blasted in the face.
Of course, there was entering the atmosphere to worry about. Just when the soldier I was dealing with seemed to get the upper hand, a particularly hard jolt rocked the entire cabin, sending us all slamming into the wall.
When the ship settled, we were all tangled in each other, and it was a hot mess as the struggle picked up again. Somehow, in the tussle, the soldier had gotten the upper hand on me and was pressing the length of his blaster against my throat. I could hardly breathe, and I pushed up against him with all my might, but he didn’t even b
udge until a booted foot slammed into his temple.
He fell to the side and I sent a quick, grateful look to Eske. She had no time to return it, however, already turning to deal with the remaining soldiers.
There was more rattling and more rolling, slamming us into the ceiling or sliding us across the floor, but somehow—blind and bound—Eske managed to take down all of the soldiers while we, uh, kinda helped. A little. By the time the ship settled, we were riffling through the soldier’s pockets, trying to find some sort of key or card to get out of there.
“I can’t believe that worked,” Eske murmured, standing to the side. I saw a bruise blooming on her cheek, but she didn’t even seem to notice. I had long since grown used to her hazy eyes traveling around at will, but I couldn’t help but notice that their wandering seemed much more frantic than usual.
“I’m impressed,” Ciangi said from beside me, before pulling out a thin security card from the soldier she was feeling up. “Even after six months of peace, you still got it.”
“I suppose teaching the children everyday has really helped me.” She sighed lightly. “I miss them, actually.”
“I do too,” I said, grabbing the blaster from one of the guards and taking the security card as Ciangi handed it to me. “So, let’s make sure we get back to them.”
These corrupted officials wanted a coup? Well, we would give them a coup. One way or another, we were turning this ship around.
I slid the card into the door, ready to charge out and make sure we seized the element of surprise. But as soon as the entrance slid open, I was immediately faced with a half dozen or so more soldiers, all of their guns drawn.
“Well, sh—”
I never got the word out. An arc of energy shot out of their weapons and I was thrown back into the far wall. With a disappointed sigh, I felt myself slip under.
So much for that idea.
7
Processing
It turned out that the commander and his crew didn’t like prisoner uprisings. They also didn’t like that four members of their crew had been beaten to a nice pulp. Who knew?
Mimic: The Space Shifter Chronicles Boxed Set (Books 1 - 9) Page 45