by J D Huffman
“We’ve sent our cargo manifest to the Outpost Manager,” a faceless voice came over the speaker. “You can scan everything as it comes through, too. You’ll see it’s all there and your Manager can sign off, and we can get off this damn rock.”
“Actis isn’t much of a vacation spot,” Demeter evidently agreed.
Sasha was less amused. She heard footsteps, some equipment moving around. Demeter spoke up again. “While you’re here, there are a few things we need you to look at.”
“We’re not an engineering detail,” the Totality said rudely. Sasha could just imagine him sticking up his nose while he said it. “Our commander noticed a lot of damage to your facility, by the way. Did someone attack you? It sure looks like it.”
“No,” Demeter said dismissively. “We had a crystal fire that got out of hand. Took a while to put it out.”
“Next time, dump a load of snow on it!” the Totality guffawed. “You guys sure have enough of it around here.”
“We’ll keep that in mind. I didn’t want to show you anything to repair, actually. I wanted to show you around our facility so you don’t think Actis is all wind and snow.”
“Really? Old man Driscoll never showed us any hospitality. You guys under new management?”
Demeter must have nodded because Sasha didn’t hear him say anything.
“Great! What do you have here? I am getting hungry. Ship rations are terrible. Don’t know if you’ve had them, just take my word for it. I’ve told my commander and he claims to have raised it up to Cylence himself, but I never hear anything back. That guy’s probably living the high life in the Dominix, getting fat on all the delicacies in the galaxy while the rest of us have to live on gritty chunks they tell us are nutritious but don’t taste like anything. But, you know, he’s Cylence, so what can anybody do about it?”
“Yeah, that guy.” Demeter forced a laugh. “If you’ll just follow me, I’ll show you what we have in the mess hall.”
“Great!” Their chatter grew more distant as they presumably walked away from the docking area.
Sasha breathed a sigh of relief. Once he gets them away from the dock, it’ll be easy to put them down and lock them up. She opened a communication directly to Serim. “Serim, if anyone in the ‘welcoming party’ contacts you, tell them to bring the most senior of the cargo ship staff to the powerplant. I want to interrogate him.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he acknowledged.
“Don’t call me that,” she snapped. “My name is fine.”
“Sorry, Sasha.”
While they waited, Sasha’s tension rose further. She had no idea what was going on elsewhere in the facility. Most of the former slaves were down in their mining units, nibbling on food she’d doled out from the mess hall. She’d explained the situation to them, the fact that they might have to remain hidden for the better part of a day while they seized control of the cargo train. Reactions ranged from polite acceptance to untempered annoyance, especially from the handful of people who seemed unhappy about the Totality being dislodged from running the place. While she didn’t have them locked in their mining units, the exits were being monitored in case anyone left before they were called to board a cargo ship, and if necessary she’d go down herself and tell them to stay put.
Demeter arrived a while later, dragging an unconscious man in a Totality uniform into the powerplant maintenance room. “You wanted him?” he asked, letting the man’s body slump to the floor as he let go. Sasha noticed his hands and feet were bound with some of the strong twine they’d found in the maintenance shed.
“Thanks,” she nodded. “We’ll handle him from here. I may call you back down to put him with the others. You’ve got them locked up?”
“Yes, in the Totality living quarters, like we discussed. Not enough rooms with doors that lock for us to put them anywhere else.”
“I know. Once we’re done taking the ships, we’ll move the prisoners down to one of the mining units and seal them in.”
“We’re not going to just kill them?” Demeter seemed surprised.
“The Totality will figure out as soon as the cargo train doesn’t arrive at its next destination that it’s been stolen. If they’re at all sensible, they’ll send a ship here—the cargo train’s last known location. They’ll find their people safely confined in the mine.”
“Except for the batch we slaughtered in taking this facility,” he reminded her.
She folded her arms. “They’ll just have to live with that. I don’t want to kill anyone needlessly—not even Totality. If they attack you, you can use deadly force. I told you that before. But I can’t condone killing people when they’re defenseless.”
“Understood,” Demeter said without argument. She couldn’t tell if that meant he would follow her mandate, or if he’d just do whatever he wanted and then claim to have been attacked when he wasn’t. There was too much to be done to bother pressing him on it just then.
“Go guide the first five mining units up to the ship,” she ordered next. “Attempt to capture the remaining crew if you can. If there’s room on the ship, let a couple more mining units aboard. Load the crystal fuel, too. Use all the help you need.”
“Of course,” he bowed, then departed to carry out her commands.
Once he was out of sight, Fred stared toward the doorway and commented, “Sometimes I do not trust that man.”
Thanks, Fred. Make me take a position right in front of everyone else. “I don’t know much about him. As long as he does what he’s supposed to, I don’t have a problem.”
“As you say,” Fred hummed, letting the matter drop.
Sasha watched the scan results on her screen as unnecessary cargo was offloaded from the ship. Demeter had clearly gone to get help, as the numbers moved fairly quickly: one barrel, then a crate, then another crate, then some bags, numerous items that were of no use on a ship but necessary for the functioning of a mining facility like this one. She started to relax a little—everything seemed to be going well, so far. If we can keep this up, we’ll have the entire cargo train under our control soon, and we can get out of here.
Demeter offered up his report once the first cargo ship prepared to depart. “Ship captured with no casualties. Totality prisoners locked away in the same quarters as the others.” The ship undocked and moved off to hover nearby, waiting for the rest of the cargo train. Sasha watched on her monitor as the second ship moved in and docked. “Ship number two docked,” Serim announced. “This one’s bringing replacement excavation equipment, according to the manifest. We’ll probably be able to dump all of it. I don’t think we’ll need to dig out more mining tunnels anytime soon.”
Sasha listened in as Demeter greeted the second ship’s crew. “Welcome,” he said more simply this time. “I understand you’ve brought us some new excavation hardware.”
“That’s right,” the Totality said gruffly. After a pause: “You’re going to need more people to help unload it. My guys don’t know how to drive these things.”
“Oh,” Demeter said, disappointed. Sasha imagined his shoulders falling at the same time. “Hammond, Itsul, help me get the machinery off the ship, will you?”
Sasha’s relaxation was short-lived. She suspected Demeter could operate the equipment—he was full of surprises, after all. The others, though? She doubted any of them knew the first thing about this sort of hardware. It’s not as if Totality slaves were ever permitted to operate heavy machinery. With as tightly regulated as their handheld tools generally were, letting slaves touch machines you could break through walls and heavy doors with—much less use to roll over people—was out of the question.
They all waited in silence, hearing the occasional bang and thunk and footsteps moving in one direction or another. The sputtering warble of some hulking machine grew louder and louder, then softer until it stopped completely. A loud, metallic bang followed, and then the
Totality in charge of the delivery began to shout. “You idiots! You’re banging up the ship! My commander’s going to kill me, and I’m perfectly fine with this body! Can’t you get some people up here who know what they’re doing? I swear, if I’d known I was being sent to a backwater like this, I would’ve asked to go on leave instead.”
“Technically, all the water on the surface of Actis is frozen,” Demeter corrected him.
Sasha clenched the edges of her control panel again. They don’t need your smart mouth, Demeter. You’re going to give us away.
Her attention was then diverted by Fred tapping on her shoulder, pointing out that their Totality prisoner was finally waking up. Sasha knelt in front of him, draping her arms over her knees. “Can you hear me?”
“Of course I can hear you,” he snarled. He turned his head to get a good look at everyone in the room. “Slaves,” he whispered, like it was a curse. “You have no idea how much trouble you’re in. Our normal response to revolts is summary execution. But to take one of us prisoner like this? Cylence has the most exquisite forms of torture. He might even come here personally to inflict them. You don’t want to meet him.”
“Oh, I very much do,” Sasha assured him in a gentle voice, lifting his chin lightly with her fingers. She stared right into the creature’s eyes. “I’ll meet him, and then I’ll kill him. I’ll stab him in the throat. Or shoot him. I haven’t decided—whatever works best in that moment.” He spat in her face, which caused her to recoil and turn away. She wiped the saliva from her cheeks and forehead, brushing along the ridges of her scar, and returned the eye contact again. “I want to know how the Totality operate. You do something with different bodies, don’t you? Tell me.”
“I’ll tell you nothing,” he promised.
She glanced up at Fred and nodded. He punched the Totality right in the back of the head. The prisoner grunted and spent a few moments gasping and coughing. I’ll have to tell Fred not to hit so hard. I don’t want him to sever the damn spinal cord. “I’ll ask you again. I want to know the nature of the Totality. Where do you come from? Who are you? Why do you look human? Are you human?”
“We’re nothing like you.” His voice was full of loathing and scorn. “We’re not of this galaxy, or even this universe. We take your bodies. We inhabit them. As soon as you kill me, I’ll find another. Might even be yours,” he grinned wickedly.
“Oh, I don’t think so,” Sasha countered with a smirk. “I know you don’t inhabit women’s bodies. I don’t know why, but I’m more than happy to be spared such a nightmare.”
“You know more than a slave should,” he hissed menacingly. “When Cylence hears of this, you’ll all beg for death. I promise you. Don’t waste your time trying to bargain me away, though. The Dominix never bargains with slaves. You’d might as well kill me.”
“We’re not going to kill you,” Sasha said flatly. “We’ll keep you alive, just like this. I’ll make sure you’re fed and cared for. Because you’re right: if I kill you, you can take some other body and reveal everything. It’s possible that’s already happened. We won’t be on this planet for long.”
“Oh? Where are you going?”
Does he think I’m that stupid? “We’re going everywhere. You think this is the first planet we’ve taken? We already have a dozen,” she lied. “And we’re well on our way to taking a dozen more. We increase our numbers every day, and we kill more and more of your kind. You should consider yourself fortunate—you’re the first one we’ve captured.“
He shook his head. “You should’ve just killed me.”
“Second ship undocking,” Serim’s voice came over the speaker, reclaiming Sasha’s attention from the prisoner. She stood up and approached the console, pressing the key that let her speak directly to Serim.
“How did it go? I’ve been a little busy down here.”
“It was fine, after some rough spots,” Serim assured her. “Demeter says we banged up the inside of the ship a little bit, but he tried to make it up to the ship’s crew with a little promised downtime. He got them isolated and his team put them all out. They’re safely locked away like the rest.”
“Good. Keep the channel open so we can continue listening. Let’s hope the next two ships go as smoothly.”
She returned to the prisoner, who was smiling in a way she found very unsettling. “What’s got you in such a good mood?” she wondered.
“You said you’d never captured any of us before me, but from what I just heard you have the crew of another ship detained somewhere in this outpost. You lied.”
“No, I’m going to kill all of them.” That was the real lie. “You, we’ll keep as a hostage.”
He frowned. “If you’re going to kill them, kill me! I don’t want to be your fucking hostage.”
“It doesn’t matter what you want.“ And now, I know they can’t just leave a body whenever they want. If they could, then he could leave this one and us holding him prisoner wouldn’t matter at all. I don’t know how I could use that bit of information, but it’s definitely good to know.
She stood up again and looked to Fred. “I don’t think he’s going to tell us anything else right now. Put him with the others.”
Fred bowed obediently. “As you wish.”
“So, you are going to kill me,” the Totality said, almost laughing.
“No,” she shook her head. “You get a room all by yourself. I’ll make sure you get to hear us killing the rest, though.” She turned away from him and focused on the console, ignoring the sounds of the Totality trying to resist Fred’s nearly unbreakable grip. A human-sized creature trying to beat the strength of a troll was simply foolish, even if that creature happened to be Totality. It’s possible they may be stronger than regular humans, but it’s not enough to escape Fred.
The third ship contained mostly food and a collection of handheld mining tools. The latter could be safely abandoned, which Serim would have known. Demeter was in the midst of greeting the third ship’s crew when another communication came through from the general operations center. It was someone else speaking to Serim. “I want to speak with Driscoll! Who’s in charge down there? I want Driscoll!”
“I apologize, but Outpost Manager Driscoll was transferred. I am Outpost Manager Tandy,” Serim replied calmly.
“Nonsense. He would have told me if he’d been promoted—or demoted. Either way, I would have known. Is this about the money he owes me? Does he think if he avoids me, he doesn’t have to pay? I’m not that upset about it. He doesn’t have to behave like a whelp.”
“It’s nothing like that, Commander..?”
“Yendis. You tell him Commander Yendis is calling for him. I’ll wait.”
“Sir, I promise you he isn’t here.”
This is not good, Sasha thought. I don’t know what information he has access to, but if he has any way of attempting to verify Driscoll’s status, we’re in big trouble.
“I’ll see if I can raise him myself,” Yendis grumbled. “Just wait until your superiors hear about this. And Driscoll’s going to get it, too. This is completely unprofessional behavior.”
By that point, the third ship was nearly done loading with fuel and former slaves. Free humans, she reminded herself. Not “former slaves.” Free humans. We’re free. And we’re going to stay that way, or die trying. Just can’t let this Yendis mess everything up.
“Number three is preparing for departure,” Demeter’s voice came through.
“Demeter!” Sasha called through the docking bay channel. “We’re having a little trouble with the commander of the last ship. He’s suspicious about Driscoll not being here. He doesn’t believe it. Serim used our cover story but he’s not taking our word for it. I think he may be trying to verify the Outpost Manager’s status.”
“Great,” Demeter sighed. “What do you want me to do?”
“As soon as that ship docks, ta
ke it by force.” She then switched the channel to Serim. “Serim, I want you to closely monitor any communications to or from the last ship. If you detect any attempts at long-range communications or even contact with other outposts on Actis, jam them. Just flood those frequencies with garbage. I don’t care what you have to do. Don’t let him reach anyone.”
“I’ll do my best,” Serim said anxiously.
He probably doesn’t know how to do that very well, she realized. None of us are experts on this equipment. We only had a few days to get familiar with it.
Fred arrived momentarily, empty-handed. “How is our plan proceeding?” he asked, coming up next to Sasha.
“We might have a problem,” Sasha said, then explained the situation with Yendis.
Fred scratched his chin pensively. “That could indeed be troublesome.”
Sasha rolled her eyes. “Yes, that’s what I’m telling you.”
“Fourth ship is descending,” Serim broadcast to the rest of them.
“Is it doing anything unusual?” Sasha inquired, not feeling at all comfortable with this situation.
“Approach vector looks… faster than the others? Energy signatures don’t match the others, either.”
Fred squinted at Sasha’s screen. “Energy output is too high for normal operation. That ship’s weapons are armed.”
“Dammit,” Sasha breathed. “What armaments does something like that have?”
Fred shrugged. “Light, but not light enough they couldn’t make this whole facility unlivable.”
“Yendis is trying to call for help,” Serim practically shouted. “I’m trying to jam.”
Fred gently pushed Sasha aside and ran his fingers over the console, entering commands she couldn’t readily follow. “What are you doing?”
“Helping him jam the signal,” Fred explained calmly. He checked the monitor, then put his eyes on Sasha. “It will not be enough. He is inbound with intent to attack.”
Sasha thought quickly. “What about the gun towers?”