by S E Zbasnik
"What is it?" Brena asked, promptly getting her ass in the way.
Ferra pushed her aside, her small frame easily overpowering the willowy dulcen. She dug through her bag hunting for the handheld "Is everything all right?" device. It had some fancy title with lots of numbers and letters on it, but everyone called it the "Is Everything All Right" because if shit wasn't, it let you know. The dials were screaming in pain as they whizzed about.
"We have a problem."
"Invalid User," WEST's voice called through the brain panel and out of the top of Mr. Cheese, "The Self Destruct Sequence has been Activated. Self Destruct will explode in one minute."
"What?!" Ferra shouted. "You can't do that."
"Self destruct will explode in 50 seconds."
The engineer pummeled her fists into her head. Think, think, think. She glanced up at the ceiling and shook her head. No, that's a bad choice.
"Self destruct will explode in 40 seconds."
"This is strange," Brena muttered to herself, not reacting the proper way an elf should when a ship was about to blow into teeny tiny pieces from underneath her feet.
What if I...no, that cursed virus locked it out days ago. Or the...no, damn it, Orn's holed himself up in there, there wouldn't be time.
"Self destruct will explode in 25 seconds."
There was no choice. She'd have to blow all the work she put in for the past hour. Ferra stood up and eyed a big red button upon the ceiling. She swallowed down the lump of failure and reached for it. Her fingers grazed past by inches. "Damn you, you piece of shit." She jumped again, her fingers missing.
"Self destruct will explode in 15 seconds."
"Brena!" she shouted, waving the tall dulcen over. She grabbed Brena's elbow and aimed her hand up. "Push that button up there."
"Which button?" the bard asked despite there being only one.
Ferra didn't say anything as she shoved her elbow up and Brena's finger collapsed into the big, red 'everything's gone to shit, reset it all' button. "That one."
"Oh," Brena let her hand fall slowly. "There is something strange about this..."
"Yeah, we have to start over at square one."
"No, that is not..."
"Self destruct will explode in 8...7..."
"You son of an ogre's turd dropping!" Ferra shouted banging her fist against any panel she could find, before throwing her spanner at the ceiling to jar the big reset button again.
"4...3..."
Ferra screamed in rage and threw her whole body against the computer's brain hoping to shock it into something, anything that didn't result in total destruction.
"2...1...Goodbye."
The brain panel sparked, kicking a few flames at her gloved fist, when the red light lifted and the calming blue returned. All of the brains sunk back down into the water, happy as clams computing data.
"What in the hell was that?" Ferra shouted to WEST, who fell back into its self-induced coma.
"I wondered if that was not the case," Brena said, tapping her finger against her mouth.
"If what were?" Ferra screamed at the dulcen, lost in rage-shock over not knowing every detail, every atom of her ship.
"Well, why would a human cruise line have a self destruct sequence on board? What would they be trying to protect? The shrimp cocktails?"
Ferra blinked slowly and glanced back at the floating brains, then to the dulcen, "That...makes a lot of sense."
"Surprising, isn't it?" Brena said tilting her head.
As the words left her mouth the sound of boots tramping down the grates skidded to a halt outside the door. Brena assisted Ferra in replacing the brain panel and, without looking up, asked, "What is it, brother?"
"You...there was a sound, an announcement," Taliesin tried to swallow back the unexpected tromp of a mile of ship when the panel above the gym's punching bag with the name Marek scribbled on it beeped alive.
"Yes," Brena answered calmly, "it is taken care of."
"It said there was a self destruct sequence, and then..."
"We know," Ferra stretched out the W as she banged on the panel and searched around for her new prey. "That one," she pointed to a series of tubes squirreled away in the back.
As Brena ducked down, her leather cap snagging on something, Ferra turned to the assassin still dead in his boots from a panicked run through the ship, "Was there something you wanted?"
"Ah...no. I guess not?" Taliesin tried to peer over to see what his sister was up to, but she only waved her hand at him.
"Good day, Sin. Does this require another green handle?" Brena asked even as Ferra slid in beside her.
The assassin stepped back from the mind shattering picture of the tennen engineer happily working with his sister. Had the entire universe slipped into another dimension when he wasn't looking? He tried to start up something of a conversation with the dwarf, but he locked himself up tightly on the bridge and refused to come out, the doctor was still cataloging the lost supplies and cursing about his patient leaving without proper procedure.
There was nothing left to do but wait, a skill an assassin was supposed to excel on, but every time Taliesin stopped moving his fingers itched and his mind overran with dangerous ideas. Meditation upon the situation only filled his body with sparks of rage, a very not path approach. Self destruction at least offered a distraction, but even that was handled by people other than him. He sighed, his heels carrying him through the ship and back out into the mess hall. Seemed like everything ended up in the galley in the end.
Well, there's always work, the elf thought as he unclasped his hand and booted up the PALM. As a few log-in screens passed, he was surprised to find a fresh ether connection. Then again, they were near a galactic hacker. It would be more surprising if he didn't.
He scrolled haphazardly though the lists of new contracts, all the big scores at the top for people trying to break into or out of the game. Most would lie fallow for years as assassins bickered over who got the name cementing kill. If you wanted to survive at this game you went for the smaller fish, it kept you traveling and your senses honed, not to mention no need to watch your back for another assassin gunning for your place.
Small murderers, bigger thieves, sexual deviants: the crimes were laid out first, then the names and locations. Each unclaimed contract was a neutral yellow, when one was taken by an agent it highlighted red and then, once finished, a dull green. He never challenged another contract, preferring to keep a wide berth from the red lines. Most of the yellows were same old same old, but as he scrolled a bit of text caught his eye.
"Abandoning her post during times of crisis and in general being a not nice person." Well, that was new. Normally, there was something about kicking widows or taking children's candy away at least. The transcribers could grow poetical at times, they were elven after all. As he enlarged the link, his heart stopped. An image of an unknown woman rotated in the upper right corner, but it was the name in bright text upon his hand that caught in his throat.
"Yates, Terrwyn. Use extreme caution, may have different alias."
Taliesin scrolled up and down the mostly empty entry, a bolus forming in his gut. His eyes stopped at the date, almost two weeks old by now. How had he missed it? He should have been paying attention, keeping a watch on the rumblings in the underground. Even not knowing her original name until a few days prior was no excuse.
As he raised the link window on his PALM, the entry on Mrs. Yates flashed red. Someone claimed the challenge. Sin dialed faster, then switched to his messaging system. "You're in grave danger." He deleted that. "Your husband is trying to kill you."
He deleted that as well. It all read like sour grapes or things she already knew. "Assassination upon your head." That was perfect. He hit send, only to have his PALM grunt at him.
"Send the message, you root fornicator!" he shouted at his hand, but it ignored his jab, grunting and throwing up an error message.
"Gallai eich traed yn cael ei yfed!" he shouted to the ki
tchen, the curse ancient and vile enough no translator would touch it.
Taliesin closed his hand and reached a decision before he thought his actions through. Rushing through the galley, he patted his pockets searching for anything sharp hidden on himself. A few lint brushes, a set of dice, and one nail clipper. He could groom Marek to death. But there wasn't time to run back and properly arm himself. In his mind, Taliesin already connected all the pieces leading to this road.
"An assassin finds the husband connection, convinces the blodau cachu to play the victim, maybe call upon one of his many debts to twist his hands, then lure the captain onto an alien ship," Taliesin laid it all out as he ducked under a low beam and skidded to a halt in the airlock room.
He froze as the hulking form of the djinn turned away from the door, its red eyes glowing. Did she leave the damn thing to guard the door, or did it have eerie powers of precognition? Most claims of predicting the future were chalked up to either a sensory overlord, No-Shit-Sherlock syndrome, or a very lucky guess. But, the djinn continued to unsettle the elf as Taliesin skidded to a halt.
Taliesin lifted up his hands as if he were under arrest. Perhaps he was and Gene was secretly in league with the other assassin. "I am aware of your dislike of me."
Steam cracked out of the face hole where a nose could be if one had bothered; a djinn snort.
"But I need your assistance." The red eyes dimmed. "The captain, Variel, she is under attack." More smoke, this time from the shoulders. "I can prove it!" He opened his hand up and the entry on Terrwyn Yates projected onto the wall, trembling as Taliesin tried to damp down the nervous energy running through his legs.
"See, it's all been a con. They wished to kill Terrwyn Yates yes, but not with a click of a key." The red eyes dissected every word on the screen and then swung back to the elf. Gene didn't say anything, of course, nor did it puff smoke. Taliesin knew any hope he had hung in the balance. If the djinn didn't believe him, then what? How could he take down something that powerful in time?
"That red border, it means the assassin has locked in the target. He or she's on the way." And that was when he realized he never bothered to check who would become his nemesis, which of his fellow brethren he'd have to dispatch. He clicked back, scrolling through the even more secure pages of the assassin's guild trying to find who claimed Variel. Gene huffed at the interruption, but Taliesin ignored him as his finger landed upon the S's.
"Snow? Shit. Shit. Double shit with sprinkle shit on top!"
Gene puffed smoke out of a face crack as the elf cursed more like the dwarf. Perhaps there was some swearing sickness sharing amongst the corporeal crew.
"Snow, he is...I have never known him to fail in reaching a target."
Taliesin folded his hands, shutting off the image of a pair of eyes and thick nose buried below a snow white hood. "Please," his voice quibbled at the edges of his vowels. Thinking straight, remaining staid was rule two of the assassins after 'No outside shoes on the gym floor,' but he couldn't shake the dual prongs of shame and fear clawing up his stomach. "Please, let me pass. Let me save her."
Gene blinked his red eyes slowly, damping down the flame and reigniting it as he thought. As the elf bowed his head in thought, the hefty hand of the djinn landed upon his shoulder. Taliesin gazed up at the almost yellow eyes and followed the djinn's finger towards a space helmet left upon the bench. The chill of precognition crawled up Taliesin's spine, but he shook his head. "There isn't time to slip into one." The djinn dropped his hand, the eyes flaring back to red. "Besides, I can contain my breath."
Gene puffed up some smoke, but reached over, beginning the airlock sequence with one touch of his rock palm. The door began to spin and Taliesin stepped around him. "Thank you," he said before taking a long draw into lungs evolved for the low oxygen of tree tops. Without thinking, he stepped out into the locks between space.
The airlock closed with a thud loud enough to knock back the elf's legs. He staggered a moment, and released the hold on his lips clawing for air. Gene watched amused by the theatrics as he unlocked the airtight seals on his suit and stretched some steam into the air.
Taliesin coughed, staggering as his lungs filled with the hacker's oxygen. "That took a bit longer than I anticipated," he wheezed to his companion.
The djinn didn't say anything as he walked around the landing, eyeing up the orb floating in the middle of the ship. He hadn't seen technology like that in years, nor should anyone. He turned to the elf shaking his head for breath while once again opening his hand. Every five feet the assassin would open his hand to check, internally praying it hadn't turned green. So far, so bad.
"Where to now?"
The djinn puffed up from his shoulders, but pointed his finger to the left incline where a pair of gear golems stood. Their insides whirred but their arms remained by their sides. Taliesin tugged down his jacket, really regretting not stopping at the armory before setting out. Maybe grabbing a small oxygen tank wouldn't have taken up so much time either, he thought while shaking away the sparkling vision at the sides of his deprived eyes. As he approached the two leviathans, their arms linked across the narrow drop. They weren't about to let anyone pass.
"I'm here to see Captain Variel," Taliesin tried. The golems only turned their gears, the non-eyes gazing endlessly past his shoulder.
"We have a very important business matter to discuss," he said, putting every ounce of dulcen smugness into the words, but they fell on lack of ears. "What if I answered a particularly tricky riddle?"
Gene grabbed his hand around the dulcen's shoulder and pulled the assassin back. Pushing steam up through his arms, he raised his fists high and brought them down upon the linked golem's arms. Gear shrapnel shattered through the air, plinking like rain drops onto the ground. Some pinged off Gene's glowing second skin while others drifted into orbit around the ship's engine.
"That was simple," Taliesin said, then turned as the two split open golem's arms began to reshape itself. Gears retracted and shifted deeper inside their chassis as blades the thickness of legs emerged from their wounds. Three in all, and they began to spin like a blender gone mad.
Gene grabbed one golem by the head, yanking upon the connection point as the other tried to slice and dice into the djinn in triplicate. Unfortunately for it, djinn hide was the second strongest substance in the universe after Aunt Enda's Soulday nutcake. Her baked goods were such a menace to defense contracts, she was the only person in galactic history to have every single species put out a contract for her head.
Bursts of steam escaped with a high whine through the seams in his suit, the noise sounded as if he were giggling. Gene cracked into one skull and tossed the brains of one golem at the whizzing arms of the other. Taliesin stood there, feeling like he should be getting into the middle of this somehow, but as the headless golem whacked its blades into the djinn, turning it around, Gene glared upon the assassin. The endless eyes burst a deadly blue.
"How do I help?" Gene gestured down the incline. "You wish me to leave you? But you require help." The red eyes lifted up as the djinn shook his head as he crashed another fist through the middle of the golem's chest, removing a gear that could fit around Taliesin's midsection.
"Right, I think you have this on your own," the assassin said and eyed up the options. The fight consumed all the way around, but -- crouching down -- Taliesin jumped up the djinn's bent back, stepped inside the still rotating gears of the headless golem and leapt behind. His right hand touched the ground and for a moment he looked back, momentarily sad that he could not stay to watch. He knew in all his long years, never again would he see a fire demon tumble with a pair of gear driven automatons, but he had a woman of indeterminate importance to him to save. Hunting for that nail clipper in his pockets, Taliesin ran down the incline, his feet getting the better of him. He blew past all the hallmarks of space life, instinctively knowing that if there was to be a final battle it would not be beside the water purifier or near the universal urinals.
> Yes, that door covered in warning stickers with a blue glow wafting around the edges. He lifted his PALM once more, still red, and ran for it. His fingers fit snuggly around the handle, and he put all his elven muscle power to try and shatter the lock. As it turned out, the damn thing wasn't locked and he almost wrenched his shoulder instead.
Taliesin fell into the door and stumbled into a dark room. He blinked his eyes, trying to adjust to the low lights and listening for the sound of confrontation. Shadows moved in the back and he dropped down low, skirting about the edge of hulking machines. As he inched closer, a man's form with a white hood across the head stood upright shadowed by a burning white light. He didn't say anything, only stepped closer towards a hanging sheet across the walls and then a woman stood up. Taliesin's heart stopped as she spun, her mouth dropped, and a gunshot reverberated through the room.
He didn't feel it, couldn't feel it, didn't have time to feel it. Instead, he leapt from his hiding spot, his right hand smashing into the assassin's arm, sending the gun crashing to the floor. His other hand reared back and pounded into the white hood. The prey shrieked something, but he couldn't hear it. All that filled his veins was hot rage as his fist pounded twice, before he latched onto the collar and yanked the murderer high. This caused the white hood to dislodge, and the ashen face of Marek struggled for breath under his arms.
"Got it, okay, good," an unknown voice called from the darkness and time stopped for the assassin.
The shot woman rose stead to her feet, wiping off the blood pooling across her shirt as if it were spilled juice. Her face was wrong, the textures and lines that give life to a face were fuzzy, as if the maker planned to fill it in later if there was time. Marek cried out something under his hands, but Taliesin didn't hear it. He watched the unknown woman turn her head and then the light hit the scar.
"Variel?"
She smiled sweetly, whatever false mask she wore unable to compensate for that twist in the captain's lips that turned every grin partially sarcastic, "Hello, Taliesin."