Fearless

by Allen Stroud

  “All very emotive, but the only change those people can expect if we stop funding the colonies is for their lives to worsen. Humanity came together to explore the stars. Division is a breeding ground for greed and war.”

  “And you’re accusing me of being emotive! The thing is…”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Sellis

  Oh shit.

  I’m in the airlock, strapped to one of the chairs. Bogdanovic is on the other side of the room. The acceleration has eased off. That means the course correction is over, but something’s wrong. Rocher said he’d contact us at the end of the burn, but neither of us has received a signal.

  I stare at the doctor; he stares at me. Eventually, he shrugs.

  “What do we do?” I ask.

  “Whatever we need to,” Bogdanovic replies. “If things haven’t gone to Rocher’s plan, then we’ll have to adapt to what comes next.” He touches the comms bead at his neck, and it clicks. “Still working and set on the right channel. We definitely should have heard from them by now.”

  I start unstrapping myself from the chair. When I’m free I make my way to the door and press the release. The lock beeps and a red light comes on, then disappears. “It’s been locked from Arkov’s control room,” I say.

  “You mean we’re trapped in here?”

  “Yeah, looks that way.” I’m thinking about the door mechanism. I can probably get through it, but what will that achieve? If Captain Shann has retaken the bridge, then we’ll be traitors. There are only so many places you can run and hide when you’re stuck on a spaceship. “We’ll need to surrender,” I think aloud. “We can’t—”

  “We’re not surrendering until we know the situation,” Bogdanovic says. “Whatever’s happened, the Gallowglass is still coming for us. There’s nothing Shann can do to stop that. If she’s taken the ship, it’s only a matter of time until we’re all dead.”

  My eyes stray to the pistol at his belt. He took it from me when we got in here and I had to check the condition of our seats. “What did you do?” I ask.

  “Excuse me?”

  “What did you do for Rocher to get a hold on you? I mean, it doesn’t take much for people to work out my issues. You’ve seen me at the card table, and you’ve probably talked to people who I owe money to. Fuck, I owe money to most of the ship. But you, you’ve always been a cold and careful fish, Doctor. So, what’s his lever?”

  Bogdanovic glares at me. “Whatever deal you had going with them or have going with them, I don’t want to know about. I’d like you to show me the same courtesy.”

  I nod. “Okay, but if Rocher’s gone, they’ll be wanting to question us about why we agreed to help him.”

  “Telling you anything doesn’t change that.”

  “No, but if we stick together, we can—”

  “Oh, we’ll stick together all right.” Bogdanovic is laughing. It’s all effort and spittle with no humour. “You’ll keep your mouth shut about everything; otherwise I’ll make sure whoever did the arm-twisting will find out you betrayed us.”

  I hold up my hands. “Hey! I’m just trying to work out our best way through this.”

  Bogdanovic shakes his head. “There’s one person you care about. Just remember, if you tell a story, I tell a story. Besides, we don’t even know if—”

  There’s a crunch against the door. I look through the glass. I can see someone. It’s…

  Vasili Arkov, the airlock technician. Our eyes meet, and then he turns away.

  Fuck. We. Are. Screwed.

  Bogdanovic is over my shoulder. “What is it? You see someone?”

  “Yeah, we’re in the shit. Vasili’s out there.”

  “Vasili? You mean they’ve—”

  “Must have done, yeah.”

  Bogdanovic scowls. “Might not be the case. Rocher could have had other agents. Arkov was arrested and interrogated before. Maybe he was kept back to help?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t think so.”

  Bogdanovic moves away. I see another figure in the corridor. I can’t make out who it is. I press my face to the glass, and my breath steams up the transparent surface. If they come in, I plan to surrender and back up into a corner. If the doctor wants to fight it out, that’s up to him.

  “Can you get control of the outer hatch?” Bogdanovic asks.

  I turn and face him. “Suicide is not something we’re doing.”

  “Rocher anticipated Shann might try something. We were sent here so that the airlock would be guarded for when the Gallowglass arrives. All we have to do is stay here and make sure the door gets opened when they dock.”

  “That’s not going to work,” I say. “Sure, there are emergency access protocols on the terminal we have in here, but even if I could override Arkov’s exterior control console, they can just vent the room. We’ll be dead or unconscious in minutes.” I look out of the window again. “I expect they’re already locking us out of the system.”

  “They need the airlock! We can say we’ll blow it up! Rupture the oxygen pipes or—”

  “Anything we threaten to do will just convince them to act and exchange this prison cell for something else. Face it, we’re on the wrong side. Like you said, we need to adapt.”

  Bogdanovic flinches and looks around the room. I realise I’m watching somebody fall apart. It’s a weird situation. Usually, I’m the one having a meltdown owing to the shit decisions I tend to make, but this time, it’s not me.

  “You have to let go,” I mumble. “It’s over.”

  I don’t think he’s heard me. Bogdanovic has always come across as being in control. Now he’s powerless. Sometimes in life you need the lemons, or otherwise you never learn how to make lemonade. I know what it’s like in those moments where everything piles on top of you. Those are dangerous moments. I don’t want to be here with a man who’s going through that.

  And who has a loaded pistol in his hand to boot.

  I don’t remember seeing him draw the gun, but he’s holding it loosely as he settles back into the acceleration chair. He’s staring at it, turning it over in his hands. “Throughout history, prisoners of war have been made to work for their captors in the most dangerous and unskilled situations. They built railroads, broke rocks, dug mineshafts. I’m not built for that kind of work. I can kill with the slightest surgical slip or with a change in medication. The slightest injury is an opportunity for me to execute my enemies. Captain Shann can’t risk that.”

  “You think she’ll space you?” I ask. “You really think she’s got that in her?”

  He raises his head and fixes me with a dead-eyed stare. “I’ve worked in conflict zones. You have to make hard choices based on percentages. Who gets the morphine? Who gets surgery? The soldier who’ll bleed out in twenty minutes, or the one who’ll bleed out in fifteen? In times like that, you realise you only have one set of hands and you can only save one person. Shann may not even realise she’s capable of making those kinds of decisions. It all depends on how far she’s pushed. We’re nothing but a threat, and the Gallowglass is coming. In the end, we’ll be a waste of oxygen.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Shann

  The aftermath is difficult. The tourniquets have to come off, but when they do, people will lapse into unconsciousness. We have to rely on Ensign Chiu to help. She wants to do everything she can, but it’s hard to trust her, given the circumstances. Unfortunately, we don’t have much choice, particularly with Sellis and Bogdanovic locked in the airlock.

  I couldn’t stay in my room. It’s a violated place now. Every time I close my eyes, I see Jacobson’s face and what I did to him. In my mind, I’m still doing it; there’s no death release and end to the pain.

  I’m in the medical room, watching the recorded camera feed from the bridge. I see Sam and Keiyho enter after the drone. They divide up. Keiyho, moving like a spid
er, goes past Chiu and moves towards Ashe, who is trying to release his safety straps. The Lieutenant Commander does not hesitate. There’s a flash and suddenly Ashe is limp with a bloody hole in his chest.

  A second feed shows me what happened to Rocher. Before Sam gets to him, he manages to get his arms free. He grabs for Sam’s gun, but misses. Sam tries to right himself to get a shot off, but suddenly, Rocher is loose and pushing off towards him.

  There’s another flash and our insurgent is dead; a hole blown right through his skull.

  We had no choice. I had no choice. Those words have become a mantra that I mutter to myself under my breath when the memory is too much, which is any moment I’m alone.Of the four traitors on the bridge, only Chiu survived and that was because of her message to Keiyho. Four targets. Three dead, one surrendered. I ordered the executions and I killed Jacobson myself.

  We were the right three people for this bloody business. Both Keiyho and Sam had the combat ops training, and I am in charge. In this, I needed to take responsibility. I couldn’t ask anyone else to operate the drone anyway. There was a chance we’d have to kill the mutineers, and we did. That has to be on me.

  Now Bogdanovic and Sellis are holed up in the airlock, locked in and refusing to come out. I don’t know why Rocher sent them there, but they’ve managed to override the door control, making it a standoff. We could cut our way in, but only when people have recovered. For now, Duggins has disabled their terminal. They can wait.

  Chiu’s here with me now in the medical room. My tourniquet’s been removed, and I’m lying down, recovering from the sedative Bogdanovic loaded me with. I’ve been asleep, but I don’t know how long. I want to vomit, but apparently that wouldn’t be helpful. The drugs need to mix and balance.

  Chiu looks terrified. She clearly has something she wants to say. I wait her out.

  “That day we were here last time. I tried to tell you,” she confesses. “I held your hand while the doctor injected you. I wasn’t sure what he was doing. I thought you might die. That’s why I stayed with you, so someone would be here, as a witness.”

  My mouth and tongue feel uncooperative. It takes me a couple of tries to form the question I want to ask. “Why did you help them?” I manage eventually.

  “My family is on Earth, in Hangzhou. I was told they’d get Mars passes if I did what I was told. Later, they said they’d hurt them if I didn’t obey.”

  “Le G-Garre will need to…question…”

  “I know. I’ve written down everything.” Chiu bites her lip. “They’ll court-martial me when we get back.”

  “If…we get…back.”

  “What I said to you, Captain, I meant it,” Chiu says. “If anyone can get us out of this, you can.”

  I look away from her. She’s risked everything changing sides; she knows that. Her career in Fleet is over if what happened here gets out. This blind loyalty is all she has left, but there’s something else, something I see in all of them, the reliance on a captain, a leader whom they can trust to have a plan, to know what to do.

  “We’ll think of…something,” I say. The words are coming more easily now. I try to smile, but I’m not sure how successful I am at it. “What’s the situation out there?”

  “Quartermaster Chase is guarding the airlock with Technician Arkov,” Chiu explains. “Ensign Johansson and Lieutenant Commander Keiyho are on the bridge.”

  There’s something nagging at me, a question. “Chiu, why did Rocher want us alive?”

  “He wanted the ship. That was his mission.”

  “While you were locked in the bridge, he could have cut off life support to the rest of the ship. Why didn’t he do that?”

  Chiu shrugs. “I don’t know, Captain. He never suggested it.”

  But why not? There’s a reason. There has to be a reason why he wanted us alive. I’m getting up, pulling out the IV in my arm and undoing the straps that hold me to the table. “Where’s Duggins?” I ask.

  “Engineer Duggins is asleep in his quarters, Captain.”

  “Wake him up and get him to meet me in Strategy.”

  “Aye, aye.”

  * * *

  When Duggins arrives, I’m staring at the screen over the table. The data archive we received and Shah unlocked for us fills the screen. “Rocher talked a lot about the value of assets,” I say. “He didn’t care if we lived or died. He was trying to get information. There has to be something in here that he wanted. That’s the reason we’re still alive.”

  Duggins grunts. “I took a look at what was sent. The compression’s interesting. You’ve got a mass of raw data there. Without knowing what we’re looking for, it could take a lifetime to figure out what they want.”

  “But they must have known the keys to the archive were on the Hercules,” I say. “They must have been trying to capture the crew to get them.”

  “And they must have figured out we had the archive,” Duggins says. “Or had a copy of it themselves.”

  “Rocher implied that they sent it to us, but I don’t know if I believe that. Maybe they already have the information and just need the key code?”

  Duggins nods. “Very possible. Do you think Shah knows this was what they were after?”

  I think about the last time I spoke to Shah. I shake my head. “Someone on the Hercules knew and prepped everyone before they were boarded.” The pieces start to fall together in my mind. “That’s why they had to kill Hutton! He’d been given access codes! They had to kill him before he could tell anyone.”

  Duggins sighs. “It’s all going past me, I’m afraid, Captain.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” I say, waving my hand. “The point is, Rocher needed us alive for this information. That means the Gallowglass people must want us alive as well.”

  “Stands to reason,” Duggins says. “But that’s not something I’d like to take a chance on, begging your pardon, Captain.”

  “Me either.” I access the navigation database and pull up a course plot. “This is where we’re heading?”

  “Yes, Captain. Gunnar Jacobson set a programmed deceleration into the system.” Duggins reaches over my shoulder and taps on the screen. “We’re scheduled to come to a dead stop, here.”

  “How much fuel will we have left?”

  “About one or two per cent of total tank. Enough to push away, but…well…it’d take weeks for us to get anywhere where people could see us. We’ll be out of oxygen and long dead by then.” Duggins runs a hand through his hair. “The communications are calibrated, though. We can broadcast our situation to Phobos. They may be able to send someone after us.”

  That plan doesn’t work for me. “We don’t want to put another ship in the same situation we were in with the Hercules.”

  “True, but I don’t see any other option.”

  I’m looking at the data archive again. “They want access to this. That means they’re still willing to negotiate. Until they arrive, they’ll still think Rocher’s in control.”

  “The minute we don’t reply to a message from them, they’ll know.”

  “Then we make sure we reply,” I say. Then something occurs to me. I bring up a search box on the archive and type in ‘Gallowglass’.

  Immediately a list of files appears and I’m smiling.

  “Perhaps they don’t want the specifications and origin of their ship revealed to the whole of humanity,” I say. I tap a finger on the files. “Do you think you can do something with that?”

  Duggins nods. “We can at least make a plan,” he says. “They might outgun us, but by knowing what we’re up against, we have something to work with.”

  I select the files with my finger and flick them to Duggins’s user profile. There’s a ping from his portable screen confirming the copy. “Start pulling it all to pieces,” I say. “Get Johansson and Chiu to help you.”

  “Aye, aye, Cap
tain.” Duggins is up and moving. I see a light in his eyes. At last, we’re not reacting and fixing; we’ve gotten some advantages – a few cards we can play.

  I touch Duggins on the shoulder before he leaves, getting his attention. “When you’re done, copy those files into our message for Phobos. We’ll hold off sending them until the last moment, but this time we’ll make sure people know what kind of ship we’re facing.”

  “Could be something to threaten them with?” Duggins suggests.

  “Yes, I’ll be sure to mention it.”

  Duggins leaves and I’m alone in the room.

  Except I’m not really alone, am I?

  Jacobson’s face is etched into my eyelids. I can almost see him screaming as I look around the room. What I’ve done won’t leave me. Talking to others and thinking about the problems at hand are all I have as a distraction.

  The next conversation may not be so productive.

  I leave the room and start making my way to the airlock.

  * * *

  Keiyho and Le Garre are waiting for me in Arkov’s control room outside the airlock chamber. They both look old and ragged, driven to this point by the events of the last few days. As I enter, I can see two figures in the chamber itself.

  Bogdanovic and Sellis.

  “Any developments?” I ask.

  Le Garre shakes her head. “They’ve been locked out of the system. Bogdanovic says he wants to talk to you. He won’t talk to anyone else.”

  Keiyho grunts. “I wonder what he thinks he has left to negotiate with. We can open the airlock at any moment.”

  “He’ll be aware of that,” I say. I move forward and activate the two-way speaker under the window into the chamber. “Shann to Bogdanovic, I’m here, Doctor, and ready to listen.”

  Bogdanovic looks up at me and smiles. There’s something cold in his expression that I’ve not noticed before. I’m reminded of the amount of times I’ve been strapped into a chair under his supervision. He could have killed all of us, anytime he wanted. I wonder why he didn’t.