by G J Ogden
“Hey, we’ve got company,” Hudson said to the guard, as he drew his weapon.
The guard looked over and cursed, but by this point the trio had also spotted them. “RGF, stop right there!” Hudson shouted, aiming his weapon at the group. He barely recognized his own voice, due to the alien acoustics of the room, and he came off sounding more threatening than he’d intended. He’d merely planned to establish authority, but instead it was like he’d issued a final warning.
One of the relic hunters slid to a stop and held out his arm, causing his companions to fall in behind. There was an awkward silence, and for a moment Hudson thought the relic hunter was going to call back to him. Instead he lifted a compact sub-machine gun from the inside of his long coat and fired.
Hudson hit the deck as rounds pinged off the strange alien metal, making noises like a drunk percussionist. The guard was hit and yelled out in pain as the round sank into his shoulder. Clasping a hand over the wound, the man staggered back, tripping over the lip of the steep corridor. By a stroke of luck, he missed the ladders and instead slid the thirty meters to the lower level, as if he was taking a ride on some sort of alien funfair. However, while the slide down might have looked fun, the heavy thud as the guard smashed into the surface at the bottom wouldn’t have been.
Hudson returned fire, causing the three relic hunters to splinter, but now all of them were firing back, and the rounds were landing closer by the second. Hudson crawled over to the edge of the sloping hexagonal corridor and peered down. The guard was moving; neither the bullet nor the drop had killed him. This guy should buy a lottery ticket tonight… Hudson thought, hoping his luck would hold out too. However, no amount of luck was going to allow him to win in a firefight against three more heavily-armed relic hunters.
Hudson swallowed hard and made a decision. He hoped this one, unlike so many of his other recent choices, would go in his favor. He pulled himself to the lip of the sloping corridor, flinching as rounds landed all around him, and threw himself over the edge.
CHAPTER 10
Air rushed past Hudson’s face as he accelerated out of control down the sloped corridor. He wasn’t averse to the thrills and spills of travelling at speeds that would make most people queasy. However, when piloting a spacecraft, he had control – here he was at the mercy of gravity. Panic was building even faster than his velocity as he threw out his hands and feet, desperately trying to slow his descent. Finally, he managed to press the rubber soles of his boots against the smooth surface of the corridor, creating just enough friction to act as a brake. Even so, when he hit the bottom, he hit it hard, rebounding into the far wall like a pool ball bouncing off a cushion.
Despite the momentum of the impact, the majority of the damage was to Hudson’s ego. He was embarrassed at how frightened the alien flume had made him feel. However, since it was only his pride that was bruised, he was able to recover quickly. He pulled the guard’s body away from the foot of the slope, so that if the relic hunters did peer down, they wouldn’t see him, and recovered his weapon. Panic had forced him to let go of it during the slide down to the lower level. Other than appearing concussed the guard didn’t seem badly injured. Hudson placed the man into the recovery position and then unclipped the radio from his belt. He cycled through all of the pre-set frequencies, but all he heard was static. Cursing under his breath, Hudson switched the radio to the RGF emergency frequency and placed it beside the unconscious guard. If the man recovered before Hudson managed to escape and send a rescue team, maybe his luck would continue and he’d be able to radio for help.
Next, Hudson assessed his location in detail for the first time since arriving like an out-of-control bowling ball. He observed that the corridor split into four a short way ahead. He wandered over, noting that two other steeply-sloping corridors broke off from each of the four new passages, leading both further into the belly of the giant ship and back up again. Some of the corridors had ladders, others used what looked like vacuum suction clamps stuck to the walls, with ropes attached. Unfortunately, Hudson saw that all of these led to lower levels, rather than back up. It seemed clear that for humans to navigate the alien interior, it required the same sort of skill set that a mountaineer or ancient tomb raider might have possessed.
Rather than venture deeper into the ship, Hudson decided to stay on the same level. He headed along the corridor that ran parallel to the one he’d entered through. Soon, the vast cooling towers were visible again, plummeting through the levels into what Hudson assumed was likely to be the engine section of the ship. This level was shallower than the vast chasm directly above, and the only light came from a collection of dim lamps. These seemed to have been tied around the towers by former relic hunters or perhaps RGF officers. Hudson had never visited the ancient tombs of Egypt or the Aztec tombs in Mexico. He imaged that entering either, alone and in near-darkness, would elicit similar feelings of fear and dread to those he was experiencing now.
The sound of gunfire from one of the myriad new corridors snapped him back to attention. He gripped his weapon more tightly, remembering what the guard had told him. It seemed that some of the relic hunters were still engaged in a pitched battle. And as he’d discovered only a short time earlier, the RGF uniform offered him no protection in this near-lawless place.
Moving swiftly to the far wall, he edged along it with his back pressed flat to the metal. Eventually, he reached another of the many corridors that permeated the ship. Glancing along the corridor he saw what looked like a rope dangling down from an intersecting passage that cut through on a sharp diagonal. If he could get to the rope then maybe he could climb back up to the top level and slip away. Part of him wanted to stay and help the RGF get control of the situation. In part, this was because the inside of the alien wreck was so fascinating and exciting that he didn’t want to leave yet. Yet he was acutely aware that Griff may already have woken from his snooze and noticed his absence. More importantly, he was also conscious of being ready to initiate the plan he’d arranged with Ericka. So as much as it saddened him to do so, he had to get out of the remarkable alien ship sooner rather than later.
He crept along the corridor towards the dangling rope with his weapon at low ready. However, as he got closer, he realized that escaping that way was not going to be as simple as he had thought. The corridor had been sheared apart, possibly from the impact of the crash, creating a canyon-like fissure that cut through the bulkhead as far as he could see in either direction. The rope hung tantalizingly just out of reach in the middle of the crevasse.
“Great, which idiot decided this was a good place to hang a rope?” said Hudson, as he stepped to the edge and peered up and down the fissure. Above, he could see light filtering inside from the twin suns of Brahms Three. The crack had evidently split the outer hull too. Looking down, he observed that the fissure seemed to extend at least three or four levels. The gloomy conditions made it difficult for Hudson to judge the depth accurately, like staring into black lake water at midnight. The fissure wasn’t especially wide – perhaps two meters at most. Hudson sighed as another crazy idea sprang into his mind. Why don’t I just make a jump for the rope?
Gunfire again reverberated along the corridor, louder and more frantic than before. Faced with a death-defying leap across an alien chasm, or a running gun battle with who knew how many frenzied relic hunters, he decided the former was the least crazy option. Hudson holstered his weapon and fastened the strap before taking a few paces back. He rubbed his hands together, as if he was some sort of Olympic athlete, preparing for his first (and in this case only) attempt at the high jump.
“Here goes nothing…” said Hudson into the curiously cooler air of the ship’s interior. He then sprinted forward and leapt for the rope. His judgment of the height and distance was good, and his hands closed tightly around the cord. Then to his horror his grip slipped, as if the surface was covered in a thin coating of ice or grease. Panic gripped him even tighter than his fingers were squeezing the rope, but it w
as no use. Hudson slid from the end and plummeted down into the black fissure. By sheer dumb luck, his trajectory slotted him into another angled corridor and he slid along it, yelling and squawking in terror as the animal part of his brain took over. The corridor then spat him out unceremoniously into another cavernous space. He skidded across the floor like an ice hockey puck, eventually coming to rest on his back, eyes wide and gasping for air.
For a few seconds Hudson simply lay there, paralyzed by the huge surge of adrenalin that had flooded into his veins. His mind was completely unable to process what had just happened. Then the precise, orderly clack of bootsteps approaching woke his senses like an ice bucket over the head. He scrambled away from the noise and tried to stand, but then felt a boot press into the small of his back, pushing him down again. He spun over and found himself staring up at a woman, wielding what appeared to be an antique-revolver. She pulled back the hammer and pointed it squarely at Hudson’s heart.
CHAPTER 11
Hudson slowly raised his hands in a gesture of surrender and tried to get to his feet, but the woman simply placed her heavy black boot on his chest and pinned him back to the floor.
“Nuh uh uh, I don’t think so, clobber,” said the woman. She was wagging the barrel of her revolver at him as if it were a finger being wagged at a naughty schoolboy. “Your thieving RGF friends are all the way down in the central core, so what’s a lonesome clobber like you doing up here? A bit of illegal freelance prospecting, perhaps?”
She was dressed in what looked like traditional willow-green hunting clothing, but her slim fitting jacket and pants had a soft sheen to them. It resembled goat’s leather or a synthetic equivalent. The material looked flexible, but also tough, and the woman wearing it looked the same. From the force with which the boot was pressed down on his chest, Hudson could tell she was strong. In many ways, she reminded him of a younger version of Martina from the Landing Strip.
“If I told you the truth, you wouldn’t believe me,” said Hudson, his chest now starting to throb under the weight of the woman’s leg.
“I could just shoot you now if you prefer?” the woman replied, with a casual nonchalance.
“Not really,” said Hudson, “though, do you mind not using me as a doormat while I explain?”
The woman regarded him for a second or two, as if he was an exhibit in a zoo. Then she lifted her leg off his chest and took three measured paces back. “Toss your sidearm away and then get up, but do it real slow,” she said, keeping the antique weapon trained on him.
Hudson carefully removed his weapon with finger and thumb and flung it to his side, before he climbed to his feet. The dull throb where the heel of the woman’s boot had dug into his solar plexus began to subside. The relief was short-lived as the aches and pains of a dozen other knocks and scrapes reasserted themselves.
“You do know that threatening an RGF officer probably isn’t the smartest idea you’ve had today, right?” said Hudson. He then stretched his weary limbs and rubbed aching muscles.
“RGF officers don’t patrol these wrecks alone,” replied the woman. She was clearly not intimidated by Hudson’s threat. Then she looked at him more thoughtfully. “My guess is that you’re a hunter trying to pass himself off as a clobber,” she added. “So, it’s probably best if I shoot you now. I doubt anyone would miss you, especially not me.”
“Maybe you could do that,” replied Hudson, playing it as cool as he could manage. Considering he was being held at gunpoint while lost inside a city-sized alien space ship, he thought he was doing pretty well. “But if you’re wrong, I doubt the other ‘clobbers’ would look kindly on a scavenger who gunned down a fellow cop. Who knows, such a deed might even come back to bite you. I imagine it’ll be tough to get a good score if the RGF are constantly on your ass, looking for some payback…”
The corner of the woman’s mouth turned up and her dark eyes narrowed. Both were only fractional adjustments to her otherwise stony expression. However, it was enough to suggest that Hudson’s cool, passive-aggressive comeback had amused or intrigued her in some way. Perhaps she simply hadn’t expected such steel from Hudson. It was certainly true that he was an atypical example of an RGF cop.
“Maybe you’re right,” the relic hunter admitted, with a little shrug of her eyebrows. “But this is a big ship; easy for a clobber to get lost in. Perhaps you just fell to your death? No-one would ever find you, or go looking.”
“Maybe my friends would miss me?” said Hudson. Outwardly, he’d maintained his poker face, despite his insides wobbling like jelly. He just hoped his tough talking was enough to convince this formidable-looking mercenary not to kill him.
“We both know you don’t have any friends,” the woman replied, coldly.
Hudson winced, “Ouch…”
“And RGF cops don’t care about each other, so nice try, but no dice.” She lifted the barrel of the revolver a little higher so that it was now aimed at Hudson’s head. Curiously, though, her body had adopted a more casual posture, which made her seem a little less threatening. “So, let’s hear it, clobber. You have ten seconds to explain who you really are and why you’re here, before I blow you away.”
“Fine, just promise not to blow me away if you don’t believe what I tell you.”
“No promises…” the relic hunter replied.
Hudson rattled through the story of his arrival as quickly as he could. The woman listened intently, her serious midnight-blue eyes not leaving Hudson’s for a second. She didn’t even blink. By the time Hudson had finished, her lips had adopted a soft, Mona Lisa smile that didn’t suit her. Hudson reasoned that she wasn’t the sort of person that smiled often, and took this is a positive omen.
“They grease the ropes, sometimes,” the woman said, aiming the revolver off to the side and de-cocking it.
“I’m sorry, what?” said Hudson, slightly thrown by her peculiar response.
“Relic hunters,” the woman clarified. “We leave traps for other scavenger crews, to catch out the unwary ones, like you.”
Hudson laughed, “Come on, you don’t expect me to believe that?!” However, the unamused look on the woman’s face suggested otherwise. “That has to be illegal? And it’s certainly immoral!”
“Immoral, yeah; illegal, no. Anything goes in here, cop,” said the woman. “You’d better get used to that.”
“And so should you…”
Both of them spun around to see a group of three other hunters emerge from behind a column to their rear. Hudson had been too distracted telling his story to hear them approach. And from the surprised and angry look on the woman’s face, it seemed she had been similarly blindsided.
“Tory Bellona… I should have known you’d be involved,” said a craggy-looking older man, who strode out in the lead. He wore a military combat vest in a vintage DPM pattern over the top of a tight black tank top. The outfit seemed intentionally designed to highlight the man’s arms, which were bigger than most people’s thighs. His hands gripped the lapels of the vest, as if he were attempting to accentuate the size of his biceps to look even more intimidating than he already did. His two younger companions, both men who bore a clear family resemblance to the older leader, stood to either side. Both of them aimed nine millimeters at the woman who had been addressed as Tory.
“Holy shit, Rex, you’re like a turd that won’t flush away,” said Tory, whose expression had hardened like granite again. “No matter how many times I try, you always seem to float back to the surface.”
“Colorful, as always,” replied the older man, smirking. “Now, why don’t you give me whatever you and the clobber are working on smuggling out of this place. I’ll bet it’s the new score, right?”
“Wrong again, shithead,” said Tory, “I don’t even know this guy. He’s just some dumbass that got lost.” Hudson saw Tory’s muscles tense up and her hand tighten around the grip of her revolver. “And now it’s your turn to get lost, Rex. And take your inbred little brethren with you.”
/> “Drop it, Tory,” said the older man, lowering his right hand and hovering it over his own holstered weapon. “You might be a good shot, but there’s no way you’ll get all three of us. Not with that antique piece, not before you’re pumped full of holes.”
“Maybe I will,” said Tory with a composed coolness that Hudson found remarkable, and enviable given the circumstances. “Why don’t we find out?”
Red dots appeared on Tory’s chest as the younger two relic hunters both enabled laser sights on their weapons. “Be my guest…” said the older man, his smirk twisting into something much more sinister.
Hudson could see that the two younger men were nervous, and that their fingers were resting on the triggers. Nerves and itchy trigger fingers were a bad combination. Tory appeared to recognize the danger as being real too, and backed down. She tossed her antique firearm to the deck while letting out a frustrated growl.
“So, what’s the real deal with your pet clobber, here?” said Rex, as one of the red dots swept onto Hudson’s chest. “I thought you already had a partner?”
“And I thought you already learned not to cross me, Rex,” said Tory. “I see you haven’t managed to replace the rest of your crew. You know, the ones I killed the last time we met?”
The two younger hunters glanced at each other uneasily, and Tory smiled at them both. “I left you two pumpkins alive out of pity for your pop,” she teased. And then she glowered back at Rex, “for which you owe me, old man.” Rex grunted, but didn’t attempt to refute Tory’s assertion. “I wouldn’t get too comfortable around your dear old dad, if I was you,” Tory continued, addressing the younger men once more. “We don’t call him tombstone for nothing…”