The Battle of Hollow Jimmy

by Becky Black

  Maiga tried to imagine how it felt for the captain of a warship to give up his weapons. "Come and take it," was the standard response taught to all of them, for when the enemy said "give me your rifle". You didn't give up your weapon without a fight. If someone killed you with your own rifle, they should have to beat you to death with it, because it was empty before they took it from you.

  But in this case, the alternative was not only his own death, but the deaths of his whole crew. How did you make such a choice between life and honour? The captain of the Trebuchet had made that choice. He'd chosen life.

  "He let them take the guns. He shouldn't have let them take the guns." Alex's voice rose again. "We could still have fought, we should have…"

  "Alex." Too late to go over that again now. She touched his hand briefly and he calmed down enough to continue.

  "It was too much for Bara. Not only for her, for all the senior officers. The captain wasn't very… popular. I…" he glanced at Sev. "He had certain views, about what he called fraternising. If we broke his rules…" Shaking his head, he snapped, impatient at himself. "Forget that. Never mind. We hated him." He looked into Maiga's eyes. "That's what it came down to. We hated him. Letting the enemy declaw the ship like a damn cat, that was just the final insult. We had to act."

  "Mutiny." Maiga's voice hushed as she said the word.

  "Yes." His voice hushed to a whisper too. "It wasn't as dramatic as I expected. We arrested the captain and locked him in his cabin, and Bara took command. I think a lot of us didn't really know what do after that. But Bara knew. She gave the order to resume course to Earth."

  To Earth, in an unarmed ship, through vast numbers of enemy ships. And the others agreed to it. Maiga supposed there were only so many mutinies you can fit into one day.

  "How we made it, I don't know," Alex said. "We had to hide and run and dodge, but by the time we got there, the space surrounding the planet was almost deserted. There were no Big Four ships there anymore. There didn't need to be. Their job was done."

  Pain replaced the panic in his eyes. Pain. Horror. Grief. Sev bent his head down onto his arms for a moment, the memory too much for him too perhaps. Maiga wanted to ask the question, "What was it like?" She'd seen the pictures, but to actually see it… But she restrained herself, as he had, from asking the stupid question.

  "The captain… I mean Bara; she stood on the observation deck for hours, all night, just looking at the planet. We held stationary orbit and she stood there for so long she must have been able to see it revolving. People spoke to her and she didn't answer. That's when she lost her mind, I'm sure. Seeing the Earth dead like that. Something down there, it just… took her. Destroyed her mind. Do you ever read stories about the old religions? About hell? She looked into hell that night. And I don't think she's ever looked away."

  He picked up his drink with a trembling hand and swallowed it in one gulp, then took a shaky breath and smoothed a hand over his hair. Maiga stole a quick glance at Sev, watching the door again. He could hear every word, Maiga knew. But he already knew the story, had been there, and was as compromised by the mutiny as Alex, and Bara and the others. There was nothing like mutual guilt to hold a group of people together.

  "What then, Alex?" Maiga asked, needing to prompt him, as he had grown quiet again. He didn't want to tell her the next part, that was clear, but she had to know for sure that she already suspected.

  "She came down from the observation deck eventually, and she went to the captain's cabin. I was there, a couple of others. She said she had to talk to him. And we wanted to send a guard in with her. He was a strong man, he could have disarmed her, taken her hostage, but she wouldn't let us. She wouldn't take a gun in either, in case he tried to take it. She went in there and… It was an hour, almost exactly, I remember checking my watch, and I was getting nervous and then… she came out."

  When he paused again, Maiga wanted to grab his shirt and shake him. But he paused only long enough to take a couple of deep breaths.

  "She had blood on her. On her clothes, her hands. Blood, everywhere. And I saw him, lying on the deck, I could see something, I think it was a shard of plastic, sticking in the side of his neck."

  Maiga had known it. She could smell the blood on Bara. That never washed off. It stained skin and heart and mind.

  "Bara said he'd tried to attack her, that she had to defend herself and then… she closed the door. I wanted to go in there, try to help him. I hated him, but I had to try. He was the captain."

  "She wouldn't let you?"

  "No. She told us all to leave. And I was so… It was too much. I ran. I locked myself in my cabin for hours. Maiga, I swear, I never intended that. I never wanted him dead."

  "Okay." Maiga sighed. So, mutiny and murder. Those were worse crimes than piracy in Maiga's book. Bara had to pay for those first. She looked up as Alex went on, surprised, as she'd thought he was done.

  "When I came out of my cabin and went back to his, I found the doors were welded closed. Welded! I think Bara must have done it herself, the welds were so bad. So I went to the sickbay, and I asked the doctor where the body was, and… and… Oh fuck, I thought I'd lose my mind right then! His body wasn't in the morgue. It was still in his cabin. She welded the doors closed with him in there. Like she could erase it, like it didn't happen. She had the room sealed. The vents cut off. The air sucked out. Cut off the heat."

  Maiga's flesh crawled. He surely didn't mean, he couldn't, nobody could do that.

  "Alex, when did you get the body out?"

  He looked at her and she saw tears fall, before he quickly dashed them away with his hand. Shame. Horror.

  "Alex…"

  "We didn't get him out. The captain's body is still in his cabin."

  Unspeakable. For a moment Maiga felt so sick she thought she'd throw up for sure. It was impossible, surely? Nobody could do that. Leave it there to rot. Every soldier Maiga had ever met worried about what would happen to their corpse if they fell in battle. They wanted their dignity.

  "How could you stand by and let that happen?" She demanded of Alex, her voice harsh enough to make Sev turn and frown. Maiga didn't care. She wanted an answer. How could he serve under the person who did that?

  "What could I do?" Alex almost wailed. He's right on the edge, she saw, and tried to restrain her anger. If she pushed too hard he'd crack and be useless to her.

  Sev still scowled at her. Interesting, she thought. Alex is the spokesman of this pair. He's the more senior officer, and he's just bigger, stronger. But Sev… Mr Sev stays quiet and has more to him than meets the eye.

  "What could I do?" Alex asked again. "Of course, I went to her, but she barely seemed to hear me. I told you, she erased it from her mind. She started saying that the captain died in the fighting. Perhaps she even believed it was true. She would propose toasts to him at dinner, pay tribute to how much he'd taught her."

  "And all the time he's lying dead a few tens of meters away." A fact, and an accusation.

  "I know. And we were cowards, all of us. Too afraid to speak. I told you I hated the captain, but there were nights I wept for him. And nights I thought of going down there with a cutting torch and cutting into that room and still I was afraid to. Afraid of her, afraid of him. Of his… I don't know, his ghost."

  "Ghost?" Maiga tried not to sneer at that.

  "I don't know." He shook his head. "But I know this, that ship is cursed. It's cursed." He dropped his head into his hands. Maiga waited, wishing she knew a way to comfort him. What should she do? Pat his shoulder? No, that seemed idiotic. But in a moment he rubbed his hands over his face and looked up again.

  "After that she said we needed weapons again, so we could ‘start our work'. I remember that's what she said. ‘Start our work.' We went hunting Chia. It had to be them, Bara said. Poetic justice. And the only way it could work was a trap. We played dead to lure them, and attacked a boarding party and then… well we, um, captured the Chia ship."

  He means they kil
led everyone on board, Maiga guessed.

  "And we took its guns, installed them on the Trebuchet. It sounds insane. It is insane. But at the time it seemed right. Taking back what they'd stolen from us. Somehow we got the damn things working. We crippled the Chia ship and left it drifting. I think Bara wanted anyone coming across it to see what we'd done to it. See we'd taken our revenge. And that was the next mission and the next. Revenge. And I was as thirsty for it as she was. But I couldn't erase the captain from my mind as she had."

  No sane person could, Maiga thought. She didn't believe in curses and ghosts, but you didn't need them here. Knowledge and guilt haunted the crew of the Trebuchet. Perhaps telling Maiga had relieved some of the burden of that for Alex. His hands had stopped trembling.

  "Why did you stay?" Maiga asked. "Why didn't you and Sev get the hell out of there?"

  "The crew," Alex said, his voice calmer now. "We're officers; we have an obligation to protect the crew. Then some of the senior officers were killed and I became first officer. I thought that at least in that position I could try to restrain her, from some of the more insane plans and some of the worst atrocities. And I mean atrocities. She wanted to attack passenger transports, massacre innocent civilians. And not just the Big Four alliance races. Any non-humans. They're all fair game to her."

  "So what's changed, Alex? Why are you here talking to me now?"

  "Because of him," Alex nodded at Sev. "She hates him, for no rational reason. I'm afraid for his life. She could just snap and kill him anytime. She already attacked him, a week ago. She has to be stopped, Maiga. For us, but for your space station, and for the lives of all the people she'll go on to kill if she's not stopped."

  "What are you asking from me?"

  "Escape. We leave on your ship, go back to Hollow Jimmy with you. And we'll help you prepare for her coming. If it was only about her, and the ship, then I'd kill her myself, I swear it. But there's so much more going on."

  Maiga nodded. "I could use your help. But as my inside man, on the Trebuchet, just as she has people on Hollow Jimmy."

  "No." Alex shook his head. "Not negotiable. Getting Sev to safety is my first priority."

  Maiga sat back for a moment. It could still work. In fact, Sev could prove very useful indeed. She leaned forward again, but spoke loudly enough for Sev to hear too.

  "Then this is my proposal. You stay on the Trebuchet; I'll take Sev back with me."

  "I don't--"

  "Alex," Sev turned in his seat. "Bara doesn't hate you, you'd be safe."

  "You'd be more than safe," Maiga said. "You two have a nice public row somewhere, you go back to the Trebuchet, Sev doesn't. Bara thinks you chose her and your duty over your lover. Suddenly she'll trust you about twice as much as she did before."

  "I don't know." Alex looked at Sev, who came over and slid into the booth beside him.

  "Stopping her is what's important," Sev said. "And it won't be for long. You know it's all coming to a head."

  "I'll let you two discuss it," Maiga said and left the booth to go to the bar. She stood there waiting for the drinks and watched the two men talking intently. Alex had his priorities. But Maiga had hers too. Priorities and plans. She would stop Bara, but that would only be the start of things. Alex had the right of it.

  So much more was going on.

  Chapter 37

  Maiga heard a tapping at the passenger hatch of the Friss. She put down the coffee she'd been drinking and opened the hatch. Sev stood there, wearing a coat, carrying a bag and sporting a couple of bruises on his face.

  "Permission to come aboard?"

  "Granted."

  He stepped inside and dropped his bag.

  "So," she said, looking at his bruised face. "You've been in a fight then?"

  "Oh, Alex and I created a horrible scene. In full view of several of our fellow officers." Sev grinned.

  "You know, just a row would have done. You didn't have to go for a full on knockdown, drag out." She handed him a cup of coffee.

  He shrugged. "We decided a couple of punches would add a bit of authenticity. They had to drag us apart, it was very convincing." He winced then. "Painful too. I just hope he'll be okay though, back on the Treb. Alex is very stressed right now."

  "Having you out of danger removes a major source of that stress," Maiga reminded him. "Now come on, let's get underway. It will take us a couple of days, maybe three, to get to Hollow Jimmy from here. So, I'll have plenty of time to brief you on the job I have for you to do."

  "Job?"

  ~o~

  Alex knew they were all looking at him, the Trebuchet's crew, and officers, as he walked through the corridors towards Bara's cabin. He didn't think of her as the captain any more. Somehow since that conversation with Maiga that's no longer what she was.

  What was she then? Still his commander, certainly. His jailer he thought sometimes. A lunatic who it was his job to restrain from acting out her more insane impulses. If he'd been there on the bridge a few days ago when she'd hacked off Sev's hair, with her knife--her damn knife!--he might have finally done something to restrain her permanently.

  As it was, when Sev told him, Alex had almost gone looking for her right then. But Sev restrained him. Her bodyguards would kill him if he tried anything. She'd appointed a couple of new ones since she'd planted the old one in the prison facilities on Hollow Jimmy. The new boys were keen to please and impress her. And they stayed at her side even on the ship now.

  They had laughed, Sev said, but only after she laughed. For a second before that, he said he saw the shock and horror in their eyes. The laughter was relief. Relief that she hadn't killed Sev. And terror of what she might do next. And self-defence. A laugh that begged, whatever she does next, don't let it be to me.

  Those bodyguards stood at the doors of her cabin and he summoned a haughty look and didn't speak to them, when he pressed the door buzzer. A moment later, she answered.

  "Alex! Oh, please come in."

  He hesitated a moment, embarrassed, as she wore only a bathrobe. Her hair was wet and Alex could hear the shower running in her bathroom.

  "Ah, I can come back later."

  "No, come in please."

  He walked in and she waved him to a chair. "I'll make you some tea," she said. "I can see you're upset."

  "You've heard about Sev? About the fight?"

  "Yes, I was advised about it at once. I'm told Sev came and took his belongings from the ship and left again. Deserted."

  Alex froze, watching her, her back turned to him. Don't let her want to go after him, to punish him, please. After a moment she turned back with the tea, then pulled up a chair beside him, and laid a hand on his arm.

  "Alex, I'm so sorry it had to happen this way. But I think you'll come to see that it's for the best." When he didn't answer, she went on. "Sev never quite fitted in, did he? Not even in the old days."

  "He was always different." It had been one of things that attracted Alex to him, his courage to be different in a conformist world. A courage Alex had always lacked, leaving him unable to act on his desire, except a few times. On shore leave, usually, when he let the drink and Sev's persuasion go to his head. "Always different." He repeated it in a whisper.

  "And that can be attractive," Bara said. "I know. But, in the end, people like that can't be relied on."

  "Yes." He lied, because he was a coward, and didn't have the nerve to strangle this fanatic, before she killed anybody else. But at least now he had a job to do, for Maiga, who had courage enough for both of them. Stay here; keep Bara from committing too many more hideous crimes. Stay here and pretend to be the oh-so-loyal first officer. So he lied. "Yes, I see that now."

  "And you came back here, back to your post, back to me. Alex." Now she took one of his hands in both her own, "I can't tell you how touched I am by your loyalty. I know things haven't been easy between us lately, but I'm sure we can work through that."

  "Yes, Captain, I hope so." He glanced up to see steam coming from the
door to her bathroom. "Er, do you know your shower is still running?"

  "Yes. Actually, there's something I have to tell you about. I think you'll be pleased, as you're always saying being first officer conflicts with your engineering duties."

  The shower cut off, making Alex glance sharply in that direction. There's someone in there. He turned back to Bara when she spoke again.

  "That isn't going to be a problem anymore. You're going to be able to focus on being chief engineer. I absolutely don't want you to think of this as a demotion. Your work in engineering is still invaluable to me."

  Alex stood up as a figure appeared in the bathroom door, a black man, wearing nothing but a white towel around his waist. Water drops glistened on his lean and muscular body.

  "Alex," Bara said, "allow me to introduce our new first officer. This is Max."

  ~o~

  The Friss approached Hollow Jimmy, with Sev at the controls. Maiga watched him closely, to make sure she was happy with his ability to handle the ship. They got clearance to land and he brought them in to the berth that Maiga had paid for in advance. The lease still had a while to run. Sev had a delicate touch with the thrusters and the ship touched down smoothly.

  "Nice work," Maiga said. She headed through to the sleeping quarters and picked up her bag from the bunk. Sev's belongings were scattered around the small cabin. Just a couple of days with him had made her want to teach him a few lessons about keeping the place tidy, but she'd restrained herself. Not her problem anymore.

  "Okay," Maiga said, finding him waiting for her in the living quarters. "Do you have any last questions about the ship?"

  "No, I'm happy I can fly her."

  Maiga nodded. She looked around the cabin and reached out to touch the wall briefly, before turning back to Sev.

  "Take care of her. And good luck."

  "To you too, ma'am."

  He saluted her. Perhaps discipline wasn't his strong suit, but he could pull off a snappy salute when he wanted to. Maiga returned the salute, then opened the hatch and stepped out of the Friss.

  "Carry on, Lieutenant."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  He closed the hatch and she left the berth. As soon as the doors closed behind her, a red light came on and the small landing bay started to depressurise. She could have stayed and watched it through the window, watched the Friss take off into space. But she didn't, already missing her little ship. Sev would take good care of it though. The last couple of days she'd found he liked nothing more than taking things apart and putting them back together, making them better. A natural engineer. She'd have liked to introduce him to Jaff, they'd get along famously. Perhaps later.