by John Walker
You have to have left something behind if you rocketed out of here. Everyone makes a mistake. You guys have made plenty.
***
Rathe and Jordan were nearly back to the ship when their com units began to ping. Rathe quickly answered it to kill the sound and crouched, speaking quietly. “Who is this?”
“It’s Hannah. You’re still alive.”
“Which is a lot more than I can say for you when I see you again,” Rathe rasped. “You have a lot of nerve contacting us!”
“No choice. Looks like the Earth ship is looking for our freighter.”
Rathe sighed. “Of course they are. They won’t find it.”
“They might,” Hannah replied. “They’ve got a probe out here flying around the station.”
“How the hell do you know?”
“I’m in a fighter. Very nearly took out some of their ships too. If I would’ve had one of the Alliance ships you moved aboard ours, I would’ve too.” Hannah paused. “I’m going to take this thing out and land. I assume you’re not back aboard yet?”
“Hannah, I swear to all that’s holy in this universe, if you leave without us…”
“I’ll just prep for launch, Rathe. Don’t worry about it. We’ll wait for you guys…as long as we can.”
“Hannah!” Rathe slapped the wall when he noticed the communicator was off. “Are you kidding me? Again?”
“She’ll leave us,” Jordan said. “I guarantee it.”
Rathe started to speak but his com went off again. “What am I, a switchboard?” He clicked it on. “Who is this now?”
“Thantis.” The voice chilled Rathe’s blood. “How’re things faring…Captain.”
The disdain the man used in the word made both pirates scowl. They stood in silence for a moment before Rathe found a voice to reply. He pursed his lips. “You betrayed us.”
“Only a little,” Thantis replied. “I did give you more access to the Alliance ship…and helped you control the station, for the most part. My task is nearly complete. There are some marines at the door but they can’t undo what I’ve started. This station, and everyone on board, will be destroyed.”
“We’re almost to our ship, you sick bastard,” Jordan said. “We’ll be out of here long before…whatever you’re doing…happens.”
“No,” Thantis said. “I’ve ensured your ship is stuck here. I’m sorry, but I really wanted to have some trusted allies with me for this. It’s a glorious moment. I’ll finally have my revenge and you criminal filth don’t get to just waltz in and out like you belong here. History won’t know exactly how to label me. Either a criminal or a hero for removing you lot.”
Rathe shook his head. “Pretty sure killing hundreds of civilians isn’t putting you on anyone’s holiday list. You could take out a monster eating people alive in this mess and you’d still be called a fiend. Disarm whatever you’ve got going on. There’s no reason to do this. Whatever your grievance…speaking of which, what could’ve been so bad?”
“I’m glad someone asked,” Thantis replied. “I didn’t always limp…nor have these beauty enhancing scars. I worked on this station as a computer expert and got called in for a problem with one of the burrowers. An accident occurred. I’d never been to an unsafe part of the facility before and I…was injured.”
“Did you hear the word accident in your story?” Jordan asked. “That means it wasn’t anyone’s fault!”
“That part was fine. It’s the fact that they thought I should retire because I was…no longer fit for duty.” Thantis laughed and it didn’t sound sane. “They sent me away from my home and friends because of their mistake. I could still function just fine. And what else did I have to do? When I got back to the capital, I couldn’t find work. No one would hire the cripple.
“I lived off of government generosity, barely making ends meet. So I saved up…found you…and initiated this plan. No one can fault me wanting my revenge. No one can say I don’t deserve to kill them all.”
“Um…” Rathe rubbed his eyes. “I’m a criminal and I can say with all certainty, you don’t deserve crap. Look, I don’t want a bunch of civilians on my conscience for bringing your crazy ass here. You know that if you would’ve just kept your side of the bargain, we were taking you with us. You could’ve joined the crew. We need good computer people.”
“I don’t work for pirate scum.”
Jordan laughed. “We’re scum? You’re about to be a mass murderer! I think you’re worse than us, buddy.”
“I have a cause!” Thantis shouted.
“Okay, zealot,” Rathe said. “Why did you bother to contact us? You’ve made up your mind. We could’ve just died here without a clue. Why taunt?”
“I wanted you to know what was about to happen,” Thantis replied. “I’ll be making a formal announcement to the whole station. That will help these marines keep order…and by that, I mean not at all. People will go into a panic. They’ll riot and try to find any means off this station they can but they won’t. I’ve locked down every pod, hangar and escape hatch. You’re all here…with me…to the end.”
“So you acknowledge this is going to kill you too?” Jordan asked.
“I’d always planned to die here. Good bye, gentlemen. Thank you for the ride.”
The line went dead. “How many people are going to hang up on us today?” Rathe shook his head. “He’s bluffing. He couldn’t have locked down our ship too.”
“I’m not so sure,” Jordan replied. “I hate to say this, but we might need to help the Earth ship if we hope to get out of this alive.”
“No way. We might as well cuff ourselves before we call them.”
“It’s that or just die.”
Rathe considered the alternative for a moment and finally nodded. “Fair point. I’ll make the call to the Earth ship…hopefully from ours. And maybe I can smack Hannah around a little bit too. That’d make me feel better.”
“You and me both,” Jordan replied as they picked up the pace.
***
Agatha received a message from an unknown source. She was about to take it when Olly cursed loudly, drawing her attention away from the console. “What’s wrong?” Captain Atwell asked.
“My probe just got blown up,” Olly replied. “Someone actually destroyed it.”
“Who?” Commander Everly stepped in. “Do you have a read?”
“Some fighter cruising around causing trouble,” Olly said. “Damn pirates.”
“Captain,” Agatha said, “I’ve got a com signal from an unknown source. They want to talk to you I think.”
“Put them on the screen.”
Agatha connected the signal and patched it on the main viewing screen. The pirate who spoke to them earlier appeared on the screen. His face was covered in sweat and he looked tired. Captain Atwell stood up to speak to him. The other bridge staff seemed on edge, as if seeing the man annoyed them.
“Captain,” the man said. “So…truce?”
“It’s easy to talk about a truce when you’re losing,” Gray said. “Why are you reaching out to us now? What do you want?”
“So…there were a few things we didn’t know about.” The pirate cleared his throat and rubbed the back of his neck. “First off, the crazy bastard who set those bombs or…did whatever he’s doing…we didn’t know he was psychotic. In fact, we just thought he wanted some money. When we got here and he…well…you know…”
“No, I’m afraid I don’t. Explain.”
“He kind of wants us dead too…for some reason.” The pirate frowned. “By the way, my name’s Rathe. Good to meet you.”
“Uh huh.” Gray folded his arms over his chest. “Tell us more about this person. What’s their name and why are they doing this?”
“Thantis,” Rathe replied. “I have no clue about a surname. He’s messed up though, I can tell you that. Got in some kind of accident that screwed up his face and gave him a limp. He’s pretty bent out of shape over it too since he plans on killing everyone on this s
tation in retribution. We think that’s unnecessary.”
“Good to know,” Gray muttered. “Clea, take a look at the database for someone named Thantis.”
“On it sir.”
“So…can we help…at all?” Rathe shrugged. “We’re just kind of stuck here until that guy’s taken down.”
“What do you mean?” Gray asked.
“He somehow fused the docking clamps so we can’t manually retract them. We’re here until we get access to the computer and frankly, that’s not looking easy all things considering. I figure you guys have a chance to make all this right and save the people on board, right?”
“I assume your help comes at a cost.”
“It would be nice if we didn’t go to prison,” Rathe said. “Beyond that, we’re pretty open to negotiation.”
“Now,” Gray finished for him. “You’re open to it now. You weren’t before. In fact, you even threatened hostages at one point.”
“Captain, that was a bluff…”
“And then you attacked us with drones.”
“A zealous attendant who was supposed to be watching our cruiser…”
Gray interrupted. “Finally, you tried to blow up the ship, taking the crew and whoever else happened to be close by with it.”
“Again, that was the zealot. She started all that trouble with the ship. We were just trying to steal some Ulem. Not nice, but certainly not violent and dangerous. Come on, you can trust me here. We’re on your side.”
“I’m very curious what exactly you think you bring to the table. From where I’m standing, you don’t have much. We’ve taken the ship back and we just taken the station’s command center. I grant that we haven’t found your other ship yet but it’s just a matter of time. What makes you think you can do anything for us we can’t do for ourselves?”
“Look, I know you’ve got soldiers all over the place on there and you think you’ve got the entire place locked down…but as you say, you haven’t been able to find our ship yet. That means we’re pretty crafty. I don’t think you’re going to locate Thantis and to be honest, I’m pretty sure we’re going to need his sneaky ass to clean up his mess.”
Adam turned to Agatha. “Ensign, please mute the line.”
“Aye, sir.” Agatha tapped the control and returned her attention to the captain and first officer.
“We don’t need these bastards,” Adam said. “They know they’ve been beaten and they’re just hoping that we give them a pass. This is nothing more than a last act of desperation. I say we let Marshall’s people take them into custody after they stop the sabotage.”
“They’re an asset,” Gray replied. “I’m not saying they’re guaranteed to contribute but consider what’s at stake. I’m not saying we just let them go but we’ve got a lot of civilians over there. If this Thantis person is required to fix whatever he broke, then a criminal to catch a criminal makes sense.”
“I respectfully disagree. Making a deal with them will only cause us more trouble than it’s worth.”
“I’ll hear them out. We’re just sitting here anyway.” Gray turned to Agatha. “Make the mic live, Ensign.” She nodded and he picked up the conversation. “Alright, Rathe. Tell me how exactly you can help us.”
“Thantis spent a lot of time on our ship while we planned this caper,” Rathe replied. “We know him. Tell your guys to stand down while we conduct our search for him.”
“Why wouldn’t he just be with his work? He plans on destroying the entire station and it doesn’t seem like he’s trying to escape.”
“I promise he’s got a plan. The twisted bastard can’t enjoy his revenge if he’s dead.” Rathe shook his head. “How about this, you can’t search the entire station. We’ll take the lower decks and you guys…keep doing…whatever the hell you’re going to do. Keep in contact and we’ll catch him.”
Gray hummed, turning away. Agatha watched intently, noting the disapproval of Commander Everly. They’d definitely have words later if the Captain allowed the criminals to help. She saw them work together for a long time and they rarely had disagreements but when they did, the tension got pretty thick.
“Okay,” Gray turned back to the screen. “You’ve got a shot. Find Thantis, if you can.”
“And…will you let us go?”
“No promises,” Gray said. “Besides, we’re not the only ones you have to worry about here. The kielans have a big grievance with you and they just got back their battlecruiser back. You’ll be lucky if they don’t blow you away.”
“I guess that’s as good as we’re going to get.” Rathe sighed. “Okay, captain. We’ll do what we can and let you know.”
The connection dropped and Agatha turned her attention back to her post. She didn’t want to see what happened next. Commander Everly and Captain Atwell would likely need a private minute in the office but that wouldn’t happen for a while. Clea kept them busy when she spoke up.
“I have Thantis Ga’Vius on file, sir.” Clea gestured to the screen and brought a picture up of a tall, thin man with black hair and a severe expression. “He held the highest computer classification for a civilian and worked as one of the chief operators here maintaining the reactor.”
“Anything else?” Gray asked.
“Just his service record…exemplary for the most part. A little severe. On his exit report, his coworkers described him as a difficult man who was overly severe and unkind. They weren’t really sad to see him go.”
“That’s messed up,” Redding said. “Poor guy.”
Timothy shook his head. “That poor guy is about to blow up a lot of people, Stephanie.”
“Enough,” Gray said. “What else?”
“When he got let go, he dropped off the grid. And…” Clea paused. “Um…he has no family.”
“That’s bad, isn’t it?” Adam asked. “I mean, kielans take that very seriously.”
“The Ga’Vius family were having a reunion. There weren’t many…seven total. They died in a traffic incident. Thantis missed the event by a day.”
“So it wasn’t just that he got fired,” Gray said. “He lost everyone he cared about in the same month.”
“Motive,” Adam said. “Can we use this?”
“Maybe.” Gray rubbed his chin. “Feed the information to Marshall’s people. They might need it if it breaks down to a negotiation. Maybe the Alliance ship can help us but either way, get a report on where they’re at anyway. I have a bad feeling we’re running out of time.”
Chapter 10
Hoffner’s marines stood near the door to the reactor chamber. The viewport revealed an abandoned room but there were several devices with flashing lights. If they were the explosives, they’d be busy for a while. He counted at least ten positioned all around the area. The reactor itself was contained, the protective metal plates remained in place.
“Ander, we’re in position. Can you get the door open?”
“On it.” Something clicked above them, the door thumped and slid into the walls.
The marines rushed in to clear the room, their weapons leading the way. Hoffner paced close to the device on his left and examined it. It didn’t look like any bomb he’d seen before and he’d worked with explosives many times. He brought out his scanner and aimed it at the thing for a moment.
There were no explosives in it. In fact, it wasn’t a detonator at all. It transmitted some kind of signal but the readings didn’t make sense. What did this guy intend to do? He did a quick count: ten in total. He got on the com, patching Ander and Marshall onto the same line. “Gentlemen, I think we’ve got a real problem.”
“What’s going on?” Ander asked. “Are you in the room?”
“We’re in,” Hoffner replied. “But these things aren’t bombs. They’re transmitters, throwing a signal. I’m sending the readings to the Behemoth now.”
Marshall replied, “I’ll get Lieutenant Darnell on this now.”
“Yeah…there’re no timers, no bombs…just these.” Hoffner sighed. “No
idea what we do with these so we’re going to just guard them for now.”
“Sounds good,” Marshall said. “Stand by.”
***
Rathe leaned back after the Behemoth killed the connection. He got what he wanted but would it really do a lot of good? It was better than sitting around doing nothing, at least until his people figured out how to get the docking clamps free. Still, Thantis deserved to pay for what he’d done.
Jordan laughed suddenly. “You’re going to love this. Hannah just requested landing clearance.”
“Oh, grant it. I’ll give her a proper greeting.” Rathe drew his weapon and headed down to the hangar. He waited in the hallway until her fighter landed and she hopped out. Before she got twenty feet, he stepped inside and aimed his gun at her head. “Welcome aboard. Glad you could make it.”
“Didn’t think I’d see you again,” Hannah replied. “Put that gun away, we have to get out of here.”
“Can’t actually. The docking clamps are holding the ship in place and we’re kind of screwed.” Rathe shrugged. “I just made a deal with the Earth ship. No thanks to you.”
“I tried to take them out.” Hannah shrugged. “Seriously, quit pointing that weapon at me or you and I are going to go round and round.”
“You’re a cocky bitch, you know that?” Rathe shook his head “You lost the cruiser, got our fighters torn up and put us in a serious situation with those soldiers out there. Why do you think I won’t kill you right now?”
“Because you’re running out of crew,” Hannah said. “And I’m one of the only pilots you’ve got left. Hell, I’m probably the only one competent. You think Jordan can get us out of here? You’re wrong.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
“So what, you’re going to shoot me in cold blood? What deal did you make?”