Under Shadows

by Jason LaPier

  “Contact!” Ayliff shouted, breaking the silence.

  The world jolted and Jax was slammed in the guts by the straps still half harnessing his body. The ship lurched and twisted, all of them gasping and cursing.

  “What is it?” McManus blurted.

  With a series of grunts, the pilot recovered enough to respond. “We’re hacked. Remote control.”

  “God dammit, McManus,” Granny shouted. “What the hell did you get us into?”

  “Just calm down,” he spat back.

  “X.” She pointed at Jax. “You said X. Who is X? I’ve heard of him. I know I have. What kind of shit did you get us into?”

  “Tell them,” Jax gasped through another lurch. “Tell them who he is. He’s going to kill us, dammit! He’s going to kill us!”

  “Shut up, Jackson! Shut the fuck up!”

  “Ayliff, reboot it,” Granny shouted. “Break the connection. Break the goddamn connection!”

  “Sarge?” was all the pilot could manage.

  “Just fucking relax,” McManus said. He was half strapped to his console, and half reaching out with a hand as if to calm the room. “Just trust—”

  He was cut off with a wheeze when the ship pivoted and began accelerating.

  “Alright, fuck this,” Ayliff said. “Granny, reboot sequence. It takes two consoles to do it.”

  “Hit it,” she said.

  And the lights went out for the space of a silent breath.

  Then came back on, only red instead of white. The hum of electronics came too, normally background noise, now seeming louder as they powered back up.

  “It’s coming up now,” Ayliff said. “I’m going to try to kill the remote access virtual ports before they try to reconnect.”

  “Wait, what is this?” Granny said. “Ayliff, are you seeing this? What’s OS MOTD mean?”

  Ayliff’s head cocked side to side in thought. “Um. Operating system. Uh. Message? Of … of the day?”

  Jax felt his breath catch in his throat and lodge there like a lump of rock. He glanced at McManus, whose eyes were glued to the communications console in front of him. Reading.

  This is Jackson. I’ve done no harm to the system, I only overwrote the OS MOTD.

  The man we’re going to see is known to most as X. His real name is Mark Xavier Phonson. He is – or was, I don’t know any more – a cop with ModPol. He is a master manipulator and has used his skills to extort others for power and money, and where necessary, to end lives.

  Sergeant McManus is under orders to bring me to X. Maybe he thinks he’s just doing his job, but this operation is far outside the normal operating parameters of ModPol. X doesn’t want me arrested, he wants me gone. He wants me disappeared. And he’s very good at covering his tracks. So it’s not a stretch to think that he’ll want this whole ship to disappear.

  What you do next is up to you. All I’m asking is that you be officers of justice when you do it.

  There was a metallic scraping sound, and Jax realized after a cold second that McManus had drawn a weapon.

  “No one touch anything,” he said quietly.

  Granny pushed herself away from her console and drifted to the center of the cabin. “That’s enough, Jared,” she spat. “Enough of this bullshit. You’re not shooting anyone, you bastard. Kyl, shut down the remote access before they get a lock on us.”

  “Ayliff, don’t touch anything,” McManus said louder. His gun couldn’t decide whether to point at Granny or the pilot.

  “Just do it, Kyl,” she said. “This ends now. Jared McManus, you put that weapon away or I’m relieving you of duty.”

  He blinked and the gun went slack for just a moment. “You … you don’t know what we’re dealing with.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “Just let him pull us in,” McManus said, the gun still up, but less threatening. “We turn over Jackson, and then we’re on our way.”

  There was a silence that followed, and Jax began to panic. “No, you won’t be on your way,” he said. “He’ll have no more use for you. You’ll be loose ends. Pilot, how many jumps did you make to get here?”

  “Uh, five.”

  “This is what I’m talking about,” Jax said, looking from Granny to McManus. “Where the hell are we? His secret fortress or something? No one hides this well and then lets people come and go freely.”

  After another stretch of silence, Ayliff piped up. “I disabled all the remote ports.”

  “Good,” Granny said. “I have a sudden urge to phone home. Can you take us to the nearest ModPol comm beacon?”

  “Yeah.” He was looking over his shoulder at Granny, then at McManus, as though giving the sergeant an opportunity to protest. When he didn’t, Ayliff continued. “We’ll be on our way just as soon as the drives come back online.”

  “And the contact?”

  “Still out there. We’re moving right with it. I think when they took control of the patroller, they set us along the same trajectory.”

  Jax looked at Granny and McManus, who both frowned. It was too late.

  A clang erupted from somewhere below them.

  “What was that?” Granny said.

  “We’re being boarded,” McManus said, flexing his fingers around his gun.

  *

  The interstellar patroller was well divided into lots of small sections. It was designed to be able to take hull damage without affecting the entire ship. It was also kind of a damn maze.

  McManus looked at his arm-pad again. Boxes, a dozen or so, all interconnected. He punched the three-dimensional view, causing a small holoprojection to rise from the pad’s screen. He’d left Ayliff and Granny in the control cabin, and had dragged Jackson to the tube room. There was no time to shove him into a tube, so he’d bound him to a door handle and left him there.

  Now he needed to get to the cube flashing red in his projection: a small cargo bay near the rear-bottom of the ship. As he pulled himself through another hatchway and into the long corridor that ran through the middle from fore to aft, he tried to inspect the map. The cargo room had openings on three sides. The more he studied the map, the more he realized there were no natural choke points anywhere; every room connected to at least two or three other rooms or corridors. With a sour grunt he realized it had probably been designed that way so that if something went bad in one room, you could still get around it and get to other important parts of the ship.

  He whipped across the handholds, down the corridor, punching the release on the hatch at the end. Down into the next room. This section was a small cluster of adjacent cargo holds. He checked his map and spun open the door that opened back in the direction of the ship’s fore.

  And he had to shield his eyes from the bright sparks coming from the floor. He cursed himself for not grabbing a helmet – at least then he could extend a visor. But it didn’t matter. Within seconds, his mind resolved the flash he’d seen: they were cutting through the hull.

  This could be his choke point. He could wait for the cutting to stop, position himself behind a crate, and blast anyone that poked their head through the hole. For a second, his brilliant mind came up with the thought of just covering the hole with crates from around the room. As the scenario played out in his head, the bulky containers were brushed aside with little force in the absence of gravity.

  The other scenario playing in his mind showed him the cutting finishing, the circle of metal floating up, followed by canisters of gas, smoke, whatever. Hell, maybe something flammable. As a choke point it was too obvious, and McManus had no real protection against any of those attacks. The red on his map began flashing more quickly. He needed to get out or he’d be the one choking.

  He went through the door on the other side. As it sealed behind him, he frantically looked for a way to lock it. He pawed through the doorpad interface until he found the lock controls. They were faded in color. Disabled. He punched the icon anyway.

  LOCK CONTROL REQUIRES COMMAND OVERRIDE.

  “Command o
verride?” He smacked the door with the flat of his hand. “I’m the goddamn commander of this ship!”

  VOICE COMMAND INTERFACE ACTIVATED. INSUFFICIENT PRIVILEGES.

  “What the fuck,” he mumbled. Then he stabbed at his armpad. “Ayliff. Ayliff, are you there?”

  “Yeah, Sarge,” came the reply through the pad’s speaker.

  “I need you to lock this door.” He scanned the surface, then noticed the doorpad’s interface had a number at the bottom. “Door number F, one, six, six.”

  “F, one, six?”

  “Six, six.”

  “F, six, six?”

  “No, goddamn it,” McManus shouted. A crunching sound came from the room on the other side of the door. He tried to breathe. “F, one, six, six.”

  “Got it,” Ayliff said. The lock icon flashed on the doorpad.

  “Okay, good.” McManus was already on the move, heading for the door to his right, on the starboard side of the room. “Can you figure out what door is directly opposite that one, to the aft?”

  “Uh, yeah, sure.”

  “Lock that one too.”

  “Okay, Sarge.”

  McManus muted his armpad. He’d just have to hope that Ayliff figured out what door he was talking about. He went through the door, then turned aft. He picked his way through the small hold and went through the far door.

  This put him in the hold directly starboard of the hold they were cutting into. He glanced at his map to verify, then flinched as louder crunching and squeaking sounds came from the door to the port side of the room. He was in the right place alright.

  He floated to a stack of crates in the center of the room. They were strapped into place, and he hooked one foot under one of the straps to anchor himself. Then he braced himself with his left hand gripping a handhold on a crate, with his right aiming his weapon around the edge of it, pointing it at the portside door. He watched the holomap hovering above his armpad. He’d been grilled in many ModPol training sessions on the expected behavior of a boarding operation. If the attackers had the means to cut through a hull, any room they cut into was going to lose pressure. If they had any hope of opening doors of other rooms without destroying the whole ship, they’d need to restore that pressure. And generally, if they were bothering to board the thing, they wanted to keep it mostly intact.

  The red turned yellow. That meant they’d sealed the hole they created, probably with an attached tube. The ship’s life-support system was trying to backfill air into the room. After a few quiet minutes, during which McManus felt he might have a heart attack, the yellow flicked off and the room on the map went back to the standard gray color.

  He switched off the map and watched the door. Gun close to the side of the crate, but not exposed to view. His head just poking around enough to see the door slide open. He pulled back and listened. How many were there? In the intense silence that followed, he could pick out the tiny clicks and swishes of movement. He knew that they couldn’t come through that doorway more than two at a time.

  He pulled his gun and face around the side of the crate. Sure enough, there were two reaching handholds on either side of the door. A third waited behind. They were wearing flexible, but expensive-looking armor and carrying flashers. High-charge pistols that could be used to stun or fry, depending on the business they needed to discuss. He took aim and fired.

  The stunner screeched and all three of them jumped, though one of them jumped by the force of electricity coursing through his system. As they raised weapons, he took another shot.

  And the gun beeped at him. He slid back just as arcs of light flashed his way. He looked at the stubborn weapon. The charge indicator was blinking a useless red. He’d forgotten to charge the damn thing after zapping Runstom. And he’d used a max-charge on his ex-squadmate, leaving the weapon nearly drained. He realized with a cold sweat that he probably didn’t even stun his target with the one shot he managed – the charge was too weak. Strong enough to slow him down for a moment, but that was about it.

  Weapons. His brain trying to kick his body into motion. Get to the fore, the weapons cabinet, just off to the side of the main cabin.

  He unhooked his foot from the strap. Reached down and smacked the release on the bar that ran through the hooks at the end of the straps. It didn’t budge, so he hit it again with the butt of the spent weapon. All the straps on one crate popped.

  Grabbing a handle on another crate for leverage, he shoved the loose box in the direction of the armored goons. The flashing of their weapons paused long enough for him to brace a leg against the remaining crate and launch himself at the door he’d come through. It returned to scorch the doorway just as he made it through. The door slid shut behind.

  “Ayliff!” he shouted at his arm. “Ayliff, where the fuck are you?”

  No response. He was already at the portside door, another one he’d come through originally. He went through it. If he was fast enough, he might be able to lose them in the cargo-hold cluster. Through the next room, then up.

  He’d reached the long corridor that ran the length of the ship. The weapons cabinet was in the armory, almost all the way to the main cabin.

  He hissed into his armpad. “Ayliff, come in!”

  Sweaty handhold to sweaty handhold, he pulled fore. “Ayliff, what the fuck.” A tiny voice rattling around the back of his mind said mute, and he remembered to turn up the volume of his armpad. “Ayliff, are you there?”

  “Yeah, Sarge, I said I’m here. Can you hear me?”

  “Lock all the doors in the cargo holds.”

  “What door number?”

  “All of them, Ayliff!” McManus shouted as he pulled with both hands, his empty weapon discarded. “All the cargo hold doors!”

  “Too late, pal.” The voice behind him came through an external helmet-speaker, giving it an electric coldness. McManus didn’t bother to look back.

  “Should we toast him or just stun him?” The helmet speaker failed to modulate the volume of this quiet aside, which blared down the hall.

  “X says to stun everyone first. I think he wants to toast them later.”

  McManus kept pulling, cursing the length of the corridor. Cursing his exposure. Cursing himself for not listening to Jackson sooner. Cursing Runstom for using up all the juice in his gun.

  Cursing Runstom for any of it; Jackson, X, the whole mess was Runstom’s fault.

  “Damn it,” he muttered as he yanked his body just past the halfway mark of the passage. Maybe he should have listened to Runstom all along.

  It was the last thought he had before his body erupted with electric fire and his vision brightened into blankness.

  *

  Jax had tried to hide, but it hadn’t taken the goons very long to find him. The pilot and the gunner had managed to lock themselves in the main cabin, but no one seemed to care. They’d restrained Jax with simple plastic cuffs and pulled him down to the cargo holds, through the hole in the hull, down the attached tube, and into their ship. They’d brought him into a room whose function Jax couldn’t identify. It was spacious, but there wasn’t much in it, other than a panting mound of Sergeant Jared McManus in the exact center. They removed the cuffs, and Jax could see McManus was also unbound.

  Phonson – Jax decided to think of him by his real name, to take the sting out of the infamy associated with his mysterious and ominous nickname – had come in shortly after. He strolled in idly, checking a few screens on the walls, nodding to himself without comment. He was helmetless and his bald, red head gleamed in the bright, hot lights of the room.

  “What the hell is this?” McManus said, breaking the quiet. Shaking, he got to his feet. Jax was tempted to support him as he struggled against the weak artificial gravity, but that was just reflex. He kept a few paces’ distance as McManus mustered anger. “You put a hole in my goddamn ship!”

  Phonson spoke without turning to them. “There are days when I feel like I can’t trust people.” Though low and even, his voice carried as though ampli
fied. “Do you ever have those days?”

  McManus braced his hands on his knees, working his way to a half-crouch, half-upright stance. “What the hell are you talking about? I came all the way out here, didn’t I? I brought you Jackson, didn’t I?”

  “Due diligence,” Phonson said with a dismissive wave by way of explanation. He checked another screen and then finally turned to face them. “I just need to find out where you stand, and what you know. There may be some light torture. If you survive, then you’ll be free to go.”

  Jax felt his long-empty stomach twist. He reflexively looked around the room for an escape. The door that Phonson had come through seemed unguarded, and it was off to the side, away from the screens he was inspecting. It was too easy, which told Jax it wasn’t possible. He felt compelled not to move. He couldn’t see anything that told him he was restrained, but he felt it.

  “Light torture?” McManus cocked his head. He was working hard to project bravado, but Jax could see the sweat beading along his brow and hear the slight quiver in his voice. “How long is this going to take?”

  “Oh don’t worry,” Phonson said. He came closer, to within a few paces of them. “Your ride won’t leave without you. One of my guys left a bomb onboard that will trigger if it gets too far away from us.”

  Evidently McManus had run out of rebuttals. He paced, his head swiveling. He must have sensed a containment as well, and he was trying to identify the edges of the invisible barrier. With an unexpected quickness, he dropped to a crouch and bolted at Phonson.

  He managed a few strides before he collapsed, his momentum causing him to tumble and slide forward. All of his muscles bulged and quivered and an airless sound hissed from his clenched jaw.

  “Wow, that thing actually works,” Phonson said. Jax couldn’t tell if he was joking or genuinely impressed. “I wanted to test it out but I couldn’t get any volunteers. None of my guys are quite so stupid.”

  “What was that?” Jax said. “I mean, I only ask because you seem anxious to brag about it.”

  Phonson’s growing smile wavered and he glared at Jax. “Anti-aggression technology,” he said, stuck between pride and mild embarrassment at being a braggart. “It’s in the room. Very sophisticated AI. Infrared cameras, they scan every movement, every muscle twitch. Even when we think we’re being stealthy, our muscles betray us with micro-movements. This thing picks up all that data and …” he started, then stalled, his head cocking as he looked for the words. “Calculates intent.”