by Mark Oliver
"Wow," Charlie said. "That's good stuff."
"You're welcome."
Charlie scooped the rest of the jelly off his nose and wiped his fingers against his wetsuit bottoms. "Why are you helping me?"
"What can I say? I'm a friendly guy."
"No, really. Why? Are you in the resistance too?"
Bei's eyes flashed angrily. "Watch that tongue, kid. Or I might have to smash that nose back to its former state."
The quick change in temperament startled Charlie. "Sorry."
"Let's leave the questions about what I am and why I'm here to a later date. It doesn't pay to be too open with strangers." He scanned the room. "The Corporation often plants a couple of spies inside these cells. What tells me you're not one of them?"
Charlie shrugged. "I don't know."
Bei looked at him. Charlie wilted under the man's icy stare.
After a long silence, the blue man said, "You know you look them?"
"Who?"
"The silvers. You have the same hair and eyes as them." He reached out and prodded Charlie's cheek. "And your skin is as thin as reed paper. Like theirs."
Again, Charlie shrugged. He had no idea how the conversation had taken such a turn in the wrong direction. He needed to convince this guy he could be trusted.
Bei calmed a little and the smile returned to his face. "You know you'd be very popular with a lady I know."
"Really?" Charlie said, shooting a glance in the direction of Bork. The beastly lady now sat with her back against the bars, eyeing him from afar. She looked upset.
Bei laughed. "Not her. I mean someone on Seenthee."
"Well, I guess she'll have to miss out. Unless she's willing to visit me in the morgue."
"Don't be so negative, kid. A lot can happen on a spaceflight." Bei huddled closer to Charlie. "Say I do somehow manage to get you off this ship, would you be willing to help me out with this lady?"
"What would I have to do?"
"I can't go into that now. But I promise that you'd have to do nothing I wouldn't be more than willing to do myself."
Charlie looked around. Bork was still staring his way. He held out his hand for an alien handshake. "I'll do it."
"Great," Bei said. And, ignoring the outstretched hand, he slammed Charlie hard on the back. "I can tell you and me are going to have a hell of time working together."
"But how are we going to get out of here?"
Before Bei could answer, the clang of metal against metal signalled the arrival of more Corporation guards.
"Which one of you lucky fucks is Bei Lowaiki?" called one of the guards.
"It's interrogation time," his skin-headed partner chimed in. "So get your miserable terrorist arse over here."
Bei stood up and looking down at Charlie said, "Don't worry about Bork. She'll keep her hairy hands to herself for now."
And then he was up moving through the cage, scything his way through the inmates, a hammerhead shark dissecting a school of barracuda.
Chapter 6
Charlie spent the next hour examining the intricate plainness of the cell floor, keeping his eyes well away from Bork's. He had looked towards her once, and found himself locked into a beastly lover's stare that set his heart racing for all the wrong reasons.
He knew if he looked over, she would still be staring. And a glance, no matter how brief, would surely send out the wrong signals. His track record with the opposite sex was not good. He had a unique ability to repel the girls he fancied, while at the same time attract the others.
Making this kind of mistake with Bork would be disastrous. Charlie stared hard at the floor. Why the hell did she pick me? he asked himself. There were plenty of other male targets in the cage.
The guard's tube clanged against the bars. The noise sent a shiver of nervous energy pulsing through the cell.
Almost immediately, the prisoners shuffled around Charlie, huddling well out of reach of the guards' energy sticks. Nobody, Charlie figured, fancies another demonstration of electricity-assisted break dancing.
A fringed solider approached the guards, leading a prisoner, blocked from view by a rotund, butterscotch-skinned man in an ill-fitting leotard blocked. To get a better look, Charlie got up and pushed his way past the spherical fellow, grimacing as he brushed against the sweat-drenched clothes.
The returning prisoner was Bei.
The blue man had his arms pinned behind him, his wrists placed in silver restraints. His head drooped on his chest. A trail of saliva dribbled down his chin and onto his torn shirtfront. Charlie swallowed. His only hope of escape looked utterly defeated.
The escorting fringe told the skinhead to open the cage. She was female and had skin the colour of pink jelly beans. She wore the same gaudy uniform and ridiculous hairstyle, and yet she seemed somehow different to the other soldiers Charlie had seen.
Her turquoise eyes lacked the emotionless determination he had observed in the eyes of the others. And instead of revealing a flat chested, athletic frame, her tight uniform wrapped itself around a body that had more curves than a Curly Wurly factory.
Charlie stared at her open mouthed, his eyes straining to take her all in. Then he remembered how Bork had looked at him, and looked away, ashamed at himself.
The two skin-headed guards reacted in much the same way Charlie had. They stood there goggling the pink-skinned soldier as if at any moment her uniform would evaporate and reveal what lay beneath it.
"What are you staring at?" She said. "You heard the orders. Open the cage."
The harsh tone shook the guards out of their drooling stances. Their faces blanched and they snapped to attention. While one guard stepped behind Bei, the other rushed to the cage and activated its lock.
The cell door opened, but instead of stepping out of the way to let the guard push Bei inside, the pink-skinned fringe dropped to her knees. She whipped out a triangular chunk of metal from her belt and slid it at the open cell door. A light flashed within it and the metal slice shot towards the base of the door. The two skinheads followed its path, looks of confusion etched across their pale faces.
The metal piece wedged itself tightly underneath the door, locking it in place. The guard by the lock finally figured something was wrong, and spun around, only to find himself staring into the end of a rifle.
"Drop your weapons and get on your knees," the pink woman said in the same commanding tone.
The guard behind Bei, however, had other ideas. He went for his gun. But the fringe reacted with lightening speed. She swung out with her rifle, smashing its butt into the skinhead's throat. He dropped to the floor, clutching his neck.
Then with the poise and finesse of a test cricketer she swung the rifle in an easy swing that ended against the man's left temple. The light in his eyes extinguished and he dropped, unconscious, at Bei's feet.
"Nice work," Bei said, kicking the skinhead's rifle away.
The other guard, stood frozen by the open cell door. He glanced down at his felled colleague. When he raised his head, the pink-skinned soldier pressed her rifle barrel firmly against his pale nostrils. "Drop your weapons and get to your knees."
The skinhead, his eyes brimming with malignancy, did as he was told.
The inmates roared in approval, punching the air with their fists and whooping heartily. Charlie couldn't resist joining in. The sight of the open door and kneeling guards had brought a smile to his lips.
Outside the cell, the pink-skinned soldier had her rifle trained on the guard. Without removing him from her sights, she stepped behind Bei, and with her free hand undid his restraints, attaching them to her belt.
The blue man massaged his hands. He turned his amber eyes to the inmates, to the skinhead on the floor and then back to the prisoners. Charlie followed Bei's glance and looked around him at the faces of the prisoners. They looked hungry for blood.
"So," Bei said, smiling, his eyebrows raised. "What shall I do with these two?"
All around Charlie, the inmates bur
st into life, surging forward to the open door. But out of respect, or fear, for Bei they stopped just short of it.
"Kill them," one screamed.
"Rip their fucking heads off," called another.
"Shove those tubes up their Corporation arseholes." This last scream, Charlie noticed, came from the Lucozade woman. Two turen males were supporting her, so that she could get a look at the retribution about to take place.
Bei looked at the woman, and said, smiling, "So be it." Then he stepped forward, and picked up the electric tube that lay at his feet.
The skinhead's eyes doubled in size, when he realised he was about to get a taste of his own medicine. He sprang off the deck, throwing all his weight at Bei.
To the watching Charlie, it all seemed to take place in slow motion.
Bei saw the skinhead charge and twisted to take the impact. As he turned, something slick and shiny, the length and width of a child's ruler, shot out of the back of his right hand. The blue man swung it at the guard, and sliced a cut through his face from ear to ear.
The skinhead dropped dead. A gash ran under his eyes, dissecting his face in a ghastly, second smile. Charlie took one look at the guard and turned away.
Charlie reminded himself, that the guard had it coming. But still he wondered if anyone really deserved to die such a grisly death.
Bei clearly thought so. When Charlie turned, the blue man stood over the guard, smiling, as the blood pooled at his feet. The object protruding from his hand, Charlie now saw, was a razor sharp, square-tipped blade. Charlie wondered if it hurt Bei to use it.
The blue man, however, was in excellent spirits. He called over to the Lucozade woman. In his left hand he still held the electric stick. He activated it and waved its flashing end towards her, and said, "I'm sorry, you'll have to make do with just the one electrocuted guard."
Beneath him the second guard stirred. The poor bastard, thought Charlie, coming into consciousness just at the wrong time.
The guard, groggy and confused, propped himself up onto his elbows. He looked around him. When he saw the open cell door, his mutilated partner and Bei standing over him swinging the electric tube, his face became so white Charlie would have sworn it glowed.
Bei looked the skinhead dead in the eyes, and said, smiling "Welcome to the party." And then he rammed the tube's sparkling end into the skinhead's crotch.
It took less than a minute for the skinhead to die, but to Charlie and no doubt the skinhead, it seemed considerably longer.
Charlie forced himself to watch. He could not afford to look weak. He needed to appear worth Bei's attempts to help him escape. But when the skinhead's testicles set alight, he decided enough was enough and turned away. Unfortunately, he had no way of turning his ears away from the man's screams or his nostrils away from the stench of burnt sex organs.
When the screaming ended, Charlie turned to see what was left of the poor sadistic skinhead. He wished he had not. If the devil ever needed a picture to go with his barbeque invitations, he could not have chosen a better image.
Bei stood over the melted corpse, his amber eyes lost in thought. Then he coughed, scratched his backside and looked up at the inmates silently watching him. A look of impatience flashed across his face. "What are you waiting for?"
For a second, the inmates stood looking around at each other. And then, as one kaleidoscopic swarm, they poured out of the cell, parting for their two saviours like a river rushing past two boulders, before reforming and flowing down the corridor.
Charlie watched them go. The blue man had made a deal to help him escape and against all odds he looked like keeping up his end of the bargain. For now, Charlie's fate lay firmly in the alien's hands.
When the last of the inmates had fled, Bei stepped, his limp gone, into the cell. He held his bladed fist up to Charlie. Then he unclenched it, flattening it out. The blade slid into the back of his hand, hidden once more under the blue flesh. The hand looked as good as new. No scars gave any clue to the blade tucked inside.
Bei nodded towards the pink-skinned fringe. "Charlie meet Awani. Awani meet Charlie. He's coming with us."
She frowned, and said, "We don't need a passenger, especially a weakling that turns his face from death. "
Shit, thought Charlie. She saw me.
"And what's going on with his trousers. He's not a sex freak is he?"
Bei laughed. "Believe me. The kid will come in useful."
"How?"
"This isn't the time and place for discussions."
She folded her arms, rooted to the spot.
Bei shook his head. "Fine. The data you have needs unencrypting, right? Well, this kid can help us with that."
"Bullshit. I know every hacker inside the resistance and he isn't one of them."
Charlie stood in the cage, his heart racing, a silent bystander in his own survival.
"No," Bei said. "But trust me, Awani. He'll help us with the data. Now enough arguing. The last I heard I was in charge here."
She shrugged and, looking at Charlie, said, "Just make sure you don't get us killed."
"I'll try," Charlie said, sounding a lot meeker than he had meant to.
A scream echoed down the corridor. Fifty metres away, the escaping prisoners huddled around one large, furry figure. Bork. Above her head, a male fringe thrashed and bucked, trying to free himself from her grip.
But Bork had him held tight, an ankle in one hand and a wrist in the other. And she was pulling hard. The soldier squealed, his face twisted and grotesque beneath his dishevelled fringe.
All around the massive female, prisoners fisted the air, chanting "Kill, kill, kill."
Bork looked over the heads of the inmates, caught Charlie's eye and smiled.
The pebble stare turned his insides to water. Yet, somehow he managed to force a smile onto his horrified face. At least he hoped it resembled a smile. He had no desire to further hurt this woman's feelings. Who knew how long Bei would be alive to fend her off?
The soldier's screaming reached a terrible crescendo. Finally, his body could bear the stretching no more. There was the noise of ripping flesh, a gurgled scream, and then the soldier came apart, pouring thick blood onto the mob below.
With a look of satisfaction spread across her mottled face, Bork threw the torn carcass onto the floor. Then she raised her hand towards Charlie, waved, and pushed herself through the bloody crowd, passing out of sight down the corridor.
A hand slapped Charlie's back. "You've got a hell of taste in women," Bei said, laughing.
"If that's her idea of foreplay," Charlie said, "then I owe you my life."
"Quit your jabbering you two," Awani said. "We'll be overrun with soldiers once they work out what's happened."
They sprinted in single file, Awani leading the way and Bei protecting the rear. Charlie, unarmed and feeling as useful as a fudge condom, covered the middle.
After a minute's running, Awani held up a hand and they stopped. She scanned the corridor, and satisfied the coast was clear, knelt down beside the turquoise wall. She retrieved a piece of metal from her belt. Charlie was surprised to see it almost perfectly resembled a fifty pence piece. When she pressed it against the wall, it clung to it like a magnet.
She backed away and signalled for the others to follow suite.
A few seconds later, the alien fifty p exploded, blowing a hole a metre wide in the wall. The explosion sent thick chunks of corridor wall scattering across the floor.
Awani slipped through the smoking hole, rifle at her shoulder.
Charlie leant down and picked up a piece of the turquoise material. It had the look, feel and smell of epoxy, the resin used to coat new surfboards.
"Get a move on, passenger, " Awani called from the other side of the hole.
Charlie looked at Bei. "Is she always this bossy?"
The blue man smiled. "She bites worse than she barks. So I'd shift it if I were you."
Chapter 7
The hole opened into a second
corridor. Once through, Awani picked up the pace. She ran holding a flat slab, palm-sized and dull green. Every now and then, without slowing, she would tap its surface, and a 3D map would flash up, showing the ship and their current location on it.
As outside centre, Charlie was one of the fastest players in his team. He enjoyed nothing more than carving his way through the opposition defence with a change of pace and taking on the last man in a straight on sprint to the line.
Yet, this pink woman had him beat. Even running at full pace, his lungs burning, he could not keep up with her. Several times, he had to swallow his pride and ask her to slow down. She always did, but not without a belittling shake of her head, or muttered insult.
Her quick pace was not the only problem Charlie had. He also had to contend with the arousing sight of her buttocks pounding away in front of him as she ran. Her uniform left nothing to the imagination. When he should have been concentrating all his efforts on maintaining a steady stride, Charlie found himself ogling the wave machine in the pants in front of him.
Whenever he realised what he was doing, he would tell himself to concentrate. And for a few seconds, with his eyes firmly fixed on the back of her head, he would gain on her. But then with the certainty of gravity, his eyes would lower, and his gaze would fall once more upon the curves rising and falling in perfect harmony before him.
Christ, he thought as he lost his stepping for the umpteenth time, being a man is a hell of business.
It did not take long for the alarms to kick in. Somewhere hidden in the walls, a legion of speakers blared. Their shrill beeping pursued the runners along the winding corridors.
Sometimes the blaring quietened, allowing giant holographic head, floating ghostlike down the corridors, to dispatch its message. Charlie recognised the head immediately. Even in the light of the hologram, the face had lost none of its blank, corpse like quality. Executive Ko's terrible face floated back and forth along the corridors informing the fleeing prisoners about the grisly death awaiting them if they did not surrender.