STAR REALMS: RESCUE RUN by Jon Del Arroz
Published by Evil Girlfriend Media
Copyright © White Wizard Games
All rights reserved. Any reproduction or distribution of this book, in part or in whole, or transmission in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher or author is theft.
Any similarity to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
Cover art by Antonis Papantonio
Design by Randy Delven and Matt Youngmark
ISBN: 978-1-940154-14-5
For my mom,
who brought me science fiction books to read
every time I was home sick from school.
Contents
Chapter 1: The Heist
Chapter 2: Moving Up
Chapter 3: A New Mission
Chapter 4: Crisis Management
Chapter 5: Our Best Hope
Chapter 6: Reprimands
Chapter 7: Assembling
Chapter 8: Rebellious Idea
Chapter 9: Duck and Cover
Chapter 10: Released
Chapter 11: Bonding
Chapter 12: Empowered
Chapter 13: The Underlevels
Chapter 14: Down, Below Station
Chapter 15: The Man On The Inside
Chapter 16: When The Future’s Uncertain, Turn To the Past
Chapter 17: Discoveries
Chapter 18: An Affair to Remember
Chapter 19: Circling Back
Chapter 20: An Unexpected Visitor
Chapter 21: Separated
Chapter 22: Together
Chapter 23: Lost and Found
Chapter 24: News
Chapter 25: Opening Moves
Chapter 26: On the Run
Chapter 27: Confrontations
Chapter 28: The Bottleneck
Chapter 29: Rescue and Search
Chapter 30: Inspections
Chapter 31: Decisions
Chapter 32: All Aboard
Chapter 33: Catching Up
Chapter 34: Contained
Chapter 35: Escape
Chapter 36: Megahaulin’
Chapter 37: Zero Authority
EPILOGUE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chapter 1
The Heist
Balibran Station
Local Date 1137.455
Joan paused in front of the sealed hatch in her aft control room. A holodisplay shimmered on the wall in front of her, reflecting her large brown eyes, only a trace of her black hair visible through the visor. The rest of her small form was covered in a pressure suit that puffed out like a hull calking compound. Using the display, Joan scrutinized every seal-point on her suit to ensure there were no leaks. Satisfied with her visual inspection, she nodded to her reflection. “Hey G.O.D., you there?” she asked, sound deadening within her suit helmet.
A mechanized, androgynous voice sounded in her left ear, from her audible implant. “I must again recommend, Ms. Shengtu, that you find a more suitable name for me as your AI assistant. Your fellow humans might not take kindly to your acronym designation.”
“I need something to amuse me when I’m out in space here all alone—no offense intended.”
“None taken.”
“Besides, the name suits you. And it’s true. GIC Onboard Diagnostic tool.” Joan hit the control pad on the back door to seal off the internal air of the ship, isolating the room.
“It is rather a lofty thought process, shortening Galactic Intellisource Corporation. Perhaps the makers intended my designation to imply such. It would not be surprising, given my planet of origin.”
“Is that a joke, G.O.D.?” Joan couldn’t help but let out a nervous laugh, which temporarily took her mind off of the task at hand. Something she desperately needed.
“Joking is not in my program parameters, even with the upgrades to my personality matrix, Ms. Shengtu,” G.O.D. said. “I might note that your pulse is elevated and your breaths have quickened. Are these questions serving to delay your launch? A human psychological technique called procras—”
“Of course not,” Joan cut him off. “Run one last suit scan to make sure everything’s good and tight, okay?” Despite her confident words, her palms began to sweat. G.O.D. was right, she had been procrastinating, though she didn’t need to hear it from him. The suit held in heat, important for the vacuum of space, but added to an environmentally controlled room, it was uncomfortable. Then again, discomfort was the least of her worries.
She needed this mission to go through without a hitch. A ship full of credits and her reputation as an “independent procurement specialist” was on the line. It felt better to call herself that than to say “petty thief.” The mission should be fine, in theory. She’d plotted with the best AI in the star cluster. Between her ingenuity, and his simulations and logic algorithms, they couldn’t fail, could they?
“According to the last three suit diagnostic scans you have requested, the suit is functioning properly. The helmet is secure to the neck base with no sign of leak, and the front clasp similarly shows no gaps or pores,” G.O.D. said.
In basic training for the Martine Star Empire Navy, her space combat instructor had made a scene the first day of class, placing a watermelon in a pressure suit. Her instructor led them to an observation portal and decompressed the room with the suit in it. When the air dissipated from the room, the watermelon exploded into a million tiny bits, splattering the window in front of the class. “Imagine this is your head if you fail to secure your pressure suit correctly,” the instructor had told them.
Joan never forgot that visual. “Run the check one more time anyway, please,” she said, unable to keep the trace of irritation out of her voice. It wasn’t the AI’s fault, his program had been modified to give him more personality. Those little irritating things that humans do, like an inability to follow directions precisely the first time, followed with that. At least G.O.D. was intelligent enough to turn those functions off during crisis moments, unlike most humans Joan had met. Including the military. Maybe especially the military.
“Your suit is still functioning within normal parameters. Would you like to initiate decompression of the aft control room now?”
Joan took a deep breath, her shoulders tightening at the prospect of vacuum. “Go ahead.”
The vents made a sucking sound as the atmosphere drained from the room. Joan felt the tug on her suit, but the graviclamps on her boots held her firmly in place. She gripped the strap of her backpack, which had her tools inside. A moment later, the room was devoid of air. Taking off her helmet wouldn’t kill her just yet—the hatch remained closed and safeties in place in case she lost consciousness, but the knowledge of being surrounded by vacuum still unnerved her. “Pop the hatch,” Joan said.
The hatch door creaked then swung open with alarming speed, clanging as it caught on the magnet that held it open. Outside, Joan saw stars at the peripheral area of her vision, but most prominent was the station ahead. It loomed as a long wall of white painted metal extending several hundred times the size of her ship. Twin cables stretched from her ship to that hunk of metal known as the Balibran Station. Her mark.
She took slow steps toward the open hatch, hooking her tether around the clip at her waist in the process. Through her suit’s handtab link, Joan hit the controls to release the gravity on her boots and floated outward. Joan didn’t dare drop her vision to the stars below her. Weightlessness was disorienting enough without the added sense of danger from gazing into the vastness of space. Ignoring that thought, Joan fired the suit thrusters to direct her toward a maintenance hatch on t
he station. Local “down” hung at a ninety-degree angle to her current trajectory. The burst of thrust faded, and she turned her body so it would right itself with the station’s artificial gravity, keeping her gaze locked on the hatch’s landing platform. She fell toward the station feet first. As her boots hit metal, Joan reengaged the graviclamps and released her tether.
The station hatch was sealed shut, with no point of entry except for a small terminal screen. G.O.D. would have to cut through and encrypt her entry to avoid being detected by security. Nothing they hadn’t done together before, but every mission still gave her butterflies. One failure, whether in her suit or getting caught, could mean the end for her. Death or a penal colony. Neither option sounded appealing.
Joan crouched down to place the back of her hand up to a terminal scanner. Her handtab chirped, connecting to the station computer. “G.O.D., let’s get this hatch open,” she said.
“Stand by,” G.O.D. said, and Joan’s helmet was filled with the silence of space.
A long moment passed, leading her to wonder if G.O.D. could slice into the station’s access systems.
A mining drone flew by overhead. Joan jumped within her suit. With her ship powered down and secured to the station, there was no danger of her being seen by an automated drone heading from the Aradel asteroid field, but the longer the wait, the more her nerves got the best of her. She focused on a breathing technique her instructor had taught her for tense situations. It often amazed her how much those few weeks had stuck with her several years later, a testament to his teaching abilities, even if he had been a complete jerk. A slow inhale through the nose, counting to three, and an exhale through the mouth of the same duration. Her steady breaths fogged her visor, but did serve to maintain her calm.
The door’s transition to a lack of pressure caused the hull to rumble, popping open as air burst from it. Joan waited for it to fully decompress, removing her arm and handtab from the area in front of the terminal. She adjusted her environmental controls so she could see clearly through the visor again.
Inside the hatch was a medium sized cargo bay, allowing for small ship transfers. Joan stood at an angle to the local vertical. She turned off her graviclamps, gripped onto the edge of the aperture, and swung sideways into the gravity field of the station’s interior. “Good work, G.O.D. Any signs of security traces?”
“Kastle Mining Corporation has outdated security protocols. There was no trouble ensuring that their systems perceive the hatch to have remained closed,” her AI said. “I retain access to their systems via a copy of my program imbedded in the station’s media library files. My position is secure.”
“Seal us up again, I’m inside.”
The hatch behind her closed with a slam. A hiss came from the other side, as the door sealing the room opened and air flooded in.
“It is now safe to remove your helmet,” G.O.D. said.
“You’re sure you can’t access the files we’re supposed to steal from here?”
“No, you must proceed to their secure, offline system in station section G23, room 108 to complete your objective.”
Joan twisted the helmet off, her ears adjusting to the slight change in pressure from her suit to the cargo bay. She set the helmet down and unfastened the chest piece, unzipping the suit so she could step out of it. The normal, regulated air felt cool through her dark, sweaty clothes.
“Where to?” Joan asked.
“Your handtab has a map of the station uploaded with directions to the objective point,” G.O.D. said.
She glanced down at her skin-embedded handtab. That bodymod was as useful a pick up as G.O.D.’s AI matrix had been, with enough computing power to hold the majority of her ship’s systems and her AI at her fingertips. Sure enough, the holographic map displayed on the back of her hand. Room 108 was out the cargo bay door, and down a corridor to the right. Easy. This was exactly why she planned her missions in advance, and why her clients trusted her with obtaining sensitive information such as these patented mining technique plans. Not that she understood why mining technique plans were sensitive or worth anything, but with the pay they offered, Joan didn’t care to ask too many questions.
It was outside of her usual job scope—salvage and debris—hoping she’d find some metal worth scrapping or components that were worthwhile. But she’d made a name for herself as of late, or so she’d been told. To make ends meet, she’d had to smuggle items on several occasions, which is how her current client heard of her. For the first time in years, luck was with her. She aimed to keep it going.
Joan stepped toward the door, which automatically opened upon her presence into a carpeted hallway. She glanced left and right, seeing no one in the moderately lit station hallways. G.O.D.’s intel stated that this area of the station stayed vacant during this hour local time. So far, everything proceeded according to plan.
Perhaps it was being surrounded by oxygen again, but Joan was instilled with newfound confidence. She strutted down the hallway until she reached room 108, placing her handtab against the door’s terminal.
The handtab chirped once more to sync with the station. “Stand by,” G.O.D. said.
Two people’s voices echoed down the corridor. Joan hurried a breath and jerked away from the terminal. She stepped to the side and glanced down at her handtab, as if she were busy with important work. “Converse with me,” Joan said softly to G.O.D.
“I require more information to enact such a protocol. What subject matter would you like to discuss?”
The people came into view, engaged in a conversation of their own. Joan did her best to not bother looking their direction and act busy. “Yes, we’ll have to get a maintenance team on that right away,” Joan said.
“On what, Ms. Shengtu?”
“As quickly as possible, you understand? I don’t have all day. My schedule is filling right up.” Joan continued her act.
The people paid her no notice and were gone from her view a moment later. Joan relaxed her shoulders. “Stressful,” she said.
“I am not certain I comprehend.”
“Don’t worry about it, just get back to the lock,” Joan said, placing the back of her hand back within sync range of the terminal.
“Standby…” G.O.D. paused for a moment. “This is odd.”
“Odd? How so?”
“This lock has been set using military level encryptions.”
Joan’s eyes went slightly wide. “Is that a bad thing? We won’t be traced, will we?”
“No, I’ve disabled any possibility of a trace at the station level. This will take more time to decrypt. But given the other security programs on the station, it is odd to have this level of lock on this door.”
“How long will it take?” Joan shifted her weight to her other foot, a nervous habit that she recognized.
“Stand by.”
“So you keep saying.”
The door terminal chirped an affirmative sound, sliding open. “Not a long wait at all,” Joan said to herself as much as her AI, then she stepped inside. Breaking and entering had been as easy as tapping the autopilot function on her ship. The mission couldn’t possibly go better, and she’d soon have a pile of credits for her efforts.
Dim lights reflected off the metallic flooring of the room, highlighting a single work console, two chairs and backup systems lining the wall. The place was as dreary as any station office Joan had visited before. “Can you brighten up the room? I can hardly see,” Joan said.
G.O.D., now fully integrated with Balibran Station’s nets, raised the lighting to the corridor’s level. At that same moment, Joan heard the unmistakable guzzah of a phase pistol readying a charge. She spun to see two Star Empire soldiers in riot gear pointing their weapons at her chest.
“Aw, scrap it, don’t sh—” her words cut short as the pulse beams engulfed her nerves, blasting pain through every inch of her body. She tried to scream, but her vocal cords tightened in shock. Paralyzed, the last thing Joan heard was the thud of her own
body hitting the metal-plated floor. The room spun into a cloud of darkness.
Chapter 2
Moving Up
Regency BioTech Central Office, Mars
Local Date January 16th, 2464
Dario Anazao stared out the long window of his upper-level apartment on the Central Office. His vision through ocular implants accented the faint reflection in the glass to give a perception of silver shine to his skin. It reminded him of a current fashion of custom vanity bodymods that many company personnel had been adding to their skin tones as of late. Without the filter, he looked like a typical Mars resident: natural brown skin, short-dark hair gelled into a soft perfection that was expected in corporate positions. He’d always been called attractive, but never exceptionally stood out.
He’d spent his off hours like this all too often, staring out into the horizon of space with the red planet below, covered by the dome and the industrialized levels of billions of people. If he was simply watching something, the oculars moved much like a regular human eye so that they didn’t give a sense of uneasiness to an onlooker. It sometimes gave his co-workers, bosses, and friends a sense of him as a daydreamer. But when he focused into the displays from the nets, the implants froze in place.
His ex-girlfriend had accused him of staring in the past, something that unnerved him. “No, no. I had my oculars set to reading the stock exchange ticker. I swear,” he’d told her during what had been their final fight. It was true, though her words held a certain amount of reality as well.
There was something peaceful about the way the Central Office rotated, giving the executives and managers of Regency BioTech an ever-changing landscape. Though he spent most of his free time on the nets with his speed advantage of a direct connection to his neural commands, something resonated in him when he switched to the visual bands that the average person saw. This was the entire world to most other individuals. He could see so much more.
That sense of wonder didn’t fill him when he performed the work that paid for these implants. Quality control. Since he could see more spectrums than others, the company expected him to use it to their advantage. Though somewhat mind numbing, Dario could think of a number of worse jobs. Waste reclamation, planetary lift security, extra-dome maintenance—to name a few.
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