The Ares Weapon

by D. M. Pruden

  “Got it. We’ve got four hours, six minutes.”

  I almost laughed. “We have plenty of time to move out of the way, don’t we?”

  She shook her head. “Even at our present orbital velocity, we can’t outrun those missiles. If we change course, they’ll track us. They’ve got a lock.”

  “Then we have to abandon this ship, don’t we? The drop ship is still in the hangar.”

  “Too small,” he said.

  “What the hell do you mean?”

  “The shuttle isn’t shielded like this one. We would die from the radiation before we got a hundred metres.”

  Both Garrick and Limn were pale and exhibited the defeated appearance of someone who accepted their fate, choosing to go quietly without any discussion, bargaining or futile screaming and sniffling.

  “Well, there must be something we can do?”

  He shook his head and slumped into his seat. I glared at him and shifted my gaze to Shigeko. Tears welled up in her eyes and she turned away from me. Was I stupid? I didn’t want to accept my fate the same way they did. I needed to know there was a way out of this.

  I’m not sure what I expected to see, but I moved to the navigation control cluster and scanned the various readouts and controls, looking for something, anything, that could give me hope. My eyes fell on the navigational schematic.

  “What is that?” I pointed at a blip on the screen.

  Shigeko glanced at the console and dropped back into her chair, frowning. “The Rego ship that fired on us.”

  “And these little flashing blips? Are they the missiles?” I waved my hand at a cluster that was slowly resolving itself into individual markers; one for each missile, I presumed.

  She nodded without looking up. “Yes, those are the missiles. You can stay there and watch them approach if you don’t believe me.”

  “You’re not being helpful, Shigeko.” I didn’t look up from the display. My eye had caught sight of another feature.

  “What is this blip, over here?” I pointed again and regarded her. She refused to acknowledge me, preferring to lose herself in her despair.

  “Limn! Is this another ship?”

  My query prompted Garrick out of his stupor and he rose to look at what I indicated with my finger. He examined the image for several seconds, seeming to be confused by what he saw.

  “It is another vessel.” He punched in a few commands and the screen zoomed in on the new player in the game. He gazed at me, slack jawed for a moment before he realized who I was. His mouth snapped shut and he straightened his posture.

  “That is the Fortuna.”

  “Our old ship? What’s she doing out here?”

  He ignored me and directed his attention to another instrument cluster. “She’s on an intercept vector.”

  “I thought it was on auto-pilot or something?” I asked.

  “She is,” he said. “Apparently Dunn programmed her to rendezvous with us.”

  “How long until it reaches us?”

  “Five hours, thirteen minutes,” he said without looking up.

  “Great,” I said, “just far enough away to get a good view of us being blown to atoms.”

  Garrick made no response. He stood at the console, staring at some spot in the distance, his shoulders slouched. He seemed to be running on empty for ideas, but I wasn’t nearly finished. I learned a long time ago that you don’t save lives without a little out of the box thinking.

  “Can we go to it? Can we cut the time down if we change course?” I asked. “Think, man! How the hell did you make Captain?”

  He looked at me and I could finally see lights come on behind his eyes. He returned his attention to the navigation console and ran some calculations. “If Fortuna stays on the same trajectory, we can meet her in three hours and forty minutes.”

  His arms fell to his sides and he turned to face me. “We’ll just get two ships destroyed.” There was none of the usual condescension in his voice, only resignation.

  He was right, of course. We didn’t have time to dock with the Fortuna, let alone get aboard and escape in it. Even I knew that.

  The bridge was as silent as a mausoleum while the three of us came to grips with the inevitable. How could we be so close to an escape and not be able to use it? I wondered if karma was always going to fuck me. Well, not for much longer, it appeared.

  What the hell was Fortuna doing out here? Schmaltz sent it away as a decoy and gave control to Dunn. What was he up to? The only silver lining, well, schadenfreude really, was that if he had been trying to screw us and escape, he had failed. That Rego ship had to know that he was aboard and they still fired on us. He must have pissed off some powerful people.

  I slumped into my chair and recalled how all this had begun. Dunn manipulated me, and probably a lot of others to lure me on this mission. He’d killed the real Erik Dunn and Jake Matthiews as part of his scheme. He or that son-of-a-bitch Charlie had screwed up Schmaltz’s situation to coerce him here as well. Poor Schmaltz. I knew, if I lived, I would miss him for the rest of my life.

  I remembered something he told me when I first came aboard.

  “Isn’t the Fortuna armed?” I said to nobody in particular.

  Garrick replied, “Yes.” He sat up and stared at me. “How did you know that?”

  “And the ship is under remote control from this one, isn’t it? Why can’t we tell it to shoot down those missiles?”

  I had the attention of both of them now. Garrick turned to the controls while Limn hovered over his shoulder. After a few minutes of trying several different keystrokes, he slammed his fists on the console. “Dunn locked the interface. He’s the only one that can make that command.”

  “Well, then, we have to bring him back to the bridge.” I started for the doorway. Taking nothing to chance, I turned and addressed him in my best doctor voice, “In the meantime, we need to alter our course and move towards Fortuna. It’s an armoured military vessel. Maybe at the very least, we can hide behind it.”

  Garrick actually smiled at me. I left to find Dunn.

  Chapter 39

  I made my way first to Medical and discovered the door was locked. I entered to find the facility empty and undisturbed. The green light on the containment power unit blinked steadily. Relieved that the virus remained untampered with, I resumed my search of the ship for the three men.

  The section door before engineering was open and raised voices carried from beyond the doorway. I crept towards the opening, hoping not to make a sound and crouched out of view to listen. In the corridor, out of sight, two men argued.

  “I told you already, Mister Dunn, the explosives were gone. I didn’t take them, Hodgson did.”

  “And I don’t believe you, Skorupa. Why are you wearing your pressure suit?”

  I leaned forward to risk a peek at the scene. Bogdan sweated profusely and Dunn glowered at him. They stood in front of the aft airlock and the younger man was half dressed in a pressure suit, the gloves and boots on the floor waiting to be attached. Dunn held the helmet, having taken it from him.

  “I was afraid you were going to release the virus and depressurize the ship. I wanted to be ready.”

  “And how could I do that if you removed the charges? You know what I think Skorupa? I think YOU planned on setting them off yourself. I think you got frightened at the last second and rushed down here to remove them. Then you decided you would evacuate the atmosphere anyway without risking the virus being released. But I found you and now all you can do is sputter and lie to my face!”

  “No, Mister Dunn, that’s not what I...”

  “I thought I invested enough to trust you. I should have known that was a mistake.”

  “You can trust me! I did like you asked. Just like you hired me to do. I’m loyal. I told you everything the Doctor asked. Everything Hodgson did. I’m worth everything you’ve paid me.”

  “You took those charges and betrayed me.”

  Bogdan’s renewed round of protests were cut
off when Dunn swung the helmet around and struck him on head with it. The young man fell heavily. I rose up to intervene, but lost my courage and crouched back behind the edge of the doorframe.

  Dunn advanced to the stunned engineer, brandishing his improvised club. He stood over Bogdan who held up his arm and begged for his life. Wordlessly, Dunn rained down blows repeatedly on him. Arcs of blood painted the wall of the corridor as he savagely beat the man senseless. He dropped his weapon and dragged his bloodied victim to the nearby airlock. He activated the inner door and while it opened, returned to pick up the semi-conscious form. He pulled Bogdan over the rim of the hatchway and dumped him inside. As the door closed, Dunn noticed the bloody discarded helmet and tossed it in as well.

  I couldn’t let him send Bogdan out the other side. Without thinking, I picked up a wrench that lay beside the door. It was sticky with something, but I didn’t want to afford the time to examine it. Dunn accessed the controls, his back to me. Realizing this would be my only chance, I sprang out from the opening and rushed at him, my primitive weapon raised above my head. That was the extent of my plan, and it proved as effective as it was sophisticated.

  He heard me and moved forward to block my downward swing with his forearm. He expertly caught my wrist and twisted sharply, sending agonizing pain into my shoulder. The wrench clattered noisily at my feet. Dunn backhanded me across the jaw and sent me sprawling to the deck. With a self-satisfied grin, he returned his attention to the control panel.

  The warning buzzer sounded and the red light flashed as the air pressure within the airlock dropped. Dunn lunged towards me and grabbed me by my hair, pulling until I stood. He pushed me to the door and directed my gaze through the glass to the unconscious figure of Bogdan Skorupa, lying on the floor. He smiled sickly at me, then leaned to the side and hit a button. The outer hatch blew out and in a rush of the remaining air inside, Bogdan’s body was blown out into the icy void of space.

  The sight of the empty airlock and the tumbling, rapidly receding body should have prompted some kind of emotion, but I experienced nothing. The scene unfolded in silence, like a video with the sound turned off. I thought I should weep or cry out in outrage but my mind was in a fog and only numbness engulfed my body. Dunn yanked on my hair once more and turned me to face him, painfully jerking me back to my deadly reality.

  “You won’t go so easily, Doctor. I have a much more fitting end for you. We have to collect a few things first for me to tie up some loose ends.”

  He pulled me down the hallway in the direction of the hangar.

  Chapter 40

  As I struggled against him I caught sight of someone lying on the floor near the bulkhead doorway I hid behind. Dunn noticed my distraction. With a cruel smile, he pulled me towards the unconscious form.

  Dylan Hodgson lay against the wall, his face a bloody beaten mass. I couldn’t tell if he lived or not, and Dunn would not allow me to get close to him.

  “Your boyfriend was sniffing around down here for me. Fortunately, I’m resourceful.”

  My mind flashed back to the sticky wrench I tried to strike him with. It now registered to me that the wrench was covered in blood. Dunn must have somehow gotten the drop on Hodgson and beaten him senseless with it.

  “What are you going to do to him?”

  “To him? I would think you’d be more concerned about yourself, Doctor. Don’t worry. He’ll be dead soon enough.”

  “Listen to me Dunn. The ship we were supposed to meet has fired on us. You need to...”

  He dragged me by my injured wrist, twisting it cruelly to force me along. He wasn’t a big man, but he was surprisingly muscular, and regardless of that, he was still bigger than me. I learned long ago how cruel men liked to throw their weight advantage around.

  I’ve only ever been severely beaten once. A client wanted me to perform a particularly distasteful act which I refused a little more firmly than he appreciated. While I healed from that assault, the man eventually paid a bigger price in a dark alley a few weeks later. My handlers, while not gentle and caring folks, didn’t like their merchandise damaged, and took a dim view of anyone who disregarded that rule.

  While many years and a lot of distance are between me and my pimps, this was the first time I ever appreciated their methods of retribution. There would be nobody to avenge me this time. The irony of the inverse relationship between my improved social status and my present personal safety did not escape me.

  The door to the hangar opened and he shoved me through. He followed me inside and frog-marched me to the drop ship. I held no delusions of him taking me with him. He most likely was going to beat me senseless, and leave me to the vacuum when he departed. I wanted to fight him; turn on him and go ape shit crazy, biting and scratching at his eyes. I knew I wouldn’t defeat him, but I thought the price of my death should be something he would remember. He never gave me the opportunity, always pushing and pulling me off balance; grabbing me by my injured wrist, by my hair, or by the back of my neck. Dunn understood how to control others, and I, with my slight build, proved no match for his experience. I wondered how many women he had murdered.

  He spun me around, and struck me, sending me sprawling to the deck. He pulled the pistol from his waistband and levelled it at me. I decided to make him look me in the eyes when he killed me, so I glared at him, defied him silently to do his worst. He stood, gun pointed at me, his gaze never wavering. He formed the same predatory smile he had shown me before.

  “No, I have something far more entertaining in mind than this.” He put the firearm back, bent forward and seized my wrist again. I tried to take a swing at him with my other arm, but he slapped me across the face and squeezed the wrist until the pain brought me under his control.

  Dunn forced me into the shuttle and pushed me into a passenger seat. He knelt beside the portable containment unit and peered through the glass at the three silver cylinders within. He opened it and removed one. The green power button flashed brightly to reassure us its contents safely controlled and not about to escape and swarm our fragile bodies.

  “Have you never been curious how this works, Doctor?”

  “I know what it does.”

  “No, you know the mechanics. I refer to how a person’s body reacts. How fast does it respond? How painful is it? You see, that’s the kind of thing I am fascinated by. The limits of the human body to pain and torture. Call it professional curiosity, if you will.”

  He studied me, the cylinder casually balanced in his left hand, like an item he considered purchasing at a kiosk.

  “Aren’t you in the least bit curious in how the last crew died? What were their first symptoms? I would think the doctor in you would be most interested in knowing that.”

  I didn’t reply. I couldn’t tell where he intended to go with this and didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of any kind response.

  “Let’s find out, shall we?” He put on a jacket draped across a chair and zippered the silver cylinder into the pocket. Satisfied that it was secure, he once more pulled me to my feet.

  “Dunn, didn’t you hear me? We are under attack. Use your control of the Fortuna and shoot those missiles down before it’s too late.”

  He ignored my words and forced me ahead of him. My mind raced with scenarios of what he planned for the contents of the cylinder. He couldn’t open it without exposing himself, so the number of ways he could perform his little experiment remained limited. We made our way towards the front of the ship.

  The door to the bridge was closed. Through the portal in the door I saw Garrick and Limn both busy at the helm and navigation consoles, their backs turned toward us. Dunn shoved me to the opposite side of the hallway and pulled his pistol out to level at me.

  “I need you to remain there for a moment.”

  I looked down the corridor for some kind of escape route. He observed me and shook his head.

  “Please, Doctor. Don’t make me shoot you yet. Stay still.”

  I had no doubt a
bout the man’s sincerity, so I sat on the floor. With the gun levelled at me, he used his other hand to open the access panel to the door to reveal the inner workings of the door control. He did something to the components and stepped back with a satisfied look on his face.

  “What have you done?”

  “Just making sure our subjects don’t get away.”

  Keeping the pistol pointed at me, he moved to another panel along the wall and opened the environmental access port. He searched for the line that fed air to the bridge. He pulled out the tube that allowed a rescue crew to provide emergency oxygen to an isolated section of the ship. Dunn removed the cylinder from his pocket and unthreaded the end. He connected it to the air supply line. I realized it was engineered for such a purpose and wondered what sick bastard came up with the design.

  With a smile, he looked at me and turned on the comm. “Captain, this is Dunn.”

  “Mister Dunn, I’m glad you’re all right. When the others left and I hadn’t heard from you, I became concerned. We have a situation and...”

  “And yet you made no effort to stop any of them from following me.”

  “What? Victorem has fired on us. We need to access the Fortuna to...”

  “Yes, yes, Garrick. I was disappointed you didn’t bother to check up on me. I would think you might be concerned with something happening to me; to our deal.”

  “Are you insane?”

  “I was attacked, Captain, by both Hodgson and the Doctor. It was everything I could do to fend them off and make my way back to the bridge.” Dunn grinned at me, amused by the sick fabrication he sold to Garrick.

  “Do you require assistance now?”

  “No, no, I’m quite fine now. I’m merely disappointed in your lack of support in the entire affair. It leads me to think that you two conspired with the others.”

  “I assure you Mister Dunn, there was no conspiracy. At least, none I was aware of. I am as loyal to you as I always have been. We both are.”