by Tammy Salyer
“Roger, Major Donnelly. This is Lieutenant Stevenson. Redirect to the lower docking bays and provide your authentication code.”
We’ve arrived. The monstrosity looms at our bow, gleaming against the blackness like a hellish, mutant asteroid. According to the disc, there are fifteen levels in the bow of the station: two that are strictly traffic corridors spanning the entire length through the center, and ten levels in the stern. The main generators encircle its core, generating the energy needed for both operations and mobility, completely enclosed in an impenetrable structural shell. No way to take those out, even if we had ten ships with ten times more firepower.
We approach facing the two main flight deck levels where the transit ship launch tracks run into the interior, terminating at the station’s primary loading bays. The tracks, being the station’s most vulnerable design component, are buttressed on each side with jutting missile tubes that ensure nothing gets near without clearance. Prismatic lenses, which capture and relay all visuals from outside, are located directly above the launch tracks’ gaping airlocks. Coupled with the segmented design of the station’s hull, the overall effect creates the impression that we’re flying toward the snatching jaws of a giant carnivorous insect.
Vitruzzi, Venus, Brady, Strahan, and I occupy the prisoner ship’s flight deck. We’d left the Sphynx crewless and in stasis when we entered into communication range of the Fortress, and everyone now wears the MCACS’s security personnel uniforms. I hate it; my own body armor is light and flexible and this stuff is like wearing a lead suit, but we have to look the part. Even so, I removed the lower plates from the torso section to give me marginally better maneuverability and speed. Security guards are hired for size and strength, and their heavy vests are not designed for my short, compact frame. All of us are now ready and waiting for the action to begin, with Bodie and Desto docked in the Sphynx’s short-range shuttle inside the MCACS’s bay in case there is need, and opportunity, to bug out.
“Fortress, this is Captain Roby, OIC. We’ve encountered hostile activity and Major Donnelly is in the infirmary. I’ve taken command. Over,” Strahan answers, assuming the role of the ship’s second in command.
“Why didn’t you send a report?”
“Our coms sustained damage, Lieutenant. We haven’t had the chance.”
“Describe your situation, F-205. Over.”
“We were tasked to pick up a fugitive by the name of Erikson, located aboard a contracted vessel. Their crew resisted us and Major Donnelly was injured during the fugee’s extraction. His situation is critical. We need immediate clearance and a medical team ready when we dock. We also have a faulty auxiliary engine that needs maintenance. Over.”
“Roger, Captain Roby. What’s your authentication code? Over.”
He flips off the com. “Shit.” The rest of us hold our breath, frantically trying to think of a way to get this asshole to open up the Fortress and let us in. We’d left the real Roby with his crew to keep him from blowing the whistle once we made contact. It’s too late to run back to the galley and retrieve him; the hesitation might serve as a warning to the Fortress’s boarding command. Before anyone says anything, Strahan switches the com back on. “Lieutenant Stevenson, stand by for authent code. STY-0038-9762-98. Over.”
Where did that come from? After a moment the LT’s voice comes back. “Captain Roby, that authent code is inactive. It actually belongs to a former Tech 3 Sergeant, Chief Pilot, Strahan, Karl S. Over.”
I look over at him, genuinely surprised. It’s a dangerous gamble for Strahan to give them his prior active-duty flight officer code. If we manage to get away with this, there’s no doubt that he’ll be investigated, which will lead back to Vitruzzi and the Sphynx, and eventually, Agate Beach. It doesn’t matter now. The option of turning back is obsolete.
“So?” He’s playing a pissed-off commander flawlessly.
“Sir, we can’t let you board without a valid authentication code. What is your authentication code? Over.”
“Lieutenant Stevenson, I’ve got my ship commander leaking brains and blood, a hull full of pain-in-the-ass prisoners and one fugee, and a busted engine. I’ve got enough problems to deal with today. Don’t become one of them. Some goon database tech who can’t read his fucking alphabet entering my authent code into the system wrong, is not my problem. Do you read me? Now, are you going to clear that fucking dock? Over.”
There’s a pause after his transmission that feels too long to be anything but a death sentence. Then: “Captain Roby. Please proceed to Alpha Dock, Bay 5. They are clear and waiting for your arrival. Over.”
Everyone in the cabin starts breathing again. Strahan looks genuinely pissed off and finishes the transmission. “Good job, Lieutenant. And make sure they have a goddamn mechanic crew on standby when we get there too. Out.”
He switches off and the deck falls into total silence. Once we’re inside the station, approximately ten minutes from now, all of the planning, running, hiding, and fighting that got us this far will stop, and the real battle will finally begin. I don’t know what thoughts are spinning through their minds, but the face of my brother, bleeding, hurt, and afraid, fills mine like a cancer. But instead of enervating me, the image replenishes my determination to get the bastards that did it to him. Whatever the cost.
Finally, Venus breaks the silence. “Captain, what are we going to do with the prisoners?”
Vitruzzi and Brady look at each other and he says, “We let them go.”
“We what?”
“If we leave them on the ship, they’re sitting ducks. And we don’t really want to cart them back to the Sphynx if, when, we get away. Besides, they’ll make a good distraction.”
“Do you really think that’s a good idea, Brady?” I ask. “We’ve got enough to worry about without giving them a chance to turn on us too.”
“Do you have a better idea?”
I don’t. This time I keep my mouth shut.
Vitruzzi takes a deep breath. “I’ll go tell them.”
The four of us walk through the guard annex to the holding bay. Vitruzzi activates the hatch and the din of voices inside quiets down as we enter.
“Listen up.” All heads turn to her. The walkway we stand on is about two meters above two metal-barred cages that separate thirty men and a handful of women. The room is brightly lit, casting garish light over their upturned faces. They look mean, pissed off, and violent, but there’s no fear in their faces.
“By now you’ve probably realized that this ship has been hijacked. We’re not here because of you, and now we have to figure out what to do with you. So we’re going to let you go.” No cheers. No applause. No smiles.
“It’s fair to tell you where we’re going, if you don’t already know. The Fortress.” For the first time, murmurs of anger and disquiet wash through the air, quickly whipping into a wrathful gale.
Someone shouts, “You can’t cut us loose in there! They’ll kill us!” More yelling, interspersed with gems like, “Fly us outta here or you’re dead,” “I’ll fucking hunt you down, bitch,” and more similarly empty, useless threats. No doubt about it, these are not the type we’d be interested in recruiting as partners, and I’m not surprised they’ve been earmarked as future human lab rats. Still, I can’t help but feel some sympathy for them. Like Vitruzzi said: no one deserves to die the way they certainly would if we hadn’t hijacked the ship and changed their fates. Whether or not their new futures will be an improvement, however, is not so certain.
“Quiet!” Her voice rings throughout the confined space like doom, and they fall silent. “We’re not taking you anywhere you weren’t going already, so quit complaining. This is the only chance you’re going to get. We’re not here to save you. But like I said, we’re giving you a chance.”
Thirty-eight pairs of eyes are now fixed on her, some with murder in them, but some are starting to show interest.
“How many here are deserters?” A little over half of them raise their hands, l
istening closely now. “There are a lot of guns on this ship. Most of you should still be able to activate them if your records were destroyed in the Rebellion. You’re going to have full access. For the rest of you, there are some grenades, maybe some incendiary units. Once we dock, which will be in about three minutes, my crew and I are going to disappear. These doors will open five minutes later and you can all do whatever the hell you want. Claim your freedom. If you’re smart, you’ll team up and get systematic about dealing with the security shit show that I guarantee will be coming.”
She turns and we walk back into the guardroom, an angry furor flooding the bay behind us. Hitting the code, she lets the door close them out. “Karl, get some E-10 in those locks as soon as we land then hustle back to the exit ramp. Let’s get these gun cages open.”
The entire scenario is a lunatic’s nightmare, but the fact is the Admin is going to have a, as Vitruzzi put it, a shit show on their hands very soon. We’re dead if they catch us. But if we’re lucky, this swarm of gun-toting degenerates with nothing to lose will thin out the Fortress’s security force, and we’ll just slip silently through their fingers.
TWENTY-TWO
Venus maneuvers into the launch track and hovers at the end until the dock controllers activate the airlock. The vibration of the ship’s floor slackens underfoot as she lowers it onto the dock and disengages the engines. The rest of us stand at the exit ramp. Three out of the six of us came from the Corps, but being back in uniform makes cold sweat seep from my pores. Or maybe it’s this place.
Staring through the window hatch into the bay, things seem too quiet. “I don’t see any mechanics.”
The communication console lights up, and a second later the dock controller starts speaking. “Captain Roby, we’re experiencing a security situation and need you and your crew to move directly to the debrief room. Just leave your cargo and injured on board. We’ll send medics and a maintenance crew soon. Over.”
The six of us turn to look at each other. “Rajcik?” Vitruzzi speculates.
I shake my head, not knowing what else it could be. “Unreal.”
“Answer him, Karl.”
Strahan clicks on the transmitter. “That’s affirmative. Out.”
Bodie releases the ramp and we walk onto the Fortress, where the coldness of space wraps its burial shroud around us.
The dock is relatively small with only three bays for ships no bigger than the one we’re flying. We cross as a group to the debriefing room. No one needs to be told where it is; we’ve all scrutinized the holodisc long enough to know exactly where to go. As we pass by the prisoner ship’s bow, I look up and see Venus staring out at us with worried eyes. She’s locked inside the flight deck, ready to get us the hell out of here the instant our mission is complete. I nod and give her a small smile of encouragement. She acknowledges the gesture with a smile in return, and raises her hand to her temple in a mock salute.
There is no one waiting in the bay to meet us. Unusual. Their security protocols are tight enough that we’d anticipated an armed escort but something else must be keeping the soldiers busy. The dock controller didn’t sound overly alarmed, but I can almost taste the panic and disorder that’s happening somewhere on the station. Whatever the cause for the alert, it’s well timed.
As we cross the bay, Brady snaps his fingers. Once he has all of our attention, he points to his throat mic, indicating that it’s time to switch them on. By pressing the throat radio sensors against the trachea, we’re able to speak much more quietly than normal and still transmit clearly to each other. If there are listening devices around, they won’t be able to pick up what we’re saying.
Brady’s voice carries through my earpiece: “Once we’re in the debrief room, we’ll split into our teams. Strahan, Bodie, and Erikson, you sweep holding cells alpha through echo, we’ll take the rest. If we don’t find the crew, we start sweeping the labs.”
He’s not saying anything we don’t already know. This is the plan we decided on days ago, but hearing it spoken now that we’re inside the Fortress gives it a heavy finality.
Our group steps into the debrief room, everyone working hard to appear relaxed. As the door sweeps closed behind us, the high reverberating octaves of an alarm erupt throughout the complex. Beside me, Vitruzzi inhales sharply. Adrenaline surges through my body, flooding my motor and sensory neurons in a building storm that will soon settle into a slow drip until this thing is done. The sound of the team breathing around me is loud, rhythmic and heavy, but aside from Vitruzzi’s first breath, no one sounds panicked. Looking to my left, Strahan’s pupils dilate with the same intent focus as my own. We are ready. I reach forward and input the code that unlocks the debrief room, opening out into the bowels of the Fortress.
Instantly swinging my carbine barrel out and down the left side of the corridor, I glance quickly in both directions. The hallway is clear. Looking back over my shoulder, I give the rest of them a quick nod, and we begin advancing in bounds up the corridor. A set of stairs at the end will take us to level two and the first set of holding cells. Vitruzzi, Brady, and Desto will check these and the rest of us will continue up one more flight to the last five cells. Level three is also where the biological and chemical laboratories are located. Part of me hopes we don’t have to search them. Christ knows what we might find inside.
We reach the end of the hallway without seeing anyone and race up the stairwells. Entering the third floor corridor, Bodie trains his rifle down its length. The alarms continue to bounce back and forth against the walls, but there’s no sign of other people. According to the disc, SOP in a code five or higher security breach is for non-security personnel to evacuate to a safety chamber on an upper level. If that’s where this section’s personnel are, the security breach must be severe. Good.
A rumbling boom thuds from behind us, sounding in or near the debrief room. The prisoners must be loose. We don’t slow, continuing up the flight to the first level of cells.
The first door is a quick jog down the corridor. Strahan inputs the pass code and it slides open on its track. Simultaneously, we realize we’re not looking into a holding cell but into some kind of anteroom, like a guard station. This wasn’t in the holograph. What other surprises will we find?
Two chairs are parked in front of a control console. A one-way window looking into an empty cell beyond dominates the far wall. Strahan gets on his mic. “Vitruzzi, Brady, be careful. There’s a security antechamber for the holding cells. Over.”
Vitruzzi’s voice comes back. “Roger. We just discovered that. Let’s just hope there aren’t any more surprises. Find anyone? Over.”
“Negative.”
“All right, keep moving.”
We exit and race to the next door, ten meters down the corridor. Strahan reaches for the keypad just as the door starts sliding open on its own. With reflexes as taut as overstretched wires, Bodie swings his rifle around and shoots the exiting soldier point-blank in the face, then drops to a knee and fires at another soldier inside as he jumps off his chair. As a bullet tears through his chest wall, a sadly comical expression of surprise affixes itself permanently to the dying man’s features. Ensuring no one else is inside, the three of us leap into the room and pull the body of the first soldier through the door with us.
The window to the holding cell is grayed out, not allowing us to see what’s behind it. Bodie leans over the control console, searching for the function that will clear it or open the door to let us inside. In a few seconds, he finds it and the glaze begins to dissipate.
A row of stacked bunks line one wall. A lean woman with a galaxy of black curls spread around her lies on the closest, her head turned away from us. A short man who looks as if he could single-handedly trounce a squad of wrestlers stands with his eyes fixed on the one-way window. His jaw is bruised and his lip swollen, and his fists are balled into bludgeons with knuckles that look as if they’ve been through a shredder. He can’t see us, but his rigid stance indicates that he heard Bo
die’s shots. On another bunk, a small woman with dark brown hair sits upright, also staring at the window.
But no David.
“Karl!” Bodie cries.
Strahan presses the speaker on the guards’ console. “Doug, Zeta, Jade—it’s Karl and Bodie. We’re going to get you out of here.”
Instantly, the woman on the bunk jumps to her feet and looks toward the window. Both of her eyes are surrounded by dark bruises shot through with shades of green as if she’s been in a hell of a fight. She squints through the remaining swelling and half whispers, “Oh my god, how did you…?”
Still on the mic, Bodie says, “Did you think we’d leave you here?”
The smile that spreads across her face is huge. The man, also smiling, responds, “Took you long enough.”
Strahan busily cycles through the security codes for the door while I take position by the entrance, ready for anyone who tries to come in.
Bodie stays on the mic. “Are you hurt, any of you? Can everyone walk?”
“We’re all okay,” Zeta answers. “Just get us out of here.”
What’s taking Strahan so long? I glance back and see a laser reader buzz to life on the console. “Dammit!” Strahan growls. “Biosensor. We need a hand. Bodie, help me lift this guy. Quick.”
They grab the man who was shot in the face by both arms and drag him back to the console. Strahan holds his limp hand inside the wavering red field but nothing happens. He curses and cycles through the operations appearing on the console as precious seconds slip away. I can almost hear a clock ticking.
“What’s the problem?”
“I don’t—wait! It won’t open unless it reads a pulse.” He reaches out and grabs the other soldier, laying his fingers against the inside of the man’s wrist.
“Anything?” Bodie asks.
Karl’s strained grin is almost a sneer as he nods. Yanking the guard’s arm violently, he brings his hand up to the sensor. The red light wavers for a moment then turns green. Steel bolts on the security door retract and it slides open.