Maia had slid her helmet over her head, sealing it along the collar. She acknowledged these supposed helpful words with a curt nod, not quite sure how she would actually react should that situation evolve over on the Martian ship. Her thoughts were interrupted by Maddox tapping her on the shoulder with an open hand, staring into her eyes through the transparent helmets they both now wore.
‘You okay?’ He asked quite softly. ‘We’ve not picked up any life signs over there at all so the worst will probably be the bodies of the crew. You still have the chance to stay over here and help Ezri monitor things from up front.’
Whilst she appreciated the concern he was showing, there was a good deal of her which was pushing her forwards and took slight umbrage at the suggestion she should wimp out just because she had never experienced such things before.
‘I’m fine,’ she replied. ‘Now, shall we go over there and see what happened?’ she prompted performing a final check on her suit’s systems via the small control panel on the back of her forearm and acknowledging that it had pressurised to afford her protection against the unforgiving cold of space.
Maddox nodded and keyed the inner airlock door control to open, his own thoughts turning from concern for his companion to preparing his own resolve for what they might find on the Martian ship.
Ezri was watching her screen like a hawk observing prey, ready to pounce and bring her crew-mates back at the first sign of change in the condition of the stricken vessel sat off their starboard bow. The sensors on the Erstwhile were being pushed to their design limits and slightly beyond as per her minute adjustments to gain further refinement of the data being gathered.
Almost as a background issue, there were tests still being run on the transmission that Roland had sent across together with his sensor readings taken moments after the transmission had been cut. She wanted to make absolutely sure that whatever had transpired was contained within the body of the Martian ship and had no relation to any external influence. However, her various algorithms which were stripping the records down to the bare bits of data and analysis each and every one provided more evidence towards an external force than she could have ever hoped for.
There were signs of a tight beam transmission, reading slightly higher than the background radiation one would normally find this deep in space. There were definite spikes and interruptions in the signal which could not be put down to any form of natural phenomena whatever.
Checking on the progress of her two crew-mates who had already left the safety of the Erstwhile’s outer airlock door and were floating across the distance between the two ships standing still against the vast blackness of space, she ran another quick analysis of the faint signal in an effort to disprove her theory which was developing over some unnatural phenomena causing problems aboard the Martian ship. The results once again showed artificial signs and she opened the channel to her colleagues.
‘Captain, Maia. I have a faint sign of an artificial signal in the region of the Martian ship just prior to the interference which cut the transmission between the Captain and Roland,’ she advised. ‘It is almost trace, hidden by its similarity to background radiation, but it is definitely there and not of natural origin.’
‘Understood Ezri,’ Maddox replied over the comms. ‘We’re almost at the ship now and there’s no signs of movement or life so far. Can you establish a warning to alert us should that signal return?’
‘I have already taken the liberty of doing so Captain,’ she replied quickly checking that her new program routine was actively scanning all incoming data feeds from the sensor array.
‘We’re now at the outer airlock, roughly midway along the length of the ship and probably a few decks down from the command level. Just about to enter so keep everything peeled and stand by,’ Maddox reported almost unnecessarily as he realised as he spoke that Ezri would be closely monitoring their progress intensely, ready to move in at the first sign of trouble.
He reached out and keyed the outer control panel, activating the outer door and it dutifully slid open after a few moments pause whilst the interior was declared depressurised. There was a distinct feeling of reluctance sweeping through his very being as he moved over to the threshold, realising quite clearly that he was walking into an unknown situation. They had no idea what had happened to the crew on board if their sensor readings were to be believed, and whether there was still a present danger to any life form who made their way inside.
‘Captain?’ Maia’s enquiring voice broke through the silence and brought him abruptly from his thoughts, suddenly realising that he had paused long enough on the brink of the opening to make his concerns over actually entering quite evident.
‘It’s okay,’ he replied in an attempt to reassure not only her, but try and bolster his own resolve. ‘Just taking a moment before we make the plunge into the unknown. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread and all that, well I’d rather not be a fool but I’m certainly no angel. Somewhere in-between will do me fine I think,’ he joked lightly as he crossed the threshold into the interior of the airlock.
Maia pondered for a moment on his words as she waited for him to be clear of the opening, then made her own way inside. It was quite obvious that even an experienced space traveller such as Maddox was prone to similar nerves which were currently threatening to cause her to freeze up.
Checking she was clear of the door, Maddox regarded the interior control panel of the airlock which was broken with the keypad hanging loose from its housing, the wiring still connected and preventing its descent to the floor of the airlock chamber. There was still power to the unit and most of the controls were intact, which allowed him to key the sequence to re-pressurise the room after the outer door closed securely, although it was a little more tricky to activate the opening of the inner door as these controls were damaged. Maia stepped forward and examined the broken panel, her efforts bearing success as with a little patience and repeated attempts, contact was made and the inner door slid open to reveal the inner corridor of the ship, mostly in darkness and only the illumination of the emergency lighting running along the length of the corridor casting pools of yellow light. It gave Maddox the initial thought that main power was interrupted, but as he stepped out into the corridor tentatively with his pistol drawn and at the ready, he spotted the first of the crew sat upon the floor not far from his position, slumped over their right-hand side and partially obscured by the dim illumination.
Quickly swinging his pistol to cover the figure, he gestured to Maia to stay where she was within the airlock as he slowly approached the slumped crewman. With every step he took he began to take note of the pooling blood on the floor in the vicinity of the body, seeping into the carpet and as he took a quick glance about he noted smudges along the wall too. Whatever had happened was not quick, it had obviously been a painful demise for the Martian who he now halted slightly short of, leaning down and applying pressure to the upper body to try and roll the figure over to lay flat against the wall.
Obligingly the torso twisted and rolled backwards, displaying the utter look of horror on the Martian’s face and the huge gash in the front of his uniform where something had quite effectively put a hole in his chest. Maddox quickly glanced back up at the smears on the wall, noting that the wound was obviously fatal but also that it would have been very quick. He had enough field experience of injuries to his comrades during the war to know that much. He sincerely doubted the man’s abilities to flail about and cause the marks. Rather something must have thrust him onto the wall and across, finally depositing his corpse into a crumpled heap where he was found.
At least he could rule out some errant radiation leak, as they didn’t tend to assault the crew in this way. He felt every sense suddenly on edge, reaching out to his surroundings for any hint that the perpetrator was still lurking about looking for a new victim.
‘Maddox,’ Maia’s voice whispered over the comm. ‘What the hell is going on out there? Please answer me….’
‘I’m fine,’ he replied softly. ‘However, I’ve found one of the crew and they’re not. Something attacked them and it’s a really grizzly sight.’
Maddox turned to look back towards the airlock and saw Maia stepping out into the corridor. As predicted she could not help but take a look, that much was a definite part of human nature. Just a peak to satisfy some deep seated curiosity.
‘No, seriously,’ Maddox muttered, but in a firmer tone to her than he had used a moment ago. ‘Stay where you are. Whatever did this may still be loose somewhere in these corridors. Remember that broken control panel? Well, if someone was hitting it in a panic to make the door close, that could be the cause. Maybe they were trying to get away from whatever did this?’
‘There were no bodies in the airlock,’ she countered and Maddox mused on that fact for a moment.
‘No, there weren’t,’ he said thoughtfully as he glanced along the corridor from his position, trying to ignore the corpse slumped beside him. ‘Maybe whatever it was opened the door, hence their effort to close it and subsequent breaking of the controls. So, possibly not only violent, but intelligent too? Not encouraging.’
Decisively he stood and returned to Maia outside the airlock, facing her squarely as he tried to make clear his rather urgent request.
‘Maia, I want you to go back over to the Erstwhile.’ Then, as he saw the pleading look on her face forming and he expected the objections to follow he quickly added: ‘Whatever did that may still be loose. If I am on my own I can dodge, dive, duck and fight. I can do whatever it takes to avoid ending up like him,’ he gestured backwards over his shoulder with his thumb, ‘and try to take it down if it comes for me. If I’m having to look out for you too, well things may not turn out favourably for either of us.’
He stared earnestly into her big eyes for a moment before she glanced away and to the floor.
‘Great,’ she muttered, ‘I take a huge chance to get away from chauvinists back on Venus, that turns out to be just another idiotic guy using me and I end up here with you. Same old story, I’m just a girl, I can’t cut it.’
Her gaze raised to meet Maddox’s own once more and there was a fiery ferocity in her eyes.
‘Well, I’ve had to fight my corner on the work shifts and make my own way for ages now so I’m more than capable of looking out for myself mister, and despite the look you’re giving me right now I’m sticking to you like glue. Now should we go and find out what happened to this poor sod here or do you want to stand around arguing?’ She said as she pulled her pistol from its holster and raised both eyebrows at Maddox, fixing him with an inquisitive stare.
‘Right! Fine!’ He grumbled sharply. ‘Just try to duck when any shooting starts and don’t be a hero. Got it?’
‘Got it!’
Glancing back down to the corpse at his feet, Maddox definitely had a bad feeling about this endeavour but there was a burning curiosity to discover what had happened to the crew. The slumped body had no obvious weaponry or empty sidearm holster to denote there had been any, coupled with the fact that Maddox knew it was not standard practice for the crew to wander about fully armed on board these patrol craft. The chances were this poor chap was unsuspecting of the danger he was in, and completely unable to defend himself when death came to claim him. At least both Maddox and Maia were armed, so if whatever had done this to him reared its head at them, they could blast it in the hope of driving it away if not killing it.
‘Maddox? You okay?’ Maia asked in a quiet voice and it occurred to him that he’d been standing staring down at the corpse for quite a while.
‘Yes, I’m fine. I’m just considering our best options for working out what happened, and I think it we head up to the bridge we may be able to access their records and logs. May give us a clue what went on here.’
‘We could head back over to the Erstwhile and leave all this for the Martians to clear up, I mean it is their mess after all. Whatever did this is their problem, isn’t it?’ Maia said tentatively as if bringing another option to his attention, but a quick glance from Maddox in her direction and a slight shake of the head gave her the first glimpse of his more serious side.
‘I know,’ Maddox replied solemnly. ‘But there are certain things I can’t just leave to chance. What if there is at least one person alive on board, somehow obscured from our sensors? What caused it?’ He paused briefly as he glanced fore and then aft of their position to gain his bearings, then gestured along the corridor from their location. ‘Come on, let’s get moving. I believe if we head that way it will bring us up to the command level.’
‘Ezri?’ Maddox’s voice over the intercom interrupted her work scrutinising every fine detail of the sensor readings as they were fed through to her station.
‘Go ahead Captain, I am here and standing ready,’ she replied as her attention returned to the screen.
‘Good. Okay, we’ve made our way over to the operations centre over here. Very plush I have to say, that is if you ignore the seriously maimed Martian corpses all over the place. There seems to have been one hell of a fight here and it seems they were caught unawares. There’s a few laser burns in the furnishings, but seeing as there’s a correlation of burns and where the bodies are I would say their attacker is armed and probably fired on them from the doorway, which is devoid of any similar scarring. Whatever it was, it was quite precise with its shots and didn’t seem to mind blasting holes in unarmed Martians.’
Ezri raised her eyebrow at the words as she contemplated for a moment, then provided her considered response.
‘Captain, whilst I hesitate to raise alarm in light of your current predicament, I should warn you that….’
‘Yes, I know,’ Maddox cut across her. ‘These ships carry Sentinels and by the looks of this, one of them went rogue. Just so I have a rough idea, how many of those things would one of these ships carry?’
Ezri took a moment to peruse their computer to bring forth the relevant information as provided on the standard ship’s complement of Sentinels on a normal deployment aboard a Martian naval patrol cruiser.
‘There would be a complement of eight aboard a ship of that class Captain. All controlled from the main computer system on board the ship,’ she reported dutifully before adding her own thoughts to the end of the factual statement, ‘however, there are stringent safeguards in place to ensure such an occurrence as you are witness to should not be possible.’
‘Well, it certainly looks like someone figured a way around those safeguards,’ Maddox muttered. ‘See what you can do over there to attune our sensors to pick up Sentinels on this ship. Maia and I will see what we can do to retrieve the logs over here, and then we’ll head back. You never know, there may be a clue in those records which give us a way to replicate hacking the system. In any case, I’d rather not linger too long with one of those on the loose.’
‘Confirmed Captain, I’m on it now,’ Ezri answered as the channel closed and she began adjusting the controls to focus upon the power systems of the Sentinels on board the Martian ship.
‘These Martians like their creature comforts,’ Maddox said to Maia as he turned his attention from the comm link to the bridge about him. ‘Carpeting, moulded wall panels and discreet ambient lighting fixtures – probably very nice when they work. These seats up here are nice and squishy too,’ he added as he took position in the seat before an active control panel, which glowed brightly amidst the dull emergency lighting illuminating the bridge.
Maia gazed about the scene all about her, the various panels blinking with different colo
ured lights awaiting user input whilst their operators lay slaughtered nearby. She wished quietly to herself he would not be so frivolous whilst in the midst of this macabre setting. Almost absent-minded she moved across the bridge to the Captain’s chair and sat herself down, her senses still taking in the full extent of the scene.
‘Now I have access to the mainframe, although limited as whoever operated this panel left it logged on with their credentials. Very nice of them, just wish they were the captain of some other high ranking individual. Anyway, what have we here?’ Maddox muttered as he concentrated upon the display before him.
Maia found herself regretting her forthright objection at being asked to return to the Erstwhile, for Maddox seemed more intent on working out the mystery than ensuring they were safe from molestation. If she were to be entirely honest, she could not really care less what happened to them on this ship, she was more interested in it not happening to her. Taking another glance about the bridge and the figures slumped in various locations, her eyes came to rest upon one partly obscured body, slightly hidden by the forward navigation control panel before the Captain’s chair. More specifically, her attention was drawn by the rather elaborate boots the body wore.
She knew those boots. Tam wore boots like that, and he was very proud of them as they were apparently one of a kind in the entire solar system, or so he kept telling her.
Standing from the Captain’s chair and ignoring Maddox’s mutterings as he scrolled through the information he was retrieving, she advanced slowly on the forward station, and then circled about it to obtain a clearer view of the person who lay there.
Tam was here on the Martian bridge. Quite obviously dead by the hole burnt in his chest, which was distressing in itself, but his presence just confirmed everything that Maddox had surmised within the diner. The fact he wore a black uniform with the company insignia on his lapels just reinforced the whole issue.
Children Of Earth (Tales from the 23rd Century Book 1) Page 7