by Jim C. Hines
“Feral?” asked Monroe, from mere centimeters behind her.
Mops jumped. “Dammit, man. Give a little warning when you come up behind someone, or I’ll tie a damn bell around your neck.” She turned her attention back to Private Schulz. “Stand down, Charlie! That’s an order!”
The edge of the curtain tore away from the wall, sounding like a flatulent Quetzalus. Schulz shoved an arm through, fingers stretched toward Mops’ throat.
“Yeah, she’s feral,” Mops said tightly, fear and adrenaline squeezing her gut. She couldn’t see any sign of injury. Schulz was suited up the same as Mops and her team. “Monroe, in your infantry years, how often did you see shock or injury cause a reversion like this?”
“Four times,” he said. “Over eight years of active duty.”
Mops pointed past Schulz. “Ever hear of it happening to five people at once?” From the eloquence of his swearing, she assumed the answer was no.
“What’s going on?” Kumar asked, panic edging his voice.
Mops caught Kumar’s arm and spun him around, pushing him away. “Check the other curtain and make sure nobody’s coming from that direction. Wolf, Monroe, you’re with me.”
More of the curtain ripped free, and Schulz lunged forward. Her fist collided with Mops’ jaw, and everything flashed white. Monroe caught Mops by the arm before she could fall.
Schulz had a hell of a punch. Mops shoved herself off Monroe to avoid the follow-up swing, then moved in to slam a knee into Schulz’s gut. It bent Schulz double. A quick push sent Schulz back into the curtain, where she fell against Smith and Omáğažu. Holmes climbed over them, intent on reaching Mops and her team.
“Fall back,” yelled Mops.
Wolf ignored her, charging past to drive a shoulder hard into Holmes’ gut. Wolf slammed him against the wall, grabbed the back of his uniform, and hurled him toward Price.
“Remind me to put her back in the brig,” Mops muttered. “Doc, they’re still wearing their monocles. Can you control them remotely? Comms, too?”
Doc gave a disdainful sniff. “Regulations and safety protocols prohibit—”
“I’ll buy you that processor upgrade you’ve been lusting after.” She stepped back as Schulz pulled herself upright.
“Safety protocols disengaged. I’m in.”
“Overwhelm them.”
No sooner had she said the words than Schulz’s monocle flashed white. She fell back, both hands clawing at her eye through her hood. She managed to knock the monocle loose from her face, but it simply fell to the bottom of her hood, where it continued to strobe.
Doc did the same to the others, who responded in similar fashion. Wolf took the opportunity to land a few more blows against Holmes, before Monroe hauled her away.
“These are our crewmates,” Mops reminded her team. “They’re sick. We’re not trying to kill them.”
“They’re feral,” said Wolf. “We can’t go easy on them. Hell, anything short of guns or sedatives, and we’re just slowing them down.”
“I’ve seen your marksmanship scores,” Mops shot back. “You’re not getting a gun.”
A series of thunderclaps filled the corridor as Doc overrode the attackers’ comm speakers. Mops flinched. If it was that loud to her ears, she couldn’t imagine how painful it must have been through those directional speakers. She yanked her sealant canister from her harness and drew a large zigzag of gel down the wall. “Monroe, give me a hand.”
The two of them seized Schulz and shoved her face-first against the wall, holding her in place as the sealant hardened. By the time the others recovered, Schulz was secure.
“Kumar, cleaning spray.” Mops pointed to the floor between her and the remaining ferals.
Kumar pulled a spray wand from his harness, secured its hose to a bottle of concentrated detergent, and blasted a film of green suds down the corridor. He coated the four crew who were approaching as well.
Holmes was the first to fall. His feet shot forward, arms flailing as he slammed to the floor.
Mops spread another mess of sealant onto the opposite wall, grabbed Holmes’ boot, and with Monroe’s help, glued him in place. Upside down.
A hand clamped around her ankle. Omáğažu pulled herself forward, her other hand reaching toward Mops’ shin.
Wolf slammed a small wrench down hard enough to snap the bones of Omáğažu’s right arm. Mops twisted free.
“Sir, I still have some hull paint from that repair job two days ago,” Kumar said hesitantly. He held up his spray wand. “I could—”
“Do it,” Mops snapped.
Kumar nodded and unscrewed the detergent from his compressor hose, replacing it with a heavier canister. As the remaining attackers closed in, he fired a thick spray of black paint at their hoods.
After that, it was simple enough to glue the rest of them to the walls and floor. After making sure none of them would be going anywhere, Mops stepped back to catch her breath. “Doc, were any of our suits breached?”
“Everyone’s bagged and fresh. Well, Wolf’s a bit sour, but that’s because she hasn’t had a shower since before her fight with Grom. Her suit’s fine.”
“Thank you.” Mops glanced over the disaster that was their workspace. One of the pipes oozed black goo. Someone must have grabbed it when they fell, or slammed into it during the fighting. Cleaning tools were scattered over the floor. Then there was the cleaning fluid, paint, sealant, and who knew what else, all dripping from the walls and the struggling ferals.
“What now, sir?” Kumar surveyed the mess, his eyes wide with horror.
Mops stretched her shoulder. “We can’t stay here. Wolf, prep a bomb for that wall. I want it sealed and done in two minutes.”
“Aw, hell,” said Wolf. “All that work for nothing?”
“At least you got to punch someone,” Monroe pointed out.
Wolf brightened. “That’s true.”
“Don’t encourage her,” Mops said, glaring at them both.
Wolf carefully unwrapped a block of what looked like soft blue clay, while Kumar and Monroe maneuvered the first wall panel back into position. Mops grabbed the next panel and did the same.
Once all but one panel had been replaced, Wolf pressed the block to the back of the center wall compartment, sprayed it with a milky white liquid, and stepped aside. The block was fizzing and bubbling like Captain Brandenburg’s snail soup by the time Monroe locked the final panel shut.
The white spray was a catalyst that would, in another thirty seconds or so, cause the sanibomb to expand into a quick-hardening foam that filled every square millimeter of the wall compartments. Everything inside would be sealed into place, unable to leak or grow or spread.
It was the quick and dirty way to decontaminate an area. It also rendered everything in those walls inaccessible until someone—generally the SHS team—came along with the dissolving agent to remove the foam and do the job right. In other words, work that should have taken a few hours had just turned into a multiday job.
Mops touched the wall, feeling the heat of the reaction even through her glove. After making sure none of the foam was escaping through the panel seams, she turned to survey her team. “Nobody unseals their suits until I give the order. Is that clear?”
“I should’ve used the head before we started,” Wolf grumbled.
“Don’t worry about it,” said Kumar. “EMC official-issue undergarments can absorb up to two thousand milliliters of liquid.”
“Three thousand,” Doc corrected, broadcasting to the team. “They upped it after that week-long plumbing shutdown on Stepping Stone Station earlier this year.”
“Fascinating,” Mops said dryly. “Now, how about an update on what the hell’s going on. Where’s Security? Do we have an update from Medical?”
“Sorry, sir.” Doc sounded abashed. “I’ve been pinging Medical for
the past five and a half minutes. No response.”
“What about tracking the crew? Analyze their movements. Tag anyone shambling around like a feral.”
“I don’t have that kind of access to ship’s scanners. I can tell you what’s happening in the immediate vicinity, but—wait. . . .”
Mops’ neck tensed. “What is it?”
“I don’t understand. I’m . . . Stand by. There’s a lot to download.”
“Problem, sir?” asked Monroe.
“I’m not sure. Doc?”
“I’ve—I mean, you—we have been granted command-level rights to most of the Pufferfish’s systems. Equivalent to what Battle Captain Cervantes would have had during the fighting.”
“Who authorized that?”
“How should I know? Wait, I have access to the ship’s internal logs now. Looks like your authorization was upgraded automatically seventy-three seconds ago.”
“If we have access, use it. I want the status of the entire crew. Are we seeing any other outbreaks like we had here?”
“Already in progress. Unlike humans, I’m perfectly capable of doing two things at once.”
“And?”
Doc hesitated. “Vital signs from crew uniforms are odd. I sent a high-priority request to everyone save your team, asking them to report in. No response.”
Mops’ gaze returned to her struggling, feral crewmates. Her gut clenched in anticipation of Doc’s next words.
“As far as I can determine, the rest of the crew has gone feral. Your team is the only group unaffected. As the highest-ranking person on board not shambling about in a feral fugue, you are officially in command of the EMCS Pufferfish.”
EMC ship names are chosen by a five-member committee with representatives from the Alliance Military Council and members of the Krakau Earth science team. Traditionally, ships are named after the deadliest species from humanity’s home world. Thus, the EMCS Mantis Shrimp, the EMCS Hippopotamus, the warship EMCS Mosquito, and the pride of the fleet, the dreadnought EMCS Honey Badger. Prodryan warriors reflexively still their wings in terror at the mere whisper of the bomber EMCS Cone Snail. . . .
EMC ships are crewed primarily by humans, with a scattering of other species. Despite initial fears that the Krakau command crews would lose control of the primitive, savage humans, the fleet quickly earned a reputation for taking on any challenge. Thirty-six years of successful peacekeeping and counterinsurgency missions have proven those fears hollow and helped spread peace and security through the Alliance.
“HOW DROWNED ARE WE?” asked Monroe, watching her closely.
“Very.” Mops licked her lips. “I’m in command.”
“Yeah, we know,” said Wolf. “Sir.”
“Of the whole damn ship,” she clarified.
Wolf’s mouth opened, but she didn’t say anything.
“How is that possible?” asked Monroe.
It was a rhetorical question, so, naturally, Kumar answered. “The regulations are clear. If every member of the Krakau command crew has been incapacitated, along with the eight other humans who outrank Lieutenant Adamopoulos, then command passes to her.”
“Does this mean the whole crew is . . .” Wolf gestured toward the five struggling prisoners. “Like them?”
Mops glanced at Monroe, saw the grim understanding in his eyes. “Not the whole crew,” she said quietly. “They’re suffering a relapse of our plague. A plague that affects humans, turning them vicious. Ferals will attack almost anything that moves. If the Krakau and the Glacidae aren’t responding . . .”
Wolf blinked. “Oh, shit.”
“Pretty much.” Mops took a deep breath, grimacing at the slightly stale taste of her suit’s air. “For now, assume everyone else on this ship is dead or feral. Doc, find us a safe route to someplace secure, preferably a battle hub or another area with full access to ship’s systems.”
“Battle Hub Two is closest. I believe I can plot a route that will avoid the other humans.”
“I spent a year on Earth for basic infantry training,” Monroe said quietly as they started walking. “Salvage and retrieval work, mostly. My unit spent two weeks in a hellhole called Disneyland Tokyo. We stirred up a nest of ferals in the northeast sector. They’d been hiding out in Toontown. We fell back into the only defensible position and held them off for three days before Command was able to send a retrieval team.”
Monroe avoided looking at anyone. “We lost four people. A buddy of mine weaponized some primitive robot tech—animatronics, I think they were called. You haven’t seen carnage until you’ve seen a mechanical yellow bear open fire on a wave of ferals, while a pink robot piglet carries a bomb into the heart of the mob on a suicide run.”
“Sounds like a hell of a fight,” said Wolf.
“You got the hell part right, but that’s not the point. On top of being outnumbered, we ran into two major problems. The first is that humans are really hard to kill.”
“Damn right,” grunted Wolf.
“The second is how hard it is to pull the trigger against your own kind. Every human we put down was a human the Krakau would never cure. A human who would never be anything but a rabid animal. Every one of us knew the only thing separating us from them was dumb luck.”
He popped his gum, grimaced, and swallowed it. “This mess is going to be harder. These are our crewmates. Our friends.”
“Also, we don’t have guns,” said Wolf.
“Or suicidal robot pigs,” added Kumar.
“We’re not killing anyone,” Mops said firmly. “Like Monroe said, these are our crewmates. Our job is to keep us and them safe until we can get the situation under control and find a way to help them. Doc, can you contact Command?”
“Internal ship communications only. If you want to talk to anyone outside the Pufferfish, you’ll need to get to Battle Hub Two.”
A dot of light on her monocle signaled an incoming comm message. From Mops’ collar speaker, a voice with the faint mechanical edge of a translator whispered a weak, “Hello?”
Mops raised a hand to halt and silence her team. “This is Lieutenant Adamopoulos.” A text tag on her monocle identified the caller as Technician Gromgimsidalgak. “Where are you, Grom?”
“The humans have all gone mad,” whimpered Grom. “They’re worse than Wolf!”
“Grom is in Recreation Area Two,” said Doc. “Specifically, they’re in the pool. The deep end.”
Mops cocked her head. “The crew went feral, and you decided to go for a swim?”
“I’m hiding,” Grom snapped. “Glacidae lubricating fluid turns water opaque. It’s all I could think of, but I can’t keep it up much longer. Send a security team to get me out of here!”
Mops mentally added pool cleaning to her growing list of things to do, assuming they survived. “Why didn’t you respond before to Doc’s all-crew signal?”
“I’ve been busy trying not to get eaten!”
“Stay out of sight as long as you can.” She signed off and turned to the others. “Grom is trapped in Rec Two. We’re going to get them.”
“Four of us against almost two hundred feral humans?” asked Kumar.
“Minus the five we’ve already dealt with, yes. Doc, how many people are in Recreation with Grom?”
“Eleven.”
She studied her team. Wolf looked ready to charge to Recreation and fight all eleven herself, proving once again that she had no idea what they were facing. Kumar looked ready to soil himself—a better-informed, if equally noncomforting response. Monroe simply waited, arms folded.
“Show us the quickest route to Recreation.” Her monocle lit up with the path plotted and a floating arrow showing which direction to go. “And the closest armory?”
A second route appeared, with an arrow pointing in the opposite direction. Of course. “Doc, start sealing off sections of the
ship. Full quarantine lockdowns.”
“Talk to them,” suggested Monroe. “Ferals are drawn to noise. Human voices trigger their hunting reflexes. Broadcast in specific areas to lure them in, then lock the doors behind them.”
“Good thinking. Doc, broadcast from areas where they’ll be unlikely to blow up the ship while they’re locked up. Empty cargo bays, acceleration chambers, that sort of thing. Keep them out of Engineering and away from any command consoles.”
“What should I say?”
“It doesn’t matter. Pick something from my library and start reading. Clear us a path.” That still left the ferals in Recreation to deal with. They wouldn’t leave if they had Grom surrounded. She pulled a half-meter utility pole from the back of her harness and twisted the metal collar at the end. The pole tripled in length. One end was a universal swivel-head attachment point. The other was a nozzle for anything from a high-pressure air hose to anticorrosive paint to simple vacuum suction. It also made a serviceable staff.
Wolf had taken out her utility knife, a three-centimeter blade that would have roughly the same effect on a feral human as tickling them with a feather.
“What’s the plan?” asked Monroe.
“Keep your mouths shut so we don’t attract more company.” She started toward Recreation. “And try not to die.”
As they neared Recreation, Mops began to hear Doc’s voice over the distant speakers.
“I have been called an unkind mother, but it was the sacred impulse of maternal affection, it was the advantage of my daughter that led me on; and if that daughter were not the greatest simpleton on earth, I might have been rewarded for my exertions as I ought.”
“What the hell is that?” whispered Wolf.
“Sir James did make proposals to me for Frederica; but Frederica, who was born to be the torment of my life, chose to set herself so violently against the match that I thought it better to lay aside the scheme for the present.”
“It’s called Lady Susan, by Jane Austen,” Mops whispered. “Now shut up. Doc, how’s our path?”