Felina began to muse that other hidden entrances existed.
For all I know, I’m standing on a damn trap-door.
The contents of this concealed compartment, or “Manticore’s Spleen” as Ikabu had put it, held her attention. The Head of Security’s narrative kept her, too, fortunately all recorded via the PDA’s audio device.
“Called such as a nickname by Captain Keyes himself after I showed it to him and Cassel prior to our Earth launch in 2226,” Ikabu said, his recollection ushering a rarity in the form of a candid smile. Unfortunately, as quick as it had appeared so did it vanish. “Of the Manticore crew, only these sentinels, myself, Keyes and Cassel know of its existence. Its purpose? As Djevojka said—we prepare for the worst. A few extra pressure-locker pistols aren’t going to satisfy that notion. We, and the USRD, hold a higher regard to the safety and wellbeing of its ninety-one personnel. As such, the Spleen here was issued construction and stricken from the Manticore’s blueprints. Its contents, as you can see, go beyond USRD standards to hold the gratification of the USMB.”
“Impressive,” Godunov said while shaking his head. “But just as unnerving. Who has access? Am I to assume only those knowledgeable of its existence?”
“Certainly not, Mr. Godunov. Only the Captain and I do.”
“Why not Ensign Cassel?” Loudon asked.
“Well, as a matter of fact,” Ikabu said, “she declined the offer to be included.”
“Declined? Why?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Zometa said with a stifled scoff. “She’s smart enough.”
“I wouldn’t blame her intelligence on this matter,” Ikabu said firmly.
“Blame? What’s to blame? She clearly doesn’t want the responsibility of a small army’s arsenal at the tip of her thumb.”
Ikabu, lips pursed, nodded with understanding.
“I respect your standpoint, Miss…Zometa, is it?” Ikabu said, and she lifted her chin. He sighed, then, and took three steps back from the Spleen—whose raised panel then slid shut twice as fast as it had originally, and slowly, opened. “But in being prepared, especially aboard the greatest nonmilitary vessel ever created by man, to patrol the far reaches of reality…precautions demand such defenses.”
Zometa ingested his words and relaxed a little.
Felina, although she didn’t entirely agree with the necessity of having said arsenal present aboard the Manticore, appreciated the safety measures met by it. And ultimately found a renewed respect for Genesis Zometa.
“Is that a proximity precaution we just witnessed?” Schuman asked, subliminal excitation in his voice.
“Sure was,” Ochoa said from behind them, drawing only a handful of gazes. “Not even Djevojka here is fast enough to slip a hand in there if she so tried.”
“Eh, but no bet’s been placed yet,” Djevojka retorted with a subtle grin.
“And the contents?” Wisniewski asked, then paused to exhibit reluctance. “Or, uh, are we allowed to document this?”
“Only video recording prohibited while in this room,” Ikabu said. “But any other notation is allowed. Besides, so have you seen it—thus it may be documented. Afterall…the Manticore has bigger surprises than this, I assure you.”
Felina felt her enthusiasm peak and churn as if a feeding frenzy of emotions in shark-infested waters, only up here there was just the endless ocean of stars.
She knew she wasn’t alone in this feeling.
Ikabu had issued the words just to keep their spirits up, surely. Nonetheless, she didn’t peg him as the lying type—although something shook her about the way he spoke of the extra lockers.
“Now, the Spleen’s contents…” Ikabu returned to the panel, gliding his thumb over the bottom edge, making it reopen. “First up is the USMB Seighty battle rifle—fairly compact, block-design, pistol-gripped, magazine-fed automatic weapon. It gets its name from the 6.8mm caliber, which in this instance is a caseless FMJ round, meaning there is no ejection of empty shells during use. The box magazine, fed into the base of the rhombus-shaped receiver, holds precisely sixty-eight rounds; a doubtful coincidence. Now, being the standard-issue close-quarters assault weapon for the USMB, its performance is excellent but inferior to specialist firearms.”
Godunov raised a hand from his PDA.
“What’s its rate of fire and muzzle velocity?”
Felina, meanwhile, felt like these were unnecessary morsels of information. Nonetheless, she took notes because there was little else to do and the PDA’s battery supposedly held a twelve-hour charge.
“The Seighty has a 1400-rounds-per-minute ROF, the fastest yet by any known handheld non-belt-fed weapon,” Ikabu answered on memory’s basis without reluctance. “And its muzzle velocity, I believe, is clocked at 3800 feet-per-second.”
Godunov and Calloway whistled under their breaths.
Felina, Zometa, and Baxter equally rolled their eyes.
“One of the greatest features about the Seighty is this here,” Ikabu announced, indicating the weapon’s stock. It almost looked like a sliding pump seen in many shotguns. “Its stock, acting as a steady foregrip without protruding from the weapon—unnecessary due to its surprisingly low recoil—is actually a cylindrical ammunition reserve. If the operator’s magazine runs dry and for whatever reason is unable to reload in time or switch to their secondary, with a single pump—since it does slide, like a manual shotgun—they’re able to utilize this reserve, which contains forty-two rounds of emergency ammunition.”
Ikabu returned the weapon only to retrieve another.
“The TG-24 here is an automatic shotgun with a drum-magazine holding twelve 12-gauge buckshot shells. Unlike other shotguns of its class, the recently developed TG-24 sports a whopping 400-rounds-per-minute cyclic ROF, with a 1600-feet-per-second muzzle velocity. Utilizing the custom USMB choke designed specifically for this weapon as of six years ago, the TG-24’s spread is tighter and thus deadlier than its predecessors.”
Ikabu returned it to grab a handgun that didn’t look too dissimilar from the Deci, except for an exposed stainless steel barrel instead of the standard slide cover, narrowed nearest the breech.
“This here, is not to be underestimated,” Ikabu said proudly, as if he himself designed it. “Designated the USMB Spitfire, it has a fourteen-round magazine capacity with a 1300-FPS muzzle velocity and is semiautomatic by design. But, its key element makes you forget these average statistics. It utilizes .38-caliber IHP rounds—that’s incendiary hollow points. This makes the weapon essentially a nail-driving brander at 1300 feet-per-second.”
This was inarguably impressive to them all, but mostly unnerving for half of them, and not just the women.
Godunov and Calloway, on the other hand…
“Lastly,” Ikabu said upon retrieving the next weapon, “we have the Tenor. Originally designated the TNR-6 by the USMB, named after the initials of the designer, after less than a year in service it quickly adapted its simpler name. Fitting, too, considering the weapon’s strident report. This aside, it is rather imposing. As you can just about tell, despite a compact-rifle design and size, it’s built around a standard revolver frame. The six-shot cylinder is calibrated for the experimental .355 Lapua-Velocity, or LV, cartridge. Despite the revolver frame, it has no external hammer, and operates like a semiautomatic rifle. With only a sixteen-inch carbon steel barrel, full handguard, and birdcage muzzle—it’s impressive in more ways than one. I can’t quite recall its numbers off the top of my head, but I assure you it gives lightning a run for its money.”
Ikabu returned it to its rack in the Spleen compartment, among varying units of each weapon.
Five Seighty’s, three TG-24’s, two Tenors, and four Spitfires. All Spleen-exclusive, which in Felina’s mind not only sounded odd but felt strange, too.
So much firepower for just a research vessel.
Nonetheless, she grasped the basics of what Ikabu was trying to get across to Felina. Being way out here, on the boundaries of mankind’s realit
y, probing the unknown oceans of stars and blackness. She grasped the notion, just didn’t fully respect the ideology behind it.
Always a military presence.
The thought again made her stomach knot up.
“And that’s the Manticore’s Spleen, ladies ‘n’ gentlemen,” Ikabu said, resealing the compartment again. “Much like the human spleen, a necessary-for-survival organ. Which, I believe, just about does it here.”
He proceeded to lead them out of the security center, while the sentinels returned to their seats. Ochoa, the only one that had been standing upon their entrance, instead walked to sit in front of the big blank monitor nearest the Invisi-Screen. Which, from the inside, was not a mirror-like device but instead a distorted window. Every now and then Felina spotted personnel walking past, going about their way down the corridor, their figures more than just silhouettes but with features, albeit warped.
Just as Ikabu reached the keypad, but before he inputted the code, Felina stopped midstride and rose her voice for inquisition.
“What about that screen?” she said, indicating the blacked-out monitor occupying nearly the entire wall in front of Ochoa.
“The big one?” Ikabu asked, sounding as if confused.
“Yes,” Felina said. She reinstated her voice with fresh firmness. “The only one in this entire room that is off.”
Her attitude was detectable without effort or scrutiny. In as few words as she’d spoken, she’d instantly rallied the inquisitive attention of the other documenters.
Everyone had their PDA’s ready.
“Well,” Ikabu sighed, “it belongs to a camera that is currently offline.”
“Where and why?” Felina asked without hesitation. “I mean, for such a massive monitor, surely it’s in a crucial area. Doesn’t that pose an enormous security threat?”
Ikabu relaxed and almost laughed to himself, it seemed.
“Please, you needn’t worry,” he said plainly. “The feed belongs to a security camera located in the main labs’ foyer. Any cameras beyond that in the labs is forbidden, as they have their own security center there—no sentinels, just automated feeds. It is currently under maintenance, no important issue. Should be up and running again in a few hours.”
“Oh, I see,” Felina said with a simple nod, pretending to be both relieved and satisfied, with a morsel of apology; when in fact it was just the opposite. Suspicion raised, she was neither idiot nor simpleton of thought.
“When did maintenance start?” Schuman blurted.
“Uh, well…I believe first thing this morning.” Ikabu turned to face Ochoa in his seat. “Is that about right, Ochoa?”
“Yes, when I informed you of it earlier, before you left for the bridge.” Ochoa nodded, then turned to face the documenters, using absentminded hand gestures as if to clarify or authenticate his statements. “Late last night, it started showing signs of malfunction. Defunct wiring, a simple hardware issue. It’s happened before, to some of our smaller cameras. Tech crew’s on it as we speak, I believe.”
Schuman started to say something else, whether it was gratitude or otherwise nobody could grasp.
An intercom announcement interrupted him.
“The time is noon, lunchtime for all personnel,” Birch’s voice rang out with a metallic undertone. Again, the time is noon, lunchtime now. Enjoy your two hours.”
“Did she just say two hours?” Calloway said with a curt laugh. “As in a two-hour lunchtime? No way.”
“Is that too hard to believe, Mr. Calloway?” Ikabu said. “Afterall, it is a long work day for Manticore personnel.”
“No, I mean, I’m just…” Calloway grinned and shook his head, then hid his big teeth behind lips as he tried to shrug off his initial reaction. And then he let his voice resume regardless of what his mind thought. “Back home, guys doing manual labor, they’d get an hour. Only forty-five minutes sometimes, ya know, ‘cause of the workload.”
“Yes, well, that is on Earth, Mr. Calloway.” Ikabu shrugged, his expression most callous despite his words. “I mean no disrespect to these workers you mention, but aboard the Manticore we are most generous to our personnel.”
“Lucky them, then. I applaud the Manticore’s employee focus.”
Whether or not Calloway was being honest was open for debate. At present there were more pressing matters, such as two hours’ lunchtime. It pleased Felina to hear, actually, she didn’t mind taking that big of a chunk to do nothing but relax and eat. Maybe even rest, which was a choice Ikabu mentioned many crewmembers took on their break.
“An hour to gather their food, eat, talk to colleagues without the pressure of time and a work schedule, really. Then an hour of shut-eye.” Ikabu explained as they walked the corridors, leaving the security center behind. Although it had raised enough questions, some Felina hadn’t even voiced, it did satisfy some of her curiosity too. She was mildly pleased with the tour so far, more so especially now, that Ikabu was leading them to the main cafeteria. “Some personnel claim that an hour of sleep halfway through their day and right before returning to work can be rather crippling, fatigue and motivation wise. These people generally don’t sleep at all during lunchtime, or do so first then wake up and eat. Others declare it as an adrenaline replenishment and burst after they wake up. Just goes to show you how differently we’re wired; all human, sure, but with different schematics.”
Felina raised an eye as the words escaped Ikabu’s lips. By far the most accurate and intriguing thing he had said since his introduction yesterday.
“One thing you’ll have to keep mind of, ladies and gentlemen,” he continued, as they neared the cafeteria—a tell-tale sign of their proximity being the congestion of foot traffic—“are the elbows.”
Ikabu needn’t explain himself further.
Everyone from Felina to Wisniewski grasped this. With ninety-one personnel aboard the Manticore and nearly seventy of them packed into one room at once—plus clusters coming and going sporadically—things got a little crowded. Given, the cafeteria wasn’t auditorium-sized, but it sufficed to fit a maximum capacity of about a hundred. So, there was certainly extra room. But the corridors leading to and fro, this was a different story.
And the entrance to the cafeteria consisted of two sets of double-doors, one on either side of a dividing wall about fifteen feet long. They were horizontal auto-doors, where the left would disappear into the left wall and the right to the right, except that according to Ikabu from precisely noon to two o’clock they always remained open.
Felina felt waves of cold, unsure, curious, and sometimes downright mindless stares from passersby. These came by the dozens, but not much more than a couple, because beyond that were many whom seemed more focused on stuffing their faces or exchanging banter with a colleague.
Cafeteria, they call it, Felina mused bleakly. Mess hall, more suitable.
“Well, this is where I bid you all a good lunch, and I probably won’t see ya ‘til tomorrow afternoon.”
“Wait, why so late?” Loudon asked.
“Aren’t you eating, too?” Ngo said.
Ikabu put up his palms. “So many questions today, I must say, it’s been an interesting time with you all. But, unfortunately, my sentinels take lunch now so I must man the security center during their absence. At two o’clock, I take mine. And, tomorrow, well your tour will be leading down into the engine rooms and maintenance chambers. But I’ll see you all again eventually. Nine more days, can you believe it? Ha! Enjoy your lunch.”
Ikabu seemed oddly upbeat before he left, a façade of sarcasm or just unease perhaps, Felina felt obliged to know but found her concern of the matter slipping away.
Odors of food belonging to a higher quality of composition and nutrition than anything she’d ever eaten before in space began to intrude her olfactory senses. And beyond! Her skin tingled with delight, her stomach growling, she grew hungrier in the next few seconds than she had been all of yesterday.
The rising tumult of men’s heated conve
rsation added an iota of headache to her disposition, but she didn’t let it dissuade her appetite.
“Well, Cassel did say ‘crash course’ earlier,” Baez grinned shakily, stepping forward. With the PDA slipped into a secure back sleeve that every USRD uniform had, left her hands were left free. She clapped and rubbed them together, then raised her eyebrows to Felina and Zometa in particular before marching into the cafeteria crowd. There was a forming line to the serving counter at the far wall, which composed the length of that side of the room. Opposite the impatiently hungry personnel were the servers, four of them Felina counted from here, although she saw other shapes in the kitchen beyond which she couldn’t identify.
“Speaking of courses,” Godunov said eagerly with exaggerated eloquence, “I wonder what their serving entrees are.”
After Godunov walked into the crowd, the rest of the documenters fanned out into the cafeteria. Wisniewski and Zometa sought separate tables to simply sit and wait, their PDA’s in hand and under strict review. Baxter and Ngo immediately began speaking with random people, introducing themselves rather courageously. Calloway meandered aimlessly, his mouth shut but his head on a swivel, eyes observing everything possible. Schuman seemed to linger indecisively before finding a clear spot at a table and putting his head down to rest.
Loudon looked over at Felina, irresolute.
“Any preference?” Felina half-smirked.
“Well, I’m not terribly hungry,” Loudon admitted, then shrugged. “But by the time we reach the counter in this line, and with these smells, I imagine I will be.”
“Good judgment,” Felina clicked her tongue, and they filed into line behind a couple of male personnel. They appeared to be scientists, wearing similar all-white uniforms as Asher, although the man himself hadn’t been spotted. They gave the two women a peculiar up-and-down look, then returned to their hushed chitchat.
“Speaking of good judgment,” Loudon said. “I gotta say, today’s been right by you. The way you put Ikabu on the spot…nicely done. I won’t lie…I kind of like the man, in a weird sort of way.” She chuckled and shook her head. “But I think I feel the same way about you.”
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