The sound of the shot was a muffled flump. The super-hot blast of plasma caught the guard in the upper left back. The shot tore a massive hole and flung the guard forward. He slammed into the edge of the bed and fell to the ground.
Aaron didn’t follow the man’s descent. He was already turning his attention to the second guard. Even though the man was in sickbay for medical treatment, he was still a threat.
The second guard had been lying on the bed with his shirt pulled up, but his eyes had popped open when Aaron shot the first guard. Aaron’s gun was already swinging towards him and he reacted instinctively—he rolled off the far side of the bed.
There was another muffled crack from Aaron’s pistol, but this time his aim was less true. The guard was already rolling away from Aaron and the shot hit the man in the upper left leg.
The guard let out a groan of pain, but it was impossible to tell if it was from the burn of his first injury, the plasma shot, or from hitting the ground hard.
For the moment, though, the guard was out of Aaron’s sight and that caused a thrill of panic to burst through him. He jumped forward, stepping over the first guard and moving around the far end of the bed. A rather sad sight greeted him. The guard was trying to feebly crawl away, but he could barely move. He was lying on his side and his eyes met Aaron’s. The man’s eyes were wide and fearful. Sighing, Aaron raised the pistol.
“No!” the guard screamed, right before the bolt of plasma nearly decapitated him. It wasn’t as messy as it could have been, as the plasma cauterized the wound instantly.
Breathing heavy, Aaron turned his attention to the open space beyond the bed. Jessica was kneeling over the body of the nurse, checking for any signs of life. “You all right?” Aaron asked.
“Yes!” Jessica called back. “He’s dead.”
A quick glance at the second guard told Aaron that he too was dead. His head was still attached to his body, but only barely.
Aaron stepped back around the bed and stopped. The first guard had not died instantly. In fact, he had tried to crawl away, but he had only made it several feet or so. The plasma shot had ripped a huge wound in the man’s back. He might have lived for several moments, but without a doubt he was dead now.
“Let’s hide them in the drug locker,” Jessica said as she vainly tried to drag the nurse’s body towards the small closet.
Aaron checked the time—there was sixteen minutes to go. “No. I’ll hide the bodies. You get in the office and upload the virus.”
Ensign Youngstrom came to a stop in front of where Commander Griffith leaned back in his chair, filling in a form on his tablet. He looked up as the Ensign’s shadow fell across him. Youngstrom was standing stiffly at attention, just like he was on a parade field. Griffith smiled, he just couldn’t help himself. It had been a long time since he had been an ensign, and he idly wondered if he had been that uptight. “What is it?” he asked.
“Sir,” Youngstrom began, his eyes still locked straight ahead. “I have a red light on my board. It’s for the coolant systems.”
The Commander sat up straight at that and his hands began flying over his tablet. After a moment he looked back up. “Are you sure? I’m showing the coolant systems all in the green.” He spun the tablet around to show the sensor readouts to the Ensign.
Youngstrom glanced down and realized his mistake. “Sorry, Sir. The alarm is on the manual safety readouts.”
“The manual readouts?” Griffith repeated, looking quizzical. He was confused because those readouts were not normally used. After a moment he stood up. “Show me.”
Russell sat in front of the small sensor box. He was past the point of panic and was quickly sliding into despair. He must have tried twenty-five or thirty times to turn the new tablet on, but he had failed every time. At first he had tried using his index finger to slide the small lever, but he couldn’t even feel the switch. He had tried using his whole hand, the side of his hand, and even his left hand, but nothing had worked. His telekinetic ability allowed him to move things with his mind and he had even tried that. He couldn’t see the lever and wasn’t sure if it had flipped or not. For all he knew, the damn thing could have been damaged on the way here.
Initially, he had hoped the alarm would only be on for a moment and would not be noticed. That hope was long gone. Still, if he could get the damn computer to come on, then hopefully the alarm would go back off and maybe the bridge crew would dismiss the alarm as a glitch. But the problem still remained how he was to get the damn thing to come on.
Sighing, he reached in and tried to slide the small lever. Nothing happened. Gritting his teeth, Russell smacked the front of the computer in anger and then he blinked in surprise. The small screen lit up as the crazy computer came online.
He continued to sit there for several more seconds with his eyes wide in surprise. After a moment, a half-relieved, half-hysterical chuckle escaped him.
Glancing down to check the time, his breath caught at how little time remained. Russell quickly bounded to his feet and began hurrying towards the coolant line all the way to the port side of the ship. Time was short and he was behind schedule. He didn’t bother trying to conserve his air anymore, but rushed as fast as he possibly could.
Commander Griffith and Ensign Youngstrom reached the monitoring station and they both stared down at the alarms. All the lights were off. No red lights showed.
Griffith turned towards Youngstrom. “You sure the light was on?”
Youngstrom swallowed hard and said, “Yes, Sir!” He pointed to a particular alarm. “This one came on and stayed on.”
Griffith watched him for a moment and then nodded. “All right.” He reached out and pushed a button on the intercom.
“Engineering,” a very young sounding voice called out.
“This is Commander Griffith on the bridge. Did you just have an alarm on the manual safety readouts?”
There was a pause before the voice answered, “I’m sorry, sir. I was filling out duty reports and didn’t notice any alarms.”
Commander Griffith seemed to swell in anger. “And what would you have done if it was urgent?”
“Sorry, sir,” the voice said again. “All the computerized alarms light up and beep. I assumed that all the alarms would make a similar sound.”
“Make a note and have the Chief Engineer contact me,” Griffith said and punched the intercom off. “I think we need to revisit the engineering duty procedures,” he said to no one in particular.
Youngstrom was still standing at attention and he looked a little worried. Griffith smiled. “Relax. I believe you and I’ll make a note in the log. Probably nothing important though.”
Smiling for the first time, Ensign Youngstrom breathed a sigh of relief.
Chapter 26
Aaron checked the time again, only moments after the last time he had checked. “Less than a minute to go,” he muttered aloud.
Jessica sighed. “That’s what you said a moment ago.” She glanced sideways at Aaron. “Do you think we’ll reach the prisoner levels before the virus drops us back to normal space?”
They had been delayed; first in reaching sickbay, and then again by the presence of the guards. Aaron checked the time again, but it was habit and nerves more than anything. “Not sure,” he said, “but if the virus hits first, we’ll still reach the prisoner levels moments later.” As he spoke, he removed the plasmic and held it ready.
Jessica watched it for several moments and then sighed again. “Kill the guards?”
“Have to,” Aaron replied. “It’d be kind of hard to sneak the prisoners out past them.” Besides, he thought, if things go according to plan, they’ll all be dead soon after anyway.
After a moment, Jessica nodded and removed her own gun.
The elevator was already slowing down when the lights went out—immediately dull red emergency lights kicked in. For the first time in hours, Aaron smiled. “Nearly perfect,” he said. He got serious again. “You get the guard on the left, and
I got the one on the right.” She only nodded.
The two guards were sitting at the desk playing a hand of cards. There wasn’t much to do while on guard duty, and the cards helped to pass the time. If they were caught, they would be in serious trouble, but chances of being caught were pretty slim. Most officers had more important things to do than launch surprise inspections.
Duane, who was the older of the two guards and the one seated closest to the elevator, had an unbeatable hand and he knew it. Must be my lucky day, he thought. He was just laying his cards down, when the lights flickered once and then went off. The two guards were immediately bathed in a murky red glow that emanated from the emergency lighting.
The second guard, whose name was Eric, bolted to his feet. In the process, he managed to scatter playing cards every which way.
“Damn!” Duane exclaimed, making a grab for the playing guards but missing. He easily would have taken several hundred credits of the younger guard’s money and the thought of losing it was almost more than he could bear. With a sinking feeling, he realized it was a lost cause and spent several moments just staring at the scattered cards.
“What the hell is going on?” Eric said.
Sighing deeply, Duane turned from the mess of cards and looked at the computer terminal. “Probably nothing serious,” he said and began to type on the keyboard. Nothing happened though, and the screen didn’t even light up. He was just reaching to push the intercom button, when the elevator doors slid open behind him. His first thoughts were they would be in trouble after all because of the stupid playing cards. That thought disappeared immediately though as a plasmic went off directly behind him. A searing pain burst through his side and he partially turned, and spotted two crewmen standing just inside the elevator door. The man fired his plasmic for the second time and the plasma bolt ended all of Duane’s worries.
As his second shot tore a massive hole in the guard’s chest, Aaron was already turning, focusing in on Jessica’s target. He needn’t have worried though. Even though she hated killing, Jessica was quite proficient at it. The guard that was her responsibility had taken two devastating shots to the chest. He most likely had been dead before his body hit the floor.
“Quickly!” Aaron called as he moved forward and checked the guard on the right for any signs of life. As he suspected, the man was dead.
Leaning up from the other guard, Jessica shook her head. “He’s dead,” she called.
“Let’s go!” he said and sprinted off in the direction of Kyle’s cell.
Susan was standing outside Kyle’s cell when the virus struck. She had only just left Kyle and stepped into the hallway. The virus was supposed to open a small number of the prisoners’ cell doors, and she didn’t want any of them to see her emerging from Kyle’s cell. They didn’t want anyone to know that Kyle was the primary reason for this prison break.
Right on time the lights flickered out and a deep blackness descended. The darkness only lasted a moment and then the red emergency lights came on. At the same time, the unmistakable whooshing sound of cell doors opening confirmed that the virus had done its job.
Mere moments later, heads began popping out of the open doors. They looked up and down the hallway and came to rest on Susan. They watched her, but being cautious, they remained in their cells.
“This is a prison break,” Susan called loudly. “You can remain in your cells or you can go with us—it’s your choice.”
That got their attention. Cautious or not, they slowly began emerging into the hall. They were a mixture of ages and shapes, but they all wore the neon pink shirt and shorts of a prisoner. None of them spoke, but they watched Susan through suspicious eyes.
There were ten of them. Besides Kyle, there were seven other men and two women. None of them looked like the master criminal. Several had solid white hair and there were others who were overweight, bordering on obese.
Susan suspected that Kyle had chosen the other nine based on his perception of them while they had been in prison together. It made sense that he wouldn’t free the obvious psychotics.
One of the older prisoners gave a shout and dived back into his cell. He had spotted Aaron and Jessica rushing down the hallway and had assumed they were the on-duty guards.
“People!” Susan shouted, “these two are here to help us.”
The prisoners began to slowly edge back out of their cells, but they still huddled near the doors.
Aaron ignored them. He and Jessica slid to a halt right in front of Susan. He leaned in close so that only Jessica and Susan could hear. “Susan, you watch the prisoners in the hall. Jessica, you come with me and let’s start getting some more of these cell doors open.” He didn’t wait for a reply, but instead he moved on down the hall, stopping at the first unopened door. He quickly punched in the code and the door slid open.
A young black man was standing next to the bed. He was tall and muscular. Aaron guessed him to be in his late twenties or early thirties. His hair was long and hung to his shoulders in dreadlocks. He wore the neon pink of a prisoner and he was tensed up, ready for whatever was happening. He stared at the plasmic that Aaron pointed in his direction.
“We’re breaking out of here,” Aaron said quickly. “You can stay here or go with us.”
Surprise and hope flickered in the man’s eyes. “Of course I’ll go with you. What kind of choice is that?”
“Fine,” Aaron answered, “but you follow orders until we get away.” He stepped back into the hallway and used the gun to motion for the black man to join the others. “Don’t cause problems or we’ll burn you down.”
Russell was still nearly twenty yards from the first coolant line when the virus hit. He didn’t need to look at the time to know when it happened. The ship had been traveling through the dull gloom of a wormhole, but the virus took care of that by shutting the ship’s engines off. An enormous flash lit up the ship and then they reverted to normal space. He paused momentarily and took in the star filled heavens; something about it was soothing.
He quickly turned his attention back to the ship’s hull, looking for the first coolant line. He quickly found it and began lumbering towards it again. He was still behind schedule but he had made up a lot of time since attaching the small computer, although he was too scared to check and see what his dash across the hull had done to his air supply. It would take a miracle to make it over to the other ship. That thought caused him to pause again and he looked around, searching for the rescue ship that he so dearly hoped was there. After several seconds of searching, he spotted it. It was far off to the starboard side and appeared to be heading this way. That was good. He was determined to make it to the ship, but if he died out here then he dearly wanted the others to get away.
He turned back and scurried across the remaining ten yards to the coolant line. It was huge, the diameter being over five feet. The top half of the coolant line protruded above the ship’s hull and it was almost easy for Russell to puncture it. He stopped short, knelt down, and waited. This was the important part that Kyle had warned them about. He couldn’t destroy the coolant conduits until the ship’s computers were shut down.
Russell reached up and tuned the radio on his suit. After a moment he found what Kyle had promised would be there. There was a constant beeping pattern being broadcast by the ship. This was also part of Kyle’s computer virus. When the virus pulled the ship out of the wormhole, it had also taken over the ship’s communications gear. The crew was locked out and could not send a message or call for help. However, Kyle had programmed the ship to begin broadcasting a series of beeps. Two longs and then two shorts. The ship would broadcast these meaningless beeps forever, or at least until the command staff rebooted the computer. He had to wait until the beeps stopped.
A second type of beeping started then; it was the warning on his air supply. He looked at the gauge and sighed deeply as the needle was well into the red. He hastily disconnected the canister and connected his second, and last, canister. He was ser
iously beginning to doubt whether he had enough air to reach the escape ship.
Still kneeling down, Russell concentrated on slowing his breathing.
Commander Griffith paced back and forth, just behind a row of computers. Ten or so crewman were clustered around the terminals and were feverishly trying to determine what had happened. So far, they were awful short on answers. All he knew was that they had dropped out of the wormhole and most of the ship’s systems had cut off. The only explanation that made sense was some sort of catastrophic computer failure, but he had never heard of such.
“Sir,” one of the computer techs called out to him. “The ship’s computer is still online.” The tech was a man, although that was being generous, the kid probably hadn’t started shaving yet.
That stopped Griffith dead in his tracks. “Then what the hell happened?”
“I’m not sure sir,” the tech replied. “The system’s online, but we can’t access it. It’s like we’ve been locked out.”
A cold icy grip settled in on Griffith’s stomach as a new thought occurred to him: Computer virus! “Have communications been restored?” he demanded.
“No sir,” a young woman replied. “Both interstellar and inter-ship communications are still offline.”
Commander Griffith looked around and spotted Ensign Youngstrom watching the mayhem. “Ensign!” he barked and the kid jumped.
“Sir?”
“Do you know where the Captain’s quarters are located?” The bridge crew all knew the location of the Captain’s quarters, but the ensign was still fairly new and it was probably better to check than assume.
Long Shot Page 21