Orion Colony

by J. N. Chaney

  Wonderful, I thought to myself with a sigh.

  Getting out of the cargo bay post-haste and telling Boss Creed or even one of the suits on board might have been the best idea. I could say I heard strange sounds and the lock was broken on the pen.

  Once again, I’d be the center of attention. Maybe I should have just let someone else stumble upon this like I had, but Boss Creed knew I was down here.

  Instead of debating all the pros and cons repeatedly, I went down to my hands and knees. If I did report this, I needed to get a better look at what was happening inside the pen. I’d feel like an idiot running for help if it was simply a broken lock. I needed more information, if for nothing else than to satiate my own curiosity. I looked down into the dark room, holding my breath.

  The area inside the pen was long and wide. Green lights shined above smaller individual pens, lining the walls in the room.

  This alone wasn’t that strange. I knew a few of the pens were larger, offering smaller compartments within. I pressed the right side of my body against the cool surface of the floor. My right cheek made contact, flattening my beard on the side of my face.

  It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the light in the room, although I still really couldn’t see. All I could make out were green lights and movement.

  Whining, mixed with angry, guttural growls, wafted from the pen. If there was anyone in the room, I couldn’t see them. All I could spot were large, dark shapes that roved around the floor. The creatures moved on four legs and acted as though they were agitated.

  I was so enraptured with trying to figure out what the creatures were, I missed the hand snaking out from inside the pen to grab me by the collar.

  With lightning quick motion, I felt myself get pulled inside.

  Chapter 10

  Whoever had grabbed me quickly released my collar and laid into me with a series of kicks and strikes. I staggered to my feet against the beating, somehow losing my hold on the wrench.

  The strikes hitting me were well placed and brutal. Pain exploded in my stomach. Stars erupted in my head.

  I put my hands up to block against it, more out of habit than anything else. I was already dazed. By the time I could see enough to make out my opponent, I was already a bloody mess. There was the metallic tang of blood in my mouth, and my right eye cheek had already gone numb.

  Dressed in black, the person in front of me had a crimson handkerchief across their nose and mouth. All I could see were their eyes. They wanted to kill me.

  I didn’t have time to focus on anything other than onto my consciousness and blocking the blows when they landed.

  I played to my situation, pretending I was more injured than I was. My opponent pressed their attack, leaving them open for me to make my move. I sacrificed my own defensive as I jabbed out with a right, catching them in the throat.

  They staggered back, grasping at their throat. I swung a wicked right hook, connecting with their eye. At the same time, they whipped out with their right foot and took me in the side of my ribs.

  Pain exploded across my body as we both went down. I gasped, realizing my ribs were either broken or bruised. Either way, it wasn’t going to be pretty. I fought back to me knees, searching for my opponent. Like a wraith in the night, they were gone.

  I told myself it wasn’t anything nefarious as I searched for them. They’d simply rolled out under the open pen door. That was it, I hoped.

  I looked around the room one more time to make sure I was alone. My eyes had finally adjusted to the dull green light. As far as I could tell, it was only myself and the strange creatures on the other sides of the pens.

  I winced as I rose to my feet, clutching my left side with my arm. I’d been in enough fights to tell my ribs were bruised, not broken.

  Thoughts of leaving the inner pen as soon as possible and reporting all of this entered my mind, but I was already here. I had to find out what was on the other side of the smaller pens. Maybe even what that person had been doing here. My guess was that I’d stumbled on to something, because if they’d been here for me, I’d probably be dead.

  Glancing around, there were at least twelve pens of creatures, six on each side. Each pen held a different beast. While they were all animals I recognized, each appeared modified to be larger and stronger than normal. The chickens were twice their typical size. The cows were more muscular, and their hides looked thicker. Instead of man’s best friend, the dogs took on the features of a wolf.

  Each pen had a lock and audio seal on it, so you couldn’t hear them from outside. The attacker had been tampering with the dog’s gate when I’d surprised them, and the audio seal appeared to be broken.

  A mangy mutt with pointed ears and thick fur came up to me, pawing at the door. The animal looked at me with large, sad eyes.

  I placed my hand close enough where he could smell but not so close that he could bite me. He sniffed my hand through a long snout, and then he tried to lick me as if reassured by my presence.

  Something else caught my eye, and I leaned down to look at a satchel on the floor. Before I could pick it up, I heard movement behind me.

  “Stop there!” Stacy said, entering the room. She held a blaster in her hands, pointed at my head.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I said, raising my hands. The act brought an excruciating level of pain from my ribs. “You didn’t see the masked guy running out of here? And why do you have a blaster?”

  “Dean?” Stacy said, coming so close I could almost reach out and grab her weapon. “Turn around and get on your knees. I’m not going to ask you again.”

  “Listen, I’m not really sure what’s—”

  * * *

  I awoke, propped up on a medical table. Blinking rapidly into the bright white lights above, I saw an angel. No, not an angel—Iris, the ship’s Cognitive. Her ethereal glow made her appear to be a divine being, like something from the old religions, and she was looking down at me with the same look of pity I gave that mutt in the pen.

  “How are you, Dean Slade?” Iris asked in a too human voice. “Can you hear me?”

  “I can hear you,” I said, wincing at the pain in my head and side. “Where am I?”

  “You are restrained in the medical unit on The Orion seed ship.” Iris looked down at my wrists and ankles. “You were found breaking into the pens in the cargo area and attempting to weaponize the animals Elon Drake brought aboard.”

  “Weaponize?” I repeated, clenching my fists to test the bonds. The steel cuffs around my hands didn’t budge. They cut into my skin, so I relaxed for the time being. “Listen, I know what you think you saw, but it wasn’t me. I fought whoever was breaking into the pen. Come on, you don’t believe me? You must have cameras everywhere on this ship. You’re a freaking Cognitive for crying out loud.”

  Before Iris could respond, the door opened. Stacy, Elon, and Arun walked in. Stacy wore the same mechanic clothing as always, Elon and Arun were dressed in dark, grey uniforms. Arun’s long, white hair was pinned behind her head, while Elon’s was in a ponytail.

  “I’m going to go out on a limb here and venture a guess that you’re not a mechanic,” I said, staring daggers at Stacy. I wasn’t sure exactly why, but I felt betrayed. “So, what are you then? Some kind of suit spy?”

  Stacy looked over to Arun who nodded to her.

  “Special agent, actually,” Stacy said, crossing her arms over her ample chest. “Disciple threats were coming in every day, especially at the construction yards. I was placed in yours to keep an eye out for people like you. That’s also why I’m on this ship.”

  I bit my tongue so hard it hurt. Instinct kicked in. I wanted to remind her that actual terrorists attacked our yard. That maybe she should work on finding them instead of keeping me detained. That there was a terrorist on board our ship.

  “I didn’t do anything except try and stop the person who was going to release those animals,” I looked over to Elon. “Why do you have animals in the cargo pen to begin with? Hell, w
hile we’re at it, why are they so big and—”

  “Enhanced looking?” Elon asked, finishing my thought.

  “Sure, we can go with enhanced. I was going to go with mutated and deformed, but sure,” I said.

  “We’re taking twelve special kinds of animals with us to Kronos Five, to build and sustain a working population, each for different reasons. A new colony needs livestock.” Elon moved his hands as he spoke like a conductor leading an orchestra. “Most of the animals were chosen for the food, but a few were also chosen as companions. The dogs, for example, are genetically modified to have the loyalty of a German Shepard with the size of a large wolf.”

  “Great, we’re taking giant puppies to keep people happy on an alien planet,” I said.

  “I do not believe that Dean Slade is responsible for the vandalism found in the cargo bay,” Iris said, interrupting our conversation. “Although the cameras show no one else, I did discover something strange while playing back the footage.”

  “No, it has to be him,” Stacy said, shaking her head. She skewered me with a glare.

  I stared right back at her.

  “There was no one else there when I arrived,” Stacy said. “No one passed me when I found him.”

  Iris opened her right hand, palm-side up. Immediately, a screen appeared in the air above us, glowing with the same dull blue illumination that surrounded her.

  The image looked down on the cargo pen door labeled with the warning sign. There was no one on camera yet. Even with the absence of any person, the lock on the cargo bay door was already broken and raised a meter. It was like someone had perfected the art of invisibility and succeeded in masking themselves from the camera.

  “See?” I said, pressing my case. “I don’t know how they did that, but there it is. Last I checked, I couldn’t turn invisible.”

  “Fast-forward to when Dean arrives,” Arun spoke for the first time.

  Iris obeyed, fast-forwarding the footage to a few minutes later when my familiar, nosy face appeared on the screen. A moment later, a very real arm reached out and pulled me inside the pen.

  “There are no cameras on the inside of the pen,” Iris said, confirming what we were all thinking. She rewound the feed and froze it on the image of the arm reaching out to pull me in. “However, that arm is enough proof to confirm what Dean Slade said is true.”

  “All right, then,” I said, nodding over to Iris. “I take back everything bad I ever said about Cognitives.”

  “Iris, let the feed play forward,” Arun asked.

  Iris obeyed, showing the person dragging me into the pen. Within a mere twenty seconds, Stacy appeared on the screen, ducking under the pen door behind me.

  “So, tell us exactly what happened in the pen once you were dragged inside, in as much detail as you can remember,” Arun said, looking over to me with his familiar calculating stare.

  “It was dark,” I said, piecing together the events for myself. “When they started pounding on me, it must have deactivated their cloaking tech. They wore all black with a red handkerchief around their face. I could only see their eyes.”

  “Was it a man or a woman who attacked you?” Elon asked.

  “A man, I think, but I don’t know for sure,” I said, trying to recall the few seconds in poor lighting where I had seen my assailant.

  “You think?” Stacy pried.

  “Hey, give me a break,” I said, trying to move a hand to my head only to remember I was still strapped to the table. “I had a concussion and probably some bruised ribs.”

  “The Disciples’ colors are black and red,” Elon mused out loud.

  “Well, while we’re all playing detective, do you think I can get out of these restraints?” I asked, looking round the room.

  “Yes, of course,” Arun said, nodding to Iris.

  Iris merely glanced at the bonds holding me in place, and they opened. With a satisfying click, I was free.

  “We need a plan to find and lure out this Disciple before he or she tries anything else,” Stacy said, pursing her lips in thought.

  “Yep, right, so this has been great,” I said with a grimace as I swung my legs off the bed and stood up. “I’ll leave you to your Disciple hunt. I’m going to go lick my wounds and pretend there isn’t an invisible maniac on board trying to bring this ship down.”

  “We need your help, Dean,” Arun said.

  “Don’t you have an army of suits on board or a—”

  “You’re the only one who has seen who we’re after. That makes you our key witness,” Elon told me.

  “But I’m not a suit,” I said, then flicked my hand at Stacy. “And I sure as hell ain’t no spy.”

  “Special Agent,” she corrected.

  “No, you’re not,” said Elon. “But that doesn’t mean you’re not valuable.”

  Chapter 11

  “Before we begin, we all know who you are,” Elon confessed. “Stacy had her questions when you assisted her in the alley, and it was confirmed when she looked up your history. It was acknowledged once more, when we took in the gang member sent to kill Ricky. He had a lot to say about you, too.”

  “Wonderful,” I said, looking over at Stacy with a grimace. “You didn’t really need my help in that alley, did you? I mean you could have taken those thugs yourself.”

  “I was about to when you showed up,” Stacy agreed. “I couldn’t blow my cover, and you looked more than capable, so I let you be my knight in shining armor. It was kind of nice. Also, sorry for tasing you in the pen. I thought you were a Disciple.”

  “Yeah, it happens, I guess,” I said. “Well, maybe it doesn’t, but it’s fine.” Now that I had everyone’s attention, I decided I needed a few answers. “What was that holo card you dropped in the alley? Your badge or something?”

  “Undercover, we don’t carry badges, but it contained information I had collected, and I was going to drop it off to Elon and Arun,” Stacy said. “If those thugs had gotten their hands on it, my cover would have been blown.”

  Looking back on it, the only reason I was even on Orion right now was because I’d stuck my neck out for Stacy in the first place—someone who didn’t even need my help. The irony in that wasn’t lost on me.

  “If you’re done with your questions, we should move on. A plan to catch the saboteur we have on board needs to be hatched,” Arun said, reeling everyone back in.

  “Just one more question,” I said.

  Arun looked at me, giving me permission to go on.

  “There was a satchel or a leather case of some kind left behind by the Disciple. I only saw it for a second, but it was by the pen with those wolf-dog things. What was it?” I asked. “Was the plan to poison the animals so we wouldn’t have them on Kronos Five?”

  “That would have been my guess as well,” Elon said, anger smoldering in his eyes. “But, I’m afraid the plan you stumbled upon is much darker than it initially appeared.”

  “The satchel you saw was filled with a violent strain of rabies,” Iris interjected, picking up the conversation. “We believe the plan was to possibly inject all the animals with the strain, not just the canines, and let them loose on the ship.”

  My mind went wild with images of animals foaming at the mouth as they burst from the cargo bay. This Disciple was sick, and it made me wonder what his next move would be. Anyone who could even consider doing that had to be out of their mind.

  “So, where do we start?” I asked.

  “He or she had access to the cargo bay,” Arun mused, lowering her eyes. “We can start there. We may even be able to narrow it down by seeing who was granted access to the bay this morning. Iris?”

  Iris blinked her bright blue eyes. “I can bring up all of that information for you as requested, but looking at the data right now, I believe I have a theory.”

  “What’s that?” Elon asked.

  “It is more likely that the Disciple used whatever cloaking technology they had to slip in alongside someone else. The logs show thirteen people
checking in and out of the cargo hold this morning before Mr. Slade arrived.”

  “None of this is to leave this room,” said Elon, rather insistently. “Not until Iris has time to run a more thorough investigation.”

  “Elon and I will continue our efforts here with Iris while you and Stacy work separately on another leg of the investigation,” Arun said, looking at me to see if I would disagree.

  I did.

  “Boss Creed might have a few things to say about that, and I’m a mechanic not an investigator,” I said, trying to piece together the events that had led me to this point.

  “He’s telling the truth,” Stacy said with a shrug. “Maybe he’s not the best asset to put into the field. I mean, I work best alone and—” She paused. “Well, look at him. He’s kind of a mess.”

  “We’ll ask Boss Creed to send you two on a special assignment fixing something on the higher levels,” Elon stated as if he had already thought about this and come up with the solution. “And you’re both wrong. He’s the perfect person to help you, Stacy.”

  “You possess more hand-to-hand training experience than anyone on The Orion,” Arun said, picking up where her brother left off. “And I won’t send one of our best into the field alone. Not now, when we know for certain there is a Disciple on board.”

  “A cloaked Disciple at that,” Iris chimed in.

  “The only people who know about Stacy’s cover are the five of us, Doctor Allbright, and the Civil Authority Officers on this ship.” Elon looked at me with concern in his eyes. “It is paramount we keep it this way.”

  “I’m not saying anything,” I said, lifting my arms in a sign of surrender. I immediately regretted the action as another wave of agony washed over my left rib cage.

  “Speaking of the good doctor, we’ll send her in here right away to get you looked at,” Elon said, heading for the door. “You and Stacy both have access to our quarters if you should need anything.”

  Iris followed behind Elon. Instead of using the door, she traveled right through the wall itself. I knew Cognitives were capable of phasing in and out of physical objects, but it was still weird seeing it firsthand.