Starship Freedom

by Daniel Arenson

  That video went dark.

  The other Mimoris kept fighting. The alien corpses piled up at their feet. The androids were the starship herself, and they were furious. They were like white blood cells, protecting their body. If the starship Freedom was a great living being, a whale the size of a town, the androids were her immune system. They rose in battle, cutting back the enemy, scouring the ship's twisting halls. The Freedom was fighting back against the parasites.

  Screams rose from one video feed. Telepathically, King scrolled through a carousel of videos. They shuffled by before his eyes, showing different battles aboard the ship.

  The scream had come from a gunnery station. It was a cavernous chamber, full of gears the size of houses. From that chamber, the crew could control one of the Angels of Liberty. There were fourteen such chambers, all identical, to fire the fourteen cannons.

  This particular gunnery station, the one in the video, controlled the Libertas. King had just been there yesterday. It was where he had entered a mecha and shot the fireworks.

  The Libertas was a special cannon. Among the fourteen, she was perhaps the greatest. The enormous gun, the length of a football field, was located atop the starboard hull, overlooking the prow. During the Battle for Mars, the Libertas had shot down the mighty RDS Mao, opening a path to the red planet—and ultimately to victory in the war.

  Right now, as King watched from the bridge, an enormous rah was tearing through the gunnery crew. It was the largest rah King had seen so far, twice the normal size. Corpses lay around the colossal spider. There was just one spider in the chamber, but it had slaughtered twenty people.

  This rah was different from the others, and not just in size. The other rahs were all black. This one had a gray body and red legs.

  "Hel'rah," King growled, staring at the video.

  As if Hel'rah could hear him, the rah looked up at the security camera.

  "Hello, Commander King," the spider hissed. He raised a severed head. "I hope you won't miss this one too much."

  He hurled the head at the camera. Blood splattered the lens, and the camera jerked sideways. It now pointed at a wall.

  Tourists hung on the wall.

  Girls.

  They hung from meat hooks, eggs in their stomachs. A few were dead. The others were dying.

  Hel'rah's voice rose to a shriek. "I will do this to Rowan! I will do this to your granddaughter as you watch, King!"

  King realized that everyone on the bridge was looking at him. They had their MindLinks on too. They had seen the same thing.

  "Somebody get me a full magazine," King rasped. "I'm going to crush that bug."

  "I'm going with you," Jordan said.

  King shook his head. "No. You're my XO. I need you on the bridge. The ship is yours until I come back."

  "Jim." Jordan held his arm. "Send a security team down. It doesn't have to be you."

  "All our forces are protecting the engine. This is between me and the spider." King accepted a magazine from a lieutenant. He loaded his gun. "I'm going to take back my damn ship."

  As the starship drifted aimlessly, as the aliens swarmed through her halls, King left the bridge.

  I'm coming for you, Hel'rah. This is between you and me. I'm going to make you regret the day you saw the starship Freedom.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  The Starship Freedom

  81 million kms from Earth

  08:52 December 26, 2199

  Emily collapsed in the duct, breathing heavily, bleeding from her leg and arm. The shadowy figure paused ahead, eyes gleaming. Emily still couldn't see who had saved her.

  "Whoever you are," Emily whispered, breathing heavily, "you saved my life. I thank you."

  Niles's exposed circuits cast a dim glow. The figure wriggled closer, coming into the light.

  She was a teenage girl. Her long brown hair lay across her face. Curious hazel eyes peered between the tangled strands. The girl wore a raggedy dress with many pockets, no shoes, and just one striped stocking. Oddly, an expensive-looking pendant hung around her neck from a shoelace. A gust of air moaned through the duct, blew back the girl's hair, and revealed an elfin face. Freckles sprinkled her upturned nose, and soot covered her cheeks.

  "Stowy's the name!" The girl held out her hand to shake. "Stowaway extraordinaire, rescuer of damsels in distress, slayer of spiders! Well, to be honest, I've only ever slain one spider, a tiny thing that crawled onto my leg. Them big alien ones are a doozy!"

  Emily tilted her head. "I know you. We met. Briefly. At the Fist of Freedom."

  Stowy grinned. "That's right! I remember! How silly of me to forget." She slapped her head. "One runs into so many princesses here in the HVAC ducts that they all kind of blend together."

  "All right, very funny." Emily rolled her eyes.

  The stowaway laughed. "You're silly. I like you." She giggled. "I'm sorry. It's just all funny! Isn't it? Giant spiders and princesses and talking dinosaurs eating your balls." Her giggling intensified. "I know I shouldn't laugh. Lots of people died. My mother always told me that. Stowy, she said, don't just laugh at dead people! Show some empathy! But I can't, you see. I have none! I don't think so. My mother said that the doctor said that I might even have autism, and that's why I'm so rude. I just blew that doctor a raspberry. Oh, by the way, she didn't really call me Stowy. My mom. I have a real name, but I left it somewhere. I can't find it now." She shrugged. "Maybe it'll pop up eventually." She began giggling again.

  Emily watched all this in silence. Niles leaned toward her.

  "I don't think she's quite right in the head, that one," the drone whispered.

  Shrieks echoed down the ductwork.

  A stench of oil and rancid meat filled the recirculated air.

  Both girls tensed. Stowy cocked her head, listening, and Emily gripped the hilt of her katana.

  Another shriek—closer.

  Claws clattered.

  Suddenly the entire duct was shaking.

  "They're coming into the ducts!" Emily whispered.

  "Impossible," Stowy said. "Those bugs are the size of baby elephants and even stinkier. They can't fit in here. They gotta just be making a racket above us."

  They listened for a moment longer. The screeches grew closer. Closer. The ducts rattled. The stench wafted. The shadows of long legs stretched around a bend in the duct.

  "Oh crumbs," Emily whispered.

  The creature emerged around the bend.

  For a moment Emily froze in terror. She stared.

  The rah had no abdomen. It must have detached that big, bloated part of its body like a lizard detaching its tail. The giant spider had essentially become a head with legs. Without the abdomen, the spider could squeeze into the ducts. It dragged itself forward, claws scraping the steel plates. The alien's jaws opened wide, ready to feast.

  "Oh, how dreadful!" Niles cried.

  More rahs scuttled behind the first one. They too had detached their abdomens. More alien cries rose, echoing. There were scores of them.

  "Come on, Emily!" Stowy cried. "Run! I mean—crawl! Hurry!"

  The girls crawled through the duct, and the spiders followed. The jaws snapped behind them, coming closer, meat grinders hungry for their limbs. Emily forgot about the pain in her wounds. All that mattered now was crawling.

  Even without their abdomens, the rahs were big creatures. If Emily curled up into a ball, she'd probably be smaller than those horrible heads. Their size slowed them down. The disembodied creatures dragged themselves through the ducts, banging their big hairy heads against the walls, scraping the steel, clumsy and cumbersome but still moving forward. They reminded Emily of bingo balls tumbling through tubes. That was, if bingo balls had jaws that could shame Oleg the Allosaurus.

  "We're done for!" Niles cried. "It's like I always feared. We're going to die in the darkness, devoured by spiders."

  "We're not dying yet," Emily said. "I have an idea."

  As she crawled, she reached into her pocket. She pulled
out the folded map of the starship Freedom, the one she had picked up when first docking inside the starship. She unfolded it, tried to read it as she crawled forward.

  "Niles, shine a light on this," Emily said.

  The drone hovered above, casting his dim light onto the map.

  "Hurry up, princess and robot!" Stowy said. "Stop reading and crawl faster."

  "We need to make our way to the engine room on this deck," Emily said. "According to the schematic, there's a deuterium reactor powering the promenade."

  "I know the way," Stowy said. "But why?"

  "I have an idea. Just trust me."

  Stowy nodded. "All righty. Forget the map. Just follow me. I know better than any map—trust me—my brain is full of maps and baby crocodiles. I'll take you to the engine room. If we're all gonna die anyway, we might as well be warm."

  They kept going and the spiders kept chasing.

  One of the rahs got close. Claws reached out, nearly grabbing them. Emily had to curl her legs inward, and she lost a shoe. The rah clambered closer, slobbering. Niles cried out and began stabbing at the spider, suffering a blow from a claw. The drone crashed into the duct wall. His jewels dislodged and spilled across the duct. The rah roared in rage.

  Emily lifted the fallen gemstones and hurled them.

  "My gems!" Niles cried. "Not my precious gems!"

  Emily ignored him and kept tossing the precious stones. She got a few in the rah's eyes. One gemstone lodged into an eyeball. The beast bellowed and stumbled back. More rahs were clambering behind it, desperate to reach the humans.

  "We're almost there!" Stowy said.

  They kept crawling, moving at a mad pace. Emily could feel the heat now. The duct rattled. The steel was getting so hot Emily winced. She could hear it below. The grinding, crackling inferno of the deuterium reactor. According to the ship's schematics, this engine powered the entire entertainment district. Dinogolf and all.

  The rahs scampered closer. They felt the heat too. It enraged them. They moved faster. Their legs reached out. One claw nicked Emily's heel, and she yowled. Stowy pulled her along. The engine rumbled below. The heat bathed them. Emily thought she would burn here, that she was cooking inside the ducts. Even the rahs cried out in pain. But they only moved faster.

  It was time.

  Emily stopped fleeing.

  She turned to face the rahs.

  The creatures filled the duct, craggy heads with ravenous mouths, red eyes and grinning sneers, dripping tongues and hungry maws. Horrors from deep space. Demons awoken into the world. Incubi in a nightmare she could not wake up from. Emily, a princess, a girl, a human—she knelt before them in the duct, and she stared. And the rahs stopped. She held them back with her gaze.

  "I am Emily, the Lady of the White Rose, the uncrowned Queen of Great Britain," she said. "In the name of my throne, of my nation, of my planet—I send you bastards to hell!"

  She thrust her katana.

  But not at the rah.

  Instead, she drove the blade into the duct. A hole gaped open in the steel plate. Emily began to saw, carving the ductwork open like a can.

  The heat blazed from below. Red light filled the duct. The engines churned below.

  Emily kept carving the steel.

  A rah leaped at her, trying to vault over the pit she had sawed open.

  Emily lashed her sword. The blade clanged against the alien's head. Sparks flew. The creature roared, raised its claws to strike … and then the duct crumpled beneath it.

  The alien tumbled into the jaws of the waiting engine. Gears grabbed the spider, crushed it, and pulled it into the mechanical depths.

  Another rah lunged.

  Emily swung her katana again. Another section of the duct ripped open. The rah tried to reach her, but the duct swayed. The opening widened. The entire structure was falling apart. Metal sheets detached. Screws came loose.

  The rah scrabbled for purchase, then slid down too. Screaming, the alien crashed into a magnetic field. The forces ripped it apart. Its scream died.

  Many spiders remained inside the duct, gazing across the pit at Emily. The lead rah opened its jaws wide, revealing a spinneret, and shot a strand of cobwebs at Emily. She sliced through it, then slashed her katana at a screw above. A screw that was holding the duct in place.

  The entire duct twisted, bent, and began to collapse.

  Rah after rah slid down the mangled chute. The churning, glowing, pumping engine grabbed them with gears like teeth, crushed them with its magnetic field, and digested them within its churning cauldrons of fusion.

  Emily fell with them.

  As the duct fell apart, she tumbled.

  A hand grabbed her.

  Stowy!

  Stowy still clung to what remained of the duct. Which wasn't much. Just a few slats of steel and some loose beams. But Stowy held on to the rickety bits of metal, and she pulled Emily up.

  "Saved ya again!" Stowy said and giggled.

  Emily climbed into what remained of the ductwork. A few more screws came loose. A beam bent. The two girls hurried, racing along the buckling duct until they left the engine room. Niles hurried behind them.

  Finally they crawled out a vent, finding themselves in an abandoned control room. Large windows overlooked the reactor chamber. Many rahs had fallen in, were burning, screaming as the great engine consumed them. They reminded Emily of souls tortured in hell, mutilated and strange.

  This starship has become hell, Emily thought.

  She swayed and slumped to the floor. Her wounds were bleeding, and there was something broken inside her. All around she heard the battle raging. Many rahs still filled the starship Freedom, and millions swarmed across Earth, and life had become a nightmare.

  "Emily? Emily!" Niles was nudging her.

  "Emily? You good?" Stowy was shaking her. "You good, Emily? You good?"

  But Emily could barely hear them. The darkness rolled over her, her head rolled back, and she drowned in an endless black sea.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  The Starship Freedom

  82 million kms from Earth

  09:32 December 26, 2199

  King marched down the corridors of the Freedom, passing by devastation.

  People lay dead everywhere, their bodies mangled. Some were Alliance soldiers. Many were civilian employees—the staff who cleaned the hotel rooms, cooked food, served tables, operated the amusement park rides, and did a hundred other jobs.

  But most of the dead were tourists. Many were women and children.

  King passed by a rah devouring the body of an old woman. The spider raised its eyes, glared at King, huffed, then lowered its head and kept eating. King walked by. He would not waste bullets on this creature.

  He was saving every bullet in his magazine for one particular spider.

  I'm coming for you, Hel'rah.

  As he stomped down the corridor, King sent out telepathic orders.

  "This is James King. Anyone in the midsection who can fight, track my beacon and join me."

  A security guard ran up, paunchy and mustached. Blood covered his uniform. He was a civilian contractor, one of the guys who guarded the amusement park. But he stood at attention and saluted. He held a smoking pistol in one hand.

  "Here to help, sir."

  "What's your name?" King asked.

  "Dennis, sir. Dennis Pibbs."

  "Where are you from?"

  "The Freedom Carnival, sir. I make sure the teenagers don't steal any of the plush animal prizes or hog the rides. Oh, you mean, where I'm from on Earth? New Jersey, sir. Well, born in Philly, but … yes, a Jersey boy."

  "Well, Dennis Pibbs from New Jersey, today you are a soldier. Today we go to war."

  Another man ran up. A tourist, judging by his Hawaiian shirt and flip-flops. He too saluted.

  "Here to help, sir! I found a gun on a dead soldier. I hope it's all right that I took it."

  The three of them walked down the corridor, and more joined them. A few were Alliance
soldiers. Most were not. Some carried guns. Most did not. Soon thirteen of them were marching down the hallway, heading toward the Libertas control room. Toward the terror that awaited there.

  Toward Hel'rah, prince of the alien empire.

  A rah came scrabbling down the corridor. They opened fire. They shot it down. They kept going.

  They fought their way through the ship. They stepped over corpses. Over severed limbs and pools of blood. They passed by a warehouse where a Mimori unit was battling twenty spiders or more. They raced by a pool where corpses floated and spiders swam through the red water.

  Finally they rose in an elevator, walked down a corridor, and there it was.

  The gunnery station.

  They stepped into a chamber the size of a church nave. Their footsteps echoed.

  When people saw the Freedom, it was usually on postcards, T-shirts, or posters. Sometimes they bought plastic models of the starship. Small images. Small toys. It was easy to underestimate the Freedom's true size. The fourteen cannons on top, the famous Angels of Liberty, perhaps looked small on the souvenirs. Just little guns jutting out from the hull like cannons from an old sailing ship. The sheer size of those cannons rarely sank in. Stand an Angel of Liberty up like an obelisk, and it would rise taller than the Statue of Liberty.

  The Angels' control rooms were appropriately enormous. Gears, valves, and hydraulic pumps covered the walls—the machinery to aim and fire the cannon. A chute dominated the room. It sloped from the hull toward the deck like a slide. At the bottom of the tube, gunners used to load the famous Maccabees—torpedoes larger than some small starships.

  King had been here just yesterday. He had stepped into Samson, the great mecha, and loaded fireworks into the chute. He never imagined he'd see this room again. Once more, Samson stood behind velvet ropes, his yellow paint peeling. Stowy was gone, but her apple core was still on the deck.