The Man Who Broke the Moon

by Michael James Ploof

  Just then a commotion shook Zeus. They both grew quiet, waiting for the telltale sign of trouble. The sirens.

  They began to wail, echoing off the metal walls of the spaceship with a tinny report, and red emergency lights finally illuminated the cell. For a moment the light and the noise were too disorienting, but Jason grew used to it quickly and considered his options. He could try to get out of the cuffs, but that would probably make his wrists much worse, especially if Pal really put effort into making the damned things more of a torture device than a restraint. It sure felt like he had. He could try to contact someone, but the ship’s emergency systems were engaged. His crew would be looking for him anyway, unless Pal had already done something to them.

  With any luck, one of them would happen upon him and Charlie in their cell, but the question remained whether anyone could do anything without overriding Pal’s security measures. As he had said earlier, he was the one in control of the ship.

  Charlie looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “You look like shit, Cap!” she yelled over the sirens. “But it’s your lucky day.”

  Jason was confused for a moment until she pointed upward. He looked and was pleased to find that Pal had hung him on an old pressure line. Zeus was so old that half of the junk inside of it didn’t even have a use. The line he was suspended on was one such example of the ship’s history of obsolescence. Kaito had installed his own system of piping that he had sworn would act to regulate air pressure in the ship. Of course, the first version didn’t work. None of Kaito’s prototypes worked, but eventually the updated models did, and he installed them to accommodate the old-school light system Jason wanted. The fleet wasn’t very happy, but when Kaito showed them that his system used minimal power they were quick to adapt their own version and install it. Of course, they never did the work of removing Kaito’s old components, and this one seemed thin and rusty enough that it might break. Of course, that would mean pulling down on the cuffs with his entire weight.

  He looked at Charlie with wide eyes and shook his head.

  She rolled her eyes and leapt to grab onto the pipe. She stuck to it like an expert rock climber might and began to jerk her weight up and down. The pipe shook and groaned, but they didn’t have any luck. She looked at him with frustration and shouted through the sirens “Together!”

  He gritted his teeth and they counted to three. It didn’t work.

  They tried again and again, until, on the fourth try, just when Jason had determined the pain to be too much, the pipe broke. Jason fell to the ground in a heap and groaned against the pain for a long while. Then, biting his lip and stealing his resolve, he stood and stretched. He didn’t know how long he had been up there, but he was stiff. That, and he was covered in his own blood.

  He looked at where Pal had been sitting before and noticed scratches in the floor. He walked over and looked at the floor. In the metal a shaky hand had etched the words: Captain. Apologies. Admiral override. Remote control. Be careful. He is coming.

  “Charlie!” Jason gestured for her to come read the etching.

  “Shit,” she said under her breath.

  The ship shook again and they both looked at each other with concern.

  “Shit,” they said in unison.

  “Do you really think it’s him?” asked Charlie. “Why would he be doing all this? He’s the one who oversaw the entire division of this area of the fleet. This mission is his life’s work. Why would he sacrifice that?”

  Jason didn’t need to think hard to know the answer. Pal had already told him.

  Chapter 22

  Jail Break

  Jason could still remember well the day Thomas died, for it was etched in his mind as his greatest mistake. For that mistake he had been promoted, and now, he realized, he would pay.

  It was war. Like his old squad commander used to say, ‘either you’re unlucky enough to live or you’re unlucky enough to die.’ They had been in the middle of the second Korean War then. Jason was still rising through the ranks and had been doing well. But at that point he hadn’t learned much about what his superior had meant.

  As squadron commander, Jason led a group of specialized insurgents behind enemy lines to hijack the newest addition to the Korean fleet. A ship that had been spoken as legend. The higher-ups knew it was real, of course, and they wanted it. They could only trust a group of young up and comers to do something so brash as trying to steal it, and in that group was Jason Eriksson, Erik Andal, Fushi Yagamoto, Thomas Tucker, and Jose Silva. Jason hadn’t expected Thomas to be included, but the admiral must have pulled some strings in a last-ditch attempt for his son to achieve some sort of glory.

  They had infiltrated the elite military air fleet disguised as prisoners of war being led by Fushi himself. The man had been undercover in Korea for years, working as a double agent. Everything had gone according to plan up until the last few moments. After waiting for night to fall, Fushi sent the security systems haywire, warning of an attack. In the chaos they had easily snuck into the ship bay, not needing to dispatch any enemies on the way. When they arrived, however, they had a band of militants waiting for them, and then...

  Jason felt a gun in his back. He turned his head enough to see Fushi behind him.

  “Fushi, are you happy to see me or what?” he whispered, annoyed.

  In reply Fushi pistol whipped him in the back of the head and took a step back, training his gun on the next in line as a band of North Korean soldiers slipped out of the shadows to disarm Jason’s group. But somehow, Jose had been ready. The man was always ready.

  With no warning, Jose dropped a flash bang grenade and grabbed Jason, who just happened to be right next to him.

  Jason and Jose managed to escape across the bay and bunker down behind a pallet of ammo.

  Fushi whistled then. “Come out, Jason. Your squad is incapacitated.”

  Jason stifled a curse and peered over the box. He looked at Fushi. The man was holding Thomas close, a gun to his head.

  “What now?” Jose whispered beside Jason.

  Fushi yelled to them before Jason could reply. “Go ahead and take the ship, Jason. We just wanted the admiral’s son. God knows why the idiot would send his son on this mission. This little bastard right here is a huge bargaining chip.” Fushi looked at Thomas as one might a child. “Aren’t you, little guy?”

  Jason frowned with confusion. “Jose, get to the ship and get it ready to leave.”

  He dared stand to face Fushi, gulping as he imagined a blaster hole appearing between his eyes. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Look, Jason, the ship is better than any the U.N. has, but it’s not the best we’ve got. It’s a decoy. We were going to put an elite strike force on the ship before it was stolen. Let them infiltrate, send back some intelligence, blow some shit up. They sure would have done some damage. But, when I found out the admiral’s little guy here was coming, of course we changed the plan quick.” Fushi rolled his eyes. “I like you enough I don’t want to kill you Eriksson. Now take the ship, revel in the glory of it. Just destroy your cam and say it happened in the heat of battle. Happens all the time after all. You and Jose will be heroes.”

  “You know I can’t do that.”

  Fushi cocked his pistol and aimed it at Thomas’s head.

  “You won’t shoot him,” Jason said confidently. “He’s part of your whole stupid plan. Nice monologuing, by the way. What a cliché.”

  Fushi inclined his head impatiently, one of his tells, and aimed his gun at Erik. “Well then, I’ll just kill your best friend. I’ll count down, Jason. If you put your gun down Erik lives, we destroy both your body cams, and you and Jose go on to become heroes. If not...” He shrugged his shoulders.

  “Ten...”

  Jason hadn’t signed up for this. All the training and all the work he had put in hadn’t prepared him. It couldn’t have. Suddenly things were surreal. He was being asked to make an impossible choice.

  “Nine...”

 
; He couldn’t abandon his men.

  “Eight...”

  No man left behind Jason

  “Seven...”

  You have your own family to worry about.

  “Six...”

  Erik is your family.

  “Five...”

  I don’t have to play his game.

  “Four...”

  I’ve got a clear line on him.

  “Three...”

  God please, just once.

  “Two...”

  Jason emphatically raised his hands and dropped them back. “OKAY!”

  Fushi inclined an eyebrow. “Drop your weapon.”

  Erik sighed, and Jason bent to put down his pistol, but at the last second, he took his shot, aimed right down the barrel at Fushi. Except, he hit Thomas.

  He killed Thomas.

  The gun dropped from Jason’s hand as everyone watched Thomas fall, and he vaguely heard Erik yelling at him as his squad tackled Fushi and the others. He couldn’t stop staring at Thomas’s eyes. He looked so shocked, and it wouldn’t change. His face was stuck. His body was still. The man Jason had once called a friend lay unmoving, a blaster hole still blowing smoke out of the back of his head. But for that he almost looked normal. Jose had pulled Jason onto the ship in the commotion. Jason couldn’t remember any of that, or the ride, just Thomas’s face.

  When he and Jose had returned, they were hailed as heroes, and only a select few ever saw the footage of those final moments. Even Jose never learned the truth. He had been powering up the ship and hadn’t come for Jason until Thomas was already dead. He reported that the man had been shot by the enemy. It haunted Jason for years, only lessened by Erik’s eventual forgiveness, years after his return from captivity. That man was never the same, and though they held a mutual respect, the friends they had been were as dead as Thomas.

  “Jason, snap out of it!”

  Charlie shook him and pointed down the hall. Killian was walking toward them wearing a frown. Behind him Pal turned the corner and started down the hallway at a full sprint, ready to trap Killian or smash into him.

  Jason frantically banged against the door, urging the man to open it, but it seemed he could not. Jason began to punch the glass as hard as he could, but he knew it didn’t matter. Pal controlled the ship. Pal controlled everything. He and Charlie stepped back from the door as Pal grew closer, and finally Killian noticed him. He had less than a second to register the robot flying at him, and as soon as they made contact the door opened and the two came barreling inside. Jason was ready for it, though. This time he wouldn’t let another of his crew be trapped by this fucking robot.

  As soon as the two flew through, Jason smashed into them, and though Pal had been moving very fast, he didn’t weigh much, and with a lot of help from Killian, Jason managed to push back enough for them all to fall upon the threshold of the cell. Charlie quickly hopped over them, but Pal reached up and snatched her foot at the last moment, sending her careening into the floor. The four became a chaotic pile of flailing limbs and jerking metal as everyone struggled to rise. Pal seemed to be hell-bent on keeping them in the brig and didn’t seem concerned of causing them all harm. Pal jerked hard on Charlie’s ankle. Jason heard bone snap, and Charlie cried out. Pal had him by the cuffs and was jerking this way and that, inflicting even more damage.

  Things were bad, and no one was going to help them. Jason tried to think through the pain. And at last came up with something desperate to get through to the robot, for he knew Pal was in there somewhere.

  “Pal, knock knock!”

  Pal paused for a moment. That was all they needed. They quickly untangled themselves from the robot and scurried out of the cell.

  “S-s-sir?” said Pal, glancing up at him confusedly through the open door.

  “Pal, is it you?” asked Jason a little too hopefully.

  Pal seemed to be struggling to move. “Y-Yes, sir. But I am compelled to detain you. Please return to the brig.”

  “Pal, you have been hacked. You have to fight it!” said Charlie.

  “He’s a goddamn robot,” said Killian. He can’t fight his programming.

  Pal only twitched. “System scan initiated.”

  Jason had a bad feeling that the robot was about to go terminator again. He had to go out on a limb. “Pal, I am the commander of this ship!”

  The robot jerked its head toward Jason.

  He cleared his throat, hoping he could keep speaking. “And I command you to close the doors to the brig.”

  For a moment nothing happened, and then Pal looked at Jason and displayed a pouty face emoji. “Yes, sir. Until next time, Captain.”

  Jason let out a bated breath. “Until next time, Pal.”

  With that the door closed on the robot, separating its torso from the waist.

  “That should buy us some time.”

  Chapter 23

  The Ninth Planet

  “Warning, warning. Incoming vessels. Warning, warning,” came Jane’s voice, with none of the urgency that the statement called for.

  “Son of a bitch,” said Jason, looking at Killian and shaking his head. Then he perked up for a moment. “Computer, repeat.”

  Jane’s voice returned, THE Jane! “Warning, Captain, incoming vessels.”

  It seemed that Pal, or the admiral, no longer had control of the ship. Zeus was back in Jason’s hands.

  Jason whooped loudly. “It’s good to hear your voice, Jane. I’ve missed you!”

  “Yes, sir,” said Jane.

  Killian helped Jason out of his bonds and together they helped Charlie to the bridge.

  The alarm still rang out in the ship, and the red lights pulsed urgently, but Jason felt better than he had in days. The withdrawal symptoms were gone, and Pal’s pill should have worn off a while ago, if it even did anything in the first place. Who knew what the crazed robot might have given Jason? Thinking back, Jason had the strange suspicion that his withdrawals might have been caused entirely by the robot, or by whatever the hell that alien drive was doing to him.

  Jason strode to his seat at the head of the bridge and sat at his station with purpose. He looked out over the bridge, surveying his domain as a lord might.

  Killian sat at his station, everything around him a crisp and shining example of the highest standard of military excellence. Erik sat to his right, his great-grandfather’s WW2 helmet holding his zippo and cigars. The man was staring at the strange doll he had taken from the POW camp he’d been in. Charlie sat with her foot up. Mae was trying like hell to salvage Jason’s hands. To the right Kaito’s station sat empty, looking as if it had been abandoned by a mad scientist.

  Jason looked toward the middle of the room to the main holo-screen. The image pixelated and sharpened, before zooming in on the two Russian Valkyries. He winced in pain as Mae worked on him. “How far?”

  “They will intercept Zeus in exactly four hours, sir.”

  “Jane, can you make us go any faster?”

  “I could override the safety on the propulsion systems. However, it would be very dangerous, and the increase in velocity needed to outpace the ships would result in an 80 percent chance of malfunction or destruction. I do not advise this course of action.”

  “What course of action do you advise?”

  “Studying scenarios ...The best course of action is to use the hybrid drive to escape.”

  “We can’t use that until we’re out of the solar system,” said Jason. “Killian?”

  “Sir, I originally found you to tell you that there is an unknown vessel attached to the ship. However, it isn’t showing on any of the systems. It’s what was making those noises earlier, and you can see it from the window off the medical bay.”

  “Is it the Russians?”

  “No, sir, it’s one of ours,” Killian responded.

  “Sir,” said Jane. “The likelihood that the hybrid drive will open a black hole in the solar system, which is the single reason for the launch to take place outside of the Terminati
on Shock, is 1 in 27,927.”

  “Yeah? Well, I’ve got ten billion reasons that we can’t take that risk. Besides, we have another fucking ship on us! What’s the second-best course of action?”

  “A preemptive strike, sir.”

  “We can’t stand up to two Valkyries, not with our aft cannons, and if we slow down we’re dead. There aren’t enough of us to man the fighters needed to defend against their drone swarm.”

  “Zeus is still equipped with the Lightning Bolt,” said Jane. “The weapon used to destroy Luna 1.”

  “Thanks for the reminder, Jane, but the targets are too small.”

  “But there is a target we could use,” said Charlie, grunting at her station and swiping up onto the main screen an image of Pluto. “We could slingshot around Pluto in about an hour.”

  “You aren’t saying what I think you’re saying,” said Erik.

  Suddenly the doors to the bridge opened, and a robotic hand came into view, clutching the floor.

  “It is a good-good-good plan, sir,” said the robot. He was dragging his torso and what was left of his legs behind him, clawing forward slowly.

  “Oh Jesus! Pal, enter sleep mode,” said Jason.

  The robot only tilted its head and looked at Jason. “I do not believe I have to follow your orders anymore, Captain. But I do want to be your friend.”

  “Uh, okay, Pal. But I need you to go keep an eye on the ship outside of the medical bay. Report anything back to me. Then we can be friends.”

  “I would like that, sir. Then I will have two friends, you and the little girl.”

  Jason blanched.

  They watched the robot leave in silence and then Charlie shrieked at him. “Why don’t you KILL that damn thing?”