by Dan Moren
Oh come on. Third time lucky… This time he slammed the heels together as hard as he could, relying on that old tech maxim: when in doubt, use force.
With a zip, the gravboots sprung to life, glomming him to the deck with a satisfying thunk. He found himself pulled forward slightly by his momentum, but the lock held and he was able to steady himself.
Holy shit, I can’t believe any of that worked.
With his position finally stable, he had the opportunity to look around. At first, he was slightly confused by the fact that somebody had bolted so much equipment to the walls, until he realized that he was on the wall. He slowly clomped his way down until he reached the floor, and then tried taking in the room from a more sensible perspective.
He had to admit, it wasn’t as impressive as he’d hoped. When you heard “vault,” you pictured a room with lots of little boxes and sacks full of money.
This place looked more like a warehouse. It took him a moment to realize that the enormous metal rectangles he was looking at were the ends of long shelves, mounted on repulsor fields that allowed them to move together, compressing for storage, or farther apart for access.
At the end nearest him stood a console and a robotic arm. To the right of the console was a short conveyor belt and a hatch that looked like a small version of a lift tube door.
He made his way over to the console, which lit up as it sensed his approach and prompted him for a secure login.
An alert chimed softly in his ear, letting him know that he had only five minutes of oxygen remaining in his suit.
I guess that’s better than a klaxon blaring at me constantly.
Five minutes. What the hell was he going to do when he ran out of air? He spared a glance for the mission clock: thirty-five minutes to go. Too many clocks, all counting down. But the mission had to come first: the rest of the team was relying on him right now. Just like he was going to rely on them to figure out a way to get him out of here.
Toggling his comm on again, he crossed his fingers – metaphorically, anyway, given the thick nature of the vacuum suit gloves – that being back in the ship would cut through the interference.
“Aegis, this is Updraft. You copy?” He held his breath. Maybe that would help him use up less oxygen.
“Christ, you’re alive, Br… Updraft,” came Taylor’s voice, and Eli could hear the relief in it. “Aegis copies you three by three. Still some interference. Status?”
“Good to hear your voice too, Aegis. I’ve got a console here, could use your expertise.”
“Got an ID number on it?”
Eli poked closer at the console, looking around the edges until he found a plate labeled EK745J. He read the string off to Taylor.
“Looks like it’s on an isolated circuit, like the rest of the vault systems,” said Taylor. “Let’s see if our signal’s good enough for a remote link. I’m grabbing control of your comm systems.”
An alert popped up on Eli’s HUD, asking if he wanted to accept the remote connection. Tapping a button on his sleeve, he granted access, and a screen of text scrolled across, way too fast for him to read.
“Whoa, whoa, what are you doing?”
“Downloading my hack toolkit into your sleeve,” said Taylor. “I should be able to use it to launch an exploit onto that console over a short-range wireless connection.”
“Oh, sure. I mean, I could have done that.”
“Uh huh. Pipe down and let me work.”
Eli watched as the text window in his HUD miniaturized; another icon indicated the wireless connection in his sleeve, which was linked to his suit, had gone active, and a moment later, the console in front of him blinked off, then seemed to cycle through a restart. When it reappeared, there was no login prompt, just what appeared to be the device’s standard user interface.
“OK,” said Taylor. “You’re in. See what you can do with that.”
Leaning forward, Eli examined the controls. A pair of directional pads seemed to allow manual control of the robotic arm, but there was also a search box and keyboard for entering a particular container ID.
“Uh, we don’t know which box is Xi’s, do we?” said Eli.
“There should be a way to search by the name attached to the box.”
Eli bent down and tapped at a few of the keys. It wasn’t the most logically laid out system, but he supposed that it was mainly intended as a backup. Still, you ought to take pride in your work, even if was only going to get used every once in a while, say, by a team of special operatives looking to steal something out of–
“Got it!” he said as a search box labeled “Name” appeared. He typed in “Xi, Ofeibia” with smug satisfaction, but his face fell as it displayed a dozen different hits. “Uh, looks like she has more than one.” Of course she has more than one, it’s her ship. Another chime reminded him about his low oxygen levels; he ignored it – it was hardly news.
As he watched, one of the items on the list started blinking. Movement registered in the corner of his eyes and he flinched backward, but it was only the robotic arm moving towards the shelves. As he watched, two of the storage units slid slowly apart and the arm trundled its way down the long aisle between them.
Eli looked back down at the display as he realized what was happening. “Aegis, somebody just requested a box attached to Xi’s name. 3263A27. Any chance that’s not the one we’re looking for? It’s heading for vault access room six.”
“Shit,” said Taylor. “I’ve lost contact with Corsair, but his last signal put him in the vault access complex.”
“Wait a second,” said Eli, looking down at the console, and then back at the open square of the hatch behind him, his heart thumping in his chest. “If we could just retrieve the box from up there, why the hell did I have to go through all of that?”
“Updraft, he–”
“No!” said Eli. “I almost died out there. A couple times! You think that was easy? I could have been stuck in a wormhole forever. Well, at least until my air ran out, and then I would have just slowly suffocated!” His breath was coming in ragged gasps now. His eyes darted to his HUD, still counting down the amount of oxygen left in the suit’s reserve – two and a half minutes. No wonder he was starting to feel dizzy. “Actually, I might still be suffocating in he–”
“Eli.”
He blinked past his lightheadedness. Taylor wasn’t one to breach communications protocol. “What?”
“I’m trying to tell you: he couldn’t have retrieved the box by himself. I think we’ve got a problem.”
CHAPTER 24
Xi and two of her goons – each of whom looked like they could deadlift Kovalic with one hand while eating a sandwich – had frog-marched him into the vault access room, past the wide-eyed receptionist. Sayers followed, and if the KO gun in her hand wasn’t pointed directly at Kovalic, it wouldn’t be any trouble for her to stun him before he could act.
They had stepped into the first available vault access room and, without any preamble, Xi had waved her bespangled arm over the security console, then keyed in a box number: 3263A27.
There had been a whine as the system had powered up, red warning lights around the hatch alerting them that a lockbox was being retrieved, and then Xi had turned back to him, smile still firmly in place.
“So you decompressed the vault. Bravo. I’m not sure exactly what you thought you’d achieve, but it doesn’t change anything: the access shaft’s emergency airlocks will repressurize it and ensure the system continues to function normally.” She spread her hands. “Consider your bluff called.”
Kovalic kept his grin nonchalant, trying not to show too many teeth. Bluff called, indeed. Here’s hoping that he was holding the right cards.
So far the deck seemed pretty stacked against him: Sayers might have loosened her grip on the KO gun, but it was still the closest weapon and he was still on the wrong side of it; Xi’s two guards, meanwhile, were flanking the only door out of the room. The odds were most assuredly not in his favor.
Xi seemed to be enjoying Kovalic’s discomfort with the utter serenity of someone who knows they have the upper hand. With a swish of her luminescent dress, she considered him.
“You’re not the first to try and steal from me, you know. It’s been attempted from time to time.”
“Might want to up your insurance.”
She laughed, this time a tinny jangling sound not dissimilar from the bracelets around her wrist. “None have ever succeeded. And generally they don’t live to tell the tale.”
Kovalic barely avoided rolling his eyes. Live to tell the tale? What was this, a pirate-themed amusement park ride? “Well, I’m sorry to break your perfect record.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, major,” said Xi, running one finger across the console in an almost languorous manner. “The jury is still out.”
“I hate to break it to you, Aegis, but he’s not the only one in trouble,” said Eli, watching his oxygen gauge deepen from orange to red. “I’ve only got two minutes of air left.”
“Jesus, Updraft. What the hell happened to your… no, never mind. We’ve got to get you out of there.”
“Yeah,” said Eli, looking around the compartment again. Besides the console and the shelves there wasn’t much in there. “My options are kind of limited. I can’t exactly go back the way I came. Can you re-pressurize this compartment?”
He heard Taylor’s teeth click together over the comm channel. “Not quickly enough. It’s a lot easier to pull a fire alarm than to turn one off.”
Eli swallowed and tried to push down the panic rising in his chest. “OK. OK.” If there wasn’t a way to get air in the vault, then he needed to get out. The only problem was that there was just one door: the one that he’d come in – hence the whole point of the spacewalk in the first place. Maybe there were some emergency suits in here? It was a halfhearted hope at best – nobody was supposed to be in the vault during flight. Just that stupid robot arm.
As if on cue, the robot arm whirred silently back in his direction, now bearing a metal box the size of a small suitcase.
Presumably the exact box they were looking for. Not that Eli had any way of getting it out of here. Or opening it. Frankly, he was going to be insanely lucky if he managed to survive the next two minutes.
The arm trundled over to the now-moving conveyor belt and laid the box down on it. Lights started blinking around the small hatch, which had slid open as the container rolled towards it.
Well, technically, he supposed there was another way out of here.
Wait a second, “technically” is all I need.
“Updraft, I’m going to get you out of there,” said Taylor. “Just give me a minute.”
“Commander, I don’t have a minute,” said Eli, watching the oxygen gauge plummet towards zero. “But I do have an idea.”
*
A muted klaxon sounded in the vault access room as the hatch to the vault slid open. The conveyor belt in front of it began to move in expectation of the container that would shortly appear there.
Kovalic wasn’t holding his breath exactly, but he did find himself unconsciously shifting weight to the balls of his feet, ready to act. He willed himself to relax, shook the tension out of his muscles. If he moved, Sayers would just stun him, and that would be the end of that. Without some sort of distraction, he was easy pickings. So his best option, for the moment, was to play this out, one way or another.
The lockbox hovered into view in the access shaft, then gently floated out and landed on the conveyor belt, which rolled it forward, depositing it on a metal table. Behind it, the hatch closed again.
Xi’s lidded eyes roved to Kovalic, the carefully sketched brows rising. “Looks like my property is perfectly intact, Major Kovalic.” She stepped up to the table and placed a possessive hand on the box. “A rather pathetic attempt at a bluff.”
Kovalic fought blasé with blasé. “If you trust it’s still in there.”
A flicker of annoyance played in Xi’s eyes. “You expect me to believe you somehow removed it and replaced the container? Really, major? Such superhuman feats!”
He couldn’t resist letting a smile cross his lips. “Your words, not mine, madam. If you’re satisfied, then we can all certainly leave,” he said, gesturing to the door.
Xi’s lips thinned, but she turned back to the box and pressed a button on the top; a grid of light splashed over her face. A beep sounded as she was recognized, a green light blinking. The box’s display shifted to a keypad, on which she entered a code. A second beep, a second green light. Finally she waved a bracelet over the panel on top, and a third green light blinked along with the confirmation beep
Kovalic glanced at Sayers. Getting all three necessary factors to open the lockbox would have been nigh impossible. The container lid unsealed with a hiss as the pressure equalized.
“Corsair,” his earbud crackled suddenly, Nat’s voice coming through. “You’re about to have company.”
Kovalic’s brows knit and he spared a glance at the door where the two thugs still stood guard. Company? Who else could possibly show up at this party?
Xi lifted the lid off the lockbox and placed it on the table, then reached in with both hands and removed a fabric-wrapped object about the size of a small painting canvas. She began slowly unwinding the fabric until it uncovered a rectangular tablet about an inch thick, with sharp, laser-cut edges. Despite looking to be made of some sort of metal, it was apparently light enough that Xi could lift it with ease.
She placed it down on the table next to the container and finished unwrapping the tablet; it gleamed where the light hit it.
Xi smiled, basking in the glow from the tablet and then turned to Kovalic. “The Aleph Tablet. Intact and unstolen. Despite your best attempts.”
At that moment, a klaxon sounded and the lights around the vault hatch began to blink again. The small door slid open and the eyes of everyone in the room turned quizzically toward it.
“What the fuck is going on?” Xi demanded.
Something in Kovalic’s mind clicked, which meant he was the only one in the room who was ready for what happened next.
A loud whoop echoed up the shaft, ricocheting around the room, and followed a moment later by what appeared to be a ballistic Eli Brody, who exploded out of the hatch like a cork from a champagne bottle. The force of his exit was enough to slam him, with a solid thud, into the empty container that had recently held the tablet. That in turn flew right into Xi, who was knocked to the floor.
Kovalic’s body caught up with his brain and he whirled towards Sayers to wrest the KO gun from her grip, but to his surprise, she was already bringing the weapon to bear on the guards at the door.
The pair of goons reacted slower than everybody else, with perhaps the exception of Brody, who was lying on the table, hands scrabbling at his helmet.
Blue rings of force issued from the KO gun, but where the two guards should have been knocked insensate, the stun field dissipated harmlessly off them with a telltale shimmer. Sayers gaped at the weapon as if it had betrayed her.
Kovalic redirected his movement from her to the guards, launching himself at one before the man could draw the weapon from his own belt. His tackle caught the big man in the midriff, knocking the air out of both of them and sending them toppling to the deck. The guard’s hand had gone to his sidearm, but Kovalic grabbed the wrist with both hands, trying to prevent him from clearing the holster. Behind him, he saw a blur as Sayers made a similar move, peppering the other guard with blows to the mid-section like she was working a body bag.
Leaning heavily on the arm of the guard, Kovalic tried to bring his right elbow around to catch the man in the jaw, but there just wasn’t enough leverage to deal any significant amount of force. The guard’s other hand, the one not trying to get to his gun, clutched at Kovalic’s throat. He could feel the strong, calloused fingers trying to get purchase around his windpipe, and tried to pull his head back out of reach.
A heavy boo
t appeared from Kovalic’s peripheral vision, hitting home on the guard’s temple. Dazed, the thug’s arm went limp to his side and Kovalic relieved him of his sidearm. Nearby, Brody, who had ditched the helmet of his vacsuit, was bent over, trying to catch his breath.
“What the hell was that?” Kovalic managed as he rolled off the guard.
“You’re welcome!”
“Save it,” said Kovalic, climbing to his feet. Sayers was still nimbly dodging the other guard’s blows while trying to dart in whenever there was an opening, but she was getting tired a lot faster than the slab of plasticrete she was punching.
“Why the hell didn’t the stun work?” Sayers yelled.
“Disruption matrix,” said Kovalic, leaning over and yanking open the unconscious guard’s tunic. A net of shimmering silver lay beneath, atop of what was clearly nanoweave body armor. “Not cheap, but it cancels out stun fields by broadcasting an equal and opposite wave of energy. Kind of like noise-canceling headphones.”
“Thanks for the educational tip,” called a breathless Sayers, narrowly ducking a fist the size of a softball. “Little help over here?”
“So we’re on the same side again?”
“You told me to get close to her. Work any angle! I saw an opportunity!” Sayers protested, landing a kick to the man’s gut. He grabbed the foot with both of his hands and swung her around into the bulkhead; she gave an oof as the wind was knocked out of her.
Brody exchanged a glance with Kovalic. “We are helping her, right?”
Kovalic sighed, but as the man was distracted with trying to throttle Sayers, he came up from behind and clubbed him hard on the head with the butt of the KO gun. The guard faltered, his knees weakening; Sayers broke his chokehold and slid down the wall, coughing and clutching at her throat. Her foot lashed up and caught the man right between the legs. He grunted and slowly fell to his knees; Kovalic pistol whipped him again and he went down for the count.
He glanced over towards Xi, but the box had clocked her hard, and she still wasn’t moving.
“So,” said Sayers, leaning against the wall, eyes closed as she rubbed her neck. “Was that all part of the plan?”
