Ghost in the Machine (Corwint Central Agent Files)

by C. E. Kilgore

  “When did these guys get so organized?” Tara scoffed.

  “Want me to stop and ask?” Hank changed course again and headed towards open space. He hit the com unit on his display. “Ethan, I know you’re busy, but we could really use your he...”

  “I figured as much with the way you were driving.” Ethan walked onto the bridge and Hank closed the com-line. He headed straight for his station and connected himself with Zera’s system. “I read eight fighters coming at us from ten, fifteen and twelve, and another group of eleven fighters coming from that asteroid belt at negative forty, ten and eight.”

  “Don’t guess the same trick would work twice?” Hank asked hopefully.

  “Not in this part of space.” Ethan replied. “Not a single protonic cluster within a least two parsecs.”.

  “Dammit. Well I guess that would’ve just been too easy.” Hank turned to Tara. “You know how I hate to run, but get the engine charged for a jump to warp.”

  Several hits rocked the ship and a console next to Tara sparked. She tapped angrily at her console. “Well I would if those shits didn’t just knock out our long range sensory array.”

  “Seriously?” Hank ran his hands through his hair. They couldn’t run, so it looks like they were going to have to fight their way out of this. He looked over his shoulder at Brom. “Are they avoiding are targeting again?”

  “No way, Cap.” Brom grinned. “After that last fight, I gave the ole gal a bit of a talk’n to and we sorted out her targeting issues.” To prove his point, Brom brought up a new overlay, targeted and fired photonic grenades at three ships. Two of the photonic grenades hit on target, but the third missed as the T’jaros fighter fluctuated its shield frequency. The grenade arced suddenly, relocking on to the ship’s new frequency, and hit the T’jaros from behind.

  Hank smiled with relief. “Light ‘em up, Brom!”

  “Thought you’d never ask!”

  Hank banked the ship and headed for the ships coming out of the asteroid belt. If they wanted his ship, he was going to damn well shove it up their drug-addicted asses. A few hits from the fighters behind them struck through the shielding, but he remained focused on the larger group. Holding Zera on a steady trajectory for Brom, he watched with an admitted pleasure as the Orellian turned the pirates into piles of floating debris.

  “Looks like they weren’t expecting that. They are making a run for it.” Ethan changed the readout to show the group behind them dispersing and the remaining two ahead of them disappearing into the asteroid belt. “Should we pursue?”

  “No.” Hank was surprised by his own answer. Maybe he was getting old, or maybe the Jhonis vibes he was channeling earlier were still hanging around. Either way, he knew they had more important things to worry about than chasing down a few stupid T’jaros. “Find us a good hiding spot in that asteroid belt to hang out for a bit while we tally the damage.”

  “Understood.” Ethan took the piloting back from Hank’s manual control and located a suitably stable asteroid with a magnetic field that would help mask the remaining hole in their own graphene reflector shields. After getting the Zera settled into a synchronistic tether to the asteroid, he headed to the bridge to find part of the console next to Tara on fire.

  “Careful, T.” Brom grabbed one of the fire suppressant containers from a storage compartment in the wall. He pulled the pin on the side of the nozzle and aimed it at the console panel. The electronics inside the panel sparked and the fizzled as the small fire died. The smell of burnt wiring filled the bridge.

  Hank cursed as he stood and slapped the headrest of his chair. “I’ve had just about enough of those assholes tearing up my ship!”

  “Not too bright, those T’jaros.” Brom placed the half spent suppressant container back into the storage compartment. “You’d think they would figure out by now that their puny little fighters aren’t a match for us.”

  Ethan headed to the stats panel and started loading up a few system overlays onto the main viewer. “They were up to something this time, though. Their attacks were pretty specific.”

  Tara grabbed a tool kit and headed over to the smoking console. She turned off power to the console, then pulled out a long screwdriver and used it to move aside some of the now fused and smoldering wiring. “Damn. Looks like the whole main board for the long range sensor array is going to have to be replaced.”

  Ethan looked over the rest of the ship from the main viewer on the bridge. “Everything else is undamaged. Life support, communications, short range sensors and the engines were all left alone in the attack. They specifically targeted our long range navigation array. We can fly, but we’ll have to keep it under full impulse until we can get the long ranged sensors fixed. It’s like they wanted to slow us down.”

  Hank didn’t like being toyed with by a bunch of lousy space pirates. “How long?”

  Tara was already elbow deep in the wiring, trying to disengage the mainboard from the console. “You know I’m more of a grease monkey than a computer jockey, Hank.” Tara gave a heavy grunt and yanked hard on the board. It came loose from its connectors and she wrangled it out from the mess of wiring. She examined it for a moment, then held it up for Ethan to see. “Looks pretty fried to me.”

  Ethan frowned and took the circuit board. “Looks like the main chip has been fused. We don’t have a spare main board for this system, so I’m going to have to repair this one. A day, maybe, if I can find a suitable chip replacement and the rest of the board doesn’t give me any trouble.”

  “It will take me that long at least to replace the wiring in this panel, anyway.” Tara reached for her wire cutters and dug in.

  “What about Orynn?” Brom rubbed a hand across his bald head. He didn’t know much about circuit boards, but he figured this couldn't be much different than the other things she had been working on. “Maybe she could do her mind-trick-floaty-thing?”

  “Good thinking, Brom.” Hank caught himself staring at Tara’s backside as she crawled halfway into the panel. “I know she’s tired, but it’s worth a try. Ethan, want to take that board to her and see?”

  “I’ll go.” Tara backed herself out of the panel and pulled a blue wire from her hair.

  “No, I need you to keep working on that panel.” Hank gave her a stern look when she opened her mouth to protest. He still needed to explain things to her, but now wasn’t the time.

  “Fine.” Tara turned to crawl back under the console. “Has anyone heard from her since we left Tir?”

  Ethan shook his head as Hank gave him a questioning glance. “I stopped by her quarters as we were departing, but she wasn’t answering and her shower was running.”

  “Alright.” Hank stepped around his chair and hit the com panel on his display. He hit the button indicated for the guest quarters and listened as it beeped over and over. “Could she be asleep?”

  “Through all that?” Brom shook his head. “Not even I could sleep through that.”

  Ethan set down the circuit board and walked over to a nearby panel to bring up the internal sensory display. “The gravity in her room is still at one hundred percent and the shower is still running. Zera, report on vital readings from crew member Orynn.”

  “Command confirmed. One moment while scan is performed.” Zera’s voice filled the bridge com speakers. An anxious few seconds passed. “Scan complete. Life readings from crew member Orynn are unstable. Crew member unresponsive to verbal request. Breathing has slowed to eighty percent and physical pressure ratings of her skeletal structure are increasing at a dangerous rate. Recommend immediate medical attention.”

  “Shit.” Ethan pulled open the wall panel above the fire suppressant canisters and removed a small medical case. “Zera, reset the environmental setting in Orynn’s quarters for Vesparian.”

  Zera gave an argumentative error beep. “Unable to comply. Connection to environmental control in corridor C has been compromised by electrical fire. Recommend immediate repair.”

  “Thanks.” E
than scowled at the faceless voice as he headed towards the bridge exit in long hurried strides.

  “What about the medical bay?” Hank started to follow Ethan out the door.

  “You stay.” Ethan turned and held his hand up to Hank, then turned to Tara. “Tara, your assistance please.”

  “Me?” Tara stood up and dropped her wire cutters back to her tool box.

  “Her?” Hank figured Tara would be the last person Ethan wanted to spend any time with at the moment.

  “Her shower is still running.” Ethan left it at that and left the bridge.

  “So she could still be naked, got it.” Tara jogged after Ethan and did her best to keep up with his effortless strides.

  Ethan’s mind was racing with worse-case scenarios, and his concern grew with each step. Had she collapsed before or during the battle? When he had come to her room earlier, had she been hurt then? Had he made another mistake, and would this one cost him everything?

  Deep in his thoughts, he almost passed the door by. Tara tried the access panel, but the door was locked and unresponsive. Ethan opened the facing on the access panel and found the wires fused. “Looks like more of the ship’s wiring was affected then we thought. Zera, unlock the door to C-6.”

  “Unable to comply. Connection to locking mechanisms for rooms C-4 through C-6 has been compromised by electrical fire. Recommend immediate repair.”

  “Fuck.” Ethan ran a hand through his hair as he thought. “Zera, can you disable the compression seal to door C-6?”

  “Unable to comply. Connection to door seal release manual override for rooms C-4 through C-6 has been compromised by electrical fire. Recommend immediate repair.”

  Ethan sighed. “Can you do anything useful?”

  Zera emitted a small beep. “Your stress levels are rising. I can play music which may be useful.”

  Ethan looked up at the faceless voice, his scowl darkening. “Zera, now is not the time to evolve a sense of humor.”

  “Command not confirmed. Please restate command.”

  Tara stared at the large metal door. “I’ll go grab the torch from the cargo hold.”

  “No time.” Ethan handed Tara the medical kit and rolled his shoulders back a few times. He side-stepped next to the door and planted his feet before placing his hands at the edge of the doorframe where he knew the compression seal would be weakest. “Step away please.”

  “Ethan, you can’t be serious.” Tara shook her head. “That door has over twelve hundred pounds of seal pressure. Let me grab the torch.”

  “No time! She could be dead by then.” Ethan looked over his shoulder at her, the anguish in his eyes causing her to step back. “Now please, Tara, step away.”

  “Ethan, I...” Tara didn’t know what to say, so she stepped further down the corridor and watched as he turned back to the door.

  Ethan blocked out Tara and the rest of ship. He closed his eyes and focused on Orynn, and on his need to get to her. His muscular system tensed, and he could feel every part of his skeletal structure move in unison with a single purpose. He pressed his hands into the vertical center of the door frame with all the force he could build while his feet pushed down into the floor for leverage. All he needed was a single crack and the pressure would release.

  A single crack and I can save her. A single crack and I can have a second chance.

  “Warning.” Zera’s voice called into the corridor. “Stress fracture detected. Continued pressure could result in door compression failure.”

  “Shut up, Zera.” Tara was now the one scowling at the faceless voice.

  “Command confirmed. Audio warnings will be discontinued until further instruction.”

  The grinding of metal filled the corridor, followed by a deafening crack and the loud hiss of the compression seal breaking. Ethan took a few wobbly steps backwards and leaned against the door. He looked to Tara while rubbing his right shoulder. “Thanks. She was really starting to piss me off.”

  “Are you okay?” Tara approached Ethan, but he stood up and rotated his shoulder before turning his back to her and facing the door again.

  “I’ll be fine.” He pressed the palms of his hands into the door and pushed in the opposite direction of the frame. After a few stuttering starts, the door gave way and slid into its place behind the wall, opening enough for he and Tara to enter the room. In his rush to get to Orynn, he forgot why he brought Tara along and headed straight for the bathroom. The image of Orynn in the corner of the shower burned itself in his mind and froze him in place.

  Tara slid past Ethan and hit the control panel for the shower. The water fell to a trickling drip and Tara knelt down beside Orynn, placing the medkit on the floor. Her body was nestled into the corner of the shower stall. It appeared as if she had been making for the doorway, but had been thrown backwards and slid down the wall to her current position. Her eyes were closed and her long white hair was a soaking wet mass of locks that ran over her shoulder and across her breasts. “Find a towel.”

  Ethan pushed himself back into motion and opened a wall storage compartment. He grabbed a couple of towels from the compartment and held them out to Tara, keeping his eyes focused to the side wall. Given the uncertainty of their relationship at that point, it felt wrong for him to look at her naked. “Here. How is she?”

  “I’m an engineer, not a doctor. She’s breathing, just very slowly.” Tara took the towels and wrapped one around Orynn’s torso. She used the second towel to dry Orynn’s face and limbs before placing over her hair. “She’s covered.”

  “Thank you.” Ethan finally looked back at Orynn and headed into the shower stall. Tara stood and made room for him as he knelt down on the wet floor. He placed a hand on Orynn’s forehead, finding her skin clammy as expected. Checking her pulse, he found it slowed to match her very slow and shallow breathing. Gently, he went to move her arm and Orynn gave a small whimper of pain in response. Moving aside her hair, he looked at the neuro-stimulator node at the back of her neck. Its white light was pulsing erratically and appeared to be malfunctioning. He lowered his head and frowned.

  This is going to hurt her.

  Leaning into her face, he tenderly brushed her soaked hair away from her ear. “Orynn, if you can understand, we were involved in a fight with those damn pirates again and the environmental controls in your room are no longer working. Your neuro-stimulator seems to be malfunctioning, so I need to pick you up and move you to the medical bay. It’s going to hurt, but it’s our only choice.”

  Tara suddenly felt like she was intruding on an intimate moment as Ethan rubbed his hand down Orynn’s cheek and leaned his forehead against hers. It made no sense to her at all. Not even an hour ago, Ethan had been a complete jerk to Orynn, and now he was acting like she was the most precious thing to him. She wondered what Hank had said to him down on Tir.

  “How can I help?”

  Ethan opened his eyes and remembered Tara was in the room. He lifted his head away from Orynn and prepared to pick her up. Cautiously, he slid his arms behind her back and under her knees. Trying to counterbalance the sudden movement as much as possible, he lifted from the knees and stood slowly upright. Orynn’s head settled against his shoulder with another quiet whimper, one arm dangling out to the side. Tara mimicked Ethan’s slow careful movements and gently took the dangling arm by the wrist and placed it across Orynn’s chest. Tara stepped back as Ethan looked to her with genuine appreciation.

  “Thank you. Could you find her a change of clothes and meet me in the medical bay?”

  “Of course.” Tara slid over to make way as Ethan headed out of the shower stall. Her mind was still trying to make sense of Ethan’s mood swings as her eyes shifted back to the corner of the shower stall where Orynn had been found. Her eyes spotted an item in the dark shadow of the corner and she knelt down to pick it up. The intricate flower bloom carvings of the opal colored shell hair clip glistened with droplets of water. As her fingers reached out and touched it, the shell cracked apart in severa
l places.

  Never having seen Orynn without it, Tara assumed it had to be important to her, broken or not, so she meticulously gathered every small piece of shell from the shower stall floor. She opened the med kit and retrieved a piece of gauze cloth. Carefully wrapping the pieces in the cloth, she stood and headed into Orynn’s room to find some clothes. She tucked the gauze package in the breast pocket of her bomber jacket as her eyes surveyed the contents of the room. All she found was a single duffle bag and a pair of shoes at the end of the bed. She hated going through other people’s things.

  29 Adonae Tu

  In the end, Tara refused to go through Orynn’s duffle bag. To rifle through the belongings of someone like Orynn, who by their very nature was so private, felt to Tara like she would be crossing a regretted boundary. Tara instead stopped by the ship’s small exercise room and picked up one of her spare pair of loose fitting black yoga pants and a grey tank top. That had been the easy part. Dressing Orynn in low gravity was a bit more challenging.

  The orange glow of a gravitational stasis field encompassed most of the small medical bay. Ethan caught Tara as she crossed the field and eased her down so that her feet were on the floor. He gave her a moment to balance herself against his grasp before letting go. “Thank you for taking care of her.”

  Tara took in a breath as her stomach readjusted to the gravity shift. Her eyes lifted to the Mecha and tried to discern where his sudden change in behavior had come from. She was happy he seemed to have gotten over whatever had crawled up his ass the past two days, but she still found it hard to forget what he had said to Orynn on Tir. “Will she be alright?”

  Ethan looked through the field separating him from Orynn, who’s dressed body now floated freely above the medical bed. “Now that she is in her native gravity, her breathing has returned to normal. I’m going to provide her with some fluids, but I think her mind just needs time to recover.”

  “I guess tonight was a bit of an overload.” Tara had no idea how Orynn’s mind or abilities worked, but she was tired and all she had done was drink ale and eat drakka meat. She could only imagine how fatigued Orynn’s body must be, but she wondered if it was more her heart that needed to recover than her mind. Orynn’s sadness as she told those people she couldn’t have children was still wedged into the pit of Tara’s stomach.