by Alex Kings
Her cabin turned and began to decelerate. The other cabin, with the Albascene clinging to its prow like the figurehead of a ship, turned to follow her.
There was a bang. Olivia's cabin rang like a bell. The first shot. It was followed soon after by a second.
Olivia raced around her cabin looking for help, found a compartment beneath the seats marked with an emergency decompression symbol, and opened the hatch to see that it was empty.
She slammed the hatch shut savagely.
“Damnit,” she muttered. “I'm going to suffocate between the shells of a giant space habitat. And I don't even have my shoes on.”
The wall of her cabin caved inwards with another bang. The dent was hot with laser fire; she could feel the heat radiating off it. One more shot would do it.
She checked the console. They were nearly there.
The Albascene fired.
The dent burst open. Air began to rush out.
A thin sheet of smart matter emerged from the inside of the cabin and snapped shut over the hole in the blink of an eye.
Olivia stared at it. The cabin did have an emergency decompression system after all.
Except –
The smart matter covering the hole evaporated. It was gone in an instant, burning under the Albascene's laser like a sheet of tissue in a raging fire.
Air began to rush out again.
A second sheet of smart matter covered the hole. This one was thinner, filmier. A moment later, the Albascene destroyed that too.
Nothing replaced it.
Air rushed out of the cabin. Olivia grabbed a chair and held her face to a grille where fresh air was coming from the cabin's tanks. Vacuum sucked at her skin. She managed to catch a few rags of air before they vanished, but nowhere near enough. She felt her lungs grasping as nothingness.
She barely felt it as the cabin slid downwards in a station. The wall of the station blocked the hole. The doors opened.
Air rushed in. Olivia fell to her knees, gasping. Her lungs felt like swollen and itchy pulp.
But she still remembered: The Albascene was following her. It would be arriving in this station at any moment.
She ran to the doors and out into a broad corridor.
The floor, walls, and ceiling were all the same shade of austere grey. The corridor was several metres wide, presumably to accommodate vehicles.
She heard the other cabin descend into a berth beside her. As it did so, her legs gave out, and she fell to the ground coughing. She scrambled to her feet again, long enough to make it around a corner, out of sight. Then she collapsed again.
She listened to the doors of the second cabin open. The Albascene's suit was humming again.
Olivia tried to stand and found she couldn't.
The Albascene glided around the corner to meet her. She stared up at it as its middle section turned. The laser aperture came to rest pointing at her.
She waited for it to fire.
A barked sentence in a language she didn't understand came in its place. A moment later, the Albascene's lower segment burst open with a crack of gunfire. A wave of colourful alien fish swept out amid water which sloshed over Olivia's legs. A wave of briny smells followed. The fish twitched and flopped about around her legs and hands, then went still.
Olivia looked down the corridor to see two humans, each carrying large shotguns. Both were dressed in smart suits. One of them turned to aim at her.
She put her hands up.
“Get up,” the man said.
When Olivia tried and failed, the other came over, grabbed her wrist, and pulled her up. Together, they half-led, half-dragged her back to the station.
Chapter 68: Missing
“There's a dead human in my ship,” said Rurthk.. He looked at the body lying on the medical bay bed, then up at Dr. Wolff. “Why is there a dead human on my ship?”
“His name was Renner,” said Wolff.
“I'm pretty sure I didn't ask about his name.”
“He snuck aboard on a cargo pod and tried to kill us. I shot him.”
“We were attacked too,” said Rurthk. He frowned. “Wait. Where in that exchange did you find the time to ask him his name?”
Wolff opened his mouth as if he was going to speak, then closed it and shook his head slowly.
“Anyway, space it,” said Rurthk. “This isn't a corpse delivery service.”
“You were attacked too?” said Wolff, gesturing at the smart matter underneath's Renner's corpse to curl up around it into a bodybag.
“Felix Zino,” said Rurthk. “He interrupted our contact plan pretty effectively.”
“Shoulda' killed him when you had the chance, cap,” said Mero, walking into the medbay.
“Ah, Mr. Iskultine,” said Wolff sourly. “How nice of you to grace my medical bay with your scintillating presence. To what do I owe the honour.”
Mero gave him a look, then held up his arm to show a gash in the skinflap just below it. A plaster wouldn't heal it correctly; it needed sutures.
Wolff shook his head and went to get the tools.
“His back was turned,” Mero said.
“You'd shoot a man with his back turned?” Wolff said, returning.
“Easiest way,” said Mero.
Rurthk tilted his head in an acknowledgement of this truth. But on the matter of killing Zino, he was less certain. “You could have chased after him at any time,” he told Mero.
“By myself?” Mero winced and Wolff started to sew up the gash. “Even while he was beat up like that, he'd have killed me.”
“Exactly,” said Rurthk. “We might've killed him working together, but it would be a costly fight.”
“So why did he leave like that, huh?” said Mero.
“Same reason, I think,” said Rurthk. “Not worth the risk. He'd already ruined our plan – I don't think we can just turn up to the double helix building again.”
“Back to square one?” said Dr. Wolff. Finished with the sutures, he put a smart plaster on Mero's injury.
“Further back than that, I think,” said Rurthk. “We've lost Olivia.”
“On the plus side, we've got some brilliant new military hardware,” said Mero. “Have you seen those shuttles?”
Seeing the way Rurthk and Wolff looked at him, he shrugged and walked out of the medical bay.
“Thank you doctor,” said Rurthk, heading out too.
They headed down the corridor into the observation lounge, where Eloise was looking out at the giant wall of Nereus's outer shell.
“It's my fault,” she said. “I told her to run. She has thirty hours of firearms training, and I sent her away from my protection in a hostile environment.”
“Yeah, it is,” said Mero. “You sent her to her death. Why do the rest of us have to suffer your grizzling.”
Eloise turned to look at him. “I don't know why I bothered to save you on that planetoid,” she said softly.
Mero offered a grin that was more like a snarl. “Because if you didn't, you all would've died an hour later.”
Rurthk put his hand on Mero's shoulder, a grip tight enough to hurt, and forcefully moved him back a few paces, looking down at him. Mero could have fought back, but he didn't, and he remained silent afterwards.
“Zino said he sent someone after her – and that person is dead,” said Rurthk.
“What, you think the kid killed one of Zino's people?” said Mero.
“She did save my life once,” said Rurthk. “Remember that?”
“I was busy with someone trying to shoot me,” said Mero.
“My point is, she might have found a way out of it.”
“Then why hasn't she called? The jamming signal is down. We're connected to Nereus's internal communications network. But we've heard nothing.”
Rurthk paused. “I don't know.”
“We have to find her,” said Eloise.
“And then what, huh?” said Mero. “Even if Zino's bored of us, Sukone isn't. Unless we can talk to Albert Wells
we're screwed, remember? So if you trust her to keep herself alive, let her do that, and we can figure out how to keep ourselves alive.”
“Rurthk,” said Eloise.
Rurthk looked between them. “He's right,” he told Eloise. “We need to figure out another plan quickly.”
“And that means abandoning Olivia?”
Rurthk fell silent for a moment. He held up his hand to stop them from talking, and closed his eyes for a moment.
“Eloise,” he said eventually. “We don't even know where to begin.”
Eloise gave him a long look, before striding out of the room. “Do as you please,” she said.
Mero opened his mouth to make some smug, triumphant comment, but when he saw Rurthk's gaze, he fell silent.
*
Olivia found herself thrown into a large, sparsely-outfitted room. She collapsed on the wood-tiled floor. A lone oak table and a few chairs sat in the middle of the room. The walls were unpainted. It smelt of antiseptic and cleaning products applied with too much enthusiasm, which didn't quite cover a sour odour beneath. Both walls and floor were stained with something she didn't want to think about.
The thing she remembered most about her journey here was the coughing. There was a short trip in the cabin, during which she coughed. A longer trip in a shuttle, during which she coughed. Then there was being dragged down corridors, during which she coughed. And now, she was still coughing. Her lungs burned and itched in sequence.
Her hands were tied behind her back, and she didn't feel strong enough to get up using only her legs. After another coughing fit, she managed to pull herself into a sitting position, leaning against the wall.
The door swung open and people stepped in.
“A dreadful commotion,” said a deep, calm, commanding voice. “Fighting in the streets. Car crashes. Corpses on the floor. Broken windows. I want to know what's going on.”
Olivia looked up at the men standing before her. All were dressed in dark suits. The one in the middle had black, slicked-black hair. “What?” she said, and coughed again.
The man frowned. “What happened to her?” he asked one of his associates. “She's ill.”
“I think she suffered a brief decompression when her cabin was damaged.”
“And you haven't done anything to help her?”
The man's associate stood up straighter. “Sorry, sir. I'll do that right away.” He strode out of the room.
“It was very rude of me to leave you hurt like that,” said the man. “I do apologise.”
His associate returned soon after with a small blue plastic tube. He held one end to Olivia's mouth. She inhaled through it.
There was silence. A few seconds later the pain in her lungs began to fade.
“Remember,” the man told his associate quietly, “politeness comes first.” Then he turned his attention to Olivia. “Tell me, please, why there was such commotion on the streets today, and what you had to do with it.”
“The Albascene was trying to kill me.”
“That much is evident.”
Olivia sat back and thought. “We came to Nereus to try and contact Albert Wells …” She paused and looked up at the man. “That's you, isn't it?”
“Keep going,” Wells said.
“But Zino was there. He tried to stop us.”
“Felix Zino?” said Wells.
She nodded.
“Yes. That lout blundered into one of my operations today claiming he wanted to catch someone. Naturally, my people informed me as soon as they were able. But by that time, the damage was done. So why did he wish to capture you?”
“Sukone plans to kill you.”
If Wells was troubled by this news, he didn't show it. “How?” he said.
“I … I don't know.”
“I see. You said ‘we’. Do you have associates?”
“Yes. We're from the Outsider. Sukone is trying to kill us.”
“I imagine he would, given that you know his plans. How can I find the Outsider?”
Olivia told him.
Wells listened intently. “Call that ship, would you?” he told one of his associates.
Olivia smiled. She'd done it. She'd got Albert Wells on their side. She stood up. “Can you take these restraints off?” she asked.
“I don't think so, no,” said Wells. He took a pistol out of his jacket and said to his associates, “Hold her.”
Chapter 69: A Death
Tommy Egliante sat in the open, watching the giant hole in his lawn being slowly filled in by automated drillers in the light of eternal sunset.
If anyone asked, he was feeling much better about the whole thing. He had come to terms with the loss, and he still had enough money to live as he'd always done.
In reality, that meant his rage had merely submerged. He no longer lashed out at furniture and staff. He smiled and spoke politely, and quietly planned an elaborate revenge.
The automated digger released another miniature avalanche of gravel into the hole with a soft roar. Egliante sipped at his cocktail, watched the sunset, and ran through his five year plan of death and torture again. A light breeze picked up and faded.
Then the back of his mansion exploded.
For a moment, Egliante mistook it for the sound of the hole being filled in. Then he felt the wave of heat from behind him, heard screaming, and leapt off his chair.
Great chunks of the walls lay scattered about. It was like someone had taken a giant bite out of his home. A pillar of burning air and smoke rose from the hole. He realised immediately. The centre of the hole was right where his vault had been. And his new hard drives.
He leapt off his chair and started to run to the mansion, but prudence stopped him a couple of steps later. There could be other bombs. Instead, to convince himself he was a man of action, he called up his operator and roared down the line, “What the hell just happened?”
“I don't know sir,” came the infuriatingly calm voice. “I'm working on it now.”
“Damned well hurry!” said Egliante.
“Yes, s–”
Egliante cut the line. He stared at the fire pouring out of his mansion. Near the edge of the explosion, the military-grade sapphiroid windows had been blown out of their frames and lay on the grass, still intact.
One of the security guards came running towards him. “Mr. Egliante, sir! I'm glad you're alright.”
“Piss off,” Egliante snapped at him.
The guard seemed unfazed. “I have some important information about the explosion,”
Egliante froze, then turned back to face him. “What? Tell me!”
The guard put his hand on Egliante's shoulder in an almost friendly gesture. Very faintly, Egliante felt a tiny pinprick against the skin.
“Sukone thanks you for all you've done for him, and wants you to know that he forgives you for your intransigence.”
A savage pain gripped Egliante's chest. His knees gave out beneath him, and he fell into the guard's grasp. “What …?” he said weakly.
“Heart attack, sir,” said the guard. “Probably brought on from seeing two attacks on your home.”
He gently let Egliante fall to the floor, then disappeared into the confusion.
*
Olivia stared at the pistol, her eyes wide. “We're on the same side!” she said.
“You may think that,” said Wells. “But I choose my own sides.”
His associates came from either side, grabbing Olivia's arms and holding her against the wall.
“But … but … Sukone is planning to kill you!”
“I know that already. But I would rather he didn't know that I know. If I kill you for, say, trespassing, he will believe me to be oblivious.” Wells checked his pistol.
“We came to help you.”
“I do not think I need the help of a band of small-time criminals. Anything else?” He came up to her and pointed the pistol at her head.
Olivia thought desperate for anything that might change his mind. “We ha
ve information!” she said. “Proof of Sukone working against Sweetblade. It was all in Tommy Egliante's vault.”
Wells frowned. After a second he lowered the pistol. “Now, that is interesting,” he said. “If we tell the head of Sweetblade, Sukone would lose support, and I would be able to deal with him.”
“So you'll do it?” Olivia asked, her voice wavering with relief.
“Perhaps,” said Wells. He waved as his associates to release her, though they left her hands tied. “Come with me.”
Wells led her out of the sparse room down a corridor into a much more richly outfitted chamber. It was small, but cosy. One shelf was covered with books, another with decorative swords. An authentic roaring coal fire sat at one end. In the middle was an oak desk and a velvet-backed chair. This, Olivia guessed, was Wells's study.
“Information on Sukone's shabby past will not be enough,” Wells said. “I think we will need further proof, at least to corroborate it.”
“Like what?” said Olivia.
“Something taken from Sukone's base,” said Wells. “That would be beyond dispute, don't you think?”
“Steal from Sukone's base?” asked Olivia.
“Yes. I think I may have found a way for your band of small-time criminals to help, after all.”
Chapter 70: Finished?
“I see,” said Sukone. He was silent for several moments, so still on the screen that he might've been a taxidermist's masterpiece. At last he moved again. “I am troubled by this development, Felix. How can I trust your competence after two failures of such magnitude?”
“They're stronger and better prepared than either of us expected,” said Zino, sitting in his quarters aboard the liner. He was in pain, embarrassed by his failure, and his patience with Sukone's bullshit was finally wearing thin. “I'm the best operative you have, Sukone, but I'm not omnipotent!”
“We are none of us gods,” Sukone said, putting on a wise, worldly tone. “But some of us may aspire to such heights.”
Zino stared at him.
“I fear your aspirations are not what they used to be,” said Sukone.
