by S. A. Lusher
Mark trailed after her. “Defend ourselves?” he asked uncertainly.
“Yes. Obviously someone put us in those pods, presumably for bad reasons. There's a good chance we'll have to defend ourselves against whoever put us in those pods. Right now, I want you to go out there and finish checking all the stasis pods. I want to see if there's anyone else in there, if it's just the two of us. I'll be searching for weapons, gear, anything useful.”
“Uh...yeah, okay,” Mark replied.
She stared after him for a moment, then set to work searching the locker room. It took close to half an hour, but she broke into every single locker and found...nothing. Most of them were empty and none of them had anything that might be used to defend yourself. At least not very effectively. She took the time to search the bathroom and the shower room, in case anyone had hidden something useful and also because she had to take a quick piss.
When that was done, she joined Mark in the main area and did a quick survey of what was left to work with. She found three doors, two of which led out into the ship, which she ignored for the moment, and focused her attention on the final door. It led to a decently sized maintenance area. Jennifer smiled at that. It might not be an armory but those maintenance guys tended to work with some heavy tools. While she searched, Jennifer turned this mystery over in her head. She'd come aboard the ship she was on now, the Cimmerian, about two months ago, when it first launched. They'd hired her pretty much sight unseen for security.
Her record had spoken for itself. She'd started small, just on basic patrol, but after just a month they finally gave her some more responsibility over a portion of the cargo deck. Though, she'd later found out, that was more because someone higher up had failed, (he'd been a drunk and it had spilled over into his job), and they'd needed someone in a hurry to take over. But it had turned out well. Before this, she thought she'd been on her way to overseeing the whole deck, not just a portion of it. Obviously, that wasn't happening now.
Although, depending on how bad the situation was, she could have control over the whole damned ship if terrorists or pirates or slavers had taken over. It wasn't exactly what she had planned on doing when she next woke up but that didn't mean she couldn't. She'd dealt with a lot of ugly crap in her thirty five years.
Jennifer finished her search of the maintenance bay, managing to come up with a handful of tools. A screwdriver that looked pretty sturdy and would be decent for stabbing, a hammer with a nasty claw and a pretty solid wrench that would break someone's jaw without too much trouble, she imagined. She pocketed the screwdriver and went back into the main room to join Mark and see what kind of progress he'd made.
“We're alone,” he said as she approached him.
“You checked all of them?” she asked.
He nodded, looking more than a little forlorn and lost. “Yeah. They're all empty except for one, and the guy inside is dead. Systems failure and the emergency protocol didn't kick in.”
“Huh, sucks for him,” Jennifer muttered. “We need to get out of this room, find a terminal, get some information.” She held up the hammer and the wrench. “Which one would you feel more comfortable with?” she asked, knowing she could use them both equally well.
Mark stared at her, then at the tools in her hands, several emotions playing across his face. Finally, he sighed and pointed. “The hammer.”
“Here,” she said, passing it to him. “Stealth will be our main defense for right now, so I want you as quiet as possible. Only speak if you absolutely have to. Understand?”
Mark opened his mouth to respond, then seemed to think better of it and nodded instead.
“Good. Follow me.”
She led him to the first of the two exits in the large room, stepped to one side of the door and had him step to the other. She had no idea what was on the other side of this exit. Jennifer hit the open button.
Nothing happened.
She hit it again. “Shit,” she whispered. “What's wrong with it?”
Mark took a moment to study the door, then he studied the pad. After a moment he frowned and shook his head. “I don't know, whatever it is, it must be physically damaging the door. The pad is fine, it's the door itself.”
With a sigh, Jennifer led him to the second door. This one, at least, had a window in it, but it was largely fogged over by the cold temperature of the bay. They got into position and tried again. This time, there was a sharp chirp that made Mark jump slightly.
“Now what?” Jennifer asked.
Mark studied the control panel once more. He sighed. “It's locked,” he said. “Hold on, let me see what I can do...I need a kit. You found these over there?” he asked, pointing. She nodded. “I'll be right back.”
“Hurry up,” she said.
He nodded and hurried off, navigating the field of stasis tubes. Jennifer watched him go, then returned her attention to the door and the window. She began wiping at it with her sleeve, trying to get a clearer imagine of what was out there...
Something dark flashed by the window.
Her heart leaped into her throat as she stepped quickly out of view of the door. Okay, someone was out there. From the speed at which they'd passed by, it was obvious they'd been running. Running from what? Maybe the door wasn't the best idea...
“Got it,” Mark said.
“Get over here,” Jennifer hissed.
He quickly joined here. “What is it?” he asked.
“I saw someone out there, I don't think they saw me...” She looked around, scanning the ceiling and the top of the walls. “Shit,” she muttered, not seeing what she was looking for. “Come on, follow me, hurry.”
Mark followed her out of the bay and back into the locker room. There, she found what she was looking for. A ventilation grate in the ceiling, directly over one of the benches. She stood atop the bench and reached for the grate controls.
“What are you doing?” Mark asked in a hushed voice, looking around.
“Isn't it obvious? We're going to use the vents. The corridors are too dangerous for now. Ugh, give me a boost,” she said.
He clipped his toolkit to his belt and laced his fingers together, offering her a boost up. She managed to get the grate open and grab the lip of it, hauling herself up and inside. She took a quick look around, then, carefully maneuvering, got turned back around and hung her arms out of the opening, looking back down at Mark.
“Come on,” she whispered.
He stepped up onto the bench, grabbed her hands and, after some work, she managed to get him up into the vent. It was a good thing he was skinny and she liked to work out a lot. There was just enough room to crawl around comfortably in.
“Where to?” he asked, his voice loud in the confined space.
“Just follow me, and remember, keep quiet,” Jennifer replied.
They set off.
CHAPTER 02
–Information–
Mark suppressed a sigh.
He was feeling stupid and a bit immature. He and Jennifer were crawling through the vents now, having just left the locker room. He was staring dead ahead of him at Jennifer's amazingly well-maintained ass.
It wasn't like he had anywhere else to look.
He'd also seen her naked now, not that it had apparently bothered her at all, and that just made him feel ever weirder. Here he was, thirty years old, and he was still felt awkward around attractive women. Jennifer North definitely fit the bill for exceedingly attractive: fit, dark blonde hair, vivid green eyes, tall...Mark had always been weird around women. He thought it was something he'd have gotten over after high school but he supposed he was stuck with it. Especially since his last relationship had ended not with a bang but a whimper.
Why was he even thinking about this?
“Whoa...”
Jennifer stopped. Mark stopped too.
“What?” he whispered.
“When you pass by this vent, take a look out,” Jennifer replied softly.
That didn't bode well. It at lea
st kicked most of his awkward feelings out of his head, replacing them once more with fear. Maybe that's why he'd been so focused on her great ass and his shyness: he was terrified, and a human brain will, if given the chance, do pretty much anything to shift thoughts away from that terror.
Jennifer kept crawling and he followed, pausing briefly to stare out of the vent grate beneath him. It was, he realized, the corridor beyond the locker room and the cargo bay where they'd both awoken in. There was a long trail of blood smeared along the cold metal floor, as though a corpse had been dragged slowly but steadily. He frowned, studying more intently, and could see a few bullet holes in one of the walls.
“What...” he whispered.
“Come on,” Jennifer hissed.
Mark broke his gaze and began crawling again, swallowing his fear for the moment. He could feel his stomach churning, his heart thundering in his chest. What could have possibly happened? Obviously there'd been some kind of attack. He tried to piece it together. Both of them worked for a corporation. Maybe this was some kind of raid by another corporation? It seemed more than likely. It was kind of like the old Wild West. When you operated in an isolated enough location and you had enemies, and if your enemies thought they could get away with it, they'd come in and kill you. Rob you blind, too, and burn the bodies.
They were pretty far out here. If some rival corporation thought they could get away with stealing research, then they'd leap at the chance to mount some kind of assault. Or it could be slavers. Slavery was extremely illegal...but not all colonies or systems were under the protection of the Galactic Alliance. Some people struck out on their own, which meant they had to fend for themselves, and mercenaries or pirate groups weren't above using slaves. So maybe this was that. It was something Mark had always feared.
But how had they gotten them all into stasis pods...and why?
That was the big mystery.
If it were just slavers or pirates, they'd take those they could, kill those they couldn't. Those kind of operations were usually smash and grab, or so he'd heard. Mark had spent most of his life deep in the cradle of humanity. He'd been born on Earth, grown up there, had only just recently decided to get out and see what life among the stars was like.
Obviously, it had been a poor choice.
They came across a second vent. Jennifer stopped and seemed to stare out of it for a minute. Mark glanced back the way they had come. Paranoia laced his system as his fear continued to rise. What if there was someone in there with them? He'd seen enough movies, played enough games where the protagonist had to go into a vent and they weren't alone...
“We're getting out here,” Jennifer said.
“Why? What do you see?” he whispered.
“It's a security office,” she replied.
Mark watched as she first took a look down through the opening, then got turned around and lowered herself feet first through the hole. He crawled up and peered hesitantly over the side. Jennifer now stood in the middle of the room, looking around.
She glanced up. “Come on,” she whispered.
Mark groaned softly and began the awkward process of turning himself around. As he got turned around, a distant sound came to him. He froze, his feet now poking out of the hole, and looked back the way they'd come once again. Nothing was there, but he was sure he heard some kind of sound. It almost liked like a...a growl. Not like a person, but like an animal. He waited, listening, almost trembling with anticipation.
“Mark, oh my god, get down here,” Jennifer whispered harshly.
Mark began lowering himself down until he hung from the ceiling. His feet still hadn't touched floor yet. He glanced down. There was only about two or so feet of space left. He dropped and grunted as he landed. Jennifer was already setting to work. Mark took the time to study the room. It was, indeed, a security office. One wall was mostly taken up by a bank of monitors, almost all of them dead or registering only static. There were two rolling chairs in front of the immense workstation, one of them knocked over.
It looked like someone had put a few rounds into the workstation.
The next wall was taken up by a workbench and a trio of gray gun lockers. They were all open, all empty. The rest of the room was bare, save for a door and a window that had been rendered opaque. The door was, at least, closed.
Jennifer was checking out the gun lockers.
“Shit,” she muttered as she straightened up. “Nothing. Not a goddamned thing. Not even a single bullet...” she sighed and inspected the workstation. “Can you fix it?”
Mark looked at it uncertainly. “Maybe...”
“Get to it, we need information,” she replied.
Mark figured she had a point, unclipped the toolkit he'd grabbed back in the maintenance room from his belt and sat down in the remaining upright computer chair. He set to work, first seeing what kind of functionality the workstation had. Some of the screens were still working, but they wouldn't display anything, which meant that something important had been hit in the base of the console, where all the crucial crap was held. He might be able to reroute around the damaged areas...with a sigh, Mark dropped down and set to work.
“What do you think happened to us?” he asked quietly as he worked. Talking always helped him work, helped him calm down.
He thought Jennifer would either not respond or scold him for speaking when he didn't have to, but instead she responded. “My original best guess? Slavers or pirates.”
“That's what I was thinking, but if it was slavers or pirates-”
“-then why were we shoved into stasis pods? That's what I've been turning over in my mind,” Jennifer replied. “I think we're into darker waters.”
“Darker than kidnapping people and selling them into slavery?”
“Yeah. Like human experimentation.”
He paused in his work for a moment. “What?”
“There are some people who still believe that the best way to move forward with science is to experiment on live test subjects. Human test subjects...” Jennifer was checking the door. Mark glanced back over his shoulder at her from his position seated on the floor.
“Is it locked?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she replied, straightening up. She crossed the room and joined him, then began searching through the drawers of the workstation.
He got back to work. It was relatively good news. The important stuff was basically intact, he just had to unplug a damaged area and reconnect it through an auxiliary lead.
“Whoa, hey, found something,” Jennifer murmured. “Oh, and it looks like you fixed it.”
“Great,” Mark replied, putting the panel back into place and replacing his tools in the kit. He clipped it to his belt, stood and sat down. “What'd you find?”
“Radios,” she said, setting down a little black earpiece on the workstation in front of him, then fitting another one into her ear and turning it one. “Test them. Turn it to channel eight.”
“Got it,” Mark murmured, fitting it into his ear, activating it and tuning it. They both ran a quick test and found them to be effective. “Why do we need these?”
“We might need to split up,” Jennifer replied.
He felt a bolt of fear shoot through him. “Split up?”
“Yeah...what does this thing tell you?” she asked, directing his attention back to the workstation.
Mark sighed and turned back to the screens. He began working at trying to pull some information from the workstation, but it became immediately clear that a great deal of damage had been done to the overall system. He worked in silence for several moments, running through as many of the systems and scanners and databases as he could think of. Unfortunately, only a very small percentage of them told him anything, not much of it relevant.
“Okay...” he said, sitting back. “I've got news.”
“What is it?” Jennifer asked. She'd taken to pacing.
“First off, the camera system doesn't work. Next, we've been out for two weeks, as far as I can
tell. I don't know how or why or even who's responsible. I've also run the BioScan...there's approximately six people left onboard, including the two of us.”
“...approximately?”
“I can't tell, I'm getting some...weird readings. I don't know what's screwing with the sensors.”
“Could it be wrong? I mean...six people?” Jennifer asked, and for a moment her self-assurance slipped a bit.
“No, I don't think so. It's getting too clear a read on the life signs. It shows us where we are...on the medical deck,” Mark replied. “The other four are one level up.”
“Well, that should be the first thing we should do, then.”
“There's a problem,” Mark said. “Most of the ship is in lockdown. A heavy one.”
“So we lift it. I've got some access codes...”
Mark shook his head. “No. This one is heavy as hell. Honestly, our best shot would be to manually open it, which I'm technically capable of doing. I'll need access to a higher level of security, which is on this level. It's just...a little far from here. But if we stick to the vents we could probably be there in ten or fifteen minutes, provided we don't run into any trouble.”
Jennifer was studying a map he'd called up on one of the functional screens.
“We're going to split up,” she said.
“What? Why?” Mark replied, icy fear pooling in his guts.
Jennifer turned to look at him. “Look, we don't know the situation here. We don't know what kind of time constraints we're operating under.”
“But...what if I run into someone?”
“Mark, you had basic training. Everyone onboard had go through basic training, I know that for a fact. And it covered small arms fire and hand-to-hand combat. You're no soldier but you should be able to handle yourself, and besides, you said it yourself: stick to the vents, you'll be there in fifteen minutes. We'll keep in contact via the radio. I'll get up to the next deck and figure out what happened from the survivors. Besides...there's only four other people onboard. As soon as you raise the lockout, you join us upstairs, then we can figure out what to do from there, okay?”
