“I don’t understand,” Urdet said, clearly forgetting Mimic’s request for quiet. “Why is she attacking him?”
I suddenly remembered how Urdet didn’t join in the last time the mimics started a hug-fest. This must have been why. “It’s not an attack,” I answered, letting the woman hold me as long as she wanted. “Remember? This is called a hug. And it’s a way to show comfort, or camaraderie, or things like that.”
“It’s just nice,” Gonzales said, parting from me before turning to the others. “Alright, everybody, bring it on in.”
Urdet looked at the others uncertainly, but Ciangi, Eske, and Mimic didn’t hesitate. Soon, there was a full-on group hug going on that seemed oddly discordant with our mission, but I didn’t mind. The world was a cruel place, so I wasn’t about to object to a sliver of happiness in all of it.
After a few minutes, we were finally ready to move on and split along our various paths. We clung to the walls, each of us going slowly so we remained quiet. If this was an up-to-date facility, we wouldn’t stand a chance to sneak around. But thankfully, no one really expected some sort of infiltration of such an outer rim research station, so their security system wasn’t exactly up to code.
Mimic and I pressed on, putting more and more distance between us and the rest of the crew. Part of me wanted to look back and worry over them, but I knew we had to keep our attention on our own mission.
We crept through the ship on the path that our wrist scanners showed us. We needed to hit the elevator first, take that up, then sneak through two hallways before we would finally reach the research center. What we would do then…well, I wasn’t privy to that information.
I held my breath the entire time, and it wasn’t until my head was swimming when we reached the lift that I realized I probably shouldn’t do that. I focused on my breathing for several achingly long moments and by the time the slow lift arrived, I was fine.
“Just like old times,” Mimic said, giving me a wan smile.
“Well, not just like them, but there is a certain quality of déjà vu.”
She held out her hand, and I wrapped my fingers through hers.
It was funny, so much of my life had been spent without a good friend. Without somebody I could trust and look to when I needed support. Someone who I knew would always be there for me and I would always be there for them, not out of any sense of obligation, but just because we cared about each other so thoroughly.
Now that I had someone like that, I didn’t think I could go back to my solitary existence of tinkering projects, cleaning, and watching flicks on the net. Even if it meant putting my life at risk, even if it meant dying, I wouldn’t ever let go of what we had.
We reached the last of the hallways we would have to navigate, and once more, we reverted to our sneaky progression. I wasn’t exactly sure how silent we actually were, but it certainly helped me feel stealthier.
It wasn’t until we were almost to the research center that I realized I had no idea how we were going to take on a group of three people—of unknown skill—without any of them having the chance to hit the alarms. The sleeper-grenades we had with us would work in smaller scenarios, but it didn’t seem likely that the gas in them would be able to take out an entire trio before someone alerted the rest of the station, and then the situation would be out of our hands.
At first, I hadn’t understood what the big deal would be if someone raised the alarm. That was what we were going to do ourselves, weren’t we?
But then Gonzales explained that if those stationed on the vessel hit the wrong code, they could stop any ships from coming at all, which would ruin our entire plan. So, while it wasn’t a one hundred percent, automatic mission ruin, it wasn’t something any of us wanted to risk.
“How are we going to take care of these guys?” I whispered to Mimic.
“I figure we make a bit of a noise, just enough to catch their attention, and they’ll send someone to investigate. We hit them with a sleeper salve, then I’ll take their form and go in. From there, I should be able to incapacitate them.”
“You make it sound so easy,” I said with a slight laugh.
“Hopefully, it will be.”
It was so nice to hear Mimic’s voice, even if it was in a stressful situation. “What kind of noise should we make?”
“Nothing too unusual, then they might send several of them out. Maybe just a very particularly metallic clank?”
I shrugged. “Sure. I’m not exactly an expert on the perfect sort of distraction noise.”
“Neither am I.”
We were close enough to the entrance that we had to cease talking, and our communication was reduced to gestures. Mimic pulled out an injector from my pack that was already loaded with the sleeper salve, tucking it into one of the pockets of her jumpsuit before creeping forward. She made it almost to the door before she looked back and gave me a nod.
I took that as my cue and clanked my scanner against the wall before dragging it slowly. It made a slight sound, noticeable but not exactly threatening.
But it seemed to be enough. I heard the low rumble of speech, then the hydraulics of the door as they began to hiss open. Quickly, I ducked into a gap behind a doorframe, but I did see Mimic change into a bench just before I was out of sight.
I wanted to watch the events as they unfolded, but I couldn’t risk being seen. So, I waited patiently, listening as the scene played out.
Footsteps echoed through the hall, coming closer and closer to me. I could hear whoever it was breathing and for a moment I was sure that they were going to find me, but then there was a quick hiss and a pop, a muffled gasp, then silence.
“You can come out,” Mimic said, peeking her head around the frame to where I was. “Everything went according to plan.”
“We’re lucky then,” I said, stepping out into the hall to see a man crumpled on the ground. “That could have gone about a million different ways with none of them being good.”
“True, but we should be grateful for the little things. Now come, help me undress him.”
“Excuse me?” I asked, giving her a double-take.
“I may not be human, but I am fairly sure that they might notice their companion had a sudden wardrobe change mere minutes after leaving?”
“Oh, right. Of course. That makes sense,” I said, rushing to help her.
We needed to hurry because every second that we lingered was another second where someone could suddenly walk in and see what we were doing. And frankly, I didn’t really want to explain why we were pulling the green jumpsuit off a fully-grown man that we had knocked out.
But we managed to get it off and then it was Mimic’s turn to peel out of her jumpsuit. I turned around automatically, even though I realized it was a bit of a non-issue considering she was wearing clothes under it. It just seemed to be the polite thing to do.
After all, I would be lying if I said that Mimic wasn’t beautiful. She had specifically made her form to be appealing to me. But as of late, I seemed more hyper-aware of her attractiveness, as if it was a constant hum always playing in the background. Nothing as important as her kindness, or fearlessness, but noticeable nonetheless.
And the same thing that made me notice her attractiveness also made it seem all the more inappropriate to watch her disrobe. It was one thing to lay beside each other at night, fully clothed and with a blanket between us, but another entirely to watch her peel her clothes off so that she could slip into a disguise.
“How do I look?”
The voice that addressed me was not the one I was used to, and I turned in concern. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised, but I still was to see a duplicate of the man on the floor, smiling at me with far too large teeth.
I jumped back, but managed to stop myself from crying out just in time.
“You did a good job,” I whispered when I calmed down enough to know that my voice would come out at the proper volume. “Creepy, but a good job.”
“It is a bit st
range to see me as another human, isn’t it? I haven’t taken this kind of form since…Giomatti, I think.”
“Yup. I’m pretty sure you’re right.”
“Strange, that almost feels like another lifetime ago, and that I was a different person.”
“I think we all are,” I said.
She nodded. “Fair enough. Now, for the hard part.”
“Hasn’t everything up to this point been the hard part?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Now for the harder part.” She took a deep breath which looked entirely odd in the body that wasn’t hers. “Wish me luck.”
“Luck.”
And then she was walking back in the direction the man had came from until she disappeared from my view entirely.
I heard muffled voices once again, and they sounded slightly puzzled, and then a single shout. I tensed, sure things were about to go down, but just like before, it grew incredibly quiet until the door hissed open once more.
“We’re good,” Mimic said, peeking her head out in her original form.
“Huh, that was surprisingly easy,” I said, entering the room and looking around.
“Speak for yourself,” she said with a soft punch to my arm. “For a moment, I was sure one of them was going to get away.” She pointed to a hatch that was open in the floor. “I don’t know where that leads, but I’m willing to bet that it’s winding and easy to lose a person in.”
“I don’t doubt you.” I walked over to it and closed the hatch, locking the mechanism that held it in place. Once I was sure that was set, I stood and looked over her handiwork. Sure enough, there were two workers laying unconscious on the floor. They didn’t look bruised or otherwise battered, so I assumed that she had pulled some extra sleeper salvo from my pack when I wasn’t paying attention.
“What about the others?” I asked.
“Well, we can’t ping them, or else we might give away their location.”
“No, but now that we are safe, we can turn our comms back on and let them ping us when they’ve finished their work.”
Mimic nodded before going into the hall, returning a few seconds later with the first man over her shoulder. “Good idea. And in the meantime, will you help me bind these folks? I’m fairly certain Ciangi packed cuffs in each of your supply bags.”
“Yeah, she did.”
We busied ourselves with making sure the three of them were secure. We didn’t speak much, but that was because we didn’t need to. Sure, we had been successful so far, but there was no telling what would happen with part two of our little party.
It wasn’t more than a few minutes later when our comms buzzed. “Ayooo, guess who got their target!”
“Good job, Eske!”
“What’s the word on what we’re supposed to do next?” she asked.
“We can’t make any moves until everyone chimes in that they’re done, so just sit tight and put the restriction cuffs on the guy. Once we get the all clear, we’ll take them all to the quarters where we can eventually do a lockdown that will keep them contained while we work the rest of our plan.”
“Uh, okie. I’ll find the thingies and wait.”
“Good idea. See ya in a bit.”
Her comm clicked off and then all we could do was be patient.
Thankfully, it couldn’t have been more than ten minutes before Ciangi and Gonzales both called in, stating they had completed their own little spy missions. Once it was confirmed and all of our comms was back on, we agreed to meet in the living quarters.
Finally, I was able to heave a sigh of relief. Part one of our plan was finally over, and had been entirely successful.
Now, on to part two.
10
S.O.S. (Steal Our Ship)
“Come on! What do you want from us?!”
I winced as one of the captive crew screamed at me, almost making me flinch and drop the water I had brought them.
“Nothing, really,” I said for what had to have been the tenth time. “Look, I know it’s confusing and all, but we only really need you to sit tight and not hurt yourselves. We’re gonna be here for a week and a half, maybe two, and then we’ll be out of your hair and you’ll never have to deal with us ever again.”
“What? That doesn’t even make sense!”
“I’m sure it doesn’t, to you.” I took a deep breath to steady myself. “Now, in a few minutes, we’re gonna undo your bonds one by one so you can walk about, eat, and sleep comfortably. You can try to escape, but that would complicate things a lot more than they need to be. We honestly aren’t going to hurt any of you, unless you force ou—”
“Wait, I know you!” another woman interjected. She was tall, and thin, with ashen hair and eyes that seemed too wide for their face. “You’re that first contact fellow.”
I didn’t know if them being aware of my identity was bad or not, so I found myself trying to sputter out some type of lie. Too bad I was absolutely terrible at lying.
“Uh, no. That guy’s on Earth. Why would I be here?”
“You’re totally him! What’s his name? Uh… Hog? Hagger?”
Clearly, I was not fooling anyone. “It’s Higgens.”
“Yeah, that’s right! Higgens! What are you doing all the way out here? And why have you pirated our station? That’s a felony, you gotta know that.”
“It’s, uh, complicated. And I don’t want to tell you because that might implicate you in all of this. Just know that I’m helping my alien friend, and we really need your station for just a bit. So, if you all don’t mind sitting back and just letting us do our thing, everyone can leave this happy.”
“I don’t believe you,” the original, yelling woman screamed yet again. I was beginning to think that her volume was stuck at full blast after the trauma of being drugged. “Whatever you’re up to, I won’t let you get away with it!”
“Uh, yeah. Okay. Whatever you say. I’m just gonna leave this water here, and then in a few minutes, we’ll call you into the hall one at a time and take off the cuffs. So, uh, see you all later.”
I finished setting the pitcher down and rushed out, feeling a strange mix of embarrassment and relief. But once I was out in the hall, my work wasn’t done, and I rushed to the communication room of the station.
Even with my scanner, I made a few wrong turns and had to double-back on myself. But I arrived at my destination before anyone could complain to me over the comms, and barreled in with a half-grin on my face.
“Sorry that took a minute. Some of our guests are a little angrier than the others.”
“That’s too bad,” Gonzales said. “But Mimic was able to get all the footage she needed.”
“That I was,” Mimic said. “Children, come here.”
The rest of the mimics huddled around her as she played the footage recorded from my wrist-controls. They each pointed to a crew member, then watched them intently. And when the recording ended, they had all taken the forms of whomever they had picked.
“I think we’re good,” Mimic said, turning to face us with the body of the screaming woman. I guessed she was the highest-ranking worker on the shift, so it made sense that the ‘highest-ranking’ shapeshifter would take her form, but I wasn’t exactly happy about it.
“Actually, I think there’s one more thing we’re missing.”
Ciangi stepped forward with a cup of what I was pretty sure was dust and ash. Where she had gotten it, I didn’t know.
“Time to rough yourselves up. All of y’all are looking a little pretty for a distress message.”
“Ah, good point.”
For once, I was glad not to be the center of the action as the mimics all began to rough up their hair and rub dirt across both their jumpsuits and faces. A couple even tore some rips in the fabric, and their skin rippled below then opened like a wound.
“Aw, that is totally gross,” Gonzales said after what I was pretty sure was Astaroth had a large gash appear on their arm. “But also very convincing. Good job.”
“Thank
you.”
“Alright, now I think we’re ready. The rest of you need to get to the blind spot of the camera.”
I gave a little mini-salute. “Aye-aye, Captain.”
The others rolled their eyes, but I was already moving to the one spot by the door where the message cameras wouldn’t catch sight of us. Once we were all squeezed in, Mimic straightened and activated the communications relay.
“Attention, Earth Gov, this is emergency zeta-three! We have been hit by an unprecedented asteroid wave that seems to have been caught in a gravitational tug-of-war by the planets on either side of us. We are repairing damages as best we can, but it won’t be long until we run out of supplies. We have a week, maybe two tops, before this station will become irreparable and we will have to abandon ship. We ask that you send one repair ship and a handful of fighters to take out the worst of the belt. Obviously, we won’t need one of your cruisers, but our station defenses just aren’t enough at this point.
“We will continue to update on our survival situation. Our estimates show that it will take one to two days for this to reach you, and a week minimum for even your quickest of ships to arrive. Please, we can only ask that you respond to this as the utmost of emergencies. Faithfully, Senior Officer Collins, out.”
Then she was turning off the comm and sinking into her seat.
“Being a shapeshifter, one might think that being duplicitous would come much more naturally to me.”
“You did great,” I said, walking forward to offer a hug. She went to take it, but I was unfortunately intercepted by Pyjik and Meridyna. It seemed that we would need to have a lesson on when was appropriate for a group hug, and when wasn’t.
Mimic, however, just smiled and watched her charges as they squeezed me.
“Well,” Gonzales said, cutting between me and the little ones. “We sent out the message. Now we can only hope that they respond.”
I sighed as I settled down into my bed in the secondary living quarters. We had uncuffed and fed our prisoners, who seemed to be acclimating to the situation pretty well, and were now just stuck waiting to get a message back from Earth Gov.
Mimic Raises an Army (Space Shifter Chronicles Book 4) Page 7
