Against A Rock

by Kalin Ringkvist

  “Commander Floreina, how did you get in here?” asked Farneil, one of the senior overseers. “I thought all the hatchways were sealed.”

  Her liars assistant suggested an option: “Specialty clearance,” Floreina replied without glancing in his direction as she marched past. “Captain Allihence has everything locked down, but I have clearance for a special security check. Just hang tight; we’re doing all we can. I think we’re on the trail of the traitor.”

  And that seemed to satisfy them for the moment and she moved on.

  But just when her confidence seemed to be rising back to its normal level, as she moved down another corridor, two security officers moved behind her.

  Mahran notified her just a moment before they moved into her hallway, and she watched them approach through her rear camera. She identified the soldiers as Mithlin and Gromor. They drew their weapons.

  “Commander Floreina,” said Mithlin. “What are you doing on this level? Is your station not still in the turret command center?”

  Floreina stopped and slowly turned around. “I’m on a specific mission by order of the captain.” Her systems scanned their faces and posture, and pulled up a history on them, showing that both had targeting and combat implants similar to her own.

  They stared at her, unmoved by her claims.

  “You’re gonna need to come with us,” said Gromor.

  She felt Mahran cringing in fear but Floreina’s face did not betray her secret mental connection.

  “Excuse me?” she replied angrily.

  “Our apologies, Ma’am, but you’re on our watch list. We’re under orders to detain any suspicious persons on our list. It’s just a precaution, I assure you, Commmander. Probably a glitch in the system…” A minute facial twitch caught Floreina’s conversational analyst, and gave her a readout that the two were likely trying to play down their suspicion. They seemed too confident.

  “And now I have a special mission that you’re interfering with…”

  Mithlin nodded. “My apologies Commander, but you need to come with us.” And he motioned toward the hatch through which they had come.

  The tactical situation was not in her favor versus two trained security personnel. They had advanced implants, the potential even for nanite enhancements, and more hand to hand combat training. Her tactical readouts clearly showed that she needed to consent to their wishes until she could gain an advantage.

  They ordered her to put her hands on her head and Gromor moved forward to remove her weapons and bind her hands with their standard restraint cuffs.

  I do have one piece of good news, Mahran told her. I think I can hack the cuffs and get them to release for you on your order. I’m working on it now.

  Excuse me? she said. I never taught you anything like that.

  I looked into certain things on my own, he replied.

  Scandalous Minmatar, she said. The guards led her back through the blown hatch into the adjacent room which served as an accounting and logistics center for the slave management crew. Sitting at one of the accounting desks, focused angrily on a visual readout screen, sat the head overseer, Karleen. She looked up to see Floreina, and her focus deteriorated. Her head cocked slowly, and her mouth opened. She stood, then straightened.

  I’m seeing a change in activity, Ma’am, Mahran informed her. I’ve got access to their systems… There’s a large group of about three hundred slaves locked in the main cargo bay two decks below you and several security officers are next door… they were going to detonate the hatch into the cargo bay and get the slaves out to assist in breaking down hatches, but now they’re changing directions to detonate their way into an air vent. I’m pretty sure they’re trying to get to your section.

  “Floreina?” asked Karleen. “What are you doing on this level?”

  She shrugged and scoffed. “Being accused of treason, apparently, and having my vital missions interrupted.” She glared momentarily at the two guards.

  “I heard Mahran was missing. I didn’t really think about it till now…” Karleen’s hands moved to rest on her hips. “He’s not on the ship any more, is he?”

  “You can connect to the main systems to search?” Floreina asked. “No one else has a connection…”

  “Well, no, but he was scheduled to be in this area and I’ve been able to connect with some of the lower sections, like the slaves in the cargo bay.”

  “I hope nothing happened to him…” Floreina said. “But I have other things to worry about right now.”

  Mahran? she asked. They’ve had communications out of this center?

  Yes, Ma’am, I’m sorry. They have short range secure radio systems down here to help hide the slaves during stays in high-security station hangars.

  Yes, yes. You were not able to lock them down?

  I have a lot going on up here, Master. I’m watching activity all over the ship… you expect me to keep a solid watch over so many people who all have it in for you—

  Okay, okay, she stopped him. Keep your mind on the goals. I’m so close to the crawlway now—if I can just get in unseen, we can hold them off for an hour or so as the doctors hook me up.

  As she spoke to her slave in the back of her mind, Karleen continued her approach. “You are guilty aren’t you?” she said, her face twisting. “That talk of Allihence’s abuses… this is what you were referring to…” She shook her head slowly. “You were so outraged you decided you had the authority to go so much further…”

  “What are you referring to?” asked Mithlin.

  Karleen glared at Floreina for a moment before answering, “She showed me some evidence of slave abuses by our captain and wanted to do something about it…”

  “You have no idea what you’re talking about; that was a passing conversation, Karleen. Don’t think everything people say to you is so huge and significant.”

  Karleen shook her head and breathed heavily. “I don’t buy this…” she looked at Mithlin. “We need to get her into interrogation immediately. Can you blow a route to the discipline chambers? Could we interrogate her here?”

  “We aren’t trained interrogators,” replied Mithlin.

  “We don’t have a lot of time,” Karleen said. “The fleet should have destroyed us by now. Even with their limited firepower, the fact that they’ve crippled our capacitor, propulsion, warp drive and our captain—we should definitely be dead right now. We need to get information out of her.”

  “We aren’t under orders—“

  “You overheard that suspicious message from turret command before their comms cut out?” she asked.

  Mithlin nodded as he moved away toward one of the computer terminals.

  “I don’t believe you, Karleen; you just betray me so easily?” Floreina cut them off. “You have no evidence. The captain set you into a panic when she made the announcement about the spy, and now you’re willing to turn on your friends and crew on simple suspicion? Where’s your loyalty? You need to back up and think things through.”

  Are you able to kill these cuffs? Floreina asked Mahran.

  Yes, Ma’am. Ready to drop on your order.

  “You tried to drag me into this!” Karleen glared at Floreina, her breathing highly pronounced. “And now you’ve endangered every member of this crew and quite possibly taken all our lives.”

  “We need to just lock her in a slave containment,” said Gromor. “We’re not authorized to do anything beyond that.”

  And Karleen screamed and ran forward, fists flying, lunging, swinging toward the commander’s face.

  Floreina backed up, taking carefully placed steps, bouncing backward in time with the combat predictions, dodging each punch fluidly.

  Targeting trajectories were calculated from the vantage of the two security officers, taking into account their positions, grips on their weapons, and their predicted attention level. Her arm calculated a route from the grip of the cuffs behind her back to the sidearm strapped to Karleen’s side.

  And Karleen swung again and ag
ain as Floreina ran backward even faster to avoid her, feeling the subtle pumping of artificial adrenaline and steroids from her medical systems. At the same time watching Gromor pull a tighter grip on his pistol and watch apprehensively as the chief slave overseer behaved in an erratic manner. But at the same time, both security officers were getting further away with every step.

  Finally she saw the wall coming from her rear vision and knew she would back against it within two more steps. However, Karleen was almost directly between her and Gromor.

  Drop the cuffs on my mark. Get ready.

  Copy that, Mahran replied.

  She took another step. With the last, she switched the pace and went down.

  Mark.

  She heard the cuffs click and loosen just as her back came against the wall, and the steel fell from her wrists. Floreina rose, just as Karleen managed to plant her first successful punch on her target.

  Her hands were already moving, Floreina and her implants already having set their trajectories. The punch connected with the side of her head. The pain processed, and even registered a minor sloshing of the brain, but Floreina pushed through it.

  The commander brought her left hand to Karleen’s hip. She flipped the attachment and snatched the sidearm, pulling it out upside down. With her right hand, Floreina grasped a wad of Karleen’s hair, and pulled their faces together. She embraced the overseer, bringing her lower body tight against her.

  Both officers raised their weapons, but had no line without firing through Karleen.

  Auto-targeting through waves of Karleen’s golden, coconut perfumed hair, Floreina raised her left hand and slipped her pinky through the upside down trigger guard, and flipped the power switch.

  She fired on Gromor as he attempted to dive out of the way, ripping and scorching the left side of his face.

  Floreina turned, holding Karleen against her, and targeted Mithlin at the desk. He moved to his right, his weapon up, searching for a shot. Even as she felt Karleen punching and struggling against her, she fired another shot, connecting with Mithlin’s chest. He staggered, but did not drop his weapon, her tactical readouts estimating the type of armor beneath his uniform. She fired again, this time trusting herself to get the shot between his eyes. The soldier went down, firing a stray laser in the air.

  But Floreina had not a moment to celebrate her triumph or mourn the lives of her fellow Amarrians, as Mahran broke in saying, Master you have another problem. More security are heading your way. There’s one coming up an access tube near the far corridor, and several more coming your way from the same hallway you came from.

  Every minute that went by the crew of the Abaddon were blowing more hatchways and manually patching into more communications systems.

  Karleen screamed, flailing her arms, punching and clawing. Floreina kicked her friend, forcing the side of her foot into Karleen’s shins and pushing with her right hand. She gained some distance to transfer Karleen’s weapon from the left handed upside down position to the proper position in her right hand.

  “On your knees,” Floreina ordered, pointing the weapon in the face of her friend, feeling the rumbling in her gut threatening to surface again. “I didn’t want to have to do this… you know I’m innocent and I have special duties I need to attend to.”

  Get out of the room now! Mahran communicated, forcing his thoughts unceremoniously into her mind. They’re coming for you down the hall! Get out! Get out! Don’t go the way you came. You need to leave through the far door and get to the access tube.

  Karleen was kneeling now with her hands behind her head, her eyes squeezed together in stressful, glaring little slits. Floreina quickly tried to calculate the causes and effects of leaving Karleen alive, but found the potentialities too widely varied and complex.

  “Stay,” she ordered, and began her run toward the far exit, snatching another weapon from Gromor’s dead hand.

  Run! Mahran demanded.

  She sprinted to the hatchway and punched in her code and heard the faint sound of a pistol powering up behind her. Jumping through the hatch, she heard the shot. It gleamed off the door, and she felt a wave of heat. She turned in the doorway to look back to see two more security officers climbing through the hatchway at the other end of the accounting center. Seeing their hands, her trajectory calculations predicted they would aim high, and she allowed her legs to buckle as she fell through the hatchway.

  The shots seared above her, heating the air in a sudden wave of discomfort. But she fell below the bottom lip as her hand clasped the edge of the door and threw it closed.

  Where do I go from here? She asked, bringing up the map and seeing a route that Mahran had already traced, down an access tube and through the masses of slaves in the cargo bay.

  She grumbled. That’s the route you find for me?

  We don’t have a lot of options, Master… I’m sorry… Hopefully you can talk to the slaves… I think I’ve managed to cut off Karleen’s connection with them.

  Floreina continued running toward the end of the hallway to find a maintenance hatch leading into another drone access tube. She crawled in and immediately began pulling herself forward. Watching her map as she moved, she saw the tube dropping off just a few dozen meters ahead. Mahran showed her the location of another single soldier coming toward her from the lower levels, climbing painstakingly straight up the shaft.

  Do you have gravity controls? she asked. She checked her weapon access, trying to reach to her side, but finding the tube too cramped for easy movement.

  I can shut it on and off for the whole ship, he replied. That’s the only control I’ve got.

  I’m going to drop down the tube, she informed him. The interior is too close to power regulators to risk firing my weapon. We’re going to need a properly timed shutdown of the gravity. Do you have a visual on the soldier coming up the passage?

  Affirmative; he’ll be to you in about five minutes.

  Floreina dragged herself frantically forward, scraping her knees across the perforated interior of the conduit.

  Stay quiet, Mahran reminded her. He doesn’t know you’re above him.

  Seeing the opening several meters ahead, she slowed to more carefully mask the sound of her approach.

  He’s about nine meters below you. He’ll see you as you cross over.

  She reached the opening and forced herself to keep going, trusting in Mahran’s assessment, hoping her opponent would not be willing to use his firearm inside the sensitive tubing.

  She threw herself to the far side of the opening and let her legs drop into the vertical shaft.

  He sees you, Mahran warned. He’s planting his feet… drawing his weapon.

  Prepare to shut off the gravity just a split second before impact.

  Copy.

  Floreina let go. She dropped, tightening her body, and bringing her feet together.

  And nine hundred milliseconds later, her feet connected, and she felt space bunching up as the soldier’s neck snapped and collapsed under her feet. They sailed downward—or the direction that had recently been downward—but came to a jolting halt as the soldier curled and wedged into the shaft. Floreina’s arms slammed against the sides, the ridges grating painfully across her elbows.

  And she floated, the lack of gravity having successfully prevented a dangerous fall.

  Reinstate the gravity, she ordered as she planted her feet into one of the ridges just above the soldier and gripped another set with her hands.

  The sudden jolt ran down her body and locked into her feet and hands. She dug in to compensate, and held tight.

  But so did the body of the soldier. She waited for several seconds but the corpse held tight. Carefully she braced against the side, bent her legs and kicked downward, but only seemed to make the body curl up even more. Inching downward she kicked at his knees, which were now curled up near the soldier’s chest. Still, the body remained wedged tightly into the conduit.

  Floreina sighed and leaned against the side, just moment
arily, and focused on the pounding of her heart.

  You need to keep moving, Mahran reminded her after several short seconds.

  The body won’t drop, she replied. Give me a minute… deactivate gravity again.

  A moment later she was weightless again, muscles relaxing in their new freedom. Sometimes Floreina could think to herself that the weightlessness was where humans originally came from… that the original Eden was a place beyond the confines of a planet and gravity. If God were physical, he would be weightless.

  She set to work tugging at the body, gripping its clothing, pulling awkwardly, barely able to hunch down enough to grip him. She groaned, stood up, and wedged into the conduit ridges.

  Gravity again, she ordered.

  Her stomach turned as her cells seemed to coalesce downward, one by one. Her feet locked into the ridges for a moment, but she pulled her right foot out and gave the kicking another attempt. Still, the corpse did not budge.

  You don’t have a lot of time here, Mahran reminded.

  I know, shut up…

  I’m sorry Master—

  What can we do here Mahran? He’s not budging.

  Mahran paused.

  Floreina sighed and pulled out her sidearm. I’ve got to cut him up… she said, adjusting the pistol to a more precise setting. She aimed carefully at the soldier’s thighs, fearing a misfire that could rupture a wall and disrupt energy flow.

  As she held the beam, gritting her face against the stench of searing flesh, she commented, Sometimes I get this sudden sense that I’m a horrible person…

  The beam cut through the first leg and the body moved and contorted downward. Floreina shook her head in an attempt to clear the nauseating smoke filling the tiny quarters. She wasted no time, however, in beginning her cut of the other leg. Ten seconds later it snapped, and the body jolted, but still held.

  Floreina holstered her weapon and gave another angry kick to the head, and the torso broke loose and fell unceremoniously down the shaft, bouncing against the tube ridges. The two legs followed behind.

  She said a prayer and ordered Mahran to shut down the gravity one last time.