by Angie Arland
“What if that section’s hiding something that’ll help us kill more squid?” Mason said.
He did have a point. Still… “Freck that. This ship is creepy enough without sticking our noses into more dark places. Where are all the bodies, man? I thought there’d be loads more squid floating around here.”
“Probably all blasted into space when their ship got ripped apart,” Mason replied. “Wonder what the hell did that?”
“Dunno. Long as the squid die in agony, who cares?” She didn’t give a cargo-rat’s ass how they died, long as she had a front row seat to the show.
“Hold up. The shielded area’s close.” Mason never used his holo to scan anything. She didn’t think he knew how to use it.
“Yeah? How much O2 you got left?”
“Enough.”
“How much, man?” The O2 gauge on her holo read twenty-two percent.
“Enough to check it out before we head back to that sleek new ship. If you stop asking so many damn questions, we’ll have enough O2 for an hour.” Mason strode ahead.
“Mason, Grimes, do you copy?” Aiden asked over open comms.
“Copy, sir,” Grimes responded while catching up to Mason as he swept the area with his holo.
“What’s your status?” Aiden asked.
“Still searching the labs, sir. Haven’t found jack so far.”
“Soon as you’re done on that deck, report to my position.”
“Yes, sir. Grimes, out.” She turned to Mason.
“We’ve got time,” he said, softening his voice. It threw her a little off guard.
She thought about it, then gave in. Otherwise, she’d never hear the end of it. “You’re really in a hurry to die, aren’t ya? Alright, we won’t get a chance to do this again, I suppose.” She used her holo and located the door to the shielded section. It dawned on her. “I just had a horrible thought…whatever is behind that door, might kill us.”
“It might try.” Mason blasted the door panel with his rifle. Slugs of energy ricocheted off, almost hitting them. The door slid open. They looked at each other, then Mason rushed forward.
“Wait for me,” Grimes yelled through the comms, praying they made it out alive.
She expected to see something like a bunch of squid scum, yet they faced a second door. She looked back just as the first door slid closed behind them.
“What the freck? There’s no power here…” Grimes checked her holo. The readings said the pressure was being altered between the two doors. “Shit!” The only space she knew that changed pressure like that was an airlock. She was on the verge of hyperventilating, then remembered they were wearing EVA suits.
The second door opened. Mason rushed into the light, blasting the shit out of everything. Grimes grit her teeth as she fed a new power-cell into her rifle and chased after the crazy son of a bitch.
Thirty-Three
For once, Aiden felt satisfied. Jane and her gel-filled tank were housed securely in the ship’s cargo hold thanks to Ryder’s ingenuity. Doctor McNeill couldn’t stop grinning from ear-to-ear inside his helmet at ‘his’ newfound prize. And most of his crew were aboard the AEV Mark-I after their historic excursion without a single scrape, bump, or bruise, all except for himself, Harper, and the grunts.
Let’s all get back for some well-deserved R&R.
Harper, Spero, and himself were the only ones left in the alien hub. Aiden tapped his foot. He considered leaving the SigsOp alone so he and Spero could double check the labs, but as jumpy as the man was already, that probably wouldn’t fly. “How’s it coming, Harper? You have it yet?”
“Just begun the transfer,” he responded after a long pause.
Aiden suppressed a sigh, knowing it would only grate on the SigsOp more. “We really need to get moving. You got the O2 canisters Reece brought, right?”
“In my backpack.” Harper looked up at him. “Sir, the system on this ship isn’t quite what I expected. That’s why it’s taking a while to jimmy-rig this thing with what we have.”
“What’s the issue?”
“It’s old.”
“And that’s a problem how?”
“Imagine using your holo to access a floppy disk.”
“A floppy what?”
“Yeah. That’s how old. It’s taken some genuine skills on my part to modify our equipment just to gain access to the system. I, uh…you know, never mind. It’ll take about twenty ems to download whatever I can salvage from the database and sensor logs.”
“Well, can you hurry it up somehow?”
“Oh, sure. I’ll make it go faster, sir.”
Aiden had a feeling Harper was pacifying him, but it didn’t bother him, everything was going to plan for once. “That’s more like it,” he said as he checked his holo. Mason and Grimes should have arrived by now.
He opened the ship-wide channel. “Mason, Grimes, what’s your position?” No response. “Mason? Grimes? Do you copy?”
“Cendent to Captain Lomax.”
“Go ahead, Nitaya,” Aiden said.
“I can provide their last known coordinates, if you require them.”
“Send their location to my holo.” Off comms, Aiden swore a multitude of times.
“What do you think they’re into?” Harper asked.
“Not your concern. You just focus on downloading the data,” Aiden said, pointing at the open panel on the core and the coils floating around the SigsOp.
Mason was a shit-magnet, no doubt. As soon as he yanked them both back to the ship, Aiden would suspend his ass. He didn’t care what excuse the guy had. He checked his holo for the transmitted coordinates, then opened the ship-wide comm.
“If you can hear me, Mason, Grimes…I’ve got your position. I’m coming.”
“You sure I can’t help, sir?” Harper asked.
“No, just…tell you what. Here.” Aiden unhooked Spero’s tether and handed it up to Harper. “Take care of her while I’m gone. Soon as you’re done here, get her back to the ship. I’m trusting you, got it?” Aiden headed for the corridor.
“Karson, you listening?” Aiden hailed the Weps.
“Sir?”
“Meet me at their coordinates. Ryder, get back to Harper’s position and cover him.”
“On my way, sir,” Karson responded, followed by Ryder’s, “Yes, sir.”
Aiden liked that about those two; they did as ordered, without question and made a good team.
He wasn’t an expert at maneuvers in zero-G, but, in this case, it was going to be faster than plodding along in mag-boots. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness in the corridor, he switched his boots off and began pulling himself swiftly along the route from girder to corner to anything in between. He batted a piece of floating panel to the side.
The click of wide comms suddenly opened followed by the repeated thwip-thwip-thwip of plasma fire. Mason screamed unintelligibly.
Grimes could be heard shouting, “Holy shit! Mason! Mason! No!” More plasma fire. “You frecking bas—!” Her screaming dulled down until all he could hear was a gut-wrenching, gurgling sound and an odd clicking noise.
Then silence.
“Grimes! Zoe!” Aiden yelled. “I’m almost to your position! Hang in there!” He pulled himself towards the blips on the holo, but even before he reached them, he knew they were gone. Swearing, he checked his holo. One light remained—one of them was still alive!
Aiden swatted pieces of frozen terudithan aside, zooming and weaving along the corridor into an open area. He zipped upward to the deck above, thumping into the ceiling there and pushing off. He scanned as wide as his holo allowed. Something in the area was interfering with the signal. “Freck, freck, freck…”
Fifteen grueling seconds later, he arrived at the door panel. He activated his boots and came to the floor while catching his breath. A single blip still flickered on the holo. He checked the display on his rifle, the power-cell read one-hundred percent, the ammo read sixty-four. He had another cell and mag of sixty-four plasma ro
unds attached to his belt.
“Karson, are you close?”
“Uh…looks like I’m about six-hundred-fifty meters from your position, sir,” Karson puffed.
Shit. If Zoe was alive, he couldn’t wait on Karson. Swallowing hard, Aiden recalled the lessons on situational awareness he’d taught to his cadets—not as easy wearing an EVA suit, even this streamlined version. Hearing slight shifts in motion in the surrounding environment would still be difficult.
The door slid open.
He stepped back and brought his rifle up, but nothing was there. “Freck,” he whispered, then stepped in. The door shut behind him, and he saw a second one ahead. Assuming it was a pressurized section, he waited, pulse racing. Finally, the second door opened.
A painfully bright glowing ball in the center of a huge cavern-like chamber illuminated it like a thousand stars. Aiden’s helmet visor darkened automatically to protect his eyes. He guessed, from dozens of smashed objects floating around the light, the object may have fallen from the top of the cavern, hopefully crushing as many squid soldiers as possible, before the cruiser came apart.
Grimes hadn’t moved from her position, according to his holo, which meant she must either be injured or unconscious. Even though the section was shielded, their comms obviously worked but what the hell was it shielding? If the chamber was pressurized, that meant sound could be heard. He recalled the muffled gunfire over the comms, which proved as much, so he listened for changes in the environment as he followed the life-sign’s location down a set of metal stairs into the main chamber.
Rows upon rows of cocoon-like pods were housed in shallow metal alcoves along the walls on that level. About ninety-percent seemed damaged, while several drifted around the light in the center and writhed like slugs in a salt bath.
A clicking noise came from behind. Something had emerged after he’d descended the steps. Aiden waited until he felt a presence come closer. It expected to take him by surprise, but he would turn the tide. His breath slowed as his senses heightened, timing was absolute. Spinning, he swung his rifle hard and smashed whatever-it-was full force.
A massive crab-like creature reeled back, thrashing tentacles from either its neck or face, he couldn’t tell, but he was taken aback at the sight of the alien monstrosity. It made a skreee noise and lunged. Its head armor flared as it jabbed and nipped at him, and Aiden rolled to avoid contact.
The creature skittered after him, defying the zero-gravity, and extended an open pincer. It gripped his torso tight and Aiden grunted from the unexpected force. It flung him, and he was jettisoned into a bank of cocoons. Stacked rows of them came free, and if it were not for his rifle getting lodged in a grate along the wall, he would have been floating awkwardly and ripe for the taking. Instead, he used the tether and pulled himself to the wall, getting his feet to a solid surface and letting the mag-boots grant him purchase. He found himself atop a narrow, trench-like runnel, which was about five-feet-deep and encircled the central deck.
From this position, he spied Zoe standing on the central deck, her rifle suspended on its tether above her. He was about to yell for her, then realized from her angle she wasn’t standing on her own power. She was either dead or unconscious, her boots still actively anchoring her to the floor as the rest of her body swayed as if underwater.
The crab-creature clattered over and regarded her a moment, then drew back it’s pincer.
Aiden tugged furiously at his rifle’s tether trying to free the weapon. It stuck fast. The rifle’s tether release was out of reach, behind the grate and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. He looked back at Zoe and the creature towering over her. His frustration and anger grew exponentially as he watched on in horror.
Plasma fire chewed into the creature’s thorax. It reeled back, searching for the origin of the blast. Finding none, it returned to regard Zoe’s unconscious form.
Aiden praised whoever it was distracting the space crab and continued the struggle to free his rifle but to no avail. He turned back to check on Zoe.
Another volley of plasma fire hit the creature. Throwing its head back it screeched like a banshee, sending dizzying vibrational waves throughout the cavern. Again, it lunged forward, nipping Zoe’s thigh; a thin ribbon of blood erupted, crystallizing in the cold depths of space. Plasma fire splintered the creature’s hind leg, sending it into a spin. The space crab whipped its armored head from side to side, attempting to find the source of the invisible aggressor.
“Over here you bastard!” Aiden roared, tempting the creature away from Zoe. It was time to do his duty and protect his crew.
The crab-creature swiveled, antennae up. It seemed to be trying to locate him, so he crouched in the trench while tugging on his rifle’s tether. As he did so, something came into view about ten feet away. He hadn’t noticed before. An EVA suit rested partially against the trench wall. The helmet’s visor was broken, within it, sheathed in a layer of frozen blood and ice, the last vestiges of fear were etched on Billy Mason’s lifeless face, while his body contorted at an unnatural angle, his torso partially severed in two. Aiden shuddered and a sense of dread weighed him down.
Mason, dead.
Grimes, possibly dead.
And I’m next.
They were trained to fight Terudithan soldiers, not giant, armored, space crab-creatures that could slice through their suits like paper. Aiden yanked again, trying desperately to pull his rifle free.
The crab-creature reared its ugly armored head and unleashed a piercing cry. Dormant cocoons suspended around the chamber burst to life, their insides squirming. A nearby cocoon caught Aiden’s attention, mere feet away. It was attached to circular tubing, and it moved and writhed until a split formed from top to bottom. A gray slime-covered thing emerged, wet husks sticking to its pale body.
At the same time, the crab-creature clicked and waved its antennae and tentacles about. It climbed the wall and scrabbled sideways perpendicular to the floor. Aiden hunkered deeper in the trench. At least for now, it was leaving Zoe alone.
His earpiece clicked. “Sir, I’m on the other side of the cavern,” Karson said. “I’ve got your position on the holo.”
In that moment, Aiden realized the futility of his situation. He had no hope of escape, but he’d give Zoe and his crew, what remained of them, a chance.
“Forget it, Kars…Noah…” he whispered, using the man’s first name. Karson was a member of his crew; Noah was a friend. “Just get Zoe back to the ship.”
“Hell no! I’m not leaving you, sir.”
“Look… Mason is dead. Zoe…close to it. I’ll distract the space crab while you get Zoe and haul ass to the ship. Don’t look back. It’s not up for debate.”
The crab-creature circled the deck, pausing to listen for sounds of movement. “Harper, forget the download. You and Spero, get to the ship. Go now. That’s an order.”
A clamor of voices came over the open comms. Aiden closed the channel.
Surrendering to the fight, he relaxed a little and hit the wall with his armored fist, sending the creature his exact location.
Karson was unhooking Zoe now from the deck, while the crab scuttled around debris and cocoons hell bent on finding him.
It had certainly been one hell of a ride. He imagined the alien creature would shear though his suit with one clean cut or plunge its pincer into his torso. His lifelong goal would never be realized, to assist in the annihilation of the Terudithan home world, but it wasn’t all bad. Sam and Lauren waited. He could join them now.
The creature moved over top of him, a giant with eight legs and a thorax large enough to cast a shadow over his entire body. Violet-pink blood dripped from its wounds onto his suit. Its right pincer retracted.
Aiden closed his eyes and prepared for the deathblow he’d waited for, so long.
Thirty-Four
Eamon Finnegan sat alone in the mess hall alongside an empty bowl of what-was-once linguine. He’d scoffed the creamy pasta while listening to the c
ommunications on his wrist holo, which sat on the table in front of him rather than on his arm—his other arm still splinted…and smarted, to be honest. Maybe that was a good thing.
Pain lets you know you’re alive.
Damn stupid thing he’d done though, trying to fix the old ion engine. The new quantum particle drive was a masterpiece, but it still had limitations, just like everything else in the fleet. He’d been feeling useless and sorry for himself as the rest of the crew went about their business.
He wiped his mustache with a napkin, his eyes fixated on the holo sitting on the tabletop as Captain Kellanie Leigh announced: “Flea! What the hell? We’ve got a Terudithan escort within nine ems? How the hell did that happen?”
“What?” Finnegan’s hairy brows lowered. “Nine ems?” he said to the empty room.
He then heard Kellanie ask, “Eve, have they deployed fighters?”
“No fighters have been detected,” the ship’s computer replied.
The dinnarei called Flea had already told him the AEV Mark-I was equipped as a defensive prototype; there were no offensive capabilities available. He found that difficult to believe, knowing Fleet Command, but this ship was certainly more alien than human engineered.
Finnegan tugged at the end of his mustache, one of his nervous habits.
There must be something I can do, he thought. The ship’s computer should have picked up the enemy hours ago. He had a hard time trusting this so-called Eve; in fact, he didn’t trust her…it.
Blasted AI, he thought, having never felt comfortable around autonomous machines that programmed, operated, and even repaired themselves. At least it isn’t another cruiser or warship. Still, a Terudithan escort vessel has some weapons and lots of squids.
“Bloody squids,” he muttered, then let out a silent, garlic-scented belch and scratched his stomach. Then, it dawned on him. Finnegan stopped rubbing his belly and stared across the room for a second.
He nodded. “Why not.”
