by Rachel Aukes
Throttle and Finn had just finished listening to Chief’s briefing, and the mess hall was a flurry of activity. He’d divided all the available Peacekeepers into nineteen teams. Sixteen of the teams all had the same assignment: reclaim their assigned stairway and work through their assigned level. The pirates had control of four levels, and each level had four main stairways. Another team, wearing full chime suits, would enter the emergency evacuation tunnel and clear it. The remaining two teams would be transported via the Javelin to go after Jader leadership and deactivate the lockdown.
No one could reach Punch, which meant Throttle had the only ship to assist in the movement. Her team of six experienced marshals was being led by Chief Roux himself, even though anyone could see that his injuries were severe. He’d slow them down, but he said they had the least distance to travel. Throttle figured the reason he was coming was that he wanted to see Anna East taken down as much as Throttle did.
On the level eight team, Throttle and Finn had the lowest tenure of the marshals. In addition to Chief, the four people accompanying them were all senior-level marshals, each having ten-plus years with the Peacekeepers. Throttle and Finn weren’t intimidated, however, as they’d both survived a war and had been in close-quarter battles before, something that many marshals went a career without experiencing.
“Syl, come in,” she heard Finn say through her comm-chip. She turned to see him trying to reach his wife once again.
“She’s okay,” Throttle said, though she was beginning to have doubts as well.
Finn’s features were hard. “If something’s happened to her, I’m going to kill him.”
Throttle didn’t need to ask whom Finn was talking about. If something happened to Sylvian, Throttle would also place the blame squarely and deservedly on Punch Durand’s shoulders. Hell, if Sylvian was dead and Finn didn’t kill Punch, she’d finish the job.
The video screens all blinked and came to life. Throttle’s gaze focused toward the nearest screen, which bore the Atlas logo before displaying the general menu.
Many Peacekeepers cheered and stared straight ahead as though running through screens on their personal Atlas chips.
She glanced back to see Chief’s face turn even paler.
“She did it. Syl brought Atlas back online,” Finn said.
Throttle heard the relief in her friend’s voice for his wife, though she knew exactly what Chief was thinking. If Anna East no longer had Atlas, then she no longer had a need to remain on Free Station.
“Damn it, Punch,” Chief said, the anxiety evident in his voice. “The mission’s scrubbed. We have to have everyone search for the explosives.”
“Where’s the most likely location?” a marshal on their team, Gavin “Detroit” Jackson, asked.
“I’ve had specialists run scenarios. East has access to the armory, so she has more than enough explosives to place them on every level. The consensus was that she’d take an easier route and place explosives in a critical area capable of burning through the station. That could be on either the control center level or down in the mechanicals levels.”
“That’s a lot of area to cover,” Finn said.
“Check the air-processing center,” Marshal Williams said. “I worked a case like this once. The owners blew their own station to collect insurance. They placed explosives in the air-processing center. We had evidence, but they’d bought the judge and jury.”
“We’ll head down to the APC, then. I’ll leave other teams on the mission plan until we confirm that the location of the explosives is or is not in the APC,” Chief said.
“Hold on. I have a crew member near there,” Throttle said.
Chief gave her a nod, and she tapped her comm-chip. “Eddy, do you read me?”
“Of course I do, Throttle. I designed the comm-chips. They’re not going to fail.”
She blew off his comment. “We have an emergency. Free Station is rigged to blow with explosives.”
A lengthy pause. “Okay. And?”
“Anna East set up explosives to make it look like the station was destroyed by an asteroid hit, and she could set them off at any time. We’re thinking sooner versus later.”
“No investigators would mistake a bombing for an asteroid impact. That plan is insane.”
“No sane person would invade Free Station.”
“Good point.”
“We think the most likely place for explosives to do catastrophic damage would be around the oxygenators in the air-processing center.”
A few seconds passed. “That’s definitely the most logical place.”
“The center isn’t far from where the Javelin is parked. You’re the nearest specialist. With the elevators down, it’d take the next closest specialist ten minutes or more to get there. I need you to hurry there and deactivate the explosives. Can you do that?”
“Of course.”
“Okay. Good luck. We’re heading your way and will see you on the Javelin. Everyone on Free Station is counting on you, Eddy.”
“I know.”
Eddy didn’t say anything else, so Throttle pulled her finger away from her comm-chip and turned back to Chief.
“Do you think he can do it?” Chief asked.
“Yes,” Throttle answered with confidence.
A broadcast signal blared across the station speakers, and Anna East’s voice permeated the mess hall.
“So you think taking Atlas from me gives you an edge? You can have it; I’m done with it. Free Station is yours again, at least for the next few minutes. Goodbye, Peacekeepers.”
A quake rattled the floors and walls, and all the screens when dark.
“Do you think she set off the explosives?” someone asked.
“I lost my Atlas chip again,” someone else said.
“Peacekeepers, remain calm,” Chief shouted over the din. “We’re still alive, so that means Free Station is still operational. That explosion was likely tied to the reason we no longer have Atlas again. I have a team working on locating the explosives, if there even are some. Stay focused. This mission starts now, and you each have a crucial role. Good luck.”
Chief turned and took the lead of his group of six marshals in the opposite direction everyone else was headed. “If she’s set a timer, she’s jumping ship. We can’t afford to wait. We need to get to eight now and block any ship coming to pick her up. If she can’t get off the station, she’ll cancel the timer.”
As they walked down the hallway, Finn spoke softly. “If she doesn’t cancel the timer, let’s hope Eddy’s fast enough.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Anna fumed. Chief Roux was still alive and doing what he did best, organizing marshals against her. Pete had been sloppy. He should’ve made sure the Peacekeeper was dead before bragging to her. She was glad she’d locked up Pete—he’d done nothing but fail her since coming to Free Station.
Throttle Reyne being on Free Station brought Anna some satisfaction, even though she’d wanted to see the marshal executed in front of her. Instead, Anna would have to take comfort in knowing that Jakob’s murderer would be dead.
She went to call out to the man who’d been modifying the Atlas records, but she didn’t remember his name, so she called him by his nationality. “Jader, what’s the status of the Atlas update?”
The young hacker turned in his seat. “I’m at ninety-seven percent complete in changing personnel records. I need another hour to finish assigning tenure contracts for all Hiraethians. I haven’t even started erasing all the Jader arrest records.”
She frowned. “That’s taking too long. You have fifteen minutes.”
“But without the router, I have to enter all this manually.”
“One hour,” she said before spinning in her chair to face the man standing behind her. “Yank, activate the timer for thirty minutes.”
The hefty man nodded. “It’ll be my pleasure, Ms. East.”
He pulled out a tablet and began typing in a command sequence. Anna noticed the Peacek
eeper specialists she’d put to work in the command center—they fidgeted and threw glances at Yank as though they knew what the timer would deliver.
She smiled at the specialists. “There, there. No need to worry. You’ll have Free Station back in your hands in no time.”
None of them seemed relieved.
“It’s set. We’d better get going,” Yank said.
“Not yet,” she said.
He frowned. “But the explosives—”
“Can be turned off at the last moment. I’m not leaving until everyone in this system is tenured to me.”
He eyed her like she was crazy. “Then leave Nelson. He can report in as soon as your contracts are created.”
The hacker looked over his shoulder. “Wait. You’re leaving me behind?”
“No, I’m not leaving you behind,” Anna said. “Keep working.” She tossed a glare at Yank. “Quit distracting him. We’re not blowing Free Station until after Atlas is updated, and we’re on the Bendix.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Eddy reviewed his tablet as soon as the airlock door closed behind him. He’d slung his tool bag over his shoulder, along with a rifle even though he found the weapon unnecessary since Throttle and Finn had already gone through much of that area and had encountered no pirates.
A map displayed on the tablet screen.
“Excellent.” Eddy added a pin to make his navigation to the engineering area all the easier. He looked up over his shoulder. “Come along, my little round friend. Let’s get this over with. I don’t like to be here any more than you do.”
Throttle hadn’t told Eddy he could bring a bot with him onto Free Station, but she hadn’t told him he couldn’t, so he took that as her leaving the decision up to him. The bot hovered behind Eddy as he followed the map. It was one of the smaller bots, designed for scanning an area for whatever substances it’d been programmed to scan for. The bot fed sensory data to Eddy’s tablet, in this case, any incendiary material its sensors identified. It was currently reading trace amounts of blasting powder, which he assumed had come from Finn, or Punch more likely, bringing shock grenades onto the station with them.
Projectile weapons of any kind were illegal to use in space, even for Peacekeepers, due to the extreme damage they could cause on any ship or station. That was why all Peacekeepers only used energy-based photon weapons. But Eddy knew Finn well enough to know that the ex-soldier-turned-marshal tended to bend the rules, and from what Eddy knew of Punch, that marshal didn’t even believe in rules.
Eddy hustled down the narrow walkway. He’d told Throttle he didn’t want to leave the ship, but she’d sounded in dire need of help, and he wouldn’t leave his crew to die if there was something he could do about it. But if he was hurt or killed, he’d make sure she wouldn’t hear the end of it. In fact, he’d left detailed instructions with Rusty to carry out in the event of Eddy’s demise so that he could guarantee Throttle would hear about his aggravation at being killed. Rusty wouldn’t be too hard on Throttle. After all, he knew she’d blame herself if something happened to Eddy, but she’d certainly deserve to hear his thoughts on the matter.
The walkway ended at a doorway, and Eddy paused only to verify the map. The air-processing center stood on the other side of a hallway open to the general population, so he’d be forced to leave the walkway that was restricted to engineers like himself. The air-processing center was the only logical place explosives would be placed that would ensure complete annihilation of an orbital station. Only a small number of explosives would be needed to ignite the tanks of pure oxygen, which would erupt into a firestorm that would burn through the station like a terrible wave.
There wouldn’t be enough left of Free Station for investigators to determine the cause, though Eddy thought the plan was a rather weak one, as it’d be incredibly suspicious not having fragments of an asteroid scattered among the wreckage. No experienced investigator would believe the story of an asteroid impact. Anna East wasn’t the smartest criminal he’d met, though he supposed the idea of faking an asteroid impact would seem a brilliant idea in the same mind that had thought it a good idea to try to sleep with her own brother.
Eddy truly didn’t understand how most people’s minds worked. To him, everyone was insane. His crewmates were also insane, just to a lesser extent than most others he’d met. He often wondered if he was the only sane person left in the galaxy. That would make sense since, in his entire life, which covered multiple star systems, he’d only ever been able to have truly intelligent, deep conversations with Rusty, who wasn’t even human.
He brushed off the thoughts about other people since they did nothing except drive him crazy. He grabbed the door handle, drew in a deep breath, opened the door, and stepped into the hallway. It was dimly lit, and he wondered if the entire station was operating on emergency power.
The bot bumped the frame on the way through.
“Careful there, Bonkers,” Eddy said, then thought to add, “You know, I bet I could get you some new directional gyros, but it’s just so darn cute watching you bonk into things.”
The bot didn’t show any response.
He shrugged. “You’re not much of a conversationalist.”
Voices drew his attention, and he snapped his gaze to his left to see two greasy men rush around the corner. Their arms were overfilled with what looked to be clothes, jewelry, and credit papers. One of the pirates took a step closer. “Easy there, buddy. We’re just passing through. Don’t do anything stupid.”
Their eyes met Eddy’s. Eddy tensed. Their eyes narrowed; Eddy’s widened. He dropped the tablet and fumbled for his rifle. Both pirates dropped their stolen goods and went for their pistols.
Eddy had his rifle up first, but the strap of his tool bag snagged on the barrel. His finger formed a vise grip on the trigger, and he fired a nonstop barrage. One of his shots hit the shin of the farthest pirate, causing him to fall forward and left. As the pirate toppled over, he fired a wild shot that struck his partner in the right lower back. His partner pirouetted around as he fell and shot the other pirate in the head.
Both pirates lay sprawled on the floor, unmoving.
Eddy stared. He glanced down at his rifle, then back at the pair of bodies. A grin filled his face, and he turned to the bot. “Did you see that? I took out two pirates!”
Suddenly infused with invincibility, he twirled the rifle around, only to accidentally fire off another shot into the floor. He cringed, grimaced, and then slowly and gingerly slung the rifle back over his shoulder.
He straightened, grabbed his bag, picked up the tablet, and crossed the hallway to open the door labeled Air-Processing Center. No Unauthorized Personnel Allowed. As he approached, the door opened. It seemed that when the station was on emergency power, most security protocols were suspended. He stepped inside, and the bot came in with him.
His tablet lit up with alerts. “Ah, there you are,” he said as he examined it for a sliver of a moment. He slid the device into his pocket and strode toward a series of machines shaped like fifty-five-gallon drums. A small black box sat between four of the barrel-shaped machines in the center of the room, a wire traveling from the device to each of the machines. A spark in any machine would start a cascade explosion, and the ensuing inferno would destroy the entire station. Each machine was marked Oxygenator.
“What a stupid name,” Eddy muttered as he approached the suspended device. He carefully examined the bottom and sides of the bomb. He felt perspiration instantly form in his armpits as he looked at the top.
He eyed the “bomb” with humor. He’d expected a homemade bomb, something as ugly and mean as the pirates who made it. Instead, he was looking at a GP device that sent out bursts of electricity to destroy illegal drugs and other contraband that couldn’t be redistributed. It was a device built with safety in mind, easily deactivated by anyone with basic mechanical skills.
The problem was that someone had hacked on a timer with a small black stick antenna, which was definit
ely not GP-approved hardware.
0:35 remained. He stared as the timer dropped to 0:34.
Goose bumps covered his skin. “Oh, rats.”
He dropped his tool bag and eased closer to the explosive. He cocked his head as the timer continued.
0:28
0:27
0:26
He lifted his finger to the timer and hit the red button in the bottom right. The timer stopped at 0:23. He flipped the toggle to turn off the system and sighed when the screen went blank instead of a big ka-boom. A few seconds later, he quickly unscrewed the omnidirectional antenna and tossed it aside, just in case.
Then, as carefully as he would string flying wires on a model airplane, he disconnected each of the wires and lowered the bomb to the floor. He tucked the bomb into his tool bag and slung it over his shoulder.
He felt a sudden sense of smugness at saving everyone on Free Station. Satisfied, he nodded at the small bot. “Whew. Let’s go back home, Bonkers.”
Eddy and the bot made their way back to the airlock. When he reached it, he stood, frozen in shock.
The Javelin was gone.
He grabbed the bot, fell back on his butt, and hugged Bonkers. He couldn’t believe it.
His crew had abandoned him.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
If Rusty could’ve sent a message through Bonkers, he would have, but his small robotic drones had no speakers and could only perform the most basic of tasks. He added a note to his work log to upgrade his bots, starting with Eddy’s two favorites: Bonkers and Blaster.
Rusty hadn’t wanted to leave Eddy behind, but he’d calculated that Eddy would be safest if the insurgents were dealt with. Still, he monitored Bonkers’s sensory feed. If trouble came Eddy’s way, Rusty would leave the rest of the crew and return to help him as soon as he ensured Throttle, Finn, and Sylvian were safe.
A week ago, Rusty would never have considered doing anything not consented to by a crew member, but the naive Bayse router that Eddy had installed allowed Rusty to look at every decision from new angles. Rusty had programmed in a single priority: keep the crew safe. All decisions would be made with that priority in mind. His human crew had once told him that he was part of the crew, which made making the single priority all the easier. After all, Rusty didn’t want to be in danger, either.
