Escape the Federation
16 Oct 2024MdN
Chapter 1 =====================================================================The door to the small flat exploded in a cloud of dust. The shock wave drove his ageing body against the rear wall still sitting in the wooden chair which collapsed on impact. Not content, fate sent the poker table the same direction. It crashed into his abdomen like a kick from a horse.
Gasping for breath, all he managed was a mouthful of smoke. It had a bitter, metallic taste, but then it would, wouldn't it. He spat the taste away, but it returned with each breath.
His ears were full of a piercingly loud ringing, yet he could hear nothing. His eyes were stinging from the brightness, he could see nothing. Up felt like down. Left was right.
An instructor had once told him: "When it goes off, you will fall. Protect your head."
He flung his arms up towards where he thought his head was and managed to hit himself in the nose. At least he was in the right direction, he thought, a moment before his arms hit the floor, mercifully cushioning his head from the impact.
Always a bright side, he decided. His eyes were still stinging: too much damned brightness!
Collapsed on the floor, he decided that was the best place to stay.
"Sys Auth!" screamed a voice which he just about heard through the ringing. "System Authority!" It came again, just to make sure, sounding more assured of itself this time. "Don't move!"
He had no intention of moving, nor any idea of where he might move to. Cloudy shapes were moving around him, his eyes squinting against the brightness.
"Effects from a stun grenade last a few seconds," he remembered the instructor saying. "be sure to over-power your target quickly."
I'm over-powered, he thought to himself as he lay there. I'm too old and too retired for this shit. How did they find me?
He was rolled over, not gently, his hands and feet were bound. Then they dragged him up and on to a chair. Opposite him was Fred, in a similar state, looking every bit the academic he was, but with blood dripping from his nose and mouth, and a heavy bruise already forming on his forehead. Was he unconscious? He certainly wasn't moving. Next to him was Fred's headstrong teenaged daughter, Tracy.
Minutes earlier the trio had been playing poker, the evidence for which lay scattered around the room under a layer of debris. Now the Federation had caught up with him, and dragged Fred and Tracy down too.
This was all his fault, he knew that.
But how?
The flat was barely big enough for father and daughter, yet it had amused the pair to invite the recluse from next door round every week for their Friday night game. He appreciated the gesture, despite having no interest in cards, it was fun to debate current affairs with the law professor and student activist.
But now he'd got them into this mess.
"Rule number one," he remembered the first time the instructor had told them, "never allow yourself to get caught." It had been a daily message. "Fight, kill if you have to - but never get taken."
He'd been careful these past few years, watching his back, avoiding anything that might draw attention to himself. He hadn't let his guard down. Friday nights were the only social event he'd allowed himself. It was safe, he'd decided, the risk was minimal.
Obviously he'd been wrong.
Each day the instructors had delivered their message with examples of agents evading capture. Their examples had become more and more extreme - he understood why, desensitising him to the barbaric methods he may one day need to employ. Those memories slowly returned as he sat in the chair. The decades had buried them, his trade-craft weakened, but this explosive intrusion brought it all back into sharp focus.
He looked around him. He counted four of them. Two assumed the role of guard. One stood watch in the corridor to deflect any inquisitive neighbours. The last he had pegged as the interrogator, 'yep we're going to be doing the dance in the flat it seems'.
Caught or in the process of evasion? The evidence for the former was overwhelming, but the difference is merely a state of mind, the instructors had told him that too.
"Don't hesitate, use lethal force, but never get taken captive." The stories told by the instructors had been gruesome, captured agents were rarely released, they just disappeared.
He could just imagine their disapproving looks at his current predicament: bound, hands and feet.
'It's just a state of mind,' he reminded himself.
The two guards seemed happy that their prisoners were restrained satisfactorily. They stood watch over him as the interrogator set up. Except they weren't watching him, they were watching her.
Chapter 2 =====================================================================
In the System Authority control room four similar raids were being monitored.
Chief Rowley cast a casual eye over the screens but his teams had everything in hand, there was no need to interfere.
The teams were interrogating in situ, Rowley wanted information and expected to get it. He was sure the wait would be less than an hour, then the next stage of the operation would begin. He only needed one of the four suspects to break to get the names he wanted, and the stakes were high enough to merit extreme measures to hurry things along.
The girl was an interesting one. Daughter of a lawyer, the worst kind, an academic with a social conscience. He'd raised her to speak out, to voice her opinion, to join in with disruptive protests if she thought the cause was just.
"You don't protest against the system, young lady," Rowley mumbled while watching her on the screen. "The Federation IS The System."
She was too young to understand the perils of the world, and her father was too ...
"Theoretical," he smiled to himself as he saw the old man tied up. He looked in a bad way, "all the better for us".
She would break easily.
Ten minutes at the most.
He'd sent his best interrogator her way to make sure.
He checked the time, then watched the screen. Looking into her eyes he willed her to spill what she knew; the clock was ticking.
All his officers wore body cams, the lawyers had insisted. "To protect them," they'd said - the hell it was. Rowley would personally see to it that any and all footage from tonight's events would suffer technical difficulties.
He expected his officers to go above and beyond for this op. He hoped that they all knew they could trust him to make it right. The four teams were selected with that in mind, and his control room team likewise. No leaks, no ruined careers, just get the names we need.
Rowley was old school, he'd been around the block but somehow ended up back at square one, running system authority ops taking down bad guys in a coriolis. His career had peaked decades ago working directly for Zachary Hudson, but one disastrous outcome and he was back here. He never had understood the events leading up to his downfall - no one had.
Years later he'd assigned his best investigator a side-project looking into those events. An abuse of power, misuse of Federation resources, call it what you will, but Rowley had had to know the truth.
It had taken a few months, but his man had come back with absolutely nothing. Nothing concrete, that is. Just a collection of coincidences, bad luck, freak accidents, and bizarre happenings that taken in isolation would have been just that. Put them all together though and it looked like a coordinated plan to lose Hudson a key star system and with it Rowley's job.
Who gained?
"Well follow the money," Rowley's investigator had suggested. "If these events are connected, then it all points to agents of Edmund Mahon."
It was so obvious when he'd heard those words years later. And here is where he had been ever since. His reverie was broken by the images on the screen.
The girl was weakening, he could see it in her eyes. The interrogation had only just begun, the officer had barely touched her, but her neat, comfortable lifestyle had just been turned upside down. It was the shock that did it every time.
"You're not invincible," Rowley told her through the screen. "You're not the unflappable, untouchable freedom fighter you thought you were." Reality always crashed down on suspects after a lightening raid like this. They could have knocked and entered in a civilised way, but blowing the door and lobbing in a stun grenade or two was always a rude awakening to who the big boys were.
"Five minutes and we'll have her," he announced to the control room. "How are the others progressing?"
He didn't really listen to the replies, he didn't much care at this point. He was certain the girl would break first. He turned up the sound to listen to his operator interrogate her.
"Someone's losing a finger," he heard him say - playing hardball already, he must sense how close she is too.
'You told them to get results fast,' he reminded himself with another smile.
"Who's it going to be?" the operator asked her, getting in her face. "Your father?" Rowley watched the body cam turn to the older man as the operator grabbed his index finger and yanked towards the shears. A couple of practice snips for effect.
"Nooo," she screamed, in tears now. "Please nooo."
"Then tell me the names, that's all we need. All this stops when you tell me the names."
The camera turned the other way. The third man, a neighbour if Rowley remembered the briefing correctly, not important. "How about his finger first instead, just a quick snip?" The shears were there again, slicing menacingly open and closed.
"No oh, God no. I'm so sorry," she managed to blub her apology to the irrelevant third man. He hadn't moved, Rowley realised. All the way through the performance his head was drooped to his chest. He must have seen the shears, but not even a flinch. Had he passed out?
"The names?" he heard from the speaker.
The camera panned back to the crying girl, this was it, this was the moment, Rowley knew they'd won.
"Wait!" he startled everyone in the control room.
"Sir?"
"Back," urgently he beckoned the video operator to skip backwards.
"Sir, she's about to cra..."
"Back, back, back, skip it backwards."
The face, he knew that face, or was his mind playing tricks after remembering the past.
The operator skipped back a few seconds.
"There!" Rowley stopped him. The neighbour's head was drooped, the shears were being threatening, then as his agent panned back to the girl.
"Stop!" just as he was going out of shot the neighbour looked up. It wasn't a clear view, the left half of a face, and still mostly looking at the floor at that. He was imagining things, surely. It couldn't be.
"Who is the neighbour? Give me a name, someone, quickly please."
The name offered meant nothing to him, but still he stared at the screen.
"Did we run him through the facial rec databases?"
"Yes, Sir. Nothing came up on the locals."
Rowley's face spun from screen to officer: "You only checked locals?"
"Of course, sir. A galaxy-wide Federation check would still have been running." His man was right, of course. "Why, who is he?"
Rowley turned back to the screen, still not sure.
"Patch me through," he ordered the communications officer, "I need a better look."
"Sir, he's about to get the names we can't interrupt h..."
"Patch me through, officer, right now!"
As soon as the scolded comms officer hit the button Rowley was yelling instructions.
"This is Chief Rowley, I need to see the neighbour's face."
"What?" the confused response was heard over the speakers.
"The neighbour's face - turn to your left so I can see the man's face on your camera."
"Sir, can this wait."
"Do it, right now!"
The screen turned towards the neighbour once more, his head drooped again. Rowley was sure he saw it drop as the officer turned.
"Lift your head up," they heard over the speakers
"And be careful," Rowley added without knowing why.
"Don't worry, Sir. This one's harmless." They all watched as the officer pointed his blaster at the man's chin and pushed it up. "His hands are tied anyway, just for good measure."
The blaster pushed the chin higher. As the face came into view Rowley's eyes opened wide.
"Don't get too cl..."
Chapter 3 =====================================================================
"Too close!" he shouted at the man with the gun.
His hands, still bound, took hold of the pistol and spun it upside down around the agent's trigger finger. The self-same finger which was to push against the trigger as he thrust the gun back towards the officer.
There was a flash. His aching eyes winced at the laser blast - "enough with the bright lights already."
He felt the other man's grip on the gun go limp as he fell to the floor with a hole burning through his chest.
"Guns aren't sticks," he said to no one in particular, "don't point them, unless you're firing them."
He jumped up and pointed 'the stick' at each of the officers in turn. Three more flashes, three more bodies on the floor.
"I'm afraid we need to leave," he said to Tracy who just sat staring at the carnage before her.
He took a knife from one of the officer's utility belts and cut his bindings, followed by hers.
"How did you...?" asked Tracy, she was duly ignored.
He took each of the body cams from the officers' tactical vests and smashed them with the butt of the knife.
"No more movie night for HQ."
He shuffled over to Fred who still hadn't moved. Fearing the worst he reached for the unconscious man's throat and felt for a pulse. He couldn't find one, but then he'd always struggled with that. It was a mystery to him how doctors pronounced death so confidently, he struggled to find a pulse on a body even when it was talking back to him.
"Sorry for making things ten times worse for you both," he said, re-evaluating his grip and trying again. "But judging by their - hmm found it - eager questioning, none of us were getting released again this lifetime anyway."
"Is my dad okay?"
"There's a very weak pulse, we're going to have to leave him."
"Leave him?" Tracy asked in surprise. "Why? Where are we going?"
He moved over to her and held her firmly by the shoulders. Tracy's eyes were full, tears about to burst through as the reality of what lay around her registered. The coldness came easy to him, a situation dictated an action which his brain would execute. As simple as that.
For most people emotions trigger behaviour. Tracy's emotions right now weren't helpful, she was panicking, she was worried about her father. That primordial chimp that all humans have, long buried by evolution, had taken over and instinct was coming up blank.
"Tracy, listen to me. This is important."
She nodded, stealing a glance at her dad.
"These men wanted information from you. More will be on the way, we can't be found here." His hand pointed out the four bodies on the floor.
Those full eyes were overflowing down her cheeks now. She made no sound.
"I need to get away and off this station. I strongly suggest you come with me or they'll pin this on you and lock you both away for a long time."
She looked around at the four bodies lying on the floor, then back to her dad, tied up on the chair still unconscious. She wiped away a tear.
"What will happen to dad?"
"He's tied to a chair and unconscious after agents raided his flat. They'll have a hard time prosecuting him for anything that happened here and I doubt they'll even try - too many awkward questions for them to answer." He looked into her eyes, they understood. "But we need to go, now!"
Chapter 4 =====================================================================
His shock at seeing the face only lasted for a second. Or his inaction did, the shock continued.
"A black Cobra," he pointed at the data terminal. "Find me a black Cobra."
The agent frowned, but went to work.
"There are four Cobras in the landing deck," he read from the screen.
"Black?" Rowley interrupted
"None are black, Sir."
He wouldn't be here without it, surely. A transport, perhaps? Maybe, but it wouldn't help the search.
"Go further back," Rowley added, "any black cobras in private hangers, workshops," he paused to think where else, "hell, are there any black cobras in the breakers yard now or recently."
He watched the young operator tapping away. He still looked confused, but so long as he did his job that was all that was needed.
"Nothing in black, Sir. Are you sure it's b..."
"I'm sure," he snapped back.
"Sir," a different agent this time. "I might have something. It looks like an anomaly, but ..."
"What is it?"
"Ten years ago the deck crew logged an arrival matching your black cobra."
"Ten years, come on man, something current."
"No, Sir, that's the anomaly. There's no further record of it. There's no departure date, and no record of it being moved off the flight line."
Rowley stood and glared at the young officer who cowered like a hare in headlights. Rowley didn't even notice him, his mind was occupied with trying to understand how such an anomaly could happen.
"There have been instances of the logs being hacked, Sir," the original agent offered. "Well connected smugglers managed to have their records deleted a few years ago, we never did get to the bottom of it."
Rowley switched his gaze, "so we assume it's still here, but how do we find it?" With a wave of the hand he motioned for answers.
"There are hundreds of storage units big enough for a cobra," one suggested without much hope.
"But the records for this one would have looked empty for the last ten years!" the cowering one sprung back to life.
"Good, very good." Rowley's finger pointed at the cowering one who breathed a sigh of relief. "Get to it. There can't be many places matching that description."
Chapter 5 =====================================================================
They were being hunted, there was no doubt. Uniformed System Authority were everywhere, checking everyone, and no doubt plain clothed officers were mingling in the crowds too. So far he'd managed to avoid the checkpoints, but the station was heading towards total lock-down. They needed a flight off this facility quickly.
What had this girl been involved with, he wondered. Too late to worry now, she had rapidly dropped down the Federation's most wanted person list in any case. Top of that list right now, he was sure, was himself.
They kept to the crowded parts of the Coriolis, Tracy allowing herself to be dragged them from place to place. He kept them moving, a circuitous route, but always heading towards the docking bay at the centre of the spinning orbital.
Worry and pain were etched on Tracy's face. Thoughts of her ailing father, no doubt. Realisation that her fate was now linked with that of a man she barely knew. A man who had just murdered four system authority agents.
He considered cutting her loose for the thousandth time, then came to the same conclusion he'd reached every other time.
He caught another of Tracy's darting looks over her shoulder. Those they passed jumped out of the way with looks of concern at the terrified girl being dragged along by a much older man. They needed to slow down and blend in, but they really needed to get off this station before lock-down was complete.
"Keep your head down," he told her, "don't let the cameras identify you." Those cameras were everywhere, surely they'd been spotted by now. "And please stop looking behind you, it makes us stand out, makes us look guilty." They were guilty, neither of them said, but guilty of what?
This used to be his bread and butter. How many times had he extracted subjects from Federation star ports or escaped by himself from a hot encounter. He felt sure it used to be exhilarating, almost fun. This wasn't.
He was older now.
He knew the risks.
It was also exhausting.
"Quick, in here," he dragged Tracy into a crowded bar he remembered being on his evasion plan. Many years had slipped by since last considering escape routes, he really had got lazy, he realised scolding himself. Fortunately space stations change very little, but this bar could easily have closed down and blocked his route.
Pulling Tracy by the arm, he led her around busy tables, through a dancing throng, towards the rear. The music was loud, the lights were dim, he'd chosen it all those years ago as a cut-out. System authority would have to check everyone in the place before moving on, vital minutes that might be important.
The door to the back office was exactly where he remembered. Had it really been a decade since he last sat down for a drink at those tables?
"Forbidden, no entry!" said the sign on the door.
He reached for the handle anyway, the door opened.
Suddenly the entire bar lit up, the house lights turned on. Those on the dance floor stopped and groaned as the speakers went silent and the bass stopped thumping. For a confused second he froze, had his opening of the door triggered an unusual alarm.
Confusion gave way to fear as the true cause became clear.
"This is a security check, remain stationary while we process you," the tannoy announced as Federation officers flooded in. Revellers with illicit substances looked around for somewhere to stash them. One or two ran for the exit - a stupid, ill conceived decision they realised as Federal Security floored them with body checks.
'Damn they were quick,' he thought, 'they were nearly on us.'
He pushed Tracy through the door and closed it behind them, hoping the chaos would hide their getaway. He locked the door to prevent anyone following and heard shouts and a scuffle from the other side.
Standing there, alone with Tracy in the deserted room, he heard his heart pounding for the first time. Odd considering the activities of the past hour, but the agents flooding into the bar was the first time he'd felt close to being captured. That too struck him as odd as he remembered sitting bound in the chair.
"That door," he pointed to the far wall as he let go of Tracy's hand. She scrambled around the desks in the office, weaving in the direction he'd given her. He turned over a table to prop against the door they'd arrived through. A drink dispenser joined it. That would have to do. He ran after her as she held the door for him.
"You'd better still be there Lucy, don't let me down now girl!" he said as they emerged into the passageway beyond.
The rear of the club opened on to the industrial heart of the station. He pointed Tracy right, towards a row of small industrial units. They ran towards them. The spartan entrances to many kinds of engineering services were a stark contrast to the bright lights of the entertainment section they'd just left.
He kept running, Tracy did her best to keep up. They were near the hangars now, above them was the docking bay. Most of these units were ship maintenance workshops or repair pods. Behind them, in the other direction, they could hear the cacophony of the loading bays. The corridor was deserted, this was more service access than customer facing. Repair work was negotiated via ship consoles not in person; engineers and supply carts were the only infrequent visitors.
He stopped to get his bearings. It was around here somewhere, he frowned. Surely he hadn't run past it. He prayed that Lucy hadn't moved location; it really had been quite some time. On they went, deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of service tunnels.
Finally ...
"Yes, you beauty!"
He sprinted over to the workshop he'd been looking for. Tracy lagged behind, struggling to keep pace. It was larger than he remembered. An expansion or two during those lost years. The din from within was loud, even through the insulated dividing walls. Engines revved, multiple engines, the floor trembled beneath them.
Tracy said something at the side of him, but the noise drowned her out.
There was a walk-in door beside the large workshop service entrance. Both were adorned with three big letters: LNR. Surrounding those letters was an almost complete golden circle of stars, each representing a championship win with the year printed inside it. The letters themselves were super-imposed over a fast looking ship that he had never seen before. Sponsor logos ran down one side of the garage door, among them he noticed De Nigh Mining and couldn't prevent a smile. It had been many years.
He held open the walk-in door for her and beckoned her through. Unbelievably, it was louder on the inside.
The receptionist examined them briefly and went back to whatever it was she was doing, pointless attempting a conversation in this din. After a few seconds the noise died down and the receptionist looked up again, removed ear defenders, and greeted them with an enquiring smile.
"Hi, I'm here for Lucy, is she here?" he asked.
The look on the receptionist's face suggested this scenario had played out many times before. "I'm sorry, Ms Newcombe doesn't meet anyone without an appointment." "If you'd like to fill out this ...," she shoved a tablet his way with a contact form already open. He was as certain as the receptionist that Lucy Newcombe would not respond to that contact form. Neither said so.
"She'll see me," he cut her off, "she has my ship in storage." He hoped she had, at least, but that was best left unsaid.
The forced smile on the receptionist's face changed to confusion as a greasy oil covered pair of overalls walked through from the workshop.
"We, err, don't do ship storage," the receptionist said while handing the overalls another tablet. He watched as the mechanic pulled faces at whatever she read in front of her.
"Yes you do," he said firmly, "my name's Morgan."
"We're a race team," she replied, "we don't do ship storage ..."
But she was cut off by the mechanic.
"Ohhh," was all the new arrival could manage.
The receptionist cast an enquiring glance towards her boss, then back towards Morgan, but she couldn't break their locked gaze. A silence that felt like eternity was eventually broken.
"Hi Lucy, I'm hoping you still have something of mine."
"Oh good God, I thought I'd seen the last of you."
"Well that's not very nice," he chuckled breaking the ice.
"Marie," Lucy addressed the receptionist without averting her gaze, "would you fetch me the keys to hangar 53 please."
"Hangar 53?" there was confusion in her voice, but no one else seemed to care. She rummaged through the key draw, "I didn't know 53 was ours ..."
"We need to leave this station," Morgan told Lucy, referring to Tracy who she appeared to notice for the first time. "Urgently!"
The floor began to vibrate once more, but from a different direction. A new engine was warming up. This one was a deeper, almost menacing growl. There was almost, Morgan thought, an element of excitement in its tone.
"Don't worry, Marie," her boss replied, still looking straight at Morgan, "I don't think we'll be needing keys." Then, smiling for the first time, "Hangar 53 is that way," she pointed. "I'm sure Minerva will have opened the door by the time you get there, in some fashion," she shrugged.
Out into the workshop they went, past half a dozen mechanics stripping down racing skiffs that shared the same Lucy Newcombe Racing livery as the door they'd passed through moments before. They ran further, along the access avenue linking a line of engineering workshops which sat parallel to the hangars servicing the landing bay above.
"49, 50, 51, ..." Morgan read the numbers on the hangar entrances.
It took a few minutes, a couple of the hangars before 53 were configured to accommodate the huge Type 9 Heavy. Those seemed to stretch on forever. Most hangars showed signs of recent activity, but not 53. As he approached, Morgan noticed boxes piled up against the entrance, and old parts discarded around the door. No one had used it for months, or maybe even longer.
The engine they'd heard starting earlier was coming from here. Morgan recognised the hollow, deep echoey bass notes of his old ship. It had always brought a smile to his face. They were nearly there.
BOOOOOM!
Smoke exploded from hanger 53 and a thunder clap bounced down the enclosed service corridor. The big door flew across the access corridor and smashed against the opposite wall. Boxes flew out in all directions spilling their contents across the floor.
Morgan stopped dead in his tracks, arms raised to protect his head from the debris clattering around him, hands over his ears to shield him from the roar of yet another explosion. Tracy crashed into him from behind sending them both tumbling to the floor.
The smoke cleared with surprising speed, thought Morgan and Tracy jumped straight back on to her feet.
"I'm getting the hang of exploding doors," she said while offering Morgan a helping hand back to his feet.
"I'm too old for this."
She led the way in to the darkness of the hanger.
Morgan followed, but stopped at the burnt door frame.
"Is this the one?" asked Tracy, suddenly doubting at his hesitation.
He turned back down the access corridor to a growing crowd of engineers attracted by the commotion. "How's the race team doing?" he shouted.
"Very well," Lucy replied, signing OK with her fingers. He was too far away to see the smile, "thanks for asking."
"Team sponsors must be delighted then," he waved and disappeared through the hole in the wall that once held a door.
He didn't see her as he disappeared into the hangar. A tear of loss in her eye. But was that for the man, the machine, or the door?
Chapter 6 =====================================================================
It was black.
So very, very black.
Flat, wide, and wedge shaped; but it was the deep, dark, blackness that struck her the most. Tracy recognised it for what it almost was immediately. The apparent Cobra Mk3 stood in the hanger before her, its passerelle extending invitingly to the floor from the rectangle of light marking the entrance.
The noise from the engines sent shivers down her spine. Different to the tones of ships she'd seen before. This was the sound of raw power. Not like other Cobras she'd heard which were more whine and rattle. Almost as if, that was it, it sounded old fashioned, she thought. In a good way though - she liked it. Reassuringly powerful and strong.
But the blackness. It was as if the ship was swallowing up all the light in the hanger. A black hole couldn't be any darker.
"Get yourself on board and strapped in," Morgan pointed her up the passerelle, and then to no one in particular, added: "This is Tracy."
She looked around to see who he was introducing her to, and found no one.
She reached the light at the top of the passerelle and found a series of big green arrows pointing her to a well lit cockpit. She could see nothing else, the rest of the ship was in darkness. In front of her a console flashed messages, communicating with traffic control it seemed.
"Requesting clearance."
"Please identify your crew."
"Only one, Mr Morgan de Nigh - owner."
"Stand by..."
From below Morgan's voice shouted up: "Minerva, use a false ident for clearance, the Feds might have a warrant on us both." Then a new message flashed on to the screen.
"'Now he tells me'"
Followed by confirmation of Morgan's fears from traffic control just as he entered the cockpit.
"Power down your engines, you are selected for random checks from border control. Federal agents will be joining you shortly."
"Hmm, that's not optimal," Morgan's voice said, joining her from behind.
"Should we leave?" she asked.
"Yes, we should." He jumped into the pilot's seat and strapped in, surprising her.
"I meant, should we leave the ship?" she corrected. "They're not going to let us leave the station now."
"We could abuse your diplomatic privileges," said a new female voice that made Tracy spin around in her seat to see who was there. There was no one there.
"I could try," Morgan replied, "but Tracy doesn't exactly count as diplomatic baggage."
"It would be entertaining to see how they respond to finding you though," continued the mysterious voice. "I suspect they would choose to ignore your diplomatic status and ..."
"Minerva! Use your time to find us a way out of this station, please," broke in Morgan. "We can catch up later."
"Oh please, you left me here with Lucy poking and prodding me for ten years. Do you not think I might have hacked into every control system in the place by now?"
"You blew up the bloody door," screamed Morgan, "that doesn't back up your claims of being a master hacker."
"I like explosions," the voice retorted. "I've missed making things go 'Pooof!'"
A whirring was heard behind them, and Tracy turned to see the passerelle sliding back into the ship and the green arrow she had followed earlier looked suspiciously like a large finger - but just one - raised as a sort of greeting.
"Speaking of which," Minerva continued, flashing up a screen showing activity outside the ship, "those border guards have arrived."
"Don't shoot them, Minerva!"
"Aww, you ruin all my fun."
"How do we get out?" Morgan asked, changing the subject.
"Oh that's simple. I've been planning for a big escape for a long time. Watch and learn, Commander."
The star port's transport mechanism clanged into place around the hull and began carrying it down the shoots towards the docking bay. On the screen Morgan and Tracy watched the border guards standing around the hanger impotent.
The comms buzzed to life once more, the traffic controller still sounded bored, but slightly more animated: "Mars and Minerva, you must not attempt to leave the landing pad or you will be destroyed."
"What's going on?" asked Tracy. "They're going to blast us into dust as soon as we appear in the docking bay!" She'd seen this unforgiving process play out as often as most others had. Station guns would destroy a Cobra Mk 3 before it even reached the airlock. They never missed. It was unforgiving and deadly.
"Your new friend has no faith," Minerva complained.
"Who the hell are you?" demanded Tracy. "And where the hell are you?" she added, looking around the darkness once more.
"That's Minerva," Morgan told her. "Rest assured, she has a very strong desire to stay alive."
The Mars and Minerva, blackest of black ships appeared on the landing pad to the surprise of nearby dock hands. They quickly scarpered. This was a Federation star port, and unscheduled launches only ever end in one way. They didn't want to be there when the light show started.
"Mars and Minerva do NOT attempt to take-off," went the traffic controller again. "Violation of launch protocol is punishable by ship destruction." The Federation's lack of tolerance for such petty crimes was the stuff of satire among Tracy's generation. It was severe, but they accepted it because it had always been so. Still, when it was someone else threatened by it, it was easy to not care. Not so much when you were strapped in to the co-pilots seat.
"We've got to get off this ship!" she screamed. "They're going to kill us!"
"Easy Tracy," Morgan placed a reassuring hand on hers. "Minerva has this under control." He smiled at her, and she didn't believe a word.
Minerva heard it too, and wasn't quite as confident as Morgan sounded.
"What happens next, Minerva?"
"Hmm, that depends if I'm talking to the master server in the control room."
"Err okay, and if you're not?"
"Then someone's freezer might be about to defrost rather violently."
They felt the clamps let go of the Cobra's landing gear which Minerva instantly retracted.
"Flight assist off," said Minerva in a sarcastic voice mimicking most ship computers. Morgan instinctively tightened his harness; Tracy, seeing him, did the same, and didn't let go. Her face now snow white in fear, her clenched knuckles like-wise.
"Final warning Mars and Minerva, redeploy landing gear and turn off your engines or we will open fire."
"Guys please," Tracy was pleading now, "just do as they say, I'll turn myself in."
She felt the nose of the Cobra lift slightly and the airlock came into view in front of her. Her entire body was shaking, in fear she thought, but then realised it was the vibration from those big engines. Warning lights began flashing around the landing bay and she saw workers running for cover, everyone knew what came next.
A quick glance at Morgan just added more confusion. He was busy flicking switches and performing what she assumed were pre-flight checks.
"There's no point doing those checks," she wanted to scream at him.
"We're going to die before we get to the airlock!"
Chapter 7 =====================================================================
"Sir, it's launching!"
'I do see that,' Rowley refrained from barking out loud. The shadowy black cobra lifted off the pad without permission, an act that would normally earn a fatal response.
"Get that weapons system online," he ordered, somehow not surprised at the lack of response in the dock.
He was going to get away, after ten years living under their noses, he was now going to get away. The girl and the evening's operations were no longer on Rowley's mind.
"Wow, that thing accelerates like ..."
It shot off towards the exit just as the weapons system came back online. Too late, as Rowley knew it would be.
Chapter 8 =====================================================================
"Brace."
A simple order from the imaginary voice.
Morgan grabbed the chair back, over his shoulders, and Tracy needed no prompting to follow suit.
"two, one, ..."
Then she felt herself swallowed up by the chair as the roar from the engines became an explosion and the ship lurched forwards. Her vision turned to red mist before she lost consciousness from the brutal acceleration.
'So this is death,' her thoughts began, 'this is how it feels to be blasted by station security. It's quite relaxing actually, my friends would never believe it.'
She was jolted awake again as the Cobra thumped hard against the inside roof of the airlock with a deafening crunch. Shaking the mist from her eyes she could make out the laser light show all around them, but not quite hitting their target.
"Shields down," the sarcastic voice once more, they'd bounced off the airlock at an astonishing speed, it was a wonder it hadn't done more damage.
"Slow down Commander," an automated warning from flight control played out over the speakers. "Dangerous flying is punishable by death." Tracy heard herself giggle at the situation; escaping station security, only to be killed for speeding.
Another thrust of unbridled power threw her back into the chair again as those wild engines boosted them out of the giant structure, the blackness of space surrounded them.
"Now comes the hard part," Morgan turned to her with a wink. "The station's external weapons are far more powerful than those puny beams on the inside, plus there are Vipers."
She felt her jaw fall open, about to ask how they'd survived this far. She was cut short as beams sliced through the darkness from a point in front of them.
"Viper inbound," Minerva announced.
"Make that five," Morgan retorted.
"I was trying to sound positive."
Tracy looked at the ship's scanner and then wished she hadn't. She had no experience of such things, but even she realised that half a dozen flashing red contacts closing on the centre can't be a good thing.
Suddenly the ship bucked as a powerful burst of energy smashed into it from behind. The console in front of her reported a sudden drop in hull integrity. Sweat dripped down her back, but she felt cold, terrifyingly cold.
Beams of energy kept hitting the ship, she felt them rather than heard their impacts. The scraping screech made by the Viper's pulse lasers hitting the hull made her skin crawl. Far worse was the gut wrenching thud from the station's main weapon knocking the ship off course and causing her heart to jump out of her mouth every time. She tried not to watch the console, but her eyes wouldn't move.
For all their grimace inducing screeches, hits scored by the Vipers reduced hull integrity by only the odd percent, she noticed. She couldn't say the same about the big station guns though. Another thump slammed into the hull and her restraints held her painfully in the co-pilot's chair. Battered and bruised, but still alive. Integrity took another plunge. A couple more hits from that and they'd be dead.
"Four kilometres," the voice reported.
"Nearly there," Morgan told her in a soothing voice. He looked calm, she thought. "Once we're 7km from the station we'll be out of range and able to jump."
She heard his words, but the console was telling her otherwise. 'Just one more hit and we're ...'
Thud!
She was thrown against the straps again and heard a pained groan escape her lips.
"Hull integrity critical," came another sarcastic announcement from the voice she was starting to hate. She looked down and saw just a single digit. Squeezing her eyes to clear the fogginess, she decided not to open them again. She didn't want to read what that single digit percentage of hull integrity said.
"Frameshift drive charging," the voice again.
She opened her eyes in surprise. Were they actually going to make it? Distracted by the thought, she let them focus on the number in front of her: 4%.
"Oh God no."
The Vipers came in for another pass. She saw their beams flicking out at her.
"Five, four, ..." the voice counted down the jump into witch space.
Beams criss-crossed the canopy. The Vipers were too distant for any kind of accuracy, but they knew the Cobra's frameshift drive was spooling, in desperation they fired anyway.
"three, two, ..."
A flash of blinding light flooded the cockpit. Tracy screwed up her eyes to protect them from the brightness. She heard the crack. It wasn't sudden, it was like the crunch when stepping into icy snow. Her eyes opened to a spider's web of lines spreading across the canopy. Slowly new cracks appeared, as though the grim reaper was teasing her with death.
She heard the gut wrenching creaks as glass molecules hung to each other in desperation, knowing the end was near, but refusing to let go of their fellow molecules until the very last instant. One section gave up first. Tracy watched as a piece of canopy flew off into the void. Behind it was a deafening whoosh of gasses leaving the cockpit. The air she so wanted to breathe escaped into the vacuum.
The cabin pressure dropped immediately and with it disappeared most of the sounds she hadn't realised were there before. In the silence, the vibrations of the spooling frame shift drive reverberated through her body.
A muffled voice could just be heard: "... one, engage." And with that the Vipers were gone and the stars streaked passed her as the Cobra escaped into a new dimension full of ghosts and their creepy howls.
Was this death, she wondered as she was flung towards the bright light ahead of her.
It was reassuring to hear her deep, laboured breathing. 'So, not dead,' she realised, 'not yet at least.'
There was a flashing blue alert on the console with a countdown timer. "Oxygen depleted in 19:51" it said. Less than twenty minutes to find an atmosphere.
"Oh God no," she said again.
Chapter 9 =====================================================================
"Where have you taken us, Minerva?" Morgan asked their imaginary friend as they emerged from the tunnel of stars.
"Oh you're not going to like this, Morgan," came the reply.
The system allegiance indicator still showed Federation, that was no great surprise, they were in the heart of Federation territory. It all brought back memories of the time the AEDC operated this far south decades earlier. The great political battles they'd orchestrated, the manipulation behind the scenes, and the open bloody conflicts they'd brought about. All of it in the name of spreading Alliance values towards Sol - the birthplace of humanity.
That was long ago now of course, a different lifetime that Morgan had consigned to the depths of his memories. The girl had re-awakened them though. Unknowingly on her part of course, but running from Federal security, escaping from Federal star ports, and high wake jumps to evade marauding Vipers, all those things stirred mischief in Morgan's soul.
This far south and Minerva stating that he wouldn't like their current location. 'Well it won't be Ross 128,' Morgan smiled as the thought crossed his mind. No way would Minerva dare jump to that permit locked system, even with the required documentation that still sat stored away in the nav computer.
A suspicion jumped into his mind, surely he was wrong: "Not Flousop?"
There was silence.
He felt Tracy's eyes staring at him, as if prompting an explanation.
Still Minerva remained silent.
"Minerva, if you've brought us to Flousop with only 4% hull integrity you're insane."
"Where are we?" asked Tracy, she'd given up on concern.
"I think this is a star system where I fought a number of very bloody wars," Morgan replied. "If system authority spot this ship, we are toast."
Had Tracy heard him talk of fighting in wars just a few hours earlier, she wouldn't have believed him.
Now?
Well things had changed.
"Oh don't be so melodramatic, Morgan," Minerva rose from her silence. "That was decades ago, no one will remember that now."
"We can't repair here, attempting to dock will be suicide."
"Not true, the Combine has maintained a small listening post around the second star. It masquerades as a small mine, but really it exists to keep an eye on Federation movements. They keep a low profile, they don't even announce themselves as Alliance, but it's part of Ms Stone's forward observation network."
The memories were flooding back now.
Chapter 10 ====================================================================
Morgan flew the Cobra low over the rocky planet. In the star light, metals reflected back at him as his eyes searched out the base. At this speed and altitude he didn't expect much warning of its approach.
The comms crackled: "Approaching Cobra, this is Pianzola Platform. We do not accept visitors at this settlement, redirect your course immediately." The message repeated on a loop. They were still a couple of hundred kilometres out, the contact at this distance startled Morgan. Nevertheless, he maintained the heading.
It crackled again: "Approaching Cobra, you are entering a restricted zone. There is nothing for you here. Redirect your course immediately or we shall open fire."
"Pianzola Platform, this is the Mars and Minerva, we are in urgent need of repair, over."
"Cobra, there are adequate repair facilities on the Federation star ports. There is nothing for you here. Redirect your course immediately, do not approach within 50km."
As if to demonstrate their ill mood, red flares were launched from the ground to highlight the 50km mark. They were approaching very quickly.
"What do we do?" asked Tracy, not wanting to believe what she suspected to be true. A daring egress from a Coriolis was one thing, attempting to force entry to a surface port with only 4% hull integrity - sheer suicide.
"Pianzola Platform, this is Morgan de Nigh," he paused. It had been well over a decade, his name would mean nothing to the staff at such a remote facility. In a fit of wild abandon he decided to go all in. "Formerly part of the strategic planning team at AEDC, I urgently request emergency landing. Please inform your base commander of our approach."
There was no response, not even a crackle of static from the comms.
Just silence.
Morgan continued on his course.
The 50km mark arrived and Morgan didn't flinch.
The Mars and Minerva flew straight towards the base.
There were no repercussions.
There was still no reply.
At 10km the comms buzzed again, and a different male voice spoke.
"Mars and Minerva, you are cleared on pad two, say again, pad two.
Helena Stone extends a warm Welcome to Pianzola, commander."
Tracy let out a long sigh in the seat next to him. It was as if she hadn't taken a breath for a few minutes. Morgan wasn't sure he had either.
Pad two lit up brightly in the darkness to guide them in.
The original voice returned to comms. "Errm Commander de Nigh, our repair facilities are on standby and the base commander invites you and your party to dine with him as his guests this evening."
Her confusion was heard over the airwaves. Morgan was sure this was her first experience of welcoming guests to Pianzola.
The End