Chapter 23

“We have to hide. They’re starting to search ship for other stowaways,” Tarrek urged with a hushed voice.

“Where do we go?” Trisha asked, an edge of panic setting in.

“The cargo racks are the first place they’ll search. Wait… I have an idea. Follow me.” Lee pushed past Tarrek and walked through the rec room area. “Tarrek, did you warn the others?”

“Yes, but they’re in the racks.”

“Great, I guess there’s no choice. Come on.”

At the door, Lee waved Tarrek and Trisha back so he could open it and glance down the hall without being spotted. The coast was clear.

He spoke back to Tarrek, “I don’t think you’re going to like this idea at all. In fact, I’m pretty sure you’re going to hate it.”

“No time, just go!” Tarrek snapped.

Lee ran down the hall to a corridor that spanned the ship and pointed with two fingers to the left. He looked back and caught Tarrek’s eyes. The side of his face that still worked scowled.

“Take Trisha and protect her. I’ll go to the other one.”

Tarrek nodded and held out his hand for Trisha. Lee took off and sealed himself in the airlock at the opposite end. There were no places to hide except to crouch at a corner near the door.

He was breathing hard now, not for himself, but for the others—for Zee. He tried to calm himself, but for the first time he could recall, he found it challenging. He realized he’d never actually worried for anyone else in a very long time. The realization hit him; he had shut that part of himself off long ago.

A flash of his mother, beautiful and full of life, crossed his mind. He remembered the way her hair blew in the wind on the one planet they had ever visited together. The color-shifting pendant swung from her neck. It was the pendant he gave her—the man that stole her from him. It surfaced a memory of her curled in a fetal position in bed, trembling from withdrawal—eyes bloodshot, and her teeth rotted.

A tone sounded and invaded his thoughts.

Then, a voice on the ship’s intercom: “Attention, passengers,” the woman’s voice emphasized the word with obvious sarcasm. “I have shut off life support to the ship. You have less than ten minutes to present yourselves on the flight deck. Feel free to try for a RemLok. Our teams will be waiting for you.” The lighting in the airlock changed and phased from natural to red and back again—the ship-wide warning for life support going offline.

“I swear, Jackson! I hate that guy,” Lee cursed under his breath to himself. Reluctantly, he stood up and left the airlock. Across the corridor, he saw Tarrek and Trisha emerging from their airlock.

Trisha was panicked, “What do we do now? What’s your plan?”

“There isn’t one,” Lee replied as they met at the central corridor. “Checkmate.”

Lee gestured for Trisha and Tarrek to head back toward the central lift, and he followed. When they arrived, Zee came walking toward them with Dex trailing.

Zee stopped and crossed her arms, “Now what, Lee?”

“Why is everyone looking at me?”

“You been givin’ the orders, pal,” Dex reminded him.

“The screb’s just getting deeper. I’m no leader–”

“Hey, you got us off of Arber,” Trisha said.

Zee shot her a look, then softened it, looking back at Lee. “Lee, we trust you,” Zee told him as two guards brandishing rifles approached them from either side of the corridor.

Lee looked at the guards, then slowly entered the lift, “There’s nothing left to do but face the Commander.”

“Hold it,” a guard with a bushy but well-trimmed, nostalgic sort of mustache ordered. “You two, get in.” He motioned his rifle toward the lift.

Zee, Tarrek, and Dex entered with Lee. The mustached guard followed behind. He kept his rifle aimed at them and pushed the control pad.

The door opened to reveal the sweeping forward windows of the enormous flight deck. It was more spacious than the Nightcrawler and the Para Bellum flight decks combined. The flight crew at the front of the deck swiveled back to watch. The guard motioned his rifle for them to exit. Lee stepped off first.

“Ahh, there we are.” The short-haired woman with narrow eyes, whose voice he heard over the intercom, stepped toward him. She carried herself like a leader, arms held behind her back in a well-postured stance. Her face seemed almost flat, except for the sharp cheekbones and a small nose. She had a boyishness, though Lee attributed most of it to her hairstyle. “You are the stowaway companions of Jackson Dekker?”

Lee nodded.

“Escaped prisoners from Arber Penal Colony. Your rap sheet and bounty list continue to grow, Mister…?”

“Sollinger.”

“Sollinger,” She repeated while tapping at the personal datapad. “Lee Sollinger, of course. And Jackson Dekker. You were the pilots that aided Mr. Xohn’s escape from that charming little outpost.”

Lee hadn’t thought about Xohn for a while. Unlike before, he actually felt a little guilty about that. “You know Vin Xohn?”

“We had the privilege of transporting Mr. Xohn back to Sietae to assist with the completion of his prototype for mass production.”

“There’s no way he’d help willingly,” Lee snapped back.

“Oh, I can be very convincing.”

“So, what, torture? Why does everyone think torture gets them what they want?” He gave a sidelong glance at Tarrek, who stared blankly. “So I take it you’re Reeves?”

“Colonel Torra Reeves, Commander of the Decimator.”

“A Colonel? That’s a strange rank for a ship commander.”

“I lead ground forces for the Hyades government. My role for the time being commands this vessel for Consular Duryss. As his principal tactician, my services became more valuable here.”

“So, what now? Are you going to torture us like you did Xohn?”

“No, Mr. Sollinger, not torture. We merely had a little chat.”

“Is that what you plan to do to us? To Dekker?”

“Mr. Dekker made a foolish, unfounded accusation against Consular Duryss. With his escape from Arber Penal Colony and illegal boarding of this ship, he has earned multiple bounties. He’s a wanted criminal, as are all of you.”

She motioned to her guards, who raised their weapons and closed in.

“Wait!” Lee snapped as he looked back and forth at the guards. “Wait. We have more evidence you need to hear.”

The guards paused and looked to the Colonel. She put up her hand to stay them. “What evidence? And you’d better be more convincing than Dekker’s insane theories.”

Lee motioned to Trisha, who came forward to stand beside him. “Colonel, this is Trisha Hensley, a GalNet reporter.”

“We’re already acquainted with Ms. Hensley. I arrested her on Boswell Hub for sowing discontent in Chelum.”

“Right, you’re military. You want absolute order and control.”

“Order, yes. Control is for the bureaucrats.”

“Well, before that, she was working on a piece about Emen, with a profile of Sietae Federal Corp and Duryss as CEO.”

“And after, they arrested her for sowing discord and panic against the Hyades government on Boswell Hub. She stirred the local Resistance cells to attack Imperials throughout the Chelum system.” She eyed Trisha, who held her gaze, unbowed by the accusation.

“From the sounds of it, she was reporting the truth she discovered in her investigation.”

Reeves shuffled her feet and looked away. “She committed acts of sedition and is a criminal.”

Lee could read she was lying. “Her bounty was illegal, and I think you know it. Duryss manufactured the charges, didn’t he? He wanted her locked up in Arber to silence her.”

“Hmph. Your interpretation, Mr. Sollinger.” She tapped on her datapad. “Our records show her bounty was legitimate, issued for network breaches tied to a mercenary she hired to break into secured Sietae Fed Corp assets. I’d hardly call that unjustified.”

“Alright, alright.” Lee sighed. This line of reasoning wasn’t getting them anywhere. He needed something that hit closer to home.

“I’m waiting to be convinced, Mr. Sollinger, and so far, you’ve done nothing but further convince me that you’re all wanted, escaped criminals.”

“You want a criminal act? How about the attack at Glist 6?”

An eyebrow raised at that. Colonel Reeves eyed him cautiously. “What ‘attack’ are you referring to?”

“Around three years ago, Jackson Dekker was part of an operation in the rings of Glist 6. They were hunting a Cobra Mk IV with Xohn’s prototype. They couldn’t capture the pilot, so they launched an all-out assault on the rings. That attack killed the pilot, and an innocent miner caught in the middle of it all.” He paused for effect. Her expression told him he’d struck a nerve. He continued, “The Hyades Government covered it up.”

The Colonel looked a lot more uncomfortable. “How would you know about it? Was it Dekker? Did he tell you?”

“Because I was there.”

“Impossible,” she scoffed.

“Not impossible. I was on the miner’s ship on an EVA when a hunk of space rock cut through the shields and front canopy of our Asp. It killed my–” his voice caught unexpectedly in his throat. “It killed the best friend I’ve ever known.”

The Colonel straightened her stance. “Military operations have collateral damage despite best efforts to avoid it.”

“Duryss authorized the action, right?”

“Yes,” she admitted.

“Let me ask you this, then. If your boss is so noble, why the cover-up? No acknowledgment of your ‘collateral damage’? At all? That sounds like a cover-up to me. Isn’t it interesting: two cover-ups sanctioned by Consular Duryss.”

She looked down and seemed to consider it. “Ok, Mr. Sollinger. I’m listening. I’m not convinced. But I’m listening.”

“Trisha tells it better than me,” he gestured for her to start.

She stepped toward Reeves. “Hello again, Colonel.”

Reeves gestured with her hand, “Get on with it, Ms. Hensley.”

“Well, Colonel, I spent a lot of time researching this. And you’re right; my guy got into the heart of Sietae Federal Corp and exposed a lot of secrets. If I may ask, how long have you known Consular Duryss?”

“Almost three years.”

“Do you know much about his past?”

“He’s from the Diplomatic Corp at Sirius Gov. He was a successful envoy for Sirius. Li Yong-Rui appointed him CEO of Sietae Federal to manage the region.”

Trisha nodded, “Right, and before that?”

“I’m not sure. He told me he grew up on Imperial worlds and learned governance and diplomacy from his father. Why is any of this relevant?”

“Because my evidence shows Alden Duryss joined Sirius Gov as a diplomatic envoy the same week Sylus Draden disappeared.”

Reeves’s face read full of doubt, “You can’t be serious. Are you implying that Consular Duryss is the same irresponsible, party-crazed, entitled son of Senator Draden?” Her voice was full of skepticism.

“The same.”

“I find that quite hard to believe. Duryss is brilliant, Sylus Draden was an incompetent fool.”

“Oh, I know, but consider for a moment his foolishness was an act. He changed his entire personality to become this Duryss persona. And look at all the Imperial business he’s connected to here, nearly triple that of his predecessor.”

She eyed Trisha. Lee picked up some conflict in Reeves’s body language. Her head turned one way, then back, as if thinking through what she’d seen and heard.

“No, no. Absolutely not. I don’t believe it. Duryss is trying to protect the people of this region.”

“From Thargoids?”

“Exactly.”

“Is he? Have you seen the profit he’s earned from all his contracts with Imperial businesses? Tell me, does he attend a lot of social functions? A lot of parties, where he is, let’s say, very well treated?”

Lee observed her. Reeves’s conflict was all over her. She scowled in anger as she stood in the center of the flight deck, shifting her stance in front of them. She made a sharp motion with a hand from the guards to their group.

With a fiery resolve, she snapped, “No, I will not subscribe to this insane conspiracy theory! Take them down to join Dekker. Lock them all up and get them off my flight deck. Now!”

A guard took position outside the room as another closed and locked the door. It was a small square room, empty apart from a row of lockers on the wall opposite the entrance.

“Well, at least we’re all locked up together this time,” Jackson said, completely straight-faced.

Lee couldn’t hold his tongue and yelled, “Thank you, master of the obvious! Screbhead!”

“Hey!” Jackson scowled back.

“Boys,” Zee admonished them. “Focus! We’ve got bigger problems. You both tried and failed to get the ice queen to do the right thing. We’re going to be headed for a high-security prison unless we figure something out.”

“Whad’ja have in mind, darlin’?” Dex asked, his head nearly touching the upper deck.

Zee eyed his cybernetic arm. “May I?” The huge bearded man nodded with a half-smile. She started to investigate the mechanics with her hands. “Maybe I can ratchet up the power on this. The bulkheads are too thick, but the door…”

“Then what?” Tarrek blurted out. “Those are KA S-19 shock rifles. You get zapped, then uh…” He rolled his eyes upward and made an uncharacteristically amusing noise like he’d been electrocuted.

“Ok, so, dangerous pew-pew guns, and we should probably avoid them,” Lee quipped.

“Or disable them,” Jackson offered. “Oh, I know!”

Lee groaned.

“Dex can punch through, grab for the nearest guard, and slam him against the door!”

Trisha was standing near him. With a gentle, patient smile, she patted him on the shoulder.

Zee looked back at him, “Jackson, this isn’t some sort of action holovid.”

“Well, it could work.” Everyone in the room turned to look at Lee in total shock that he agreed in even the slightest way with Jackson. “I mean, it’s the best bad idea we’ve got. I think we’re down to only bad ideas at this point.” He pointed to the door, “If Dex goes through close enough to a side where a guard is likely positioned. That’ll take care of one. The other is gonna try aiming through the hole. We need to stay out of line-of-sight by being up against the wall. You’ll have to get your arm back in as fast as possible, big guy.”

Dex nodded, “A’right. Go ahead, darlin’, crank it up.”

Zee looked around the room, “We’re lucky you have an older arm. Its power regulator is hardware adjustable.”

“Yep, stops the hackers,” Dex replied, winking at Lee.

Zee continued, “I need to find something I can use as a tool…” The rest of them started to look around the room.

“There’s nothing here!” Trisha sounded anxious. “It’s just lockers.”

Lee examined one of the half-dozen lockers at the back of the room. “Hmm, biometric locks. Guessing weapons lockers.”

“I don’t think they’re dumb enough to lock us in room with weapons,” Tarrek said while trying to feel around the edges of a locker.

“Unless that’s all they have in all the locker rooms,” Lee replied. “Dex, you think you can bust one of these open?”

He shrugged and moved in front of one. “Ya don’t think the noise will bring the guards in?”

Tarrek immediately moved beside the door in a ready stance and gestured to the other side for someone to join him.

Lee moved into position, crouched, and nodded back at Dex, who was also crouched to be level with the locking mechanism.

“A’right, ‘ere goes…”

He pulled his arm back, twisting his torso to add his body weight to the motion. He slammed his mechanized fist into the door, crumpling it inward, the corners bending out in response. Dex stood to grab a corner. But the door to the room opened. The nose of a charging shock rifle crossed the threshold of the door.

Tarrek elbowed the gun down toward the floor and spun his other arm in a connected reactive motion, landing a punch square in the guard’s face. The guard reeled back while the second guard moved in toward Tarrek.

Lee ducked low, aiming himself for the second guard. He pushed off the floor and hit the repulse button on his magboots. He slammed into the guard and grabbed for the gun to fight it away. The man crumpled under him and let go of the rifle. Lee looked back to see Jackson pulling his arm back from a cheap shot to the guard’s kidney. The first guard recovered and re-entered the fray.

Focused on the struggle, Lee lost his sense of the rest of the group. A booming voice cut through the chaos, “Enough!”

Everyone froze.

Standing at the doorway was the figure of Colonel Reeves, hands on her hips, holding a wide battle-ready stance. “Stand down, people.”

The guards recovered control of their weapons but kept them pointed to the floor. The rest of them engaged in the fight stood up straight and looked at the Colonel.

She tapped a comm panel, “Flight deck, hold our position.” Then Reeves stepped into the room and looked over at the bent-up locker. “You people have some pluck. I’ll give you that. Escort them to the observation lounge. We need to have a little chat.” She snapped around and left the room with a purposeful walk down the corridor.

The mustached guard raised his shock rifle, “You heard the Commander. Get moving.”

Lee led the way out of the room with Zee at his heels. There was something different in Reeve’s tone.

He turned to head to the ship’s bow, with the rest of them following behind. Entering the observation lounge momentarily took his breath away. The view was stunning. The large curved glass at the bow extended from the deck plate to the ceiling. It encompassed his entire field of view as it stretched entirely around the curved room. It gave Lee the feeling of walking out among the stars. Off the starboard side, a stream of densely packed star clusters illuminated the bronze-colored dust of the galactic plane.

In the center of the forward windows, Reeves stood resolute and patient, waiting for them to file in. Dex entered last, with the guards following behind. Both guards took up a position at the double doors, rifles ready.

Reeves began to pace. Her boots echoed in the chamber. “This ship is delivering a large shipment of experimental modules to Sietae.”

“Xohn’s prototypes,” Lee spoke up.

She nodded.

Jackson added, “We saw them in the cargo hold.”

“Of course,” she nodded. “When we arrive, we will offload the prototypes to Duryss. Then we’ll meet your engineer friend.”

“You…?” Jackson almost spat. “You’ll what?”

“I’m not saying I believe you. I don’t believe for a moment that Duryss is that reprobate Sylus Draden, but I know his actions are suspect. You don’t get far in command without good instincts. I need more information. And I need you to convince Mr. Xohn that I’m on your side. We didn’t end on the best terms when we left him in Duryss’s hands.”

Trisha stepped out from behind Jackson, “So, what changed your mind?”

“Him,” she gestured with her head toward Lee. “He was right about you. And, right about me,” Reeves said with a touch of regret.

Trisha replied, “Right about what?”

“The charges against you. Duryss ordered me to arrest you and find a charge that would stick. I was too focused on getting back my command; I didn’t even question.”

“Figures. He needed to keep me off his back,” Trisha said, pursing her lips with a smirk.

Reeves nodded in agreement. “I realize now he’s been abusing my loyalty and manipulating me. To what end, I don’t know. I believe your engineer can help me understand what these modules do and how they’re useful against Thargoids. They’re like no weapon I’ve ever seen, and if they provide any Thargoid defense, I have no idea what it could be.”

Lee couldn’t hide the surprise in his voice. “Thargoids? Who said anything about Thargoids?”

“That’s been Duryss’s campaign for the past few years. He’s been upgrading station defenses in the Hyades to repel Thargoid attacks.”

Lee shook his head, “But Thargoids? They’re not even in the Hyades.”

“Attacks have been getting closer,” Reeves insisted.

“Well, Xohn’s ThermARC isn’t going to help you.”

“ThermARC? What do you mean?” She tilted her head at him, reminding Lee of the alley dogs on Carson City.

“It’s not a weapon, and I don’t think it’ll help with defense. At least not for stations.”

“What are they then?”

“It’s a heat exchanger. It converts heat to energy and helps ships run silent longer, or indefinitely.”

“I don’t understand,” her face was contorted into a puzzled look. “How does that help against Thargoids?”

“It doesn’t,” Tarrek groused. “He wants them for something else.”

Reeves crossed her arms. “All the more reason we need your engineer friend to tell us what Duryss is doing.”

Zee shifted next to Lee, “So you’re helping us?” There was unmistakable doubt in her tone.

”We’ll call it a ‘favor’ for pointing out my tactical blindside to Duryss.”

Lee addressed all of them, “What we need to do is expose Duryss.”

“That will be a challenge,” Reeves responded. “As you’ve experienced, he’s willing to silence the media to control them. He’s a shrewd politician, willing to spin the media narrative in any way that will favor his position.”

Lee continued, “Then we need to find concrete proof and take it to someone with the power and influence to expose him.”

Dex made a sweeping gesture with both of his arms. The servos in his cybernetic arm whirled, “Who can do that out ‘ere? The Feds? Imps? No one cares about this corner of nowhere.”

“Except for the corporations,” Lee answered.

“Oh, bloody hell,” Dex grumbled.

He continued, “It’s all business out here. We need to go to the big boss himself.”

“Li Yong-Rui,” Zee said.

Lee nodded back and pointed to the stars beyond, “Sirius Corp started this mess by putting that man in charge out here.”

“So how do we find evidence and get it to Li Yong-Rui?” Jackson asked.

“Well, we’re headed to Sietae,” Lee looked over at Reeves for confirmation, and she nodded back. “Sietae is where the Hyades government operates, so while we’re there, we’ll rip the evidence from their servers.”

Trisha shook her head, “But how do we get it to Li Yong-Rui?”

Reeves raised a finger and shook it once, “Your ships were impounded in Sietae. Once you have the information, you can take it to him.”

Tarrek jumped into the conversation, his accented voice contrasting the others in the room, “This going to be a complex operation. We need to split up to pull it off.”

“Agreed,” Reeves replied. “Someone will need to join me to talk to Xohn. Someone he trusts. Then we need to infiltrate Duryss’s office.”

“I think I’m the one Xohn trusts most,” Lee offered. “And I’m the one to hack into his office.”

“Perfect,” Reeves replied. “Xohn is undoubtedly in the office complex, which will be near Duryss’s office. We’ll free Xohn, hack Duryss, then meet the others at the docks.”

“Then rest are with me,” Tarrek said. “We’ll get ships ready to fly.”

“My crew can help,” Reeves said, then paused in thought. “I need to brief them on this.”

“You think they’ll help?” Zee looked back at the guards.

The mustached guard looked at his compatriot and nodded. His partner nodded in response.

“I know they’ll be with me on this,” Reeves smirked. “Duryss has jerked us around for too long.” She walked over to the guards at the doors and put a hand on the shoulder of the mustached one. “This isn’t going to be easy, and once we do this, there’s no turning back.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the guard replied.

“Let’s get going then. I need to talk to the rest of my crew.” Reeves walked out with the guards following behind.

“I don’t trust her, Lee,” Zee shot him a concerned look.

He shrugged, “I’ll keep an eye on her, Zee. It’ll be ok. We need her to get to Xohn and get our ships back. She’s not shipping us back to Arber, so that’s got to count for something.”

“I guess we’ll see,” Zee grumbled.