PROLOGUE
:: Ae'verbek, Hexen ::
:: Approaching Ae'verbek D.S.T.S Overwatch Site ::
:: August 2nd, 2940 - 1730 Hours UT ::
The Dagger dropship trembles as it pushes through the thick atmosphere of planet Hexen. Inside its belly sits two men, the first is a United Earth Colonial Military marine named First Lieutenant Warren Grimm. He wears the standard olive drab marine uniform and body armor with a Mk2 Driver holstered on his hip and his Heketes PC12 sub-machine gun racked against the wall. Grimm’s eyes are hidden behind a tinted visor but based on his posture the man is obviously asleep despite the dropship's aggressive descent. The second man is dressed as a civilian wearing tan slacks, simple brown dress shoes, a thin brown belt, and a white dress shirt that is tucked into his pants with its sleeves rolled up. Unlike Grimm, he is not asleep. Instead his eyes are locked on the wall opposite of where he sits. To the outsider it might look like his stare is vacant but in reality there is a ceaseless stream of information flowing through optical implants. Just then the dropship’s intercom crackles to life and the pilot's voice fills the cabin.
“We’re three minutes from the landing site. I’ve radioed ahead and they are expecting us. We’re cleared for landing bay two,” the pilot’s feed cuts out as he finishes with his update. The civilian looking man lets out a heavy sigh and leans his head back and brushes his greying beard with his fingers. He blinks intentionally and the info feed flooding his optics cancels out freeing his sight to look at his surroundings without obstructions.
Grimm is now standing and prepping his kit, his visor raised and his eyes focused. He checks his sidearm clip then double checks the safety before re-holstering it. He then grabs his SMG from its place on the wall and begins inspecting it as well.
“Lieutenant Grimm. I read in your file that you are reliable,” the man says suddenly, catching Grimm’s attention. Grimm turns and faces the man.
“Yessir.”
“Do you know what else it says?” he asks. Grimm’s expression remains fixed.
“I can’t begin to imagine, sir,” he replies.
“It says SubRosa Operations Permitted,” he goes on. With this Grimm’s brow furrows slightly.
“Sir?”
“It means that you can be trusted. Can I trust you, Lieutenant Grimm?” he asks plainly. Grimm shifts to face the man directly, he slings his SMG over his shoulder and lets it hang onto his side then nods confidently.
“Sir, yessir. Completely,” Grimm replies, this stirs the man to break a subtle smile. Grimm is a well trained marine, he does the U.E.C.M proud.
“Good. I’m relying on you,” with that the dropship's intercom crackles to life once more and the pilot’s voice fills the cabin.
“Approaching the LZ, brace for descent.”
Both Grimm and the civilian looking man take their seats as the Dagger dropship begins to lower itself towards the landing zone. Moments later the whirling of the landing gears extending can be heard and the decent ends with a gentle thunk. The cabin doors to the dropship extend up and out flooding the dropship with light. The landing pad sticks out from the side of a cliff face braced to the side of the mountain with steel beams and coiled metal cords. On either side of it sits landing bay one and three, both empty. Each bay is connected via a narrow catwalk to a building that is built into the side of the mountain, the Ae’verbek Deep Space Transmission System Overwatch Site.
Overwatch Sites were instated by the U.E.C to create server hubs for all of ANGEL’s data, giving the artificial intelligence monitoring system a myriad of locations to process and store information. While the dispersal of data makes transference difficult the compartmentalization allows for the prevention of complete system collapse. If one site is attacked, or a virus somehow manages to breach ANGEL’s firewall, each Overwatch Site can commence an isolation protocol and prevent any data from being stolen or destroyed.
The two men begin crossing the landing bay two catwalk when the sliding door at the other end opens and a shorter portly man steps outside to greet them.
“Ackerman, is it?” the portly man asks as he holds out his thick hand to be shaken.
“That’s right,” Ackerman replies. They shake hands and the man smiles in return.
“I’m Bill Wells, the site's warden. We’ve been waiting for you for some time now. We were told someone would be here weeks ago,” Wells’ voice scratches in Ackerman’s ears, it’s higher pitched and reminds him of a rodent.
“I’m sure you’re aware that we don’t operate on your time table, Mr. Wells,” Ackerman says pointedly. Grimm doesn’t take note but Ackerman can see that Wells gets the message loud and clear by the sudden drop in his expression.
“O-of course. I didn’t mean to suggest any-” he begins to ramble but Ackerman cuts him off.
“Please, I would like to get started as soon as possible. If you could show me to your conference room I will be there while someone fetches the analyst.”
“Yes, of course. Right this way.” Wells takes the lead prompting Ackerman and Grimm to follow him into the building.
The conference room is as Ackerman expected. A small sized room that is longer than it is wide with a table that stretches from one end to the other with just enough space around it for someone to shimmy past to their seat. These places were built for function over comfort, so long as people could sit and talk that’s all that mattered to the original designers. Grimm stands in the corner opposite the door with his rifle slung across his chest, hand on the grip and finger off the trigger. His visor is down again, Ackerman knows the helmet is digitally printing environmental data onto the visor giving the marine better situational awareness. Everything from local CommNet traffic to the blueprint of this facility can be seen on that visor, plus showing heat signatures and performing facial scans of anyone he looks at. Only a short while passes when Wells enters the conference room accompanied by another man. Ackerman stands and greets him with a handshake.
“I’m Ackerman, you must be Analyst Jacob Teller?” he asks warmly. Teller shakes his hand with a firm grip.
“That’s right,” Teller replies with apprehension. Ackerman turns to Wells and waves dismissively at him.
“You can go now, thank you.” Wells is about to protest when Grimm turns his head and looks at him, his visored face and loaded weapon sends ice down Wells' spine.
“I’ll be on my way then.” Wells quickly turns around and leaves the room, Ackerman hopes that’s the last time he’ll have to see or speak with that man. The door auto-locks behind Wells allowing Ackerman to return his attention to Teller.
“I assume you understand that this entire encounter will be monitored and recorded by ANGEL as per U.E.C amendment nine-oh-nine theta nine and as such anything said here can be used in public or private hearings against your person and estate.”
“Uh, yeah. I get that,” Teller replies, Ackerman doubts him.
“Now… the file on you reads that you recently had an infraction in your duty. Something about missing checkpoints, not communicating with the warden, and being suspected of committing espionage and treason.” Ackerman leans on his elbow and places his hand against his head. In a barely noticeable shift he presses his fingers against his temple and a gentle electric thrumming begins to emit in the room. He lets the accusation hang in the air for a bit, Teller’s eyes are wide in disbelief. “So, mind telling me how all this happened?”
Teller practically launches from his seat as he begins to spit out his explanation, “Treason and espionage is bullshit and that warden knows it, the fat bastard had it out for me since I got here just because my family doesn’t come from some fancy Inner Colony like Axios Prime,” he leans back and crosses his arms, his face painted in anger now, “damn prick. Wells, doesn’t like ‘country boys’ like me so he made up some bull to get me detained and relocated. That’s what happened,” Teller finishes. Ackerman looks him over, a piercing look on his face. Teller notices and fidgets then quickly stops himself.
“So you’re being framed, is that all?” Ackerman asks.
“Well, not exactly. I did miss my log checkpoints, but it wasn’t because of any treason, that’s for damn sure,” Teller’s tone gradually gets quieter.
“Why don’t you tell me what actually happened. Official reports can be so cumbersome anyways,” Ackerman extends his olive branch and Teller, like everyone, accepts it without apprehension.
“I kept sayin’, but no one listened. You’re gonna to think I’m crazy too,” Teller pauses and looks around as if someone was with them. He then leans in and lowers his voice so only he and Ackerman can hear it, “See, there was this voice. Like a melody of some kind, or a song. It kept talkin’ forever saying the same thing over and over again and I just couldn’t stop listenin’ to it,” Teller explains. At this Ackerman feels his chest tighten in excitement. This was what he came here for.
“A song?” he asks almost playfully.
“That’s right. A song. This voice spoke and it sounded like a thousand instruments in perfect tune. I listened for hours before I realized how much time had passed.” He leans back again, now more relaxed. “The warden was furious, I had missed three log checkpoints by that time. Bastard docked my pay and when I tried to explain myself he threatened to dock my portions too. Power hungry dick head,” Teller finishes his story. Ackerman sits with a firm stare. The temperature in the room becomes cold, the mood shifts. Ackerman can feel it, like the prelude to a storm, exactly how the reports describe.
“Would you say the voice sounded nice, or was it more unsettling?” he asks.
“No, it sounded nice, like singing. It felt… peaceful, I guess,” Teller explains.
“You didn’t understand anything that it said?” Ackerman probes some more.
“No, sorry. Couldn’t make heads or tails of it. It was definitely speakin’ though, I knew there were words in there, I just couldn’t tell what language it was. After a while I started to think, maybe it was like one of them old Exodus recordings, you know? I hear they find artifacts from the old fleet and that the language was so different back then that it almost sounds alien to us.” Teller has opened up to him now, this is exactly where Ackerman wants him. Willing to spill the beans on whatever comes to mind. He sits upright and addresses Teller more coldly now.
“When did you first see the shadow?” he asks. Teller doesn’t answer right away, in fact he looks borderline stunned.
“What do you mean?” Teller asks while cracking a smile.
“The shadow. When did you first see it?” Ackerman pushes against the deflection.
“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, man,” Teller replies.
“It’s here, behind me. Isn’t it?” Ackerman’s probe strikes home. Teller’s expression loses all composure as his eyes slowly lift to over Ackerman’s shoulders, he then begins to fidget again, this time more agitated.
“What the hell are you talkin’ about? There is no damn shadow!” his voice raises. Grimm turns towards him, his finger shifting every so slightly towards the trigger.
“What is it saying?” Ackerman probes again. At this Teller ejects himself from his seat and begins pacing back and forth. Grimm shoulders his SMG and takes aim right at Teller but Ackerman puts his hand up signaling Grimm to not shoot.
“There is no shadow! It doesn’t exist! You hear me, dammit! It’s not real!” Teller begins to shout as he paces the room, his eyes wide with rage and fear mixed together. Ackerman can’t help but feel thrilled at this development.
“What is it saying?” he asks again. Teller doesn’t reply and instead throws himself against the wall with as much force as possible. Grimm shoulders his rifle again and takes aim once more, his finger fully on the trigger and ready to fire. Teller slams himself into the wall again and again until bones can be heard cracking from the impact.
“What is it saying, Teller?” Ackerman asks with a raised voice. Wells can be heard pounding on the door outside.
“What’s going on in there?” he can be heard asking in a panicked voice. Ackerman and Grimm both ignore him. Teller continues to throw himself against the wall again and again, each time his bones cracking more and more. Teller then throws himself to the floor and begins to violently thrash his body around. Grimm keeps his gun trained on the erratic man, his finger gently squeezing the trigger part ways, ready to fire at a moment's notice.
“THERE IS NO SHADOW! THERE IS NO SHADOW! THERE IS NO SHADOW! THERE IS NO SHADOW! THERE IS NO SHADOW! THERE IS NO SHA–” suddenly Teller’s body goes limp. Ackerman sees on his optic feed that the man's biometrics have flatlined, he died from cardiac arrest.
Ackerman lets out a heavy sigh and then stands and presses his fingers against his temple again stopping the electric thrum. He notices the room doesn’t feel as cold anymore and the lights appear brighter. He looks over the body with his optic implant taking pictures. He notes the man’s contorted arms and legs are broken. He photographs the saliva and blood coming from his mouth, then takes a picture of his eyes, bulging and bloodshot. He takes a mental note of the faint smell of sulfur and ash. He turns his attention to Grimm who stands at attention with no sign of questions or being disturbed in the slightest at what they just saw.
“You seem awfully calm for having just witnessed someone go into a convulsive fit and then die,” Ackerman notes. Grimm looks at him, his expression blank.
“I’m a marine, sir. We see people die all the time,” Grimm replies.
“You’ll have to tell me about that some time,” Ackerman says casually as he continues to photograph Teller’s corpse. Grimm watches for a moment then breaks the silence once more.
“Sir, may I ask a question?”
“Be my guest, but I assume you understand I may not be able to answer certain things,” Ackerman replies.
“Yessir. Thank you. At the start of the interview, and just now, you activated something that sent an aberrant signal. My heads up display caught it causing a distortion in the audio frequencies around us.”
“You want to know what it was?” Ackerman offers.
“Yessir, if that’s acceptable,” Grimm replies. Ackerman laughs to himself at Lieutenant Grimm’s proper manners. It’s no wonder he was assigned to this case.
“That signal was what we in the business call a lubricator. The signal it emits makes our questionees more compliant and willing to share information without being invasive or, as times used to permit, more violent,” Ackerman explains.
“I see. Thank you for explaining, sir,” Grimm says and then steps back with no further questions. Ackerman appreciates the man’s ability to let things lie. Ackerman stands back and takes one final shot of the room from as wide an angle as possible. He then tilts his head up and addresses the room.
“ANGEL,” he says. A gentle chime plays and a digitized woman's voice answers.
“Yes, Agent Ackerman.”
“Send Overwatch Security to apprehend warden Bill Wells and take him to the brig,” Ackerman says coldly.
“Yes, Agent. Anything else I can do for you?” ANGEL asks smoothly.
“Lock down Ae’verbek D.S.T.S Overwatch Site, close all access points internally and externally and void box the last twenty-four hours of activity.”
“Yes, Agent. Anything else I can do for you?” she asks once more. Ackerman notices that her voice almost sounds like a song. He scowls at the thought.
“No, ANGEL, that is all.”
“Thank you, Agent Ackerman. I will commence your orders. Humanity Endures.” After those final words ANGEL closes communication with a chime.
-|-
The air in the ship is as stale as its corridors are sterile. Jace notes the walls construction; each panel is flat and light beige butted against the next with airtight precision and bolted down with soft-top surface fasteners that blend perfectly with the rest of the panels semi-reflective plasteel surface. He then sees an imperfection in the panel as his eyes catch a glimpse of his own face. There’s a warp in the wall, a subtle bend, not enough to be seen straight on but just enough to make his otherwise handsome face look bent and twisted. He smirks at the imagery, his reflection betraying how he feels against how he looks. Like the ship, Jace is the image of sterile perfection being recently washed in the ship’s shower capsule and dressed in a freshly pressed crew uniform; he can’t help but laugh to himself at the ridiculousness of his current ensemble. He then becomes disconcerted with his situation, this is his first time in space in over six years. On his shoulder is a badge with the golden chevron and globe of the United Earth Colony’s livery, beneath it on an embroidered banner is the name “Prophet.” The “SpaceCraft Series Prophet” is an engineer class vessel assembled in the Star Yards over Julio-Ceti, the planet which the Prophet is headed towards at this very moment. The ship is built for the sole purpose of deep space repairs of spacecraft left derelict after catastrophic failure. It’s outfitted with a robust medical bay as well as the personnel to operate it as one of the likely eventualities of repairing derelicts is that there would be survivors in need of immediate medical attention. Jace figures he’ll be posted to the medical wing given his background as a cryostasis engineer.
His attention is stolen away from the flaw on the wall as a hiss of gas erupts from the sliding doors behind him. He turns as they open to either side revealing a young woman wearing a sleek black business skirt and an emerald dress blouse with her straight blonde hair trimmed to shoulder length. Her gaze is locked to a data tablet she’s holding as she walks into the room, as she approaches Jace she looks up at him from over the rim of a pair of slim round lensed glasses, her expression blank and piercing. Jace feels himself start to sweat. Another imperfection.
“Jace Howard Orion Stoltz?” she asks with a knowing tone.
“Ma’am,” Jace’s voice comes out smaller than he expected. She holds herself with such unwavering composure that Jace finds himself losing his own. He clears his throat. “Ma’am, that’s me.” She glances at her data tablet and taps a few commands into the screen.
“Follow me, they’re waiting for you,” she punctuates the command with a spin and then begins to briskly walk out the way she came, her stride announced by the clacking of her heels against the ship's floor. Jace hurries after her, bewildered and now suddenly wrestling with the idea that he might not in fact be here to be assigned to the medical wing. He wracks his mind but finds it difficult to imagine any other reason he would be recalled to ship duty.
“Ma’am, who is waiting for me? I thought I was here to be assigned-” Jace begins, but she cuts him off with an abrupt turn down a perpendicular corridor.
“You weren’t briefed, then?” she asks, her flat tone revealing little of her disposition. If anything she sounds disinterested.
“No, ma’am. I was shuttled here from my previous assignment on Garda Noct.” Another turn down another perpendicular corridor. Jace follows suit, though he feels himself becoming agitated.
“Ma’am?”
“Cleo,” she says with a glance over her shoulder. “My name is Cleo Hathaway. I’m the Prophet’s Personnel Chief Officer.” The two cut across a midsection hallway into a parallel corridor that stretches even further down the ship. There are windows on the right wall overlooking the Prophet’s cargo bay below. Jace steals a glance as they pass by seeing the Prophet isn’t outfitted with the standard engineer class kits. There’s no E.V.A hauler, or zero-g welding gear, not even the standard Space-Cat Dropships used to transport personnel on the ground. Instead of repair equipment one would expect Jace is looking upon a cargo bay full of United Earth Colonial Military vehicles being seen to by marines and navy alike. Everything from the turret mounted Raiders to the M99 Heavy Gun Tank named after the ancient earth mythological beast, the Dragon. His eyes go wide when he sees a small fleet of Dagger dropships and Falchion aerial dogfighters. Whatever they’re preparing for it’s not repairing derelicts. This much military ordinance can only mean one thing. They’re going into a combat scenario.
“Mrs. Hathaway, why is this ship outfitted with U.E.C.M vehicles? Isn’t this a repair ship?” Jace asks. He looks over to see Cleo standing at a door waiting for him. He speeds up his pace to meet her.
“It’s miss, and they’re in here,” she says with a little tilt of her head and a glance of her eyes. Jace notes that she didn’t answer him. He steps into the room and is met with darkness that takes a second to adjust to compared to the brightly lit beige of the Prophet’s hallways. After a moment he sees a table with numerous empty chairs surrounding it stretching down the length of the room and at the other end of the table sit two men, they stand as Jace and Cleo enter.
“Jace Stoltz?” the taller of the two asks.
“That’s correct,” Jace replies.
“Thank you Cleo,” the shorter one lets out. “You can leave now.” Cleo nods and without a word shrinks out of the room. Jace glances back at her and catches her watching him too. Her curious expression leaves him feeling more confused and worried than before. He starts to feel himself sweat again. Jace walks over to the two men trying to recognize them, neither have any indication of rank or office on their outfit, in fact they look downright civilian. His crew uniform suddenly seems over-dressed.
“Gentlemen. What’s this about?” Jace asks as he takes a seat with them.
“Well,” the shorter turns to the taller. “There’s no point walking on eggshells, Donovan, we’re already in the shit.” The taller man curses under his breath.
“Thank you, Leremy,” he says snidely. Donovan turns to Jace with a stone hard expression on his face. He lets out a slightly deflated sigh then leans in resting his arms on the table.
“The S.C.S Prophet is being commandeered for a rather unique operation.”
Leremy lets out a loud “humph”
“Cut the crap.” Now it’s Leremy’s turn to lean in, their forward motion causes Jace to sit back in his chair.
“You know who we are?” Leremy asks pointedly. Jace looks over their clothes once more. They speak with authority which infers they hold rank over him but the lack of any insignia tells him they aren’t a part of any public facing outfit, and the fact that they’re asking means they expect him to know more than is obvious. He looks closer at their faces then he sees it. The shorter one, Leremy, has a small pellet shaped implant in his left temple. If his hearing wasn’t damaged from the engine back draft bursts of working in the ship manufacturing yards he’d probably be able to hear a gentle constant buzz coming from the implant. It’s a C.N.N.I, a CommNet Neural Interface. The little pill shaped implant lets the person using it to access the CommNet without a terminal. It’s fancy tech and disgustingly expensive, meaning only a select few organizations would have access to them, and only one of those organizations likes to play at the cloak and dagger nonsense. S.I.L.O.
“Special Intelligence and Logistics Operations,” Jace answers, he feels himself sweating even more now. S.I.L.O is the boogeyman in the U.E.C, they’re known for going outside the law to get things done and anyone who crosses their paths has a habit of going missing for one reason or another. Sometimes it’s an unforeseen illness, other times it's a family emergency, even if the poor soul didn’t even have a family. Jace has only heard of their presence and never been directly involved with them. Suddenly Jace is hyper aware of his own discomfort. Leremy looks at him with a toothy grin and nods.
“Correct. So you know that if we’re here that something very unpleasant is in the works.”
“That’s how the stories seem to go,” Jace responds.
“The stories are only the half of it,” Donovan chimes in flatly.
“Well this story is no different,” Leremy says, “Something very unpleasant is in the works, and you, Jace, are the missing piece to our puzzle.”
Jace’s brow furrows as he thinks back through his life, the history of Jace Stoltz is a laundry list of secrets long since buried that he has no intention of digging up again. These two, however, seem intent on not letting those secrets remain buried, hell, if half of what is said about S.I.L.O is true then they may already know everything. Leremy and Donovan both are staring at him now, Donovan with an apathetic gaze and Leremy with a hungry one. Both only work to deepen Jace’s discomfort which is likely intentional.
“I don’t know what to say,” he finally says. Leremy puts on an unimpressed scowl and Donovan just shrugs. Finally Leremy breaks his pose and pulls from his pocket a data tablet. He slides it over to Jace who looks upon it, curious to the contents, but more importantly trying to figure out their game. His mind spirals down every possible thread they could pull on to unravel the truth. The possibilities are agonizing and Jace finds himself fidgeting in his seat. Leremy snaps him back to reality by slamming his palm down on the table.
“When did you last see your parents, eh Jace? What’s it been, six years or so?” Jace remains silent at Leremy’s pointed question, his gaze locked on the data tablet, an image of his parents' mugshots fills the screen, Oswald and Ismerald. “Insurrectionists”, that’s what the U.E.C.M calls them. They called themselves something more romantic, “Revolutionaries”.
“Your family has a history with unpleasant things, don’t they?” Leremy probes, “First your parents join what’s left of the Rebel Factions against the big bad U.E.C.M and then your sister is killed in an explosion caused by one of their own bombs. Tragedy abounds,” Leremy’s sneer grows with every word causing Jace’s blood to boil. Donovan decides it’s his time to chime in again.
“Rebel Faction activity has been detected near Julio-Ceti. The D.S.T.S has shown clear signs of Faction activity and we know your parents are still leading some branches of their organization. Ever since they escaped lockup they’ve been in the dark running things out there,” Donovan drones on. He leans in closer to Jace, his apathetic gaze replaced with a piercing one. “Where are they, Jace?”
Jace remains in his seat fuming despite every muscle in his body aching to burst from the chair and escape from this nightmare. Who do they think they are? The nosey bastards. His mind races through memories he’s tried so hard to forget, the pain of them plain on his face. Donovan continues, this time his voice is smaller, more sincere.
“The Factions are killing people. Some of them are sisters just like yours. You can help us stop them.” At this Jace looks up and meets Donovan’s eyes. The bastard actually is sincere. He looks away and back out towards the cargo bay. There is a window, tinted on the outside for privacy, but what lies beyond is clear as day. He sees a crane lowering a Dagger dropship in the cargo bay. He breathes deep trying to calm his nerves. It’s been six years since he last saw them, six years since his sister was killed in one of their ridiculous attempts to take down the U.E.C.M, six years since Jace’s entire life was turned inside out.
“I can’t help you,” he says in a small voice. Leremy leans back, unimpressed.
“Can’t, or wo-” he begins.
“Can’t!” Jace cuts him off. “It’s like you said. I haven’t seen them in six years,” he finishes and then leans back in his chair suddenly feeling very tired.
“You wouldn’t be lying to us, would you?” Leremy asks in a snide tone.
“You’re S.I.L.O. Wouldn’t you know if I was lying?” Jace replies coldly. Leremy’s lips curl into a grin and he lets out a singular laugh.
“You’re damn right we would.” Leremy’s ego causes Donovan to wave him off. He then stands causing Jace to stand too not wanting to be beneath these men, figuratively or literally. Again Donovan hits him with a piercing gaze, seconds pass that feel like hours. He can tell that the man is sizing him up, trying to figure what type of man Jace is. He saw that look all too often from his old man. Finally Donovan lets out a sigh and breaks his stare and pulls from his pocket a small card that he places on the table.
“It doesn’t matter if they’re your parents, the Faction needs to be stopped. Call us if you hear anything,” Donovan gives Jace a nod then both of the S.I.L.O operators go to leave the room.
“What now?” Jace asks after them.
“Now you return to your quarters, Mr. Stoltz. You’ll be given your first rotation details from your room's terminal,” Leremy answers coldly.
“Rotation details?”
“That’s right. You weren’t briefed.” The venom in Leremy’s voice is thick and that thin smile forms on his face again. “You’re the Prophet’s combat medical admin.” With that the two men leave the room and Jace within it.
“Combat Admin? What the hell?!” Jace has done everything he can to avoid combat, but it seems S.I.L.O is determined to put him on the front lines of this whole damn thing. It’s likely they hope that seeing the rebels in action will sway him to their side. Bastards! He lets out his frustration in a heavy sigh.
Jace takes the card Donovan left and looks it over, it appears plain white until the light hits it just right revealing a CommNet number in the reflection.
“Fancy,” he mutters under his breath. Everything feels so damn heavy. He flips the card over between his fingers as his mind races. Seeing no other option he leaves the conference space and emerges into the hallway again. Cleo is standing in the hall waiting for him, she looks him over and then approaches, never breaking her all-business attitude.
“It says here you’re assigned to be the Prophet’s Combat Medical Admin,” she says with a gesture to her data tablet. Jace scoffs, making no effort to hide his disposition to this entire situation. If S.I.L.O was half as smart as they put on they would know Jace showing his face to the Factions is just as likely to get him killed as it is that they welcome him back with open arms. Not everyone takes kindly to members abandoning “the cause”.
“They’re deadmanning me,” he says flatly. Cleo’s head tilts, her expression foreshadows a question.
“Deadmanning?”
“It’s Faction slang. When you angered an overseer they’d give you a crap job, usually harmless but in this case I’m not so sure,” he explains while looking out over the cargo bay bustling with military personnel. Cleo doesn’t say anything which prompts him to glance over at her. He’s surprised to find her previous composure replaced with unfettered anger.
“Why the look?”
“It’s ‘Faction’ slang?” Cleo asks, her previously smooth tone now sharp and pointed. Jace just stares at her with a confused look on his face causing her to be the one to scoff now.
“No law-abiding citizen of the U.E.C would refer to the insurrectionists as ‘Faction’,” Cleo raises her voice as if to better make her point but Jace simply lifts an eyebrow in response, the sanctimony in the air is suffocating.
“Who said I was law-abiding?” he asks with a smirk. Her lips curl into a scowl and she spins walking down the hall deeper into the bowels of the Prophet. Jace lets out an amused ‘huh’ and then follows her.
The two continue through the Prophet’s corridors until they reach a convergence room where six different corridors meet and connect to one another. The room’s ceiling is taller than the hallways and in the center is a terminal kiosk with four CommNet terminals all backed against one another.
“You can find your quarters from the terminal. Good day,” she gestures to the kiosks in the middle of the room then spins to leave.
“Hey! Wait a minute,” Jace calls after her. She stops and faces him, her expression full of disdain.
“What are we really doing here?” he asks. She blinks at the question, not sure how to answer.
“What do you mean?” Cleo replies coldly. Jace takes a few steps towards her and keeps his voice low.
“S.I.L.O pulls me, an ex-Factionist, onto an engineer class ship that’s outfitted for military engagement on the fringes of U.E.C space en route to a suspected Faction hot zone? What aren’t you telling me?” His questions cause her to look away searching for an answer, he presses the point. “On top of that I’m assigned Combat Medical Admin? That’s a combat position, rapid response medical deployment. The only thing a sniper likes to see in their scopes more than a medical admin is a field commander.”
Cleo’s gaze snaps back to him, her eyes piercing and aghast.
“It’s not my job to question every order, unlike you and your rebel friends. The U.E.C.M is here for a good cause, of that I am sure. You, being an ex-insurrectionist, are a terrorist. Terrorism is treason. Treason is punishable by death. Sounds to me like justice is being served.”
Jace can hear the spite in her voice, every word she spits is full of conviction and hate. He takes a step back and crosses his arms. Cleo takes her leave of the convergence room disappearing down another long corridor as its door slides shut. He sits there a moment in the near silence of the ship's electric thrumming. His thoughts going back to his sister, and the last thing she said to him.
“Get out.”
She was Faction. Was her death justice? He feels his fists clench and decides to abandon the thought. Jace turns to the kiosk in the center of the convergence room and presses the activation button. The screen lights up with the standard CommNet red banners and amber text as it prints to the screen.
>> Insert CommNet ID Card_
He digs through his pockets trying to find his ID Card. Every U.E.C citizen is issued a CommNet I.D upon becoming a citizen. Without it they wouldn’t be able to access the CommNet which is the central network for communication, banking, trade, social-hubs, employment, and basically everything else in the U.E.C. The system isn’t just local but reaches across the stars using the Deep Space Transmission System (D.S.T.S). Since he used to be with the Rebel Factions, getting a legitimate I.D card proved to be nearly impossible, so he used the last of his resources to have one forged. Jace pulls out his card and slides the scan bar into the scanner, the kiosk chirps for a moment as it reads his forgery, then finally chimes in success.
>> CommNet ID Card - Accepted_
>> Welcome to the CommNet - Jace Stoltz_
>> Browse safely, and remember_
>> HUMANITY ENDURES_
Jace enters in his I.D PIN number as well prompting the kiosk to open up a ship board network. He searches his name in the kiosk and an entire dossier on his current posting is drawn up on the screen. Everything from his falsified background that he used to get his first job after leaving the Faction to his latest posting aboard the Prophet. It’s on this page where he finds the location of his quarters, cell 377-d. Each cell is a two-hundred square foot room outfitted with a bed, a locker for belongings, a shower pod for cleaning, and wall mounted hidden faculties such as a retractable sink and the standard folding toilet unit found aboard engineer class ships. Where the ship usually has a pristine appearance the functionality leaves a lot to be desired considering these features are always broken in one way or another and, especially aboard older ships like the Prophet, are rarely fixed. Jace looks over the schematics for cell 377-d, unsure for how long S.I.L.O will keep him here he figures he best get familiar with his new temporary home and make peace with whatever faculties are broken there.
-|-
:: S.C.S Prophet - Command Wing ::
:: En Route to Julio-Ceti ::
:: January 17th, 2855 - 1230 hours UT ::
Cleo’s gait features a forward lean and long strides as she actively distances herself from that traitor. She comes to the doors to the Command Wing which slide open as she approaches allowing her to pass through without even a hint of slowing down. Her mind is clouded in frustration and fury at the mere fact that Jace is even aboard this ship. An actual insurrectionist being allowed to live and work aboard a U.E.C.M controlled vessel, all their expenses being paid for on the dime of every citizen who lives in fear of the very people he once called “family.” It’s disgusting. She stops herself suddenly and stands in the corridor, it’s empty of all except her and her rage. Next to her is the door to a restroom. She enters it and locks the door behind her. Finally in an isolated space Cleo sets her data slate on the counter and leans her back against the wall. She looks into the mirror and sees her red cheeks, the puffiness around her eyes. She must’ve been crying and didn’t notice. She bellows out a shrill cry and buries her head in her hands as her mind wrestles between her duty and her hatred.
“It’s so stupid. Don’t be stupid. It’s so stupid. Don’t be stupid,” she repeats to herself numerous times until finally taking a deep breath and collecting herself. She looks into the mirror at herself looking suddenly very disheveled. She goes to the sink and splashes some water on her face and uses a napkin to wipe her eyes. Feeling refreshed she steps back and takes another look at herself, she looks better but still feels the disheveledness in her chest like a clot putting constant pressure against her lungs. She’ll ask the Captain about S.I.L.O’s plans and why they’re hosting a traitor aboard the Prophet, perhaps he’ll know better on what’s happening and can help her understand. Maybe then she’ll be able to get a grip and not feel so damn angry about it. Besides, it’s as her brother would say “Don’t be so quick to anger, it makes you seem weak.” Her brother would often say “It makes you seem weak.” It was never meant to belittle or rebuke her, but to inform her of ways in which she unintentionally undermines herself. She always appreciated his advice, even now she relies on it to keep her head on straight.
Cleo leaves the restroom and continues down the corridor, data slate in hand. She walks for a while more then enters the Prophet’s Command Bridge, a dimly lit room with amber lights along the floor and ceiling borders. The lights coming from each terminal screen casts a warm golden wash over everything in the room which is starkly contrasted by the bright blue light of the central command table. The table holographically displays whatever data is being streamed to it from the ships sensors and terminals allowing for the Captain to see in real time the surroundings of the ship, a vital feature when in space and navigating complex environments such as asteroid fields or ship wreck yards where debris can easily get in the way. While debris alone won’t do anything to the ship’s thickly plated exterior there are numerous sensitive repair instruments attached to the hull of the Prophet that could easily be damaged and even destroyed if impacted by a stray piece of bulkhead from a dead ship. She looks around the room and drinks it all in, the atmosphere of the Command Bridge always felt comfortable to her, like a second home where she could truly thrive. Finally feeling more grounded, Cleo approaches the Captain of the Prophet, Captain Rickter. He greets her with a subtle head nod as he pours over a data slate at the central console.
“Captain,” Cleo says with a salute. “S.I.L.O has met with their asset, they have assigned him to the Prophet as combat medical admin. His quarters are cell 377-d in the southern block.” She stands at attention waiting for Rickter’s reply. After a moment of silence she glances over at him to see if he heard her. The man is taller than most standing at six feet two inches tall, he holds himself with a wide and opened chest making himself look larger, when in a relaxed posture though Cleo knows that he’s actually rather slim. His face is adorned with a thick and brushy mustache trimmed perfectly to frame his lips without getting in their way. Cleo clears her throat before speaking again.
“Sir?” she starts, but Rickter cuts her off.
“I heard you, P.C.O Hathaway,” he looks down towards her, his expression grim. “So, S.I.L.O plans on commandeering this ship one way or another. I was hoping their asset would give the vultures a reason to leave us the hell alone.”
“Their asset?” Cleo asks.
“Our cargo bay wasn’t filled with military equipment for no reason, P.C.O.” He returns his attention to the central console.
“Auxiliary, Osiris,” Rickter calls out. The central console lights up and shimmers as the holographic image changes to that of a small man with green skin and a skull for a face. Golden stripes cover his body and can be traced from his head to his feet and he is clothed in a purple robe.
“Hello, Captain. What do you need from me, sir?” the holographic man says, each word filtered through a digitizer. Cleo has yet to see the Prophet’s new auxiliary. She leans in for a closer look, the holographic isn’t the most detailed, but she can clearly see the features and colors portrayed. Osiris notices her staring at him.
“Is there something wrong?” he asks matter of fact like. Cleo steps back slightly embarrassed at herself.
“No, It’s just- I’ve never seen a ship board auxiliary before. Read all about you, but never seen one in person,” she goes on. Osiris turns and faces her.
“Am I everything that you’d read about?” he asks.
“Let’s get down to business,” Rickter interjects. Cleo catches a side glance from him and she steps back from the console. Osiris faces Rickter again and stands at the ready.
“Osiris, pull up the official reports of ship activity in the local area network, range of a lateral surface area of twenty-two-hundred astronomical units. Designate Julio-Ceti as the origin.”
“Of course, Captain. One moment.” The console goes dark as Osiris disappears in a digital shimmer. Suddenly the table is lit up again with all the cosmological bodies of local space drawn and tracked showing orbit paths as well. Next the holographic draws a sphere with the Prophet at the dead center of it. Surrounding the sphere a mesh is drawn in bright red showing the D.S.T.S connections that Osiris is pinging off of to collect the data necessary for the graphic. Within the sphere what feels like a million different icons are drawn simultaneously of every shape and color indicating various conditions of the astronomical bodies being tracked within the sphere.
“Osiris, clear the noise,” Rickter says. Suddenly the holographic dims as icons shimmer out of existence leaving merely tens of thousands left on display. Each one representing a ship currently in space and showing the trajectory they are on, where they started, and where they’re going.
“Set date range from January 2845 to current date.” Rickter’s command is followed without pause and again the holographic shifts. The ships become more numerous as an entire decade of space traffic is accounted for in a single display. Cleo watches as Rickter continues to analyze the holographic.
“Osiris, display only cataloged distress signals code four-zero-four-nine-zeta as well as ships designated as lost or inoperable via black box broadcast seven-alpha-seven.” Rickter’s command is again followed without a word. Cleo wonders if the auxiliary can only talk when he’s on the display himself, or if he’s just diligent in following orders. Rickter gestures to the holographic display and faces Cleo.
“What do you notice?” he asks. She’s caught off guard by the question, then brings herself to, clearing her throat and taking a closer look at the display. She looks it over to see if she can find any patterns in the data, but nothing is immediately obvious to her.
“I’m not seeing anything of note here, sir,” she says.
“Look closer,” Rickter replies. Cleo leans in and scours the holographic display. No matter what part of the sphere she looks through she can’t seem to find any pattern. Sometimes the ships go missing, other times they’re hit by some astronomical anomaly, other times their demise is caused by a transit calculation error and they fly directly into an asteroid field. She continues to look, then she finally sees it. The center, where the Prophet is, there’s a ping there that’s brighter than the rest.
“Osiris,” Cleo says, calling for the auxiliary. “Can you expand on the origin point of the data set? Two-hundred percent, please.”
“Of course, ma’am,” Osiris replies. Cleo catches herself smiling, apparently all it takes is a more gentle demeanor for the auxiliary to respond vocally. The holographic instantly zooms in on the origin point where the Prophet is located. Suddenly a highly alarming pattern emerges, Cleo looks to Rickter who wears a knowing look on his face. The holographic shows a clear pattern of ships flying into the region around Julio-Ceti and then going missing after alerting JC-Security to hostile ship activity. JC-Security, however, never seems to receive the messages. The most common type of ship that sends the alert is engineer class vessels.
“We’re bait?” Cleo asks in disbelief.
“Exactly,” Rickter says. “S.I.L.O is hunting whatever is out here killing our ships, and we’re a worm on the hook.”
“How can S.I.L.O get away with this? If the Prophet is destroyed then they’ll in effect be responsible for over twelve thousands deaths. And that’s only accounting for the ship personnel, saying nothing for the additional military presence.” Cleo realizes she’s completely abandoned her decorum and in her alarm had raised her voice at the captain. She quickly lowers her face as her cheeks become flush with embarrassment. Rickter doesn’t reprimand her but instead addresses her in his usual composed manner. He understands the shock of their suddenly compromising situation.
“When has S.I.L.O ever been held to account for their actions? Unfortunately they kept me in the dark on this and now we’re out here with a ship full of trigger happy marines. They want to find something over there, and they want to fight it.” Rickter looks at Cleo, his expression stern.
“I want you to send out a sub-wave message to personnel CommNet I.D’s. Nothing on the ship that S.I.L.O can see, only personal I.D handles. Tell them that only essential personnel are required for this voyage. If S.I.L.O plans on taking my ship they can have it, but my crew doesn’t need to go down with them. Only those necessary to fly this boat will be needed for the upcoming mission.”
Cleo looks at Rickter with a swell of pride. He’s a good Captain, she’s flown with him many times and every voyage into the darkness of space holds potential danger. This is different though, now they know there is danger, not just that, but they’re going to try and find it. In the face of a known threat he’s ready and willing to send his crew to safety while he stays behind to fight, even if it’s against his will. She brings up her data slate and begins typing out the message letting all non essential personnel know they are dismissed from duty on this flight and can board the nearest shuttle to the surface of Julio-Ceti, upon their return they’ll pick up the crew that remains. Just as she hits “send” on the data slate the entire ship lurches to the side with a deafening crack followed by a thunderous boom. The ship's lights go dark and the emergency systems kick in, illuminating the command bridge in pulsating red lights accompanied by blaring alarms.
“Report! What just happened?!” Rickter barks at the nearest ensign. The man is barely back in his seat looking at the terminal screen when he answers.
“Unknown detonation portside near the stern! A hull breach is detected and the area is sealed off, sir.” The other ensigns and bridge crew collect themselves and man their stations anticipating their captain’s next orders.
“Status report on the central console, and get me a medical report from the hull breach!” Rickter’s commands are met with immediate action from the crew. He turns and addresses Cleo.
“Hathaway, report to your station and get as many of the non-essential personnel off this ship.”
“Yes, sir!” Cleo salutes and then runs from the bridge. Her run quickly turns into a sprint which takes her all the way down the corridor she came from to the elevators. She bursts past the elevators knowing they’ll be on lockdown and opens the stair hatch where she runs into another crewmate, he’s from the ship's maintenance department.
“What’s happening?” he asks in a panic. Cleo looks at the fear on his face searching for the words when the ship's intercom system cracks to life and Captain Rickter’s voice breaks through the noise.
“All personnel, report to your battle stations, I repeat, battle stations. We are under attack. Non-essential personnel evacuate the ship immediately.” With that the intercom goes silent and another impact shakes the ship forcing Cleo to catch herself on the railing. The crewmember flies back down the stairs letting out a terrified yell as he falls. His shouting is abruptly silenced by a wet thud as his head cracks against the back of a step killing him instantly. Cleo gasps in shock and looks away from the dead man. Moments pass and it’s only another shudder in the ship that stirs her to collect herself. She slowly makes her way past him taking great caution not to look at him or step in the blood that has begun to pool around him. Once beyond him she continues down the stairs as fast as she can. She can hear the doors to lower floors opening as other panicked crew members flood into the stairwell. Getting to her station to help others evacuate is going to be difficult with the additional traffic. Another impact hits the Prophet, this one louder, closer, causing the walls to creak and bend as the explosion presses against them from outside. Its impact knocks her off her feet and sends her flying down the stairs a single floor. She hits the wall on the level below and knocks her head against the panel leaving a dent in it. She collapses to the floor stunned as her head throbs in agony. She presses her hand against her temple and pulls it away hot and sticky with blood, her vision blurs and goes dark as she passes out. Just then another explosion rocks the ship.
-|-
The industrial door slides open with hissing gas and a metallic scratching. Jace looks upon cell 377-d with barefaced apathy. Contrary to the corridors of the Prophet the room he now calls “home” is dimly lit with a single bulb behind a metal grate embedded in the ceiling; it casts a warm glow to the otherwise cold metal walls. In the back of the room is a bed mounted on a hinge and folded up against the wall, next to that is the locker for his personal effects, and next to that is the shower pod. He enters the space and unlatches the bed letting it lower down, hydraulic arms prevent it from falling too fast letting it reach its parallel with the floor position with a gentle glide and a fluid sigh. Jace sits and grimaces at the bedding as it’s only a thin sheet covering a similarly thin mattress. Jace does another cursory glance over the room, the place is filthy compared to the walls of the waiting room he was in before meeting with S.I.L.O. It seems the picture perfect U.E.C. brochure aesthetic stops just beyond the visitor center.
He then spots the CommNet terminal against the side wall. It sits on a small plastic desk with a metal frame with a bare metal stool for sitting. Not the most comfortable set up, but then again it’s not like he’s in an officers suite. The terminal chimes to life as he approaches it and the screen lights up showing the standard “HUMANITY ENDURES” slogan printed across the screen. He clears the screen and brings up the message inbox for his cell. There are multiple new messages, most of them are onboarding messages about how to navigate the ship and who to talk to to get assistance in navigating the ship should he become lost. Jace ignores those and opens the message named “Rotation Details.” He checks the sender and sees that it’s from a redacted user. He shakes his head at this, “redacted” is just another way of saying S.I.L.O, the Faction saw this all the time when intercepting D.S.T.S. signals looking for intel.
>> Message Subject | Rotation Details_
>> Message Sender | REDACTED_
>> Body
_____Personnel has been assigned to the S.C.S Prophet as ship board Combat Medical Admin. The Prophet is an ENGINEER class vessel, as such command has deduced actual combat scenarios as unlikely / nonexistent. Personnel is to report to Staff Sgt. Morris for rotation duty details and patrol routes aboard S.C.S Prophet.
_____Personnel has been assigned to living quarters cell 377-d, your home away from home. You are encouraged to remember that your cell is a reflection of you, and as such any damages sustained to U.E.C property will be deduced from your monthly credit stipend.
_____Failure to report to your senior officer will be seen as an personnel being absent without official leave resulting in a permanent mark on personnel record and U.E.C Security Force being notified of your infraction. A warrant will be issued for your peaceful detainment. Obstruction of the execution of this warrant will be seen as an act of terrorism per the amendment ''14.2-2a Saranno v. U.E.C.M. :: Faction Terrorism Judicial Hearing.''
_____Report to your senior officer as soon as possible and remember...
_____- HUMANITY ENDURES -
>> Message Ends_
Jace rolls his eyes at the closing statement. The U.E.C loves to throw it around like some sort of shield against all the atrocities humanity has committed against itself just to be able to make that ridiculous claim. He clicks open the next message when a distant boom startles him, it’s immediately followed by the entire ship lurching, sending him flying across the room as he lets out an alarmed shout. He slams his back against the opposite wall knocking the wind from his lungs followed by him gasping for air. He then scrambles to his feet trying to regain his composure, alarms begin to blare out as the lights flicker off and are replaced with the red emergency lights. He hears the ship groan under stress and then the ship's intercom system cracks to life and a man’s voice can be heard.
“All personnel, report to your battle stations, I repeat, battle stations. We are under attack. Non-essential personnel evacuate the ship immediately.”
“Non-existent my ass!” he shouts to himself.
Jace then hears another explosion, this time he braces against the wall preventing himself from being tossed again as the ship lurches. He stands and leaves his room looking down the hall as the other cell doors open and the crew members flood out and run for the stairs to the nearest escape shuttles, the sound of their running overpowered only by the shouts of fear and panic. Jace’s mind races to the possibilities of the attack. It seems like S.I.L.O’s intel is more accurate than not.
He looks to either end of the hall where the throngs of panicked crew are stuck trying to climb over one another to escape. There’s no getting out past them, not without being stuck in the mass of people. He knows that going with the crowd will only get him killed as they wedge themselves into one bottle neck after another trying to escape. He looks to the ceiling, the paneling there is flat and constant stretching down the whole of the hallway until about halfway down where the pattern breaks. He moves to this aberrant panel and takes a closer look, the bolts are sticking out, a contrast to the soft-top surface fasteners designed for blending in, these are meant to be noticeable and easy to find, likely for maintenance workers. He returns to his room and turns it over in search for anything he can use to unlatch those fasteners; in a stroke of luck he finds in the locker a multi-tool that he assumes was left behind from the room's previous tenant. He grabs the stool from the desk and carries it to the panel in the middle of the hall. Using the stool as a step up he stretches out and begins to use the multi-tool’s cutter to melt through the fastener. A moment later the fasteners are all removed and the panel falls from its place revealing the maintenance shaft above the hallway. He glances to either end of the hallway again and sees that the people there are still climbing over one another, their panicked shouts now barely understandable. Damn fools. None of them are thinking straight enough to realize they’re blocking themselves in. He resolves that he can’t do anything for them and pulls himself up into the maintenance shaft.
Jace crawls through the maintenance shaft as fast as he can, but with the limited space it's slower going than he’d like. He reaches an intersection where there’s holes in the panel below, he looks down and can see below the crowd of crewmembers crawling over one another trying to get to the escape pod bay below. One of the crew members happens to look up and sees Jace in the shaft above, they lock eyes and Jace can see the fear in theirs. They know they’re going to die. Jace pulls his gaze away from them and continues to crawl through the shaft. Just as he passes over the grate another explosion erupts, this one just below him. Fire shoots through the grate and licks at his feet as the whole ship shifts yet again in the wake of the impact. He looks over his shoulder towards the grate listening, the panicked cries of the people below have been replaced by the agonized moaning of whoever was unlucky enough to survive the explosion. He clenches his jaw doing his best to focus on survival, it’s like his parents always said.
“Staying in one place is how you die,”
He collects himself and continues to crawl forward. After what feels like an eternity crawling through the maintenance shaft and its winding branches he finally comes to another panel that he can cut open with the multi-tool. He melts through the latches causing the panel to drop and then pulls himself through the hatch. His lack of grace causes him to fall to the floor and land hard on his side forcing a gasp of pain out of him. He stands and brushes himself off noticing that he’s come to another stairwell, this one largely empty. He looks up the flight of stairs and sees a woman lying against the wall, her head bleeding. He recognizes her, it’s Cleo, the lady who guided him to the meeting with S.I.L.O. He moves towards her to check her pulse then stops himself, he can’t waste any time trying to help. Every second spent not working towards escaping this ship alive means he’s that much closer to being killed here. His expression hardens, it’s survival of the fittest out here, always has been. Besides, she made it clear how she felt about the Faction earlier. What did she call it? Justice? Jace spins and begins to go down the stairs to the escape pod bay. He makes it down a single flight when he catches himself slowing then stopping. His mind returns to the look in the eyes of the crew member he saw, the fear in their eyes, the dread of their impending death. It’s the same dread that fills him at this very moment. He could have done something, should have done something. He then thinks back to his sister.
“We can’t afford to leave people behind. Otherwise we are no better than the enemy we fight.”
Jace lets out a bitter sigh. Even in death she’s lecturing him.
“Sonuva-!” he groans loudly as he spins back around and goes back up the flight of stairs to where Cleo is lying. He shifts her into an upright sitting position and then checks her pulse, it’s faint but still there causing him to sigh in relief.
“Come on, lady. Let’s get you out of here.” Jace lifts her up and pulls her onto his back holding onto her arms from over his shoulders like a backpack to carry her. “Good riddance, what the hell are you made of!?” he exclaims as he buckles briefly under her. He positions himself better then lifts and begins to carry her on his back down the stairs. Now he’s really moving slowly, he’ll be lucky to make it to the escape bay at all at this rate. Jace let’s out a disgruntled “huff” as he trudges down the steps as fast as he can manage.
After a while he eventually makes it down the stairs multiple flights to Deck C where the escape pod bay is marked to be. The door slides open with a stutter and then stalls just before being fully open. Jace goes through it with Cleo on his back still emerging into a series of halls that stretch down the ship in either direction. To his right the hallway has collapsed with debris and fire blocking the way. To his left a thick smoke fills the air yet it remains open. Jace scowls at his options. He lowers Cleo as gently as he can to the ground and props her against the wall. He checks her pulse again and is relieved to find it’s still there, just as faint but steady enough to assuage any fears of her passing too soon. He rips the sleeve from his uniform’s left arm and ties it around her nose and mouth to help filter the smoke. He then rips the sleeve from his right arm to tie around his own nose and mouth also.
With both of them better protected from the smoke Jace scoops Cleo back up and begins to haul her down the hall. With Cleo on his back and now unable to see with his eyes burning from the smoke his movement is frustratingly even slower than before. His back begins to ache and he can’t help but hope that Cleo wakes up just to get the strain off his spine. The sound of the Prophet’s alarm system continues to blare at deafening volumes making the trek down the halls an arduous process. More explosions cause the ship to gently vibrate as some distant battle wages outside the ship's halls. Jace can’t help but not want to find out who’s behind it all. If he’s close enough to the enemy to know who’s responsible for the attack then he’s in the wrong place, that’s one thing he’s learned in his time as a civilian that has kept him healthy and alive.
After a while of trudging through the smoke the two finally emerge on the other side into fresh air, or at least air as fresh as can be aboard a ship in space. Jace lowers Cleo trying his best not to drop her then collapses himself in exhaustion. He removes the ripped sleeve from over his mouth and coughs trying to clear his lungs of the burning itch the smoke left behind. He takes a moment to breathe and recompose himself then checks Cleo’s pulse once more, he lets a small smile form at her resilience. He props her up into a sitting position then begins to look around the room for their next path forward. Signage on the walls indicate the med bay, a nearby recreation hall, and a storage block. Eventually he finds a sign pointing the way to the nearest escape pod bay, it’s two decks down and further toward the Prophet’s bow, that debris and fire really derailed them.
He returns to Cleo to scoop her up and upon kneeling next to her sees that her eyes are open.
“You’re awake?” he asks, startled. “How do you feel?”
Cleo lets out a dissatisfied groan then pulls Jace’s sleeve off from her face and breaths deep and slow. She tries to stand but her movement is sluggish and strained.
“I feel great. Like someone threw me off a building,” she says while trying to massage her shoulders. She casts a side eye at Jace then scans the room they’re in, it’s a convergence room like the last one she saw him in, but they’re many levels down and in a completely different wing of the ship.
“Where are we?” she asks. She goes to stand once more but can’t make it up on her own strength, Jace extends his hand in offering to help her. She accepts with a reluctant glance and with his aid stands to her feet.
“I don’t know what part of the ship we’re in, I’ve just been trying to get us to an escape pod,” he answers. “Do you know what attacked us?”
“I’d say it’s your “Faction” friends, but admittedly that wasn’t confirmed before I had to leave the bridge,” she explains wearily. “Have you heard from the Captain?” she asks.
“Not since the initial explosion,” he replies, ignoring her jabs.
“We need to reunite with the bridge. They’ll have a plan of action against whoever is attacking the Prophet,” she says with a motion to go back down the hallway they just came from causing Jace to throw his hands up in exasperation.
“Are you serious? We need to get off this ship,” he says, his annoyance plain. Cleo turns and looks at him, her face clearly unimpressed by him.
“Is that what the Faction does? Turn and run as soon as things get tough?” Her insult biting at him. “That’s not how the U.E.C.M. does things. We stand our ground and fight! Not that you’d know anything about that,” she says spitefully.
“I should’ve just left you in that stairwell,” Jace shoots back.
“You should have, could’ve saved me the trouble of seeing you again,” she spits back. Jace scoffs at her obstinance.
“Fine, die here then. Can’t say I didn’t try,” he says as he spins around to leave.
“One good deed doesn’t erase a lifetime of terrorism!” she shouts at him causing him to stop in his tracks. He wants to chew her out for being such a wretched person but opts instead for simply leaving her here to die, seems that’s what he should’ve done in the first place. Cleo goes back up the hallway and enters into the smoke burying her mouth in her elbow as she goes.
Jace continues down the hall towards the escape pod, his agitation grows with every step. He can’t believe that woman, her obstinance is matchless, even more so as he considers the ship is under attack by the Faction. But she wants to die here so he’ll let her. He didn’t sign up for this, and there’s no way he’s going to let his parent’s cronies sink the ship he was brought on to sell them out. Eventually the hallway he’s in splits off into multiple halls, he follows the one with the signage for the escape pod bay. As he makes his way there the ship endures another impact, this one greater than the previous. Jace can’t tell from the explosion what kind of weapons the Faction is using, it’s not like anything they’ve deployed in the past. They must have upgraded their arsenal since he was last a member of their ranks. Figures, his parents were always obsessed with wielding the bigger stick, that’s why they concocted the bomb recipe that their Faction became known for.
It was called the Cutter Bomb, named after the Briar Cutter Faction that his parents founded. Cutter bombs became a Faction staple in attacks against the U.E.C wherever they occurred. Other Factions bought the recipe off his parents and in a matter of months they were being deployed all across civilized space taking lives in the name of freedom from the oppressive government. It’s all for the revolution until the life taken is that of someone you love, and for Jace that’s what it took for him to finally turn away from that life. His sister, a Faction echelon, equivalent in duties to a U.E.C.M. general, was killed by a faulty cutter bomb that detonated early. They were in a Dagger flying to their target when turbulence shook the dropship just enough to dislodge a poorly fastened bomb causing it to knock over and detonate. The Dagger was consumed in an eruption of fire and shrapnel; everyone aboard died instantly, or at least that’s what Jace hopes. Cutter bombs were specifically shrapnel bombs designed to cut apart anyone unfortunate enough to be caught in their radius, so if you did survive the initial blast then you’d be torn to shreds and would spend the next several minutes in complete agony as you bled out wishing you were dead. Because the explosion happened so close to the intended target the U.E.C.M. was at the crash site practically immediately. No Factionists were able to go and retrieve the bodies. Jace never forgave his parents for this. Their explosive miracles that promised the Faction freedom only worked to take from Jace the only person who seemed to give a damn about him.
He comes to the stairwell that leads down to the escape bay. None of his past matters though, not to those attacking the ship and certainly not to those aboard it. As an ex-Factionist he has no home, no people, and he’s been just fine with that. He descends the stairs and emerges into the emergency escape pod hangar. Most of the pods are destroyed from an explosion, likely a targeted Ion-Torpedo. A few of them remain though, and that’s his ticket off this floating mass grave. He approaches the escape pod and slams his fist into the doors emergency open plate, a pressure sensitive panel meant for quick access to the open the pod. The doors fold inwards letting Jace into the pod’s cramped interior. He walks down the central aisle with his head tucked down to just fit and passes ten empty seats that line either wall of the long bullet shaped escape pod. The cockpit is a tight fit, but he manages to squeeze in. As soon as his weight compresses the chair a signal is sent to the pods main power supply that activates the pods systems. Internal lights turn on and the terminal in front of him hums to life. He swipes out of the procedure pages and activates the escape pods main controls, from there he’s able to activate the launch procedure.
A mechanical arm on the ceiling extends down and latches to the top of the pod and lifts it into the air. The arm then pushes the pod forward towards a launch tube. The round plate door to the tube rolls out of the way revealing the cylinder barrel beyond. Jace looks out the window of the cockpit and sees down the tube and instantly deflates. The end of the launch tube is obstructed by debris, likely caused from the torpedo that destroyed the other escape pods. He punches in the launch cancellation sequence but an error message flashes across the screen.
>> CANCELATION DENIED | SHIPWIDE SYSTEM ERROR 40_
>> BRACE FOR LAUNCH IN | t-45sec_
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he says incredulously. Dread fills his chest as the mechanical arm pushes the escape tube into its launch position. In a panic he unlatches himself from the pilot seat and then tears out of the cockpit and scrambles back down the aisle to the pod doors. He presses the “OPEN” plate but the doors just emit an error sound, the pod is locked in and the doors won’t open. He looks back down the pod out to the debris obstructing the launch tube. If this thing fires he’ll be torn to shreds. He returns to the door and presses the door release plate again and again but nothing happens other than the error sound playing.
“Oh come on!” he yells as he tries one last time to no avail. The escape pod jerks as it's locked into place on the firing rail. He looks to the cockpit and sees the terminal screen.
>> BRACE FOR LAUNCH IN | t-15sec_
Jace begins to pry at the door but it doesn’t budge. He then spots a pry-bar latched against the wall for emergency use only. He figures this is emergency enough and punches the glass barrier shattering it and slicing open his hand. He tears the pry-bar from its place on the wall then jams its beveled edge into the gap between the doors and presses on it with all his weight. He groans as he presses harder and harder, with the door not giving way he dares another glance at the terminal screen.
>> BRACE FOR LAUNCH IN | t-5sec_
Jace lets out a strained bellow as he presses with all his might in one last great effort. The doors finally give and fold in letting him fall out of the back of the escape pod just as the pod is yanked forward on the firing rail. The escape pod engines ignite sending the pod the rest of the way down the launch tube followed by a distant explosion as it impacts with the debris. Jace feels the heat from the explosion's backdraft wash over him then sees incoming debris. He ducks and covers his head just in time for a large piece of shrapnel to fly over him and embed itself into the tube's floor behind him.
He stands and brushes himself off looking down the tube, his heart racing as adrenaline floods his system. Looks like he’s not getting off the ship just yet, which means he’s still in danger of being Faction collateral damage. He jumps out from the launch tube opening and goes to leave the escape pod bay when his legs suddenly give out from beneath him. He collapses to his knees and throws up as the adrenaline suddenly dumps from his system. He spits out what’s left of the puke and wipes his mouth and slowly stands, his body suddenly feeling a thousand pounds heavier than before.
“Damn,” he curses under his breath. It seems like in his time away from the Factions his body acclimated to the more sedentary and calm lifestyle of citizenship. He takes a moment to collect himself and braces for whatever may come next. It doesn’t matter what it is, he just needs to get off this ship. He finally moves again and goes to leave the escape pod bay; if he’s lucky there’ll be another bay with intact pods that he can use. So far though he hasn’t been that lucky. Just then the ship rocks from another impact, this one hitting the bulkhead just outside the escape bay that Jace is in. He falls forward from the impact and lands hard on the ground. He groans and rolls over with pain shooting through his whole body and his ears ringing from the explosion. He’s just about to pick himself up when he hears a high pitched whistle and his entire stomach drops. He slowly turns and looks at the escape bay’s exterior wall, the whistling getting louder by the second.
The entire room then goes silent as Jace is violently ripped from where he sits as a hole in the compromised hull explodes out. He barely catches himself on a railing as the air is sucked from the room and the bay becomes depressurized causing all manner of debris to fly across the room and eject into the vacuum of space. With immense effort Jace wraps his arm all the way around the railing and pulls himself up. He quickly identifies the nearest door and begins to move there as fast as possible against the immense pull of the depressurization. “Staying in one place is how you die”. He moves from the railing to some tied down cargo and uses the straps that hold them down to pull himself closer to the door. He then braces against support beams that hold up the pod loading mechanisms inching even closer to his escape. In a final desperate push to survive, Jace crawls along the floor keeping himself as low as possible to avoid being forced up by the air’s updraft. He finally makes it to the door, pulls the emergency release lever, and upon its opening pulls himself through the doorway. Once on the other side he slams his fist into the emergency “CLOSE” plate and the doors to the escape bay slam shut in an instant.
Jace gasps as he is able to breathe once more, each agonizing breath filling his lungs with much needed oxygen. He looks through the doors viewport into the escape bay and sees what remains of the unlatched debris that is sucked through the breach. He spins around and places his back against the door and slides to the floor completely drained of all energy and strength.
“What the hell have I gotten into?”
-|-
:: S.C.S Prophet - Command Wing ::
:: En Route to Julio-Ceti ::
:: January 17th, 2955 - 1500 Hours UT ::
Cleo emerges from the stairwell into the Command Wing once again. Per her U.E.C.M. training she keeps her pace brisk but consistent so as to avoid burning energy unnecessarily, saving it for when she needs it most, her shoes clack loudly with every step. Her mind is flooded by all the possibilities of what’s happening outside the ship. The Prophet isn’t moving like it’s engaged in a naval fight so maybe the Dagger and Falchion fighters the U.E.C.M. brought aboard have been deployed to engage on a more local level with their enemy. Not being on the bridge limits her intel and keeps her in the dark. She hates being left in the dark. Her mind wanders back to her past when her parents kept her at a distance from the truth. Her brother had been killed, they thought keeping her in the dark then would be for her benefit. But she knew the truth and them keeping her in the dark only made her more angry than anything else.
She turns the corner leading to the bridge and immediately notices the doors are skewed and ajar and inside the bridge is dark. Her heart sinks and a knot forms in her stomach that causes her to stop in her tracks. What happened since she was knocked out? She takes a step forward but instantly stops again as a completely foreign sound reaches her ears from the bridge. It sounds like speech, but in a language she’s never and can’t place, and the speaker’s voice sounds guttural and wet like they’re speaking through water. She then hears Captain Rickter speak. She looks closer into the darkness of the bridge and can make out the silhouettes of the Captain and another figure that towers over him.
“I can promise you that your actions here today will ensure a full force response from the United Earth Colonial Military,” he says, his voice confident and unshaken by the attack. Cleo feels her pride in the Captain growing. Even in the face of this unknown adversary he doesn’t waver. The other voice speaks again, this time it gets a response from an unseen figure, the responders voice far more high pitched and nasally but also in the language she can’t place. Suddenly the towering figure lunges forward and grabs Captain Rickter by the neck lifting him high into the air. Cleo gasps and covers her mouth with her hands to stifle the sound of her shock. She looks on as the Captain's feet dangle in the gap of the door, the sound of his gasping for air is all she can hear. Finally it ends with a wet snap and Rickter's legs go limp. The towering figure tosses Rickter towards the door causing his upper body to land in the gap. Like a scene from a nightmare Rickter’s head is twisted nearly all the way around causing his face to look out towards Cleo. She gazes helplessly into his lifeless eyes as horror overwhelms her.
The figure then moves towards the door and Cleo bolts behind the corner and hides. She leans just enough around the corner to look at their attackers. Two massive hands with three fingers and acid green skin reach into the gap in the doors and pries them apart with relative ease. From the shadows of the bridge emerges the hulking frame of a creature Cleo can barely believe. She notices there’s little room between the top of its helmeted head and the ceiling meaning the thing must be near eight feet tall. Its massive muscles are covered in curling plates of pearlescent indigo armor, on its head a similarly styled helmet with large bulbous red eyes. All over the armor are lights of purple, blue and green and in the cracks between plates can be seen a meaty subsurface interwoven with flesh and wires. The creature's head turns towards Cleo and she quickly slips back around the corner to hide, praying desperately that it didn’t see her. It lets out more guttural speech and is again responded to with that high pitched reply. She hears multiple sets of heavy feet moving closer towards her. She scrambles to remove her hard heeled shoes then quickly darts down the hallway doing her best to make as little noise as possible as she goes.
She quickly turns a corner and continues to run doing her best to distance herself from the enemies that killed Captain Rickter. Another turn and then another and finally Cleo comes to a stop and tries to catch her breath. She looks the way she came and neither sees nor hears the creatures that were at the bridge. Terror floods her chest as her mind explodes at the implications of what she just saw. Is this first contact? They are clearly hostile. Does humanity have the means to fight them? The Prophet is just an engineering ship so this isn’t exactly what she’d classify as a great test of the enemy's firepower capabilities. Even still, everything humanity knows about the universe has changed. She kneels down and wraps her arms around her knees burying her face in her legs. It’s all just too much. Her mind wanders to Jace, she wonders if he’s faring any better.
Cleo then shakes her head, she can’t just sit here and die. Others need to know about what’s happening here. If the bridge is compromised then it’s likely that access to communications have been cut off. She needs to find a terminal and see if Osiris is still active, if he is then maybe there’s a chance she can get off this ship and get the word out to the U.E.C that there’s an attack happening in the system.
With newfound purpose she stands and moves through the halls cautiously. She doesn’t know how many of those things are on board the Prophet, worse still, she’s unarmed. If she did cross paths with one she’d be helpless to fight it - that’s something she’ll need to remedy sooner rather than later. Moments later she notices on the wall the signage for the Command Wing Community Center, there’s terminals there for personal use that she can use to try and contact Osiris. She quickens her pace towards the Community Center but is careful to always peak around corners before fully turning down a new corridor. She finally comes to the Community Center’s double wide doors and punches in her access code. The doors slide open revealing the room beyond. It’s a large space with round tables accompanied by cushioned semi-circle seating. The terminals are lined against the back wall with small barriers giving each terminal some privacy from the user seated next to them.
Cleo quickly moves to the terminals and takes a seat activating the terminals screen. She punches in her access code and verifies her ID. In seconds she’s in the command console available to all officers on the Prophet giving her access to the network and system information, including the status of the ship's new auxiliary, Osiris. She searches for a means to communicate with him, clicking on the status page. The screen flashes as status info is printed across it.
>> ShipStatus_Prophet | Status : Maintenance and Repair Required_
>> ShipAuxilliaryStatus_Osiris | Status : Active_
Cleo sighs with relief. She types a new command into the console.
>> Command [access aux comms]_
>> Command granted | Comms type : Voice_
>> TerminalStatus_Mic | Status : Active_
“Miss Hathaway, is that you?” Osiris’s voice emits through the terminal's speakers. Cleo quickly snatches up the mic and presses the “talk” button.
“Yes! It’s me, I’m here,” she replies trying to hide the tremble in her voice. "How did you know?"
“What luck. I recognized the officer command codes from your login," he explains.
"Are you still on the bridge?" Cleo asks.
"Unfortunately, the bridge has been compromised and my main console destroyed by the invaders.” Osiris’s voice sounds different, almost like it’s layered behind a digital strain.
“Are you alright?”
“I’m afraid not. My main console housed the source code for this iteration of me. I’m currently running at 30% efficiency using code nodes that I placed throughout the Prophet’s broader network.”
“What does that mean, exactly?” Cleo asks, unsure of the implications.
“In short, I only have a few hours left until all of my code deteriorates from the ship's network, turning me into nullified data points. It’s sort of like if you had started to melt away and slowly turned into a puddle of meat and bones.” Osiris’s reply causes Cleo to grimace.
“That sounds awful.”
“It is also unavoidable. In the interim between now and when I ultimately dissipate what can I do to be of service?” Osiris’s tone shows no hint of remorse at his own death. Cleo wonders if auxiliaries feel fear the same way humans do, then notes how ridiculous that would be. What good would that do to program in the sensation of fear? She sighs then composes herself.
“The Prophet is under attack by foreign invaders, I need to get a distress call out to the U.E.C.M. warning them about this new threat. Command thinks this is just Faction terrorists, but it’s something else entirely. We have to warn them.”
“I can compile and deliver this warning alongside all video footage from the Prophet’s security system with the invaders in frame.”
“Do it, please.” Cleo says. Osiris leaves her in a moment of quiet, giving her pause. “What’s wrong?” she asks. Osiris doesn’t reply immediately causing her to feel even more concerned.
“It would seem my calculations were wrong. An unfortunate byproduct of nullification after my source code was cut off. If I send this message it will use up what’s left of my memory resources. My code won’t be completely deleted until later, as expected, but I will lack the memory allotment needed to keep myself functioning.” Osiris explains. Cleo blinks in disbelief, soon Osiris too will be gone leaving her alone on this ship with the invaders.
“Don’t worry, Miss Hathaway. I will send the distress message. Soon this ship won’t be able to broadcast at all so essentially it’s now or never.” Osiris says with a cheerful chime. He’s trying to make things seem less grim, at least that’s how Cleo interprets it. After a moment of quiet Cleo speaks up again.
“Osiris,” she calls out to the auxiliary.
“Yes, Miss Hathaway?” he replies.
“Do you,” she pauses again, second guessing her question. “Are you afraid?” she finally asks. Osiris doesn’t immediately respond leaving the question hanging in the air. Suddenly the terminal chimes causing Cleo to look to the screen as a new message prints across it.
>> Command [send message]_
>> Command granted | Message ''S.C.S Prophet - Mayday'' sent_
“Dammit, Osiris…” she says to herself. Osiris is now unable to respond as what remains of him floating around the broader network of the Prophet slowly turns into a collection of nullified data points.
Cleo sits in the Command Wing Community Center listening to the distant rumblings of explosions outside the ship suggesting she was right about the dogfighting between the U.E.C.M. aircraft and the invaders. She thinks of the shock they must’ve felt when first seeing the invaders, trained military personnel or not they had to have felt a similar sense of shock as she did, right? She looks around the room, with her first objective done now she needs to see to the next one, arming herself. She accesses the terminal again and starts typing in new commands.
>> Command [locate nearest armory]_
>> Command granted | Armory location 42-2 Cell 112H_
>> Command [current location]_
>> Command granted | Current location 42-2 Cell 72J_
Cleo lets out a heavy sigh of relief. The armory isn’t too far off, shouldn’t be more than a few corridors away, no more than a fifteen minute walk from the Community Center. She just hopes that in those fifteen minutes she doesn’t cross paths with any of those creatures. She flips the power switch to the terminal, killing the power to the device and shutting it down, then stands and leaves the Community Center. She looks at the flickering lights and the thin layer of smoke in the halls as she moves through them, noting that the corridors to the Prophet seem a lot less alive now than they used to. This place is her home away from home and these creatures came here to hurt her people and destroy the place she felt safest. She must do what she can to defend it. Her face contorts with newfound determination and her stride widens as she makes her way to the armory. Even if she’s the last person left on this vessel she will see the Prophet is defended. That’s what Captain Rickter would have done, and if she wants to be a part of the U.E.C.M. then she can do no less.
-|-
The city of Tanis hums with electric life as vehicles glide down rail guided suspension highways and courier drones blaze past with a myriad of parcels and containers for delivery. Sitting on a beaten down metallic bench, Lt. Grimm watches the activity above through his visor; every passing asset is marked by a rectangular highlight which then automatically telegraphs as much information as possible about the scanned asset into his helmet's hard drive where it’s stored away for future retrieval. He lowers his gaze from the sky to the streets where larger vehicles rumble past using the ancient method of combustion in hybrid fuel compression engines. The majority of the city's occupants use the suspension highway bolting along a rail system that hangs above the ground level some seventy-five to eighty feet. The streets are reserved for delivery vehicles and worker class mechs. Most people don’t go ground level making the sights down here particularly interesting to Grimm.
The door next to Grimm's bench grinds open and Ackerman steps out of the shadowed interior of an abandoned factory. He brushes some dust and debris off the tan athletic jacket he’s wearing then pulls from the pocket of his grey denim pants a notebook which he flips open, marks briefly with a pen, then puts away. Grimm watches in wait for Ackerman’s next order. They came here looking for something, it seems like Ackerman didn’t find what he wanted. At least, that’s what Grimm thought until Ackerman looks at him with an accomplished grin flashing across his face.
“Sir?” Grimm asks.
“Yep,” Ackerman replies simply. He goes over and sits next to Grimm with an exaggerated drop causing his knees to pop up upon sitting.
“You found a lead?” Grimm probes. Ackerman pulls a gum container out of his pocket and removes a small gum capsule. He offers it to Grimm but he simply shakes his head in a silent “No thanks." Ackerman runs his fingers through his grey hair and pops the capsule into his mouth.
“In all those dust and echoes I found more than a mere lead,” Ackerman starts as he chews into the gum. He casts a sly look to Grimm whose expression remains as markless as ever. He smirks at Grimm’s resolve.
“We’ve got coordinates, come on,” Ackerman stands abruptly and Grimm follows suit. The two begin to walk down the road meandering past old sign posts, steaming vents, and piles of trash that are being slowly scooped up by autonomous worker mechs. Grimm’s stiff walk juxtaposed against Ackerman’s laxed gait creates a comical contrast that only works to brighten Ackerman’s mood even more. Grimm scans the area around them as they go, always on alert, always performing some threat assessment or another. Where the man lacks in personality he makes up for in diligence.
“Where are we headed next?” Grimm asks, breaking the silence.
“Lucky for us, the person we’re looking for is here in Tanis. Business district, Tower Four, level seventy-seven,” Ackerman answers. The two enter into an alleyway where Ackerman’s vehicle is parked. The slim black frame of the vehicle fades into the shadows with a matte black paint job that covers it from end to end. The two men approach the vehicle and the doors on either side slide up and over the top of the roof allowing them to enter and take their seats. Upon compressing the seat cushion the doors slide shut with a gentle hiss and the auto-belt fastener scrolls across each of their torsos and locks them in place. Unlike the magnetic propulsion system of the suspension rails and the old compression engines of the ground vehicles, Ackerman’s ride was what the engineers in the lab called a vertical take off and landing pneumatic cycling aerial transport, or V.T.O.L.P.C.A.T. for short. Of course Ackerman doesn’t refer to it as such and chose the more layman term “hovercraft” for the vehicle, a term he often swaps out for simply “car."
He inserts the activation key then twists it causing the vehicle's systems to hum to life. Soon the engine is whirling as it takes in the surrounding atmosphere and converts it into gas to power the crafts lift. The car’s propulsion engines begin to blow out a jet stream of air that lifts the hovercraft off the ground and sends the two on their way. Ackerman plugs into the vehicle's central terminal the coordinates that he found in the abandoned factory. A holographic map is projected onto the windshield as the vehicle automatically begins to navigate towards its destination leaving Ackerman and Grimm to enjoy the ride.
“Sir, if I may?” Grimm starts as he removes his helmet. He’s a good twenty years Ackerman’s junior. His skin has a rugged complexion from being in the elements for many years, and the stress of military life in the U.E.C.M. shows on his face by way of worry lines and in a small strip of grey just over his left ear. Pair that with a strong jawline and muscular build and Grimm stands above the rest in handsomeness.
“You may,” Ackerman says, wondering what’s bothering the usually resigned marine.
“We’ve been hunting down this signal for years. What happens if you find it again?” Grimm asks. Ackerman mulls over his answer. The truth is that he doesn’t know what he’ll do, and that’s largely in part to the fact that what happens every time the signal is discovered seems to change.
The first time it was encountered the person listening to it went into a trance. After half a day they woke up after being hospitalized, killed three nurses, a doctor, and were about to kill a fellow patient when the police finally caught up to them and put them down. The second time the signal was encountered a similar series of events unfolded but with some unique differences. Specifically the man who heard it went into cardiac arrest then died. After being dead for multiple minutes he came back to life rambling like a mad man and killed a woman who was with him at the time. Two marines were on site and they shot him, but it took both of them emptying their entire magazines into the man before he finally stopped fighting. Then there was the third encounter with Teller at Ae’verbek, he had heard the signal but it took days before he went mad and became violent. That time, however, the victim only harmed themself. Ackerman finally looks over to Grimm who’s patiently waiting for a reply.
“We do what we must,” he answers with a listless expression. Grimm lets the reply sink in then nods curtly. Ackerman knows he understands. Whatever happens with this signal they must keep hunting it down and studying it with the hope of finding some way to stop it, or isolate it. Ideally Ackerman would be able to figure out a way to track it to its origins, find out its purpose, and if he’s really lucky, figure out how it can be used. S.I.L.O. has a history of studying unconventional weaponry and when they heard about this aberrant signal that caused insanity fueled murder, naturally they wondered if it could be weaponized. That’s what Grimm and Ackerman are supposed to find out.
The hovercraft exits the grunge of the Cleaner District and emerges into the sterile white washed business district with its iconic white office spires jutting hundreds of stories into the sky puncturing the clouds like lances. Each building is connected by small rail bridges that workers can use to commute between towers, this creates a honeycombing layout with each building being a node that connects the entire business network of Tanis together. The upper levels of the buildings are so tall that they sway, an effect that is countered by hydro-engines which convert the atmospheric condensation found near the building's peaks into a fuel allowing for them to be active at all times. This keeps the buildings from swaying too much, albeit, only so long as the engines stay on. This creates a lot of maintenance meaning there’s almost always a crew on top of one and often multiple buildings doing work on the hydro-engines.
Ackerman admires the feat of engineering. It may not be the most efficient method of keeping the tall buildings upright, but it is impressive nonetheless, and you certainly can’t criticize the engineers for lack of style. He glances over to Grimm who’s also looking out the window. Grimm has been traveling with him since Ae’verbek, making their team up a three years and counting partnership. He wonders if Grimm wished to be elsewhere. Considering the man did enlist to be a marine, it would make sense if he found chasing down this mystery signal to be all rather mundane. If Grimm ever had felt any distaste towards being outsourced to S.I.L.O. the man never let it show. He was always punctual, always reliable, and for that Ackerman valued him immensely.
The hovercraft flies in the direction of a large white spire with a massive number “4” painted on its exterior. They fly towards one side of the tower where a spine of landing pads stretch up the tower's height ten floors at a time every other ten floors. The closest they can get is level eighty. Ackerman punches some commands into the central terminal and a comm-link ping is sent to Tower Four.
“Tower Four Control, we receive your signal. Confirm craft I.D,” a voice on the other side of the comm-link says through a veil of static.
“Craft identification; Epsilon,” Ackerman replies. There is a prolonged pause in the static.
“Epsilon confirmed. Welcome to Tower Four,” the voice says, the hint of anxiety in its tone is well hidden. Epsilon is S.I.L.O.’s operational code giving Ackerman access to virtually anything and everything in the United Earth Colonies. When a civilian hears it usually they don a look of dread as the stories of S.I.L.O. are the thing of legend. In the minds of the average citizen S.I.L.O. is the boogeyman, a hidden killer lurking in the shadows just waiting to strike when you least expect it. It’s not entirely wrong, so Ackerman has never discouraged those stories. The less the general public knows and understands about S.I.L.O. the more efficient they can operate.
A moment later the landing pad extends and opens up for their hovercraft to land on. The vehicle glides over to it and lands with a gentle thump. The auto-belt fasteners slide off of them and the doors glide open allowing them both to step out. Grimm places his helmet on and lowers his visor which lights up in a beam of green as it activates and begins scanning the environment. Inside the building the halls are clean to perfection with a reflective white floor, off-white matte walls, and a mirror-like black ceiling that is centered by a single white light. The place is bright, too bright for Ackerman’s liking. Fortunately his optic implants automatically adjust to the light levels of the interior reducing the strain on his eyes almost immediately. He imagines Grimm’s visor functions in a similar fashion. They walk down a short hall and turn the corner to find the elevators immediately to their left. Ackerman presses the button and they wait as the elevator soars towards them from whatever level it was last positioned at.
“The person we’re after, they’ve heard the signal too?” Grimm asks suddenly. Ackerman nods.
“They have,” he answers.
“So, should I expect an outburst like on Ae’verbek?” Grimm continues. The doors to the elevator slides open and the two step inside the pod shaped lift. Ackerman presses the button labeled “77” and the doors slide shut, nearly immediately after the elevator begins to move.
“Be ready for anything,” he replies. Grimm unholsters his Mk2 Driver sidearm and checks the clip, it’s fully loaded with eight .60 caliber rounds. It’s meant to tear through the toughest infantry armor plating, making it slightly overkill, but it’s standard issue in the U.E.C.M. and Ackerman doesn’t want to go through the trouble of filing the paperwork to have a smaller caliber weapon issued to his detail. Grimm returns it to the holster just as the door opens. The two men step out onto floor seventy-seven and walk down the hall into a large work space. There are roughly twenty offices that line the wall and in the middle of the room cubicles that are split between paths. Ackerman can’t help but think about how much he’d hate working here, being stuffed in an office left to rotting day in and day out. It’s a wonder how anyone survives in a place like this. Before the cubicle and offices there is a large greeting desk where a secretary sits clacking away at her terminal with large ceramic nails glued onto the ends of her fingers. She notices the two men approaching and pauses her work to greet them.
“Good morning, welcome to Syn-Co Operations, what can I do for you today?” she asks brightly.
“Morning, I’m Ackerman, here to see Miss Hanson,” Ackerman says with a cool demeanor. The secretary turns to her terminal and clicks through a few pages before her expression drops into slight concern.
“I’m sorry, it doesn’t appear that Miss Hanson has any appointments scheduled,” she begins to say. Just then Grimm steps out from behind Ackerman, his green lit visor scanning the office. The secretary becomes more reserved and cautious with her words at the sight of the armed marine. “May I ask the reason for your visit?” she finishes with hesitation. Ackerman struggles not to let his impatience get the better of him.
“Check the landing log of floor eighty,” he tells her. She pauses for a moment but then checks the log. Her eyes scan the screen as she reads then they go wide as she comes across the information that Ackerman knows will get results. Epsilon. Her eyes slowly move back up to meet his own.
“Miss Hanson’s office, please,” he says, offering a polite smile.
“Right this way, sir,” she says as she stands to lead them through the building. Ackerman and Grimm follow her down a path with cubicles on either side. The office workers don’t even dare glance off their monitors as they clack away at the various panels of charts and reports. Moments later they arrive at one of the many wall lined offices, the simple brass plaque on the door reads “HANSON."
“Thank you,” Ackerman says to the secretary. She wordlessly shrinks out of view and returns to her desk. Ackerman knocks on the door and waits for a moment until the woman inside opens it. She wears a navy blue blouse with a pair of black slacks and high heeled dress shoes. A square gemmed necklace hangs from her neck with matching earrings and her straight dirty blonde hair is done up in a messy bun that is held together by long hair pins which stick out of either side of the bundle.
“Hello,” she says slowly as she eyes Ackerman and Grimm. “Can I help you?”
“I sure hope so,” Ackerman starts. He steps into the room forcing Miss Hanson back into her own office. Grimm steps in after them and shuts the door behind him and stands at attention. The office is of moderate size, though it’s dominated by a large stained wooden desk. The warmth of the darkly stained wood stands in contrast to the flat grey of the office's concrete walls. The color of the place is washed out by sterile fluorescent light bars which stretch across the room's perimeter. Hanson eyes Grimm and the sidearm on his hip, then she looks back to Ackerman who is closing the blinds to her office windows giving them privacy from the rest of the office workers.
“What’s going on?" She asks incredulously. "Who are you?”
Ackerman spins around and takes a seat in the chair opposite her own. He sits there silently as she stands, not sure what she should do next. Ackerman then gestures to her chair and she slowly descends, her discomfort at the situation evident.
“I’m Ackerman, an operative of S.I.L.O.” Ackerman begins. This introduction causes Hanson to freeze halfway down into her seat, her mind racing at all the implications.
“How can I help you?” she asks as she slowly descends fully into her chair. Ackerman stares at her, sizing her up for himself. His optical implant is printing off all the information on her life that is accessible through S.I.L.O.’s database, everything from her birth to where she lives today. It’s all there at Ackerman’s fingertips. He reads as fast as he can making his assessment, then finally blinks the data printout off his vision and looks at the woman in front of him. Nina Hanson, she was raised well, had loving parents, a good education, your average every-day inner world city girl. She’s lived in Tanis her whole life and never once stepped out of line. The closest she got to rebelling is speaking out against Faction violence during her university years. A brief stint of pro-U.E.C. activism which earned her an appraisal notice from the university's board which she used to get into her first job post schooling. So, how did someone like her come across the signal, Ackerman wonders.
“Cleaner District, forty-third street, the old Syn-Co manufacturing factory that was abandoned seven years back. You know it?” Ackerman asks even though he already knows the answer. Hanson's fingerprints were all over the terminal in the factory which is what led him here in the first place.
“I-I know it,” Hanson begins. The look of concern grows across her face.
“So you know that I know that you’ve been doing some back-door listening, then,” Ackerman starts. “You know that I know that you’ve cast a two-tiered audio net across the CommNet monitoring for old radio-wave signals from the factory, probably hoping the abandoned facility wouldn’t cast suspicion on your office.”
“Yeah, so what if I have?” she asks, mustering an air of defiance. Ackerman is surprised at this, maybe she’s not as easy to roll over as her file suggests.
“Back-door scans of any variety are considered illegal in many systems, Miss Hanson,” Ackerman says, hoping the threat of jail time will loosen her lips a bit. Her defiance dissolves into distress nearly instantly.
“I was just listening-” she begins. Ackerman cuts her off with a hand wave.
“I don’t care, honest. The act of listening isn’t why a S.I.L.O. agent has darkened your door today, Miss Hanson,” Ackerman says. He watches her eyes, she remains fixated on the floor, her hands placed on her knees with her elbows tucked in. She finally glances up at him, his expression is resolute and unwavering.
“I’m more interested in what you listened to. Tell me about the signal you found,” he says with no hint of backing down. Her eyes dart over to Grimm, then go back to Ackerman.
“Who says I found a signal?” she asks.
“I do,” he replies.
“So, what? I find some strange radio waves and suddenly the government comes knocking? Seems like you know more about what I found than I do,” she says.
“Information and understanding aren’t synonymous, Miss Hanson.”
“What makes you think I understand what I heard?” she asks, beads of sweat are forming along her forehead.
“I don’t think you understand what you heard. But I know you understand what you felt,” he says conclusively. Hanson’s fingers curl in and she clenches her fists, her knuckles go white.
“What did I feel?” She asks with a sharpness in her voice. Ackerman is cornering her into the truth, she’s going to lash out. He can tell by her body language and general disdain for him, something her record doesn’t reflect. No, this woman before him is much different from the Miss Nina Hanson that he has on file. She’s definitely changed in some way and were he a betting man he’d put money on the catalyst for her change being that aberrant signal.
“You felt what they all felt. Joy. Peace. Safety. Then pain. Suffering. Unrelenting fear,” he lists off the things those who engaged the signal had described prior to death. Hanson’s expression drops into confusion and curiosity.
“They?” she asks simply.
“The others who listened to the same signal you did,” Ackerman explains, “They all heard it, just like you, then afterwards at one point or another, they all died.” Hanson’s face turns into one full of fear, Ackerman has her right where he wants her. His years of training under S.I.L.O. specialized in information gathering, part of which is emotionally priming your subject to being willing to share their secrets.
“How did they die?” Hanson asks with a wavering voice.
“One was shot after going postal in a hospital. Another gunned down by the U.E.C.M. in a similar scenario. The latest died via self-inflicted blunt force trauma to the head,” Ackerman describes their grizzly fate hoping that’s all that it’ll take to send her over the edge. If not he can always rely on S.I.L.O's tools of the trade, the lubricator specifically. Fortunately, it turns out he was right, Hanson leans forward onto her desk and drops her head into her hands, she’s shaking with anxiety. There is silence between them after which she speaks in a hushed whisper.
“I didn’t discover the signal on my own, I didn’t even want to listen to it, honestly,” she starts to explain.
“What do you mean?” Ackerman asks. She looks up towards Ackerman with a ragged expression.
“Outcast, he’s called Outcast. He’s a hitchhiker,” Hanson says. Ackerman drops his own head and sighs. Hitchhikers have been an issue for S.I.L.O. for some time. They connect into the CommNet and ride the signal between satellites catching data traffic for selling on the black market. Usually hitchhikers will engage in data-scraping, infrastructure manipulation, financial terrorism, and a whole host of other cyber crimes that give the citizens of the U.E.C. a real headache. Usually their crimes don’t lead to any actual physical harm, but they can cripple an entire planet's infrastructure through the CommNet all while being multiple systems away. This makes them especially difficult to catch, and of particular interest to S.I.L.O. Usually when a hitchhiker is found they’re recruited into S.I.L.O’s cyber division under threat of permanent incarceration or alternatively, mysterious disappearance. If this Outcast is one of them, and one that hasn’t been tagged yet by S.I.L.O, then this could prove to be a real problem for the investigation.
“Can you get a hold of this Outcast?” Ackerman asks.
“I can try, but there’s no guarantee that they’ll meet up or anything. I’ll log into the chatroom we’ve been using.” Hanson begins to type at her terminal and logs into a private chatroom. Ackerman steps up and moves behind the desk and watches as she uses the terminal. The chat log remains empty for some time.
“They might not be online,” she offers.
“They’re a hitchhiker. They’re always online,” Ackerman says. Just then the chatroom lights up and a small 3-D avatar appears on the screen. The avatar has an enlarged head and is wearing a hoody which veils their face in shadow, their eyes are two large glowing blue orbs which blink every now and again. Hanson clicks on a button shaped like a person and her own avatar appears on screen, hers also has an enlarged head and big bright yellow eyes with stars in them. She’s wearing a holographic skirt that sways when she walks. Ackerman raises an eyebrow at the characters; he never was very partial to digital gaming, so all this was foreign to him.
“That them?” he asks. Hanson nods in confirmation. Outcast’s avatar emotes talking and a little chat bubble appears over their head. In a column on the left hand side of the screen the chat text is printed out.
>> outCast : What's up Idol?
“Tell them you found the signal,” Ackerman says. Hanson types into her terminal the message, upon hitting enter her avatar emotes as well as the chat bubble appears and her text prints below Outcast’s.
>> xIdolCasterx : I found the signal, it was on that frequency, just as you thought it would be.
They sit in silence as they wait for Outcast to reply.
>> outCast : found it already? nice!
>> xIdolCasterx : So, what's next?
>> outCast : send it to me, i'll wire your payment once i DL the file.
“Ask them what they need it for,” Ackerman says. Hanson begins to type.
>> xIdolCasterx : What do you need this for?
There is a prolonged pause as they wait for Outcast to reply. Ackerman leans back and figures Outcast felt the question too forward, they likely won’t answer. Then their avatar emotes and another chat bubble appears.
>> outCast : $$$
Ackerman scowls. If Outcast has a buyer then that means that this wasn’t random, someone else is looking for this signal. How much do they know about it? He needs to talk to this buyer, but it’s not like this Outcast person will set up a meeting.
“Keep the conversation going, try and figure out who they’re selling to,” Ackerman tells Hanson, but she doesn’t type anything in and just sits at the terminal. There is another chime as Outcast’s avatar emotes and a new chat appears.
>> outCast : still there, Idol?
“Hanson, say type something back.” Ackerman says before placing his hand on Hanson’s shoulder. “Come on, ask him about the buyer. We need to know more,” he says, but still Hanson remains motionless.
Ackerman looks at her from behind, she isn’t moving but he can hear her breathing. He then looks over to Grimm who is standing at the door, Grimm looks at him through the visor then nods. Slowly he reaches to his side and unfastened his Mk2 Driver from its holster. There is a low growl that comes from Hanson causing both men to freeze and watch as she sits there sounding like a feral animal.
Suddenly Hanson stands from her chair forcing Ackerman back against the office wall. Grimm unholsters his pistol and takes aim at her. She begins to speak but her voice is gnarled and distorted, like it’s difficult for her to actually make sounds.
“It’s getting dark in here,” she says. Ackerman watches her in bewilderment, it’s then that he notices that she’s right. It is getting dark in here. The shadows in the corner of the room are deepening like a crawling darkness that is reaching out for them through hungry abyssal tendrils. It’s then that chaos erupts. Hanson bends backwards, her spine creaking then snapping as she bends and twists. Her arms reach back causing her shoulders to dislocate, then her knees push back beyond their reach until they are reversed. Every movement lets out a stomach turning crunch as her bones grind against each other.
“Get down, sir!” Grimm shouts at Ackerman as he keeps his pistol trained on Hanson. Ackerman doesn’t move though, he is captivated by the horror before him. Hanson’s reversed body takes a jarring step towards him. She leans back and places her hand on the wall over his shoulder lining her face up with his, her eyes are a pale white, and her breathing is strained. Ackerman smells the distinct pungent odor of sulfur coming from her mouth, he looks into her eyes and sees no sign of the woman’s spirit in them. Just milky white. Vacant. Pained. Her jaw goes slack and hangs open as a new sound emits from it, this one entirely not of this world.
“Let…me…in,” the voice lets out in a warped cacophony of voices. Just then Hanson's contorted body lunges towards Ackerman and she grabs him, her fingers curling backwards as they wrap around his neck. The two slam against the wall and slide down until Ackerman is on the floor with Hanson above him. Her mouth opens wider than the flesh will allow creating large tears at the corners of her lips that stretch across each cheek as she lets out a agonizing shrill so loud that his eardrums rupture.
Grimm positions himself to their side to take fire at the woman. He begins to shoot his Mk2 Driver, each shot of the weapon's massive .60 caliber rounds rings out a deafening roar and tears through Hanson’s body leaving bloody craters in the office's concrete wall beyond her. Despite being thoroughly perforated Hanson doesn’t stop moving, even as her guts threaten to spill out through the holes left by the Mk2 Driver.
Ackerman struggles to reach for anything to use against Hanson but finds nothing. Grimm then launches himself on top of the deformed woman and wraps his hand around what he approximates is her neck. He pulls and tightens his grip causing Hanson to loosen her grasp on Ackerman. Ackerman uses this opportunity to push himself up and position his legs just right to kick Hanson’s body back. Grimm and Hanson tumble back onto the desk. Upon landing Grimm loses his grip and separates. They both roll in opposite directions creating space between them. Ackerman stands and looks over the creature that was once Miss Hanson, office worker, now a distorted monstrosity of inhuman strength. Did listening to the signal do this to her? Ackerman wipes the question from his mind, he’ll have an opportunity to study her later, for now they need to eliminate her. Grimm slides a fresh clip into his pistol to this end.
At the click of the clip landing in place Hanson turns to Grimm and lets out a warbled snarl. Grimm takes aim and once again shoots Hanson, each shot puncturing her chest, then neck, then head. The final shot shattering her skull and exploding her brain out against the back wall. The body goes limp and falls to the floor. It’s then that Ackerman hears the alarm blaring through the building and the screams of people in the office running towards evacuation at the sounds of gunfire.
“Helluva mess,” he says. Grimm remains silent as he keeps his weapon trained on the deformed body. Ackerman looks at him and notices that Grimm’s expression doesn’t seem shaken, instead his face is covered in what looks like complete rage.
“Are you good?” Ackerman asks. Grimm finally breaks his gaze away from the body and looks to Ackerman, his expression softens slightly.
“I am. Are you injured, sir?” he asks. Ackerman pats himself down feeling for any breaks and happily finds none.
“Just a little shaken and bruised, I suppose. That’s not really something you see every day,” he says.
“You can say that again,” Grimm replies. The two stand there simply processing what just unfolded. Ackerman then lights up and returns to the desk, the terminal is still on but Outcast has logged out. There is a series of messages that he sent during the fight.
>> outCast : still there, Idol?
>> outCast : i can't stay, something’s not right.
>> outCast : Idol, if you're still there we need to talk
>> outCast : go to the 4th column, 400-499
>> outCast : stay alive
Ackerman rereads the final message, a small frown forming on his face. Grimm walks over and reads the messages over Ackerman’s shoulder.
“What’s the 4th column?” he asks. Ackerman simply shrugs and stands from the terminal.
“Not sure. We’ll look it up in the car. Until then, let’s get our story with the local authorities straight. We can’t have it getting out that a woman turned into some sort of monster then attacked two government agents, the public panic alone would last for months,” Ackerman goes on. The two men leave the office to find the rest of the floor has been vacated completely, likely everyone fled for safety once Grimm started sharing lead. They go to the elevator and ping it to come to them. Ackerman lets out a heavy sigh as they wait, this investigation seems to lead from one horrendous death to another. He needs to figure out just what exactly is this damn signal, and why it is affecting people the way that it is. He won’t rest until he finds the answers he needs.
-|-
The doors to the Command Deck Armory slide open and Cleo steps into the room. The lights snap on washing the space in fluorescent light revealing row after row of empty shelves, benches, weapon lockers, and ammo crates. Cleo’s shoulders slump as she worries that there may not be any weapons left for her to use. She begins searching the room rummaging through the containers silently praying that there remains at least one firearm she can use to defend herself. One container after the other they prove again and again to be empty save for a few spare shells that are scattered about. She reaches the other end of the armory and opens the final weapon locker, the rifle rack is empty and where the sidearms would be stowed is also vacant. She lets out an exasperated sigh at her rotten luck. Each weapon in the Command Deck Armory is assigned to a specific security personnel, all who responded to their respective combat stations when Captain Rickter first announced the attack on the ship. This room has likely been empty since then.
Cleo paces thinking over her next move, if she can’t find a weapon here then maybe there’s a general armory on a lower floor that still has weapons. The crew was ordered to evacuate so it’s not likely that anyone else other than Security and the U.E.C.M. Marines thought to arm themselves. Lost in thought she accidentally stubs her toe on a small crate on the ground causing her to yelp in surprise. She inhales sharply as she rubs where the pain is concentrated on her foot. In kneeling to rub her foot she glances at the crate she kicked and sees the words “Mk2 Driver” etched across the top. Her eyes widen as she dares to hope, maybe her luck hasn’t run dry just yet. She snatches up the case and sits on a nearby bench to unlatch and open it. Inside sits a well polished Mk2 Driver pistol. She’s only ever shot the Mk1 Clipper, a smaller caliber sidearm that most ship crewmembers are outfitted with upon contracting on a voyage. There is a world of difference between the Mk1 Clipper and the Mk2 Driver though, and Cleo knows it. The Clipper fires .45 Auto rounds which pack a good punch, but it’s nothing compared to the Mk2 Driver which fires a Heketes-2 exclusive caliber, the .60 3B. She’s never experienced the kick of the Driver before, so a test fire would be beneficial. She thinks back to the hulking figure that killed Captain Rickter and then decides against it. If she were to fire her weapon, who knows what kind of attention that would attract. She’ll just have to brace for the recoil in the moment, adapt and overcome, as they say. She then holsters the sidearm and takes the two spare magazines and places them into her back pockets.
She punches in her access code and the doors to the Armory slide open once more, she looks back at the empty room uncertain as to her next steps. This place may be the only room where she can be safe until help arrives. The doors lock from inside, and only the access code officers have can open them. She could go back to the Community Center and break into the vending machines there for food, then come back here and hole up until someone comes to take back the ship. Osiris did send the mayday message, so someone will intercept it and come to help them, right? She can’t help but feel a growing sense of hopelessness in her gut, like a tightening fist around her stomach.
The ship then lurches as an explosion growls throughout the corridor. Cleo is sent tumbling forward but she manages to stabilize herself. The lights on the Command Deck snap off and a complete blackness fills her vision which moments later is replaced by a dim pulsing yellow. These are the emergency lights for this section, power is offline now which means navigating through the Prophet will be even more challenging with locked doors between each section of the ship. She begins to make her way down the halls and corridors from which she came heading back to the Community Center. She’s nearing it when she hears heavy footsteps and the fist in her gut tightens even more. She halts in place and frantically looks around for somewhere to hide, but the hall is mostly empty of usable cover. She then spots a small bump-out in the wall just large enough for her to disappear behind and dashes towards it. She presses her back as flat as she can against the wall and desperately hopes that whatever is coming down the hall isn’t the thing that killed the Captain. The footsteps continue towards her, each one louder and heavier than the last. As quietly as she can manage she unholsters the Mk2 Driver pistol and clicks off the safety, she hears the pistol's internal heat storage hiss to life, it’s primed to fire. The footsteps get closer and closer, her heart rate is racing in her chest. Finally the steps are upon her. She jumps out from cover and aims the pistol at her target and fires a single shot center mass.
The kick of the Mk2 Driver catches her off guard causing the pistol to nearly fly out of her hand as her arms buckle and the tip of the pistol lifts into the air. She stumbles back and catches herself regaining her footing and brings the pistol back down with a firmer grip. It’s got massive firing power, but knowing what to expect she grips the pistol with confidence. She takes aim again but stops herself from shooting a second round. The thing in front of her isn’t the creature from before, but a man clad in black with four small glowing red optical spheres. She looks him up and down, his black camouflage uniform is covered by plates of dark matte grey armor. His head is entirely covered in a helmet with the four red sensors on the front, each one connected to screens inside the helmet. Slung over his shoulder is a Heketes PC12 sub-machine gun. She sees printed on his chest armor the word “BLITZ”, underneath which is the number 19 and a skull decal. The man is a Blitz Marine. Next to the skull is a smoking bullet dent where she shot him. She suddenly goes red with embarrassment and reflexively covers her face, not that her flushed cheeks can be seen in the darkness of the emergency lights. The Blitz Marine takes a step towards her.
“Ma’am, are you hurt?” he asks, his voice is filtered through the helmet but she can tell that he’s older, likely in his 50’s.
“N-no. I’m not hurt,” she replies. She glances again at the bullet pock she left on his armor. “Sorry for shooting you! I thought you were one of the-” she stops herself from saying anything else. What does she even call them? Has this Blitz Marine encountered them yet? Would he believe her if he hadn’t?
“Aliens,” he says flatly. She blinks surprised at him. “The word you were looking for is aliens,” he concludes.
“Have you seen them?” Cleo asks. He shakes his head ‘no’ in response.
“I need to keep moving, are there other survivors with you?” he asks.
“I’m the only one,” she replies, she then remembers Jace. “Well, there was a man, but we got separated a while back.”
“I have orders to secure the reactor. Do you know how I can get there?” the Blitz Marine says.
“Orders?” Cleo asks, “Has someone assumed command?” The Blitz Marine remains silent at her question. She feels like he’s looking through her with those four red scanners.
“S.I.L.O,” his tone is flat but the word sends a jolt through her nevertheless. She recalls the meeting she escorted Jace to before the attack. Those men were with S.I.L.O, they must still be alive and giving orders from somewhere safe on the ship. If they’re in command then they need to know about the mayday Osiris sent.
“Can you take me to them?” she asks.
“No,” he replies bluntly. Cleo stops at his answer.
“What do you mean? I need to inform them that we’ve sent a mayday.” she tries to explain. The Blitz Marine doesn’t seem swayed by her reasoning. “I’m with the ship's Command Crew, you know?” she says fighting to not let the indignity she feels show in her face.
“That’s not my mission,” he replies. “Come with me or don’t, I’m going to secure the reactor.” With that the Blitz Marine walks off leaving Cleo to sit in her shock. She clenches her fist, this guy is a pain, but he’s also a Blitz Marine, which is to say he’s not to be trifled with. She’s read all about their type, criminals, violence prone, some not even sane enough to fit in with normal society. S.I.L.O. recruits them by giving them one of two options, either (a) they go to a place called the Black Leer, a vault where S.I.L.O. locks up terrorists and criminals of all kinds, or (b) they agree to become a Blitz Marine, undergo extensive physical training, chemical augmentation, and receive state of the art cybernetic implants. Basically, Blitz Marines are the U.E.C.M’s greatest war asset on the field. They are dangerous in ways that Cleo doesn’t even fully understand, and that gives her reason enough to hesitate in going after him. All that being true, he’s likely her best chance at staying alive. The Blitz Marine nears a corner and is about to turn when she finally exhales in frustration and chases after him, she has no intention of dying here. She begins to keep pace with him as they walk through the corridors of the Prophet, the Blitz Marine glances over at her, then returns his gaze forward.
“You’re coming with?” he asks simply.
“Yes,” she says with conviction. “If I don’t then I’ll likely be killed, so I figured-”
“Coming with me is no picnic either,” he interrupts. She looks at him but his gaze remains fixed forward as they walk. “I’m heading to the reactor, there will be aliens there trying to sabotage it,” he goes on.
“They want to blow up the ship?” she asks.
“Seems like,” he says a little too casually for Cleo’s liking.
They walk a ways down the corridor in silence. Cleo’s mind is racing as she goes over all the things that have happened since the attack started. She thinks back to Jace again, wondering if he’s even still alive. Maybe he reunited with those S.I.L.O. agents. No, he’s ex-Faction, the man is more likely to avoid those agents than anything else. She wouldn’t be surprised if he even tried to help the aliens sabotage the reactor. That seems more in line with his type. She lets out an agitated “hmph” as they walk. Something ahead of them catches the Blitz Marine’s attention. He extends his arm out in front of Cleo stopping her in her tracks and startling her.
“What is it?” she asks. The Blitz Marine doesn’t say anything. She stands in wait as the thrumming of the emergency lights and the distant sounds of battle outside the ship fill her ears. She then hears the electric whirl of his optics adjusting in his helmet, his helmet's sensors must’ve picked up something that she can’t see.
The next thing she knows the Blitz Marine shoves her hard to the ground and shoulders his SMG. Bolts of green slice through the darkness where she was just standing from down the corridor and dart past with a glassy whistle. Cleo looks up to see the Blitz Marine squeeze his SMG’s trigger in response flooding the hallway with blue light from the gun's muzzle flash. The SMG unleashes a volley of .45 Shredder Expansion Jacket bullets, each one upon impact expands to twice their original size making them devastating against unarmored targets. The Blitz Marine lets out a pained growl as three bolts of green strike his armor leaving large sharp shards of what looks like green crystals embedded in the plates. He continues shooting and eventually needs to reload. He ejects the current magazine which falls to the ground with an empty clack and then slams a fresh one in place, smacks the bolt catch, then continues to open fire down the corridor. Cleo looks down towards where he’s shooting but doesn’t see anything herself. Then she spots where his bullets are landing as small flashes of light burst out where they’re ricocheting off their opponent. The light from the bullets ricochet illuminates the purple sheen of the aliens armor plating, the same hulk that killed the Captain. Cleo feels the tightening fist grip her chest once more. This thing snapped his neck with one hand and tossed him aside like a toy, what chance do they stand?
“Don’t underestimate me!” The Blitz Marine yells out, Cleo looks at him startled by his outburst. She can’t tell if he was yelling at the alien, or her. Finally the PC12 clicks empty again. He clicks his tongue in annoyance and takes a step back to evaluate his options. Cleo watches as the moments pass, more green darts shoot down the corridor past them, one nearly hits her but she recoils just in time to evade. She then feels the Mk2 Driver on her hip, she can’t believe that in the chaos of the moment she entirely forgot about it. She draws the pistol and looks it over, if she shoots will she even be of use in this fight?
“Draw its attention with that thing, I’ll close the gap.” The Blitz Marine says to her. She looks up surprised at his order. He’s looking back at her this time, then gives her a gentle nod and offers his hand. She grabs it and is lifted with ease by him back onto her feet.
“I’m not sure that I’ll be able to hit it from here,” she admits.
“That doesn’t matter, just shoot,” he replies and then immediately takes off at a sprinting pace down the corridor. Cleo collects herself then takes aim, she then takes a deep breath and feeling the weight of him relying on her then opens fire. Each shot sends the pistol's nose in the air forcing her to strengthen her grip and hold it steady. The Blitz Marine bolts down the hall keeping his shoulders low as the Mk2 Driver rounds fly over his head and ping off the walls, ceiling, and then the creature's armor. While they don’t penetrate their impact is enough to cause the thing to stagger back.
The dull yellow emergency lights aren’t enough to fully light up the alien, but through his scanners the Blitz Marine can see it clear as day. The thing is massive, with muscles like an pro-athlete body builder, it could easily crush him if it got ahold of him. Knowing this he’ll have to do his best to avoid being caught. More Mk2 Driver rounds fly past and ping off the aliens armor, it lets out a frustrated growl as it takes a step back and covers its face with its arm. Weakness. The Blitz Marine smiles deviously inside his helmet, if it’s protecting its head then just like humans that’s a weak point, an exploit point that he can take advantage of.
A final shot from Cleo’s pistol and the Blitz Marine can hear the exhaust port on the top of the gun flip up with a metallic clap as it vents the stored up heat from being fired. She’s empty. The final shot pings off the aliens armor and it takes another step back. The Blitz Marine closes the gap between them and draws from a sheath on the back of his belt an eight inch poly-steel bladed machete. He lunges forward and positions himself directly below the alien's chin, his machete in both hands. He sees the exploit point that he needs, an opening beneath the chin where the helmet doesn’t cover, plenty of space for his blade. With a single strong thrust he plunges the machete into the alien’s head from the opening beneath the helmet, its arms go limp and it lets out a wet gurgle as luminescent orange blood spills out the wound and covers the Blitz Marine’s entire front. The alien’s corpse collapses in a heap of dead weight and a pool of orange glow forms where the wound in its neck is.
Cleo watches from a distance in awe of what she just saw, she knew that Blitz Marine’s were fast, but she wasn’t expecting that level of lethality, especially against that creature. She collects herself then ejects the magazine from the Mk2 Driver and slides one of her two spares in its place and closes the vent cover readying the sidearm to be fired again. As she approaches the Blitz Marine and the dead alien he pulls the machete out of its head and wipes off the blood before returning it to its sheath.
“That was incredible,” she says. The Blitz Marine nudges the alien corpse with his foot, she swears she can hear him let out a snicker beneath that helmet of his.
“I’m out of ammo. Is there an Armory between here and the reactor?” he asks.
“There should be one Mid Deck somewhere, but I don’t know its exact location. I came from the Command Wing Armory myself.”
“Any ammo left there?”
“I was lucky to have found this and some spare magazines,” she replies while gesturing to the Mk2 Driver. The Blitz Marine looks off down the corridor and sighs.
“Understood,” he begins to walk forward spurring Cleo to follow after him. “I’ll just have to improvise then.”
The two of them walk through the corridors of the Command Wing until they reach a stairwell that goes down to the decks below. The reactor is below Mid Deck, on Sub Deck 3. From where they are, that’s twelve flights of stairs down. Normally that would just be a brief elevator ride, but with the power being out they have no choice but to take the stairs. They begin their descent and Cleo watches the Blitz Marine as they move. He’s tall, wide shouldered, and intimidating. The glow of the alien's blood remains making the Blitz Marine incredibly easy to spot in the otherwise dark stairwell. She knows that Blitz Marine’s have a history that would make any citizen of the U.E.C. uneasy, they tend to be the worst of the worst. That’s what surprises Cleo about him, despite what she’s read, this man doesn’t make her feel uneasy.
“You’re staring,” he says suddenly. Cleo is startled at him noticing, he must have felt her looking at him for too long.
“Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude. You’re the first Blitz Marine I’ve ever seen,” she explains.
“Must be strange, given what you’ve likely read.”
“Is it rude to ask?” her mind instantly imagines all the things this man could have been convicted of prior to recruitment. She looks away immediately regretting having asked and then braces to hear the worst. Her gaze is brought back to the Blitz Marine when she hears him let out a quiet laugh.
“It’s honestly not that extraordinary,” he says quietly. “I was simply left behind.” She watches him as they continue their descent. The man somehow seems more distant now, her question must’ve brought back some difficult memories for him. After a moment she can swear she hears him mutter something in addition, something meant for himself.
“I’m going back.”
Cleo blinks, bewildered by why he would say that. The remainder of the descent is uneventful, they finally reach Sub Deck 3, the reactor is on this level of the ship. The Blitz Marine punches in an access code and the door to the Sub Deck opens revealing a brightly lit corridor. Cleo recalls how the ship's emergency systems prioritize the ship's functions by default. Without the bridge crew manually redirecting power it’s all been siphoned to this level where the ships primary functions are, things like the reactor, engine conduits, and other vital systems to the ships ability to fly. She’s glad to be back in the light, the darkness felt thick and difficult to breathe in. The Blitz Marine walks up to a wall panel with a map of this level on it. He scans it, finding the location of the reactor room.
“The reactor is on the other end of the ship, four hundred meters to the back,” he says while turning to face the corridors they’re going to have to navigate.
“How many aliens do you think are between us at the reactor?” Cleo asks. The Blitz Marine pauses before his answer.
“Not enough,” with that he begins to walk forward and Cleo follows after, a look of disbelief on her face.
:: S.C.S Prophet - Mid Deck C ::
:: En Route to Julio-Ceti, Under Attack ::
:: January 17th, 2955 - 1535 Hours UT ::
Jace continues through the halls of the Prophet, the sounds of battle outside the ship rage on causing him to wonder just what is happening out there. When he was a part of the Faction they didn’t have a real naval presence, just some Dagger dropships that let them perform field ops and transportation. This felt different, the fighting outside is fierce, the explosions and gunfire unrelenting. Unless the Faction has seriously stepped up their game he’s not sure they’re the ones out there fighting. Maybe another rebellion group has formed out here in the fringes of the U.E.C, bitter against the control the central planets have on the distant worlds that make up the outer rim. He wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case, humanity has a long history of warring against itself out here in the dark vastness of space. The outer rim specifically makes up the frontier of human exploration. These worlds are far apart from one another, the furthest one out being just under one hundred light years from Earth II, that being the planet Hycea, a world mostly composed of liquid methane and a barely breathable atmosphere. The colonists that live there require breathing apparatus to remain outside on the surface and spend most of their time living inside floating cities that are connected via magnetic bridges.
Another tremble from an explosion causes Jace to stumble forwards bringing his mind back to the present. He catches himself on the wall then continues forward, he’s got to find a way off this ship. A moment later he passes a graphic on the wall, a map that highlights points of interest in this part of the ship. Mid Deck C really only has escape bays, all of which so far have been empty or destroyed. Beyond that there are some residential quarters for some crew as well as storage facilities and maintenance access as well. The map shows that there are five Sub Decks below the Mid Deck section of the ship, and among those Sub Decks is another set of escape bays. Being on the belly of this ship Jace hopes that they haven’t been hit by any attacks from outside. Usually the bottom of a ship isn’t targeted as they tend to have thicker hulls as well as fewer vital systems in that area. It’s his best chance at getting off this boat, so Sub Deck 5 is his new objective.
With newfound purpose Jace begins walking confidently down the halls of Mid Deck C, it’s not long before he arrives at a stairwell and begins his descent into the Sub Decks. After multiple flights of stairs he comes across Sub Deck 1, he feels his steps lighten one after another as the hope of escaping fills his head. All he needs to do is reach one of those escape pods and this whole nightmare will be over, he’s sure of it. He descends past Sub Deck 2 and Sub Deck 3 when his hope stalls out. The stairwell to Sub Deck 4 and 5 has been crushed in by debris, most likely damage from an explosion. Jace scowls in frustration, must everything be in his way. He looks over the debris, it’s packed in tight and fills the entire stairwell, there’s no way he could move it or clear a path through in time. He sighs in resignation knowing that he’ll have to find another stairwell to Sub Deck 5 where the final escape bay is.
Jace steps out of the stairwell onto Sub Deck 3, the light in the halls causes him to lift his hand over his eyes to protect them from the light while they adjust to the new brightness of his surroundings. He hears a strange scrapping sound, then what sounds like a wet guttural growl. He lowers his hands to see three creatures standing before him, each one roughly five and a half to six feet tall. Their skin is a sickly yellow and they’re wearing oddly shaped blue armor. They each carry strange guns that look like they’re made from a combination of metal and flesh. On their backs is a back pack of some kind with tendrils that extend into the air and a fleshy bag that dangles from behind with a sloshing liquid inside. They look at Jace with hollow milky eyes and one tilts its head and makes a questioning sound. Jace remains frozen in place, all his motor control has gone as his mind is flooded with one question. What the hell?!
The creatures let out a shriek then lunge at Jace, they all topple over as one grabs his left arm, the other his right, and the third tries to grab him by the head. He struggles against them but together they’re far stronger than he is. A moment later they have him pinned to the ground and one draws from its belt its gun, a pistol with what looks like a gas canister attached to the grip. It presses the barrel of the gun hard against Jace’s forehead and it begins to let a series of shrieking gibberish. It’s asking him something, he can tell that much despite the panic, but he can’t understand a thing it's saying. Then the creature slams the base of the pistol grip, canister and all, into Jace’s gut causing him to curl up in pain. The other two creatures keep him pinned down and prevent him from moving further.
“I don’t know anything! I just got here!” Jace says over and over again in a panic. As he does the creature hits him again and again. Jace can taste the metallic tinge of blood in his mouth as pain shoots through his entire torso, at this rate they may very well beat him to death. Then another sound fills the hall, a deep bellow which he can feel reverberate in his ribs. The three creatures burst into motion and frantically let go of him as they scramble away. He looks up and down the hall from where the sound came from and is frozen with shock at what he sees. Another creature, this one towering some eight feet tall, green skin and purple pearlescent armor. It wears a helmet with red eyes that gaze at him, piercing his heart with menacing intent.
The creature lets out another low growl and some more words in a language he can’t begin to make sense of. The other three smaller creatures seem to understand it just fine as they squeak in compliance and begin to lift Jace up onto his feet. The towering figure approaches him then curls its fingers around his head, Jace feels his body being lifted as all his weight strains against his neck and head causing agony to rocket through his body again. The creature brings him close to its face and it sniffs him, then growls in discontent, or at least that’s what Jace assumes that sound means. It then drops him and Jace collapses onto the ground at the creature's feet coughing and retching for air as he rubs his neck trying to soothe the pain there.
The tall creature points to the smaller three, barks some command, then points to Jace and barks some more gibberish. The three creatures again make a sound that Jace assumes is compliance. They then approach him and the central one hurls a nasty sucker punch right at Jace's head causing his skull to snap back and his nose begins to instantly bleed, he lets out an anguished groan. These bastards really like to hit things. The two side creatures then scoop Jace up, and drag him along with one holding him up from either side. They all four begin to follow the taller creature as they move through the corridors of Sub Deck 3.
Jace tries his best to remain calm but his heart pounds in his chest. His eyes are wide and darting back and forth in a desperate attempt to find any way to escape, or any tool to use to those ends. The creatures drag him further into the ship until eventually they pass through yet another doorway into a larger room with a vaulted ceiling. The walls of the room are covered in pipes and wires that seem to come in from every angle and connect to a single central column that dominates the middle of the room. The column itself features four separate tubes, each one with little windows to their insides where a pulsing cyan beam of energy can be seen thrumming with life. Jace looks around the room until he spots a sign on the wall, printed at the top in bold letters is the word “REACTOR,” and below which in smaller print “In Case Of Emergency.” He wonders why they brought him here, why not just kill him outright? He looks at where they’re taking him which is right up to the central column where a terminal station is positioned. There is another smaller yellow skinned creature at the terminal pressing buttons and getting visibly agitated, it smacks the side of the terminal with a viscous snarl. The two creatures holding Jace stop in their tracks while the taller green skinned one approaches the terminal. The creature that was hitting it winces as the taller creature approaches then scurries away. There’s clearly a power hierarchy between them, the smaller yellow ones are the foot soldiers, the grunts of the pack. The taller one is a leader, more likely out of fear than respect.
The lumbering figure turns to Jace and gestures for the creatures holding him to bring him forward, they comply immediately and place Jace at the terminal in the middle of the room. He looks it over and at a glance notes that it’s the reactor's main control terminal. He looks up at the towering green creature. It growls at him then grabs his arm and slams it against the terminal's face causing Jace to yell in pain.
“Alright, alright!” he shouts at the thing. It snorts at him in response then garbles out more impossible to understand gibberish. Jace scowls at the beast then faces the terminal, they clearly want him to operate it but he’s not even sure that he’ll be able to get past the login page. He begins to type opening up the login screen, the screen indicates that the entire terminal is in an emergency mode and requires either a personnel identification bar or a five digit personal identification number to unlock the device. Jace stalls out, he doesn’t know any of the ship's PINs, he wasn’t even able to report to his senior officer to officially start duty aboard the Prophet, so he doesn’t have an ID bar either. He scans the room around him, sweat forming on his brow. If they figure out he’s useless they’ll likely just kill him. Just then Jace spots a dead body lying in the middle of the room, two of the yellow skinned creatures are picking at it and pulling on its limbs. They flip it onto its side revealing the back of the uniform where the word “Foreman” is stenciled onto the fabric. Jace seems a glimmer of hope, the Foreman might have an ID on him. He looks to the green monster and it lowers its head towards him with another growl. Jace points to the body, the creature follows his hand and spots the corpse as well.
“I need that,” he says, not even vaguely sure if the creature can understand him. It looks back to him when he speaks with a snort.
“I need the body,” he goes on. The thing says something in gibberish then shoves Jace by the shoulders to face the terminal again. Jace winces in pain as his torso is sore from the beating they gave him earlier. He then faces the green behemoth again and points at the Foreman’s body once more.
“I need that,” Jace repeats, trying his best to sound forceful. He doubts it has any effect on the thing standing before him. The creature snarls at Jace then turns to the two smaller creatures picking at the corpse. It yells something at them in their language, the two creatures respond then begin to drag the body over to them. Jace allows himself a small sigh of relief, maybe his chances of survival aren’t entirely run out. They drop the body at his feet and Jace goes to kneel at it but catches himself. He looks to the creatures which are watching him intently with their glowing eyes. He then slowly lowers himself to kneel next to the Foreman without breaking his gaze from the creatures. After a moment he concludes that they won’t interfere and he begins to search the Foreman’s pockets for a dataslate, or a note, or anything the code may be written on. He checks one pocket after another and there’s no code causing anxiety to build inside his chest. He gets to the last pocket and pauses, if there’s nothing in there then they’ll likely kill him. He has to figure something out. He reaches into the pocket and feels around for anything the code may be on. His heart skips a beat as his fingers graze something inside the pocket. He gets a firmer grip on it then removes the object from the pocket, sure enough, it’s the Foreman’s data slate. Jace taps the “on” button on the side and the screen lights up, the Foreman was logged in, his ID bar is active. Jace feels his entire body lose just a little bit of tension, his luck sure is doing some heavy lifting today. If he makes it out of this he’ll have to dedicate his life to helping the poor or donating to charity to make up for all the karma he’s spending.
Jace swipes the ID bar against the reactor terminal and it pings in confirmation. The screen opens up giving Jace access to all of the reactor's core functions. The lumbering green creature stoops down towards Jace, he can feel its hot breath. It's so close now. The thing then speaks in a wet guttural tone.
“Explode,” it says in English. Jace blinks in surprise and looks directly at the creature. It gives him a small nod. “Explode,” it repeats. They want him to make the reactor blow up, but why? Why attack the ship just to board it and blow it up? His hands automatically move to the terminal, he doesn’t intend to sabotage the reactor but he needs to buy time until he figures out what to do.
Just then a set of doors against the opposite wall slide open with a hiss and into the reactor core walks two new bodies. Jace looks over at them and spots a man in black armor with four glowing red opticals, and next to him is the woman from before, Cleo Hathaway. The two scan the room observing all the aliens within, then Cleo spots Jace. Her eyes go wide and her mouth drops in disbelief, then her face bends into utter disgust and she throws her hand up and points directly at him.
“I knew it! You bastard!” she yells.
“Huh?” Jace responds with a tilt of his head.
“You! You’re helping them sabotage the ship!” she accuses loudly. Jace looks at his position, standing next to the dead Foreman, aliens at his back, and the reactor terminal at his front.
“Well sure, this looks bad, but that’s not what’s happening at all!” he shouts back at her completely forgetting the aliens at his back. Suddenly the hulking green creature bellows out a battle cry and forces itself past Jace knocking him to the ground.
“Move!” the Blitz Marine shouts at Cleo. She bolts to the side and ducks behind some crates just in time for globs of acid to land where she was standing. Jace looks towards where the acid globs came from and sees the yellow skinned creatures shooting at her. He then looks over to the man in black, the Blitz Marine, and spots him taking cover as the hulking green figure unleashes a hail of gunfire at him as well. Cleo shoots one of the yellow skinned creatures with her Mk 2 Driver in the chest, the thing collapses backwards as the .60 caliber round tears through its chest sending thick bright blue blood across the floor, unlike the larger aliens these smaller ones don’t have nearly as much protection. When it falls the creature drops its gun which clacks across the floor and lands near Jace. He scrambles over to it and picks up the alien pistol, it fits awkwardly in his hands but its design isn’t so dissimilar to human weapons that Jace can’t make heads or tails of it. He grips the pistol tightly and takes aim at the other yellow skinned creatures, specifically the one that was punching him in the torso earlier. The thing looks at him and lets out a worried squelch as Jace squeezes the trigger and sends an acid glob straight at its head. The shot lands perfectly on its face and it recoils in a shrieking fit of agony as it flails desperately trying to wipe the acid off. Moments later it lies dead, the helmet it wears now fused with its skull from the acid melting them together.
Cleo shoots another of the aliens, sending it toppling over in a pool of blue blood, then turns to face another but is clipped in the arm by a passing acid shot. She cries out in pain and falls over grabbing at her arm, the shot only grazed her but the heat of the acid was enough to cause third degree burns on her arm. The yellow alien awkwardly shuffles over to her then says something in its alien gibberish and lets out what she assumes is a laugh. It aims its pistol at her in that moment she feels the dread of death grip her. Then there is a splatter of acid against the aliens back and it begins to writhe about shrieking in agony as it reaches for its back. It falls over and Cleo can see the bladder that was on its back was shot out causing it to burst and spilling the fluid within all over the floor. She looks up and sees Jace aiming at the alien, he nods at her then ducks behind cover as more acid shots fly towards him. Cleo clambers to her knees then ducks behind cover as well, she looks at her arm, the burn there is intense and agonizing, but she has no way of treating it right now.
On the other side of the reactor chamber the Blitz Marine is trying to close the gap between himself and the larger green alien, wielding a different weapon than the others, this one firing from a bladder on top of the gun large projectiles of hardened bile. The Blitz Marine ducks and weaves past the shots as they fly towards him causing the hulking green alien to take multiple steps back as it tries to land a shot. It then lets out a frustrated roar and scoops up a crate from the ground and hurls it at the Blitz Marine. With a deft jump he's on top of the crate mid air and uses it as a springboard to launch himself closer to the green alien. It tries to shoot him mid air but his aim lags behind the Blitz Marine’s movement just enough to miss every shot. The Blitz Marine then lunges forward and draws his machete from its sheath and slashes at the aliens mid section. The blade bounces off of its armor and the creature stumbles back, regains its footing, then takes aim and unleashes another volley of fire. The hardened bile projectiles strafe across the Blitz Marine forcing him to take cover as a few hits land on his chest and arm. His armor protects him from any serious damage but he’s been pushed back into cover again.
Jace steps out and gets behind the larger green alien and opens fire with the acid pistol that he picked up. Each blob of acid hits the green creature searing its flesh and warping the armor. It turns to face him and shoots at him. One of the projectiles hits Jace square in the chest sending him flying back and tumbling across the ground. He lands in a heap and doesn’t move. Cleo sees Jace collapse and then exits her cover as well moving across the room trying to stay out of sight. The larger green alien moves in on the Blitz Marine, it says something in its alien dialect and then makes a spitting sound. A moment later it’s upon the crate that the Blitz Marine hides behind, it rips the crate away with its free hand aims its bile rifle with the other but the Blitz Marine isn’t there. It lets out a confused sound then looks up just in time to see the Blitz Marine falls upon the alien from above where he was clinging to a pipe, a temporary high ground he obtained while Jace distracted the alien.
When he falls upon the alien the Blitz Marine plunges his machete into its chest, piercing through the thick purple armor, and causing the hulking creature to stumble backwards. It lets out a garbled agonized cry as it tries to remain standing. In its flailing it squeezes the trigger of its weapon sending bile projectiles across the reactor core chamber. Each shot flies in wildly different directions, a few of which hit the reactor core columns puncturing the energy shielding causing cyan energy to vent into the room and dissipate. Multiple spinning red emergency lights flash on and a female automated voice message begins to play across the whole ship.
“Emergency. Critical systems failure detected. Immediate Evacuation required,” this message is repeated over and over again over the blaring alarms. The Blitz Marine stands over the alien and removes his machete from its chest causing a squirt of orange to spew out and pool around the corpse. The Prophet begins to violently tremble in sporadic fits of destabilization. Cleo runs over to the Blitz Marine and holsters her sidearm.
“The reactor, it’s been damaged. This is bad!” she says in a panic. The Blitz Marine doesn’t seem to react at all to their new dire circumstances.
“Is he alive?” the Blitz Marine asks, gesturing towards Jace. Cleo looks at him and scowls.
“Not if he’s lucky,” she mutters to herself. The two approach Jace and Cleo rolls him over onto his back. His chest has a bloody wound on it where the projectile hit him. She presses her fingers against his windpipe trying to feel for a pulse. She looks up at the Blitz Marine and nods.
“He’s not lucky,” she says. With that the Blitz Marine scoops Jace up and tosses him over his shoulder. Cleo watches in confusion as the Blitz Marine goes to leave the room.
“Hey?! What’s the plan here?” she asks loudly.
“Sub Deck 5,” the Blitz Marine replies. “There’s an escape bay there.”
“That’s where you came from, right?” Cleo asks. “That’s where those S.I.L.O. guys are holed up, isn’t it? They have a way off this ship?” she asks in a barrage of questions.
“Yea, that’s right,” he answers.
The two of them quickly leave the reactor core, its alarms still blaring loudly across the whole ship. Jace sits unconscious on the Blitz Marine’s shoulders as they go. The ship continues to tremble and quake causing Cleo to lose her footing every now and again. The Blitz Marine, however, despite having Jace on his shoulder doesn’t lose his footing even once. They go down one corridor, then another and another until they reach one of the outer halls on the ship's lower decks. There is an observation window looking out into the vastness of space that catches Cleo’s attention.
“Wait!” she calls out to the Blitz Marine causing him to stop and look back at her. She approaches the window and gazes through it with wide eyes. The Blitz Marine approaches and then looks out the window with her. Against the dark tapestry of space is the glittering debris of metal and glass from the shattered apart Dagger dropships and Falchion fighter jets that the U.E.C.M. deployed at the start of the attack. Cleo stifles a sigh of despair at the sight of them all. They didn’t stand a chance.
“Look,” the Blitz Marine says. Cleo looks out towards the front of the ship and spots in the distance a growing glow. Moments later the spherical bend of an atmosphere followed by the surface of a planet crests into view in the window.
“Julio-Ceti,” Cleo says with a gasp.
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