PERSONAL RECORD: DESIGNATION ZETA4542910-9545E
PALLAS STATION
478.2.6.03
When the vestibule door finally opened, Kyleigh and I rushed out into the deserted corridor, she to the right and I to the left. Air burned my lungs as I ran, and by the time I reached the storage room, a stabbing cramp in my side made opening the door even more difficult. It unlocked, and the drone hovered where I had left it, still tethered to the wall by its charging cables.
>>Power level, 37%.
For three seconds, I stared at the words, but the image that played before me was the drone in the hall, its tentacles squeezing—
No. I pushed away the memory and pulled the drone free. “Come. I must reach the shuttle before it leaves.”
It complied, keeping even with me as I dashed down the hall. When I reached the barricade, a single marine stood at attention.
“Recorder?” she exclaimed, her eyes darting from me to the drone to my helmetless head.
“Let me pass.”
She centered her weight. “Can’t do that.”
“I must get to the hangar before the shuttle departs.”
“Not without armed escort you don’t. Besides, the shuttle will be leaving any minute now.”
The skin on my neck prickled. Captain Archimedes Genet needed to be informed about the probable corruption of our communications system. If this woman would not let me pass, she left me but one choice. Refusing to allow fear of past actions to influence my present ones, I sidestepped to enter commands directly into the drone.
Her voice tensed. “Move away from that thing!”
Its appendages unspooled.
“Deactivate the lasers,” I countered while I finished entering commands. “I do not have time for your games.”
“This isn’t—” She broke off as the drone reached toward her. “Stars, Recorder. You going to kill me, too?”
My mouth went as dry as Pallas’s surface, but I straightened my shoulders. “Lower the barricade.”
She held her ground. “Orders—”
The drone wrenched the rifle from her hands, and its attached tether yanked her off her feet. While the drone kept her away from her weapon, several tentacles connected with the access panel. The barricade vanished.
Unleashing a flurry of imprecations, the marine fumbled with the tether. She broke free and pulled out her sidearm, aiming it at me, but before her action fully registered in my mind, my drone intervened, all tendrils and tentacles splayed. Panic rose as appendages twined about her neck and captured her wrist.
“No!” My cry echoed back at me. “Drop it! You must drop the weapon.” I backed into the corridor. “Please.”
Her sidearm clattered to the concrete floor, and she cursed.
“Do not use your communications link. Do not notify Jackson. Doing so is unsafe,” I warned, then addressed the drone, “Come.”
My footfalls and labored breath muffled all other sounds as I ran, the drone at my side. When we rounded a corner, however, it raced in front of me, but I dared not waste precious seconds to read its message.
“Later.”
In answer, the drone grabbed me in all four arms, hauling me from my feet. Ignoring my winded protest, it accelerated and turned corners with a precision that did not alleviate my fears. The bland hallways became a grey blur and the emergency floor lights a searing blue streak. Air whipped past, and my short hair lashed my face. I pulled one arm free and covered my eyes with my elbow.
Someone shouted, and the drone slowed. I cautiously lowered my arm and craned my head. The open door to the hangar loomed, and two figures in marine blue aimed rifles in my direction.
I gulped down air and called, “The shuttle—has it left?”
A tall figure strode between them. “Recorder, get back to quarantine.”
“Jackson?” I asked. “You are not in the control room?”
“Obviously.” Behind his helmet’s faceplate, Jackson’s steely grey eyes became slits. “That thing brought you here. It can take you back. Now.”
“Release me,” I said to the drone, but it did not comply. Instead, the arms tightened, making it difficult to breathe, but I managed, “Jackson, has the shuttle left?”
“Not your concern.” His words ground over each other like rocks. “I don’t know what stunt you’re pulling, but if you don’t want to be locked in that storage closet with the rest of those things, you get that monstrosity out of here.”
“Jackson, you do not understand. Communications have been—”
“You threatened my people.” He tapped his link and said something inaudible before tapping it again. The marines behind him shifted in front of the hangar’s laser barricade.
The barricade . . .
“That marine.” I gasped as my mind belatedly caught up with the situation. “She notified you.”
“Spacing right she did.”
My hands fisted. “I warned her! Communications are being monitored.”
One of the marines scoffed, but Jackson stilled. “How?”
“The suits,” I said. Surely, he heard the desperation in my voice? “The stolen suits must be how they knew where we were, that we were retrieving the equipment. Why you did not receive Jordan’s call for backup.”
He spat out an uncouth epithet. “Should have opened with that.”
“Stars,” one of the marines breathed.
“I was to warn the shuttle and thus Thalassa. Kyleigh ran for the control room to tell you—”
A short pattern of sound—perhaps an alarm or a signal—blared down the halls.
“Looks like Tristram made it. The shuttle had to have heard that. They’ll know not to trust comms.” Jackson strode toward me. “No need for you to come this way, especially without escort or helmet. Don’t think we won’t address that later.”
“Set me down,” I repeated.
The drone finally complied, and my knees hit the floor. I gracelessly forced myself to unsteady feet, but it twined a tendril around my waist, rotating me away from the marine and rising until its screen was directly in front of me.
>>Located Consortium suit.
I blinked. “What does that mean?”
“It means once we’re secure, we’ll discuss how your reckless behavior endangers my people and yourself,” Jackson said.
>>Located stolen Consortium suit belonging to Elder Eta4513110-0197E.
A chill swept over me. “Where?”
>>Ventilation ductwork and fissure twenty meters southeast.
Which way was southeast? Every nerve tingling, I spun to face the hall, studying the ductwork as if I would be able to see through the metal.
“In the quarantine room where you belong,” Jackson said behind me. “I’ll get you an escort—”
“Alone? Or with others?” I fumbled for the damaged datapad on my thigh.
>>Two biosignatures from previous encounter. Two unknown.
“Yes, others,” Jackson said. “I can’t take you myself.”
“I did not say you would, Jackson,” I told him, my focus shifting from the datapad to the ductwork and back. Not wanting to risk input on the damaged screen, I asked aloud, “Can they hear us?”
>>All communications monitored, flickered across the pitted surface.
“Yes, we can all hear you.” Jackson said more slowly.
“She’s lost it,” one of the other marines hissed. “Want us to take her straight to Maxwell?”
I backed against the drone, its familiar surface an uneasy comfort. “Then they know?”
>>Uncertain.
“Recorder,” Jackson began.
The drone shifted behind me and twined two tentacles around my waist and neck.
Jackson grunted, and something thudded to the floor.
“Recorder!” someone barked, and another voice shouted, “Call it off!”
I spun in the drone’s grasp.
Jackson was on his knees beside me, shaking and gasping, a tendril wrapped around his throat.
Dropping the datapad, I rushed to Jackson’s side and tugged on the drone’s appendage. “Release him!”
The tendril whipped loose but did not spool back inside. Jackson did not raise his head. All other thoughts dimmed, and I tried to brace his weight.
“Stars, he was trying to help you, Recorder,” the second marine said. “No reason to try to kill him.”
“Jackson,” I urged, “you must breathe through it. The pain will subside.” I glared at the drone. “He would not have harmed me.”
The drone pulsed red.
“There is no excuse,” I continued as if the flash of light had been an apology, though a drone did not have that capacity. “Unless directed, drones are not to harm citizens save in protection of members of the Consortium.” I lifted Jackson’s head—his helmet seemed heavy indeed—and studied his unnaturally grey face. “Can you stand?”
He nodded once and shoved off the floor, using my shoulder as a prop.
The drone’s red deepened, and one thin tendril handed me the green datapad. A new crack spread across the lower left-hand corner, but its response was clear.
>>Protection.
“Protection from these marines is unnecessary. They are my—” I stopped myself before the word friends emerged. “Allies. They are allies, here to assist in tracing the virus, which threatens the Consortium. They mean me—us—no harm.”
>>Delaying access to shuttle.
“Without malicious intent.”
>>Unsafe. Leave Pallas. Others closer. Safety on shuttle away from terrorists.
Which way was southeast? “Where are they? Is their intent confirmed?”
>>Monitoring channel.
“Void it, Recorder,” Jackson growled through gritted teeth. “You’ve been talking to it? Those terrorists are coming?”
The first marine whistled. “That’s what she meant by others listening.”
Before I could respond, the drone issued a low buzz of static, then a muted conversation played under the noise.
“. . . armor holds up pretty well. Didn’t take down that big guy in the hall first time.”
“She has a drone again,” a woman said. “But the grunt at the gate reported that she doesn’t have a helmet.”
A dull chuckle made my flesh crawl.
“Her head’s the target,” Skip’s voice declared. “One clean shot, and we’re good.”
“Serves her right after what she did to Cord. And we don’t need the murderer anyway. Ross just needs a few cc’s.”
The hallway seemed to spin. Jackson touched my shoulder, and the drone sent a short reprimand, snapping me upright. Jackson cursed. He released me and shook out his hand.
“. . . don’t want the sample polluted. I still say we grab her instead.”
“Right, but we should be able to get enough,” a different man said. “The drone’s the problem. Can’t have it going rogue and taking out our people. Let them deal with it. We do this right, and we’ll have what we need.”
“Fair enough. Linda, fall back,” Skip ordered. “Risking a fight with that many grunts is stupid.”
“Don’t know which way they’ll take her back.”
A resounding boom emanated from the hangar as the seal on the doors unlocked.
“She won’t be out without a helmet again. Can’t miss the chance. We’ll have to split up.”
“Shuttle’s leaving,” said the second marine.
Jackson nodded. “That’s our safest bet.”
Both the eavesdropped dialogue and the static disappeared.
The first marine pounded a code into the panel, and the barricade flickered off.
“Drone,” Jackson ordered, “get her out of here.”
Though it should not have responded to a citizen, the drone grabbed me around the waist and towed me into the hangar, its speed increasing with every meter. I glanced back. Jackson and the marines shrank, then disappeared as the drone raced around the second shuttle. Shouts echoed, but the cavern and the growing rumble of the shuttle’s engines swallowed the sounds.
The drone stopped so suddenly that I slammed into it, and a blast of cold air slapped my bare cheeks and burned my eyes. To my right, the hangar doors crept open, and beyond them, I caught the faintest glimpse of stars. The drone lifted me through an opening hatch. A tendril shot out to a control panel, and my ears popped as the hatch shut.
Noises swirled and blurred. Nate’s tenor broke through insistent and emphatic conversation, and I latched onto it.
Whether the drone dropped me or the floor rose to meet me, I landed on my hands and knees, and the engines’ growl rumbled through the antistatic flooring. My stomach lurched in time with the small craft. The drone withdrew to the single Consortium alcove, anchored itself, and shut off external sensors to charge more efficiently.
Voices raised in protest as hands lifted me, then secured me in a safety harness in the seat across from two hover gurneys. The one closest held Alec. Though still in his suit, an extra canister of oxygen fed directly to the small filtration unit, and a monitor beeped steadily at his head. The second gurney bore a large black bag, sealed with biohazard tape.
Skip, not I, had destroyed the equipment needed to save Lytwin. So why did my conscience nag me?
I leaned against the headrest while Nate settled on my left and Lars on my right. The others who had come to my assistance hurried through their own safety routines. The general scurrying and shuffling disappeared under the engines’ dull roar. I closed my eyes as forces hurled me against my seat. Weightlessness took hold, then gravity switched on. The engines settled into a steady thrum, and my drone hummed in its alcove.
I stole a glance at Nate, and worry threaded through me again. His face had drained of color.
“Quite an entrance, sweet—” He stopped abruptly, then concluded, “Sweet stars above.”
The marine in front of us grappled one-handed with his safety harness and glanced over his shoulder. “Timmons is right.”
“Michaelson,” I said. “I am glad you are well enough to travel.”
He grimaced, then his gaze flicked to the drone before boring into mine. “It isn’t that we don’t want your company, but we have ninety minutes until we reach Thalassa. Why don’t you explain why on any known planet you chose to join us in such a dramatic fashion.”