Ghost of Mind Episode One (14 page)

Her eyes drifted half open, her body heavy
and full of fatigue. She wanted nothing more than to give up and
surrender to unconsciousness. Let the swirling darkness take her.
But if she did that, she would either not wake up at all, or end up
back in that holding cell. This time with the flickering image of
John Doe drifting into view above her telling her he knew exactly
what she was.

An Old One.

Alice groaned. No, she clutched her throat as
tight as she could and she let out a desperate, resounding cry.

She pushed herself up.

She could not stand, but she could crawl.

She shifted forwards, her hands and face and
arms bleeding. Her blood was not red. It was hardly blood in fact.
It was a white-blue substance that evaporated as soon as it touched
the ground.

It was seeping from the cracks in her skin
that had appeared after the robot had tried to suck her dry. Given
time, they would heal. Given time, Alice would heal too. But time
would be the key.

She had to get to somewhere safe.

Before the computer alerted the security
forces to the fact that something huge had just tried to
rematerialize inside a chunk of patronium ore.

Alice made her desperate, slow, jolting way
over to the other side of the room. She had the door locked in her
sights, the one that would no doubt lead to a corridor outside. She
had no intention whatsoever of clambering through it only to fall
in front of some surprised worker's feet.

It was the maintenance shaft to the left she
was headed for. It would lead into a service duct.

Alice, still groaning, not caring that her
voice echoed through the cavernous hangar bay, made her way
forward. Every movement of her arms sent spikes of pain through
her, more blood trickling and oozing out of the cracks along her
chin, lips, and neck.

Finally she made it, then, her eyes virtually
rolling into the back of her head as she expended yet more precious
energy she did not have, Alice logged into the ICN and overrode the
security keeping the panel closed. She pulled it off, clambered
inside, then locked it in place.

Though droplets of her blood laced the metal,
they soon evaporated, leaving no trace, no DNA, no residue.

Telling herself she could do this, begging
her body not to give up, Alice crawled through the maintenance
shaft. Fortunately her body was small enough that she could fit
through with ease.

Still keeping half a connection to the ICN,
Alice let it guide her. She also used it to find out what level she
was on and what was around her.

Apparently she was on the top floor of Block
Alpha.

It made her laugh through a croak.

Her very own home town, as it were, though
Alice had never been allowed to travel this high up.

It made sense too; if this was Block Alpha
she could understand why that hangar bay had been empty. The
weather fields would still be shut down, so everyone would have
been evacuated.

It made her let out the shortest, sharpest of
laughs.

Alice was not often lucky, yet here she was
striking the jackpot again. Okay, not the jackpot; she'd been
unlucky enough to run into John Doe and almost get killed by a
soldier robot.

Still, she would take the opportunities given
to her.

‘
Computer,’ Alice croaked, her eyes half
closing, ‘find me the closest room with an omidium power source.’
Now that she knew the whole level had been abandoned, Alice had no
problem in talking.

Even if the computer had already alerted
security to the fact something had rematerialized inside a chunk of
ore on top of Block Alpha, it would take them a while to bother
sending anyone in. Not whilst the weather fields were down; it
would be far too dangerous.

‘
Closest room with omidium power source is
aboard a vessel,’ the computer chimed back, its voice echoing
around the panels around her, appearing to come from all directions
at once.

‘
Direct me to that vessel,’ Alice croaked
back.

It was her only option.

An omidium power source would do two things
for Alice. It would shield her from being scanned, and it would
heal her.

Her race had been renowned for their ability
to sustain themselves through multiple energy sources, whether it
be food, air, electricity, force, or power.

But some sources were far more useful than
others. Omidium was one of those sources.

As the prospect of it loomed in her mind,
Alice crawled a little faster. Her hands were caked in sweat, the
blood trickling down them hissing as it evaporated.

‘
Now all I have to do is figure a way to
get on board said vessel without tripping security,’ she told
herself, using her voice needlessly, listening to it echo and sound
around the enclosed metal service duct around her.

It would be no easy task. But Alice was
desperate. When was she not?

As the computer directed her, Alice's mind
focused on the task. It prevented her from asking a single
question. Just what vessel was she headed to?

If she had known, she would have turned
around to find something else.

Chapter 22

John Doe

He sat in the comfortable chair, his left leg
twitching up and down. He couldn't stop it; it was all he could do
to prevent himself from jumping up and punching the Prime in the
face.

The Prime twisted his lips into a
sanctimonious grin. He was a Garpa alien, and his squat and round
form would have made a great punching bag at that moment.

Calm down, John told himself, get a handle on
yourself.

‘
We thank you for your valiant service,
Commander Doe,’ the Prime said, his voice ringing with fake
sentiment. ‘Your brave efforts ensured the protection of this
Block,’ the guy pressed his eight fingers together and nodded
solemnly. But it was fake. It was all fake. Everything he said to
every movement he made.

John forced himself to offer a nod in thanks.
It was about the stiffest and least affable move he could
manage.

If it weren't for the fact that Chado was
standing by his side shooting the Prime one of this trademark
grimaces, John would have walked out ages ago.

‘
This situation was appallingly managed,’
Chado snapped back.

And that was the great thing about Chado. He
didn't care if he was talking to the Universal President or a
lowly, lowly ensign; he spoke his mind, especially where security
and safety were on the line.

‘
Your forces persistently ignored warnings
from the Pegasus. The weather fields along Block Alpha closed down
due to a chronic lack of maintenance. Your management of this
situation will be reported to the Union Forces top brass,’ Chado
added with a growl.

John bit down hard on his tongue to stop
himself from smiling, but the look on the Prime's face was
priceless.

He'd gone from being a self-important balloon
to deflating in a second.

With wide, outraged eyes, he looked at John,
obviously expecting he would rein his XO in.

John was going to do nothing of the kind.
‘Tell me again why you failed to scan that Old Tech? Skip to the
part where you failed to recognize it was a soldier
robot.’

The Prime paled further.

‘
Because that's the part the Union Forces
heads are going to want a full description of.’

‘
We had scanned it,’ the Prime blustered,
his pink skin turning a shade deeper. ‘The computers hadn't picked
up a thing.’

John gave another uncomfortable nod. He knew,
god he knew that he should be handling this better. The Prime would
no doubt make a call to his superiors the second John left the
guy's office. Then John would get the dressing down a Union
commander would deserve for bullying a planet's Prime, even if that
planet was the backwater dump Orion Minor.

‘
We are already implementing an
investigation into the maintenance of Block Alpha's weather fields.
Commander John Doe, my people did everything they could to ensure
your safety and to aid you in your mission.’

Even though he wanted to keep hold of his
anger and never let go, John felt himself deflating. Though he
could appreciate that the guy in front of him knew all the right
words to say, John was done being defensive.

He understood men like the Prime. They were
stuck in their own worlds, so far above the slums they rejected,
that to them the world was rosy and clear.

He was a man of his time, stuck in his own
unique context. Like everyone else on the high levels, he wouldn't
see the slums long enough to truly be affected by what would go on
there.

But none of that helped get the image of that
woman from John's mind. It seemed seared right in there. Every time
he closed his eyes a vision of her gaping mouth appeared, the robot
choking the life out of her.

‘
The Union provides this planet with
security and funds. The spending of these is outlined by a
system-wide agreement. If it is found that maintenance funds were
not used towards the proper upkeep of the weather fields on Block
Alpha, an investigation will ensue,’ Chado continued, that frown of
his getting deeper and deeper.

He was like a dog, John's own personal
yapping terrier. Except this one had one hell of a bite too.

Even though John would have loved to sit
there and watch Chado go to town, it was time to head back to the
Pegasus. He needed a shower, one of those good old fashioned water
ones and not just the sound waves most space farers usually used to
clean themselves. He wanted the hot water to rush over his head and
to take the memories of the day with it.

He stood up, raising a hand subtly at his
side, letting Chado know that the execution was over.

Fixing a dead, stony glance on the Prime,
he cleared his throat. ‘Thank you for your assistance, Prime,’ John
forced himself to say. ‘We can appreciate this has been a stressful
situation.’ John pushed the words out of his mouth, mulling over
just how much damage control he should bother laying out. Tapping
his foot, his shoulders tensing, he forced himself to add that he
would be kind in his report to the Union Forces top
brass.

Then John left the room, Chado on his
heels.

When the door to the Prime's office swooshed
closed behind him, John let out a beleaguered sigh.

‘
This is unlike you, John, are you ill?’
Chado asked, voice quiet, a sarcastic expression on his
face.

John knew exactly what his XO was getting at;
when John wanted to rake someone across the coals, he usually had
no problem. Especially when that person's reckless and selfish
behavior had endangered lives. All of his crew knew that John had
grown up in the slums, they also all appreciated that whenever John
got to go out and bat for the little guys, he came out swinging
hard.

John brought a hand up and scratched at his
top lip. It reminded him of her.

Then he patted down his short hair. It too
reminded him of her.

The woman in the hood. The one who had held a
secret so terrible she'd jumped off a building for it.

‘
Sir, may I make an observation?’ Chado
cleared his throat, his towering form casting John into shadow as
the two of them walked past an enormous bank of windows as the sun
streamed in from above.

The high levels were so far above the rest of
the planet that they punched through the swirling mass of dark grey
clouds that always covered Orion Minor. From up here there was
nothing but beauty; shining clean buildings peeping out of a sea of
clouds and kissed by the sun high above.

It was easy to think the universe was a great
place when given a view like this.

‘
Go ahead,’ John finally
managed.

‘
Go back to the Pegasus before - as you
human's say - you put your foot in it,’ Chado finished with a
knowing look.

‘
Hey, I'm not the one who threatened the
guy with a Union Forces’ investigation,’ John pointed
out.

‘
I was following your lead,
sir.’

‘
No you weren't, you are just as incensed
as I am,’ John noted through a growl.

‘
Indeed. Incensed or not, this will not
bring her back from the dead,’ Chado added.

And it made John stop and stare up at his
XO's face.

‘
Commander, sometimes death hits you.
Sometimes it doesn't. Today it has. Go and process it; I will deal
with the crew and the final preparations for our departure. The
ship is docked on top of Block Alpha; our maintenance crew are
currently helping them re-establish the weather field.’

John felt frozen for a second, then he
managed a small sniff.

Sometimes death hits you. Sometimes it
doesn't. Today it has.

Those weren't Chado's words; they were
John's. He said that to his crew all the time. They were words of
wisdom - maybe the only ones he had worth sharing - that he'd
garnered from life in the slums.

And they were true, every last one of
them.

Fighting in the Union Forces meant that his
crew faced the specter of death on numerous occasions. Sometimes it
didn't affect you. Sometimes the news that a transport cruiser had
been raided by pirates just glanced off, you processed the words,
you did what you had to, but you didn't shed a tear.

Sometimes a single death could send you to
your knees.

Bringing a hand up and rubbing his chest,
John let out a trapped breath of air.

Chado gave him another knowing look and
then gestured towards the window. ‘I will arrange a transport to
Block Alpha. I suggest you re-upgrade your armor before you head
over though; I hear while they have atmosphere on most levels,
there are sections that are without air and are open to the
elements.’