Horny Gold

Hey, ya'll! Welcome back to another episode of my wacky space adventure! This is technically part two of what I've been thinking of as the mid-season finale of this series. There's plenty more to come, so don't you worry. Fair warning, though, there's basically no spice to this episode. I know, I know, what the hell is this doing on a smut site, right? Well, basically, trying to shoehorn in a scene would have completely messed with the tone for this one, and hopefully you'll agree that there's no good time for a little horizontal shuffle when everyone's fighting for their lives. I'll make it up to you, double pinky promise.

Anyway, on to the show!

They were already in the shuttle when Hatred went offline.

Their send-off from Anchor had been terse. The colonists were still in bad shape and would require aid from the Consortium in order to make it through the rest of winter. But at least they were able to return to their homes and get back to the endless work of trying to survive on an alien planet.

Wu had left them with much of the firepower they'd brought down. Two or three colonists armed with Gizmo guns with some cinder rounds would be a better defense than they had. It was all gear that could easily be replaced when they returned to Port Ever Evening.

Alma was not doing as well as they initially thought. The fracture to her leg was easy enough; the medical staff set it, and she just needed a shot of osteofluid to help the bone knit together. It was once they were able to get her to the medical unit that it was discovered she also had a moderate splenic fracture and bruising to her liver. Of course, Anchor's lone autodoc was out of commission and couldn't be repaired with the materials they had on hand.

That made lingering in the colony a non-viable option. They'd achieved their objectives, with Nikki able to restore communications by using the Hornigold to redirect their lone communication satellite to a better orbit so that it could connect to their leaning communications tower. There were other settlements on Ymir, smaller than Anchor, that had gone dark too. It was feared that they'd suffered similar attacks, and now that communications were back up, those fears were confirmed. They were already back in contact with most of them, advising them on how to take down the terravores.

Nikki left them with emphatic promises that the Consortium would not forget about them and a request for aid to the Office of Interstellar Colony Support was the first message she sent out. They could expect to receive messages from a caseworker assigned to them within the next month.

There was some grumbling that this was all vague bureaucratic bullshit, but really, Nash and the others couldn't argue much.

With Alma juiced to the gills with nerve blockers, they secured her to a crash couch in the shuttle and made their way to orbit.

The only notice they got from Hatred going offline was that the spider bot suddenly clanked to the floor. They hadn't reached orbit yet, and while the spiderbot didn't have its own crash couch, it would stand on a wall in the direction of their travel on its magnetic feet, riding the g-forces like a surfer.

"What was that?" Wu asked as he piloted the shuttle. "Something come loose back there?"

Lucia craned her head around to see Hatred, still attached to the wall by his little magnetic feet, but with the rest of his body limp against the floor. "Hatred?"

"Iana, can you hear me?" Wu called back. There was no answer from the bot, and they were on the other side of the moon from the Hornigolds' current orbit.

"Lost connection, maybe?" Lucia suggested.

"It's possible, but she said that kind of thing wouldn't be much of a problem," Wu said. "I'll ask her about it when we get back."

Upon reaching orbit, it would be another hour before they could talk with the Hornigold.

"All things considered," Nikki said. "I think our mission went surprisingly well. Better than it had any right to."

"You know, I'm glad you're with us," Wu admitted. "We wouldn't have been able to do much about restoring their comms without you."

"Here it comes," Alma said, groggily.

"What?"

"The Captain is going to offer you a spot on the crew, and then you guys are gonna fuuuuuuck," she said the last word in a taunting sing-song voice.

"That's not true. Also, you're stoned."

"Yep, can't feel a thing. My whole body is numb. But I'm right."

"No, you're not," Theo said. "He may fuck herbeforeoffering her a position on the crew."

"I already have a job," Nikki said

"Yeah, see, she already has a job. She's not interested."

"I didn't say that," Nikki said with a playful smile.

"Yeah, she didn't say that," Alma said.

"Lucia, back me up."

"You people are weird."

"Says the girl with the pet cocktopus," Alma slurred.

"What's a cocktopus?" Nikki asked.

"You've been on the ship for weeks, and you haven't met Jeff?" Theo asked.

"Jeff?"

"Yeah, the alien tentacle monster she keeps in her room?"

"No, I have not seen an alien tentacle monster hanging around the ship."

"Some spy you are," Alma grumbled.

"I'm not a spy," Nikki said defensively. "I'm a diplomatic liaison dealing with colonial relations."

"Yeah, that's a fancy word for spy," Theo said

"Fuck the government, wooo," Alma said, weakly pumping a fist in the air. She dramatically turned to where Nikki was sitting. "Oh, hey, look, the government." She tried winking suggestively at Nikki but it was more of a slow, uneven blink.

When they got close enough to the Hornigold to be able to radio their arrival, Wu set the course to bring the shuttle in line for docking.

"Iana, can you read me?"

"Yes, I can read you, Captain."

"We're coming up on your six. We'll be docking in about 15 minutes."

"Roger that, I'll be ready for you."

"Hey, real quick. You having any connection issues? Hatred is down."

"Might be a glitch, but you know me, I don't hate anybody."

"Roger that. Over and out."

"Over and out."

Wu disconnected from the com.

"That was weird," Theodore said.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Because that wasn't Iana."

***

***

Decius had run into the first major problem of this mission. It seemed that the crew took security rather seriously. After dealing with the synth bitch, he discovered that while he could reach the bridge, he could not access any of her systems. Normally, most non-military ships had basic security features, such as passwords, voice-print IDs, and fingerprint biometrics. Other terminals, such as engineering or navigation, would have even simpler access, often just a PIN, albeit with lower privileges. These were usually deemed "good enough" to stop a drunk crew member or opportunistic pirate, and Decius could get around all of them.

The Horny Gold's, however, were much more sophisticated. It seemed no console had a full operational scope, not even the captain's. It meant multiple passwords and biometrics had to be entered to take full control.

But he had ways around that. A relatively simple program on his handheld held a worm for just such cases. He hard-connected it to a port on the side of the pilot's terminal, and the worm program activated, invading the software to collect the relevant stored metrics. As soon as the program activated, however, the whole bridge went dark, with the red emergency lights clicking on.

On every terminal in the bridge, the same message appeared:

You are not supposed to be here. Leave, or you are going to die.

Decius felt himself frown at the message. The bridge had fully locked down.

This was an annoyance more than anything. Controlling the bridge made his mission infinitely simpler, but he had his contingencies for that, too. He could probably crack the lockout, given enough time, but there was no telling how much time he could count on. If the crew arrived before he could do it, then that was time wasted that could have been better spent on the contingencies.

His first task had been to activate the comms to communicate with the returning shuttle. He could still do that, but had to now use his own ship's hardware. Cloning the Horny Gold's comms signature wasn't hard. He'd pulled in plenty of data on that while he'd been following her. Short-range communication was all radio waves anyway. Signatures could be spoofed.

Voice cloning was also a simple task. Back on Arcadia's lunar port, he'd attempted to gain passage on the ship he now sat in. He'd spoken to the synth bitch, now a dead synth bitch, trying to talk his way on board. When Decius realized she wasn't going to let him buy passage, he slipped his hand into a pocket and recorded the rest of their conversation.

That was really all he needed; the program did the rest. Voice cloning wasn't new or novel, but it had its uses. It was a disguise deployed as a trick, but not really useful for more than that, as it would crumble under any real scrutiny.

Theo was with them.

If he were an amateur, he might have tried to use the voice clone to simulate a hostage situation, have the synth weepily beg for her life to get the captain to comply. Even if he hadn't killed her, that would have failed. Proof of life beyond just the voice over the radio would have been requested. And in the latter case, bringing Theo on board alone with the rest of the crew on the shuttle would have still given him the upper hand. Any sane captain would refuse such an imbalance during a negotiation.

Decius was not going to sit here and negotiate with these people.

It would give them too much time to string him along will they tried to think of ideas. No, he needed to hit them hard before they even knew they were stepping into a trap.

But that was a risk all on its own because it meant letting all of them back on board the Horny Gold.

It was a risk, sure.

But once they were on board, nothing they did would matter.

***

***

"What do you mean that wasn't her?" Nikki asked.

"I don't know who that was. But that wasn't the XO."

"Pirates?" Lucia suggested.

"Not their MO. If they took the ship, why not leave with it? If they wanted us dead, why aren't they firing on us right now?" Wu turned to face Theodora. "Iana told me that someone else tried to buy passage with us when we were docked on Hyperia. She turned them away. Some big guy with face tattoos."

Theodoras' face went pale.

"Friend of yours?" Nikki asked.

"I swear, I thought I'd shaken him. I would have told you, but I thought he wouldn't be able to find me."

"Who is he?" Wu asked, his voice even and calm.

"Decius Morn," she said, a twinge of terror in her voice. "He's a bounty hunter. An assassin. There are a lot of guys like him floating around Tempest. Works for whoever pays. The only reason I even know his name is that my house has used his services. The only reason I got away is that I stabbed him in the fucking chest. If he's here, it's because he's after me, and since he hasn't turned the shuttle into a fireball, it's because he's been paid to bring me in alive."

"Well, fuck," Nikki said.

"Okay," Wu said, steeling himself for his next words. "If he's taken the ship, we have to presume Iana is either dead or incapacitated. Hatred's offline."

"You really have to stop letting people hijack your ship, sir," Alma said. "It's a bad look."

"And we gave most of our weapons to the colonists," Nikki said, echoing his next thoughts.

"We still have sidearms. And the Retro Lucia was carrying."

"Do we have enough rounds safe enough to use on a ship?"

Wu grunted. "Hollow points, not ideal, but low enough velocity that they should be fine unless we get really unlucky. Everyone should have one magazine worth."

"Is that going to be enough?"

"It has to be."

On the viewscreens, they watched the Hornigold grow steadily.

"Okay, team, we have ten minutes to come up with a plan that doesn't get us all killed."

***

***

When Theo entered the cargo hold from the shuttle's airlock alone, Decius couldn't have been happier.

It seemed this would be easy after all.

He had been waiting on the second level of the cargo hold, perched on top of the crane, which gave him a perfect view of the airlock.

Not one to let good fortune go to waste, he immediately carried out the plan.

The smoke grenade triggered next to her, sending an opaque white cloud through the whole area. He'd intended it to disorient her whole crew, but simply getting the drop on her was good enough. His own vision wasn't obscured; his helmet display automatically targeted her and saw her through the smoke.

Next, he shot the neural wrap at her. The device was small, about the size of a personal handheld. It was a grenade of sorts. He threw it down at her, and as soon as it touched her, it exploded into a giant smart fabric blanket. The thin material was surprisingly strong, locking around her head, arms, and torso, squeezing together as it sent a hefty electrical charge through the whole thing. Theo was wearing an environmental suit, and her helmet was on, so she didn't get much of the debilitating shock, but it didn't matter.

He triggered the next device. It vaguely looked like a handgun stuck to the ceiling by the end of its magazine.

He'd already programmed its instructions, and the device was smart enough to improvise a little.

It fired a tether at her, wrapping around her just as fast as the wrap had. Once it locked, the tether retracted, yanking her off the floor.

Decius moved. Pushing himself down off the crane and colliding with her at a perfect angle.

He shoved her right into the open aquatic tank still in the cargo hold.

His idea for this bit of improvisation came when he watched the crew unload their cargo from them at Ever Evening. He wasn't sure what that cargo was and, frankly, didn't care, but he watched them transfer the contents, including the water, and reload the two empty tanks back in the cargo hold. He was delighted to find that they were still there.

He slammed down on her, pushing her all the way into the tank, her legs kicking in blind panic. He pushed off her to change his momentum, flying out of the tank, grabbing the lip, and swinging himself back down to the floor. His mag boots click back on, and he reached up to seal the tank with the detached lid. This took the longest, several seconds, to secure the lid and let it turn the aquatic tank into an airtight prison.

This next part was going to suck.

The lockdown of the bridge made it necessary, although it fit nicely with the current sequence of events.

"Can't have your friends following you, can I?" he shouted at Theo, as she struggled helplessly inside her prison. He eye-clicked through the menu on his helmet display and selected the remote detonator.

The explosives he had ringed around the outer and inner shuttle airlock were not exceptionally powerful. They didn't need to be. Pressure would do most of the job.

The airlock disappeared as it was forcibly ripped outward in a concussive explosion. The force of the decompression separated the shuttle from its mothership, sending both spinning. With the outward force of the decompression, it was all but guaranteed that the shuttle would have taken the brunt of the damage. Maybe not outright destroyed, but he would have been surprised if it had remained spaceworthy.

Theo's glassy prison, no longer secured by magnetic clamps, was sucked out too, tumbling chaotically into the low orbit of the planet.

"Don't worry!" he called out after her. "I'll pick you up in a second! We're gonna have a lot of fun!"

It had been less than a minute since she'd stepped through the airlock.

Decius turned and hurried back to his ship.

He turned the corner into the same crew quarters he'd initially made his breach into, and launched himself through the umbilical still connecting his ship to the Horny Gold.

He didn't see the man standing there until he shot Decius three times in the chest.

***

***

They depressurized the shuttle before docking. Helmets on, including Alma, who, although still mostly awake, was groggy and almost entirely immobile.

"You sure about this?" Wu asked Theo again. "There's about a hundred ways this could go wrong."

Theo nodded. "Morn is smart, resourceful, ruthless. He will try to kill you regardless of whether he captures me. This is a good plan. I am not afraid."

"I hope you're right."

They left Theo alone on the shuttle as it docked.

Spacewalks, even in this advanced age, were never to be taken lightly. A simple belt thruster unit was enough for a person to move around, but its range was paltry and wouldn't be enough if things really got out of hand.

They stuffed the limp body of Hatred into a nylon mesh bag and clipped it to Wu's belt. Lucia and Nikki were tasked with carrying Alma.

The four of them made their way off the shuttle. As it docked with the Hornigold.

Of course, they were able to see Morn's ship.

Wu recognized it as a long-range corvette. It was a simple, compact design. Not exactly sleek--spaceships rarely were because they were unconstrained by aerodynamics, but given the short wings, it was likely atmosphere-rated to some degree. It was about a quarter of the length of the Hornigold and was attached via an umbilicus that went right into his ship's hull.

"I think this son of a bitch put a hole in my ship," Wu said indignantly.

They knew the ship was there from simple cameras aboard the shuttle. Even as close as they were, the sensors of the shuttle didn't pick it up. That meant it had a high degree of stealth. Wu suspected it had been following them for a while, unnoticed.

"Okay," he said. "Stick to the plan. With Theo alone, he's going to grab her, make a run for his ship, and probably try to destroy either the shuttle, the Hornigold, or both. Lucia and Nikki, you're going through the other shuttle's airlock. You need to sneak past him while he's busy with Theo. Get Alma to medical, lock her inside, and get to the bridge. If he gets past me, you need to have control of the Hornigold to stand a chance.

"I understand, Captain," Lucia said.

"Nikki, don't go looking to fight this guy. You both need to make it to the bridge."

"Aw, such concern. Am I growing on you?"

"Dead CBI agents are hard to explain. My concern is not having more paperwork."

"Liar," she said. Wu could see her playful grin through her helmet. She was enjoying this.

"Don't go after him. Your mission is the bridge."

"Aye aye, Captain." She gave a mock salute.

They turned to thrust around the side of the ship, making their way starboard toward the other shuttle.

Wu continued toward the corvette.

Like all ships that travel in the Big Black, Morn's had multiple airlocks. He reached the one on the aft side and got to work. Most airlock security only extended to the inner door. The outer door, although closed and locked, had emergency access and manual overrides on the outside. The corvette was no different. Wu located the emergency override panel and popped it open. Inside was a recessed area containing several levers and a wheel valve. They were unlabeled, but he knew which ones were which. He opened one lever and turned the wheel. The white steam of venting and instantly sublimating atmosphere appeared at the edges of the airlock door, a little bit of atmosphere and pressure venting. It did not hiss as sound did not travel in the vacuum of space. He waited for the white steam to abate before opening the other two levers. It was inside the airlock an instant later, closing it behind him.

The inner door posed the real barrier. But Wu had come prepared. A small bag of tools floated next to him, clipped to a tether on his belt. He located the access panel next to the locked door and got to work.