“Okay...that’s not going to work.” Ansul declared as he jumped back from the holding cell’s door.

The Martian could always be counted on to have a couple of tools stashed somewhere on his person and this occasion was no different. He’d dared to fiddle around with the force-shield emitter that was preventing them from leaving...well, there were also a couple of guards in the hallway but guards had never stopped them before.

The captain had had his fill of Essa Von Braun’s shenanigans. To hell with her and to hell with IPH. If they managed to bust free of Aeolus they may never get any work with Interplanetary Holdings again but no court in the known universe would hold them on any kind of criminal charges. The Service takes care of its own, they’d see that the Honshu had never violated contract and that Von Braun had used her position to try and settle a personal score against Tarsik and his men. Chairman Qualda may have helped wipe her criminal records but the Service still had its own records and knew very well who she was and what misdeeds she had been party to.

“What about you Jones any ideas?” the captain asked. “Then again never mind, I forgot that you were busy getting drunk while we were having to put up with Essa Von Braun’s bullshit!”

Jones was lying on one of the cots nursing a headache; he’d apparently wasted zero time getting himself intoxicated. “If it makes you feel any better sir they had the worst booze this side of the Xerxes system.”

The captain tapped his now non-functional tele-wave that the guards hadn’t even bothered to remove, “Note to self, put crewman Jones off at the next barely habitable rock.”

“See, I knew you had a sense of humor sir.”

“You get your ass up and help us figure out a way out of here crewman or you might have to learn the hard way the difference between when I’m joking and when I’m not.”

Jones sat up and shook his head.

“There’s far too much power going through those emitters for me to risk messing with them again.” Ansul stated.

“What about the Honshu, is there any way she could disrupt the station’s power, even for a moment?”

Ansul sat down next to Jones and thought about it for a few moments. “Well...and I’m not even sure this would work...”

“I’m listening.”

“Nah....”

“What?”

“I just don’t know enough about the station and how she functions. I don’t even know what kind of power core she has.”

“Great.” the captain threw his hands up in frustration.

“What about the guards?” Jones finally had something to contribute to the conversation. “Couldn’t we just tell them that one of us is sick and needs a doctor? They come in and wham! we clobber them.”

“You’ve seen way too many vids haven’t you?” Ansul said, staring Jones straight in the eyes with a very serious expression.

“Wait...maybe he’s not that stupid. I mean...maybe he’s unintentionally less stupid than we think. The guards might actually fall for it if they have a genuine reason to think that one of us is actually hurt.”

“How do we make them think we’re actually hurt?” Ansul asked.

“There’s no way we’re getting through this force-shield, we know that and the guards know that. It does put off a mild electric discharge though and....”

Jones interrupted, “...Service uniforms help deflect electrical discharges.”

It would seem that the crewman isn’t so dumb after all. “Right! I get the guards’ attention and run into that sucker at full force and pretend that the shock knocked me unconscious. They come in to see about me and we beat the rocket-fuel out of them.” the captain then turned back to Jones, “Interrupt me again though and I’ll punch you right in the mouth crewman. Clear?”

Jones shook his head in acknowledgement and Ansul stood up and helped him to his feet.

“You ready for this or should we let you sober up for a while?” the Martian asked.

“Are you kidding me? I fight best when I’ve got a little sauce in me.”

“Fine, follow my lead.” with that the first officer grabbed his captain’s sizable right bicep. It took Jones a moment to figure out what was going on but he got the drift and grabbed Tarsik’s left arm.

“I’ve had it!” the captain yelled out at the top of his voice. “I’ll tear those IPH space-dogs limb from limb! Come and fight like men you cowards!”

Jones looked at Ansul with questioning eyes but the first officer’s nod told him to just keep playing along.

“I’ll bet I’ve had my way with most of your mothers you dung heaps! Let me go! Let me go!”

The guards came around the corner and saw Tarsik being held back by his own two men and screaming at the top of his lungs. A large vein was protruding from his forehead and only added to the illusion that the rather sizable space captain seemed as if he’d gone completely off his rocker.

“There you are you cowards! You tell that commander of yours that I’ve got a merry-go-round for her....and candies for everyone! Except the dog, he can get his own!”

“Space madness, we think. Our doctor thought he was close to a breakdown already.” Ansul yelled over the insane ramblings of his commanding officer.

“Just shut him up before we have someone come in and sedate him.” one of the guards declared.

The men in the hallway never saw Captain Tarsik tap his men on their sides, his signal for them to let him go. He lunged forward heavily and both Ansul and Jones feigned weakness as they let him slip from their grasp. The burly space captain launched forward like a rocket and smashed into the faint rippling blue haze that was the force-shield. Despite the fact that he could never have penetrated it with brute force alone the guards still took a step back instinctively. The shield erupted in electrical arcs and threw the captain backwards several feet, right into the waiting arms of his men. They caught him and let him down to the ground. Absolutely taken aback the security men had no idea how to respond. Finally fully grasping the plan Jones bent down on one knee and reached for the captain’s neck.

“There’s no pulse!” he yelled at no one in particular.

Ansul looked up at the two stunned guards and shouted, “Don’t just stand there, help us dammit!”

Without giving it much thought, exactly as the captain had hoped, the taller of the two guards reached for the device on his belt that shut off the force-shield. He mashed its crystal-like button that immediately went from a glowing blue color to a faint white. None of the Honshu crew knew what IPH non-commission rank insignia stood for but the taller man was obviously in charge as he ordered the shorter guard to go through the door first.

“Check him out.” the taller guard commanded.

‘Yes sir.” the subordinate said as he shoved Jones out of the way and reached for Captain Tarsik’s neck. Jones caught the look of surprise on the guard’s face as he felt a nice strong pulse but before he could utter a word the captain caught him with an uppercut straight to the sternum. Faster than any of them could believe such a large fellow was capable of moving he then grabbed the second officer’s ankle and pulled his leg out from under him. The man hit the floor so hard that the wind was knocked out of him and Ansul was on top of him instantly.

“Nighty night sunshine!” with that he punched the guard square in the face with all of his strength. He checked to make sure the man was indeed unconscious before getting to his feet and turning to his captain. “I was going to ask if you’re okay but I guess I have my answer already.”

“Still hurt like hell.” the captain declared, “My head’s spinning a little bit but I’ll be all right. That force-shield packs a hell of a wallop, Service uniform or no.”

The captain, Ansul and Jones made sure to grab anything that might be of use off of the unconscious guards including their tele-waves and stun pistols. Before reactivating the shield Tarsik gave each man a quick blast from their own weapons to make sure they’d be out for at least an hour. With a quick press the crystal once again lit up with a bright blue glow and the force-shield was back in place. They were in luck, the station’s holding facility was rather small and seemed to have no further guards on duty. Whether or not this was the only brig onboard none of them knew but the fact that it was basically now in their control boded well. They used a nearby security console to bring up a basic layout of the facility. Unfortunately for them they quickly learned that they were now on the opposite side of the station from where the Honshu was docked.

“Well, that’s just great. How in the space-blasted hell are we supposed to get clear across this station without being seen?” Jones moaned, “Oh, and let’s not forget that they’ll probably be calling to check in with their guards any minute now and will notice something is up.”

Ansul’s only response was to hold up one of the guards’ tele-waves in his left hand while his right continued to work the console’s keyboard.

“It’s a shame we didn’t stop to ask them for their names in case someone called for them.” the captain’s typical confident smile had returned.

“Good with impressions are we sir?”

“Stow it crewman.” Ansul barked at Jones. “Captain it looks like there are maintenance paths that run parallel to most of the main corridors...but there is one major problem.”

“Why is that not surprising? What is it?”

“The station is arranged like a flower with the docking platforms being the petals. The center hub of the facility branches out from a circular core into thick spokes that the platforms are attached to. Those outer areas, like where we entered, are hardened to prevent anyone from breaking into the station but they seem pretty soft on security as far as actually leaving is concerned. The problem is that all of the maintenance paths terminate close to the center of the facility. That’s where the main vaults are located so security is extra tight in those areas.”

“So if we use one of those paths we run into a dead-end near the center of the station?”

“Exactly!”

Finally having something useful to contribute Jones piped up, “These are MU-9 stun pistols captain, I could rig one of their power cells to explode....maybe that could blast through the dead-end and into the central core. In fact look,” he walked over to a nearby weapons locker, “I’m pretty sure this thing is full of MU-9s that we could rig into a bomb.”

Captain Tarsik did not want to dampen his young cohort’s enthusiasm but they had to be realistic, “That’s a hell of a maybe there Jones. The bomb might not work and even if it did we’d still only be half-way across this station. I’m also not okay with the possibility of killing anyone in that blast, IPH personnel included.”

“There’s also another concern sir.”

Tarsik turned to Ansul, “You’re right. That space-blasted tower that generates the atmosphere and gravity on the landing platform, without that we’d be popsicles in a matter of seconds.”

“Oooh, goodies.” Jones had used a key taken from the head guard to open the locker. “Pretty sure these’ll come in handy. Three more MU-9s and....whatever this is....”

“Let me see.” the captain walked over and grabbed the item, “Portable force-shield, definitely handy. This is mine.” the device was basically a handle with a button on it but when activated was capable of generating a shield that would absorb physical blows as well as the discharge from energy weapons, at least for a few minutes until its power supply was exhausted. After tucking the device into his belt and giving Jones a look of haughty derision for his heavy smell of alcohol the captain walked back over to Ansul, still messing with the console, and leaned in to whisper. “Got anything yet?”

Captain Tarsik liked to project an air of invincibility and didn’t want Jones, or any subordinate for that matter, to get the impression that he did not have a plan. It wasn’t arrogance; he simply knew that his crew would function more effectively if they had complete confidence in their leader. He would always give Ansul, or any crew member for that matter, credit for solving a problem but in the heat of the moment he always liked to look like he was in control. It probably wasn’t necessary at this moment seeing as how Jones was the only one around to see it and had probably already assumed there was no real plan but old habits die hard.

“Well. I’ll be honest with you, this station was laid out pretty well to prev...”

Both mens’ eyes went wide at the sound of one of the guards’ tele-wave crackling to life. “Sargent Craigsmith. Quarter-hour status report.”

Jones turned around and despite his drunkenness caught sight of the alarm on his superiors’ faces. Captain Tarsik hesitated for a moment and then activated the tele-wave, “Sargent Craigsmith here...” he looked at Ansul questioningly and all that the Martian could do was shrug, “situation normal. Nothing to report.”

The voice on the other end went silent for a moment then, “Sargent please confirm your authentication code.”

“Plan B!” the captain yelled out. Ansul jumped from the console’s chair and grabbed one of the stun pistols.

“What’s plan B?!” Jones asked as the two other men began bolting for the door.

“Run Jones. Whenever I say ‘Plan B’ that means run!”