USCSS Casimir: Outer Rim Territories

Madison Voss was a restless dreamer. Even in the grip of stasis there was a look of feral wariness about her. A slight tightness of the jaw, an anxious pinch of the lips and a fearful flutter to the eyelids. Madison loathed hypersleep. Not because she lacked faith in the science behind it or denied the need for it. She simply feared to dream.

After four long years, visions of Acheron still haunted her. Nightmares unbidden and unwelcome. Subjecting her mind to the trial of stasis, where a single dream could last an entire month, required every ounce of willpower she possessed. It didn't matter that she wouldn't remember the nightmares or the act of sleeping itself. It only mattered that she dreaded to close her eyes. Even for a minute.

Since then she'd developed a healthy addiction to stimulants such as Neversleep Pills and various varieties of methylenedioxymethamphetamines. Proper treatment for her anxiety and post-traumatic stress with mood-stabilizing drugs was too risky. She could not afford anything that might cloud her thinking, numb her awareness and slow her reflexes. Much as it would have pleased her to minimize further nightmares and improve the quality of her sleep, she had to keep her edge.

Distinctive of physiognomy with a mixed German heritage, her features were lean, yet strong; well defined over a sharp bone structure with a straight nose and thin, shapely lips. When they were open, her eyes were ice-blue, both confident and daring under low, straight brows. As a whole her looks were not classically beautiful, but still attractive. Hers was an expressive face, as compelling of personality as it was telling in mood possessing an entrancing feminine mien.

Though only thirty three years of age, Madison looked older. Recent years as a drug-hyped fugitive-refugee were hard-born, aging her prematurely with tough wrinkles and scars.

Before her nightmares, before LV-426 she slept like a baby. Hypersleep was nothing to worry about aboard her ship, the Viper, with her trusted synthetic, Jex, to keep watch over her and keep her company. There may be little to call safe about the brash career of an interstellar bounty hunter, but Madison had learned to live with the risks as well as anyone could. So long as she had her synthetic partner, his irrepressible sarcasm, and an impressive stock of weapons she was fearless. Almost.

That was before The Company put a contract on her head. Now the Viper was lost, heavily damaged and abandoned. Perhaps the same hunters hired to kill her were given permission to salvage it? More likely The Company dismantled it for scrap. There was no price they wouldn't pay, no task they wouldn't do to erase every trace of her. The fact they deleted her identity from every known electronic database proved that beyond a doubt.

Her current alias, Marion Shelly, was the most recent purchased on the black market to keep one step ahead of them. That wasn't getting any easier, or cheaper. The rest of her false ID's had already failed her. Each time they did, her pursuers got closer. Meeting Ernest Hart on Torin Prime was a stroke of good luck. Or perhaps not? It was still possible her chance encounter with Ernest was too good to be true.

According to Ernest, administrator Ze'ev Darkon on Ashkelon Station would pay a fortune for proof of what happened to Hadley's Hope before it was obliterated. In that regard she had plenty of evidence to make it worth his while. Besides her video-recordings there was the egg. The egg. Fuck that fucking thing!

After Jex got himself blown up saving her life the only thing that kept her going was the desire to put him back together. She was tired of being erased. Tired of being hunted. Tired of running and especially tired of being alone. Jex could be reworked. She needed him. More than any person, Madison was attached to Jex. He was the only being she'd ever clicked with. He was like a brother to her.

Hauling his dismembered torso around in that cryo-coffin wasn't right. He deserved better. Synth-shops on the black market were capable of repairing him, but the price was high. Very high. Ashkelon Station might be a trap, but it was worth the risk. She spent most of what money she had left to hire this ship. Ze'ev was offering much more, enough funds to fix her synthetic and find another quadrant of the galaxy to hide in.

_ _ _

Madison struggled to rise and open her eyes; pushing her mind through the fog of drug-induced incapacitation. Above her the lid of the hypersleep pod had already opened. Around her the hypersleep chamber was cool, its lights brightened. As her skin prickled with goosebumps voices stirred around her.

“Madre maría, despierta de nuevo!” Captain Yago spoke gruffly. The Cuban was forty-six years old. Handsome and professional with a close-shaven beard and close-cropped black hair streaked with gray.

“Fuck my mother and every other whore!” Groaned Bartimaeus the Greek in replication. He was the ships engineer, neither handsome nor professional with a famously foul mouth.

“Father!” Exclaimed Bartimaeus' daughter, Sophelia, with disgust and embarrassment. Vicente, Captain Yago's son and assistant to Bartimaeus began to laugh loudly until his mother shushed him. Seleste was the Captain's wife and Executive Officer.

“Please pardon him!” Seleste called over to Madison in shame as everyone clambered out of their pods.

The crew of the Casimir were family and very old friends. Such badinage was to be expected, yet Madison was in no sort of light-hearted mood. One of the other pods was empty. She had noticed it immediately after she sat up, rubbing life back into her eyes. The realization sent a chill through her. Something was wrong.

For a few moments she couldn't remember who was missing, but then it came to her. Fausto Vidal, the man with the tattoos. The ex-gangster. The one she'd recognized with a price on his head. Shit!

Madison glanced worryingly at the single exit to the hypersleep chamber. Of course, the pressure door was already open. It would have opened automatically as soon as the ship dropped out of hyperspace. But how long ago was that? Minutes? Hours? days?!

Madison stepped away from her pod dressed in nothing but thin cotton undergarments. Standing five-foot-ten, her hair fell shoulder-length, light-brown, thick and untrimmed. It used to be much shorter, yet since she was uncomfortable letting anyone stand behind her with a pair of scissors of late, it was now growing wild.

As of this moment her demeanor was on edge, her body tensed, lean and well-muscled like a tightly-wound spring. Quickly she moved to the pressure door controls and shut it before turning to speak out loud to the others, “Where is Fausto?!” she asked.

The rest of the sleepers glanced around, confirming that she was correct. Yago's younger brother had seemingly vanished.

“He must have stepped out while we were still waking up?” the captain suggested, saying so in English for Madison's benefit.

Madison didn't think so. Fausto's pod had no residual condensation or frost on the upper lid like the rest. He must have awakened a while ago. How was that possible? They were still in hyperspace until a few minutes ago... right?! Still, she didn't sense the captain was deceiving her. At least not so far as he knew. The rest of the crew also looked genuinely confused. Whatever he was up too, Fausto was most probably acting alone.

On top of that, how he slipped out of his pod prematurely wasn't as important as why he did it? Madison imagined if he wanted to kill her, it would have been easy enough to do while she was still in stasis. So why? He might be trying to set her up. He might also be trying to go through her things, such as the cryo-coffin! Fuck. Fuck. FUCK!

“Are you ok?” Seleste asked sensing her anxiety, stepping over to her side reaching for Madison's arm. The Executive Officer was forty two, thin with plain features and long, thick braided hair that reached the small of her back. She was smart, kindly and well-meaning. A good mother to Vicente and a fine role model to Sophelia.

“Don't touch me!” Madison growled yanking her arm back.

“Sorry!” Seleste stepped away, holding her hands up apologetically, glancing back with concern at her husband.

“Hey take it easy,” Captain Yago stated in a mellow voice, frowning. “Just relax! You're our guest!”

“We need to check Fausto's pod. How long has it been offline?!” Madison questioned, stepping towards it to look at the readouts. Impatiently she pressed a few buttons.

“Hey don't touch that!” Bartimaeus complained, scowling. His dark eyes were judging, clever, and no-bullshit. Short and stocky, and very hairy, the engineer had a coarse beard and a receding hairline.

“Ok then you check it!” Madison implored him.

“Shit on me, what is this woman's problem?” Barimaeus asked the captain spreading his arms wide.

“Please calm down!” the captain entreated his single passenger, bewildered by her outbursts.

“Just check the fucking pod!” she demanded insistently.

Captain Yago paused for a moment, seeming to conclude it was easier to accede to her request than argue with it. “Bartimaeus, please, check the pod.”

“Sure, after I get my fucking clothes on and take a piss!” the engineer snorted stepping towards Madison on a path towards the pressure door and out of the chamber.

Madison stepped in front of him, “Stop!” she hissed through her teeth.

Bartimaeus half-chuckled, “You gonna make me?!”

“Listen!” Madison stated to everyone in a low voice, as equally stern as it was no-nonsense, “We may be in great danger!”

Captain Yago furrowed his brow, “Excuse me? What danger?!”

“You wouldn't believe me if I told you,” Madison answered with an edge of frustration, “Do you have weapons on this ship?”

“I've got all the firepower I need right here!” Bartimaeus grunted grabbing at his crotch.

Madison gave him her best cold stare; a look perfected on dangerous fugitives who doubted her resolve to bring them in dead or alive. Fausto had already received that look once, shortly after they met. Men in general tended to underestimate her. Sometimes that was useful, sometimes not. In moments like this, she used this stare to make them think twice about fucking with her.

“Yes we have weapons,” Captain Yago stated, interrupting the stare-down.

The notion that Fausto rigged the hypersleep pods to keep them in stasis while he pulled the ship out of hyperspace early seemed far-fetched, but not impossible. From what she could remember from his bounty, Fausto was a successful extortionist and a hacker. He had both the incentive to set her up and the programming skill to pull something like this off.

Besides, if she could recognize him as a marked man, it was just as probable he would get the same sense about her. It takes one to know one, as the old adage went. For all she knew Company mercenaries were homing in on this ship at this very moment! Aiding in that probability, Fausto might have redirected the course of the ship to facilitate her capture. The Casimir could be anywhere, adrift, a sitting duck!

Madison looked around. There were no status display screens or terminals here in the hyperspace chamber that meant anything to her. Of course she was totally unfamiliar with the Casimir's antiquated systems, many of which were barely holding together. Or else, modified far out of the norm.

On the Viper, the ships A.I. handled most of everything and was very proactive about keeping her informed. She needn't hardly lift a finger, save for piloting when she wanted too. So far as she could tell, the Casimir was an entirely different sort of ship.

“How do we know we've dropped out of hyperspace at the correct coordinates? How can we be sure there weren't any added delays to our journey?” she questioned out loud, the timbre of paranoia clear under her breath.

Captain Yago answered immediately, "Our intended destination is Ashkelon Station. If Apollo pulled us from hyperspace prematurely there would be a cautionary active status update, or else, an emergency alarm,” he gestured to wall panel display, "I don't see anything like that. We're probably exactly where we're supposed to be."

“I will confirm that as soon as we get to the bridge!” Sophelia chimed in. She was young, petit, maybe twenty one or twenty two? Clearly Greek like her father, but pretty, with thick hair of dark curls.

Madison looked back at Sophelia, and the others, noting they were all looking at her like she was psychologically damaged goods. Admittedly, they may be right. Madison would never forget what she'd seen, what she'd survived. Post-traumatic-stress was the least of her worries at the moment. Common Mad, pull yourself together!

At the moment, she was at a loss about how to convince them to take her seriously? Madison was never good like that with people. Maybe I am just overreacting over nothing? Fausto may still be alive and the egg may still be safely frozen.

Then again, her habit to expect the worst was the only reason she was still alive. That wasn't a habit she intended to break just now, especially when her instincts were screaming that she had to be on guard. Mad always trusted her instincts. The best she could do was make one last effort to warn them. She spoke as calmly as she could manage under the circumstances, “There may be a dangerous organism on board. An Alien.”

“Fuck my mothers ass!” Bartimaeus sputtered with a surprised outburst of ill-humor.

Madison clenched her jaw to keep herself in check, I'm telling the truth you stupid son of a bitch!

“What are you talking about?! How could something like that get on board?!” Captain Yago questioned, raising his voice, moving forward to stand beside Bartimaeus putting his wife and son behind him protectively. Madison cringed, These people were making too much fucking noise!

Madison ignored his question and continued, "I'll go out first. It's safer that way. One person moving alone might avoid attention. I'm the only one with experience going up against these things so it should be me. If you're smart, you'll shut that pressure door behind me and keep quiet!” she implored them, “I'll come back once I'm armed and cover the rest of you.”

“Fuck that and fuck you!” Bartimaeus growled shoving a finger in her face.

Ok asshole, suit yourself, Madison turned and left them behind, opening the pressure door, passing under it and out into the corridor alone. Behind her back they started to argue and call after her, but that was just noise now. The expectation of impending combat and a contest of survival with the demons from her nightmares flipped a switch in her mind. Adrenaline rushed through her veins sending her heart rate racing. Piggy-backed on that surge of energy came intense focus. It was just her now. Her and the Alien.

Just past the threshold of the pressure door Madison found her robe on a peg where she'd left it hanging above her slippers. As she slipped those unto her bare feet she pulled her undershirt up over her head. Naked above the waist her skin trembled and shivered with pierced nipples. All her body jewelry had to be removed before hypersleep of course and there was no good reason to put it back in now.

Tattoo's of icy blue flames licked across her chest spreading from a beautifully rendered frozen rose on her sternum. More ink across her right shoulder showcased a bandolier of brilliant chrome bullets hanging over her shoulder blade. One bullet for each of her successful hunts. Thus far there were about two dozen. Eventually she planned on another matching tattoo over her left shoulder.

Here and there, other tattoo's of personal significance made her body a canvas of self expression. The name of her favorite cat. The date of her first hunt. The chemical equation for gunpowder. Etc. Other bits of art included jesters, Succubi, playful fairies and the occasional morbid skull.

Madison noted one other robe and set of slippers were already missing as she donned hers, Fausto's!

To her right was a locker room and crew bunk. Her clothes were in there, the ones she wore before she disrobed at least, but something else might be in there too. She didn't open the door. She kept moving, keeping her back against the padded corridor wall. In her hands she folded up her undershirt and wrapped it around her face, over her mouth, tying it behind her neck. The makeshift mask might keep the creepy crawling hand in the egg from implanting an embryo, or whatever the fuck it was, down her throat, Maybe.

Madison did her best to slow her breathing and keep her footsteps quiet; senses strained to the limit for the sake of survival. It was odd to her how many subtle noises this old starship was already making. Discordant undertones of machinery, electric solenoids, vibrating pipes, valves, fans and occasion bleeping electronics kept her eyes moving; peering into every nook, crevice and shadow. Fuck what I wouldn't do for a flamethrower right about now, she thought.

Madison asked for a tour of the M-Class star freighter as soon as she came on board, but at this moment she was struggling to recall its exact layout. It was quite a large ship, over three hundred and thirty meters long. From her own minds perspective that tour was less than a day ago, yet in reality it was actually closer to two months since they left Torin Prime behind them. Any memories she had exploring this ship so recently felt vague and disconnected.

The first chamber she entered on the Casimir's Lower A-Deck was a companionway junction. To the right was the mess hall and beyond that, the bridge. That much she recognized plainly. It was tempting to rush for the bridge immediately. There she could at least get a bearing on their coordinates and catch a glimpse of whatever there was to see through the exterior windows? Ashkelon station might be looming large ahead of them at this very moment! If that was true she could call for aid, and even if it wasn't, she could at least send out a long-range S.O.S.

However, here were too many shadows, blind corners and hiding places in the mess hall. No way she would risk it without arming herself first! She also recalled that straight ahead, across the companionway, around another corner on the far side was the med bay. There were drugs there. Drugs she desperately wanted to help keep herself calm. Yet directly in front of her, at the center of the companionway, was a ladder leading down to B-Deck. B-Deck was where her weapons and other belongings were stored in another locker/bunk room near the forward air lock.

Just a short climb down, one level. Then maybe five yards worth of corridor, and she would have access to her firearms again. Thinking about it like that made it seem like the obvious priority. Holding her favorite F90 assault rifle or automatic shotgun would be better than drugs.

Slowly she stepped over to the handrails of the ladder and froze. Was that blood on the rungs right there? Peering closely she reached out and touched it. Dried blood, cold against the metal. Fausto had come this way, but which way? Up or down?

She peered down first. From here the ladder went all the way down to C-Deck. C-Deck was where the cryo-coffin was stored in one of the cargo holds. He must have gone down first if he was after whatever she was trying to hide. Next she glanced up.

Above her, the ladder ended at the upper level of A-Deck. There was a topside observatory up there offering a good view of the stars. More spots of dried blood marked rungs all the way up. So he did go up there, but why was he wounded first? Was he still up there right now?

Madison had no answers, only questions. There was only one way to reach an understanding of what was happening so she stepped unto the ladder and started to descend. Just then, the loud voice of Bartimaeus called out from the corridor behind her, “FAUSTO! Where the fuck are you?!”

Madison moved faster. There was little point trying to remain quiet now and no point yelling back at him to shut up. She glimpsed Bartimaeus moving around the corner from the exit of the corridor beyond the hypersleep chamber just as her head dropped below floor level. He was dressed now, booted feet making loud clomping and scuffing noises on the deck plating. The others would be close behind him. Fools!

As she was just near to stepping off on B-Deck she glanced up again and felt her heart freeze in her chest. An elongated skull was peering down over the edge at the top of the ladder, teeth clenched and hissing; a grinning visage of death incarnate. Arching and waving above its poised form was a long, wickedly-hooked segmented tail, moving quick as a whip.

Before she could even think to cry out, the Alien was already in motion. So fast! A blur of liquid shadow and claws. Madison threw herself off the ladder, half-rolled and scrabbled back to her feet. Both her slippers came off in the process but she hardly cared. Above her an overture of shouts and horrified gasps erupted as the Alien fell upon the ships crew. An opera of screams was soon to follow.