Chapter 16 - Part III

(Sofia)

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After travelling for a few minutes down a rock tunnel that was clearly not manmade, the sleek smuggler craft entered a cavern that possessed no gravity – artificial or otherwise. In other words, there were no generators around to supply an artificial gravity using effect-fields. It was probably because the lack of a field would reduce the likelihood this region of the Island would be discovered.

By manipulating the holovid screen using the small handheld remote I’d been loaned, I used the device to look around the exterior of the craft at the surrounding cavern.

The enclosure was large enough to house an apartment complex. There were a couple of large crates anchored down to the rock floor and walls using cargo meshes. I saw a handful of low-slung craft that might have been cargo sleds floating near one wall of the cavern, and fuel canisters were moored to the floor nearby. Other than that, the place was deserted. That is, there was no one waiting for us.

I swung the holovid around some more, using it to look back down the tunnel leading into the cavern.

One way in. One way out.

At least, that’s what I thought I till saw a dark shadow near one corner of the cavern.

Hah. So they have an escape route.

Sitting on the cabin seat, I rationalized why the smugglers were being so considerate toward me.

Having been saved by the busty young woman calling herself, Sayen, I was then treated like an important guest. I believed it was because they didn’t want to get on Crimson Crescent’s bad side. Not many people do. Knowing my father was the founder and Big Kahuna of Crimson Crescent, had sent them into a brief spin. However, after I told them why I was here, the wheels began to spin in their heads, and they became downright concerned.

I was now wondering if I should have lied, but Sayen had put the fear of the gods in me, so I’d blurted out the truth of our mission.

The cabin had grown very quiet, and then Sayen had told the two men with her to afford me every courtesy. So now I found myself being treated like a first-class passenger aboard a star liner. I had travelled first-class once, but in disguise of course. That was an experience. A totally awesome experience.

Anyway, more about that another time.

The smuggler craft came to a stop in the middle of the cavern, near the anchored sleds, but it didn’t touched down. Through my Awareness-field, I sensed it fire anchors from the ship’s belly into the ground. A few moments later, Sayen emerged from the cockpit and swaggered into the main cabin. She struck a pose, like a runway model – though with her figure she’d never model for a major label – and addressed the two men sharing the cabin with me.

“Right, boys. Time to load up and make the run to Island Five.”

One of the men – a blonde, clean-shaven young guy whose name I learnt in conversation was Frankfurt – raised a weary hand. “Anego, when you say load up, how much are we talking about?”

“As much as we can toss into the ship and the cargo sleds.”

The second young man, a guy with short cropped hair that gave his head a flat top, waved a hand about as though exhausted. “So we’re ditching this joint?”

Sayen planted her hands on her hips, the motion making her enormous breasts bounce. Given how tight her mini-skirt dress was, I really had to wonder at the weight of her bosom.

She grinned excitedly. “I’d rather hope not. However, we need to deliver the goods we were paid for because I really don’t want a bounty on our heads from that organization.”

She pointed at a back corner of the cabin, and while I didn’t understand what I was supposed to be looking at, I did see some boxes stacked high.

Frankfurt said, “But Anego, they probably blame us for those drones showing up.”

She lowered her hand back to her hip. “That’s why it’s important that we deliver the goods. We may even have to give them a discount.”

“But Anego—”

She shook her head, and her breasts rocked from side to side. “No arguments. We have a reputation to uphold, and we always deliver the goods. So we’re going to toss as much into the ship and the sleds, drop off the agreed amount at the backup delivery point, and then we decide whether to abandon Pharos for a more lucrative market, or simply lie low for a while. We certainly have enough saved up to go on a long, long vacation.”

I felt she was deliberately ignoring me while saying all this for my benefit.

Timidly, I raised a hand. “Um, Sayen?”

“What is it little girl?”

I winced at being called a little girl. Heck, I was bigger up top than most girls my age, but compared to her, I was squarely in a junior league.

Taking a quick breath, I asked, “What about me?”

“What about you?”

“What are you planning to do with me?”

Sayen blinked slowly. “Well. Do you want to join us?”

I blinked slowly. “Huh?”

Sayen’s grin widened and looked creepy to me. “Want to live life on the edge?”

“Anego,” Frankfurt said, “that’s easy for you to say. You’re so damn powerful. But this girl—”

Sayen nodded and so too did her breasts. “Agreed. She’s small fry.”

I winced again and felt deflated—I mean defeated—but was surprised when Sayen stepped up to me and grinned down at me over the tops of her breasts. I immediately wondered how she tied up her shoes, or zipped up her boots with those mountains in the way.

Please dear gods, don’t let me grow as big as her.

With a grin, Sayen asked, “So, how would you like to be big fry?”

“Heh?” I couldn’t stop myself from glancing at her chest. “Ah...well….”

Sayen leaned down toward me, probably so she could see me better. “How would you like a real Artifact?”

This time my attention was wholly on her face. “What…?”

“What do you say?” she asked. “Interested?”

Studying the expression she was making, I tried to judge if she was being sincere. She looked serious about her offer, so I took a chance and nodded. “Okay. I’m listening.”

“I’ll take that Siren off your hands—”

“No!” I quickly stood up. “No, this Siren was given to me by my mother. No. I’d rather keep it and be a small fry.”

Sayen jerked back with a surprised look, but her grin came back strong after a moment. “Okay. Okay. Relax. But seriously—how would you like to master a really powerful Artifact?”

“Well…I’d like that very much…,” I admitted.

“Good. Then in return, we could use your help.”

I swallowed and narrowed my eyes at her. “How…?”

“Join us on our venture. We could use another hand, especially a Familiar. You showed some talent when you led those Public Security Zeroes on quite a run.”

“You want me to be smuggler?”

“Sure. The pay is good, and you get to travel a lot. You can experience the thrill of the chase and being chased! And we can get matching tattoos.”

Frankfurt choked, and the young man with the flat top haircut – I think his name was Holland – groaned loudly.

“Uh, Anego. About the tattoo, you really should reconsider.”

Sayen frowned and bit her lower lip. “Okay. Then how about a belly ring?”

My mouth dropped open. “Eh?”

“Want to see mine?” she asked, and started lifting up her tight dress.

Frankfurt and Holland moved in a hurry, and grabbed onto the bottom of her dress.

“No!”

“Don’t do it!”

“You’ll scar her for life.”

Sayen struggled against them. “There’s nothing wrong with my navel ring.”

Frankfurt disagreed. “It’s not your belly ring. It’s the tattoo you have down there!”

Holland blurted out, “She’s too young to be seeing something like that!”

Sayen stopped struggling, and the men relaxed. “Oh, alright. Maybe when she’s older.”

The two men dropped to their knees, and Frankfurt asked, “Whatever possessed you to get that horrid thing?”

“I thought it was funny,” Sayen replied. “I mean they do call it the gates of paradise—oomf!”

Both men shot to their feet and clapped their hands over her mouth.

Frankfurt pleaded, “Anego, not another word. Please. We beg you.”

Sayen’s eyes were wide in surprise, but she nodded after a moment or two.

Cautiously, Frankfurt and Holland released her and stepped back.

However, they weren’t breathing sighs of relief just yet.

Feeling cheated, Sayen crossed her arms, supporting her bust in the process. She faced me and asked, “Well, give it some thought.”

I swallowed loudly, clearing my throat and a little of my surprise. “…okay….”

The truth was, I was giving it some thought, and that surprised me far more than the young woman’s antics.

A life away from Crimson Crescent.

Before I considered it further, I remembered the mission, and realized it was something that needed to be accomplished first, before I could think of life away from Crimson Crescent…and away from Father.

“Right,” Sayen declared. “There’s an atmosphere in the cavern, so no need for pressure suits. Let’s get out there and start loading up. We have no idea how long before those drones find the entrance and catch up with us.”

The men started strapping thruster packs to their legs and arms. With no gravity, they needed some way to propel themselves around the cavern interior.

Holland said, “Anego, the sensors in the tunnel will tell us. We’ll have plenty of warning.”

“Besides,” Frankfurt added, “you can just go out there and blow them away.”

Sayen looked faintly displeased. “Sure, sure. Now hurry up.”

Stepping up to the portside cabin door, she slid it open, then looked back at me. “Girl, summon your Siren and give us hand.”

I hesitated for a moment, a reaction she didn’t miss, then slumped my shoulders faintly as I nodded. “Okay….”

Without another word, Sayen jumped out and started floating away on her back.

“Wee. Zero gee backstroke,” she cried out happily.

Holland muttered loud enough for me to hear him through my Awareness-field. “Bloody Hell, Anego. Can’t you take the situation seriously?”

Frankfurt snickered. “Hey, she’s just giving her chest a rest. Zero gee is good for her back.”

Holland chortled. “You know, all this time, I’ve never been able to figure out if they’re real or not.”

Frankfurt shrugged. “Does it matter?”

“Guess not.”

Both men stopped at the hatch and watched Sayen swimming through the backstroke through the air, her mountainous chest rising proudly from her body.

“They sure are amazing to watch….”

“Bloody Hell they are….”

I coughed politely, and crossed my arms, under my less than mountainous appeal.

They both stiffened, and then turned their heads slowly toward me.

Holland smiled nervously. “We were…admiring the view….”

Frankfurt nodded rigidly. “Yeah, all these natural formations.”

I arched my eyebrows at them. “Natural…formations…?”

“We should get to work,” Frankfurt declared.

“I agree. Time’s a wasting,” Holland seconded.

They leapt out and headed for the crates meshed together to the rock wall.

After a few seconds, I leapt out too, and summoned my Siren Maiden. With it, I was able to fly about with ease. I’d trained with Siren for many long hours in zero-gravity, so I was able to help the two men unhook the meshes, and release the cargo crates without fear of messing up.

The crates weren’t that large, but even though they were weightless in zero-gee, they weren’t mass-less, so it still took some effort to get the moving and get them stopped. I had my Siren scan them with her sensors, and she reported they were packed to the brim with powder. I didn’t recognize the chemical composition, and neither did my Siren.

Should I ask them what’s inside the crates? No, maybe not.

Holland used a remote to control a cargo sled, bringing it closer to the crates, and I worked with them to load up the craft. Because the cargo compartment wasn’t high, we couldn’t stack the crates. In the end, we had to settle for packing them tightly in one layer.

During all this, I noticed Sayen was swimming from one cavern corner to the next.

So much for doing her share of the work.

I looked down at the loaded sled.

And what the Hell am I doing? Should I really be helping them?

I gave it some thought, and figured these people were my best bet to getting in touch with Crimson Crescent. I knew that Father had operatives squirreled away in Pharos. Even if I couldn’t join up with Maestro, at the least I could find a way home.

Home.

I looked up at the ceiling cavern.

Did I really want to go home?

Turning halfway, I looked behind me at the smuggler craft some two dozen meters away.

The Marginal Profit was a cigar shaped, mat black craft around thirteen meters long, and five meters wide. Its streamlined body had thrusters and field-emitter clusters tucked tight against its hull, allowing it to fly down narrow tunnels like a sort of oblate bullet. Overall, it reminded me of a salamander, but instead of legs, it had tear drop shaped thruster assemblies and no tail.

I turned back to the view of Sayen floating like a busty mermaid in zero gravity.

“Is she always like this?” I asked.

Holland was working a second sled closer, and glanced at Sayen. “Nah, she’s normally a lot worse.”

“Worse?” I questioned.

Frankfurt snorted loudly. “Oh for sure. She’s holding herself back because of you.”

“Because of me, or because I’m the daughter of Crimson Crescent’s leader?”

“Both, I’d say.” Frankfurt crossed his arms, despite the thrusters attached to his forearms. “Honestly, I’m surprised she’s taken such a shine to you.”

Holland drifted closer. “Been a long time since we’ve seen her like this.”

“Yeah. She looks bloody happy.”

“Happy like when she’s planning a new venture.”

“Yeah, that happy.”

I frowned inwardly, feeling confused and complicated.

So I’m her new venture? What in high heavens has she planned for me?

I heard something like an alarm coming from the earpieces the men wore. Holland and Frankfurt turned to look at the smuggler craft, then at the rock tunnel we’d travelled through to get to the cavern.

Sayen stopped swimming, and was bathed in the darkness of the black mist. She emerged from it a couple of seconds later, wearing the stylish black armor that I didn’t recognize. Beside her, floated two black Vector Clusters, each of them resembling winged birds.

Of a sudden, through my Siren’s expanded Awareness-field, I sensed the surroundings tremble.

Something was racing through the asteroid Island.

Something my Siren believed was an explosive shockwave.

Sayen yelled, “Get back in the ship!”

Neither man argued, and I followed them back to the anchored craft.

“Release anchors,” Sayen ordered with a loud cry. “Slave the loaded sled to the Profit, and floor it!”

I arrived at the open hatch a heartbeat before Sayen, and glimpsed the tunnel we’d come down glowing with a distant white light. It was like the light of mag-lev surging toward us at incredible speed.

Around us, the cavern began to break apart.

Sayen pushed me inside, then slammed the hatch shut – leaving herself outside the craft.

“Anego!” Frankfurt cried out.

I heard the woman’s voice enter the cabin through hidden speakers. “Get moving!”

“What about you?” Holland asked.

“I’ll follow. The cargo sled will never keep up without my help.”

“But Anego—”

“Just get moving!”

Frankfurt shook his head. “She’s crazy. She’s bloody crazy.”

“No, she’s not,” Holland said. “Even slaved to the Profit the sled can’t maneuver like the ship can.”

“Then we use an effect-field to tow it.”

“Can you guarantee we won’t lose the sled?” Holland asked in a harsh tone.

Frankfurt drew back but when he started to reply, Holland shook his head hard and fast.

“Anego won’t risk losing that sled. Without it, we’re all dead, and she knows that.”

Wrapped in my Siren Armor, I was consuming much of the interior. For a heartbeat I thought of heading outside, but instead asked, “Can she do that? Can she really push it and keep up with us?”

Holland’s jaw clenched before he replied, “With that monster Artifact of hers—yeah, she can.”

I felt a surge of power rush through the ship, and the engines whined loudly before they can began to roar. The tremor of the anchors retracting was almost lost in the great shudder the ship released.

From the cockpit came the voice of another young man, and I remembered there was a pilot and co-pilot up front. “Hold onto something. We’re punching out of here!”

Before he finished the sentence, the ship began moving with a sudden hard kick the inertial cancellers couldn’t handle in time. I used Siren’s effect-fields to steady myself within the cabin. At the same time, I used two effect-fields to hold onto Holland and Frankfurt, preventing them from crashing into the rear bulkheads of the main cabin.

The men gasped, but shot me thankful looks.

I was kind of surprised that I’d helped them, so I turned away my face to hide it. But that made me quickly focus on what was happening outside the ship.

*Siren, expand the Awareness-field to max. I want to know what’s happening out there.

[ACKNOWLEDGED.]

Closing my eyes as my perception of my surroundings ballooned to a gigantic size, and I could sense Sayen flying behind the Marginal Profit and the cargo sled.

Behind her, a massive heat wave rushing toward us, ripping up the tunnel and roaring into the cavern.

The Marginal Profit jumped down into the exit tunnel I’d noticed on the holovid when we first arrived.

As the ship rolled and twisted, following an invisible racing line down the tunnel, I realized this wasn’t a tunnel but a crack – a fissure – in the asteroid’s body. I remembered that Island One was a seventy kilometer long chunk of rock from a dead moon. Something that size was bound to have numerous fissures and cavern sized pockets.

Did they map out the fissure and decide they could use it as an escape route?

The Siren Maiden flexed her effect-fields and I noticed her inertial-fields had manifested, cancelling out most of the stomach twisting maneuvers the Marginal Profit was performing as it raced ahead of the heat wave.

As unbelievable as it was, Sayen was flying behind us, pushing the cargo sled ahead of her.

Just what’s inside those crates? What’s so important about them that she would risk her life by racing ahead of the fireball?

I noticed something I’d failed to pick up on until now.

The ship was maneuvering with a precision and skill that I thought was impossible for a human pilot, cutting a razor sharp path down the fissure, keeping mere meters away from the ragged, jagged rock walls.

Is it an automated system, an Artificial Awareness, or could it be…?

I turned my attention upon the cockpit, and sensed the two men seated at the controls.

Could it be…they’re Familiars?

I had yet to meet them, but through my Awareness-field I could picture their appearances. One was large and burly. The other slightly shorter and slender with a well-toned physique. Both of them were neural-linked to the Marginal’s control systems.

If they could pilot the ship this well, I was certain they were Overclocked Familiars, but I couldn’t pick up the presence of an Awareness-field so I suspected they didn’t have Fragments or Artifacts of their own. That surprised me since Sayen had offered one to me.

So why me and not them?

“Anego—you still with us?” Frankfurt asked.

“I’m with you. Be quiet and don’t distract me.”

I looked to the stern of the ship, and focused my Awareness-field on Sayen and the sled.

She was steering the cargo sled by using the effect-fields projecting from her Artifact. The sled was completed wrapped in those fields. At the same time, she was propelling herself along with maneuver-fields of incredible power.

I wondered how fast we were racing down the fissure, and Siren gave me an answer a heartbeat later.

Six—six hundred kilometers an hour!

The ship continued to follow its mad twisting course for another handful of seconds, but began to slow down when the flames no longer licked at our tails.

“Thank the bloody gods,” Sayen said loudly into the cabin. “I need a damn shower.”

Frankfurt and Holland looked at each other. “What the Hell is going?” they asked at the same time.

With the mad flight coming to an end, I had two questions in my mind.

Where were we going? And what had we just outraced?

Was it an explosion of some kind?

I looked back in the direction we’d travelled.

Sayen was still pushing the sled along, though not as hard as before. Behind us, the fissure was no longer glowing hotly because it had been buried shut when the rock walls caved into it.

Seeing that, I had to wonder how much damage the explosion had done to the asteroid’s interior.

The blast came from the direction of the Old Docks….

My stomach clenched painfully as my thoughts came together into unanswered questions that felt more frantic than the last.

Don’t tell me—did the Pantra blow up? Did Maestro order it destroyed?

I noticed I was biting my lower lip and made myself stop.

Could an exploding ship release such a massive explosion?

If the Pantra was gone, then what about Maestro and his people? Had they gone down with the ship, or escaped by using the explosion as a diversion? But if it wasn’t the Pantra blowing up, then what had caused that explosion? If the last was true, then had the Pantra and Maestro escaped the blast?

Around me, the Marginal Profit slowed down a little more as it entered a narrow stretch of the fissure that looked more like a regular tunnel. Again, I could tell this much because of my Awareness-field. The ship flew down the tunnel and entered a large cavern with flat walls and ceilings, and I realized we were inside an underground bunker.

Then I saw that it wasn’t a bunker, but an underground parking lot.

Concentrating the Awareness-field like a narrow yet bright searchlight, I swept it around and studied what I could see through the field.

It was a parking lot, but it looked abandoned. The piping was leaky, and power conduits barely functioned so there was little electricity flowing through to the lights mounted to the ceiling. The interior was mostly dark, and I saw through the Awareness-field a handful of derelict vehicles. The gravity simulated by effect-field generators buried underground was weak, probably no more than half-a-gee.

I wondered if this place was simply forgotten over the years because it was no longer used, or maybe someone had removed it from the architectural records. From my knowledge of Crimson Crescent’s activities, I knew that the Lorelai Meisters my Father employed frequently altered the structural records of asteroid colonies and stations in order to create hiding spots.

So there are places like this inside Pharos too….

I widened my Awareness-field so that it surrounded the ship, but that shrunk its size down to a radius of a hundred feet. But it was big enough for me to sense when the ship touched ground, its landing skids gripped the cracked permacrete, stopping the ship from floating off in the weak gravity.

From the cockpit, the younger of the two men called out, “We’re here.”

“Bloody Hell,” Holland muttered grimly. “What the Hell just happened?”

The portside hatch opened, and I saw Sayen standing beside the ship, clad in her Artifact. The black Skin-Regalia resembled a something the evil witch of the woods might wear in a fairytale if she was crossed with a super sexy dominatrix and medieval knight wearing too little armor to be of any use. However, right now, no one was paying attention to the mountains on her chest, or her sexy Skin-Regalia. That was because Sayen looked furious, and she was directing that fury at me.

“Start talking,” she said to me.

Maybe because her voice was low made it more frightening than if she’d shouted at me.

I swallowed hard a couple of times, then took a deep breathe. Still wearing my Siren Armor, I stepped to the middle of the cabin.

“I…I don’t…I mean…I can’t be sure…but—”

“But what?” she asked, her voice still low but steely hard.

“But…but that might have been…the Pantra blowing up.”

Sayen’s eyes narrowed into thin slits. “Explain.”

I swallowed again, and took another couple of breaths. But I didn’t delay as I could sense she was growing impatient.

“The crew were Imprinted by my Father’s people. They were smugglers that betrayed Crimson Crescent to the Enforcer Fleet. So his people captured them, Imprinted them, and used them to take us here to Pharos as part of the mission.”

“They were expendable,” Sayen said.

I nodded feebly. “Yes…they were expendable….”

“So in the event of capture, they were Imprinted to blow themselves up.”

My stomach clenched under pressure from the truth in her words. I gave her another feeble nod. “Yes, but…but not inside Pharos.”

Sayen’s eyes widened slightly. “What do you mean?”

“I heard they were supposed to be a diversion, so blowing up inside the Island wasn’t supposed to happen. My father may be a heartless, ruthless bastard, but killing innocents isn’t high on his to-do list.”

“So he’s not keen on collateral damage? Then what about the superfreighter explosion six years ago?”

I could feel the men’s gazes on me, and in the corner of my eye, I saw two men step out of the cockpit and enter the front of the cabin. But most of my attention was on Sayen who stood deathly still just beyond the open hatch.

“I don’t know about that,” I answered honestly. “Ask my father.”

The young woman took a long step back, and half turned away from the ship to look into the cavernous parking lot.

Her voice was softer than before. “If that really was your ship blowing up, and it wasn’t supposed to happen inside the Old Docks, then either something went wrong…or someone planned it that way.”

My eyes flared wide open as a shiver ran through my body. “You mean it was deliberate…?”

Sayen’s gaze met mine when only her eyes swung my way. “Like I said, it could simply mean that something went wrong. The smuggler crew may have triggered the explosion because they had no other choice. But that would mean the option to do so—the option for an early death—was Imprinted into them.”

I had trouble swallowing. “You mean…they were Imprinted to blow themselves up, rather than run away and then blow up.”

“Precisely,” she replied.

“But that would put the mission at risk….” My voice trailed away as my thoughts grew dark and desperate in the face of that truth.

Sayen smiled at me, as though reading my troubled thoughts. “It’s possible your comrades have a traitor in their midst.”

I forgot to breathe.

I felt as though my heart had stopped too, and my chest grew tight, squeezed by a vice-like grip.

Was it her? Was it Merkala? She wasn’t part of Maestro’s Crew. I heard she came along for the ride at my Father’s orders. But if she came with us because of my Father, did she Influence and Imprint the crew with new orders? I just don’t get it. If Merkala is the traitor, did Father know this or not? Or is she working with Father? What reason does he have for sabotaging the mission at all?

I squeezed my eyes shut, but Sayen’s voice cut into my thoughts as she muttered somberly, probably to herself. “Whatever the truth, we’ve got problems of our own.”

Behind me, Frankfurt asked, “Anego…what the Bloody Hell do we do now?”

Opening my eyes, I watched Sayen cross her arms slowly. “We deliver the goods at the second drop-off point. Like I said, I don’t want to get on the organization’s bad side.”

“And then what?” Holland asked.

She took a deep breath that ballooned out her chest.

“Honestly…I haven’t thought that far.”