Humanity Endures

Part 9 - Infiltration | Chapter 4

Terxah nodded, and stated clearly, "Understood, sir."

Velan gestured for her to be on her way, and, without saying a word, Terxah snapped to attention in agreement and marched through the nearest pair of doors, a mixed squad of formerly Nemesis and Kalithiharian marines following behind her. Velan didn't blame Kalmah for wanting to escape the chaos that he presided over, but not only did he have to prevent future desertions, but there was a certain Wraith that he had to appease if he wanted to keep breathing — his choice to bring her back on board was, like all the other decisions he had made for the sake of his crew, driven by cold pragmatism.

***

Falmenec exhaled deeply, his mind awash with a mixture of scientific thoughts, inspiration, and the insidious pangs of fear that had so defined the past fifteen minutes. Around him was the bullet-riddled interior of one of the station's more-intact labs; to his right was an ever-stoic, yet increasingly impatient, Korthekar, and before him, suspended in a stabilizing fluid, a small lump of human-looking flesh seemed to gaze at him mockingly. Drumming his armored left hand's fingers on the smooth surface of the digital desk before him, Falmenec, cursing the elusive tissue sample, then reached across the desk with his right hand, which grasped the handle of his improved alien detector. Raising the scanner into the air and pointing it squarely at a lump of human-looking tissue, Falmenec, shuddering with anticipation, then clasped the trigger of his device with a vigor born of desperation. A moment later, the device began to whir and cackle with activity; another half-minute, and the device chimed.

"Specimen is human" the device read, its audible whirring quickly dying down. Falmenec, uttering another curse and slumping in his chair, began to wonder whether or not he would ever complete his task; a glance at the unmoving Korthekar, however, and Falmenec, realizing that the lives of everyone else on the station depended on him, wearily returned to work, intent on exploring the next mote of inspiration he had. After the most recent failure, he was less than hopeful, but he had to try nevertheless — if he had only fought when he had hope, he would have died long ago.

***

Terxah, eager to redeem herself, clear her name, and be close enough to the rest of the crew that she could intervene if things got out of hand, barrelled through the gore-covered interior of the space station, not even bothering to check the corners and hallways she passed for aliens, while her marine squad struggled to keep up. Her rapid advance was made towards the starboard escape pod bay, a room dedicated to the storage and control of the station's escape pods, for it was there that she would be able to deploy various countermeasures that could bring the wayward escape pod, and its essential occupant, back on board the beleaguered station — even if it did not want to return.

Rounding another, blood-stained corner, and leaping over a small pile of thoroughly-looted human corpses, Terxah, observing the escape-pod through the external cameras of the station, was surprised to see that it remained in proximity to the station itself, though this made sense: if the pod were to fly away from the station and suffer a malfunction, Kalmah would be marooned in the Remnant with no hope of rescue. By staying near the space station, Kalmah would be protected from the trigger-happy ones amongst Velan's force, while also remaining safeguarded from aliens. It was an ingenious plan, though it was amazingly selfish, and, sadly, it conflicted with Terxah's commands. Recalling that all Tekran ships were legally required to be able to summon launched escape pods back to the host ship in case of a misfire — so long as the escape pod had not manually disabled this feature — Terxah then interfaced with the station's systems and activated this return protocol. Observing the escape pod through a nearby telescopic camera, she watched as the engines on Kalmah's escape pod flickered to life.

Grinning, Terxah and her escort rounded another corner and was met with the gore-filled, hallway-like room she had been seeking; from here, they could retrieve their person of interest. Bullet holes lined the room's walls, immolated alien corpses lay strewn about, and the original metallic floor was invisible for the ocean of dried human blood that completely covered it, but despite all of this, as the chamber still possessed the means of launching and receiving escape pods, it would serve Terxah adequately.

Viewing Kalmah's escape pod again, Terxah became certain of her triumph as the escape pod began to draw nearer Velan's station; yet, as the escape pod's engines flickered and died a moment later, this anticipation died as well. When the pod's engines ignited an instant afterward to increase the distance between the pod and the station, Terxah, remaining calm and not so much as uttering a curse, sought other means of bringing the pod aboard, now that she knew the pod's occupant was capable of hacking machinery. Terxah then calculated that even if she could not bring the pod aboard the space station through normal means, she could still leverage emotion and threats to coerce her objective — people were variables difficult to account for, yet easily manipulated.

Accessing every single external weapon on the station within but a few seconds, Terxah then locked all of these onto the rogue pod; opening up communications to Kalmah — though this was a difficult act in the Remnant, it was more than possible at such short distances — Terxah dispatched an explanatory textcomm.

"You have fifteen seconds to dock with this station before I blast you into quarks and gluons," read Terxah's brief statement, which, if anything, got the message across. While Terxah waited for a reply from Kalmah, her quantum communicator — which was paired with a similar device owned by Velan — chimed; glancing at it, Terxah became privy to its message.

"Revision to my last order: If you're able to, have Kalmah's escape pod dock with the station but do not open it; things are getting worse here, and after her attempt at fleeing, she would likely be shot under suspicion of being alien," it read.

Terxah replied, stating that she understood and would comply; the station's circuitry informed her that Kalmah's pod was making its way towards her escape pod bay, and Terxah finally cracked a victorious grin. Once Kalmah's pod slid into one of the station's docking tubes a few seconds later, Terxah had the station's systems in that area shut down, trapping the pod, and with it, Kalmah, in the claustrophobic space — though, at the same time, both of these were incredibly safe. The muffled, sobbed words "Let me out!" could be heard, but Terxah, compelled by orders, ignored these pleas entirely. Shutting down escape pod systems station-wide after this, so that no one else could try to flee, Terxah, satisfied at having accomplished another task, began the minor trek back to Velan's makeshift bunker. Of course, were this bunker and the rest of the station to fall, Kalmah was trapped in a missile-sized escape pod that was itself trapped in a docking tube, and she would be utterly helpless; however, Terxah, who had no intention of allowing the station to fall to the aliens, gave no thought to this potentiality as she marched, assault rifle in hand. Currently, half the crew rightfully feared her, and they didn't even know what she was; if the aliens, despite knowing the truth, did not already share this fear, she would soon make them.