The crude plasma forged glass crackled under Rene’s feet as he ran across the concealed concrete pad. Heat still radiated up from the surface his feet and knees uncomfortabley warm. Not for the first time he wished he had a set of temperature stable fatigues. He hated to leave Solae but any chance of her survival lay in taking the ship as quickly and as bloodlessly as possible. Rene was no spacer but her had more experience with ship and with close quaters violence than anyone else present.

Ignoring the obvious route he leaped up against the side of the ship, snatched the emergency handholds and pulled himself hand over hand up onto the dorsal spine. For a moment he balance on top of the ship, fully half the height of the main house. From the vantage point the night looked like a black ocean, the limited moonlight painting the tops of trees silver. He took two clanging steps across the spine of the ship and dropped through an open air shaft into the main hold.

Even having caught the edges of the access port to break as much momentum as possible, Rene still hit the deck with a considerable clang. He was in the main hold, a ten meter by twenty meter box that took up nearly half the ships internal volume. Rather than deck plates, the floor was a corrugated metal grating raised ten centimeters above the bottom of the compartment. The underlying deck plates were slick and shiny and the whole place reeked. At the end of the compartment stood a large man wearing a shapeless grease stained jumpsuit. He had a high pressure hose in his hand and was hosing off what looked like low metal couches, the water coming off them ran black as river silt.

They were stretchers for the slaves. Rene realised, they put them in comas to transport them but they didn’t make any provision for waste beyond hosing it into this improvised drainage sump at the end of each voyage. Rene struggled not to gag, though evidently the man using the hose had enough exposure to Syshin excreta to have gone nose blind to it because a tobacco stick hung from his slack lips as he gawped in shock at the dark clad figure who had just fallen from the sky. Rene struggled for some quick clever lie that would make the man stand down but between the stink and his own revulsion nothing came to him. 

The grease stained man dropped the hose  and grabbed at a holster on his overburdened utility belt. It hit the deck with a metallic clang, the pressure making the nozzle whip like a scorched snake as it sprayed water uncontrollably.  Rene unslung the mob gun, leveled and fired in a single smooth action. The weapon coughed like a god clearing its throat as the dispersal charge blew a storm of areofoil blades down the barrel. Mob guns were a good choice in close quarters, and particularly in spacecraft. The lightweight ceramic blades couldn’t inflict serious damage to machinery but spread into a flesh devouring cloud over short distances. Rene would have preferred his pistol but a misplaced plasma bolt might cut an oxygen line or destroy some irreplaceable hardware. The first shot went wide, with a crackle like a hundred glass bottles being dropped onto concrete. The walls were covered with cargo netting behind which tools and supplies were contained. The netting flew appart in a storm of fibers and crates and boxes tumbled free in a mini avalanche. Rene cursed and worked the pump, driving another round into the chamber and spitting the hot empty, sizzling and smoking, to the deck. 

“Put it dow..” Rene started to scream but it was too late, the creman finally pulled his pistol free of his holster and started to raise it. The mob gun coughed a second time. This time the blast caught the man full in the chest, shredding him where he stood. The hose exploded from a dozen puncture points along its rubberized length as the unfortunate crewman was flung back into a bulkhead with a wet crunch like a steak hitting a butchers block. His tabacco stick spun in the air for a second before dropping into the water with a soft hiss.  Blood ran down into the grating along with the other filth. 

Rene brushed what he hoped was water from his space and ran to the bulkhead door which led towards the cockpit. He saw a figure peering down the access gangway and bought his gun up. The man dived sideways into a compartment Rene couldn’t see and the blast of his mob gun tore up empty deck plates, sending puffs of insulating flying from a nearby access panel that hand’t be properly secured. He moved to step into the accessway but before he could enter a fire containment door slammed down between him and his destination. Cursing, Rene pounded on the door with the butt of his weapon, succeeding only in scratching the paint. Two or three hostile crewman stood between him and the cockpit. Worse they could get access to Solae. If he had his sword maybe he could have gone through the door but he had left that with Kalrio to protect Solae.

“Stars bloody burn me for an idiot!” he cursed and raced back to the mangled body of the crewman he had killed. The blast had cut the utility belt to pieces and scattered tools in a broad arc of destruction. Water from the severed hose soaked his knees and legs as, desperately, he started grabbing gear, looking for something, anything he could use to get the door open.






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“Mistress Solae wouldn’t want me hurt would she?” Byona Prap wheedled through the honorific stuck in her throat.. The maid, or former maid now she supposed, paced the room in which she had been sealed, casting frequent glances out the window to where the Bonaventure had just touched down. She could see the pretty bitch’s hair as it caught stray light from the house.

“Uncertain, data is limited,” Argon replied with computerized good cheer. The maid ground her teeth. When she got out of here she was going to pound the AI into glass dust for confining her here. The overwrites Solae had used were far to complex for her to understand or dream of replicating. Byona was not a smart woman, but she had an animal cunning which had allowed her to eek out a comfortable living. Or at least it had before the Syshin loving bitch had showed up. Solae was instantly recognisable from the wanted holos and the extravagant rewards offered were beyond Byona’s dreams of avarice. 

“She would have already disposed of me if that were her plan,” Byona insisted in her faux reasonable tone. There was a slight pause.

“A reasonable assumption,” Agron conceded.

“If she dosen’t want to hurt me she wouldn’t deny me medical treatment would she?” Byona pressed. She glared out the window, wondering what that fool Lis was doing out there. Had the Noblewoman seduced him to assist her? It seemed unlikely while she had her cold eyed protector there to take care of her.

“You do not require medical treatment Byona Prap,” Argon replied, his sensors were not the high end class that the aristocrats like Lord Armon employed but basic medical status was a standard monitoring point. 

“Not physically,” Byona went on, “But mentally I’ve suffered a tremendous trauma! Several of my friends are dead including poor Dolf!” The slovenly guard had been a friend of sorts, and if she got out of this she would make sure the Syshin maids who had butchered him were sold to the worst brothels she could find so that they would suffer for what they had done to their human betters.

“The death of friends is recorded as a serious trauma,” Agron replied and Byona felt a small surge of triumph.

“Then surely Mistress Solae would not deny me psychological care!” This was it, she knew she had the computer now.

“Likely she would not,” Argon agreed in the same cheerful tone which he always used. 

“Then please connect me to an emergency psychologist in Armistice,” Byona all but crowded. The computer constrained by its programing and defeated by her logic opened the communication line. By law it wouldn’t even be able to monitor the call.  Byona smiled as she began to speak. Very soon, all that reward money would be hers...