Holly waited with her team in the main passageway after setting up. There were guns staged nearby but nobody was openly carrying. Moussa and Samoylova seemed ready. Nieves didn’t have her heart in the plan but would keep quiet. And Holly wondered about herself. Her hands shook and visions of being brutally mauled flashed in her mind. If the Fuller-creature with a knife couldn’t hurt Patterson and two of those cursed things couldn’t take Stocky then she was doomed if they found out. God, don’t let them suspect. I don’t want to hurt anyone.
She told herself again and again that it was unavoidable. When you knew there was going to be a gunfight then you had to get the first draw.
The Sci-Med team entered through the doorway to Propulsion One. They were armed and carried bulky containers of medical equipment to supplement the trauma center in Command. They carried the load without any apparent difficulty. Stocky looked at them with silent suspicion. Patterson dropped a heavy suitcase and her pack load and then asked, “Is something wrong?”
Intuition of fallen angels.
Fear raced through her nerves, consuming every fiber. Maybe they knew. And then a dirty feeling of guilt and unworthiness followed because she knew she had to lie. “Nothing other than we’re down to half a crew and dependent on stims.” She wished that De Silva was still alive to find a better way.
“We need to formulate a sleep rotation,” Chandna said.
You would like that, wouldn’t you? She nodded in friendly agreement. “That’s number two on the list. Number one is – secure this Gate.”
“What do you need?” Patterson asked.
Patterson didn’t look or sound threatening at all. It seemed like she genuinely wanted to help. And Holly wanted to believe it, but she knew that their secret sabotage showed their real motives. She pointed at the accessway doors in both directions. “I want to set up our defense in the access corridors. Keep Pazuzu from knocking on our doors.”
“Makes sense,” Patterson said.
“Moussa, take Stocky with you to the Workshops and bring back heavy items for a barricade.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said.
“Also look around for any tools that we don’t want Pazuzu to obtain.”
“We’ll do that,” he said, “but I think it has already obtained plenty.” He told Stocky to pick up a shotgun (he did too) and then they left for Propulsion One.
Holly looked at Patterson. “Go up to Consultation. Make a formal confirmation whether you’re officially declaring Pinnacle and review the message I drafted up to inform the probe of our status.”
“Alright,” Patterson said. “I’ll do that fast and then help you out. Leave the heavier stuff for me.”
She nodded. “I’ll need you to take some command duties. I can’t do it all.”
“We’ll talk about that later,” Patterson said. She set her weapons down and turned for the lift.
Samoylova grinned.
This almost seemed too easy. They now had the weakest of them alone. The only one they didn’t need to be afraid of. “Doctor, will you come with me,” Holly said. “I’ll show you the storage room that we’ll use to supplement our med-center.”
Chandna set his pulserifle down and slipped on his backpack. He lifted two of the smaller suitcases for the first run – he would have to make several by himself. “Please, lead on.”
Holly led him down a secondary corridor and the others followed. She opened the door to the supply room directly adjacent to the trauma center. She then pulled a pistol from under her jacket and pointed it in Chandna’s face. “Drop the gear and get in.”
He calmly looked at her. “I don’t understand.”
Samoylova nudged him in the back of the shoulder with a shotgun barrel. (She had quietly picked it up.) “You know what they say out here. ‘Never trust the Triumvirate.’ Now get in!”
Chandna lowered his items and spoke at the nearest comms box. “Patterson, they…”
“Shut up!” Samoylova screamed. “Nobody hears you!”
“We’ve disabled all the nearby microphones. Now get in and take a seat. And don’t so much as flinch. Nieves will tie you and everything will be alright.”
Chandna looked at each of them in a moment of silence and then walked forward and sat in one of the metal chairs which were arranged. He looked straight at Holly with confidence but not defiance. “You know you’re stepping far outside of your command authority?”
Nieves quickly followed him into the room and silently began to string safety line around him. Holly watched for a couple seconds to verify that she was professionally focused.
“You’re making a mistake,” Chandna said.
“Sci-Med has already failed us. We’re just doing what we must to survive.” She waited for Nieves to finish tying him and then tested the binds across his wrists, ankles, and waist. And she emptied his pockets. She was satisfied and left, shutting the door behind her. Out of all of them, he deserved it the most.
“Who should we get now?” Samoylova asked.
“Patterson. It’s best to take the weakest one first.”
“Good idea,” Samoylova said.
If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
Holly led them to the lift and then called Patterson down by messaging her tablet. They waited for the doors to part and then they thrust their gun barrels at her face.
“Hands on top of your head,” Samoylova said.
“What are you doing?” she asked. She looked at them in shock and then slowly raised her hands up.
“Shut up and step out of the lift.”
Patterson looked at each of them. “What’s going on?”
“Don’t talk to her,” Samoylova ordered. “Get out of the lift! Move…down the hall!”
“No!” Patterson said, calming her composure. “You’re becoming paranoid.”
“Don’t make us repeat ourselves!”
“TURING,” Patterson said, “I am removing…”
“The microphones are disabled!” Holly interrupted.
“Get out of the elevator or I’ll shoot you in the leg,” Samoylova said.
Patterson glared at them. “You’ll regret this. We all might.” She stepped out into the hall and began to walk as directed.
“I only beat you to the punch. I heard the three of you talking in Sci-Med.”
Her eyes widened. “We never planned anything against you.”
“But you were thinking about it. And now we’ll keep you in our sight so that you’ll know that’s a bad idea. Chandna is in the room up ahead. He’s not hurt. None of you will be hurt.”
They led Patterson into the storage room and then Nieves tied her up and emptied her pockets like she did with Chandna. Patterson looked in her eyes after she had finished. “Did Holly tell you everything?” she asked. “Did she tell you that you can’t fully trust each other either?”
“Yeah, we know,” Samoylova said. “We’ll solve that problem later.”
Patterson shook her head. “No, you’ll die.”
Samoylova glared at her. Nieves stood apprehensively far back from the group.
“We’ll see,” Holly said, and then she bent over and had a moment of coughing. She cleared her throat and noticed Patterson watching. What did her opinion matter for now though? She looked at her group. “Let’s get Stocky. And pray he still obeys orders.”
----------------------------------------
Patterson was relieved when they brought Stocky in unharmed. She remained silent as they tied him up. He looked at her in frustration. He probably felt as if he had failed her. Chandna, strangely, was perfectly calm.
Holly and her team backed out towards the exit after verifying his bonds and emptying his pockets. “We’re sorry we had to do this. But I overheard you. We’re just doing what you were going to do to us.”
“We discussed ways to verify that none of you have been exposed to the Contagion,” Chandna said.
“You discussed imprisoning us,” Holly said.
“Quarantine,” Chandna said. “Temporary controlled observation. We weren’t going to do anything to you that we don’t do for ourselves.”
“I don’t want to hear it,” Holly said.
“You don’t want to hear it because we never agreed to do it,” Patterson said.
Holly turned to her. “You just hadn’t finalized your plan. Now what did you do to the Nineveh?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Patterson said. She rolled her eyes convincingly.
Holly turned angrily toward Stocky. “What did you do to the Nineveh? I know you weren’t in Green when we called you on comms.”
She watched and listened to Holly as she spoke. Holly turned away when she looked at her and her voice had a slight stutter. And she was in noticeable pain. She coughed a lot too. Maybe she was compromised. Stocky looked as if he was about to speak but she cut him off. “Don’t answer her.”
Holly flinched, but quickly recomposed herself. “I’m the Captain of…”
“You’re a liability. Zhu had to board the derelict because we all knew you couldn’t lead. De Silva went into System’s Access for the same reason. And Ginting is dead because you passed out on the Mess. This action of yours is no different. Failure is routine for you.” She knew it would hurt, and it was intended to.
Holly stared at her in silence. Her eyes were wide and her mouth quivered.
“That’s enough,” Moussa said, glaring at Patterson as he stepped forward in an authoritative manner. He turned to Stocky. “What did you do in Propulsion Four?”
Patterson smiled from her work. “Don’t answer.”
Moussa pointed at Patterson and looked toward Samoylova. “Put a gag in her mouth if she speaks again.”
“Will do,” Samoylova said.
“Tell me,” he said to Stocky. He folded his arms across his chest and waited.
Stocky bobbed his head around as if he had a million thoughts. “I have my orders,” he finally said. “You can try torture, but replicants handle pain better than you humans do.”
“Nobody’s getting tortured, Stocky,” Moussa said. He looked at each of the prisoners. His gaze softened. “We’ll figure out what you did on our own. But you won’t be freed until we do.”
“We should probably sedate them,” Samoylova said. “They’re just a burden on us until we know if we can trust them. And, at this point, they’re mutineers.”
“Let’s not call them that yet,” Moussa said. “But they’re close.”
“No, we’re not,” Patterson said. “The Paramount – I can do whatever I need to. Now are you going to gag me?” She waited to see if they really had fallen so far as to gag her for doing what was within her right. It was her responsibility as the leading Sci-Med Officer to do whatever was necessary so that a threat such as Pazuzu could not spread through human settlements.
Samoylova walked over to one of the equipment shelves and grabbed a shop rag and tape.
“Wait,” Moussa said. He looked angrily at Patterson.
She looked defiantly back. He knew she was right and he didn't like it. She decided to push his buttons further. “All my life, feeble normies have tried to tell me what to do. I don’t like that.”
Holly, Nieves, and Samoylova all flinched at the n-word. Moussa’s eyes hardened. “And I don’t like your elitist attitude. I’ve been working the frontier since before you were born.”
“You mean before you were eclipsed by me.”
“Maybe we should sedate them,” Nieves fearfully mumbled. Her suggestion was clearly born of fright and not aggression.
“You can’t sedate me anyways,” Chandna calmly said. “I’m an android.”
“You can’t be an android,” Moussa said. “The hibernation unit would have caught you.”
“The Company took care of that,” Chandna said matter-of-factly.
Patterson looked at him confused. Everyone else looked at him in silence too.
“Why would they do that?” Samoylova asked.
He turned to her. “The real Doctor Chandna barely passed his psych assessment. Your buyer wasn’t comfortable with him being on an operation of this scale and insisted that I be used in his place. He thus underwent mind mapping. I have all his knowledge.”
“What do you know about our buyer?” Samoylova immediately asked.
“Nothing,” he said. “There is no information about the buyer anywhere on this ship.” They were all silent for a moment and Chandna continued. “Also, do any of you even know how to sedate a replicant? Obviously, you must use a stronger drug or more of it. But do you know how much? Too little and it won’t produce the desired effect. But too much will kill him, and that would be murder. You fine Christians can’t do that.” He gazed at Holly with emotionless eyes and a forced smirk.
The captors nervously looked at one another. But they focused more on Holly’s leadership.
“We won’t sedate you,” Holly said. She looked at Stocky. “You had to work with androids when you were mining. How come you didn’t know about Chandna?”
“I apologize, Captain,” he said, looking down at the deck. “I wasn’t vigilant enough.”
“He did tell me his suspicions,” Patterson said. “It wasn’t a pressing concern and so I never investigated it. And there are ways to make determination difficult. Our buyer didn’t want us to know.”
“We’ll see,” Holly said. “I’ve got access to all the ship’s security logs. I can find out where you’ve been going and what you’ve been doing.”
Patterson saw that Holly seemed to be assertive again. Her mind games only caused a short despondency. And Moussa showed that he would fill any void. Undermining her authority wasn’t a viable strategy.
“Seal them up,” Holly said. “Set the door to alarm and we’ll leave them locked up until I’ve reviewed logs. Samoylova, you and Nieves go through their bags and find out what kind of tests they were going to run on us.”
“Will do,” Samoylova said. They left one by one. And the door was shut and locked.