You prod your face, making sure your organs are in their rightful places.

After investigating your chafed ears, running nose, and dry tongue, you conclude your spike has ended uneventfully. The rumors of the rare narcotic causing organ degradation or spontaneous combustion remain unfounded. For now, at least.

You’re prone. The bunk continues its ministrations, vibrating aggressively, attempting to rouse you to your feet. The classic “get up already” protocol.

You tilt your head on a swivel.

Your cabin is devoid of both pistol and pirate. Feeling under the pillow, you find only a stray hair from an amber mane. If not for that discovery, and the bloodstains on the wall next to the doorway, it’s almost like you haven’t been kidnapped. Vomit collects in your throat as you roll onto your side, the room spinning.

You rap your knuckles against the communicator panel on your bedside, mashing a random handful of mechanical switches, summoning Dyle.

“Well, here we are again,” the AI chides.

“How long have I been out?”

“Is that why you dragged me all the way up here—to ask me that?”

“Come on, be easy on me,” you choke. Your dutiful program conjures three-dimensional charts, information on your historical vitals, including a notice that you’ve oscillated in and out of consciousness for four entire cycles. Just the graphical illustrations of physical anguish elicit a groan from you. “I assume they’re all on the bridge. Have they simmered down, at least?”

“I don’t know—it depends on whether or not they’ve already eaten,” he chirps.

The communicator changes to a disarming white, expressing his departure. Your indifferent AI chooses his digital route to the bridge, leaving you stumbling towards your former cockpit. It’s a trek that takes thirty paces, but in your shambling, you count the cycles, months, years.

Ninety cycles’ worth of stolen narcotics wasted on piratical shenanigans, you lament. Every vein in your body pulsates. Your heart relentlessly funnels artificial oxygen to your sore extremities.

You place a clammy hand against your head, massaging away the pain that tapdances through your skull. Waves of anxiety, fear, and finally anger cascade against the base of your spine, making you grind your teeth. You’re sweating, nauseous at the thought of snapping back to your perilous situation.

As you approach the kidnappers, the emotions only intensify. You wonder how much blunt force it would take to separate the mercenary’s head from his spinal cord, or how to disable an android’s local communicator processes.

The cockpit’s landscape has changed.

Instead of the endless aquamarine seas of transit, the ship is anchored in place above an emerald jewel of a planet. A sparse amount of ships fly at range. Traders, tankers, travelers, their signatures appear on Dyle’s screens as disarming white dots, waltzing themselves across the planet’s atmosphere to the various port cities and installations that lurk below. The interface in the far corner labels the body as New Port Moresby.

A censored description of the body spits from the projector in a display of inviting serif, curated by the Echelon Consortium Board of Tourism, spoken aloud by the local posh accent.

“Settled in 2XXX, New Port Moresby was one of the first colonies established by The Commonwealth. Through generations of selective fauna cultivation, the once-hostile surface of New Port Moresby is home to some of the galaxy’s finest entertainment facilities, including pubs, gladiatorial performances...”

Advertisements arrive, shouting discounted rates for drinks, upcoming amphitheater matches, betting installations with room and board. Then, statistics and data. Outdated census information, incoherent pie charts, inflated planetary domestic product calculations that obfuscate the true reality below.

“Well, I’ve never heard of it,” Reggie whines. Her digits dart across the keyboard in front of her, drawing the displays to new heights and points of emphasis, pinching and sculpting. “There, on the planet’s far side. Lakota County. Once we land, all we’ll need is a local geographic fixation point, a corporate biosignature, and finally, the clown.”

“Which I presume we’ll ditch along with the ship,” adds Serac.

“As it should be. We should worry about getting back to the Cimarron. Power vacuums are common in situations like these.”

“Don’t be so serious, ma cherie. A good mutiny just separates the wheat from the chaff,” the mercenary retorts.

“Captain, I assume this will be another smash-and-grab?”

The mare lurks in the corner, ignoring her subordinate’s chatter. She stares through the transparent screens at the planet below, observing the serpentine curls of endless hurricanes. A bolt of lightning cracks across New Port Moresby’s atmosphere, its sudden appearance and disappearance altogether uneventful.

She senses your arrival, straightening to a more confident posture. From head to hoof, she’s wrapped in translucent plastics; two of your plastic ponchos ironed together to fit her frame. Her patchwork uniform obnoxiously crinkles like those of her crew, the whole cockpit reeking of gummy vinyl burnoff.

“Captain,” the android begins, still staring into her millions of data points, uninterested in the presence of another living creature on the bridge.

“If you have to ask if it’s a smash-and-grab, it’s a smash-and-grab,” Serac laughs. He gives her shoulder a squeeze, laboriously rising to his feet. Following his captain’s glare, he turns to you before taking a drag of his cigarette. “And here he is! Have a nice rest? I had no idea you kept such an excellent vintage. We had the real VIP treatment, eh?”

Haphazardly repaired sunglasses cover two recovering black eyes. The stench of blood ruminates from his mouth. Upon further inspection, a molar is missing from his cocky smile. He grips his belt and swaggers towards you.

But, as if remembering some far-off order, he stops short and crosses his arms, leaving ample space between you both. A Pavlovian response triggers the tastes of salt water and overripe bananas. Your body questions whether you’ll once more slip into a narcotic-fueled coma.

The mare, focused elsewhere, barks to the rapt attentions of everyone on board.

“Same as last time, but we won’t need anyone alive. Get the datapad unlocked, then get out,” she commands. Her eyes linger on the planet below. Your blood pressure spikes as she chews her lips. “Serac takes point with the secretary.”

“And once we unlock the datapad,” the android begins. She lets her statement hang, begging for an order. However, the mare continues to fixate on a swirling maelstrom on the planet’s surface.

You, too, feel a familiar sense of downpour. A rain soaks you to your bones, keeping you waterlogged. Constant eighty-knot wind lashes your face to chafing. Churning, knee-deep mud drags you deeper with each step. The suction, a continuous riptide, pulls you beneath in its humid embrace, seeping between fingers, catching your eyes, entombing you.

The captain speaks to nobody in particular.

“Once we get in, get the datapad cracked. I’ll cover you both and keep the clown alive. We need to keep him alive.”

Content with the following silence, the mare continues to lose herself in thought. She’s motionless, stuck in the corner. Cemented like footings at the water’s edge, whipped with high tide.

Her colleagues prepare themselves. They triple-check their firearms, adjusting their ill-fitting clothing in tandem. Serac presses a lit cigarette to his partner’s malformed plastic jacket, altering an improperly ironed seam, tightening it around the waist.

The ship vibrates, fighting against the planet’s atmospheric forces, arcing across the tension into a comfortable spiral that guides you to its far side.

Rain dots the windows as you lower into New Port Moresby’s troposphere. At first drizzling, turning into a squall as you descend. Clouds flood the cockpit. They encase the Mr. Memory in the grey hue of an afternoon’s storm, highlighting Dyle’s neon holograms that cascade on your miserable face.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

Your target is a beacon in the darkness.

The metallic complex stands against a canopy of trees that covers the entire planet. Somewhere beneath the rooftop greenhouses, hidden behind tinted windows, rooms hold servers clutching databases filled to near-capacity with spreadsheets, efficiency reviews, and compliance paperwork. An overworked secretary pecks away at her console with manicured fingers, unaware of the approaching felons, more concerned about deadlines than sightlines.

Under the luminous signage, the trademarked symbols of crescent and two full moons, the busybodies of SpiritCorp labor to create something of immense shareholder value; something valuable enough to drag the mare back to her old stomping ground.

Dyle settles himself on the brightly lit platform above the distant rainforest floor. The Mr. Memory’s exterior, pockmarked with battle, is alone in the sea of luxury vessels. Endless water collects at your feet, weathering the landing pad, creating miniature waterfalls that no doubt birth lakes and pools hundreds of meters below in the undergrowth.

The pathway from the open-air landing pad is a simple covered bridge. Invasive vines crawl up the metal installation from the canopies. The twining greenery encases the structure with an overlay of formerly poisonous petals and once-carnivorous fly-traps.

You glance behind at the Mr. Memory, idling, Dyle awaiting your return.

Between you stands a pair of lackeys and two meters of mare. She’s uneasy, her eyes darting from craft to craft. Head uncovered, mane sopping wet. Paranoid pupils investigate shuffling corporates, excusing themselves as they amble from your path, shouting apologies over rain banging on aluminum roofing. The plastic poncho sticks to her pelt, emphasizing her inhuman curves. Like the layers of weaponry underneath, they’re forgotten in the downpour.

She shoots you a snort to face ahead. You’re reminded of the consequences of noncompliance, now that you’re free from Dyle’s watchful sensors. He doesn’t notice your heart-rate quicken with fear.

Inside, the office is familiar. White walls and floors converge into sterile sets of leather loveseats and glass tables. Disarmingly cubic. Twin Neo-Futurist statues of the goddess Diana flank the corners of the quadrangular room, themselves beset by massive windows that showcase the dreary outside of New Port Moresby. A sign kindly asks to wipe your feet.

This atrium has a single reception desk, staffed by a lupine clerk.

His tobacco colored hair and coat are immaculately groomed. The curls contort enough to fit within the confines of his equipped earpiece, oversized, advertising his purpose. A simple finto-Merino black turtleneck ends at his Perspex watch, and as he toils, the antique timepiece measures the passing cycle against a set of Roman numerals. His fashionable styling even compliments the barcode beneath his eye, faded to an off-blue, similar to the suit jacket draped over his faux-leather chair.

Unlike his caprine counterpart across the galaxy, he confidently files through his paperwork instead of falling over himself.

The heavy armor at his chest is no issue, but you assume the overwhelming humidity has forced him to shirk the uniform requirements. He’s diligent, possibly because of the augmented arm that begins at his elbow and traces to his rapidly typing paw. It’s a silvered, contemporary mechanical sleeve that encases his forearm, hugging it close and acting on subconscious input. He gives your group a quick glance before absentmindedly whispering further statements over his communicator.

Serac, the front-man, saunters towards the desk, boots squeaking against tiling. Perspiration collects on his receding hairline. His nostrils struggle for air, still contused to closing. Close to his goal, he sighs with satisfaction. He chuffs a newly lit cigarette, one of the last in his pack.

Reggie approaches a distant sofa in one corner of the room. As she perches, it’s clear she’s alien to the high net worth clients who lounge with intent, impatient for service. The android sits too straight, looking too perfectly irritated, ‘innocuous’ an unknown input for her. She’s an appliance among the living, impersonating an unmodified human.

The mare gestures for you to head to the opposite side. One where a monocero trawls through a handheld memex, reviewing quotations for kidnap and ransom coverage with little fanfare. On the sterilized walls hang oily replications of dynamic still-lives, multifaceted compositions of simple objects transfixed into quadrangular kaleidoscopic stains.

Unconsciously, you’re reminded of the gun to your back. The mare whispers a litany of threats regarding noncompliance. Silent ones. Ones that bleed into you, like the water pooling into the cushions upon which you sit, shaking at your wrists.

Attempting to calm your nerves, you glance at those around you. At the two barcode-wearing slaves in outdated gabardine suits of subdued beiges. The elderly Blemma nervously toying with a medical datapad. A rack of functional ponchos held in a glowing-red heating chamber.

Nothing helps. You’re still hungover. Your headache can’t get any worse.

The banality strikes Serac as he takes another deep drag from his cigarette, smiling as he approaches the receptionist. The lupid’s eyes glaze over, receiving a transmission over his earpiece, bringing a mechanical finger-pad to the receiver. He’s halcyon, mumbling, nodding obediently.

The receptionist reaches below his desk, returning with a double-barrel, sawed-off, break-action shotgun.

Sitting in his affixed plexi-steel chair, he empties both barrels into the chest and head of the maquis. There’s no time for reaction as the two shots eviscerate the mercenary. Gore sprays the white ceiling with different shades of crimson refuse, his single cigarette landing on the ground alongside him.

A more formal alarm system sounds, bathing the room in cascading cones of red light, dragging themselves against the dirtied floor and dancing on the pools of fresh blood.

The android screeches. She fires at the secretary. She’s gyroscopically positioned, advancing with intent. Lupine scapula wrenches, dislodging the worker from the reinforced chair.

“Ambush!”

Doors on both sides of the facility open, revealing corporate mercenaries. Throngs of security wear their own indigo, armor emblazoned with crescents, two full moons, and standardized barcodes. Visors cover vision, digits on their chests their only identifiers.

You crawl behind the expensive couch and produce your sidearm. The mare reveals her own, firing indiscriminately into the onslaught before diving for the now-halved body of her subordinate. She strips his corpse, plucking his discarded plasma Darne from beneath what’s left of his perforated poncho.

She fires an impotent volley into the reception desk, preemptively fortified against projectiles.

To prevent the approachment of murderous security, you fire from around your own cover, landing a bullet near the leg of a screaming guard before deteriorating furniture and flying poly-fabrics obstruct your view. An android grips your wrist to breaking, and at the sound of more indiscriminate shooting from the captain herself, you’re dragged towards the central reception. You lose your composure, scraping against the tile, discharging in wildly.

You plug a ceiling camera, a distant visual display, and shatter one of the many windows, drawing in the storm.

Rain converges through the growing mouse-hole with a gust of wind. Humid air whips debris into a frenzy, swirling faux-feathers into minuscule vortices. The calming storm pelts the waxed tile flooring between pounding hammers and charging beams.

Your first vision after being thrown behind the bulletproof safety of the desk is the wolf’s head and arm separated from his bod, his lower jaw hanging on by a single splinter of bone. Launched casings pelt the discarded appendages as they lie. Above the reception, the mare’s digits, soaked in the deceased’s fluids, struggle to maintain the grip of her weapon, vibrating in its recoiling ministrations, nearly slipping out of her hands.

“Clown!”

Reggie screams above the gunfire, slapping away your gun and forcing your palm to the datapad. She forces the lupid’s severed paw over yours. His bloody finger-pads lazily mash against the back of your hand, leaving smudged fingerprints. A mangled shoulder’s blood mixes with acidic ceno-spinal nerve fluid, coating the screen.

A misreading. The datapad politely asks you three to try again.

The android pops over the desk, taking time to fire before sitting down with an inconvenienced sigh. An explosive round collides with a designer settee, birthing a plume of black smoke that envelops a third of the atrium. Gripping the headless corpse, she drags the deceased’s turtleneck against the bloody console, only succeeding in smearing gore across the screen before once more squeezing your appendages together.

With a receptive set of three tones, the pad unlocks its secrets. Reggie discards the carcass and points her shotgun to your chest. Locking eyes with your would-be killer, she pulls the trigger.

However, you’re still there.

She laughs, fiddling with her bandolier.

“I’m sorry. It looks like I’ve lost count. Just too much going on today.”

Another casing detonates nearby, kicking up sterile tile that knocks into the reception. A painting of hundreds of broken colors and erratic brush strokes collapses off the far wall, its frame breaking in three places. The mare ducks behind her cover. She brandishes an additional sidearm, coughing at the pillowing smoke and discarding Serac’s Darne, super-heated to melting.

Blood and soot cloud her wide eyes, long eyelashes matted together with drying gore. It sticks to her plastic outline and catches beneath her fingernails. The mare grits her teeth, stray lupine fur snared between incisors, panting through her rage. She shouts above the next few rounds that pelt the rapidly degrading white desk, chipped and shattered from its original ovular shape.

“Unlocked?”

“Yes ma’am, almost done faffing about,” the android smiles. “Just a moment.”

She once more trains her gun on you with intent.

A hoof lands against Reggie’s side, shifting her fire to the ceiling. It shatters an orthogonal light fixture, adding to the noxious smog and peppering you with sharp glass. The mare glares down at her subordinate before once more firing into the approaching security forces. With a begrudging, confused acceptance, Reggie rises to her feet and fires into the smoke.

You’re allowed an opportunity to shimmy over the desk, back toward the doors.

Fire consumes the simil-velvet couches. The room chokes with black clouds. A mercenary wounded in one arm falls to the tiled floor, on top of a screaming bystander who protects herself with only a stained white cushion.

First the android, then the mare. Both follow your lead, plugging the staggering security forces as they stumble against the crimson lights and raging inferno.

You have the advantage. Your captors, the bloodthirsty mare and the deranged embassy staffer, are too far behind. Sparks ignite in your lungs, chafing from your recent spike, as you pump your arms to gain speed.

You can get back to the Mr. Memory before them. Back to Dyle’s reassuring airlock. Back to your maligned safety of mediocrity.

But a concussive projectile nips your shoulder. Momentum forces you to the ground’s pulsating tides of water. You place a shaky grip against your wound, the blood bearing a familiar consistency to the severed paw you’ve only recently discarded.

In response, the captain fires a grenade into the darkness. Her efforts are rewarded with a crash, as two-thirds of a security officer’s mangled corpse ejects through a nearby window. The change in air pressure draws the fire to new heights.

A set of furred digits grabs your collar, dragging you to your feet and back into a sprint, not letting you falter.

Without your express permission, Dyle speeds from the area, leaving the gunfire, rain, atmosphere, and finally the planet behind, as he forces another jump to temporary safety.