Natalya readied her carbine as she pulled the lever. Artificial gravity kicked in and oxygen blasted through narrow vents to fill the airlock. Natalya felt her boots hit the metal deck as Co stood ready, Augustus balanced on one foot, and Sisi let out a little yelp as she face-planted into the floor.

The hatch opened, and there stood a surprised maintenance crewman in a black cloth uniform. He didn’t get a chance to gasp before Natalya punched him in the face, knocking off his black, beret-like hat.

The crewman flailed backward and Natalya followed him inside the ship. They stood on a catwalk that encircled the ship’s magazine, row after row of tungsten slugs waiting to be loaded. The slugs were nonreactive, and therefore could be stacked between the narrow, metal catwalks. Some of them could be loaded with neutron bombs or other warheads, but those were kept in a separate, more secure magazine. On a catwalk below stood another crewman, who looked up at the sound of Natalya’s punch.

Co spotted the man and leapt at him. The black-uniformed crewman took a single step as Co landed on top of him, her metal-braced legs cracking him over the head. Co held her foot against the downed man’s neck and nodded at Natalya.

Natalya squeezed the other crewman in a sleeper hold, cutting off blood flow and causing him to pass out.

“Strip them,” Natalya ordered when the crewman fell limp in her arms.

“With pleasure,” Augustus said.

“Tie them up and make sure they can’t radio in. Let’s move.”

In short order, they’d stripped the two maintenance crewmen and tied them to the catwalk, using a bit of rope Augustus had brought along for just such an occasion.

They took off their enviro-suits, discarding them and the helmets out of sight but near enough to the catwalk’s grated metal staircase so they could be retrieved on their way out. All four of them wore the same black Zhou Guard uniforms from their infiltration of the Zhou. They took the jackets and hats from the two crewmen, however, since Sisi looked more convincing as a maintenance worker than a soldier. The hats had pins on them in the shape of one of the slugs, indicating the crewmen’s role. Their rank was pinned on their shoulders.

“Aren’t there cameras?” Sisi asked.

“In vital areas, yes. Ptolemy’s plans showed there weren’t any here, since crews rarely need to come to a magazine filled with nonreactive tungsten slugs,” Natalya answered. “There are cameras on the bridge and brig, though, so keep your hat on and look like you’ve got a purpose.”

“How do I do that?”

“Look marginally pissed off, like you’ve been given orders you don’t want to do.”

“Okay.” Sisi made an angry glare.

“You look constipated,” Co noted.

“No I don’t.”

“Just pretend you’re sucking on a lemon,” Augustus advised.

Sisi did so.

“Perfect. Just don’t stick out your tongue,” Natalya said, and approached an aperture hatch. “Remember, if anyone asks, we’re being sent to interrogate the prisoner.”

Natalya readied her fist, and opened the door.

An empty corridor greeted them, motion sensors activating lights in the rectangular hall. It reminded Natalya of Chimera’s corridor, a simple passage of un-painted metal, interrupted only by the black metal braces that ringed the walls every few meters.

From the plans Ptolemy had provided, Natalya knew they had to pass through another hatch about thirty meters ahead and on their left, further toward the ship’s middle. They did their best to stay quiet, Natalya with her carbine ready. After they’d passed several more hatches on their right, some sealed to protect weapons systems and some open for cargo storage or maintenance crew’s mess, Natalya heard the clanking of footsteps ahead.

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Natalya raised her fist to order the others to stop. She lowered her hand, putting her gun at her side and signaling the others to do the same. She glared at them, locking eyes with Co, Augustus, and Sisi to insist they pay attention and mimic her, then waved her hand forward.

A crewman in the same uniform as the two Natalya and Co had tied up, but with a missile-shaped sigil on his hat, walked toward them. He also looked like he was sucking on a lemon as he grumbled to himself. He didn’t look twice at the four in black as they passed him.

“He thinks we have a purpose,” Sisi giggled.

“I think he looked great in his uniform, which may be why he ignored us, the shy cutie,” Augustus said.

“Quiet, both of you,” Natalya said as they turned toward the brig.

They passed another group of missile-badged crewmen who didn’t pay attention to them, and arrived at the entrance to the brig. It was a simple door, a thick, metal hatch that swung outward. It was at the center of a T-shaped, three-way intersection. A pair of shield emitters and auto-turrets guarded the door.

“Sisi, tell me if I’m wrong, but those shields don’t look like they’re on,” Natalya pointed out, not breaking her stride as she headed straight for the brig.

“I don’t think so,” Sisi replied.

Natalya saw the cameras also standing sentinel beside the turrets, and subdued her rising adrenaline.

“Get ready,” Natalya whispered. She walked straight to the brig’s hatch and pulled it open.

“Huh,” Sisi said as they looked inside an empty brig.

“Maybe they took a lunch break? Let’s hope they brought cookies,” Augustus theorized.

Co stood at attention, eyes on either end of the T-shaped hallway, a breath away from filling the corridor with holes.

The brig was small, with a narrow chamber in the middle flanked by two carbon fiber-barred cells. There was a desk at the center where an observer could likely be stationed. The cell on the left looked recently occupied, with an unmade bed built into the cubic walls. The bed was near wide as the cell. The oblong toilet jutting from the wall made the cell look claustrophobic and unnaturally sterile.

On the right was a rectangular cell three times as wide as the other. It was completely empty, polished clean save for a black metal chair. The chair had holes in it, and a basin beneath where blood had pooled. Fresh, crimson stains marred the chair.

A railing along the ceiling connected the two cells. This allowed for a prisoner to be kept on sliding shackles while being transferred from one cell to the other.

A set of empty shackles dangled from the railing, dripping blood.

Natalya only looked around long enough to ensure Jasper wasn’t there. She pulled up the ship’s schematics on her datasheet and frowned at the rows of alternative brigs.

“This is awful,” Sisi said.

“Effective. Torture someone, then put them in a cell facing the torture device. Likely breaks their will faster,” Co explained.

“I mean awful as in awful-awful, not awful planning.”

“Ptolemy insisted this was the high-level prisoner brig. And it’s obviously been used,” Natalya said, taking a moment to look at the shackles. “Co, guard the door.”

Natalya saw a viewscreen on the observer’s desk. She leaned over the screen, the image paused on a recording. Natalya touched the screen and it started moving, showing Jasper being dragged out of the torture cell and into the middle of the room.

His arms hung limply from the shackles, his feet slipping on his own blood as he tried to stand.

“Prisoner movement log,” a female security officer said, staring into the viewscreen as she recorded what was happening. “Interrogation of the prisoner has thus far yielded no results. We are transferring him.”

“We let him heal this time?” one of six guards asked. They all wore hats with pins shaped like shackles.

“No. Qin wants to try something else,” the officer making the recording instructed, then turned back to the viewscreen. “We’re escorting the prisoner to the bridge.”

The guard took Jasper’s sheathed sword from where it was kept in the empty cell. Jasper reached a hand out to pull it toward him, but one of the six guards struck him with an electro-stick. His hand fell limp. The officer in charge placed Jasper’s sword in a large safe at the back of the brig. She drew a pistol, joining the armed escort that led Jasper into the corridor.

“Prisoner movement log ended,” the officer said. The viewscreen went black.

Natalya turned to find the locked safe on the back wall.

“Sisi, can you pick a lock?” she asked.

“No. But I can use my welpro to pull the bolts out of the frame,” Sisi said, pointing the device at the safe. With a few adjustments to the welpro’s settings, its soft humming changing to a whirring purr, Sisi dislodged the safe’s frame.

“Co, help her with the door. Auggie, stay on our exit,” Natalya instructed.

With the help of Co’s robotic arm, they wrenched the door open just wide enough for Natalya to reach inside and retrieve Jasper’s golden sword. The blade seemed dull in her hands, no light coming off the polished metal.

Natalya wiped the blood off the handle and held the sheathed sword in her off-hand, strapping her carbine across her shoulder.

Just as she was about to order her crew to make their way to the bridge, the dull, white lights in the brig started flashing red.