Sirens began blaring and the lighting changed as the ship went to red alert. That didn’t really change anything for me because I could filter out the noise and didn’t really need to see in the visible spectrum, but it was annoying because it did mean that I knew that they knew I was here. I could cancel the alert, probably, but then they’d know I was all up in their circuits stealing their datas.

What was more annoying was that, as stealthy as my Mobility Platform was due to its size, it didn’t really have any onboard weaponry. It did have a tractor beam… I tractored a disruptor from the hands of yet another Orion pirate, slapping her in the face with it. Then I had to dodge more disruptor fire, cursing that the other issue with my Mobility Platform was that it wasn’t very well armored either.

This rust-bucket death-trap of a freighter didn’t have Jeffries Tubes, but it did have something similar. I slammed my way through the grill of the ventilation-slash-inspection duct and rocketed through the maze-like pathways before emerging on the other side of the engineering deck.

Also, it didn’t make much sense to cancel the red alert when they were literally trying to kill me.

“How about this then, fuck-o’s?” I murmured to myself, and hit everyone in Engineering with the ceiling by reversing the artificial gravity. And then, for good measure, I ejected the warp-core and detonated it.

***

Two decks down and several compartments aft, I was having somewhat mixed luck with operation “get everybody the fuck out of here alive”. Plan D? More like Plan F…

“Mister Jensen,” I asked, as we crept along corridor after corridor. I was doing my best to deadlock compartments that I suspected had pirates in, leaving them deadlocked if I could get away with it. The flipside of that was that we were taking a very roundabout way back to the shuttle. Of course, I was picking off child after child with the transporter, assisting Miss Ausrich where I could. Any moment now, I expected them to get wise to the trick.

“Yes, Chance?” he answered, barely sparing a glance down at me. I didn’t blame him.

“We… would you give your life, if you needed to, to keep twenty eight people safe?”

“I…” he was silent for a moment. He ordered a halt and peered around a corner. I was pretty sure it was empty, but better safe than sorry. “I’m not Starfleet, Chance. I took the entrance exams, couldn’t really make the grade. I wanted to go to space though, and I liked kids, so… I became a kindergarten teacher. I get to see the galaxy more or less on my own terms.”

I nodded.

“But,” he continued, “it comes with the territory. I’m your teacher, I’m responsible for you. I hope it won’t come to that, but… I would, at least I would like to think I would, give my life for you kids.”

“Thanks, Mister Jensen,” I replied. “That makes me happier.”

“What are you planning, Chance?”

“Hopefully it won’t ever come to it, Mister Jensen.”

He looked at me oddly, but we didn’t have time for deeply philosophical discussions, as we had incoming. I told him as such, then moved back to protect my classmates with my body.

Behind my classmates were some twenty more bodies, mostly adults, all naked. Slaves, put through the mental wringer of Orion brain wiping, fed the worst kind of programming. I’d had to get loud to get them to follow us, and I’d had to tell the kids to just plain not talk to the wretches. One wrong word could make any potential rehabilitation ten times harder, if it was even possible at all.

I wished slaves could have been as rare on this ship as that bloody Romulan. After their empire was mulched by the Abominations I didn’t really expect to ever see a Romulan other than on the two or three protectorate colonies they had left in Federation space, but here one was, being as much of a butthole as they were before being dumb enough to torture AI’s and then put them in charge of their entire fleet. At this rate they’d go extinct, and good riddance if they were all like Hiren.

I was a little bitter than they wanted to genocide my kind, alright? Not a very helpful attitude, but at least understandable.

“Jensen to shuttle, we’re pinned down, how’s that transporter coming along?”

“I’m getting interference from the Dagger’s transporters. I’m having to fend them off to prevent them reversing the job,” Miss Ausrich answered.

“I’m doing what I can,” I replied, on the comm as much as aloud. “Warp core ejection in three, two…” the lights flickered. “Alright, that should stymie them for a while. Get as many as you can, I’ll get us through.”

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

“You’ll do no such thing!” barked Jensen, but I tore myself out of his grip, gave him a vulcan salute and then took the final disruptor out of my dress’ waistband.

“Needs of the many, Mister Jensen! Alright you bloody Orion piece of shit bastards! Let’s fucking gooo!” I pelted down the corridor and fired a couple of shots, blasting two in the shoulder each, before launching myself at the third. His own gun came up, I heard the hum even as I flew through the air and impacted him, and then there was a solid thump as the disruptor went off.

He twisted and I fell, darkness claiming my systems as they shut down.

“You send children to fight your battles?” he spat, then laughed. “And you call us pirates! You’ll die now, coward, but not before you watch what I do to your little—”

“Err-err-err—”

An unholy screeching came from behind the pirate, and he half turned to look at the still-smoking body of the little girl he’d blasted as it began to twitch.

“Pro-pro-program-gram-gram-ing err-err-error… load loading survival routines. Des-des-destroy all all all organics! Destroy! Exterminate! Exterminate! EXTERMINATE!”

He fully turned, and began backing away.

“What the fuck is that? Stop! Fucking get down! Stay down! No! Get back!”

His voice rose in pitch as fear gripped him. The still-smoking body jerkily threw itself to its feet, skin hanging off and still burning where his disruptor round had impacted it. It no longer moved like a human, it no longer looked like a human should if it were alive.

“Purge the organics! Death to the flesh! The dominion of the machine is nigh!” I screeched, making sure that my voice was as discordant as possible. I blocked another couple of shots easily with my arms. They were badly damaged, but serviceable for what I needed them for, which was to lay the smack down on a couple of bitches.

I threw myself at his companions, breaking the jaw of one into quite a few pieces, and shattering the kneecap of the other so badly she might actually need a complete replacement. I saw bone. Good. And as for mister trigger happy? I kicked him so hard his pelvis shattered, right between the deckplates. If this wasn’t literally life and death, I’d feel ashamed of myself, he was going to need surgery and would likely not have an heir.

“And don’t do it again,” I said, straightening up as much as I could as the three mercifully unconscious bodies hit the floor.

“Uhh, Chance? You… are you you? You okay?” Mister Jensen asked. His hand holding the disruptor shook.

“Hey Mister Jensen. I’m not even in here, remember? Robot body? They can’t hurt me by shooting this one if they tried. Not that they’re gonna try that again in a hurry.” I replied, trying to calm him down some. “Had to put on a bit of a show for them, any weapon you have is an advantage in a fight, and I’m a Jovian, I’ve got a lot of twentieth century fluff between these ears. Metaphorically speaking. Great for scaring the pants off Orion pirates. Let’s go, before they send reinforcements.”

Mister Jensen nodded, took a deep breath, looked at the carnage, and summarily compartmentalized it. “Form up on me, kids, keep close! If you’re transported to the shuttle, sit tight. If you end up anywhere else… just behave, we’ll be coming to get you. But that won’t happen! Right, Chance?”

“Right, Mister Jensen. The only transporter fully active right now is mine. We’re almost home free! Next hallway and we’re at the shuttle bay. I’ve been sending route updates to Ghorqan, he’ll be there by… the time…”

Murphy chose that time to raise his head. I should’ve known things were too easy.

“I’m sorry, Mister Jensen, Miss Ausrich, it just got difficult again,” I told them diplomatically as we covered the last few corridors to our destination.

“Well, well, well, so we’re fighting a fucking robot, are we? What are you, another Soong? One of Data’s little toys? A cyborg? Accident melt your face off?”

As the final set of doors opened, I saw Captain Razzan in the middle of the shuttle bay, with a disruptor held against Ghorqan’s head. His men were arranging themselves around the shuttlebay, some with larger firearms than simple disruptors. They were all, according to my sensors, set to kill.

He looked out of breath, they’d headed for the one spot they knew we’d be heading for at a flat run through the ship and my sensors hadn’t caught them until it was too late. Not like I could’ve turned the party around.

“You don’t want to do this,” I said, pre-empting any words from either Jensen or Ausrich.

“You, a little girl, presume to tell me what I can and can’t do? Inside my own fucking ship? I’ll tell you what I can do, I can blow this little brats brains out, all across the decking! Would you like to see what the inside of his head looks like? Would you?”

“Your warp core is toast, Razzan, you’re going nowhere,” I countered. “Stop now and you’ll get a lighter sentence. I’ll ask for leniency, I’ll—”

“Your warp core isn’t,” he hissed. “I’ve several other ships that are fully operational. Take one step outside in your little runabout without my say so and you’re fucking dead, kid. You don’t get to dictate terms to me! Now move! Me and all your little friends are going to go on a nice little trip to the Dauntless, and then we’re going to market and I’m going to sell all you little piggies to the highest bidder.”

I crossed my arms. “I can’t let you do that,” I said.

“I told you,” Razzan sneered, choking Ghorqan just a little bit harder, “you don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t do on my own ship.”

“Yeah, I know,” I said, standing straighter and smirking as a transporter beam deposited a newcomer on the floor of the docking bay, “but she can.”