Chapter 7: The Storm Brews

“Karine, pass this information to the Paul Jones,” Wei ordered. “We are pressing towards the centripetal ring of the Columbus. Return back to Darshit and remain.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice, Master Sergeant,” Karine said with some relief in her words.

Kole was the first marine to look through the large porthole of the emergency shaft in the elevator. It was more of an access point if the elevator was not functioning. With the lack of gravity, it was remarkably easy to grab the handle and pull yourself down. He disconnected the mag locks of his boots as he touched the handle. He was able to fit with his equipment into the shaft and work his way out of the elevator. In zero gravity, he had all the liberties of movement as he looked around. His helmet allowed him to see everything.

He looked down. Without the hindrance of the elevator, the elevator shaft was really just an empty one. A couple of sliding doors lined down the shaft, where the elevator was designed to stop and allow personnel to go through. Without the elevator, the doors were in the middle of nowhere in the superstructure. He continued to move himself downward to enable his team’s clearance to move out of the stuck room.

“Clear,” Kole said. “Come on down.”

Zalika could hear the communication chatter that was going on between Karine and the Paul Jones. To her, it became background noise. Bekra said nothing as she removed her hand from her arm. She said nothing to the reptilian woman as she gave a quiet nod to her. She felt nothing more had to be said. She focused her attention on Chuang as he looked at the open area.

“Don’t worry,” Zalika told him. “No gravity on this ship ... you can’t fall down and break your neck.”

“I know, I know ... still getting used to it,” Chuang replied.

Chuang was next as he started climbing down the emergency access shaft to get out of the elevator. His free hands made all the more comfortable as he used one little thrust to push himself down the hole and out of the elevator.

“Whoa ... whoa,” Chuang said as he accidentally lost his grip on the handle. Without gravity, he lost control as he began to float harmlessly in zero gravity. He was plummeting downward toward the bottom floor at a slow speed.

“Your thrusters, dumb ass,” Zalika told him as she watched him plummet. “Use your thrusters.”

It dawned on him as he activated the small vectoring thrusters on his armor. A series of short puffs of air jetted out of his suit as it began to slow him down to a steady rate. He then kept himself upright and activated the thrusters to put him on a slow trajectory directly to the bottom-most deck.

“Come on, Bekra,” Zalika gestured to her. The Itrean woman walked up as she slapped the assault rifle to her chest. It stuck as she went and bent down on her digitigrade legs. She reached and grabbed the handle. She did her best to wrap her tail around her body as she pushed herself down the ladder. To make room, she went and stuck her hand outside of the ladder and onto the walls of the elevator shaft itself. The moment that she did, the armored hands magnetized to the walls. Much like her magnetized armored claw feet, the hands would naturally engage and disengage as it kept her secured to the wall. The freedom of zero-g allowed her to grip the walls with simple ease.

Kole went and climbed all the way down the ladder towards the bottom of the deck. Chuang’s boots emitted a small puff of gas as it slowed down his trajectory. He landed with a gentle tap to the bottom as his boots clicked on and magnetized him from bouncing off the deck. He looked up to see Bekra was looking down as she climbed down the shaft to reach him.

Zalika was next as she held up her rifle and used one hand to grip the emergency access shaft’s ladder handle. She wasn’t in the mood for doing the slow climb like Kole or Bekra was. She used one hand to push herself down with a hard heave. This pushed her body down at a faster speed than Chuang ever did. She looked over to see Bekra still moving slowly down as she passed her on the way down. She didn’t even bother to use her thrusters as the boots clicked and grabbed her body to the deck.

“Sorry...” Zalika said. “Getting around this ship is a pain in the ass.”

Chuang turned to look at Carlos as he followed suit. His heavier frame made it a little bit harder for him to go through the elevator’s emergency access shaft, but he also kept himself steady on the ladder. Kole reached the bottom deck as Bekra was nearing the deck.

“I don’t get it,” they heard Felix on the comms. “Why the hell would there be sabotage?”

“I contacted the Paul Jones and updated them,” Karine replied. “They acknowledged it. I don’t know. By doing that, the ship is stuck here in this region of space. How long would the Columbus take to travel on conventional drives back to Eutera?”

“Let’s see...” Felix said. “At about 1.1 light-years away. It would take about...”

“Like hundreds of years,” Darshit answered. “Without the Kig or the Paul Jones, the Columbus is stranded in space.”

Carlos was nearing the bottom of the deck. Kole directed Zalika to get ready as he walked up to the manual override panel for the doors at the bottom of the deck. Chuang readied his rifle as he pointed it at the door. Bekra followed suit as she got her rifle ready.

“I mean...” Felix continued on the comm. chatter. “What would be the point of that?”

“Could be madness,” Uluwehi replied through the comms. “We still need to figure out what had happened to that piece of debris that they found. If it was carrying something on it ... it might not have even been possible that the Itreans took the ship. Some pathogens might have gotten off of it and infected the crew that goes to the brain. Next thing you know ... everyone goes loopy.”

Kole pulled off the panel as he slapped it to the wall. The same lever was present as he gestured Chuang to do the work. He took his spot and lowered and aimed his M18 alongside Zalika. Chuang began to grab the lever and began to do the same as before.

“We haven’t considered the other things,” Darshit said in the comms. “This ship could be attacked by something other than the Itreans ... like the Nova Hamidou Pirates.”

“Pirates don’t make much sense,” Carlos said. “They don’t leave the Paloran star system. Why go this far just to attack a UHN ship? If anything, the pirates would flee the moment they saw a battleship.”

“Everyone, quiet down a little bit,” Wei ordered. “We are crossing the passageway that leads to the elevators and shaft access to the centripetal rings. We are nearing the power module of the ship.”

Kole watched as Chuang was opening the door of the bottom deck. Each pump of the lever brought the doors closer to being opened fully. Kole stepped forward a little bit as he could see past the opening. Carlos had one hand on his rifle as he had his left hand on his side near the other gadgets that he carried.

“Carlos ... your sentry turret,” Kole said as he directed at the opening.

“You got it,” Carlos replied as his hand went to a large gray cylinder-like box. It popped off the armor as he saw the small opening.

Kole gestured Chuang to stop with the lever. The door was cracked open by afoot. Carlos took the large device and heaved it into the opening. Like some ancient traveling rugby ball, it spun in zero gravity with simplicity and ease in the large room. It would continue to travel until it reached something tangible. Finally, it did within several seconds of travel. In the solid darkness, the device stuck to the wall on the opposite side of the door. Magnetic clamps sealed it to the bulkhead as the machine opened up to reveal a small gun turret. It had a camera and sensor system on it as the gun swiveled around to gather the data inside the room.

“Accessing the camera feed,” Carlos said quietly as he tapped his wrist like computer. The camera feed was directed into the visor of his helmet. He could see what the sentry turret was looking at as he led where the gun and camera were looking. He could see a large room all around him, including the cracked open door of the far end of the turret’s location.

“I ... don’t see anybody inside the ventral bridge,” Carlos said. “We are clear to enter it.”

Kole turned to Chuang and gestured with his head to resume opening the door. He spent about another ten seconds before the door was opened up for the team to enter the bridge. They aimed their weapons into the vast opening ahead of them.

The bridge itself was nothing remarkable to look at, especially with the lack of power. Without the helmet and equipment, it was just another dark room. The computer panels and displays were all offline. There were only a couple of lights that were being emitted, but everything else was silent.

“Typically on a warship,” Carlos explained. “The ventral bridge is only used as a backup bridge unless the captain says otherwise. In emergencies, they actually do come in handy, though.”

“Shouldn’t we have gone to the dorsal bridge first,” Bekra asked.

“Not yet,” Kole said. “We will, though ... I am sure of it. We need to figure out what has happened. If we can get power up, we can use the sensors to track anybody on this ship without a problem. I understand your feelings, though. There may be crew that is in the bridge right now that are trapped and need our help.”

“I don’t know,” Zalika commented. “Everything that has happened just seems ... off.”

“You think this is an empty ship?” Kole asked.

“I don’t know what to think ... fuck ... it is ... I don’t know what is going on,” Zalika staggered in her words. “What Karine said does have me worried ... I just...”

“You are afraid to tell them,” Bekra added as she stopped to look at her. “It is alright to be like this. You don’t have to act like some stubborn overbearing Shal’rein.”

Kole decided to stay out of the conversation as he hoisted up his M18 and walked over to the panels. Chuang watched as Carlos proceeded towards his turret. He walked past the room’s center console as he tapped a button on his wrist like computer. The sentry turret adjusted itself, and the gun turret and camera sealed itself up. It turned itself back into the gray cylinder-like box as the magnetic locks disengaged. It floated in zero gravity as small vectoring thruster pushed it back towards Carlos. He grabbed it in the air and slapped it back on his armor and hip with his free hand.

“That thing is really cool,” Chuang commented.

“I know, I love these things,” Carlos replied with a smile. “I am sure basic training only said so much about these things. They work in zero gravity, but they are less effective once you have gravity to attend with. The only big problem is that the gun isn’t very effective against armor. I still use it like Felix’s recon drone, though. When we get back to Eutera, I will train you on how to use these things. You will be better at this than I am.”

“Awesome.”

“Hmmm...” Kole commented as he looked at one of the panels. “No good. The good news is that the bridge is useable, but the lack of power is not helping any.”

“Is there anything we can do here?” Zalika asked.

“We can check out the battery power room a deck above us. It might have the spare power, but there is nothing else I can do from this.”

“We can use the spare power from our suits to power it, though,” Carlos added. “Otherwise, we need the spare power core that Felix has with him.”

“Carlos and I will go up to the power room,” Kole said. “Zalika, Bekra, and Chuang ... I want you three to keep this area secured. Once we have power, we have a base of operations.”

“Got it,” Zalika said. “No problem lounging here for the time being.”

“I might end up needing you, though, when we try to get the batteries working. Don’t get too comfortable.”

Zalika shrugged. “Back to engineer again ... ugh.”

Chuang watched as Kole and Carlos left the bridge room and back out to the elevator. He looked back to see Bekra that was looking over the room. Her visor with red glowing eyes made her look freakish in the pitch-black environment.

“Impressed by the armor?” Zalika commented as she was looking at Chuang.

“Yeah... , “ Chuang replied.

They could hear new communication chatter that was coming over the headpieces of the helmet. They listened and focused on the marine team’s camera sights that were passing through the passageway that led to the centripetal ring and the stern section of the warship.

Looking at the camera feed, they could see what Felix was looking through on the top left section of the marine helmet’s visor. The passageway was shaped differently, like a giant cylinder tube than a rectangular hallway. It still allowed the marines to walk in formation together as they progressed forward.

“Centripetal ring is offline,” Felix said. “Drone still is starting to pick something up. Looks like ... yep ... more blood.”

“Confirmed,” Uluwehi said. “It is lined on the elevator section and walls. All of it is human.”

“According to the data repo... , “ he paused as he looked at his sensor screen. He zeroed in on what he was picking up. The sensor screen of his computer showed a layout of the warship. The moment that he got near the elevator, there was a brief flash of red light on the screen. It was extremely minor and hardly noticeable to see. It flashed and was gone.

“Felix?” Wei asked. “Are you picking something up?”

“Strange ... I thought I picked up life signs ... it was coming from above us. It was in the centripetal ring, but the data just dropped. Might be a glitch. Uluwehi, you picking anything up?”

“Not yet, but I am watching my own screens closely when you said that,” Uluwehi replied. He resituated the pistol he held and kept it held comfortably close to the sensor screen he was watching.

“Keep going, men,” Wei said. “Almost at the power room. Karine, are you back with Darshit?”

“Yes, we are,” Karine replied. “We can still see you guys far ahead of us. We are standing comfortably, waiting.”

“Good,” Wei replied.

The marines were walking forward as they walked past a large elevator door. They noticed that it was open wide. Some blood was lining the walls and trailed directly into the opening.

“God...” Uluwehi replied. “What the hell happened here?”

“You tell me, doc,” Harper replied. “I feel like this is just some drug trip gone bad.”

“Keep an eye on that elevator door. We are blowing past it to the power module,” Wei said. “That is the way to get into the centripetal ring. Don’t let the blood scare you, could be anything that might have caused it.”

“Like what?” Cruz asked as he aimed his rifle at the open door and walked past it. Marines kept their weapons glued to the opening as they stayed in formation. The rear guard was keeping a close eye on it as they walked almost backward.

A sense of dread had filled the air. The sight of blood was both ominous and foreboding. It was like a sign that pointed to trouble. What had caused it and who it exactly it belonged to was a mystery.

Chuang, meanwhile, was getting anxious remaining in place. He would shift around and look at the empty room of the bridge as his hands and fingers would tense on the grips of his rifle.

“Not exactly the ideal mission, huh, kid?” Zalika gestured.

“I am alright,” Chuang replied. “Boot camp taught me many things ... wasn’t really prepared for all this.”

“Nothing ever is. I guarantee that once this is all done, things will be alright for a long while. Like ... we haven’t had an incident that we needed to be sent to for all the time I was on Eutera. Bekra has seen more action, and Eutera has been a vacation spot for her.”

Bekra did a series of quick nods to confirm it.

“I can’t imagine the campaigns you have to go through.”

“It isn’t that many,” Bekra explained. “Most battles are in space. If we are fighting on the ground, then it is because the fleet is gone or destroyed. I was in two battles on the ground. Both of them were on the same planet in two weeks.”

“You hear the rumors about Cipra?” Zalika asked.

“Rumors?” Chuang asked.

“Yeah ... something about possibly retaking it. It is just a rumor. Not much information is available for it yet, probably just false hopes.”

“It would be very hard to retake it,” Bekra added. “The Aksren clan would be ... what is the word ... entrenched?”

“Yep ... Aksren would have all that shit ready to fight back. I hope we are, though ... better than this shit.”

They looked back at the helmet data as they continued to listen to the conversation. There was a light thump sound that came from near the elevator shaft.

“Contact!” Felix said. “I picked up an audio spike ... came from ... the centripetal ring ... it is away from the elevator shaft.”

Wei lifted up his hand to halt the team as they came to a stop. Adrenaline started to kick in as marines were keeping their guns aimed at the elevator shaft.

“Still not picking up ... wait...” Uluwehi said. “There ... Master Sergeant, I am picking up a pinging tone from one of the crew’s tracking beacons. Looks like ... Ensign Burton ... served on the Columbus for two years. Yep ... it is in the ring, alright. The signal is really faint, though. I am about to lose the signal.”

“Losing it too,” Felix said. “Fuck ... it is gone.”

“I lost it,” Uluwehi added with a sigh. “Crew might still be alive after all.”

“Alright, men,” Wei said. “We are almost there. Keep going. We know where we are going next after this.”

Zalika, Bekra, and Chuang continued to watch the camera feed as the marines pressed their march forward. Eventually, they reached the module. The power module of the ship was adjacent to the engine module. It was more or less a large passageway, but it consisted of elevators and large doors. It looked nothing impressive from the corridor, at least to the marine’s point of view.

“Drone is still not picking anything ahead of us leading to the engine module,” Felix added. “Approaching Super Direct Fusion Drive number 1 on the right-hand door. The door is already open. It has both the emergency batteries in here and the first power generator. Recommend securing this.”

“Agreed,” the master sergeant said. “Cruz, Harper, you are in first.”

“Let’s do it,” Harper said as they stepped up ahead of Felix and the Master Sergeant. Their M18s were pointed directly into the interior door of the room.

Both men almost charged in with their weapons at the ready. The teams watched as the two men entered the room, pointing at opposite sides of the room.

“I don’t see any bodies,” Harper said.

“I am not picking up AHH!” Cruz yelped.

Something bumped into the helmet that startled him. He held firm as he turned to look at it. Even Harper turned around to look at it. His fear almost turned into a laugh instantly.

“Cruz! Harper!” Wei yelled as he walked in.

“Don’t worry, Master Sergeant,” Harper remarked as he pointed at a floating cutting tool that had smacked Cruz’s helmet. “Cruz got spooked by the ghosty tools.”

“Fucking hell,” Cruz as a couple of marines got a chuckle from it. Cruz looked at the cutting tool with disgust. He then looked at it closely, though, as it seemed to grab his attention.

“Were clear,” Harper said. “Besides a couple of things floating around in here.”

“Master Sarge,” Cruz commented as the team began to walk in. “Cutting tools...”

Felix came into the room, and his camera was showing what everyone saw on his camera feed. The power room consisted of the Columbus’s main power reactor. Located behind a clear heavy duty see-through durable plastic, the fusion reactor was the heart of the warship. More powerful than the ordinary direct fusion drives of former Earth’s past, the drive looked like two dome cylinders connected together. Pipes of different design interconnected and led outward. Adjacent of it was a series of massive black boxes. The power would flow into the batteries and then outward to the other portions of the vessel. The fusion generator itself wasn’t really that large. It was the size of a small car, but everything else connected to it that made it so big. Outside of the plastic wall, the marines began to take note of something.

There was just one problem with the room. Everything was damaged. The panels that connected to the see-through walls had holes in it. Consoles that lined up and connected to the generator looked like they were torn apart.

“What the fuck?” Harper replied as he had a better look at the room.

“Looks like somebody went and decided to wreck this place apart,” Cruz replied as he went and grabbed the cutting tool floating in the air. “Might be our same saboteur.”

“That is exactly what the gate probes looked like,” Karine added as she was watching through the camera feed. “They or someone just started cutting the equipment up.”

Cruz walked up and began to punch in buttons on his wrist computer. He was shaking his head as a light lit up from one of the consoles. The panel of the console itself was working at half its capability. Lights flickered in and out from the display. A status screen didn’t deliver the good news as Cruz did his best to read it. Written in both English and Chinese, the data would fragment and then repeat back again on what it was picking up.

“What is your report?” Wei asked.

Cruz shook his head. “Somebody wanted to wreck this poor girl that was for sure. The Fusion generator has multiple stress fractures. There are no signs of external damage. Everything was done from the inside. Bullet holes riddle the power regulator. All but one of the batteries is still operating, and ... that can’t be right.”

“Confirmed,” Felix added. “I am picking up more gas trace signatures of weapons fire. PDW-20 ... man they turned the generator into swiss cheese.”

“From what I can tell,” Cruz said as he was still struggling to read the data. “It ... the generator is going to require at least a couple weeks of repairs just to fix this shit.”

“Emergency power?” Wei asked.

“Ugh ... not good. All but one battery is still operational. It has ... I don’t understand this ... it has 1% of power left in it.”

“How the fuck?” Felix commented. “That is barely enough to power the computer for a few minutes. Why is it so low on power?”

“Drained...” Cruz replied. “From what I can tell, the cells were designed to bleed its own reserves ... at least with the one that is still functioning.”

“Why?” the master sergeant asked. “Who would do this?”

“In order to do this, you need somebody from this ship to do it,” Cruz explained. “The crew ... hell somebody or some group decided that it was better for the ship not to have power.”

“Without power, even the most basic shit wouldn’t work,” Felix explained. “Life support, engines, computers, sensors, ... all of it would be gone.”

“What about the other generator?” Wei asked. “The backup generator?”

“I am not picking up data from it either,” Cruz said. “I wouldn’t be surprised that it is down and like this too. Might as well take a hack saw and gut the ship. Hell, might as well fucking scrap the bitch and tell Mars to make another one.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Harper commented. “I mean ... why would somebody do this?”

“Scuttling?” Carlos said as he listened to the communication chatter. “Prevent the ship from falling into the wrong hands, maybe? There are lots of reasons why you would want to damage your own ship.”

“What about other enemies?” Felix questioned. “Pirates, I know we discussed them, but what about secret organizations?”

“What secret organizations?” Cruz asked with annoyance.

“I mean UWA organizations and shit. Think that this might be some sort of covert operations crap. There have been anti-government groups like Darkwatch that are anarchists. UWA intelligence might be running some sort of experiment to test people out in certain stressful environments, and then they pull the plug and get the big laugh at us. What about other UWA secret government organizations like Outreach?”

“This is just mindless speculation and bullshit,” Harper said.

“I agree,” Wei replied. “We are wasting our breath while other lives maybe still at stake. This isn’t getting us anywhere. Cruz, is there anything that you can do here?”

“Well ... we have the one battery that is left,” Cruz answered. “The cables are damaged, but ... maybe it could be transferred somewhere else.”

“Master Sarge,” Kole’s voice echoed through the comm. channel. “I might be able to help with this. We just reached the secondary power room. It looks like it took the same hits as Cruz and Felix were seeing. This was intentional, alright. They didn’t damage any of the consoles on the ventral bridge, though. The computer core could still be powered up. Carlos believes that he can repair the cables here to reroute the power from your location and divert it to my location. The cells can then power up the quantum computer core for the bridge. From there, we can access the logs, learn about what has happened, and then do more extensive sensor sweeps of the Columbus.”

“It won’t be that much, though,” Cruz said. “1% of one of these cells is enough to power the computer for like a few minutes before it goes out again.”

“Do it,” Wei commanded. “Cruz, Adrian, you will remain here and conduct the repairs and remain on standby for Kole to transfer power. Kole, you will be in charge of all this. Get the computer back online.”

“Aye,” Kole replied.

“Should we consider getting more reinforcements?” Felix asked.

“No, we still need to figure out what is going on before we start flooding this ship with people,” the Master Sergeant answered. “We need more info ... we need to go up to the centripetal ring and investigate what Felix and Uluwehi were picking up.”

A sense of dread once again filled the hearts of the marines. The master sergeant could see a few of the faces go pale with fear.

“Are you sure, Master Sergeant?” Harper asked.

“Honestly, I still think we are worrying about nothing,” Cruz commented.

“Says the person that is staying here. I would ask Adrian, but I know he doesn’t say much shit at all.”

Harper looked over to Adrian, and he just shrugged. He shook his head and looked back to Cruz.

“Look, I have to stay here and repair this shit. I hate it too, but I still think whatever happened is gone. The crew might have gone mad, and maybe they haven’t. Yeah, there is broken shit and whatnot, but it might have been an attack from some group. Itreans come and board the ship, and then they are gone ... crew tried to sabotage the Columbus from being captured, or some madness broke out ... I don’t know. All we are doing is looking over a corpse and having to be some forensics team on why this event happened.”

“I agree,” Kole commented. “Remain calm. We are a marine team that has lived comfortably on some planet enjoying the R and R as other marines are in more danger than we ever were ... until now. Now we have to be the team that has to do the rough crap. Do as the Master Sergeant says. He is in charge, is that clear?”

“Aye...” Harper replied. The other men seemed to nod in agreement.

“I can say this,” Uluwehi explained. “I see no signs of a pathogen. No virus or bacteria is present since we have walked this whole way. If a virus was loose, then it is gone.”

“Most viruses that we create are very short-lived,” Bekra added in the communication chatter. “We design it, so it spreads, wipes out the population, and then dies out to prevent it from somehow hitting us in return or some other life form from getting it.”

“Do you think that we are officially safe from any contagion?” Wei asked.

“I believe so.”

“What about radiation?” Wei asked.

“I am not picking up any radiation,” Felix commented. “No sign of an EMP bomb.”

Uluwehi seemed to hesitate. “Then I see no means of needing to keep using our power armor oxygen supply. Master Sargent, it is, in my opinion, that no pathogen can warrant our demise or hurt us. We may breathe the ship’s air.”

“What about the fact that life support is gone?” Harper asked.

“Well, the air is colder but isn’t that cold. The ship’s air is still here. It hasn’t gone anywhere. My only reason for suggesting it is that is to help supplement our air supply. We have several hours of breathable air in the suits, but if we are here for a very long time, then we can just use the ship’s air until it runs out. It’s up to you, Master Sergeant. I am going to keep using my own air, honestly. It is an option, not an order.”

“I feel very comfortable wearing and using my own air for the time being,” Wei answered, seemingly for the many. “I leave it as an option, though if you want to breathe the ship’s air. That includes you, Bekra.”

For Chuang that was on the bridge, he looked over to Bekra and saw her press a button near the back of her neck. The helmet covering that she wore over her head retracted away to reveal the crest and beak of who she was. She looked around as she seemed to try to observe the area. She even breathed the air for a little bit to gather the scent.