The Cell Mate Pt. 04

"I make a far better distraction and shield and I can't do that and prepare our vessel," Perikos explained, correctly interpreting my misapprehension. Once again I was bringing up the rear in terms of meaningful contribution. Ah well. At least by now it was to be expected.

"We will move quickly and quietly the remaining distance before closing in. If we are fortunate, we will have as much time as we need to take the ship. If we are less fortunate they will be anticipating our attack and we will have no more than ten minutes to neutralize hostile forces and capture the vessel before reinforcements arrive."

Okay, Commando. We either have all the time in the world or hardly any at all. There wasn't much point to continuing this conversation. Lucky for me Perikos shared my line of thinking.

"There is little else I can think to say to prepare you. It is my express hope that this operation will go as smoothly and seamlessly as possible but there is no chance of us avoiding potentially lethal conflict. Know that I intend to honor my promise to you. Regardless of the outcome, I will not leave you behind."

Shit. I took that to mean it'd take my body to be buried on Perikos. Bullshit, I decided. I hadn't come this far and gone through this much to die before getting off the planet. I was going to get on the platform, get a weapon and kill some Kragosi guards and any motherfucker who tried to stop me was going to die trying.

Emboldened by my sudden bout of bravado I shook my right foot a few more times and Perikos began gliding slowly forward.

We were moving so slowly, so carefully that I thought it would have been faster for me to walk. The lights from the station grew brighter and I wondered if Perikos was right and they were scanning for sights and sounds. I was suddenly frightened of my eyes reflecting the glare of the lights back to them, making me visible and giving us away. Why hadn't Perikos thought of that, I wondered, clenching my eyes shut. I opened them again, unable to tolerate sightlessness right now. Perhaps that was why; Perikos wasn't really a sadist by nature.

We slowed as we moved even closer and I could make out the individual lights glaring out into wilderness and for the first time felt a jolt of sympathetic fear for the guards stationed there. They had every reason to be afraid of the dark.

I could make out the hull of a shuttle docked at the station. Just one. If I had been in charge of trying to lure the Perikos here I would have planted one ship and then sabotaged it so the creature would waste valuable time trying to repair the damage while reinforcements swept in to recapture it. Not for the first time I hoped that Brogn and I weren't of like minds. Plus I thought they were underestimating Perikos' destructive capacity. But again I felt a tiny surge of sympathy for the guards stationed here. It was pretty much a suicide mission. And it wasn't their fault they were ugly and disgusting. The whole species seemed to have drawn the short straw. Maybe their cruelty in inbred. Then I remembered being jammed in the ass with the laser prod of their spears. Yeah, maybe. But remembering the pain properly caused my sympathy to run out.

We drew closer still and Perikos tightened its grip around me considerably. I took steady, even breaths to keep my nerves in check as we slowed our approach.

This looked to me like the 200 meter mark. Perikos was right, the searchlights couldn't penetrate the darkness properly from here, the platform was too small and the lights weren't bright enough. It was too much to hope they weren't ultra-violet lights. Again, if I had been organizing this thing, I would have used the last few days to lay down uv strips around the perimeter of the platform, like the kind from the prison exits. I wanted to tell Perikos but couldn't speak. I wondered if it'd already anticipated that kind of obstacle.

So, one ship, five searchlights and some other more lethal fire I couldn't see. Probably no more than fifteen guards but hell, what did I know? This was it. Priority one: get gun. Priority two: use it to mow down the guards between me and the ship. This was it. I was never going to be more prepared.

"Jayn?" The music was nearly inaudible and I had to strain my entire body to hear the notes. "Are you ready?" I felt a slight pressure between my breasts, over my heart. I tried to smile but it probably came out as a grimace. I nodded again. I was ready.

I felt my body propelled so quickly I had no time to orient myself. We were flying over ground at cruiser speed and then the darkness seemed to launch me upwards, too fast for me to react. I saw the platform and little moving flecks on top of it, caught the sickening sight of those bands of light after we'd already crossed one. I felt Perikos' grip loosen around me as I fell.

I landed on my left wrist with a crunch and I knew the bone had been broken but it didn't feel like anything. I heard a deep, guttural squeal and saw steel in front of me smoking. The far half of the ship was obscured by darkness, or rather by Perikos. I heard two more squeals, low and muted through the mass of darkness that was no doubt ripping the Kragosi guards limb from limb. Get a gun, I told myself. I climbed to my feet, vaguely aware of the extent of the bruising on my ass and thighs from the fall. My left wrist was bent wrong but I still didn't feel any pain. Something to worry about later. I began to run without knowing why, and dove behind some loading machinery in time to hear a fizzle of burning metal from the other side. I counted my blessings on apparently having good instincts as whoever had fired continued to blast ray after ray from his weapon at the loading machine. Idiot. I'm not even armed, why fire blind?

The machine I was hiding behind began to heat up under such constant fire and I ducked low. Twenty meters away was more machinery for cover and ten meters from that looked like the lift. It wasn't attached to the cockpit, only to the cargo area so if the cockpit couldn't be breached through the cargo bay I was pretty much a sitting duck. The stupid guard continued draining the charge on his weapon and the darkness swirled to intercept what sounded like a small explosion of the dark side of the platform. I guessed none of the guards had managed to get to the spotlights yet or their battle would have become a lot more one-sided. There were spotlights on every side; the guard firing on me would have done better to get to the spotlight and turn it on Perikos. I had to keep it thinking I was a threat then. Fine by me, I owed these fucks.

I reached down and threw the breakers on the loading mechanism the guard was firing on. It had a set of thick treads to move it along the platform and I pointed it at the machinery twenty meters away, crouching with it as it moved and narrowly avoiding the volley of laser fire. My kingdom for a gun.

The fire ceased halfway through as the guard over-clocked his weapon. I thought he might draw a sidearm but instead he began to charge my plodding cover. My eyes grew wide and I reached down, throwing dials and switches as the guard let out a battle cry, his fat, warty legs blurring as he hurtled at me. I heard a whooshing noise and a wet puckering sound and I saw the steel prong of the forklift jutting out of the guard's gut inches from me. His eyes rolled in his head and think trail of greasy, foul-smelling fluid I supposed was blood oozed from the wound. I had no idea what had happened and I was afraid of moving in closer if it wasn't dead. Then the guard voided its bowels and I indulged myself in a moment of retching before checking it for sidearms. Nothing. I dashed back over to where the guard had dropped his gun and checked the barrel. It was cooler than I thought and I hoped it still worked. I stooped low, dashing back towards the other unloading machine. I caught sight of a Kragosi guard at the farthest corner of the platform. He was running towards one the uv spotlights. Unable to use my left hand I rested the barrel of the gun on a nook in the unloading equipment, sighted my target and fired. He went down.

I heard heavy footfalls and spun around, seeing another guard charging me. This one had a gun. I took aim again and fired but this time I missed. The weapon was too heavy for me to use single-handed. I fired again, this time aiming high and I watched the guard crumple and fall but not before I heard an explosion and felt an odd, biting heat at my side. I looked down and saw a hole in my side where a ball of blunt, hot metal had burrowed. It didn't really hurt either, just felt uncomfortable. Something was definitely wrong with me.

I turned back towards the lift and started to sprint, expecting the pain in my wrist and side to worsen, to stop me from moving forward but it didn't. I heard too more explosions behind me, one louder than the gun that had shot me but I didn't look back. I reached the lift and crouched inside, turning the key left in the lock and punching the 'up' button. The lift droned upwards as I crouched in the steel basket, again a sitting duck with the top half of the lift open wide, just waiting for someone to hurl a grenade.

Suddenly I was encased in darkness and it muffled twin explosions as I was blasted off my feet and fell hard on my bruised ass.

"You're hurt." The music whispered and then it changed, became urgent, frightened. "Hide me. I am sorry."

It bled away as quickly as it came and I felt it burrow inside me, stretching me wide probably tearing me in its haste but I could hardly blame it, especially as I wasn't feeling pain. All around me my vision was blotted out by three distinct orbs of light, three suns in miniature. My stomach bulged and I heart raced as I felt the heat from the lights and made out the steel railing in front of me. It was warped and twisted, no doubt from the explosions Perikos shielded me from. The dark oblong hull blotted out one light entirely as the lift chugged upwards still. Not much farther.

I threw myself face down against the bottom of the lift as a hail of bullets and lasers peppered the spot my head had been only a moment before. I wasn't sure how I knew to duck but I was grateful, I thought, splaying my hands over my head and neck. The pain at my side, near my navel increased from a dull thob to a sharp pinch and I had time to worry I had tore something else before the lift docked at the cargo bay and I lurched forward into the hold.

It was barely lit, the only light streaming from the bay doors. The lift began to descend and I knew I had less than a minute to get to the cockpit. I charged ahead into the darkness, slamming my body into steel crates and paper boxes until I reached the other side of the hold. I ran my hands frantically along the walls, trying to find a panel that would open to the cockpit. I felt Perikos shift inside me and felt as though I was being split open as it dislodged itself. I fell back as it splayed its darkness out over the wall and I saw a panel open up on the far left side. I lunged towards it and it slid shut beside me so that I was standing alone, shot and broken and bleeding in the cockpit of an alien vessel. I saw the control panel by the steering. No time like the present.

I propped myself up on the broad metal chair and engaged the engines. I heard them whine to life and my heart felt light and my head dizzy. That was the easy part. I tried to enter navigation codes but Kragosi characters meant nothing to me. I heard crashing and more squeals coming from the cargo bay. Probably a good sign.

I tried the thrusters but something at the station was holding us down. I took a deep breath and began flipping switches and pushing keys at random, feeling the ship rock as I accidently unloaded our laser cannons on the platform below. Nothing exploded. I reached across the control panel, my breathing ragged now as I tried more buttons, more levers. The ship jumped like I had shocked it and I scanned the console, unsure of what I did until I saw it through the navigation screen: a shuttle approaching us fast. It shot at us, that I was sure of, and I was also sure if I couldn't break the station's hold, we were really screwed.

My bit my lip and tried the only thing I could think of. I revved the engines, trying to maximize thrust. I was either going to flood it or fix it and I didn't know which until I engaged the thrusters again and felt the ship rocket forward and up, narrowly avoiding a collision course with the other shuttle.

The cargo bay door slid open as we ascended upwards and a mass of darkness glided towards the console and me. I couldn't read the screen to make sure we were up to speed or figure out where we were going to exit the atmosphere if we were. Judging by the lack of Gs, I had managed to engage the dampeners and close the cargo bay doors.

My body seemed too big and clumsy and my fingers were cold again. The night sky swirled around my head as I tried to steer us away from the shuttle I knew must be following us. The ship shook again and I wondered what kind of damage we sustained as I saw a line of darkness slide over a series of red buttons and I thought I felt the ship grow lighter a second before I felt the atmosphere fall away and the stars around us grew brighter.

There didn't seem to be enough air. The pain in my wrist seemed to consume my entire left side, mingling horribly from the deep, savaged bullet hole in my side. I tried to breathe deeply but the air wouldn't come. The vacuum of space, I thought, feeling darkness closing in around me. I felt a little twinge of fear mixed in with the wonderful warmth. Darkness wasn't so bad after all.

"Little Shade? Can you hear me?"

I was fantastically groggy. I fought away the cobwebs and felt my wrist and side pulse as I came to. I tried to move but the pain was paralyzing.

I felt a cool tendril stroke my clammy skin. I was lying down on something hard. Metal. I was cold but at least I wasn't alone. I opened my eye and saw Perikos hanging over me, my body propped up on some kind of counter or table. My wrist was bound with a cloth to a piece of piping and the hole in my side was cleaned but uncovered. I wasn't sure if the bullet was still there or not.

"Are we away?" I asked, my voice wavering more than I would have liked.

"Yes, Little Shade. I have set a course for Rhydia Station."

The blackness in front of my face looked somehow off, rougher perhaps, its contours less slick and more matte. "Are you all right?"

The music sounded frightened, uncertain. "I sustained a certain degree of ultra-violet radiation."

I sat up without thinking, barely noticing the wrenching tear in my gut and reached a hand out to it. Tears leaked out of my eyes before I could stop them, before I could even think properly. "How bad?"

"Bad enough that although I would normally assuage such fears from you, as of now I need all the energy I can get."

I felt my tender insides groan in protest.

"Now is not the time for such intimacies. I have felt considerable concern for your injuries. I am sorry that I could not protect you from them."

I tried to say no, to stop it from apologizing.

"I will remove the foreign object from your side as soon as I believe I can sustain myself. I have engaged the hyperdrive and so we have only two days until we reach Rhydia. It will be more pleasant for you if I induce unconsciousness in you so you do not suffer from your wound."

"Fuck that," I croaked, sliding my hand into the mass and pulling away a strand of darkness. I held it against my face, cuddled against it as Perikos gently wound itself around me, taking care to avoid the bullet hole and the broken wrist, my bruised legs and ass. I concentrated on my fear then. Fear Perikos would die, that the hull was damaged from the attack, that we were being followed or that I would be arrested on the Rhydia Station. Above all I felt terrified of being separated from it. Perikos tightened around the back of my head and around my right shoulder.

"You needn't do that for me."

"I want to. And I can't help it. I can't help being scared."

"You have nothing to fear now, Jayn. Soon the ship will reach Rhydia and you will have freedom and be among your kind again."

Nothing to fear, that was rich. My own kind weren't allies. I didn't know anyone on the Rhydia Station or even in the System. I might get sent right back where we came from. I would never see Perikos again, never feel its tendrils on my skin or hear its music in my ear. I needed the darkness and I needed the fear. Not the fear of being locked away, starved, raped and beaten or the fear of TransmitNet finding me and having to flee for my life. I needed Perikos, plain and simple. Everything that it did to me, for me. Everything that it was. I wiped the hot rivulets from my eyes and squeezed Perikos' tendril close. I was going to fix this; I was going to save Perikos and myself. I knew it would save Perikos because I knew how frightened I felt, how hopelessly overwhelmed I was at the slightest prospect. And I knew Perikos would save me.

Summoning the last of my energy I pushed the tendril away and rolled off the table. My side and wrist throbbed horribly but my fingertips buzzed with adrenaline as I padded across the metal floor to the cockpit. I leaned towards the navigation panel where I read the coordinates for Rhydia Station. I deleted them. I turned to the swirling mass of darkness hovering behind me and summoned all my courage.

"What are the coordinates for Perikos?"