The Trophany – Part 5

If you missed Part 4, click here
Part 3, click here.
Part 2 is here.
Part 1 is here.

Two hours later, they
reached the location Bergen gave them for the shuttle. “There’s nothing here.”
Doug set the rover to idle and twisted around in his seat. “We’re at the right
coordinates, but I don’t see anything.”

“They wouldn’t leave it
sitting out in the open, genius,” Cyn said. “It’s probably in some kind of
underground bunker.” She twisted around, too, to look at Bergen. “What do you
think?”

“I copied the specs on the hangar. Let me send them to you,” Bergen said, scratching his head. He poked at his phone. “It’s all Krimson to me—maybe you can figure it out.”

Marielle gave Bergen a
strange look, then turned back to her computer console. She’d volunteered to
keep an eye on Cisneros and The Trophany. Fortunately, Cassi had known how to
ping the rovers’ locators without alerting the occupants. Marielle’s screen
showed a rough map of the asteroid, with the base outlined in blue and their
location a blinking green dot. Another dot, this one red, blinked a short
distance away, in the craggy hills to the west of them.

“I think I can run a
subterranean scan on this thing,” Cassi said, tapping some controls. Her
extensive EVA experience had also given her a working knowledge of most of the
equipment in the rover. What she didn’t know, Doug and Cyn had figured out.

After a moment, Cassi
nodded in satisfaction and pointed to the screen beside her. “This area is
hollow. We just need to figure out how to get in.” She tapped a few more
commands and grunted happily when it pinged. “Yup, there’s a door right here.
Do you have any open commands in that file?”

Cyn flicked something and
grinned. “Got it!”

The forward-facing cams
showed a slit opening in the hill off to their left. As they watched, it
stretched wider, until it was large enough for the rover to crawl inside.

“Bogies on the move!”
Marielle’s voice cut through the cheers. “They’re headed away from us, though.
Must be looking for more loot.”

The rover trundled into the hidden hangar. Cassi did some magic on her console and the door shut behind them.

“Is there atmo inside this
space?” Quinn asked.

“No,” Cassi said. “But it
looks like there’s an accordion airlock over there.” She pointed out the
location on the front screen. “Pull up close to it—might be automated. If it’s
standard SFS build, it should have recognized our vehicle when we entered
and—yes!”

Onscreen, a yellow-green,
accordion-folded tube stretched out from the wall. As they moved closer it
seemed to home in on them like some kind of alien creature scenting the atmosphere
inside their rover. Quinn shuddered. She knew it was standard tech—her
imagination was obviously too active.

The airlock latched on to
their rover with a muffled clang. Doug climbed out of the driver’s seat and
squeezed past the passengers to the rear of the boxy vehicle. He opened a panel
near the door and entered some commands. With a pop and a hiss, the door swung open, cold, stale air
flooding into the rover.

“Let me take point,”
Marielle said, checking her disrupter then pulling out a blaster.

“You don’t expect anyone to
be here, do you?” Quinn asked.

Marielle smiled, grimly.
“No, but better safe…”

The rest of the team
trooped out of the rover, and Quinn shut the door behind her. “Can you lock
that?” she asked Doug.

“I’ll put a passphrase on
the open sequence,” he replied. “That should keep space pirates from stealing
our rover.” He grinned and winked as he keyed in a command.

She smiled faintly and
followed him up the airlock.

When the cycle completed,
the inner door opened.

“Oh, shit,” Marielle said.

Cisneros stood there,
smiling. “Drop it.” He held a blaster aimed at The Trophany’s head.

Marielle laughed, hard and
bitter. “I don’t think so. Go ahead and shoot her. You’d just save me from
having to do it.”

“Marielle, how can you say
such a thing?” The Trophany cried. “We’re friends! Think about how we—”

“Save it, Tiff,” Marielle
sneered. “I heard you plotting with this ass-hat. You were going to leave us
behind so you could fill your shuttle with gold. And now that you’ve realized
he’s going to dump your sorry butt here, you want my help?”

“What?” The Trophany pulled
out of Cisneros’ grip. Ignoring the gun pointed at her face, she rounded on
him. “You were going to abandon me?! How dare you!?” She kicked him in the
shin, the decorative steel tip of her boot cracking into the bone. Then she
shoved her knee up into his groin.

Cisneros jerked back,
hunching over in pain. “You little—!” He slid his finger onto the trigger of
his weapon and his head exploded.

The Trophany screamed as a cloud of disintegrated blood, bone, and flesh showered over her.

Marielle flicked the safety
on her blaster and holstered it. She looked at The Trophany, then cocked her
fist and drove it into the other woman’s face. “You owe me, bitch.”

* * *

Through the inner door of
the airlock, they entered a small, rough-walled hall. A door on the left led to
a tiny chamber with a cot and a sanitation pod. Three familiar, meter-high
crates half-blocked the way. At the other end, another airlock led to the
shuttle. Everyone carefully stepped over Cisneros’ headless body, leaving it on
the floor in a pile of brain dust.

“How’d you get in here?”
Marielle asked, poking The Trophany between the shoulders.  “Your rover
wasn’t in the garage.”

The Trophany stumbled but
caught herself. With her arms secured behind her back, she didn’t put up much
of a fight. “We got into the compound, but Perry couldn’t open the shuttle. He
sent the rover away on autopilot, and we waited for you.” She whimpered and
hunched her shoulder up by her bruised jaw.

Cyn stopped tapping on the
control panel by the second airlock. “It won’t cycle,” she said. “It’s asking
for a passphrase, and it’s not responding to anything in the file you sent,
Tony. You got any ideas, Parra?”

Doug shook his head. “I
could try some of the old ones, but they’re changed every six months, minimum.
We’ll probably get locked out if we try too many.”

Quinn banged her head
softly against the wall. To have come so far and be stopped now! “The old
look-under-the-drawer thing won’t work here, will it, Tony? Any thoughts?”

Bergen had his phone out
and was swiping through it. “I downloaded everything I could. Let me see what
I’ve got.” After a few moments of silence, he pushed around the crates. “Let me
try.”

“I’m already here,” Cyn
said. “Just read it out to me.”

Bergen shook his head. “Too
many weird characters. It will be easier for me to just type it in.” He
squeezed past the others to the hatch. Cyn stepped aside and Bergen typed into
the panel, consulting his phone as he did. “Damn. Hang on.” He poked the phone
a couple more times and tried again. “Ah! Got it!”

With Cassi’s help, Cyn
donned one of the tiny EVA suits and went outside to do a preflight check while
the rest of them entered the shuttle.

Bergen took a quick look at
the cockpit then retired to the passenger area. “I’ll let Cyn do her thing,
then start the warm-up.” He grabbed a water pack from the galley and dropped
down into a seat.

“Quinn,” Marielle said.
“Move away from Bergen. This thing has a wide range, and I don’t want to take
you out by accident.”

Quinn looked up. Marielle
had her small disrupter aimed squarely at Bergen’s chest. “What are you
doing?!”

“The real question is: what
is Bergen doing?” Marielle asked calmly. “He’s a Krimson spy.”

“What? No!” Quinn stared at
Marielle. “Cisneros made that up.”

Marielle shook her head, her eyes never leaving Bergen. “He thought he made it up. Funny, he was actually right, wasn’t he, Bergen?”

Bergen looked from Marielle
to Quinn, his eyes flicking around the room, evaluating. “You’re crazy,
Marielle. I’m a finance guy.”

“No, you’re a Krimson spy.”
Marielle stood in the aisle, feet apart, weapon pointed, rock-steady, at
Bergen. “This isn’t an SFS shuttle. It looks like one—they did a good job of
mocking up one of ours. But they never expected any SFS personnel to actually
get inside. Look at the inside of the door, Quinn. Emergency egress
instructions written in Krimson text. The ID numbers on all the fixtures in
here—chairs, vid screen, galley cabinets, water packs. Look at any of them, Quinn. They’re all Krimson.
And only Bergen could open the door.
I can’t believe he thought Doug and Cyn wouldn’t notice.”

Bergen hesitated, then
shrugged. “Our shuttles are built for stealthy insertion. That means using SFS
equipment anywhere an SFS technician might look. We frequently land at your
bases for fuel and maintenance. But as you said, no one is supposed to come
inside. Poor planning on our part, but you know, budget cuts. Getting SFS parts
is not cheap.”

Quinn gasped, leaping out
of her chair. “You’re admitting it? But I’ve known you for years! How can you
be a Krimson spy?”

“Deep plant. I’ve been on
the SFS payroll longer than most of their real employees. Of course, my Krimson
Empire salary offsets the crappy pay here.” Bergen leaned back in his chair,
sizing up Marielle. “Here’s the thing, though. I’m saving you. Your own chain
of command left you here to die, but I risked my mission and my freedom to get
you off this rock. I could have left without any of you.” He paused, cocking
his head. “I could have taken a boat-load of gold back to the Empire, too.” He
smiled wistfully. Then his face hardened, and he turned away from Marielle, his
eyes locking onto Quinn’s. “But I didn’t. I’m risking it all to save fourteen
civilians. Dependents of my government’s enemy. Do you want to know why?” He
paused.

Quinn nodded, mesmerized.

“I’m saving you, because
that’s what we do in the Krimson Empire. We value loyalty. And family.
Children. Friendship. We don’t leave civilians to die because it’s easier than
getting a divorce or because there’s a pile of cash.” He stood, slowly,
ignoring Marielle and her gun, his eyes glued to Quinn’s.

“I was sent here to provide
information that would help broker peace between our people. I didn’t hurt
anyone. I didn’t provide any information that would endanger anyone, even your
military combatants. I told my handlers about the people I met here in the SFS,
and that we’re all really the same, and that warring with the Federation doesn’t
help anyone except the fat-cat defense contractors. And I think my little
contribution helped pave a way for peace. I could have gotten on my shuttle,
knowing I’d done my part, and flown back to my home. But that’s not how we fly
in the Empire. So, I’m saving you, and your friends, and your admiral’s whiny
wife, and even that fontenk poerken Cisneros, if Marielle hadn’t killed
him first. If you’ll let me. But you’re in command, Quinn. You decide.”

Quinn looked from Marielle
to Bergen. “He’s right. He could have left us. Or killed us. But he didn’t.
Let’s go get the others and find our families.”

The Trophany’s
uncharacteristically meek voice floated over the seat backs. “Can we take some
gold?”

Quinn rolled her eyes. Then
she thought better of it and looked a question at Bergen who grinned and
nodded. “Yes, we can.”

To find out what happens when Quinn and Tony get back to the Federation, pre-order Krimson Run. It releases on Monday!

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