Redemption Protocol (Contact) (21 page)
> Thank you, Tyburn, noted and rejected. No more of that suggestion for the moment, thank you.
Brennen cast to Marsac again.
> Ethan, you must be shocked right now but we can deal with this. I'd like to come and talk to you.
In Havoc’s bubble, Whittenhorn looked flustered.
“I don't think there’s any advantage to us being here. Not now that Marsac is contained.”
Bergeron nodded.
“The non-security personnel should move back to the front of the ship.”
“Exactly. I'm not qualified for this,” Humberstone said.
Havoc frowned as he studied shipnet. He could feel waves of jamming surging on and off – Marsac didn't know if he was coming or going.
“No one is going anywhere.”
Bergeron wrapped her arms round herself.
“We’re putting extra lives at risk. It’s stupid and wrong.”
“Shut up,” Stephanie said.
Whittenhorn looked around the group.
“Some of us should move to the command hab, so we can better co-ordinate.”
Bergeron and Humberstone nodded their agreement.
Havoc studied Whittenhorn. Their executive officer looked pale and terrified. Havoc tried to keep his tone reassuring as he shook his head.
“We're fine. Hang tight and we'll get through this. Have you all got your masks?”
They nodded.
“Great. Put them on for me, would you?”
People fumbled their masks on. At least it gave them something to do.
For the first time, Marsac responded.
> Alright. Just you, Brennen. Alone.
Progress
.
Havoc cast to Brennen, excluding Marsac.
> Brennen, take a blast shield from the bubble.
> Will do, Havoc.
> Don't go in there, Commander.
> Noted, Mr Tyburn.
> It's a pointless risk, Brennen.
> Noted and disregarded, Mr Tyburn.
“You don't have any authority here.”
Havoc turned, surprised. Whittenhorn stared at him defiantly.
“I’m in charge here.”
Havoc noticed Whittenhorn’s hands clasping and unclasping by his sides.
“Ok, everyone, Brennen is moving in. We should be there soon.”
Whittenhorn raised his chin.
“If I order us to move back then we will. Now that Brennen’s moving into the lab the risks are higher and our need to be here is gone. We’ll leave one or two people here at most.”
Havoc monitored Brennen moving along the flexipipe toward the lab module, conscious, as they all were, that this could go disastrously wrong at any moment.
“It's negligent to take unnecessary risks with the crew,” Bergeron said.
“Mr Whittenhorn has a duty of care,” Humberstone said.
Whittenhorn nodded vigorously.
“Exactly. It’s my duty.”
Brennen entered the lock leading into the test lab. Whittenhorn’s eyes roamed wildly.
“Ok, I'm going to move us back. Havoc, you can stay here.”
Havoc looked at Whittenhorn.
“Look we're all scared, but you know as well as I do everyone has to stay here. If Brennen can calm down Marsac we're there. We can segregate him on a tethered shuttle and disarm the device.”
Whittenhorn looked more affronted than placated.
“I'm not scared.”
“I resent that suggestion,” Humberstone said.
Stephanie gasped with exasperation as she rolled her eyes.
On the shipnet feed, Havoc watched Brennen step out of the lock.
> Ok, Ethan, the lock is open and I'm moving into the lab. You should see me soon. I'm holding a blast screen in front of me as a precaution. You can scan me if you want. Stay with me, Ethan.
> I'm scared, Brennen.
> So is everyone, Ethan. Look on shipnet, we're all here with you.
Nicely handled, Havoc thought. He watched on shipnet as Brennen slowly approached Marsac.
Whittenhorn lurched for the lock leading to the spindle.
“We're leaving.”
Bergeron and Humberstone pressed after Whittenhorn.
“You can’t leave,” Weaver said.
Havoc reached between the lawyers and grabbed Whittenhorn's dress uniform. He pulled Whittenhorn around.
“No one is leaving. Any one of you could be the saboteur with the codes to blow up Marsac.”
“That’s outrageous!” Bergeron said.
Whittenhorn’s eyes flashed with panic.
“We're going. I need to co-ordinate.”
Humberstone looked at Havoc’s outstretched arm.
“You have no authority to stop us. Whittenhorn is in command.”
Havoc dropped his arm.
“We wait together.”
> Hello, Ethan.
> Hello, Commander.
> I'm just going to stand near you for a minute and let you relax, ok, Ethan?
> Ok. Thank you.
Humberstone hit the lock release button.
Havoc stepped past Whittenhorn, resealed the lock and turned to face everyone.
“No one is leaving. Not another word from any of you.”
Bergeron turned to Whittenhorn.
“This is wrong. He can't do that.”
Humberstone hopped from foot to foot.
“You should arrest him. We need to leave now.”
“Please, for the love of God, shut up,” Stephanie said.
> Ok, Ethan. Bit of a predicament we're in.
> You could say that, Commander.
> So we're just going to take this one step at a time.
> Ok.
Whittenhorn cracked. He tried to shove past Havoc.
“I need to leave. I'm too valuable.”
Havoc couldn't believe it. Whittenhorn actually said it.
I'm too valuable
. He grabbed Whittenhorn's uniform and lifted him up to his face.
“
We all want to live
, you weasel, don't you get it?”
Whittenhorn squealed, wide eyed.
Havoc dropped him, shaking his head.
> Havoc, tell Sylvie I love her. And Lucas. If anything happens. Just tell them.
> You can tell them yourself, big man.
> I hope.
Whittenhorn, Bergeron and Humberstone stared at Havoc with resentment in their eyes. He knew that look. They wanted someone to blame for their predicament and that someone was him. He sighed.
“These are Brennen's orders.”
“Unlawful orders,” Bergeron said.
“So, unenforceable,” Humberstone said.
Bergeron lifted her chin.
“You threatened us.”
Whittenhorn felt his collar.
“You hit me.”
Stephanie exhaled in disgust.
“You guys need to grow some balls.”
Stephanie turned to Bergeron.
“That goes for you, too.”
Humberstone’s eyes roamed around the bubble.
“This whole side of the disc will be obliterated. We could die here.”
> We need to get you on a shuttle, Ethan.
Silence.
There was no reply from Marsac.
“Oh no,” Whittenhorn said.
Havoc watched Marsac and Brennen in his mind's eye, relayed over shipnet. Marsac was crouched, wide eyed and massive. His eyes flashed silver, his cannons and filament blade deployed, ready for war. Havoc could feel the hum of electronic countermeasures coming off him. The air pressure in the lab was down to one third of standard, a much better position from a shock wave perspective. Havoc hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
Brennen motioned forward with the blast screen he was holding.
> We need to get you on a shuttle, Ethan. I know you're worried about that, so I'm going to come with you.
There was a pause.
> Thank you, Commander.
Havoc exhaled with relief. They'd broken through, right there. Brennen had convinced Marsac he was going to back him all the way.
> Commander?
> Yes, Ethan?
> I need to tell you something.
> Go ahead.
> Can you...
On shipnet, Havoc saw Marsac raise his hand. Marsac wanted to securely point cast to Brennen, without any possibility of eavesdropping. Brennen shuffled forward, reaching his hand round the screen in response.
It was a mistake. A huge mistake.
“Oh no,” Havoc said.
The people in the bubble looked at him.
Signal lost
.
The screen went blank and the world ended.
30.
Havoc watched himself from a distance. One side of their bubble was gone. They traveled through space at tens of thousands of kilometers per hour. They had been before and they were now, but before they'd been in a ship and now they were on an open platform surrounded by shredded composite and cold infinite space.
The screams were strangely drawn out, attenuating as the air rushed past during the explosive decompression. A ruptured oxygen tank burned fiercely outside. The scorching fire made everything in their wrecked bubble either bright light or dark shadow.
The depressurization wave nudged them toward the abyss. Havoc grabbed Stephanie and Bergeron as they lurched back, then stepped through them, standing between everyone and the void.
They were in space. There was no sound, other than his own breathing heard through his own body. The ambient radiation temperature was five degrees Kelvin, or two hundred and ninety degrees Celsius colder than it had been a moment ago. The fluids escaping from the tanks around the test lab vaporized in the vacuum and desublimated to frozen crystals. Still, the cold wasn't immediately critical to Havoc – the vacuum was a superb insulator.
Augmentation and masks meant the lung pressure of the people around him was maintained so their lung damage would be minimal, but even so, for those without appropriate augmentation, water vapor was already forming in their soft tissue and causing it to swell. Evening wear and space wasn’t an optimal combination. It wouldn’t be long before their blood circulation would cease and hypoxia – oxygen starvation – would result. Havoc could see it happening already.
A calm female voice repeated 'evacuate, contamination’ over shipnet as streams of radiation and ionized gases flooded out of the blown lab tanks.
Fragments of dialogue came over comcast. People were screaming, flooding the channel with panic, though Havoc's receiver leveled out the sound. He switched modes and streamed the casts to text in his mind's eye.
> Hull breach here.
> Help!
> We've lost pressure.
> They're gone!
Behind it all was the softly insistent: 'Evacuate, contamination'.
He looked out. It was like peering over the edge of a damaged skyscraper. They were suspended a kilometer above the main engine, which was visible below through the struts of disc five and six. Because the ship was decelerating, they had the equivalent of gravity in the direction of the main engine. A fall from here to a distant part of the decelerating ship could still hurt or kill someone, depending on their augmentation. A shattered strut tumbled away, crashing into disc five before spinning into the distance. The oxygen fire outside their bubble fizzled and died, along with the searing contrast.
He couldn't be sure that the remaining half of their bubble would remain attached to the ship, but he judged it safe enough for the next sixty seconds. Whittenhorn and Humberstone scrabbled to open the lock. Stephanie stood off to one side. She seemed ok. Whittenhorn and Humberstone hauled themselves through the open lock and Bergeron jumped after them. Bergeron caught Weaver in the face with her elbow as she forced her way past. Whittenhorn, Bergeron and Humberstone crammed themselves inside the lock and the door closed behind them.
Weaver half spun toward Havoc and collapsed to the floor. She was staring out with her mask half off her face. Havoc caught her and replaced the mask as he sensed her vitals – they were ok. Fleeting expressions of confusion then panic swept across her face. She looked up and her eyes fixed on him. The decorative triangle glyphs she’d worn for the party spun across her pupils.
> You ok?
> I think so.
> How much gas do you have?
> I’m fine. I can’t believe I didn’t switch over.
Havoc nodded as he lifted Weaver to her feet. Weaver’s augmentation was amply sufficient for her to evacuate the area. He accessed shipnet for lifesigns on Brennen and Marsac.