Survive.
Survive.
Alex breathed so shallowly her lungs barely moved. This wasn't difficult--and neither was it entirely because she didn't think she wanted the owner of the faint footsteps creaking through the ship's corridors to finish her off like the so-called "crew" of this torturous prison. Her lungs and throat burned with each flex and release, the action in itself tiring, and the reek of her surroundings--stars, herself--made her want to crank the oxygen device on far earlier than absolutely necessary.
Did the slow tread belong to someone who'd piloted the ship? Somehow it didn't seem likely. She suspected she was the only one left. Good riddance. At least, where the guards were concerned. The other captives, inmates who'd been imprisoned with her...if they had broken then death was a mercy. If they hadn't--death still might be a mercy. She didn't know what was out there. The fate that awaited her could indeed be worse than her fellows.
So if it wasn't a pilot, the Diem Vuong had been boarded then...but not by attackers, she suspected. There would be many more footsteps were pirates involved, and this intruder was careful. Not in a militant way, but rather in an observational way. Every so often, the footsteps paused, then continued, in the manner of someone surveillant of their brand new cruiser or a potential bidder sizing up a possible creature at one of the open-air markets on Ludech.
Pace, pace, pace, pause.
Pace, pace, pace, pause.
She imagined two things after a time, as the steady thumps lulled her to caution-laden comfort: first, that it was one of the large automatons from an ages-old mission, the ones that inspected asteroids brought into a mining facility, the ones who'd stare, cock their heads just so, calculate profit margins, and then press a button to either reject the payload or to drill it down to nothingness. The second was less likely: that the ship had been attacked and then seized in a teched-up net of some kind by a madwoman who was now roaming the halls in admiration of her prowess with a...
...Whatever the frell cripples ships to this egregious degree. Honestly.
Shaking her head slowly at folly and frustration brought Alex's attention to the long, sticky and clumped strands of red hair coiled under her body. She'd always wanted to try dreadlocks. ...Just not this way. Without an intervention from the gods, she'd have to cut the whole mess off completely; maybe try something short, sassy. Spiky and shit. Hold the literal shit. Her nose wrinkled. The fact that her hairstyle, out of everything else she could possibly fret over--over infection, starvation, unhealed wounds, whoever was clomping around out there, impending gagging over the roil of death around her, leaks in the hull, even over her ridiculous amounts of moons-cursed freckles--was the most grating thing on that list at the moment a pair of massive boots came into view almost made her laugh.
No, almost giggle.
In that horribly ill-timed, hysterical way one giggles when one is frellin' screwed up the thermal exhaust port without hope of reprieve.
Her hands clenched into fists, several filthy knuckles jammed into her mouth to stop the ragged breaths from escaping into something tangible. It must have worked, as the boots turned, tapping back from whence they came. Good. Good. For when they faded away altogether, she could make a break for it. Because no matter the tale behind the toes tapping down the corridor...they came from a ship beyond this one.
More than likely, it was one that she wouldn't have to worry about hull breaches on. Something flight-worthy. And while she had no wish to be captured anew, nor spaced, nor flayed and peeled like the hull of the ship she occupied, the notion of an opportunity to escape the moons-cursed dungeons she'd lived in for who knew how long began a frantic scrabbling up her spine, nestling into her thoughts until it was an all-consuming need that dared her to defy logic, sense, and all else.
In the name of survival.
Alex moved slowly, her entire frame stiff from having lain for so long then cramming herself into an unfamiliar shape. Trying to straighten her muscles out once more nearly made her groan aloud--and the knuckles found themselves back in her mouth as a meek sound was uttered.
"I might as well dump this back the way it came. I don't think even Rocket wants to take a crack at this mess. I have more than had my fill."
Smoke-gray eyes widened as gaps in her knowledge were flooded with information from the cold, stilted commentary. The boarding party of one was there to assess the Diem Vuong for valuables. And her ship, this presently stinking liferaft among the stars, was so bad off as to not be worth a dren. As useless as her father thought her to be. Alex staggered to the wall, leaning on one palm, and closed her eyes.
If there's something to be said for these monsters, at least they saw that I was useful to the end.
Her eyes snapped open on the grim thought, all-consuming rejection blasting through her mind. This was not the end. Her casual assessment of the ship's condition had been right, and more, if the mass was ejected, she'd be afloat with no hope of a second chance for recovery.
An hour of oxygen is not enough to rebuild a ship from the inside out.
Which only amplified the pulse of determination at the back of her skull, working its way now to the front. Escape. Survive. Abandon ship. If the person attached to the mechanical voice was leaving, that left her with almost zero time to act on that flight instinct. So Alex moved.
Lurching cautiously into the hallway on bare feet, she opted for a route that led toward a secondary exit--assuming the scrapper hadn't forged a new seal in the hull and come through that to board. She retraced steps from memory, having passed parts of the small craft as she was dragged back and forth to the interrogation chamber. Eying more and more crippled mechanisms and a blast door that looked to have been rattled free during the latest jarring of the vessel, she paused, then configured the oxygen mask to failsafe mode.
Not good, but not yet a prob--The thought sliced off as she stepped into Engineering and stood with her mouth agape, her palms clinging to the frame of the once motion-sensitive doorway to hold her up. Or to hold the ship up.
Because the entire back wall was...missing.
Beyond, she could catch a glimpse of a docking area of some sort--probably the scrapper's personal bay. And since nothing caught at her or sucked her into a vacuum through the gaping structure, Alex decided this exit was as good as any exit. She slipped through the cracks, leaning a little too hard on the wall as she did so. Falling, and in short order half-buried under a cascade of mass of hardware and wall bits, to the floor of the bay.
"Frellin'. Stupid. Ship..." came a weak murmur among the wreckage, as she tried vainly to wriggle her way free. Maybe...no one will notice.
And with that ridiculous thought, the hysterical giggle broke free. Barely there, pained, and, to someone well-integrated with society, sounding perhaps a little unhinged.
Survive.
Alex breathed so shallowly her lungs barely moved. This wasn't difficult--and neither was it entirely because she didn't think she wanted the owner of the faint footsteps creaking through the ship's corridors to finish her off like the so-called "crew" of this torturous prison. Her lungs and throat burned with each flex and release, the action in itself tiring, and the reek of her surroundings--stars, herself--made her want to crank the oxygen device on far earlier than absolutely necessary.
Did the slow tread belong to someone who'd piloted the ship? Somehow it didn't seem likely. She suspected she was the only one left. Good riddance. At least, where the guards were concerned. The other captives, inmates who'd been imprisoned with her...if they had broken then death was a mercy. If they hadn't--death still might be a mercy. She didn't know what was out there. The fate that awaited her could indeed be worse than her fellows.
So if it wasn't a pilot, the Diem Vuong had been boarded then...but not by attackers, she suspected. There would be many more footsteps were pirates involved, and this intruder was careful. Not in a militant way, but rather in an observational way. Every so often, the footsteps paused, then continued, in the manner of someone surveillant of their brand new cruiser or a potential bidder sizing up a possible creature at one of the open-air markets on Ludech.
Pace, pace, pace, pause.
Pace, pace, pace, pause.
She imagined two things after a time, as the steady thumps lulled her to caution-laden comfort: first, that it was one of the large automatons from an ages-old mission, the ones that inspected asteroids brought into a mining facility, the ones who'd stare, cock their heads just so, calculate profit margins, and then press a button to either reject the payload or to drill it down to nothingness. The second was less likely: that the ship had been attacked and then seized in a teched-up net of some kind by a madwoman who was now roaming the halls in admiration of her prowess with a...
...Whatever the frell cripples ships to this egregious degree. Honestly.
Shaking her head slowly at folly and frustration brought Alex's attention to the long, sticky and clumped strands of red hair coiled under her body. She'd always wanted to try dreadlocks. ...Just not this way. Without an intervention from the gods, she'd have to cut the whole mess off completely; maybe try something short, sassy. Spiky and shit. Hold the literal shit. Her nose wrinkled. The fact that her hairstyle, out of everything else she could possibly fret over--over infection, starvation, unhealed wounds, whoever was clomping around out there, impending gagging over the roil of death around her, leaks in the hull, even over her ridiculous amounts of moons-cursed freckles--was the most grating thing on that list at the moment a pair of massive boots came into view almost made her laugh.
No, almost giggle.
In that horribly ill-timed, hysterical way one giggles when one is frellin' screwed up the thermal exhaust port without hope of reprieve.
Her hands clenched into fists, several filthy knuckles jammed into her mouth to stop the ragged breaths from escaping into something tangible. It must have worked, as the boots turned, tapping back from whence they came. Good. Good. For when they faded away altogether, she could make a break for it. Because no matter the tale behind the toes tapping down the corridor...they came from a ship beyond this one.
More than likely, it was one that she wouldn't have to worry about hull breaches on. Something flight-worthy. And while she had no wish to be captured anew, nor spaced, nor flayed and peeled like the hull of the ship she occupied, the notion of an opportunity to escape the moons-cursed dungeons she'd lived in for who knew how long began a frantic scrabbling up her spine, nestling into her thoughts until it was an all-consuming need that dared her to defy logic, sense, and all else.
In the name of survival.
Alex moved slowly, her entire frame stiff from having lain for so long then cramming herself into an unfamiliar shape. Trying to straighten her muscles out once more nearly made her groan aloud--and the knuckles found themselves back in her mouth as a meek sound was uttered.
"I might as well dump this back the way it came. I don't think even Rocket wants to take a crack at this mess. I have more than had my fill."
Smoke-gray eyes widened as gaps in her knowledge were flooded with information from the cold, stilted commentary. The boarding party of one was there to assess the Diem Vuong for valuables. And her ship, this presently stinking liferaft among the stars, was so bad off as to not be worth a dren. As useless as her father thought her to be. Alex staggered to the wall, leaning on one palm, and closed her eyes.
If there's something to be said for these monsters, at least they saw that I was useful to the end.
Her eyes snapped open on the grim thought, all-consuming rejection blasting through her mind. This was not the end. Her casual assessment of the ship's condition had been right, and more, if the mass was ejected, she'd be afloat with no hope of a second chance for recovery.
An hour of oxygen is not enough to rebuild a ship from the inside out.
Which only amplified the pulse of determination at the back of her skull, working its way now to the front. Escape. Survive. Abandon ship. If the person attached to the mechanical voice was leaving, that left her with almost zero time to act on that flight instinct. So Alex moved.
Lurching cautiously into the hallway on bare feet, she opted for a route that led toward a secondary exit--assuming the scrapper hadn't forged a new seal in the hull and come through that to board. She retraced steps from memory, having passed parts of the small craft as she was dragged back and forth to the interrogation chamber. Eying more and more crippled mechanisms and a blast door that looked to have been rattled free during the latest jarring of the vessel, she paused, then configured the oxygen mask to failsafe mode.
Not good, but not yet a prob--The thought sliced off as she stepped into Engineering and stood with her mouth agape, her palms clinging to the frame of the once motion-sensitive doorway to hold her up. Or to hold the ship up.
Because the entire back wall was...missing.
Beyond, she could catch a glimpse of a docking area of some sort--probably the scrapper's personal bay. And since nothing caught at her or sucked her into a vacuum through the gaping structure, Alex decided this exit was as good as any exit. She slipped through the cracks, leaning a little too hard on the wall as she did so. Falling, and in short order half-buried under a cascade of mass of hardware and wall bits, to the floor of the bay.
"Frellin'. Stupid. Ship..." came a weak murmur among the wreckage, as she tried vainly to wriggle her way free. Maybe...no one will notice.
And with that ridiculous thought, the hysterical giggle broke free. Barely there, pained, and, to someone well-integrated with society, sounding perhaps a little unhinged.
Dreams come in a size too big so we can grow into them.
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