USD: 38 Days after arrival at Fort Glisson

Location: Van Biesbroeck’s star, Meltisar, Orbital Elevator Nexus MIL-1A, Somewhere

Alex groaned as she shook her head slightly, the black hood still covering her view. Her feet dragged along the ground as the two men struggled to carry her. The sound of the klaxon had faded away, leaving her disoriented and unsure of where they were taking her.

She didn’t resist and remained still. Her HUD was blaring warnings and repair estimates to her now, with more detailed information than she’d seen since her ShipCore compression had happened.

|ANUF EMERGENCY ACTIVATION|

|TRAUMA REPAIR ACTIVE|

|MAJOR NERVOUS SYSTEM DAMAGE DETECTED|

|ETA 5:34 NERVOUS SYSTEM REPAIR|

|NANITE CONTROL CAPACITY 100%|

|MASS LOSS ESTIMATE: 1.5%|

Continuing to pretend to be unconscious as they dragged her through the station, she silently began to form a plan. She had no idea why no one had seen or stopped them, but then realized that her clock on her HUD was distorted and broken, and her sense of time might be off.

She really had no idea how long they’d been dragging her. She needed to wait until the right moment to strike, once she had regained some strength and the repairs went through. If she moved too soon, they’d just zap her again and she probably wouldn’t remain conscious a second time.

Alex's senses started to clear up as the men finally reached their destination. They dropped her on the floor and she had to force herself to accept the impact without giving up the ruse of being unconscious. She realized they were talking but her ears were ringing still and everything was garbled.

The cold metal of the floor spread through the cloth hood against her face. Watching her repair countdown, a series of notifications informed her of the status of different nerve bundles. She wanted to hear what they were saying and suddenly the system shifted her hearing into a higher priority and about thirty seconds later she could hear them.

"We don't need the lieutenant, why did you fucking bring him? She's the one the bounty is for, you morons," one of the men grumbled.

"This bitch offed Jim and Charlie," another man said.

"So what? That just means we'll get larger shares," the first man said.

"Ertan, you're a fucking snake Marston," the second man replied.

"This is more than enough to retire and then we'll not have to deal with that old sod any longer," Marston said.

Alex remained still, processing that information. She wasn’t surprised there was a bounty on her, or maybe it was just on NAIs in general, what did surprise her was that they had any idea of what or who she was. Or how they had pulled off the snatch and grab with the emergency klaxons going off.

The station had security and emergency services, they should have been able to see on the cameras that something was going on and follow them. There was so much blood from the men she had killed she doubted they’d have easily been able to hide the blood trail!

Forcing herself to calm down and focus on the situation she was please to see that her physical systems had mostly recovered. She wasn’t sure if she was stronger than a normal person just yet—but she’d be able to move and react again.

"So, about the buyer?" the second man asked.

"Already contacted them. They'll be on the way," Marston answered.

"What about the lieutenant?" a third man asked.

"Get rid of him," Marston commanded.

Alex tensed at the words. She needed to act before they—

A second later a gunshot filled the compartment, forcing her to stop her self from jerking suddenly. The sound reverberated in her ears setting filling her head with a new ringing sound and a HUD warning about hearing damage. A cold feeling filled her as she realized that she was too late to do anything, it had happened instantly before she’d even been able to move.

Marston followed up with a second order, “Box her.”

Two men that had been silent the entire time and had apparently been standing over her reached down and pulled her up off the floor. They dragged her a bit and then lifted her up and dumped her in a metal box.

A surge of panic filled her, and as the lid came down to seal her in she slammed her palms into it just before it clicked shut. The metal plate exploded upward with enough force to slam into one of the men sending him stumbling backward.

Alex ripped the hood off her head, she could hear garbled shouting from the men and then a rifle barrel appeared over the edge of the crate. She grabbed it and deflected it away a second before it went off, pointing the barrel at the man’s companion. A three-shot burst blasted her hearing and one of the kidnappers in the chest sending him tumbling to the floor.

A look of horror appeared on the man that had tried to shoot her and she yanked the rifle out of his arms and slammed the butt of it into his face. A chorus of gunshots deafened her and whizzed by her head and Alex ducked back into it, thankful that whatever the container was made of was thick enough to stop the incoming rounds.

Pinned in the box, she decided she needed out and began to rock it back and forth with her weight until she managed to tip it over onto its side. She spilled out opposite of the incoming gunfire, and slid into a sitting position and checked the rifle.

Magazine, 57 rounds remaining, she counted mentally as she recognized the weapon as one of the chemical propellant weapons that had been in use on Ackman station.

A man appeared on the far side of the room that seemed to be trying to flank her and she took aim and lit him up, he stumbled then ran back the way he had came, the way he held his side told her she probably had winged him at least.

The incoming gunfire continued to rain down on her position, sending ricochets and debris flinging at her from her left and right side, and Alex assessed her position as terrible. Noticing the body of the man that had been shot laying in a spreading pool of blood she leaned out of cover for a second and yanked him toward her.

She was almost hit, but she was fast enough and the fullisalde slammed into the dead man’s legs instead. She patted his belt rapidly, when she found something that pleased her greatly.

They hadn’t managed to do the training throw in basic yet, but they had drilled to be familiar with the item. She thumbed the activator latch then counted two seconds and tossed it over her shoulder.

The gunfire suddenly stopped and she could imagine the men cursing and telling each other to take cover as the grenade landed somewhere near their position.

The entire compartment shook, and red lights began to spin and flash overhead. Alex looked down at her captured rifle and then ripped off the rail mounted scope. Thumbing the settings button on it, she switched it to mirror mode and then pocked it around the corner.

She couldn’t spot their positions, but she did see a man moving to new cover. She popped up and took aim with the iron sight on the weapon, but hesitated at firing. She recognized the man as the Iron Horse’s Chief Engineer! He had been there when the marine who had accused her of sabotaging the ship had blown his top.

Spotting movement broke her out of her thoughts and she opened fire, aiming low and Marston stumbled and fell, multiple hits slamming into both of his lower legs.

She ducked back down just as gunfire opened up on her again.

She’d seen Lieutenant Harmon, too. He was tied to a chair that had fallen backwards and had not been moving. Somehow, she knew he was dead and she felt a sick feeling in her gut threaten to make her vomit. Alex forced that feeling down, to take a chance to fire a blind burst over the crate.

The mercenaries were trying to flank her she realized, and she’d made the mistake of staying in the same position. Not that she had many chances to move, but now they were working their way around and the shots were coming around towards her at a wider angle. The two main offenders were working together and she’d not be able to return fire to both at the same time.

She pulled the dead man up to a sitting position and leaned up against his back. He wasn’t very good cover, but he was better than nothing and provided a little bit of protection in an exposed direction.

Alex continued to exchange gunfire until she had nearly spent both magazines. The mercs must have noticed that her rate of return fire had dropped rapidly because they began to make bigger movements and she realized her time was running out.

Checking the corpse’s belt again she grabbed his sidearm and unsafed it.

Two men came around the corner on opposite sides of her with clear lines of fire at the same time. She knew she couldn’t shoot both, but then she didn’t have to. A metal crane in the machinery compartment suddenly dropped its hook, and it launched itself towards the floor as the magnetic grabber activated. It slammed into the man with enough force to pancake him into the ground.

Alex turned and fired on the remaining man at the same time he opened fire with his rifle. A sudden burning filled her side, but he went down and she silently thanked Instructor Riley for forcing her to practice over and over until she’d scored expert with handguns.

Her hand went to her side, a warm wetness filling her palm as she put pressure on it. It was angled in a way that made her hopeful that it hadn’t hit any organs and cleanly passed in and out. It still hurt though.

|WARNING NANITE CONTROL CAPACITY 100%|

|EXCEEDING MAXIMUM REPAIR|

|NANITE RAMPANCY WARNING 102.5%|

Alex cursed as she leaned back against the crate, her head feeling light and more blood pouring out her nose. She wiped it away with the back of her hand as she rested for a moment, right up until a sudden piercing pulse of light punched through the crate’s bottom and hit the back wall of the compartment.

She immediately flipped around and went prone. A second pulse bolt lanced through the crate, the hot energy punching through and melting through the metal so fast it didn’t even leave any splinters.

Alex cursed at herself for failing the count the men correctly. When a third heavy pulse bolt slammed into the crate near her position she rolled out from cover and took aim and fired.

The man didn’t have time to aim at her and was forced to duck under a metal crate himself. Her weapon clicked empty, and she pushed herself up onto her feet. He was the last one, she was sure of it. Looking around she spotted a dead man leaned up behind a large piece of machinery and she sprinted for it.

Halfway there pulse rounds began to slice through the air, narrowly behind her position to slam into the bulkhead and machinery sending arcs of sparks and molten metal flying through the room. Almost there she ducked down and launched herself the last few meters through the air to land in a rough roll that sent a sharp pain through her wounded side.

Pushing herself back onto her feet she hurried to the dead man’s side and grabbed his rifle, as well as his spare magazine. Ejecting his old one she slapped the fresh one into the weapon. Realizing he had a grenade as well she grabbed it just as another round object flew over the machine’s cover and landed near her feet.

She didn’t have time to think. She just reached down, grabbed it, and tossed it back like it was the most normal thing in the world. She activated the one she had collected and threw it after that one a few seconds later.

Realizing what had just happened her chest tightened, and it felt like someone had punched her in the kidneys. A warning on her HUD flashed angrily.

|WARNING BLOODFLOW SHORTAGE TO KIDNEYS|

|ADRENAL OVERFLOW DETECTED|

Alex reached down to touch the bullet wound. It wasn’t spilling out but she felt sick and she didn’t understand half the warnings on her HUD anymore. So many of her biological functions were tied into working with her nanites that when things like rampancy occurred it affected her entire system.

No more incoming pulse fire came, and she slid down to sit behind the machine she had hid behind. Checking herself for any more injuries, her hand fell on her ShipCore bag. More alarmingly her hand went inside of it and she realized that something had punched a fist sized hole through it. She pulled it off her shoulder and opened it up to look inside.

The glowing blue orb shined at her like nothing had happened. Alex let out a sigh of relief and zipped it back up. The hole wasn’t quite large enough to let it fall out but she’d need a new one now.

Lost in her thoughts she realized she’d lost her focus. She wasn’t sure if it was from the injuries or her system overload. Regardless when the man stepped around the corner with pulse rifle aimed at her she remembers she was in a life and death situation.

She did the only thing she could.

She swung her ShipCore at the man, the heavy orb crashing into the side of his head faster than he could aim and pull the trigger. The weight of the ShipCore crushed his skull into pulp and slammed him into the side of the heavy machinery.

As fast as she could she collected it back over her shoulder, with the unfortunate addition of more dripping blood. Then she checked her rifle that she’d set down and peeked around the corner. The red flashing lights continued to spin overhead, but there was no movement.

Stepping out slowly she checked her corner, rifle held up and at the ready. Clearing the compartment, she realized that was all of them, or any remaining had fled. As she approached the middle of the room, she saw Harmon. Moving to his side she checked his throat for a pulse, but his skin was already growing cold to the touch.

Alex felt numb; she didn’t let it affect her again and she stood back up to look at the other bodies filling the room. Spotting a blood smear on the ground, she saw where someone had dragged themselves out of the compartment. Following the blood trail, she spotted Chief Engineer Marston crawling across the floor of the corridor in an attempt to escape.

She followed him. He must have heard her as she approached because he rolled onto his back then scooted away from her holding up a hand at her with a terrified expression. When his mouth moved but she didn’t hear anything, she realized her hearing was still broken from all the gunfire.

Urging her nanites to repair her eardrums once again, his voice slowly came through, although that didn’t make the man’s screams understandable although the meaning was clear: stay away.

Alex didn’t follow that direction, instead calmly walking right up to him and standing over him. Terror filled his face, but she didn’t feel anything.

Yells carried through the corridor further down, and soldiers in power armor entered the hall weapons at the ready. She’d already slung her stolen rifle onto her chest at some point, so she just raised her hands slowly.

Shouts for her to do multiple things at once reminded her of her DIs back at Fort Glisson.

“Recruit, Alex Starlight Myers, SR: S834-643. Lieutenant Harmon needs medical attention. Please contact Admiral Darren Westlake and let him know the situation.”

She continued to repeat herself and the soldiers continued to yell at her. When one tried to tackle her, he bounced off.

She looked at the soldier who landed on his ass with disdain. “Your power armor sucks.”