down in one of the old steel chairs so hard it creaked. The common room was furnished to seat many, but not too comfortably. Stark white and grey speckled flooring, bare metal walls and a dozen utility tables with chairs made for a dingy recreation area, but it was effective. One wall was spattered with dried blood, against it were the remains of a cafeteria serving bot. Its six arms hung limply and the cables that had been torn free when they managed to get to its power cell and remove it remained as they had been since the Holocaust Virus had struck the station.
'We'll be fine 'till then. We just have to keep our heads, keep whoever's out there away from us and we'll start rebuilding.'
'Rebuilding? You can start rebuilding. I'm transferring out,' Brad scoffed. 'That's if they don't just open fire until we crumble and drop out of orbit.'
'Even if they are who you think they are, why would they? We have at least thirty of their people plus whoever's trapped in that gunship in the secondary landing bay.'
'Okay, fine. So you rebuild. With who? Before all hell broke loose this station had what? Six hundred indentured miners and support personnel?'
'Actually, it was a little over a thousand including the station crew and technicians,' Larissa corrected as she sat down at the table.
'Okay, one thousand. How are you going to staff up? We're down to fifty three.'
'I won't have to worry about that, this operation is so important that the company will leave anyone half way qualified here. Besides, when they see we have eleven tons of raw diamond ready to ship, they'll have to.'
'But the Triton has got to have gotten a scan off on the core of the station. There's no way they've been sitting out there this long without finding a way to scan through the magnetic barrier.'
'Have you ever gotten a scan to read through the barrier?'
'No, Amanda, I haven't. That's a bloody big carrier out there though, unlike I've ever seen. Who knows what they can do?'
'Oberman here,' the intercom crackled overhead. 'MWorm gennie is up and running. Are we talking to the repair guys who fixed the power yet?'
Amanda activated the intercom switch on the neck of her loose vacsuit. 'No. Make sure that line is secure and go help everyone else secure the station. I'm calling the company. Oh, and if you can get power to those cannon mounts so they can look operational…'
'That's doable. I can even get them rotating but they'll never fire.'
'As long as it looks like we can fight, we just have to make sure they keep their distance.'
'Right. On my way.'
She took the portable console from Larissa, brought a listing of primary contacts up on the screen and initiated communications. The display turned a light shade of green as it verified that the micro wormhole generator was online and creating a high compression wormhole to a relay station light years away. The lights dimmed noticeably. The three station officers waited patiently, Brad absent mindedly tugged on his goatee.
A brown Caran Enterprises screen came up. The square, diamond and circle logo hovered just above the lettering. Amanda selected a rotating exclamation point. It moved to the centre of the screen and rotated for several seconds before a squarish face appeared. 'You are recognized, Amanda Dimitri. The senior Foreperson on Ossimi Ring Station. You're declaring an emergency?'
'Yes. A virus infected our primary systems and our automated workforce after Eden Fleet disabled our defences. We recently fended off some raiders and are currently under siege by a new, unknown threat. The ship's name is Triton.'
'That ship is wanted in connection with violations of several galactic laws. Are you being coerced in any way right now?'
'No, I'm not being forced to communicate with you and no one's telling me what to say.'
'Are any of your defences online?'
'No, Eden Fleet destroyed them before leaving. The obscuring field is up though, so we can't be scanned at long range.'
'Good. What is the condition of any product you have on hand?'
'Always about the product. That's aaaaall the company cares about,' Brad muttered as he leaned back in his seat.
'We have enough to pay for repairs to the station and more. Can you send a ship?'
'A rescue vessel and military escort was dispatched when your station management lost contact. They should arrive shortly.'
'Can they handle a large carrier?'
'Certainly. Your instructions, Foreperson Dimitri, are to keep the product safe, gather your personnel in the most secure part of the station and make every effort to prevent further damage. There will be bonus pay if you are able to detain any of the perpetrators or recruit new workers to counter any casualties you may have sustained. There is also a large bounty on the Triton and any crew members. End communication, thank you.'
The channel closed, shortly followed by the micro wormhole generator and the lights returned to their normal brightness. Amanda sat back and smiled. 'I knew I heard about a bounty. Anyone want to try for that bonus?'
The main crew compartment for the Cold Reaver was nothing more than a large hold made to carry many soldiers from a carrier or garrison to the field of combat. Most of the crew relaxed by hooking themselves up to the straps dangling from the ceiling. When strapped in they could let the shoulders of their vacsuit armour take their weight and hang.
Ayan had ordered everyone in the station to retreat to the Cold Reaver three hours before, when the power to the main section of the station was restored and they realized that they had lost all contact with the Triton and the station crew were no longer using the jury rigged comm unit to speak to them. It was strange, very strange.
Ayan, Finn, Stephanie and Alaka stood separately from the rest of the soldiers and technicians they had brought with them. 'So we repair the links to the gravity mill, restore power and life support to about half the station and they just stop talking? It doesn't make sense,' Stephanie said quietly. She was the only one in the group hanging by a crew restraint.
'Is it possible that communications were damaged when the power was brought back online?' Alaka asked.
'Not on my end. We were nowhere near the communications systems,' Finn replied.
Ayan thought for a long moment before answering; 'Communications? Oh, not a chance,' she replied as though she just realized a question was asked.
'What are you thinking Commander?' Alaka asked her.
'I can't stop thinking about that power drain. There are only a few things that could have caused it. Stabilization thrusters being one, but we're in a stable orbit and this station can't travel. From what we can tell they haven't restarted mining operations, and they're not producing anything like antimatter or causing a high energy reaction like you'd need to restart a singularity reactor.'
'That leaves spatial compression,' Finn mused.
'A wormhole, exactly. I'm thinking it may have been a micro wormhole for communications.'
'How does that add up with them locking every airlock and hatch down with us inside and then not keeping in touch with us?' Finn asked.
'They must have new information from the outside,' Ayan looked to each of the senior officers around her before continuing. 'The Order of Eden has put a bounty out on Triton crew members. If they're looking to contain us for a prize this is the quickest way to do it.'
'I was wondering when that would happen. I'm just surprised it could come around and bite us on the ass so fast,' Stephanie nodded.
Alaka and Finn didn't seem shocked either, a surprise to Ayan. 'We're left with three options; cut our way to them, which would take days and send the wrong message, we could try to re-establish contact, or we can cut our way out.'
'I think we should cut our way out,' Stephanie offered.
'Yes, we can figure everything out once we're back aboard the Triton,' Alaka agreed.
